The Wayward Son

by Warfield, Caroline

Emma beamed at him from the stove. “Almost ready, Robbie. Sit yourself.”

  The urge to grab her by the hand and have it out once and for all shook him. The tug of a small hand in his brought him back to earth. Audrey placed him in the corner of the bench along the near side of the table. The chair on the end, she insisted, belonged to her papa. She climbed onto the bench beside him and shot her brothers a look of triumph for having co-opted the guest of honor.

  What in God’s name am I going to say to these people? He needn’t have worried. The Corbins spoke to, over, and around each other in a steady stream of chatter that included their grandfather and, ultimately, drew Rob into it by some alchemy. He found himself describing parades on the Champs-Élysées, the chandeliers in the Tuileries Palace, and the gardens of Versailles. Ellis blessedly steered conversation away from the boys’ attempts to hear about battlefields, cannons, and gore.

  Through it all, he never lost awareness of Emma’s father, studying him with a steady gaze and occasionally prompting for more information.

  Emma’s savory stew and warm bread disappeared quickly, and her apple tarts brought moans of pleasure. Soon enough, Emma rose and began fussing at her children about dishes that needed clearing and schoolwork left undone.

  Her father, still sitting with Roberta in his lap at the far end of the table, spoke over her. “Robbie, didn’t you want a quiet word with your sister? It’s a warm evening, good time for a walk.”

  “But won’t you want your coffee?” Emma darted a nervous glance at Rob, who had risen to his feet.

  “I’ll make it and see to these rowdies.” Ellis removed his wife’s apron and gave her a little push. “There’ll be coffee when you get back.”

  Rob knew an opportunity when he saw one. He soon had his sister in her cloak and out the door, his hand firmly attached to her elbow.

  “Pleasant evening. Shall we walk by the river?” Her smile wobbled a little.

  “We need to talk. You avoided me last night.”

  A sheepish expression made her shoulders droop. “I didn’t want to speak with Da hanging on our every word.”

  He couldn’t make out her expression in the gloom. Needing to watch her face, he dragged her out of the narrow lane and up the Market Street.

  “Where are you going?”

  “To the Willow. Ellis will keep your father occupied so we can talk.”

  They found the taproom full and a few stragglers in the dining room. After a quick look around, he pulled Emma down the corridor without acknowledging the stares of staff and customers.

  He pulled open the door to Da’s—Emma’s father’s—office and stopped so suddenly Emma bumped into him. “It looks exactly the same,” he muttered. The ledgers lay in the upper-right corner of a battered desk. A cup full of pens sat next to them. Candle sconces with fresh candles still hung at the four corners of the room, adding beeswax to the odor of wood and ink. A round table with two chairs remained in its place by the window.

  “Of course, it does. The man likes things tidy.” Emma followed him without complaining, took a seat at the table, and flashed a bright smile, one a bit too forced for Rob’s peace of mind.

  “What a joy to see you sitting there where you belong, Robbie,” she chirped.

  “Cut line, Emma. What are you up to?”

  Chapter Four

  Emma blinked and arranged her features in innocent surprise. “I can’t think what you mean.”

  Rob reached in his coat and pulled out a wrinkled piece of paper, slapped it on the table, and recited from memory, “Remember brother, you promised to come if ever disaster struck, and I need you. The time is now.”

  He glared at her. “Disaster, Emma? Death, destruction, fire, plague, famine, flood…”

  She sank back into herself, smile gone, brow wrinkled. “Not all disasters come on suddenly. Some creep up on us,” she murmured. “Have you looked at Ashmead? It isn’t the same as you remember.”

  He tried to think what she meant. Rob had seen only two horses in the livery, and no customer had knocked on the door while he spoke to Ellis. Time was Corbin’s Livery would have had half a dozen horses on hand and more hired out any given day. Something in Ellis’s expression kept him from commenting on it. Walking to their house, there had been some boarded-up shops, others in need of paint. The village might not be as prosperous as once it was, but it didn’t appear to be on its last legs either.

  “I can see Ashmead has come on harder times, but I don’t see what that has to do with me.” He leaned across the table toward her. “Emma, if you wrote that letter to bring me back here with some deluded idea I would stay, you’re sadly mistaken. My life is elsewhere. What do you want from me?”

  She breathed in deeply. “I thought—That is, things just keep getting worse, failures leading to more. Ellis says it started with the will. He says less business from the hall started a spiral and—”

  “What will?”

  “The old earl’s.”

  Rob needed a minute to digest it. “The earl is dead?” That means David is the Earl of Clarion. “How long has it been?”

  “You’d know if you read your mail!” Emma glared at him now, clearly irritated.

  I never read mail from Ashmead. For a long time, he had ignored even Emma’s until one Christmas in Lisbon when he grew maudlin over his fellow officers’ cheerful letters from home.

  “You’d know about the will, too,” she went on. “He stripped the estate, and with less and less trade from the hall and fewer visitors, bad times fell on the valley. I thought if you returned, we might turn it—”

  “What does this God-forsaken will have to do with me?” Her rambling irritated him. “Get to the point, Emma.”

  She stared at him as if he were a madman. “You really don’t know, do you? I mean, you ignored Da’s mail and even mine until that note you sent three years ago, but I didn’t think you’d ignore the earl or Mr. Spangler.”

  “Who the devil is Spangler?”

  “The earl’s solicitor. Didn’t he notify you?”

  The day Rob discovered he owed his commission as a lieutenant to the Earl of Clarion, he refused to accept any further interference from the man or his estate. He earned every promotion he got after that, to the disgust of officers who considered themselves his betters. Letters came. He burned them unopened. He studied his sister with narrowed eyes. “Notify me about what?”

  “The will,” she repeated, emphasizing the word with exasperation. “What do you think we’re talking about?”

  “We’re going in circles. What exactly does this will have to do with me? Are you trying to tell me he left me something?”

  He almost missed her next words.

  “Willowbrook. He left you Willowbrook,” she whispered.

  Willowbrook? A vision of the woman, standing proud with her turnips and her musket, washed through him. “No,” he roared, “Hell no.” He reared up, almost toppling his chair, and leaned on the table with both fists. “He can’t make me into some damned landowner to suit his fancy.”

  *

  The next morning, he still struggled to digest what Emma had told him and still had no idea what to do about it. He sure as hell had no desire to confront the new earl. David Caulfield paraded his superiority over the innkeeper’s son their entire childhood. Rob had had enough aristocratic disdain from officers who resented his rise in rank, every one of them in finely tailored uniforms sent from Gieves & Hawkes in London by their titled fathers. He wasn’t about to submit to it in Ashmead.

  But he had to do something. Better, he thought, to avoid the earl and confront Clarion’s man of business, Spangler, who Emma assured him had premises in Nottingham, a half day’s ride from The Willow and the Rose. A cacophony of confused thoughts and emotions rode with him. They couldn’t force him into some landed squire, and he wasn’t about to get mired in Ashmead.

  He tried to forget the hope in his sister’s eyes. Even if he accepted this bequest, what difference would it make to the va
lley? Willowbrook appeared prosperous enough as it was.

  An unpleasant idea wormed its way into his consciousness. The old man apparently left Rob the holding, but if the new earl believed he would never return to claim it, he might have continued to use it as he chose. The woman living there seemed to be on cozy terms with the earl. Is she his mistress?

  The thought of her in David’s bed outraged him. A surge of jealousy flooded him, followed quickly by resentment. Willowbrook is mine. I may not want it, but David can damned well take his sordid affairs elsewhere.

  Rob groaned at his contradictory emotions. I don’t want it. I don’t want some rope tying me to Ashmead, but I sure as hell don’t want the Earl of Clarion using it either. Confusion continued all the way to Nottingham, and Spangler didn’t help.

  The man’s premises, filled as they were with thick carpets, dark paneling, and heavy furniture, struck Rob as the office of a social climber, a sprouting mushroom. Rob felt like washing his hands after the man’s limp handshake and condescending greeting.

  “Baronet? That would amuse the previous earl, I can tell you,” the man oozed, his eyes glittering with some sort of private amusement. Rob didn’t see the humor. “It would explain why our correspondence went awry, wouldn’t it? We addressed plain Lieutenant Robert Benson, and here you are a major, eh, Sir Robert?”

  Something in the way he said Sir twisted Rob’s guts. He stifled the urge to throttle the man.

  “As you see, Spangler. I’m told there was a will.”

  “Yes, yes. You received a generous benefit. No cash, of course, but generous all the same. Biggest of the lot, in fact. More than all the others.”

  “Others?”

  “His lordship left gifts to many.” Again, some private joke lurked in the man’s eyes. His lips twitched as he eyed Rob. The word bastard lurked in silence, at least in Rob’s mind.

  “I presume you’re here to take possession,” the man said, clearly enjoying his authority.

  “I’m here to refuse it,” Rob spat. Even as he said it, a possessive surge of resentment over a Clarion mistress in residence in his property made his mouth sour.

  All good humor drained away, and Spangler’s brows flew up. “Refuse? One doesn’t refuse an inheritance. No. Can’t be done.”

  “Can’t be done?” Rob demanded.

  “Isn’t done,” Spangler clarified.

  “What happens to Willowbrook if I refuse it?” Rob asked, never taking his eyes from Spangler’s changing expressions.

  “I—that is, it would require some research, precedents to be found…”

  So, it can be done. Rob wondered what Spangler gained from his acceptance. The need for a solicitor of his own came to him sharply.

  At his hesitation, the calculative gleam in Spangler’s eyes sharpened. “Can one assume you do not wish to reside on the property?”

  “One can assume anything one wishes. I’m telling you I don’t plan to stay in the valley. What are my options—aside from refusing?”

  Something in Spangler’s avid expression, as if glimpsing an opportunity and weighing his own gain, made the hairs on the back of Rob’s neck stand on end.

  “You might sell it, of course,” the man said smoothly. “I would be happy to serve as your agent in that. You could give it away, but I wouldn’t recommend it.”

  Give it back to the earl? Everything in him rebelled against that. He realized with sudden clarity he shouldn’t have tried to refuse the bequest for that reason alone. Give it to Emma? Maybe. Rent it out? Responsibility for the damned place would trap him as surely as living on it. Selling would probably make the most sense.

  “I have my own agent in London.” It wasn’t a lie. He’d never sold a property, but he’d put a deposit on one the week before. Something about Spangler made his skin crawl. The way his eyes glittered at the thought of the property selling set alarm bells off. Trust Clarion to employ a muckworm to do his business.

  “Hand me the documents,” he said. Did he imagine Spangler hesitated over the papers?

  “Of course. Now, if you sign here…” Spangler slid the last page of a longer document to Rob.

  “All of it, Spangler.” This time the hesitation was obvious.

  “Most of it is legal nonsense, Sir Robert,” the muckworm said.

  “Legal language is never nonsense. All of it, if you please.”

  Spangler pushed the document across the desk with a shaky smile. Rob read it through quickly and raised his hand to sign the last page before innate caution pulled him back. He would have to go over the bequest more carefully and perhaps consult a solicitor.

  When he requested a full copy of the actual will, the man balked. The original resided with the Clarion estate, of course, and it would, Spangler declared, take time to make a fair copy, but perhaps he might supply the applicable portion in a week.

  The solicitor should already have a copy, but Rob didn’t argue. He scooped up the papers and brought the meeting to an abrupt end, to Spangler’s disgust. His own solicitor could view the original.

  Riding back toward Ashmead, he couldn’t shake the sensation that the bequest and the estate involved something more than a simple transaction. It would take some time to ferret out the truth. Anxious as he was to return to London, he would have to stay until he found the best way to get it off his back.

  A sudden need to question the doxie at Willowbrook seized him, and he urged Khalija onward.

  Chapter Five

  Lucy arranged two straw skeps a short distance from the dozen that buzzed with activity, grateful she’d been able to convince Vincent Thatcher to take up the skill over winter. Ashmead’s general store once employed a skepper to keep the valley beekeepers supplied, but opportunity in Devon called him, or so he said, when business dropped off. Vincent’s weren’t as well made, and one listed a bit to the side, but they seemed to be woven tight enough. She wished he had made more. Next year, she’d set Thatcher’s boys to learning the task as well.

  She hoped her bees would find the new skeps attractive when she inevitably destroyed the existing ones, and the bees swarmed to follow their queen to new quarters. Chasing wild swarms took time away from other work. She’d know by summer’s end when she destroyed the older ones to harvest the bees’ produce. A bit of comb in the new skep usually did the trick. She paused at that thought and breathed in the sweet smell of honey and wax in the active colonies. It should be a good year. There would be plenty for Willowbrook and a fair amount to sell.

  I will hold my usual bit back—just wages. If the heir doesn’t put me out before that. Memory of the big man who had ridden up with his puzzling questions dampened her hope.

  Set as it was uphill beyond the Willowbrook stables, between the barn and the apple orchard, the bee yard had always felt safe, a quiet kingdom all her own. She jumped at the unexpected sound of a horse behind her and spun around to see a proud bay with black mane and tail, trotting into the barnyard, as if conjured by her memory. Benson’s nosey son had returned again. None of the claimants had ever intruded into the working area of the farm before.

  He stood in his stirrups and looked up at the bee yard, as if studying what she did. Lucy stiffened her spine, picked up the basket of tools she’d been using, and walked down to confront him. As she approached, he leaned on the pommel, never taking his eyes from her. Something in his insolent gaze heated her skin and set her heart racing. His fiery eyes swept from the battered half-boots she wore for farm work, past her tattered hem, and across her shabbiest day dress. When he frowned directly into her face, she almost tripped but refused to show weakness.

  Who is Robert Benson—baronet and major he may be—to judge how I look?

  “May I help you?” she demanded, chin high.

  He paused for a moment, without answering, and then dismounted.

  “You needn’t dismount. You’ll be on your way shortly.”

  “Will I?” he asked, a sardonic brow rising.

  “You have no place here,”
she said firmly.

  “Oh, I rather think I do,” he replied without breaking eye contact. “And you need to answer a few questions for me.”

  “Any questions you have can best be answered by Spangler in Nottingham.”

  The smile that spread across his face didn’t quite meet his eyes, eyes that held more heat than kindness. “As it happens, I’ve just come from there,” he said.

  Her heart skipped a beat. “Your questions, then, Sir Robert?” she asked, hoping the firmness in her voice didn’t falter.

  Her effort seemed to amuse him, and Lucy felt rather like a mouse under the waiting stare of a sleek cat. “Let’s begin with this,” he said. “What are you doing here?”

  “Setting fresh skeps in my bee yard, as it happens,” she replied evenly, “Not that it is your business.”

  He let out a bark of laughter. “What I mean is, how is it you are living in my house, squatting on my land?”

  Lucy’s heart sank, her worst fears confirmed. The true heir had come at last, and she would be mercilessly put out of her only home. Her stomach clenched, and she desperately hoped she wouldn’t be sick in front of this man. “Your house?” she squeaked, humiliated by the sound.

  He patted the side of his coat. “I have papers here that say Willowbrook is mine or will be once I sign them. Who are you?”

  She clamped her mouth shut, unwilling to answer. Still, he hadn’t signed the papers. She tried to suppress a surge of hope. She feared that defying him would not earn her any kindness.

  “My name is Lucy Whitaker. I live here by the kindness of the Earl of Clarion who has been Willowbrook’s caretaker,” she said at last, through stiff lips.

  The information did not seem to surprise the man, but he curled his lip cynically and snarled. “His kindness appears to have limits. Can’t he dress you better than that?”

  “Dress me?” Lucy gasped. This buffoon thinks that I—that David—That— “You ignorant oaf,” she sputtered, anger driving out caution.

  Her outburst made him blink, and his expression grew thoughtful. “You might choose your words more carefully,” he said. His voice held a fraction of menace, though he spoke softly.