Silver Enchantress Read online

  Elli gave Dulcie a peck on the cheek and danced out the door. She stopped at the Clancy’s back door and helped the youngest pull up his breeches before following him into the kitchen. The baby wailed for its breakfast while his mother spooned gruel for the others. Elli relieved her of the pot and finished the task while Molly gratefully picked up the babe and quieted it with a full breast. For a fifteen-year-old, Elli had learned more about life than many more educated girls.

  Molly gave her a hunk of day-old bread and a slab of cheese as she left. Elli hugged the baby and wandered on. She had no regrets at losing the home in the woods where she had spent so many years. Nan had tried to love her, but the others never had. They had begrudged every morsel that passed her lips. The boys had been rough with her, knowing she could not cry for help or tell on them. As they grew older, they had been worse than rough, and she did not miss their constant harassment. The village was her home. Its inhabitants were her family. She was as content here as she could be anywhere.

  That was not to say she was any angel, she knew. When aroused, her anger was violent and rebellious. One of the boys still bore the scars of the red-hot coals she had flung at him. The blacksmith had nearly lost a finger when he made the mistake of touching her in the wrong place while her hands were within easy reach of a knife. Luckily for everyone, her temper stayed well buried for the most part, a hidden demon that slept until wakened.

  Elli switched at the long grass beside the road as she wandered away from the village, sketchpad in hand. She had stolen the sketchpad from a drunken soldier who had stayed at the tavern one night. He had no use for it where he was going, and his poor attempts at likenesses had not been worth the waste of the precious paper.

  A carriage rolled along the road ahead, approaching the village Elli had just left. Carriages were rare in these parts, and this one seemed to have some difficulty on the rutted cart path. It lurched from side to side, sending up clouds of dust.

  Elli stepped from the road into the tall grass, watching with amusement and fascination as the unwieldy vehicle hit a bump and the driver cursed. She admired the proud bays hauling their heavy load.

  Today, she had chosen to wear a wide-pocketed apron over an old frock of Molly’s, taken in and hemmed up until it was good as new. The morning sun glittered on the dew, as well as the auburn braid she’d tied with her prized possession, a simple yellow ribbon.

  Elli could see a pale woman garbed in mourning inside the carriage, her hair capped and hidden. A man sat on her far side, but Elli could discern little of him except the rich blue of his coat. She wished she could squeeze a color such as that from her plants and berries, but so far she had succeeded in only a watered-down version.

  The woman glanced out as the carriage rolled by, and for one brief moment their eyes met. Elli smiled and waited for the dust to settle so she might walk on. The woman screamed.

  Puzzled, Elli hurried on her way, eager to reach the place where the best berries grew before others found them.

  Inside the carriage, the woman frantically tugged at her husband’s arm as he yelled for the driver to halt.

  “Isabel! It was Isabel! I swear it! Not her ghost, John! Oh, God, please stop and catch her! John, make him stop!” Her shouts grew more hysterical as the driver struggled to bring the horses to a halt.

  Her husband looked harried and worried at the same time, nervously patting his wife’s hand and muttering reassurances as he tried to glance down the road behind them. He knew better than to expect to see their dead daughter risen from the grave, but his wife was not normally an excitable woman. Her daughter’s untimely death had strained her health, but he never had reason to suspect it had taxed her mind.

  The carriage finally came to a halt and a footman opened the door. Sir John attempted to persuade his wife to stay inside, but she insisted on following him into the roadway.

  “There she is, going into the woods! Oh, follow her, John, hurry please!”

  They had traveled nearly half a mile from where the girl had veered off into the tall grass and strode toward the stand of trees. The man gazed down at his wife in incredulity. Normally a placid man of middle age, he had not run since he was a boy, and he had no intention of taking up the practice now.

  He turned to the footman and gestured toward the disappearing child down the road. “Follow that girl, Quigley. Tell her my wife would like to speak with her, if you please.”

  The young footman hastened to do as told.

  As the lad ran in pursuit of the girl, the woman wilted against her husband’s arm. “Oh, John, am I losing my mind, then? Is this what happens when grief takes its toll? She was so young, John. It just does not seem fair.”

  Awkwardly, he held her close and patted her shoulder. “Don’t cry, Emma. You’ll see. It’s the hair, I should imagine. The hair is much like Isabel’s. But she’ll be some robust country miss with rotting teeth or crossed eyes or pox marks. Quigley will bring her back, and I’ll give her a shilling to be on her way. You can’t help wishing, my dear. I’d give all I had to bring Isabel back for you, but I daresay she’s happy where she is. We must remember that, Emma.”

  The woman grew quiet but refused to return to the carriage. She had seen what she had seen, and she refused to believe her eyes had confused a snaggletooth peasant with her own lovely, delicate daughter.

  Quigley followed as best as he could, but this was unfamiliar terrain. As soon as the girl slipped into the shade of the trees, she was lost to him. Brambles tore his clothes and small branches slapped his face as he sought some discernible path or a sight of the mysterious girl who had sent the missus into tears.

  Elli heard his thrashing and cursing and paused behind a wide oak to discover the source. Unimpressed with the young man in fancy gray livery who had obviously followed her into this lonely place, she slipped away, leaving him to his plight. Men did not rate high on her list of favorite things.

  In despair at disappointing the man who had treated him well for so many years, Quigley finally fought his way from the woods back to the waiting carriage. The absence of his quarry told his tale without words, and the lady began to sob. Sir John questioned him with his eyes.

  “It weren’t no use, sir. There’s no sign of a path. I called, but she didn’t answer. Disappeared, she did, like a deer at dawn.”

  Or a ghost, but Sir John did not put that thought into words. “Thank you, Quigley, you did your best. Make inquiries in the village, will you? She must live hereabouts. I’ll take Lady Summerville to the inn and return to help you.”

  Quigley bowed and set off toward the village, and the lady hugged her husband tearfully.

  “Come, Emma. You are overwrought. This journey has been too much for you. We will make you comfortable, then settle this mystery at once.”

  They climbed into the carriage and rode off, leaving the hapless Quigley to question the suspicious and closemouthed villagers.

  By the end of the day, the young footman had resorted to sitting on a stump beside a small tavern, whittling a piece of kindling and watching the world go by. The carriage had not returned and neither had the girl, if she existed at all.

  Returning with her sketchpad crammed with colors and leaves, her apron filled with the treasures she had found, Elli spied the young man at his post before she had passed the first house. She turned down an alleyway and entered Molly’s kitchen from the rear.

  Brown-eyed, dark-haired Molly glanced up in relief. “There you are. There’s a gent from one of the fancy houses askin’ after you. What’ve you gone and done now? Stolen more apples from his lordship’s trees?”

  Elli shrugged and sampled the stew simmering over the fire. She was aware of doing nothing wrong, though she considered his lordship’s apples the same as the leaves on the trees or the chestnuts on the ground, free for the taking. The fancy young man would never find her if she did not wish to be found, and he could prove nothing against her if he did.

  Presenting a handful of acorns to the t
oddler, Elli slipped out into the deepening twilight. Molly knew nothing of interest. Perhaps Dulcie would.

  Mischief made her cross the road near enough to the tavern for the young man to catch sight of her bright hair and yellow gown from a distance. He yelled and ran after her, but she paid him no heed.

  Dulcie gave Elli a look of irritation as she entered by the back door. “What have you been up to now that the swells are looking after you, you naughty heathen?” She demanded as Elli stopped to warm her fingers at the fire.

  She looked up with a smile and a shrug. Even if she could speak, what could she say? She had done nothing.

  “Well, there’s some gent’s man out there askin’ questions of you. I’m surprised you didn’t see him when you came in. All day he’s been out there. Proper grand, he is. Mayhap you ought to see what he wants.”

  That suggestion struck Elli as ludicrous. She was curious, certainly, but so was the cat who had looked upon the queen.

  A pounding at the shop door warned that the footman had begun his rounds again. Shrugging, Dulcie dragged herself back to the front room.

  Elli listened as the liveried servant inquired after “the young girl in a yellow frock” seen crossing the street in this direction.

  “Isn’t there enough girls where you come from that you must pester after ours?” Dulcie demanded.

  “No, ma’am,” the man said. “It’s not that, you see. It’s me mistress. She’s been taken ill since her daughter died. And then she sees this girl what looks so much like Miss Isabel, she cries and carries on so that Sir John sent me to look for her. He don’t mean her no harm. It’s just to make the lady happy, you see.”

  Elli heard desperation in his voice, and she scowled at the pots on the walls. She had no great amount of faith in her fellow man, but she did not want to cause anyone trouble, either. She intended to go nowhere alone with the man, but she supposed it would do no harm to show she existed.

  There was no sense getting Dulcie in trouble. Elli let herself out the back door and walked around to the front. The sun had not yet set. There would be light enough to see the stranger’s expression when she walked in on them.

  In the distance, she saw a carriage approaching, probably returning for the servant. She had best end this quickly. Then she could escape into the woods, if necessary. No one ever found her there.

  She opened the shop door and brought the colors of the setting sun into the room with her. Quigley swung around and gaped openly.

  “This here’s Elli. Be she the one you seek?” Dulcie inquired innocently.

  The young man’s thin, dark face was a picture of astonishment as he studied her. “How do you do Miss Elli. . . ?”

  Elli curtsied and wandered past him, into the shop. She was starving, and mischief brightened her eyes as she produced an apple from her apron and munched it. Dulcie nearly turned purple, but the young man didn’t turn a hair.

  “Is there a surname you are called by?” Quigley asked.

  “She don’t speak,” Dulcie informed him, apparently relieved that he had shown no recognition of the forbidden apple.

  “Surely she must have a name. Who are her parents?”

  The rattle of the carriage in the street ended this conversation. Quigley headed for the door to signal his employer. Dulcie and Elli exchanged looks, and Elli eased toward the back of the shop.

  The pretty man frowned in concern as he greeted the elegant lady descending from the carriage. He stepped aside to allow her in, followed by an older gentleman.

  “I see you found her, Quigley. Good work. Apologize for the delay.”

  His wife’s faint cry caused the gentleman to strain to see inside the cottage.

  “Beth?” The lady asked in shock, holding her fingers to her lips and staring at Elli, who shifted nervously from foot to foot.

  The gentleman’s frown grew more anxious. “Emma, you should not have come. You have over-tired yourself.”

  “No, John, look. She looks just like Beth at that age. Beth had all the coloring, everybody said. Our daughter looked more like me. Oh, my God, John, am I truly losing my mind?”

  Since his wife’s sister, Elizabeth, had died at the hands of Irish highwaymen years ago, Sir John seriously feared this might be so. He studied the child with more care.

  Thick, nearly red hair fell to a tiny waistline. Delicately boned, expressive features framed wide, light eyes of intense curiosity, and Sir John understood his wife’s hysterics. Seen hastily, she would easily pass for their daughter’s twin.

  As the girl hesitantly stepped toward them, John gasped. He had known his wife and her sister since they were young girls. They had grown up on the estate neighboring his. Elizabeth had been the younger, wilder, and more beautiful sister of the two. He remembered her well, now that he was faced with her image. But the uncanny resemblance was not what had made him gasp. It was the eyes.

  He gestured gently toward the young girl. “Come forward, please. We mean no harm. We have only just lost a daughter to smallpox. You resemble Isabel so closely. . .” He noted the village woman’s skeptical look and sent her a pleading glance, indicating his wife’s entranced expression. The shopkeeper’s face softened.

  “What is your name, child?” John asked, his gaze still intent upon the play of silver in the girl’s eyes. His sister-in-law had never possessed eyes like that. But her Irish husband had.

  “She don’t speak, sir,” Quigley whispered. “Her name’s Elli. That’s all I’ve learned.”

  Elli. My God, this wasn’t possible. Eileen had died in another country, long, long ago. His stomach lurched, but hope had already found a place in his heart. He turned to Dulcie.

  “You are her mother?” he demanded, knowing the answer without being told.

  Dulcie snorted. “Not me, I ain’t. Nan’s the one you want, but she ain’t been heard from this while back. Claimed the girl was her sister’s, but nobody’s been by looking for her. None but you, leastways.”

  The girl Elli now stood before Lady Summerville. Child and woman stared at each other. His wife lifted a frail hand to tuck a strand of hair behind the girl’s ear, and Elli didn’t flinch.

  “Does she go by any other name but Elli?” John inquired, striving to hide his excitement.

  “Not ’zactly. Nan called her summat like Ellen, but ’round here she’s just called Elli, Nan’s girl.”

  Emma seemed to come awake, and her tearful gaze turned to her husband. “Eileen? Could they mean Eileen? John, surely this cannot be. . . She’s dead like Beth.”

  But the girl’s eyes had gone wide, and she covered her mouth and backed away.

  The baronet gently said the name again. “Eileen? Is that your real name?”

  Elli stared at the elegant, pale lady who looked so sad and frightened. She was taller and considerably plumper than herself, but her features were small and delicate, and her hair a faded russet beneath the white cap. Elli tentatively touched her own fiery tresses. She had seen few people with hair like hers.

  Swallowing hard, she shifted her gaze from man to wife and back again. She did not know these people, had never seen them in her life, but they spoke a name that echoed in her memory. Nan’s husband had sneered it upon occasion, calling it a popish name, but the memories jarred were older than that. And she was suddenly afraid.

  “Emma, I do not want to raise your hopes. We may be over-reacting. I’ll have to send someone out to search for the girl’s parents or this Nan person. But those are Richard’s eyes or I’ll be damned. Too bloody handsome for his own good, your sister’s Irishman was. Could be a by-blow of his, but where would he have found another wench just like your sister?”

  Sir John turned toward the woman who appeared to be the child’s guardian. “Would you consider allowing the child to come with us? I know how it is to become attached to a child, but it would be for the girl’s own good, I promise you. You may come with her, if you wish, to see for yourself, but I promise she will be treated better than our own da
ughter.”

  Elli’s hopes lit with a fiery light at these words. The memory had frightened her, but not these people. She knew instinctively that this elegant gentleman offered new worlds to explore. She had glimpsed that world once. She would see more of it. With swift determination, she flew from the room.

  Emma gave a cry of dismay. “Oh, John, you’ve frightened her. What will we do now?”

  Dulcie sent a sharp glance after the lass. “That one’s frightened of naught. You’d do well to teach her a little fear, if you ask me. I have no hold on her. She comes and goes as she pleases.” She turned a wary eye back to the gentry. “But don’t be expecting to get your lady daughter back. She’s wild as any vixen. Gentle enough most times, but headstrong. She won’t tame easy.”

  John smiled faintly. “Emma, she’s just described your sister. Do you think there could be two of them in the world?”

  “Only the original and her daughter.” And Emma’s sad lips turned up at the corners in anticipation.

  When Elli returned, she bore all her worldly possessions wrapped in an old shawl and carried her sketchpad under her arm. Her gaze danced eagerly from one newcomer to the other. Now life could begin.

  Chapter 3

  England, Spring, 1745

  Drake Neville, newly-styled Lord Sherburne, smiled cynically at the country society gathered in the medieval great room of Summer Hall. Sir John loved the past and had restored this hall to its primitive grandeur, complete with gold-embroidered arras and battle-axes above the chimneys, but the restoration was not what caused Drake’s lips to curl. The hooped gowns competing with flowing, outdated wigs in unsophisticated attempts to achieve London elegance caused his amusement, and his regret. He had hoped for just a small, quiet dinner with his father’s friend, but apparently Lady Summerville sought to entertain the entire county.