Page 86 of Winterset

“We will,” Reed assured her, taking her hand and squeezing it. “Now…let me escort you home, and then you shall invite me to stay for dinner, and we’ll spend the evening, you and Kit and I, racking our brains for answers to our puzzle.”

Anna had to smile, as he had planned. “All right.”

* * *

They did, in fact, follow Reed’s proposed schedule for the evening, riding to Holcomb Manor and joining Kit for supper, then sitting down afterward in the sitting room and discussing their progress concerning the murders. Their revelations regarding Lord Roger de Winter left Kit stunned and almost speechless.

“Our grandfather?” he asked in amazement. “Are you jesting?”

“It’s hardly something I find funny,” Anna told her brother. “Yes, it’s true. Both the maid we went to see and Nick Perkins admitted it. They helped Lady Philippa conceal it from everyone.”

“I cannot imagine.”

“What worries me most,” Anna said, “is that our uncle lived in that house until ten years ago. He was alive when it happened, about ten or so—old enough, perhaps, to have had some idea of what was going on. It might have…influenced his madness.”

“Yes, but Uncle Charles is not like that,” Kit argued. “The way you described Lord Roger…”

“I know. But none of us knows what really goes on in Uncle Charles’ mind. It’s quite likely he saw those masks, even read the journals. Couldn’t he have developed a similar obsession?”

“It does sound like the type of delusion that Uncle Charles has. But I have never heard anything about those particular beliefs in all his ramblings. You know that what he believes is all about the Queen and how he is the heir to the throne and all that.” He cast an embarrassed glance at Reed. “I am sorry to involve you in all this.”

“No need to be,” Reed responded casually. “I’ve told Anna all about my myriad peculiar relatives.”

Anna cast him a warm look. It pleased her to see Reed and Kit talking together so easily. They could be friends, she thought, letting her mind drift for a moment in a pleasant dream. If only things had been different…

The evening wound to a close. Reed rode home, and Anna went up to bed, leaving Kit to take the first watch of the evening, as he had told his servants he would.

* * *

It was raining. The ground was wet and slick, and thick drops clustered on the leaves of the trees, rolling off them. She was walking through the woods. Everything around her was silent and gray, with the faint light one found beneath the trees on a rainy day.

Ahead of her, she saw a man lying on the ground, unmoving, his face turned up to the sky. Raindrops pattered on his face, rolling down his cheeks, and he did not stir. She moved closer, fear clutching at her throat.

She stood over the man and looked down at him. His face was pale and still as death, raindrops clustering on his eyelashes, soaking his hair.

“No!” Her scream ripped through the woods.

* * *

“No!” Anna sat bolt upright, her eyes flying open.

The dream had been so real that for a moment she was unsure where she was. Her heart was pounding in her chest as though it might explode, and she was cold with horror. Reed was dead!

She threw back her coverlet and jumped out of bed. She lit a candle with shaking fingers, then hastened to her wardrobe. She had to go to him. She had to see! Maybe it wasn’t too late.

With icy fingers, she pulled out a simple dress that buttoned down the front, easy to put on by herself. She whipped off her nightgown and dressed, shoving her feet into slippers.

She hurried out the door and ran down the stairs, her unbound hair floating in a tangle down her back. Once outside, she ran across the yard. It was her first instinct to run all the way to Winterset, but her mind was working well enough to conquer that thought. It would be much faster to ride.

It was almost dawn. She could see the lightening of the sky in the east, though the sun had not yet appeared over the horizon. The birds were beginning to move and twitter in their trees, but the stables were still dark, the grooms not yet tending to their business.

She ran in and hurried along the stalls to where her horse was kept. She grabbed a bridle from a hook on the wall, and at that moment a groom came clattering down the stairs from the sleeping quarters above.

“Miss!” he exclaimed, hurrying toward her. His hair was still mussed from sleep, and his shirt hung outside his trousers. “What’s the matter?”

“Saddle my horse,” Anna said, shoving the bridle at him.

“Now, miss?” He gaped at her.