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  She dropped the wooden pendant and brought both of her hands to her neck to parenthesize his. She tried to relieve some of his squeezing pressure. Then, she tried even harder to get free, finding it more and more difficult to breathe. Definitely, she had let things come too far. Yet, how was she to have known Charles was planning to choke her? He was her husband. He loved her. She loved him.

  He...couldn’t...be...doing...this!

  “Charles!” Marie thought she was the one to voice that exclamation which made her husband suddenly turn loose.

  She dropped to her knees on the ground, gasping for air. She had been on the verge of passing out. She knew it. She wasn’t sure, even now, she wasn’t losing consciousness. Everything was swimming in front of her eyes.

  What seemed like long minutes of struggling to regain perspective must, in reality, have been only mere seconds, because, when Marie finally focused again, Charles was still standing pretty much in the same place. He had turned slightly to look at the old woman and the two men who stood just a few feet away within the shadows of the thick underbrush.

  “Charles!” the old woman snapped.

  For the first time, Marie realized it had been the woman’s previous command, not anything said by Marie, which had caused Charles to free his stranglehold.

  Charles clamped a hand to each temple, as if struck by a sharp pain to his brain. By way of enforcing that illusion, he let out a low, animalistic groan that sent new rills of terror coursing through Marie’s veins.

  His arms dropped limply to his sides. He turned ever so slightly, and Marie felt he was actually, finally, seeing her again.

  “Marie?” he asked in verification. His voice was low, almost a whisper.

  He collapsed, his head audibly striking a rock as he slumped to a heap on the ground.

  * * * * * * *

  Marie paced her bedroom, furious. More than that, she was sick with worry. Not only had Charles had some sort of attack at the pool, to which Marie still couldn’t put rhyme or reason, but his head had received a nasty bump when he fell.

  The old woman and the two natives had taken firm charge of the situation, acting much as if Marie wasn’t even there. They had loaded Charles on his horse, much as if he were a sack of potatoes, and had brought him back to the house—Marie following after. Admittedly, Marie, by that point, had been a bit hysterical. She had cried and was still crying, her face streaked with tears. Her eyes were red. Her nose was runny. Her cheeks were unattractively puffy.

  She would see her husband! They couldn’t continue to keep her from him. She didn’t care what they said or did; she was mistress of his house. She was Charles Camaux’s wife. She had more right to be at her husband’s bedside than that old woman and the old hag’s two native cohorts. If that trio persisted in keeping her out, each and every one of them would pay dearly if—no, not if, but when—Charles came out of his coma and got back on his feet.

  She went to the mirror over her vanity table. Her reflection verified what she already knew: she looked a sight! There was no reason why she should have expected to look anything but...after what had happened.

  She headed into the sitting room, and, then, to the door leading to the hallway. She took three deep breaths and opened the door. She came out, turned a sharp left and started toward her husband’s suite.

  The two men who had been with the old woman at the pool were stationed outside Charles’ door, much like a pair of half-naked palace guards.

  Marie put on an expression that dared either of them to challenge her right to do what she was doing. If they tried to interfere, she would bring down the house with her screams. These savages hadn’t seen anything until they got a good look at a girl of good English stock once her feathers were really ruffled.

  Neither man made any attempt whatsoever to stop her. They just stood there, much like wooden dummies, their muscled arms folded over their muscled chests.

  She shut the door behind her, only sorry for the loud bang she made in slamming it if just because her husband, after all, had a head injury that likely wasn’t helped by Marie’s burst of childish chagrin.

  She was going to have to stop acting like a schoolgirl and more like mistress of the house if she wanted to be treated like the latter. In a way, she could even admit—albeit reluctantly—that it was a good thing the old woman and the men had been there at the pool to take charge when Charles had collapsed. Marie couldn’t have gotten her husband back to the house on her own.

  On the other hand, it was possibly the old lady’s shouts which made Charles collapse in the first place. Marie refused to believe her husband would have continued to strangle her. More likely, he would have come to his senses, shortly, with none of his collapsing and bumping his head.

  How long, anyway, had those three been there, watching and spying? Long enough to have seen all that had come before? Even the thought of any of them having seen her swimming naked, or....Her already tear-pink cheeks reddened even more.

  She would fire that old woman from the staff! She wouldn’t stand that creature forever lurking in the shadows like the ghoul she was, spying on the intimate moments between a man and his wife.

  Charles’ rooms were dark. Marie pushed away from the door as soon as her eyes made out the gauntlet of furniture she needed to maneuver to get to the adjoining room that held her husband in his bed.

  He wasn’t conscious when she reached him. Thank heaven, though, he obviously wasn’t dead, either. He breathed evenly, more as if asleep than anything. A corner of his forehead showed discoloration even in the shadows.

  Marie sat on the edge of his bed. She reached out her hand and gently touched his face. His skin was cool which, along with the tempo of his breathing, were definitely good signs.

  She gave a quick, darting glance around the room, somewhat surprised she was really alone with her husband. Genuinely, she expected to see the old woman somewhere within the shadows, watching to make sure Marie didn’t cause any fuss.

  That was another thing that got Marie worked up: the unavoidable feeling that the old woman blamed Marie for everything that had happened, when it was Charles, not Marie, who was showing a side never exhibited in London. Supposedly, Marie had married a rather prim and proper man in England, who had metamorphosed into something quite different on Saint-Georges. Not that Marie was complaining about all of the changes; but, when one purchased the salt of the earth, one expected to find salt, not something else.

  Undoubtedly, Carolyne Nelson would have been surprised by some of the change in her son-in-law.

  “Just a little bit stuffy for someone as well off and as good looking as he is, wouldn’t you say?” Carolyne had asked on the eve of her daughter’s wedding. Although, it wasn’t the first or the last of her hints that her daughter should think twice before attaching herself to Charles Camaux. Not that Carolyne managed to come up with anything factually derogatory, although she might well have sent someone off to Saint-Georges to snoop if the couple had only allowed her sufficient time. Marie thought, now, that maybe her mother had had a way of intuitively sensing things that “weren’t quite right”. However, even Carolyne would have to admit her intuition hadn’t saved her from her three disastrous marriages, going on four; her latest problems, resulted from a spouse twenty years her junior, and had left her much too occupied, and much too exhausted, to give as much time as she might normally have devoted to delving into her daughter’s hasty courtship.

  Charles stirred in his sleep (unconscious?), and he mumbled something briefly and completely undecipherable.

  Marie sat back to stare at his face. His features were handsome, even in a relaxed state, like now. He had such long eyelashes. She hadn’t ever really noticed before just how long they were.

  “What is happening, Charles?” she whispered, resting the flat of her hand along the left side of his face. “Who is Cécile? Who is that old woman? What are these spells you’re having? Would you really have kept on strangling me if the old hag hadn’t show
ed up to stop you? How can I possibly help you, if you continue to leave me in the dark?”

  She sensed, rather than heard, activity in the downstairs of the house. Conditions had apparently heightened her intuitive senses.

  She left the bedroom, passed through the outer room, and came back into the hallway. She paid no attention to the men still at the door. In turn, they paid no seeming attention to her.

  She walked to the balustrade and looked down into the area below, seeing nothing. She heard nothing, either. Yet, she continued to sense something.

  She went down the stairs and surprised Madeleine who was exiting the den. The colored girl looked wide-eyed, as if she wanted to run somewhere but didn’t know where, or even have a clue as to how to begin.

  “Do we have a visitor, Madeleine?” Marie asked, trying to pretend as if she felt absolutely nothing out of the ordinary. Madeleine, though, wasn’t able to follow Marie’s cue. She looked terrified. She acted terrified. She continued to appear as if the very sight of Marie struck her quite deaf and dumb.

  Marie saw the girl’s nervous glances back toward the den and decided to take Madeleine out of her obvious misery by moving on. She headed for the den, and Madeleine disappeared up the stairs at a run. Marie pulled open the sliding doors that gave access to the book-lined enclave.

  At first, she mistook the room as empty. However, that misconception was soon alleviated by a shattering of glass.

  She saw the man struggling to rescue a crystal decanter, tipped over on a corner table, and bubbling cognac across a highly waxed tabletop. The decanter had broken a snifter when falling, shiny shards of the latter like minor icebergs amid a gushing sea of spilling amber liquid.

  “Father?” Marie asked; obviously, the man was a priest.

  He had long, matted grey head hair, echoed by a long and matted grey beard. His reversed collar was anything but clean. His dark suit was neither clean nor pressed. His hands shook as he tried, once again, to pour himself another drink, paying little attention to the mess already made.

  Finally bringing a full glass of brandy to his pouty lips and drinking, he eyed Marie over the edge of his snifter, like a child caught having pilfered from a cookie jar.

  “Who are you?” he asked when he finally stopped drinking. He’d diminished his glass of booze by half.

  “I already know who I am, thank you,” Marie replied. She’d had about enough of people bossing her around, and here looked someone she might very well handle. “The more pertinent question seems to be: Who are you?”

  He didn’t seem impressed. Then, he was already in somewhat of a drunken stupor. He’d been drinking long before he worked up the guts to come here to learn if the rumors were true. He took another swallow, finishing off what was left in his glass. When he spoke, his words were more than a little slurred.

  “Who am I?” He greedily eyed the now upright and partially filled decanter. “Who am I? Where do you come from that you don’t know Father Carl Westbrook?”

  Definitely, Marie wasn’t impressed. As far as she was concerned, Father Carl Westbrook was obviously a priest on the slide—if he was a priest at all.

  “Well, Father Carl Westbrook....” She paused to inject: “Please, do have another drink.” She watched as he proceeded to do just that. He was no steadier pouring this time than last. “No matter what they might have told you, Father, I hardly think my husband is yet ready for a priest. I would have thought everyone’s time put to far better use had they summoned a doctor.”

  Westbrook’s latest glass of booze stopped at his lips.

  “Your husband?” He tried to get Marie into focus.

  “You’re in my house, Father Westbrook. Charles Camaux is my husband. He’s had an accident. I thought that was why you were here. He’s....”

  “He’s a fool!” Westbrook said loudly. He’d not yet sampled anything from his latest glassful. “Your husband...Madame...is...a...certifiable...fool!”

  He gulped the cognac in one massive swallow that made his large Adam’s apple bob beneath his collar.

  “You tell him that for me, Mrs. Camaux. You tell him Father Westbrook—oh, yes, he’ll remember me—said that’s what he is, too!”

  He smacked his empty glass down on the tabletop with a force so great that Marie marveled any of the crystal withstood the shock.

  Staggering, he left the room.

  Marie let him go. She doubted he was sober enough to give her any real answers, so she left him to be one more mystery in a series of building mysteries to which she was determined, eventually, to have answers.

  He exited through the large front doors of the house, letting them close with a loud, shuttering rumble behind him. Marie felt the resulting vibrations ominously pass through the floor beneath her feet.

  * * * * * * *

  It wasn’t yet daylight. For not the first time, that was something Marie sensed before opening her eyes. When she did open them, blackness was silhouetted within the window. The curtains remained opened from the day before. No servant had bothered to close them. Madeleine had been the only household servant Marie had seen during the course of the whole previous evening: emerging from the den to the stairs, then, briefly, when the young girl had silently delivered a platter of cold meats, salad, and white wine from Karena (the dirty dishes still on a small table in Marie’s sitting room). Marie didn’t consider the two taciturn men, who’d remained on Charles’ door, as official members of the household, having never seen them before their appearance at the pool; she still hadn’t the faintest notion who they were or from where they’d come.

  She rearranged her bed clothes and tried to find a more comfortable position, all with little success. She was surprised she’d been able to sleep at all. That she had dozed was the best indication of just how thoroughly drained, physically and mentally, she had become.

  She shut her eyes, telling herself that, come morning, she was determined to get to the bottom of “things”. Surely, there was someone who had the answers besides the mute cabal in the house and on the estate grounds. Who? What made Marie think they would talk to her?

  She refused to go on the way she was. She wouldn’t leave Charles while he was possibly in danger from concussion, or other complications, from his fall, but, after those crises were over, she could make no guarantees she was going to stay. Granted, she had promised to stick with Charles for better, or for worse, but there was a limit. The advantages Marie had known in marrying Charles came very close to being completely overridden by the disadvantages. Whether it was apparent to anyone else, or not, Marie was well aware her husband needed help that went beyond his recently bumped head. Why hadn’t a medical doctor been summoned? Why hadn’t Marie insisted upon one? What made her so thoroughly accept the authority wielded by that old woman?

  Who had sent for Father Westbrook? Had someone suspected Charles’ problem was more spiritual than anything else? Or had the “good” Father simply picked that particular moment to make a courtesy call on Charles Camaux and his new bride? The latter hardly seemed likely. There had been nothing courteous about Father Westbrook. He had seemed genuinely surprised to find a Mrs. Camaux on the premises.

  Marie realized sleep was presently quite out of the question. So was doing something to pass the time, until morning, like reading a book. She was incapable of concentrating on anything except her disarrayed state of affairs. Such thoughts were doubly frustrating, since Marie couldn’t be all that sure just what her status was. She was Marie Camaux; she knew that much. She was the wife of Charles Camaux. Yet, there was an old woman wandering around who was obviously more in charge of things than the mistress of the manor.

  Not that Marie could say any of the servants had been downright disrespectful. Even the two men outside Charles’ door hadn’t done anything genuinely offensive; they’d let Marie by when she had finally gotten up the spirit necessary to make the attempt. Before that, the old woman had merely told her to go to her room; Marie—assuming there was no way to fight her w
ay through the human barriers—had done as she had been told. In retrospect, she could wonder if the two men had ever been as threatening as she’d originally imagined. Oh, they looked mean. How could they help but not, both six feet tall, well-muscled, and with seemingly perpetual sneers? In the final analysis, though, the only man to have physically manhandled her had been her own husband. As far as she could determine, he had, by doing so, come the closest to doing her bodily harm.

  Far from being purposely disrespectful, Madeleine had seemed more like a frightened animal. The rest of the staff had somehow managed to fade into the woodwork, although they obviously had remained cognizant of the prevailing circumstances; since, Karena had managed to prepare something for Marie to eat in her room, once it became obvious the mistress wouldn’t be coming down to dine.

  While Marie recognized that the quickest solution to everything was simply to have Charles regain consciousness and explain it all, that didn’t relieve her confusion at the moment.

  She opened her eyes, again, this time to fluff her pillow beneath her head. It was, then, she noticed the shadows in movement.

  She watched, fascinated and frightened, as dark merged with light to cause a swirling effect on a large section of the ceiling and walls. For several long seconds, she was completely unable to reason the cause: it looked like the very same mixture of shadow and light often seen at the bottom of shallow pools.

  Before she reached the conclusion that her nervous condition had brought her to the point of hallucinating, she realized what she saw was the result of something occurring outside and distorted by the window.

  She threw back the blankets and got out of bed, realizing that what she saw was a replay of those kinds of shadows that danced across the walls and ceilings in darkened room whenever firelight was in play.

  Was the house on fire? That thought was exceptionally terrifying to a woman whose husband was unconscious just down the hall. How would she get Charles out of the burning Château if the servants, as well as the two muscled men panicked, too busy trying to save themselves to be concerned about their master? There was no way Marie could lug Charles down the stairs and out the front door without help. While Charles’ muscled body gave him exceptional strength when he was conscious, that same muscle, when he was in a coma, was dead weight that Marie would be hard-pressed to drag even a few feet, let alone the full distance.