Secrets of the Highwayman by Sara Mackenzie Read Free Book Online

his horse in the park not long since, and died of a broken neck, plunging the household into mourning. Despite that, it was decided to go forward with the Yuletide Ball.”
    Melanie cocked her head, and he could see her listening to the laughter and music upstairs, thinking that Ravenswood didn’t sound much like a house in mourning.
    “Major Pengorren is here, too. He was my commanding officer in the army, and has been a pillar of strength in my family’s time of need.”
    “Pengorren? As in Miss Pengorren? Then—”
    She didn’t finish because Sophie, in a pale blue dress, her dark hair elaborately styled on top of her head, came out of the ballroom and down the stairs. Nathaniel found himself looking at his sister through a stranger’s eyes, seeing how young she still was although she’ddeliberately dressed to appear older. The neckline of the high-waisted dress showed off a surprising amount of bosom, and he wondered how his mother could allow it. But, then, his mother was occupied elsewhere these days.
    “Nathaniel,” Sophie said, and smiled her sweet smile.
    He felt a painful stab in his heart, seeing her like this after so long. Although she could not know he had been dead for nearly two hundred years, that he had only returned for the purpose of showing an invisible stranger his family, he felt the moment weigh heavily upon him.
    “Sophie, my dear sister.” He set aside his confused feelings, gathered up his wits. “You’re blooming tonight, a rose in the dead of winter.”
    She giggled, pleased with the compliment, and all of a sudden she was his little sister again, following him about with her constant chatter and gazing up at him adoringly.
    “You look very handsome yourself, sir,” she teased, and stretched up to kiss his cheek. “Although Mama will say you smell of the stable. Why haven’t you changed into your evening wear, brother? Or at least your uniform. A man looks very dashing in a uniform.” He wanted to capture her, hold her, warn her…But he wasn’t allowed to, and she was already moving away, her eyes shining.
    “Speaking of uniforms, the major has promised me a dance, which makes me very special for, as you know, he never dances. Oh, and Sir Arthur Tregilly has drunktoo much claret and is ogling the ladies’ ankles, and Miss Trewin is asking where you’ve got to for the fourth, no, the fifth time.”
    “I can’t help breaking hearts.”
    Sophie giggled again, but perhaps not quite so innocently as before. “I know you can’t, Nathaniel.”
    He hesitated. He was breaking the queen’s rules, but he couldn’t help it. He had to speak. “Is everything all right with you, Soph? You would tell me, if it wasn’t? I’m always here.”
    Except he wasn’t, not when she needed him.
    Sophie looked at him strangely, and then she shook her head. “Silly,” she said, and continued on her way, probably to pass some message from his mother on to the cook.
    Well, so much for brotherly concern. Nothing was going as planned.
    Melanie had pressed herself back against the wall so as not to touch Sophie, and was looking dazed. He took her hand in his again, and this time she didn’t argue.
    “Come on,” he said with quiet desperation, “let’s get this over with, and then you can go home.”

Six
    They were standing outside the room where the guests were dancing. Melanie had always imagined dancing in the nineteenth century to be elegant and restrained, but there was little restraint here. Couples galloped around the room whooping and laughing, and the air was strong with the smells of alcohol, scent, and sweat.
    It brought home to her that these were real people, not cardboard cutouts in a television drama.
    A short while ago she had stood in this room, staring out of the windows at St. Anne’s Hill, and there had been nothing but empty, dusty silence. Now the windows were framed by bunches of green ivy and mistletoe with white berries, and dozens of candles were reflected in the