“Do you think,” spoke the gentle voice from the stranger next to her, “you could forgive me for knowing and not telling you? Not today or tomorrow, but eventually?”
“I don’t know.” Her chin trembled, fresh tears pooling. “You cannot imagine what it’s like to feel so betrayed. I thought your family saved me because they were good people. I trusted you because I thought you loved me. Everything has been a lie.”
“Not everything. I do love you. Does that not make a difference? Allow for a hint of forgiveness and understanding?”
Hazel covered her mouth and nose with her hand to stifle the sobs that began to rack her body.
When she felt his hand against her back, she leapt off the chaise. “I need to go home,” she said between gasps of breath. “I need to get away from here. I want Papa.”
Before she risked another look at Harold and lost her resolve, she barreled out of the sitting room and back into her bedchamber, shutting the door behind her.
Chapter 22
Four days. She had only been gone four days. Harold would swear it had been a year.
No one in the house knew the real reason why she left. By some inner strength, Hazel had worn a smile on her departure day, insisting to everyone that she was merely visiting her papa and brother, a casual visit, nothing to raise alarm. Even Sir Chauncey and Lady Williamson thought it a brief coastal trip, either at the behest of her father or from homesickness. It took the Williamsons only three days to arrive to Trelowen after he sent them the request to accompany her. They insisted on taking her and the Dowager Baroness Collingwood in their own carriage, the couple excited for an excuse to go on holiday. Neither asked why Harold was not going.
What his parents and the staff thought about Harold’s reaction to her departure, he could not say, for he had not left his bedchamber in four days. Nay, before that. Except for arranging the travel and seeing her off, he had not left his bedchamber since their talk in the sitting room, one week ago.
He was uncertain if he would ever leave his bedchamber again.
It seemed reasonable to wait until his father declared bankruptcy and invited the collectors to ransack the house for whatever assets they thought would cover the debts. Even then, why leave his chamber? They could not very well take his bed.
Harold stared at the back of his eyelids, an arm draped over his face to block out light and sound. If only it could block out thoughts.
She had not left him, surely. She would return. Their relationship would never be the same, but she would return. Would she not?
Betwixt bouts of grief, he oscillated from anger and guilt. If he had spoken with her sooner, it would not have ended as it did. If he had been the one to tell her the details of the marriage settlement and the family’s financial situation, it might have exonerated him. But then, he was not the guilty party. Like her, he had been a pawn in his father’s greed. He hated his father for putting him in this position, and he railed at her for not trusting him enough to believe his innocence. Did their love mean nothing? How could one love another person but not trust them? The very nature of love meant trust. Did this mean she did not love him after all?
Dark thoughts had absorbed the past week’s nights and days. He was drained. Physically and emotionally, he was drained. He had no more energy to be angry, guilty, or grieved.
Letting his arm flop to his side, he stared up at the canopy of his bed. Devil take it. When had he last bathed? The stubble on his cheek did him no favors.
If he were going to win her back, he could not do it from bed. He would win her back. Or at least try. That was the only way of it. If he did not do something, she would either never return or she would return with a steel trap around her heart, forever distrusting him and villainizing him. If she thought the worst of him, how would he win her back?
Somehow, he had to right their situation. He had to regain her trust. An impossibility from this vantage point.
If he found a way to right his father’s mistakes, would that prove him trustworthy? If he found a way to reverse the percentage of her father’s income, would that prove him trustworthy? If he groveled at her feet and cried like a babe, would that prove him trustworthy?
Whether Hazel could trust him again remained to be seen, but he had only one choice—to act.
What took him a week to accept was that he was not blameless. All this time he had enabled his father. His hands were tied financially, yes, but he had allowed everything to happen with his passivity. Aside from a few mumbled objections, he had never fought his father, never stood his ground or refused to do the baron’s bidding. He had enabled him by obeying the man’s every whim. His father’s wishes had always come first, even at his own personal sacrifice. Obey thy father. To thy father be true. What about himself? What about what was right? Blind obedience could not possibly be what was true or right. If he accepted this blame, the blame of passivity, then he could right the situation by acting in the best interest of his family.
It was not until Sunday that Harold requested to meet with his father. He needed a few days to recover from wallowing. Circles had haunted his eyes. The stench of four days had taken nearly as long to wash. He had notably not wanted to confront his father without a clear plan. This was no idle confrontation but the moment to end all moments, at least for Harold.
He arrived at his father’s study with a hardened heart and a bead of perspiration at the base of his spine. One did not confront his own father lightly.
The study door closed behind him, a quiet but firm thud.
He wrinkled his nose. The room stank of liquor and unwashed body. So pungent, Harold had to swallow down the bile. His own filth of four days could not have compared to this.
Slumped over the desk, glass of brandy gripped in a hand, was his father. The periwig had not moved from its stand. If Harold was not mistaken, it was the same waistcoat and coat his father had been wearing during their last meeting that now adorned the back of one of the chairs in front of the hearth. The man’s white linen shirt was stained with sweat and drink. The baron lifted his head long enough to see Harold had entered the study, then he laid it back on the desk, his forehead resting against the wood.
Harold had never seen his father in this state. For a moment, he questioned if he should confront him now. No, stay on course. Now more than ever his father needed to hear what he had to say.
“Father,” he began, keeping his voice strong and controlled, “I will no longer standby and watch you destroy this family. Your greed has already ruined others and now my marriage. I’ll stand for it no longer. Either allow me to help set the estate to rights or I’m leaving.”
Eugene’s head did not lift, but his shoulders shook with laughter. “As I said. Nothing but a leech. Want me to pay for your living elsewhere, boy? Think again.”
“Actually, I’m going to Cornwall to save my marriage. But once I leave, I will not return. I’ll arrange for a quaint and manageable cottage for Hazel and myself. I have twenty thousand pounds for our survival.”
That lifted his father’s head. The man’s eyes were bloodshot and watery, his skin puffy with red blotches. He swayed trying to maintain an upright position, even while seated.
“What’s this? Where the devil did you get twenty thousand pounds?”
“My wife’s dowry. You may have instructed to use it for the investment, but the dowry was part of the marriage settlement, my marriage settlement. While I didn’t have access to anything else you put towards the investment, I did have legal right to the dowry. Hazel and I will use it to make a new life for ourselves. Away from you.”
“The devil, you say.” Eugene coughed, spittle dribbling down his chin.
“You are a fraudster and a crook, Father. You were not this man when I left for India. I don’t know who this man is, but you’re not the father I once admired. You’ve always taken risks, gambled more than you should,
but you were never cruel.”
The baron’s fist pounded the desk. “I’m trying to save us from ruin! Don’t you see that?”
“No, you’re a gamester just like your father. And it’ll destroy you just as it destroyed him.”
“Don’t you dare compare me to my father,” Eugene sputtered.
“Do you not see it? You’ve surpassed his greed. Once the investors hear they’ve lost their money in this deal, word will get around. Creditors will learn of the loss. They’ll know you can’t pay the debts. You won’t be able to keep them at bay. And if you try a new scheme to steal investor money, you will be hanged for fraud.”
“I’m a baron, boy. I can’t be hanged.”
“Is that a risk you’re willing to take?”
Eugene rubbed his neck with swollen fingers but did not respond.
Harold took a deep breath for renewed confidence. “I’ve seen the accounts, Father. I know them by heart. I can get us out of this predicament if you’ll trust me. Allow me to help. You’ve ignored my advice for too long, and look where it’s led. Either entrust my help or I’m leaving and not coming back.”
The baron finished the remaining liquid in his glass then made to rise for a refill. His legs faltered, and he crumpled back into the chair with an expression of anger and frustration.
Cursing, his father said, “Then leave. Useless boy. Don’t you know your obligation is to me? Your obligation is to be my heir, not follow the call of your tallywacker.”
“No, my obligation as heir is to stop you from harming yourself and others. Listen to me, or I’m leaving.”
“Then begone. I can always sire a new heir.”
Hazel had always imagined she was a Londoner at heart. The wind and sand of the coast, despite the many good memories made with her brother and Agnes, could not boast the sheer fun promised by a bustling city. Soirees, balls, teas, suppers. What more could a girl want? Granted, she had never been to London, but she had dreamt about it many times, anything to escape the humdrum life by the sea.
Thus, it surprised her to spend every day after her arrival to Teghyiy Hall homesick for Trelowen. Helena’s supper parties. Calls on tenants and neighbors. Visits by those same tenants and neighbors. Agnes. Lord Kissinger. The drafty boathouse. Her list carried on. Not the bustling city, but home.
She refused to admit it was Harold she missed. Dishonorable cad.
That he had fallen in love with her made it all the more odious. A simple plan to gain her father’s money had worked out rather well for him. Dratted fiend.
To keep her mind off him—impossible task when his brown eyes haunted both her waking and sleeping thoughts—she spent copious amounts of time whinging with her brother, touring Nana about the area, and playing hostess to Melissa and Sir Chauncey. The talk with her father had been procrastinated. The whole drive home, she wanted to urge the carriage to go faster so she could tell Papa how the villains had tricked and ruined them. Once home, she could not bring herself to say the words. He would be devastated. Lord Collingwood was his childhood friend, a trusted companion. Papa had even entrusted his beloved daughter to the family. This betrayal was unforgivable in her estimation.
So contented was Papa by her visit, she could not tell him.
Until today.
Mr. Cuthbert Phineas Trethow summoned Hazel to the parlor. He opened conversation with questions about life at Trelowen, sharing with her a few anecdotes about spending summers there as a young boy. Lord Collingwood’s great-grandfather, Godfrey Hobbs the fifth Baron Collingwood and builder of Trelowen, was Cornish born and raised and kept his ties to his parish. Those ties remained to this day in one form or another. Mr. Trethow’s father had been close friends with Lord Collingwood’s father, and thus their boys, being of similar age, grew close, as well.
Had Hazel discovered the yew tree he used to climb? He asked. Had she found the secret path through the woods leading to the folly?
Questions of his youth abounded. Hazel enjoyed the stories but had little in the way of answers. One question, however, caught her quite by surprise.
Following a question about her meeting a neighbor he remembered from his youth, he asked, in the same conversational tone, “I don’t suppose you’ve heard any mention of the investment? No trouble if not. Only thought to ask in case something might have been said.”
This was the opening for which she had waited. Now was the perfect opportunity to tell him the family had been duped. Opportunity or not, this was no easy task.
“About that…” she said, committing herself to the admission.
There was more to her hesitation than not wanting to hurt him. This meant harkening back to the scandal, something she had hoped he would have put out of his mind, something that humiliated her even now despite her innocence. Swallowing her pride was the only way, for if she did not speak now, she may not find the courage again.
“I have something to tell you, Papa. Something you won’t like. It pains me to tell you.”
She waited, a tiny hope in her heart that he would instruct her not to speak if it pained her to do so. The reprieve did not come. He waited expectantly.
“I have reason to believe…that is, I overheard Lord Collingwood referencing the marriage settlement. He…you see…he took advantage of the situation and tricked you. He’s not the friend you thought he was. We were both fooled and used for profits.” She took several deep breaths.
Rather than appear shocked or troubled, her father leaned away in confusion. He scratched his chin and said, “Did he mention the investment by chance?”
“Don’t you understand? He’s stolen from us! Whatever is in the marriage settlement, he wanted so badly that he pretended to help us. He was a first-rate rogue, playing the hero when he just wanted the money.”
“So…no mention of a ship? Did India or China come into the conversation?”
Hazel huffed. “You’re not listening.”
Cuthbert waved a hand and leaned an elbow on the arm of his chair. “Yes, yes, it was a good settlement, but what of the ship?”
“I don’t know,” she said, exasperated. “All I heard him say was that the investment had gone wrong so what a saving grace he had the Teghyiy income to depend on and the fee tail. What was in the settlement, Papa?”
Pensive, he stared unseeing, then mumbled, “Gone wrong, you say?”
“Yes. Was that the deal you talked about on our drive to Devonshire? Oh, Papa, what did you put in the settlement? Has he truly ruined us?”
Cuthbert rubbed his cheek absently, paying her no mind. She thought he had not heard her. He stared. He harrumphed. He stared.
“Papa?”
The truth of what Lord Collingwood had done must have taken a toll. Her papa leaned back against the chair and closed his eyes. She knew this would not be an easy task and had not wanted to hurt him, but the hurt was inevitable. No one wanted to be betrayed by those they trusted.
“Is there no way of reversing the settlement? Taking him to task somehow?”
Cuthbert rolled his head her direction. “Settlement? What settlement?”
Hazel blinked. “The marriage settlement. Everything he stole from us.”
He rubbed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. “That investment was to be the making of us. I did what I needed to do to be part of the deal.”
“No, he tricked you. This is his doing. Whatever you lost in this deal is his fault.”
He waved a hand then covered his eyes, his words muttered, almost flippant. “Nonsense. If anything, I tricked him.” He muttered again, unintelligibly, then leaned forward in his chair with frustrated animation. “You’ve no idea how badly I wanted this deal. It was to be the making of us!”
Eyes wide, she stared at her father, trying to sort out what he was saying, what he was implying.
“I can only hope you misheard,” he cont
inued. “Investment gone wrong could mean anything. I’ll write to him tonight, get the truth of it. This deal is everything! The wealth, Hazel, the wealth! The settlement was nothing. A fee tail for your first boy to inherit the estate if Cuthbert Walter doesn’t have a boy, which of course he will, so more the fool Collingwood, plus a trifle portion of the annual income, all to convince him to marry you to his son. He couldn’t refuse my capital if you were married to his son. A clever plan. All the money we could have. All the money. A deal to end all deals.”
“My marriage was your trickery?”
“Genius, yes? You know how badly I wanted that marriage. With a sweep of my signature, I secured both the marriage and the investment.”
“But you’ve given away everything! What of my brother’s inheritance? What of the money you put towards my dowry?”
His answers were muttered again. Her father could not be bothered with her. She saw that now.
The fifteen additional minutes she stayed in the parlor, wheedling answers from him, proved disheartening. She heard enough to understand the contents of the settlement and what the loss of the investment would mean to their finances and to her brother’s future—something she normally would have urged Harold into helping secure out of their vast wealth and the kindness of her husband’s heart, but that was hardly possible now, not when they were paupers. She heard enough to understand her father’s role, or what her father thought his role had been.
Betrayed anew. Betrayed by her own father. In her naivety she had thought the two families worked together to save her from ruin because they cared. In the end, it was only about the greed of two men, each thinking to outdo the other to invest in some ridiculous financial venture. The two had used their children to achieve their goals.
After hearing the tale from her father, as much as she could ascertain anyway, she now realized only one person had stepped in to help her.
HeirAndEnchantress_PGolden-eBooks Page 26
