Chapter One
Most people tended graves during the daylight hours, pulled weeds, laid pretty posies and poured out their hearts to a cold headstone. Most people said a few prayers in church, conversed with the vicar, left feeling that they had done right by the departed, done their duty for the next month at least.
Few entered a graveyard in the dead of night when the sky was clear and the moon full. Many believed ghosts lurked behind the stone monuments. That the deceased wandered these morbid places searching for the peace denied them in life. When the wind howled, did it not sound like the wailing of those weighed down by their burdens? Those hindered by the heavy chains that made it impossible to cast off their sins and pass over to the light?
Who tended a grave in the dark?
The foolish.
Drunken sots.
Those possessed of a dark secret.
Lawrence Trent, the illegitimate son of Viscount Ranfield, hid in the shadows, hoping to surprise his quarry. Once a week, someone came to lay flowers and religious trinkets at his half-brother’s grave. The midnight visitor left pious poems in a pretty box, confirming the theory that the elusive mourner must be a woman.
Neither Lawrence nor his brother had any living female relatives. Hired weepers never returned once soil covered the coffin. Members of his brother’s household staff cared little for the master who rarely ventured south of town. But someone with an affection for the deceased visited often.
Who else could it be but a mistress?
To occupy his mind while he waited, Lawrence considered the eerie setting. The church’s square flint tower dominated the landscape, casting an ominous shadow over the grey headstones. Trees loomed over the graves like weeping relatives. The sound of nocturnal creatures scurrying beneath the light of a full moon only enhanced the haunting scene.
Whoever braved the churchyard at night had courage in abundance. Indeed, Lawrence was about to consider the character of such a woman when another noise captured his attention.
He narrowed his gaze and followed the clop of a horse’s hooves approaching on the narrow lane beyond the hedgerow. In the dark, it was impossible to see with any clarity, but he heard the woman’s muttered whisperings to her mount before he saw her enter through the wooden lychgate.
Lawrence shrank back into the gloom. It wouldn’t do to frighten an innocent parishioner, though something told him the woman strolling towards the graves, shrouded in a lilac cloak with the hood raised, was his elusive quarry.
When she took the winding path to the left of the church, his heart thumped against his ribcage.
What brought her here?
Grief?
Love?
He couldn’t help but feel a little envious of his brother. As well as courage, this lady possessed undying loyalty and dedication.
Lawrence pushed out of the darkness and stalked slowly behind his prey. He trod lightly on the overgrown grass, for the need to watch her perform her weekly ritual burned fiercely in his chest.
As expected, the woman stopped directly in front of his brother’s grave and studied the headstone marking the final resting place of Charles Louis Farrow. Beloved son (and only legitimate son) of Viscount Ranfield. Drowned on a fateful day four months ago. Resting in a graveyard occupied by every other deceased Farrow for the last two hundred years.
The heavy weight of grief and regret returned, coupled with the same crippling suspicion. Why had his brother entered the water on such a cold night? How did a man drown when he had the strength and stamina to swim the Channel?
Perhaps Charles had frolicked in the river with this woman, had rescued her from the raging undercurrent but struggled to save himself. Either way, she had to know something about the man whose memory she worshipped.
Lawrence focused his attention and peered into the darkness.
The woman reached into the satchel hidden beneath her cloak. She removed a glass bottle, pulled the stopper and sprinkled droplets over the tomb. After placing the bottle back into the bag, she knelt and brushed away a few leaves and twigs. Then she removed a small nosegay and replaced the withered one.