“I suppose it doesn’t matter to them that you’re married,” she commented in a miffed tone.
“It matters to me,” Ashton murmured with gentle fervor. He raised her chin and, while all the world watched, kissed her softly parted lips in a most loving manner, causing an eruption of giggles to come from the nearby conveyance.
Lierin’s anxieties were completely appeased when he finally lifted his head. Her own eyes were warm and shining as they caressed his face. “Does the bliss ever stop, Ashton, or does it just keep getting better?”
He smiled. “Sometimes it takes hard work and tenacity to make love last. It can grow stale from misuse.”
“It’s been so easy loving you this last month,” she breathed. “I can’t imagine having to work at it.”
“Would you like to see the place where I first saw you?”
Lierin nodded eagerly. “Oh, yes. I want to know everything that we did together. I want to relive those moments with you.”
Ashton leaned forward and instructed the driver to take them to the Vieux Carré, then settled back to enjoy the ride as the horses clip-clopped their way across the cobbled wharf. He had been half afraid to take her on the steamer, not knowing how she would react or if he would be encouraging more nightmares. Though he had watched her closely, ready at any moment to give the command to dock, she had shown no qualms. Indeed, she had displayed as much exuberance as anyone going on their first excursion. Hoping that something would stimulate his wife’s memory and encourage its return, he had made arrangements to have the same suite at the St. Louis Hotel wherein they had, as a slightly younger couple, explored the delights of their newly wedded status. The view of the streets would be the same, with similar sounds drifting in through the tall french doors. He would take her to the restaurants where they had dined and wander through the same shops, visit the parks where they had once strolled and attend theaters where troupes had entertained them. As much as could be controlled, all would be the same. It was the best he could do; he could only hope it would be enough.
Lierin leaned with comfortable ease against Ashton’s side and took in the remarkable sights that whisked past in an ever-changing panorama on either side. She had no idea where they wended, but was content and happy in her place close beneath his arm. The barouche passed along a street where hotels and eating establishments abounded, and then turned down a narrow lane where myriad shops were adorned with ornamental iron lace and overhanging balconies. Ashton pointed, drawing her attention to a cluster of small boutiques that hugged the street.
“Over there! That’s where I first saw you, but it took you a while to learn I existed.”
Lierin responded with an amused chuckle. “I probably knew you were there all along and was just playing coy. I can’t imagine any woman not being aware of you.”
“Nevertheless, madam, you gave me a fright. I was sure my life had ended when you got into the carriage and rode away with your chaperone.”
“Then where did we actually meet?”
“Ahhh, Providence was with me.” Smiling, he nodded and gave another address to the driver. “A band of miscreants had cast a shadow of blame on my crew, no doubt to escape the penalties they justly deserved. They bribed a man to give a false account of pirates attacking other steamers and then taking refuge aboard my vessel. By the time the officials recognized the ploy for what it was, the blackguards had slithered free, leaving me outraged and determined to confront a particular judge who was reviewing the evidence against my men.”
“My grandfather? Judge Cassidy?”
“Aye, madam. A wise man who allowed me to speak my piece until a certain young lady came to his defense. I shall be eternally grateful that he did.”
The barouche entered a tightly turning passage where brick fences rose on either side. Wrought-iron gates hung beneath rounded brick arches, permitting a view of blossom-bedecked gardens and meandering stone paths. The conveyance swept out into a wider street where tall townhouses snuggled close against each other. As they progressed on their way, the houses became larger, with narrow spaces appearing between. The gardens became lawns, and the lawns widened, with moss-draped oaks and a variety of other trees shading them. The barouche passed every style of house, from columned colonials to dwellings found in the West Indies, and it was in front of one of these latter types where they finally halted.
Recognition might have been hindered by the fact that shutters had been nailed over the windows of the house, but the interior was hardly more comforting, for it was dark and rather morbid. Ashton opened several windows and pushed the shutters free, allowing the sunlight to spill into the rooms. Ghostly shapes of sheet-draped furniture stood like dreary sentinels about the room, but the presence of these lifeless creations apparently had not discouraged the entry of a recent visitor who had left signs of his passage in the layer of dust on the floor. The manly footprints wandered aimlessly through the lower part of the house, but in the judge’s study it seemed the man had had a definite purpose in mind, for the tracks went directly from the door to a lowboy and returned to the portal in the same unswerving manner. On the wall above the table a pair of hangers were spaced wide apart, as if two paintings had once hung side by side above the piece. Ashton could only make a guess as to what might have hung there.
“When I received your portrait, it was accompanied by a letter which explained that the painting was one of a pair given to the judge by your father. The other was of your sister, Lenore, and they were both in your grandfather’s possession at the time of his death. The one of Lenore might have been sent back to her, but these footprints are fairly recent, and as you can see”-he drew her gaze downward to the footprints-“once the man entered this room, he came directly to this table.”
“What interest would anyone have in a portrait when”-she swept her hand about the study-“when there are other things of more value to interest a thief?”
Ashton chuckled. “I never saw the portraits while they were here, but if Lenore looks anything like you, I can understand why a man would want it.”
“Now don’t tease, Ashton. Someone must have had a more sensible reason than that for taking it.”
Ashton shrugged. “I can’t imagine any plausible purpose. No one had a right to come here except by our authority. Your grandfather made provisions to leave everything in this house to you and made no attempt to change the will even after he received word that you had drowned.”
“But why didn’t he do so?”
“Lenore and your father left here at odds with the old gentleman, and I guess he figured I was the only family he had left. At least, that’s what he indicated when I came to see him. He was on his deathbed, and he muttered something about me inheriting everything that he had meant for you, so I guess he knew what he was doing.” Ashton gazed thoughtfully about the room as if seeing it for the first time. “I couldn’t bear to come back here while I believed you dead. This house held too many memories.”
“I don’t remember being here at all, and yet…” Lierin shivered as a sudden chill went down her spine, and she glanced around in growing dismay. “I sense something here….” She lowered her gaze beneath his questioning stare and continued in a whisper: “It’s almost as if the house were crying out in mourning…or warning….”
“Come, my love,” Ashton urged gently, drawing her with him to the door. “We’ll go back to the hotel now. I can’t see any reason for staying here if it upsets you.”
Lierin let him lead her from the house, but at the front gate she turned and stared back at the house with its sloping roof and shaded galleries that stretched across the front of the house. Beneath the wide eaves of the higher porch, the dark, lusterless windows seemed to gaze back at her in sad reflection, as if they were compelling her to stay and bring them back to life again. The bolted shutters on the lower veranda were dusty and in need of repair, and nearby the flower garden was overgrown with dried weeds. A trumpet vine had obviously feasted well on the rich soil, for it stretched its tentacles skyward above the roof. Her eyes followed its thick mass to the lower porch, then flew upward again to one of the windows on the higher level. The glass was a dark void, frustrating her efforts to see beyond it, yet she could almost swear she had caught a movement there. Curiosity knitted her brow as she searched the other windows, but they were equally blank, providing no glimpse beyond their translucent panes. Was it only her imagination? Or simply a reflection of a bird flitting past the window?