To The Rescue. Jean Barrett

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СКАЧАТЬ Halting the car, Jennifer found herself looking across a valley at a steep-sided, craggy peak. The last faint light of day streamed down on the summit where, looking as though it had been carved out of the rock itself, the castle perched, like a great sailing ship in a turbulent sea.

      No introduction to that medieval pile could have been more dramatic.

      Sitting there, gazing at the structure, it seemed inconceivable to Jennifer that such a formidable fortress could contain anything so benevolent as a monastery. But that’s exactly what the castle housed, and had for centuries.

      Guy had told her how Warley had come to be occupied by the brothers, but she didn’t want to remember the story now. The very thought of Guy awakened the shock of his death, and with it a rush of fear and anguish.

      As though triggered by those dark emotions, the wind rose again while overhead the clouds closed the gap. With the pale light vanished, the castle became a mass of black stone, grim and forbidding.

      The curtain of snow also descended again by the time Jennifer reached the turning on the floor of the valley. The little Ford valiantly climbed a twisting lane through banks of snow that threatened to soon block the way. With the engine straining, it seemed to take forever to crawl to the top of the rise where the castle loomed in front of them.

      Made it, she thought thankfully as the car finally chugged through the portal of a massive gatehouse that once would have been barred by a lowered portcullis.

      Swinging into the bailey, Jennifer brought the car to a stop and got out. The place was dim, with only a single lantern burning on one of the walls. But its light was sufficient enough to guide her to a heavy oak door. There was a chain suspended beside the door. She tugged on it, and from somewhere inside a bell clanged hollowly.

      As she waited for a response, she looked over her shoulder where she had left her passenger in the car. There had been neither sound nor movement from him since they had left the glen.

      Her mind was on him, wondering if he would recover, when the door scraped open. Head swiveling, she was startled by the sight of a robed figure standing in the shadows of the archway, his face hidden in the depths of a cowl.

      An ancient castle, flickering light, a mysterious figure. It was the stuff of Gothic legends. But even before he spoke to her in a gentle voice, Jennifer knew she was being foolishly imaginative. There was nothing diabolical here. And of course he wore a robe with a cowl. This was a monastery, after all.

      “What is it?” he inquired kindly. “Have you lost your way in the storm?”

      “Please, I need your help. I have an injured man in my car, and I think he may be in a bad way.”

      Chapter Two

      Heat radiated from the glowing core of the peat fire. Huddled on a stool close to the wide hearth, Jennifer tried to keep warm without scorching herself.

      There was apparently no central heating in the castle. Either funds didn’t permit it, or the good brothers were obeying a spartan existence dictated by their order.

      The room they had given her was a testament to that. Its thick stone walls were unadorned except for a plain wooden cross. The furnishings were sparse and simple, though the bed looked comfortable enough even in the poor light. There was a single lamp on the bedside table, which made her think that the electricity must be limited to essential uses. But even with the menacing shadows in the corners, Jennifer was glad to be out of the storm, which had worsened since her arrival. She could hear the snow being driven against the window by a raging wind that battered the ancient walls.

      Looking up from the fire, she cast a nervous glance in the direction of the closed door that connected her room with the one that adjoined it. Jennifer wondered what was happening behind it.

      “We’ll let you know as soon as Brother Timothy has examined him,” she had been assured.

      The monks assumed she was concerned about her unconscious passenger who had been installed in that other room. Although it was true that his condition mattered to her, they didn’t know that she was equally worried about his identity.

      She had sacrificed an opportunity at the scene of the accident to search him, suppressing her longing to know who he was. Since he could be in a critical state, it had been far more important to get help for him without wasting a moment of time.

      Jennifer regretted that lost opportunity now because she still knew nothing. She was certain of only one thing, that the man she had rescued was no one she had ever met before.

      But whoever was with him now might be learning not just his identity but why he’d been pursuing her. And if he was carrying anything on him that implicated her in Guy’s murder, then—

      Jennifer started at the sound of a knock on the hall door. Leaving the stool, she crossed the room to answer it. When she opened the door, a tall, almost gaunt figure stood there in the dimness of the passage. The habit he wore of coarse, undyed sheep’s wool identified him as one of the brothers. He bore a tray with covered dishes on it.

      “I’ve brought you some supper,” he said. “If I might come in…”

      “Please.”

      She stood aside in the doorway. He glided on sandaled feet into the room where he paused to look around.

      “In front of the hearth, I think. If you’ll just hold the tray for me, I’ll drag the table there into place.”

      She took the tray from him, watching him as he drew a small table over to the fireplace. When he’d placed a chair at the side of the table, he recovered the tray from her and carried it to the table. Satisfied with the arrangement, he turned to her.

      “I hope you don’t mind eating in your room. We do have a dining parlor for our guests, and tomorrow you’ll be able to have your meals there. But what with the weather and all, we’re in rather a muddle tonight. This seemed to be the most expedient way of seeing to it that you didn’t go hungry.”

      “I don’t mind in the least. I’m just grateful to be here at all.”

      “Yes, I understand you had rather a bad time of it out on the road. It’s Miss Rowan, isn’t it?”

      “That’s right, Jennifer Rowan.”

      “I’m Father Stephen, the abbot of Warley Monastery.”

      Jennifer was surprised by his identity. She wouldn’t have expected the abbot himself to serve her like this. Nor was there anything about his robe, except perhaps for the heavy cross that dangled from the cord around his waist, to distinguish him from the other monks.

      He must have sensed her confusion. “This was an opportunity for me to meet and welcome you to Warley,” he explained. “I’m sorry I was unable to come to you sooner, but there were other matters that needed my attention. Have they made you comfortable?”

      “They have,” she assured him, though he needn’t have concerned himself.

      The brother who had answered the bell in the courtyard and the monk he’d summoned to help him, had been efficient from the moment of her arrival. Taking charge, they had managed between them to move both her and her unconscious passenger into the area of the castle reserved for guests, delivered their luggage to the connecting СКАЧАТЬ