BITTERSWEET SUMMER
By Alice Duncan
(writing as Rachel Wilson)
Bittersweet Summer
Copyright 1999 by Alice Duncan
All rights reserved
Published 1999 by Penguin Publishing, Inc.
Jove Haunting Hearts
Smashwords edition September 1, 2009
Visit aliceduncan.net
Chapter One
Bittersweet, New York, May 1895
The black surrey bumped along the uncared-for road, through thick woods that Tobias hadn’t seen for almost twenty years. He looked around with interest, trying to suppress the twinge of nostalgia threatening to attack him. It was foolish to be sentimental about something that held nothing but painful memories, and Tobias knew it. Still, those memories were all that remained of Tobias’s childhood, and he was hard-pressed to keep the faint longing at bay.
“I don’t know why you’re interested in this old heap, Mr. Rakes. There are much better properties for sale in Bittersweet. Properties that would require less work than this decaying pile of stones.”
“I told you, call me Tobias.”
“Tobias,” Wesley Armitage said obediently.
Tobias Rakes glanced at Armitage, who was Tobias’s attorney, and took cynical satisfaction from the fact that Armitage seemed to be valiantly trying to hide his true feelings. What the lawyer really wanted to say was that he considered Tobias a damned fool for exhibiting an interest in purchasing Crowfoot Castle.
It amazed Tobias that so trivial a thing as money could influence how one was treated in this world. As little as a year ago, when Tobias was one of the hundreds of penniless soldiers in the Army of the West who were attempting to rid the Dakota Territory of its so-called Indian problem, Armitage probably wouldn’t have spoken to Tobias at all had they chanced to meet. That was before Tobias’s tibia was fractured by a Sioux’s arrow, and before his maternal grandmother died and left him a fortune. He was also sure Armitage couldn’t care less about Tobias’s near-fatal wound. It was the money that held Armitage back from speaking his mind.
Armitage wasn’t alone. Now that Tobias was known to be a rich man, everyone seemed determined to call him a hero and curry his favor. He imagined he could shoot off his Army revolver in the Bittersweet public square without incurring anything more serious by way of retribution than lifted eyebrows and behind-his-back gossip.
Which was all right with him. Thanks to that arrow, his military career was over, and it was just as well to be rich if one were crippled. A familiar wash of bitterness made him frown.
“For one thing,” he said, resuming the conversation while bracing himself on the buggy seat and trying not to jar his leg, “it will annoy the very life out of my father. The Crowfoots and the Rakeses have hated each other for generations, you know.”
“Yes,” said Armitage, his tone indicating he was repressing another lump of bile, “I know. Everyone in Bittersweet knows about the feud.”
“I’m sure they do.” They didn’t know, perhaps, that Tobias Rakes and his own father, Ernest, had been carrying on their own personal feud since Tobias’s seventeenth year, half of Tobias’s life. At least, they would have been feuding had Tobias remained in Bittersweet after the eruption. Instead, he’d spent the past decade and more roaming half the world over in an effort to escape his heritage and his own idiocy.
Armitage sighed deeply. “Well, take a good look, because if you do aim to buy it, I don’t want you blaming me if you have to sink a fortune into restoring it.”
“I won’t blame you, Wes.”
Armitage drove his buggy as far up the overgrown drive as he could, but a fallen tree blocked their passage before they were even halfway there. Armitage glanced at Tobias with some concern. “I fear we’ll have to walk from here. Will you be—all right?”
“Diplomatic of you,” Tobias said dryly. “Yes, I’ll be all right. I can’t run and skip any longer, but I can walk.” With the aid of his cane and a good deal of physical agony. Tobias felt his lips thin and made an effort to relax them. He didn’t want anyone to know how galling he found his disabled state. To keep his mind from his plight, he forced himself to take stock of his surroundings.
Crowfoot Castle loomed up from the encroaching vegetation like something out of an Arthurian legend. Turrets soared and spires pierced the sky. Vines crawled up chimneys that undoubtedly housed the nests of generations of birds. Tobias wondered if the chimneys would smoke once they’d been swept free of debris. Probably. He’d have gas lines run in to the old place, and install electrical wiring. No sense living in the dark ages, even if one did plan to live in a castle.
A crenellated wall surrounded the castle, and from where the buggy waited, Tobias could barely see the huge stone porch and the enormous double doors to the castle. One could imagine knights saluting lovely ladies. The ladies, of course, would be standing on the castle leads, waving their men off to war.
Theirs would be a noble, chivalrous war. Not the kind of war Tobias had been engaged in, prompted by the white men’s greed and the Indians’ struggle to survive against a more powerful invading civilization. In Tobias’s mind, there was nothing noble about chasing down starving Indians. He also considered that the Indians had been offered precious little justice by way of treaties and payments—which the whites had never yet honored—although he knew he’d never be able to make anyone else understand that. A fellow had to be there in order to understand it, and even then the whole situation had made little sense.
Annoyed with himself for allowing his mind to wander, he studied the castle. Wes was right about it, Tobias owned. But, while it had obviously been neglected in recent years, it could be a stunning building if someone poured enough money and heart into it. Tobias didn’t have the heart, but he had heaps of money. That would have to do.
Created from honey-colored stone, quarried locally before the American Revolution, Crowfoot Castle seemed to absorb the summer sunshine and glow at him. The old place appeared almost friendly, for a castle. The word came to Tobias out of the blue, and he smiled because the image was so incongruous.
Contentious old Charles Crowfoot, the money-grubbing Yankee businessman who’d built the castle a hundred and twenty-five years ago, had, according to all accounts, been anything but friendly. Not that Tobias held Charles’s lack of congeniality against him. According to those same accounts, Tobias’s great-great-great-grandfather, Gerald Rakes, Charles’s business partner, had been every ounce as mean-spirited and disputatious as Charles. In fact, they’d deserved each other.
Trying not to grunt with pain, Tobias lowered himself from Wes’s surrey, being careful not to jostle his wounded leg any more than he had to. After the arrow had shattered his tibia, his femur had broken when he’d fallen from his horse. Tobias had barely managed to convince the field doctor—and then only at gunpoint—not to amputate the leg. He wasn’t positive yet that sparing the damaged limb had been a good idea. Still, as long as it was attached to the rest of him, there was a chance it would heal eventually and allow Tobias to resume some of his former pursuits.
“The grounds haven’t been kept in anything like order, as you can see,” Wes said, sounding crabby about it.
When Tobias glanced at him, the lawyer was poking at an overgrown lilac bush whose blossoms scented the warm spring air. Trilliums and buttercups and dame’s rockets rioted behind what looked like it might have been a privet hedge once upon a time.
Tobias remembered the names of all the flowers and was surprised at himself. His mother had taught him about flowers when he’d worked beside her in her well-loved garden. She’d died when he was ten, leaving him to the questionable mercies of his father, but Tobias still remembered the names of the flowers.
He shook his head and gazed beyond the flower beds to what had once been a rose garden. Unpruned rose branches reached for the sky through overgrown bushes and weeds, and hooked the leaves of unkempt bushes on their thorns. These were pleasure gardens run amok, and Tobias felt somehow akin to them.
He breathed deeply. Yes. Although he knew better than to hope for happiness in this life, he was beginning to get the feeling that, with luck and liberal applications of his maternal grandmother’s money, he might find peace here. Even if his leg never healed enough for him to ride again, he could clear out the shrubbery and take long rambling walks on his estate. He’d get himself a couple of hounds to romp at his heels. Hounds were faithful, unlike people. Besides, merely knowing that his father would be home, hunched over his desk in the Rakes’s estate and gnashing his teeth with fury, made the prospect a pleasant one.
They walked slowly through the brambles, bushes, and weeds, Armitage moderating his pace to suit Tobias’s halting steps. A host of bees busied themselves among the flowers, a regiment of birds chirped from the trees, and Tobias saw a hummingbird dip its long beak into a bell-shaped purple flower on a straggly morning-glory vine. He’d forgotten how pretty the bluebirds were. By the time he and Armitage had walked through the wall’s arched port cochére, which reminded Tobias of the entrance to a cathedral he’d seen in France, and approached the stone porch, Armitage had a key out.
“I’m sure all the hinges in this place screech like banshees. Don’t worry. The villagers claim the castle is haunted, but I’m sure it’s only rusty hinges.” Armitage set down the lantern he’d been carrying and worked on the lock.
Tobias laughed. “I’m not afraid of ghosts.” He’d encountered much worse than ghosts in his life.
“Glad to hear it.” Armitage pushed on the door. Sure enough, it groaned like a choir of off-key ghosts as it swung open to reveal the huge flagged entryway. Armitage stood aside and allowed Tobias to enter before him.
Tobias glanced around with interest. The castle was built on a grand scale. Faded tapestries that looked as though they hadn’t been cleaned or dusted for decades covered the walls, and a tattered runner spanned the flags from the front door to the enormous oaken staircase which divided halfway up into two arching stairways. “Charles Crowfoot didn’t spare any expense when he built this place, did he?”
“No, he didn’t. And his descendants haven’t spared any to keep it up, either. Here, let me light this lamp. It’s dark as a tomb in here.”
Even after Armitage lit the lamp, the room seemed murky. “It’s because all the curtains are drawn,” muttered Tobias. He walked to a long window and pulled aside thick velvet draperies, dislodging a cloud of dust and exposing tall, leaded, and very dirty stained-glass windows. In spite of the impediments in its way, sunlight poured into the room. “There. That’s better.”
“If you say so.”
Tobias chuckled at Armitage’s tone, which was stuffed to the brim with disapproval. “Lead on, Wes. Show me the many wonders of Crowfoot Castle.”
“I don’t think there are any.”
“Show it to me anyway. I want to know what I’ll have to do to make the place livable if I decide to buy it.”
“Tear it down and rebuild a decent house with modern conveniences in its place would be my suggestion,” Armitage posited acidly.
“Tut, tut. I think Crowfoot Castle will be the perfect home for me.”
With a heavy sigh, Armitage shook his head. “All right, if you say so. Follow me.”
So Tobias did.
# # #
Genevieve Crowfoot peered around with distaste and thrust the enormous key to the front door of Crowfoot Castle into her apron pocket. “Uncle Hubert didn’t believe in wasting money on servants, did he?”
Genevieve’s aunt, Delilah Crowfoot, her nose wrinkled and her brow furrowed, said tartly, “No, he didn’t. He didn’t believe in spending money on anything except his precious books.”
“I’ve never seen so much dust.”
“Nor have I. Not that it surprises me. Hubert always was a mean, tight-fisted boy.”
“Boy?” Genevieve laughed. “He was eighty-three when he died, Aunt Delilah.”
“You know very well what I mean, Genevieve Crowfoot.”
“Of course I do, Aunt.” Genevieve bent and deposited a quick kiss on her much-shorter aunt’s plump cheek. Then she sighed. “I suppose we ought to get started. The sooner we begin, the sooner we’ll be through.”
“I’ll be glad to be rid of this old pile of stones.”
“Oh, I don’t know.” Genevieve led the way through her deceased uncle’s dusty, gloomy entrance hall, carrying a bucket and a mop and an armful of rags and other cleaning implements. Her aunt carried a lantern. “I’ve always rather liked knowing the castle belonged in my family. It’s a nice old place.”
“Nice? Humph. It’s outlandish, if you ask me. Your great-great-great-grandfather must have been awfully full of himself to want to build such a place in America. A castle, my foot.”
“Now, now, Aunt Delilah. The Revolution hadn’t been fought when he built it. New York was a British colony in those days. I suspect Charles Crowfoot was merely being traditional, and spent his money creating a grand estate, the way he might have done if he’d remained in England.”
Delilah uttered another humph, and Genevieve laughed. “All right, perhaps he was being more extravagant than traditional.”
The two ladies set to work with vigor, scrubbing and dusting and mopping. Genevieve had seldom been inside the castle, her uncle’s eccentricity and misanthropy having successfully kept his family, as well as the rest of the world, at bay for twenty years and more. She would be sorry to see the old place sold, and she hoped whoever bought it wouldn’t rip it down and build a new house, but would live in the castle. She’d hate to see it destroyed even if a castle was, as her aunt believed, somewhat out of place in the state of New York.
Genevieve herself had always lived in the much smaller cottage on the castle grounds. Originally built for the castle steward, the place had been plenty big enough for Genevieve, her parents, and her aunt Delilah. An only child, sometimes lonely, Genevieve had frequently thought how nice it would be to have swarms of children romping up and down the castle steps and playing in the expansive grounds. The grounds, which contained not only lawns and gardens, but a good-sized forest, were large enough to hold an army of children. She and Benton, her late cousin, used to play Robin Hood and his merry men for hours and hours during the long summers of their childhood.
Not that Uncle Hubert had maintained the grounds any better than he’d kept up the inside of the castle. Cocklebur bushes, nettles, weeds, and brambles choked pathways that had once been raked and graveled and that had twisted through several beautiful gardens. Genevieve, who enjoyed horticulture, would love to get her hands on some pruning shears and have her way with what used to be the rose garden.
She stood up, wiped her forearm across her dripping brow, and stretched the kinks out of her back. “I’ll have to tackle those windows later. I’m sure we won’t even get the hallway and the library finished today.”
Delilah, red-faced with bending and mopping, straightened too. “I’m sure you’re right.” She frowned. “I don’t know if it’s worthwhile to spend a lot of time in here. Whoever buys it will probably only tear it down.”
Genevieve snorted. “I’d be embarrassed to have anyone even look at the place in its present condition.”
“Well, there is that.”
“And if we can get it looking fairly decent, perhaps a buyer will see its worth and want to restore it.”
Delilah said nothing, but Genevieve could tell her aunt didn’t believe it, so she detoured to another tack. “Besides, this will give us a chance to go through Uncle Hubert’s things and decide what to keep, what to sell, what to take to the poor box at church, and what to burn.”
“I’m sure Hubert never had anything I’d want to keep.”
“You didn’t like your older brother much, did you, Aunt Delilah?”
Genevieve wasn’t surprised to see a guilty expression settle over her aunt’s gentle features.
“I’m sure that as a Christian woman I loved my brother, but you must admit he was a hard, tight-fisted man.”
“You’re right, Aunt. It’s difficult to imagine the two of you coming from the same family.”
A noise from the oak stairway made both ladies spin around, startled. Genevieve didn’t put any stock whatsoever in rumors about the castle being haunted. Still, it was a huge, gloomy old place, made more gloomy by what seemed like centuries’ worth of dust and decrepitude, grime, and cobwebs clinging to its walls, floors, and furnishings. She pressed a hand to her pounding heart. “My goodness, I do believe the spooky atmosphere in here is getting to me.”
“It got to me before we even opened the door,” Delilah said darkly. “Although it’s probably only remnants of Hubert’s personality cleaving to the stones. He never wanted to part with anything at all, much less his life.”
Genevieve gazed at her aunt with real appreciation. “You have a poetic streak a mile wide in you, Aunt Delilah. Did you know that?”
Delilah blushed. “Nonsense!” But Genevieve could tell she was pleased.
The noise came again, this time louder. Then Genevieve heard a voice.
“I don’t know, Wes. I think the place has charm.”
“Charm! Rats I’m sure it has. But charm?”
Genevieve almost dropped her mop when two men appeared at the top of the landing where the stairway divided. Delilah gasped and clutched Genevieve’s arm, her fingers digging in like pincers. Genevieve recovered first.
“Who are you?” she inquired sharply. Then she recognized Wesley Armitage and let out a huge gust of breath. “Oh, Mr. Armitage! I didn’t know you were planning to drive out here today. You gave us such a start.”
“Miss Crowfoot.” Armitage smiled broadly and ran down the massive oak staircase. He held out a hand as he approached the two ladies. “Yes, indeed, we have a possible buyer for the castle. Tobias and I came out today to look the place over.”
At this news, Genevieve looked up quickly, and she saw the other man. With a small gasp, she drew herself up straight. Good heavens, what an unpleasant-looking fellow he was. He was tall and broad-shouldered, and he eyed her and her aunt as if he wished them to perdition. Dressed all in black, leaning on an ebony cane, and with an expression sharp enough to chop wood, he looked like he’d stepped out of one of Washington Irving’s old tales about Puritanical pilgrims.
Noticing her expression, Armitage turned. He maintained his own smile with no apparent trouble, obviously enjoying the situation. “Miss Delilah Crowfoot and Miss Genevieve Crowfoot, allow me to introduce you to Mr. Tobias Rakes.”
Delilah let out a little squeak and a breathy, “Rakes?”
Tobias Rakes, a corrosive smile twisting his harsh features, came forward. He didn’t carry that cane for looks, Genevieve noticed; he had a distinct—and, she suspected, painful—limp. “Indeed, ma’am.” He removed his black hat and bowed. The gesture appeared supercilious to Genevieve. “Tobias Rakes, at your service.”
It was not for nothing that Genevieve Crowfoot was well known in the small village of Bittersweet for possessing a sunny disposition. At once, the humor of the situation struck her and she laughed out loud, drawing a sour squint from Tobias Rakes. “It’s rather daring of you to venture into enemy territory, Mr. Rakes.” She held out her hand for him to shake. She had ages ago decided that a hundred years was long enough for any family feud, and she wasn’t about to perpetuate it.
Tobias Rakes eyed her hand for a moment before he took it in his own black-gloved and much-larger one. “Miss Crowfoot.” He made no comment about her reference to the Crowfoot-Rakes unpleasantness.
She refused to allow his dour manner to intimidate her, and hence, looked him square in the eye. Nor did she flinch at the frigidity she saw reflected in the ice-blue gaze staring back at her. Good heavens, the man was as cold as Bittersweet Pond in the dead of winter. “Are you looking the castle over for some fell purpose, Mr. Rakes?”
He left off glaring knives and daggers at her and glanced around the entry hall. Genevieve did likewise, taking pleasure in viewing the newly cleaned and shiny flags. The room would look quite nice with a few colorful rugs scattered around and perhaps some bright paintings on the walls.
“Yes, Miss Crowfoot. I’m thinking of buying it.”
His words jolted her. “You’re thinking of buying it? A Rakes?” Genevieve burst out laughing again but, feeling foolish, slapped a hand over her mouth.
For the first time since she’d first seen him, Tobias smiled. His smile was so glacial, she wished he hadn’t.
“Indeed, madam. I am seriously considering it.”
“Mercy,” Delilah whispered at Genevieve’s back.
Genevieve choked back her laughter. Because the answer was important to her, she asked bluntly, “If you do buy it, will you tear it down, Mr. Rakes?”
“Tear it down?” He turned, pierced her with another blue stare that felt like tiny icicles stabbing into her, and lifted a sardonic black eyebrow.
“Mr. Rakes has taken it into his head to fix the place up if he offers for it, ma’am,” Wesley Armitage said with a distinct lack of enthusiasm, his smile gone.
“Fix it up?” Delilah repeated blankly.
“Oh, Mr. Rakes, how wonderful!”
From his frigid mien, Genevieve guessed she should have contained her enthusiasm. Then she decided she didn’t care if this cold, hard man considered her silly. His avowed intention thrilled her. “I do hope that you will buy it then, Mr. Rakes, and that you’ll be kinder to the old pile than Uncle Hubert was. As you can see, he let it fall into dreadful disrepair. Aunt Delilah and I were trying to tidy it up before Mr. Armitage began showing it, although it will probably take an army of housemaids to make it respectable again.”
“I should have told you we’d be coming out here today, Miss Crowfoot. I apologize.”
Armitage looked contrite. Genevieve, as notorious for her soft heart as she was for her sunny disposition, laid a hand on his arm. “Oh, no. It’s perfectly all right, Mr. Armitage. As long as you warned Mr. Rakes beforehand.”
“He warned me.” Tobias sounded bored.
Nettled by his attitude, Genevieve said, “Fine. Then Aunt Delilah and I will continue our work.” She inclined her head and turned away from him.
Poor Delilah, who never quite knew what to do in uncomfortable situations, nodded as well, and peered with some surprise at her niece. Genevieve imagined her aunt was shocked by her shabby behavior, but honestly! One should be expected to take only so much. If that man wanted to be aloof and unfriendly, so be it. Genevieve had better things to do than try to lure him into behaving nicely.
“Ahem. Yes. Well then, good day to you, Miss Crowfoot.” That was Wesley Armitage, who had a manner or two to rub together.
Ignoring Tobias Rakes, Genevieve turned again, shook Armitage’s hand, and smiled at him. “Good day to you, Mr. Armitage.” And, without acknowledging Tobias Rakes’s presence by so much as another glance in his direction, she resumed plying her mop.
She heard the two men talking as they headed to the front door, and she heard the front door open and bang shut as it closed behind them, echoing in the front hall like a vault door slamming. A shudder rippled through her. To dispel the eerie mood engendered by the unsettling sound, she snorted. “Well! If that man buys the castle, I suppose I’ll be glad of it because he said he won’t tear it down, but I’ve never met such a reserved, unpleasant man in my life.”
“He’s a Rakes, dear. You know what they say about the Rakes men.”
“I don’t believe being a member of any particular family gives one the privilege of being uncivil.”
“No, I suppose not. But you must recall your uncle Hubert. If ever there was an uncivil man, it was he.”
That drew a chuckle from Genevieve. “You’re right, of course.”
“And don’t forget, dear, that poor Mr. Rakes has an exceptionally sad tale behind him.”
“Ah, yes.” Genevieve remembered. “Something about a failed love affair, wasn’t it? And his father disapproving?”
“Disapproving? I suppose he did disapprove!”
“Hmm. I was only eight years old at the time, and no one would talk about it in front of me for fear the lurid tale might lead me into wickedness.” She grinned at her aunt. “Why don’t you tell me the story, Delilah? I’m past being corrupted.”
“Corrupted?” Delilah clucked her tongue at her niece. “The things you say, Genevieve. Oh, it was awful, though. The beastly man disowned his son. Cut him off without a dollar to his name. And all because the poor boy had fallen in love with a female the old man considered unsuitable.”
“The way I heard it, she was married. That sounds rather unsuitable to me.”
Delilah sniffed. “Perhaps she was. But the dear boy was only seventeen years old at the time. He was only a baby, really, and she was ever so much older than he was.”
“Hmm. So you believe the affair was her fault?”
“I’m sure of it. I knew Madeline Riley, my dear, and I can tell you that she was no better than she ought to be.”
The expression tickled Genevieve, and she smiled as she dipped her mop in the bucket.
Delilah continued, her sense of injustice giving impetus to her broom. “And even if the poor boy did exhibit faulty judgment, I can’t imagine casting off my only child, whatever the provocation. I knew his mother before she married Ernest Rakes, you know, and she was a lovely person. I’m sure that if she’d lived, she could have steered her son in a more suitable direction. But that father of his was as hard and cold as an iceberg. He was totally unsuited to the rearing of a spirited young lad.”
Genevieve mulled over her aunt’s words. “Perhaps you’re right, Aunt Delilah. It’s hard for me to imagine disowning a child.”
“I should hope so. You, my dear, have a heart, unlike some people I could mention.”
Amused by her aunt’s vehemence, Genevieve laughed as she carried her bucket of filthy water to one of the low panels of tall stained-glass windows in the hall. With some effort, she pried up the latch, then pushed the window open and lifted the bucket to empty the water.
When she glanced outside, she saw Tobias Rakes and Wesley Armitage standing in what had previously been a flower garden. Tobias had a hand resting on a stone dolphin protruding from what might have been a pretty fountain once upon a time. It looked to Genevieve as if he were attempting to take some of the weight off of his damaged leg, and she took herself to task for judging him without knowing his full story.
With a sigh, she dumped the dirty water onto the weeds choking the ground below and turned away from the window. “He sustained a terrible injury in the army, too, if I recall correctly.”
“My goodness, yes. Why, he was attacked by Indians, Genevieve!” Delilah’s voice throbbed with excitement, and she gave an eloquent shudder. “Can you imagine such a thing? Attacked by wild Indians. I believe it was in some outlandish place like the Dakotas or something.”
“Hmm. Yes, I think you’re right.” Genevieve contemplated the entryway and considered what to do next. They had determined to tackle one room at a time, but Genevieve rather thought she’d had enough of mopping for one day. “Do you suppose we should start on the library now, Aunt? I’m tired of bending over and scrubbing floors.”
Delilah sighed. “I suppose that’s a good idea. I’m not looking forward to dusting all those old, musty books, though.”
“Nor am I, but it must be done. I suppose some of them might be valuable.”
“You’re right, of course.”
“There might be some treasures in the library. First editions and whatnot.”
“Humph.”
Genevieve grinned. She loved her aunt very much. Aunt Delilah’s presence in her life did much to assuage the pain of her parents’ death. “I think I’ll leave the window open. Maybe the place will air out some.”
Delilah made a noise that clearly conveyed her doubt, and Genevieve’s grin broadened. “Well, it can’t hurt.”
“I suppose not.”
So the two ladies, armed with feather dusters, rags, and tins of furniture wax, entered a room at the end of the entry hall that used to serve as Hubert Crowfoot’s library. Genevieve’s heart fell when she pushed the door open and surveyed the room. “Oh, my. I had no idea he had so many books.”
“I told you he never relinquished anything, Genevieve. He was particularly greedy about his books.” Delilah sounded as discouraged as Genevieve felt.
“Well, there’s no help for it. The sooner we start, the sooner we’ll finish.”
“Yes. Perhaps if you begin at that end—” Delilah pointed toward the west wall. “—and I begin at this one, we’ll meet in the middle someday.”
Because she was so fond of her sweet aunt, Genevieve kissed her cheek again. “Good idea, Aunt Delilah. And perhaps we should sing as we work. When Benton and I were made to do things we didn’t want to do, we often found that singing helped us along.”
“Dear Benton.” Delilah sighed, for Benton had been everyone’s favorite. He’d died of a lung ailment when he was twenty and Genevieve but eighteen, and the family, such as was left of it, still missed him.
Because she knew her aunt had a strong religious streak, Genevieve cast about in her mind for a hymn, leaving aside those that referred to the Holy Ghost, since she didn’t want Delilah’s fanciful mind to begin churning over old ghost stories. After a moment, she started singing “All Hail the Power of Jesus’ Name,” one of Delilah’s favorite hymns. It also had a perky, if somewhat martial, tune to it, which added to its charm in this instance. Delilah joined in, and soon the library rang with music. Genevieve was sure the old castle had seldom been filled with song. It seemed a pity to her that it should be so. If she had her way, the whole world would sing, the sun would always shine, and people like Tobias Rakes would open their hearts to life’s beauties and not dwell on past injuries and injustices.
They’d been working for an hour or more, pulling out the books one by one, clapping pages together, and dusting off cracked leather bindings, when a thick, yellowed paper fell from the book Genevieve held. She watched it flutter to the floor and sighed. She’d stood and squatted so much today, she was sure her muscles would scream at her tomorrow. Nevertheless, she squatted once more and retrieved the piece of paper. Its condition and the old-fashioned writing on it drew her attention, and she glanced more closely at the words written on it. Her cursory glance transformed into an astonished stare. “Aunt Delilah!”
Delilah sneezed, then turned, wiping her nose with a handkerchief retrieved from an apron pocket. “What is it, dear?”
Genevieve looked up from the paper. “Have you ever heard rumors about a treasure hidden somewhere in the castle?”
“A treasure?” Delilah blinked, her placid face expressionless. “I’ve heard about the ghost, but never anything about a treasure.”
Nodding, Genevieve reread the words written on the paper. Maybe she’d read them incorrectly the first time. No. No matter how often she read the words, they remained the same.
“My goodness,” she whispered. “My goodness gracious sakes alive.”
“What is it, dear?”
“I do believe there may be more in this castle than dust and old books, Aunt.”
“You do?”
“I do. According to this—” She held the paper out, being careful not to damage it, because it was very old and brittle. “—Great-great-great-grandfather Charles Crowfoot was hiding a vast fortune in here somewhere.” She smiled at her aunt. “And I aim to find it before that awful man does.”
Her aunt’s mouth fell open and her eyes widened. “Well, bless my soul!”
Chapter Two
By the time Wesley Armitage called upon Genevieve Crowfoot to let her know that Tobias Rakes intended to make an offer for Crowfoot Castle, three weeks had passed. Genevieve and Delilah had almost finished cleaning up what Genevieve had begun to think of as the old dump. The treasure, if it existed, remained undiscovered, and she was peeved about it.
Feeling uncharacteristically grumpy, she stomped up the stone steps that led to the castle’s attic. “Blast it, Aunt Delilah, I want to find that treasure.”
Huffing after her niece, Delilah barely had breath enough to answer her. “It probably no longer exists, dear. If it ever did, which it probably didn’t. It’s probably nothing at all, really.”
“Nothing, my foot. It’s got to be something. It may not be diamonds and gold, but that paper mentioned ‘a vast fortune.’“ Genevieve stood in the cobwebby attic and glared around. “Tobias Rakes already has a vast fortune, Aunt Delilah. He doesn’t need another one. We, on the other hand, do. Anyway, by rights, it’s ours.”
This was true. The Crowfoot family circumstances had declined considerably since Charles Crowfoot’s day, before the Revolution. He’d been a successful merchant, trading in tea and furs. His descendants had done their best to keep the Crowfoot assets prospering, with varying results. Genevieve’s father had not possessed much of a head for business, being intellectually inclined. He’d been more interested in teaching than in making money. While he’d managed to support his family, his teaching salary had been nowhere near vast.
Since her parents’ death in a carriage accident a year and a half earlier—an calamity that had prostrated Delilah and still grieved Genevieve—she and Delilah had been existing on the income from Genevieve’s small inheritance. It was sufficient, but not lavish, and Genevieve could think of many things she’d like to do if she were suddenly to find herself wealthy.
Not that wealth was the main reason she was still searching for the treasure. She mostly wanted to satisfy her curiosity. She and Benton used to spin lavish fantasies about pirate treasure and skeletons chained to the castle’s dungeon walls—not that there was a dungeon in Crowfoot Castle. In a way, Genevieve thought that finding a hidden cache of anything at all would be a grand way of remembering Benton, whom she still missed terribly, and the castle itself, which soon would no longer be a Crowfoot family possession.
Besides all that, she’d taken an extreme dislike to the chilly and imperious Tobias Rakes, and she didn’t want him to profit from a treasure that rightfully belonged to her and Delilah, if it existed. She knew her petty attitude did her no credit, but she couldn’t help it.
She huffed indignantly. “At any rate, this is the only place we haven’t searched, so let us begin.”
Delilah sighed as she scanned the attic. “I don’t expect there’s much of anything up here. Some people use attics to store things in, but from the looks of the rest of the castle, I doubt that anyone ever got rid of anything at all, much less stored it in an attic.”
“It does look rather empty in here, doesn’t it?” Genevieve frowned at the cavernous room. Except for a trunk or two shoved up against a wall, it was mighty bare. “I suppose we ought to sweep it out, even if there’s nothing here.”
So they set about with a vengeance, sweeping and dusting and sneezing. Since Genevieve was going to meet Tobias Rakes on the following day to sign the sale papers, he was on her mind today. “I wish that man were a little more friendly,” she muttered as she emptied the contents of a dustpan into a small barrel she’d lugged upstairs.
“Perhaps he will be when you know each other better, dear. He’s a very handsome man.”
“Handsome!” Genevieve looked over to find her aunt smiling sweetly at her. She knew what that meant. “Don’t even think about it, Aunt Delilah. I’ve refused perfectly pleasant men before now because I don’t crave the married life. I’m certainly not going to fall in love with a hardhearted, bad-tempered man like Tobias Rakes, even if he is going to buy the castle.”
All at once a blast of frigid air shot through the castle attic. Genevieve looked around in alarm. “Good heavens, where did that come from?”
Delilah rubbed her arms and squinted at the grimy attic window. “I don’t know. My rheumatism didn’t predict rain for today.”
“It’s not raining,” Genevieve muttered. She rebuttoned her collar, which she’d unbuttoned only minutes earlier because she was warm. “I don’t know what it is.”
A piercing shriek sliced through the air.
Delilah gave a short, sharp scream.
Genevieve cried, “Good Lord!”
Another shriek, longer, more shrill, reminding Genevieve of tales she’d heard of Irish banshees and fog-shrouded moors, pierced their ears. She dropped her broom, clapped her hands over her ears, and hurried to Delilah, who threw her arms around her.
“It’s the ghost!” Delilah whimpered.
“It’s not a ghost!” Genevieve pitched her voice to sound scornful, although it was an effort. She’d never been so frightened.
Sudden, horrible, echoing laughter filled the room. It swelled and swelled until Genevieve was trembling almost as furiously as Delilah. She said, “It must be the wind.” It was feeble, and she didn’t believe it—but what else could it be? “You know, these old houses always have lots of odd noises.”
“It’s the g-g-ghost.”
Genevieve peered down at her aunt. Delilah’s eyes were squeezed shut, and she was shaking so hard Genevieve feared she’d bite her tongue. Because she was alarmed herself, she wanted to step boldly forward and investigate the awful noise, but it would have been cruel to desert Delilah. “Nonsense!” she said stoutly. “There’s some other—logical—explanation.”
Another blast of arctic air, several loud groans, one more shriek, and the sound of chains rattling made both ladies jump and sent Delilah into a string of incoherent protests. The phenomenon was beginning to irritate Genevieve, who took strong exception to anything frightening her aunt.
She said, “Stop it!” although she suspected the words would bear no fruit. How could mere words stop a natural phenomenon? She had no doubt the cause of this odd disturbance would turn out to be natural. Why, the very thought of a ghost making all this racket was absurd. Laughable.
To prove it to herself, Genevieve laughed. Her first attempt sounded strained, but she made a valiant effort to correct it, and tried again with more success. Delilah subsided into silent paroxysms of shivers. When Genevieve glanced at her, she saw Delilah darting terrified glances around the attic. It made her angry to see Delilah thus.
“This is ridiculous,” she declared.
“It’s the ghost,” whispered Delilah.
“Fiddlesticks!”
“Fiddlesticks is it?” echoed from the rafters. “Fiddlesticks?”
Delilah began to moan softly at Genevieve’s side. Genevieve, wrapping her aunt more snugly in her arms, was feeling a trifle moany herself by this time.
“I’ll show you fiddlesticks!”
And with that, the ghost appeared.
Delilah fainted dead away into the pile of dust she’d just swept.
Genevieve was so startled that she could only stare for several seconds at the phantasm before her. Garbed in a gown that would have been fashionable a hundred years before, and with her hair powdered, coiffed high upon her head, and sparkling with jewels, the ghost hovered at the far end of the attic, her form wavering and shifting in the air. Genevieve blinked several times, sure it was a figment and would vanish shortly.
It didn’t.
Then Genevieve realized her aunt had fainted. At once her anger boiled over. Genevieve had a very long fuse and seldom got angry, but at this moment she’d gladly have plunged a knife into the breast of that—that—that thing staring at her so very smugly from across the room.
“How dare you?” Her voice pulsed with wrath. “How dare you frighten poor Aunt Delilah this way? Who do you think you are, anyway, to make horrid noises and scare delicate old ladies? If you’ve done any harm to my aunt, I’ll call the law down on you for malicious mischief!”
And with that, Genevieve knelt beside Delilah, pointedly ignoring whatever that thing was at the far end of the attic. Furious, she chafed Delilah’s hands and spoke gently to her. When another cold blast shot past her, she whirled around and glared at the phenomenon, which was now hovering right overhead.
“Stop that this instant! If you have a quarrel with us, take it up with me, for heaven’s sake. All you’ve succeeded in doing so far is making my aunt faint, and that’s no very great feat. The poor dear has a heart condition, you know, and I won’t have you bothering her!”
“Do you have any idea who I am, girl?” the thing asked, its voice strange and echoey.
“I don’t care who you are! Or what! You’re a vicious, mean thing, whatever you are, and I want nothing to do with you!”
“Is that so?” The thing sounded rather put out.
Genevieve didn’t care. She lifted her aunt’s head onto her lap. Poor Delilah looked terribly pale. Genevieve wished she had some water to sprinkle on her forehead, but she wasn’t about to leave Delilah alone in the attic with that thing while Genevieve went to fetch some. Her indignation was so great, it conquered her fear entirely. She glared fiercely up at the phantasm.
“Of all the nasty, spiteful things to do, I think frightening helpless old ladies is perhaps the most childish and mean-spirited of them all. What did you expect to accomplish by it, anyway? All we were trying to do was clean up this old run-down pile of stones.”
“Run-down pile of stones?” Evidently, whatever the entity was, it didn’t appreciate Genevieve’s description of Crowfoot Castle. It puffed itself up like a balloon until it seemed to take up the entire ceiling. It was an interesting phenomenon, but Genevieve wasn’t about to tell it so.”Yes! It’s a rundown pile of stones, and it’s about to be sold. Aunt Delilah and I were trying to make it at least partially presentable until you interfered. What did you mean by it?”
The being tried one more echoing cry and a louder rattle of chains. This time Genevieve even heard bells, sounding ancient and sepulchral in the background. They were effective in creating a spooky atmosphere, but she was in no mood to appreciate it. “Oh, stop that! Stop it this instant! You’ve made your point. You’re able to frighten people. So what?” She gave the thing her hottest, most indignant scowl. It was the expression she saved for important occasions, and she seldom had to use it.
“Bother.” The phantasm seemed to deflate, and it floated slowly over to rest on a trunk set against the attic wall.
Genevieve felt a lick of triumph for having quelled it, at least momentarily, whatever it was. Because she was still irked, she snapped, “What are you?”
“I’m not a what,” the thing said. Its voice sounded hollow, as though it were speaking in a cavern. “I’m a who. I’m Charles Crowfoot’s daughter. People in Bittersweet had taken to calling me Granny Crowfoot by the time I died, even though I never married.” She sounded dejected.
Still rubbing her aunt’s hands, Genevieve said, “I don’t believe you. Ghosts don’t exist.”
Granny Crowfoot frowned at her. The expression appeared quite natural, as if frowning came easily to her. “They do too.”
“Fiddlesticks.” Genevieve chose not to look at the phenomenon calling itself Granny Crowfoot because, in spite of her bold words, she was unsettled by it. “Don’t be ridiculous.”
“Ridiculous?” Granny Crowfoot made a huffing noise that sounded like a sneeze in the big empty attic. “What do you know about ghosts, girl?”
She knew very little about them, actually, but Genevieve decided it would be prudent not to let on. She gave an indignant harrumph and continued ignoring the ghost, concentrating on Aunt Delilah, whose temporal form comforted her, even if it was unconscious at the moment.
Granny Crowfoot, if that was she, fluffed her skirts, drawing Genevieve’s attention. Those skirts appeared as though they were sewn out of brocade, but they couldn’t be because brocade was heavy. These skirts were so light as to be transparent. Genevieve looked away again, not wanting to dwell on it.
“I heard the two of you talking in here.” Granny Crowfoot waved her hand to indicate the attic. “I’m sure you were joking when you said a Rakes was going to buy the castle, although it’s not a very funny joke if you ask me.” Her lips pursed. “Young people today. You have no respect for anything.”
Frowning heavily, Genevieve dared look at Granny Crowfoot again. “I don’t know about that, but I, for one, certainly have no respect for family feuds, if that’s what you’re talking about. Nonsensical things, feuds.”
That set Granny Crowfoot off again. With a shrill whistle that seemed to stab through Genevieve’s head like an arrow, she blew herself up again until she’d spread out across the entire ceiling. Really, this was too much to bear. Genevieve said sharply, “Stop it! My aunt will never recover if you keep doing that!”
“Gerald Rakes murdered my father, you insolent girl!”
“So what? It happened more than a hundred years ago. Anyway, he was tried, convicted, and hanged for it. That should be the end of it.”
“The end of it? The end of it?” Granny Crowfoot’s incredulity was so great, her voice broke. “My father was a gallant gentleman and a patriot, you insolent girl! He was one of the leaders of the Revolution!”
“Well, I’m happy to know I have such an illustrious ancestor, ma’am, but I still don’t see why that justifies the perpetuation of a family feud and injury to my poor aunt Delilah.”
“Oh? Oh? And just how do you think you’d like it if someone murdered your father, you saucy baggage?”
“Stop calling me names. And I wouldn’t like it at all, of course, but I can’t understand blaming the grandchildren for the sins of their grandparents.” Genevieve, who had been devastated by her parents’ deaths, resented the ghost’s question. It sounded as if she was trying to trivialize death, and Genevieve saw nothing at all trivial about losing the two most important people in her life.
“Ha!”
To Genevieve, ha was insufficient justification for a hundred-year-old family feud, and she told the ghost so. “Besides,” she continued, feeling smug, “it’s going to end now whether you like it or not, because a Rakes man is going to buy the castle.”
A long, drawn-out shriek met Genevieve’s audacious declaration. Granny Crowfoot swooped and whished around the attic like a demented skyrocket, making Genevieve wish she hadn’t been quite so forward. It was disconcerting watching a specter bounce through the walls and zoom here and there. Genevieve tried to duck every time it shot anywhere near her, but she felt an odd sensation of something cold going through her at least thrice. The sensation was most unpleasant, and really quite painful. “Stop it,” she cried, not for the first time since she’d met the pesky thing.
At last Granny Crowfoot did stop. She sank down on the trunk again and appeared to be pouting. Too bad. There wasn’t anything anyone could do to stop Tobias Rakes from buying the castle, because Genevieve was going to accept his offer. Tomorrow. And Granny Crowfoot could lump it if she didn’t like it.
“You can’t allow such a thing to happen.”
Granny Crowfoot sounded breathless, a phenomenon almost more surprising than she herself was, to Genevieve’s mind. “I can so. How can you stop the wheels of business from turning?” She thought better of telling Granny Crowfoot that she, herself, Genevieve Crowfoot, was going to be the one to sign the papers deeding Crowfoot Castle to Tobias Rakes. She had no idea how vast a ghost’s powers might be—she rather doubted they were that great—but she didn’t want to court catastrophe. Her life had held too much catastrophe in recent years as it was.
Granny Crowfoot began pulling at her powdered hair. Genevieve watched, fascinated, and wondered if ghosts had to dress their hair the way corporeal beings did. She didn’t ask.
“Listen, Miss Crowfoot,” she said, striving for a reasonable tone. “I honestly believe there’s no need to keep the Crowfoot-Rakes feud active any longer. I’m sure no one alive today can even recall the facts of the case, and I’m even more sure that no one cares.”
“Ooooooh!” Granny Crowfoot cried, sounding really quite pitiful. “Aaaagh.”
Delilah stirred on Genevieve’s lap. Genevieve didn’t want her to catch sight of the ghost and faint again, so she said, “Will you please leave now? The castle will be sold to Mr. Tobias Rakes on the morrow, and that’s that. Now go away before my aunt awakens. You’ve done enough damage for one day.”
Granny Crowfoot rose from the trunk, looking like she wanted to kill something. Although Genevieve was quaking inside, she refused to show her fear, sensing that the old ghost would have won if she did.
“Noooooooo! Noooooooo! If a Rakes sets foot in this castle, I shall give him no rest! I shall haunt him until he begs for mercy!”
“Don’t be silly. I’m sure you can keep him awake nights, but I’m just as sure you can’t hurt anything,” declared Genevieve, who was sure of no such thing. “For heaven’s sake, you’re a ghost! You can’t even pick up anything that weighs more than an ounce or two, much less do anything with it. And flying through people only makes them feel cold and prickly. Mr. Rakes was a soldier on the frontier, and I’m sure he’s endured much worse than cold spells in his life.”
“Aaaaaaaaaaaah! Eeeeeeeeeeek! Aaaaaaaargh!”
Genevieve chuffed indignantly. “Oh, will you stop that! You’ve made your point. Now go away.”
“You think I can’t haunt that man? You think that, do you? Well, I’ll show you who can haunt and who can’t!”
And with that, Granny Crowfoot commenced flinging herself around the attic again. Genevieve sighed gustily, wishing her deceased ancestor didn’t make so very virulent a spirit. She was alarmed when one or two loose objects—a nail and a dust ball—hurtled through the air. So the old bat could throw things around, could she? Well, Genevieve was still almost sure she couldn’t do any more than that, or she’d have done it already.
“Wonderful,” she said, making her tone as caustic as possible. “You can fling dust balls around. That will impress Mr. Rakes, I’m sure.”
With one last string of ooooohs and aaaaaahs, the ghost vanished. And none too soon, by Genevieve’s way of thinking, for Delilah’s eyes were fluttering open.
By the time she’d helped her aunt out of the castle and done her best to soothe Delilah’s shattered nerves, Genevieve was on the verge of consigning all ghosts to the pit, and particularly cantankerous Crowfoot ghosts. She didn’t blame the Rakeses for steering clear of the Crowfoots for more than a hundred years, if all of Genevieve’s predecessors were like Granny Crowfoot. She didn’t even blame Gerald Rakes for murdering Charles Crowfoot, if Charles had been anything like his daughter.
“I shall never set foot in that place again as long as I live,” Delilah said in a voice that shook pathetically.
Genevieve sighed. “I don’t suppose you’ll have any reason to after tomorrow, Aunt. I’m going to meet Mr. Rakes in Mr. Armitage’s office at ten o’clock, and we’re going to sign the sale papers. After that, whatever exists in Crowfoot Castle will be Mr. Rakes’s problem.”
# # #
Genevieve awoke the next morning in an undecided mood. Should she tell Tobias Rakes about Granny Crowfoot or not?
She brooded about it all through breakfast. “I don’t know,” she said after swallowing a bite of toast smeared with blackberry jam. “What do you think, Aunt Delilah?”
Delilah, who was still pale and shaken, peered at her with wide eyes. “I think it’s only fair to warn him, dear. No one should enter that place unprepared.” She shuddered and could barely lift her teacup for the trembling in her limbs.
“I’m sorry you were so frightened, Aunt. That awful ghost has a lot to answer for.” Genevieve wished she could return to the castle today and give Granny Crowfoot a good hot lecture and a lesson in manners. Imagine, scaring poor Delilah so. Genevieve, whose sense of right and wrong was well-developed and unshakeable, felt great indignation on her sweet aunt’s behalf.
Poor Delilah glanced around the bright, sunny cottage kitchen as if she expected the ghost of Granny Crowfoot to materialize there. Genevieve expelled a breath. “I’m sure old Granny Crowfoot can’t leave the castle, Aunt. I don’t know much about ghosts, but I don’t think they can haunt more than one or two places. Besides, I’ve never felt the atmospheric phenomena that accompanied her in this house. I think the castle’s stuck with her.”
“Oh, I do hope so!”
Immediately after the words popped out, Delilah realized her hope, if true, would make Tobias Rakes’s life uncomfortable, and had the grace to blush. Genevieve smiled as she rose from her place at the table and picked up the jam pot. “I think you have nothing to fear in that regard. And don’t feel guilty about Mr. Rakes, either. He’s a grown man who’s been through worse than being haunted by that miserable old ghost. Besides, he’s been told by Mr. Armitage what to expect. Mr. Armitage told me he even warned Mr. Rakes that the castle is rumored to be haunted. He’s buying the place knowing what he’s in for.”
“I’ll warrant he doesn’t,” Delilah said glumly. “It’s one thing to chat idly about a haunted castle. It’s another matter entirely to be haunted in the flesh.”
Genevieve couldn’t fault her aunt’s reasoning, but she didn’t want Delilah to worry. Delilah’s sensibilities were fine, and she was apt to brood. She kissed the top of Delilah’s head as she headed out of the kitchen to fetch her bonnet and shawl. Delilah stood in the doorway, framed by the red roses climbing over the trellis Genevieve had had Mr. Pickstaff build, and waved her off, still looking apprehensive.
The day was splendid, however, and Genevieve couldn’t find it in herself to worry unduly about Tobias Rakes. He looked to her like a man who could take care of himself. Besides, maybe a good haunting would snap him out of his perpetually gloomy mood.
She glanced around with satisfaction as she walked down the road toward town. Buttercups bloomed beside the road, larkspurs and forget-me-nots bumped up against blooming hawthorn bushes, and Genevieve felt splendid—even if she was on her way to sell her family’s castle.
In a way, though, while she was sorry to see the castle slip out of Crowfoot hands, she also felt as though this might be the first step in ending the entirely too-old Crowfoot-Rakes feud once and for all. It was true that members of the two families no longer took potshots at one another from behind hedges and so forth—and hadn’t for a good fifty years or more—but it was also true that relations between the families had rarely been cordial at any time during the past century and more. The whole notion of a feud seemed preposterous to Genevieve, who found it difficult to hold a grudge for longer than ten minutes at a stretch.
Her sunny mood lasted until, having reached Bittersweet and paid a visit to Pickstaff’s Dry Goods Store, where she bought a bottle of lavender toilet water for Aunt Delilah, which she hoped would make Delilah feel more the thing, she walked briskly up the steps to Wesley Armitage’s law offices.
As soon as she opened the door, she saw Tobias Rakes. He rose stiffly from the chair in which he’d been sitting, turned to look at her, and she suddenly felt almost as cold as she’d felt when she’d encountered Granny Crowfoot the day before.
However, the fact that a Crowfoot and a Rakes could have the same unsettling effect on her buoyed her spirits almost immediately, and Genevieve gave him one of her friendlier smiles. No sense in allowing grouchy people to affect her own mood, after all.
“Good day, Mr. Rakes.”
He nodded. “How do you do, Miss Crowfoot?”
They shook hands. “I’m very well, thank you, Mr. Rakes.” Genevieve felt a tingly sensation when he took her hand, but she endeavored to ignore it and turned at once to Wesley Armitage, who had also risen upon her entrance. “And good day to you, too, Mr. Armitage.”
Mr. Armitage smiled. His smile seemed to Genevieve a little tight. “Good morning, Miss Crowfoot.”
She removed her wrap briskly and sat in the chair next to that from which Mr. Rakes had risen. “Well, shall we get on with it?” She kept her tone cordial but businesslike. “Are you ready to take possession of a haunted castle, Mr. Rakes?” Again she wondered if she should mention her encounter with Granny Crowfoot. She decided she’d take her cue from him.
“Yes.”
He said only the one word, but from the look he gave her, which seemed cold and jaded, she saw Mr. Rakes didn’t appreciate her little attempt at humor. Genevieve sniffed. Too bad for him. She wasn’t going to subdue her good nature for him or anyone else. She also decided on the spot that she’d just keep her information about the castle’s ghost to herself. He’d probably not believe her, and anyway she wasn’t sure she liked him well enough to warn him. Let him meet Granny Crowfoot for himself and see how he liked it. Her. Whatever.