“Yer’ll ‘ave to stay ‘ere awhile. I got me orders, and I ain’t one ter disoblige when there’s so very much at stake ter line me pockets.”
Kitty rubbed her wrist where his grip had been vice-like. Her skin was red and sore.
“I have a performance to put on tonight,” she told him. Not that she expected that to hold much sway. “Do you know who I am? An actress. People will recognize me. Miss me. They’ll come looking for me. You don’t want to be accused of… of taking me against my will. And if you don’t release me, that’s what you’ll be guilty of.”
But he was already at the door. “I don’t care who yer are, miss. Fact is, I’m bein’ paid ter keep yer ‘ere until further orders. Yer won’t get far.” He nodded toward the open window, with its deadly plunge to the ground, then opened the door, brandishing the key to show her he was about to lock her in. “I dunno what ye’ve done ’n, like I said, I don’t care. I got a family ter look after, ‘n a few coins ter keep yer contained so that yer can answer fer what yer done ain’t a big deal ter me.” He smiled, not unpleasantly, but with a frightening vacancy and lack of empathy. “I’ll send me daughter up wiv a plate ‘o victuals ‘n a loaf ‘o bread. That’ll keep yer until I know what we’re ter do wiv yer.”
“Please, stop!” Kitty ran across the room, but he’d already closed the door firmly behind him and made no response when she banged loudly. “Who has ordered me to be detained here?”
When there was no answer, she ran to the window on the side opposite the river and saw him crossing a muddy courtyard where a few hens pecked at the ground. Even though she shouted through the window, he did not heed her as he mounted the steps to a ramshackle cottage where he was greeted at the door by a dirty-faced toddler before he went inside.
Chapter 26
“I know I married a tyrant, a blackmailer, a philanderer, and a gambler, but I didn’t know I’d married a fool!” Araminta made no secret of her disgust as she glared across the table at Debenham in what would probably be their last drink together.
Alone in the library, he’d just admitted to entertaining that fancy trollop whom she thought had been her friend, but whom she realized had set out to ruin them both.
Araminta drained her glass then slammed it upon the table. “So you have conveniently supplied in one little box every damning secret you ever had to hide. You have nowhere to go, and very soon you will be behind bars. You will be attainted. Your estate confiscated. You will hang, and I will be left with nothing. Not even a noble husband to mourn. Your son will be a penniless nobody, while I will be vilified, and your memory will be blackened forever more. That’s how it is, isn’t it, Debenham? There is no other way.”
He looked ashen, even in the soft candlelight. Vanquished. There was no other word for it.
Her rage was like a ribbon of white-hot fire chasing through her veins. “And all for the dubious delights of a common little actress. You allowed her into your bedchamber; you allowed her access to your secrets. And as a result of your stupidity, you will be known as a traitor. You will be attainted. Yes, let me say that word again! Attainted! All the lands and estates of a traitor are forever forfeited to the Crown. And the second consequence? Corruption of blood; an attainted person can neither inherit property, nor transmit it to his or her descendants. Do you have any ideas on how to save our skins?”
For the first time, it seemed he had no cutting words either.
“So you are simply preparing to die?”
He couldn’t look at her, and his voice shook. “I shan’t let them just take me without a fight.”
“So you’ll run away.”
He shrugged. “What else can I do?”
Araminta raised her eyes heavenward. “I always knew you were a coward, Debenham. After all, it’s the only way you got me to marry you. By coercing me, for you couldn’t have had me if I’d been allowed to make the decision for myself before you seduced me so thoroughly.”
The clock ticked loudly in the silence. Araminta was unmoved by the quaver in his voice. “I’ll be gone before the morning. You can take whatever valuables you can store away so that you and William won’t be completely destitute…” His voice cracked. “I shall miss the boy.”
“And me? Shall you miss me? For I certainly shan’t miss you, Debenham.”
To her surprise, her husband put his hand across the table and rested it upon hers, almost tenderly. “I will miss your fire and spirit.” He raised his eyes to hers. “I’ve always admired that.”
“Even while you’ve tried to vanquish it?”
“I’ve always enjoyed a challenge.”
“But now you can see there is nothing left for you. You’ve ruined yourself, and you’ve ruined your wife and son.”
A small sob escaped him. “If I didn’t have William, I wouldn’t care so much about what happens after I’m gone. But to think that my son will bear the stain of ignominy…that he will be denied what is due to him—the noble title of Debenham and the rich estates that go with it.”
Araminta drummed her fingers upon the table. There had to be a solution. Some way to salvage something of what Debenham had thrown away.
Time seemed to slip away before her very eyes, the hopelessness like a wave that threatened to wash her away.
“I have an idea, Debenham,” she said slowly, as the fire from the second brandy she’d just consumed rather rapidly spread a welcome warmth through her belly, infusing her with inspiration. She leaned closer to him, trembling as it gained a life of its own. “There is some risk to yourself, but I can’t see any other way.”
He didn’t respond. Hope had truly left him, but Araminta was on the cusp of it. She’d always managed to come up with a cunning plan, and this surely was her best yet. “You’re a strong swimmer and you can surely dodge a water wheel. Now here’s my plan which I’m the first to admit is not perfect. It’s just that I can’t see any other way of ensuring that William’s future and fortune remains intact.”
While the morning fire crackled in the grate, a sleep-deprived Silverton and a burning-with-enthusiasm Ralph Tunley focused their attention on the engraved pewter box that sat on the table in front of them.
Stephen Cranborne paced the room behind him, every now and again glancing across at the box, framed by the yellow curtains at his sash windows. “Without a doubt, gentlemen, we have what we need to put our man away for a very long time.”
Silverton wasn’t surprised at the lack of enthusiasm in Cranborne’s tone. What he was surprised at was the degree to which Cranborne’s activities had been documented by Debenham and used against him.
Stephen Cranborne straightened and ran his hand through his light brown hair. He looked older suddenly. And very cornered, as well he might.
“No need to look at me like that,” Cranborne darted a sideways look at Tunley. “You’re thinking more than just that I’d be a thousand plumper in the pocket if I’d confessed my sins to you when you first intimated your suspicions.”
Silverton’s sins were not the only ones clearly outlined in the oblong pewter box. Cranborne had been named as the father to the child most likely to inherit Sir Archie Ledger’s estate. In the biggest shock of all, he’d also been labeled Lady Partington’s lover.
Only Ralph was lily-white compared with Silverton and Cranborne, not to mention a raft of society’s notables whose various affairs and misdemeanors were carefully tallied in the lists Debenham had compiled.
Of course, the elephant in the room was to whom the box should be delivered—to Sir Edward alone? And with its full complement of secrets?
The early morning sun was filtering across the floor, and the question still had not been addressed, when a loud knocking at the door came as a relief. The question could be delayed while a matter of apparent urgency needed attention. Even if it was only a question concerning dinner.
They all turned, and Ralph was the first to step forward as Miss Hazlett flew into the room. Silverton hadn’t seen the young governess for
some time, and then she’d been dressed in drab serge with her hair severely restrained beneath her bonnet. Now, she’d clearly not taken the time to properly dress her lustrous dark locks, which had come undone from their bindings and cascaded down the shoulders of her hastily-buttoned pelisse. Indeed, the top two buttons were not fastened. Miss Hazlett was a young lady of such restraint Silverton wondered what could have prompted such a departure from her usual careful toilette.
“Lissa?” Clearly, Tunley thought the same, but with more alarm judging by his tone.
“Kitty sent this!” she cried, coming to a stop before him in the center of the room and thrusting a piece of parchment at him. “Oh Ralph, she’s been taken. I went to your lodgings, and Mrs. Nipkins sent me here. I beg your pardon, gentlemen, but this is a matter of urgency. Lord Debenham is holding my sister against her will. She’s sent a message to that effect, and beneath it, his Lordship has written that he’s prepared to negotiate in return for her release.”
“Kitty? They’ve taken Kitty?” Silverton felt the air sucked from his lungs as he repeated, “Debenham wants to negotiate?”
“There’s nothing he can negotiate over,” said Cranborne with a frown. “We have all the evidence we need for a case against him.”
“He says he has nothing to lose, and he’ll simply take Kitty with him when he goes. That he’s going to jump into the river, and that if you don’t entertain his demands, he’ll…he’ll kill her.”
It was true. Debenham didn’t have anything to lose. He knew that all the evidence needed to see him hang was there in that little pewter box. He was also vengeful, and he’d know that no court would consider Kitty’s life important enough to haggle with. Besides, there wasn’t time.
“I’ll go.” The others had said nothing, but it had taken Silverton no time at all to come to the conclusion that he’d do whatever was physically within his power to secure Kitty from Debenham. Remorse hung heavily upon him. “I knew I shouldn’t have let her go when she gave me the box last night. Thank God she’s all right for the moment, is all I can say. I’ll go now.”
They all went. However, the others traveled by carriage while Silverton went on horseback once he’d changed into riding clothes.
It was less than an hour to the hamlet named, but he was bone-weary by the time he arrived, for the roads had been half washed away by a recent deluge.
The address had not been familiar to him, and now he found himself before a large flour mill. He had no idea why Debenham might have chosen such a location, except that it was remote. Kitty would not be overheard by curious neighbors.
He saw her from the window before he’d even come to a halt, and his heart seemed to double in size when she smiled her relief; her face a faint and far-off mirage that gave him hope. “Silverton!” She’d barely managed to utter his name before she was abruptly torn from the window, and Silverton threw himself off his horse and ran to the door of the mill.
Kitty was in danger because of him. She’d taken an enormous risk, and it was up to Silverton alone to extricate her from whatever threat was hanging over her head. Debenham had everything to lose, but he was clearly not going to go out without a fight. If Silverton had only thought the thing through better, he ought to have known that he should have put a constant watch over Kitty until Debenham had been brought to justice. What a fool he’d been to have underestimated the importance of everything that had happened in the past twenty-four hours, not least the danger to Kitty. As if she’d not already put herself in mortal danger through her brave act—of folly, some might say—to entice Debenham to his home.
The sound of squelching boots across the courtyard made him turn from his hammering on the mill door, and the miller nodded his head in greeting.
“I eard as ‘ow there’d be someun ter fetch the lass.” He was an enormous fellow with huge meaty fists and a bullet-shaped head poking out of his rough clothing. While he looked menacing, his tone was conversational. “Brother, mayhap? She’s done a grave wrong, I ‘eard. Stole sumfink that wasn’t ‘ers. You ‘ere to give it back fer ‘er return?”
Silverton looked about him. He had to raise his voice above the fast-running river and the clank and creak of the waterwheel nearby. Recent heavy rains had caused a veritable cascade. He wondered why Debenham had chosen this, of all places, to entice Silverton.
And what he had in mind.
It didn’t matter. Silverton just needed to get Kitty out of here, safe and sound.
“That’s what Lord Debenham told you? I need to see Miss Bijou now.”
The miller opened his mouth to reply but stopped at a sound behind him.
“Ah, Silverton, so it was you all along.”
Silverton jerked his head around at the familiar caramel tones as Debenham came into view. As sartorially elegant as ever, his high shirt points seemed to hold up his long neck, almost serpent-like neck it seemed, given that his eyes glittered amber in the morning light.
“I wondered whom Miss Bijou would summon to her rescue. Fool that I was, I believed you were the last for whom she harbored any fondness after you gave her your congé the moment you announced your betrothal to worthy Miss Mandelton.”
“Miss Bijou knows I will always look to her interests and not only in this instance when she has delivered to me exactly what you know will see you rot in prison.”
Debenham looked regretful. “I do curse my stupidity in making it so easy for you, having successfully obfuscated matters for so long. But there it is. You have me, and I could either offer to go peacefully now and accept the inevitable or make you a proposal.”
“You’re not in a position to make proposals.”
“I think I am considering I hold in my hands the life of the woman you apparently love. I had not known that, Silverton. I thought she was a passing fancy. Very lovely, she is, I do agree. I’d hoped to secure her charms myself, but it appears she desires only you. You can imagine I do not hold her in such high esteem having now realized she is the very creature who has ruined me. I would wish her dead. I may be headed that way thanks to her, and I should rather like to take her with me since I have nothing to lose by it. Do I?”
Silverton’s blood ran cold. “Very soon you will be overrun by sheer force of numbers.”
“As I expected. But also as I expected you have come ahead of the pack. You wanted to talk to me because of secrets you wish not to be broadcast. You see, there is room for negotiation.”
“I need to see that Kitty is unhurt.”
“Of course. Let us go upstairs and meet the girl, shall we? Hear what she has to say.” Genially, Lord Debenham invited him inside. It was cold, the temperature having dropped as the rainclouds became more oppressive. The thick walls of the building kept the warmth out and the chilled air in and Silverton shivered, despite his woolen coat.
Yet it was like the sun had burst upon him when the top-story door was opened, and Kitty rose at their entrance, standing in a shaft of light from the window like a sun queen, her hair burnished gold, looking even more beautiful if possible, though he quickly saw the strain in her face when he advanced.
“Kitty!” he cried, hurrying across the floor to take her in his arms. Her warmth and willingness to be embraced were the balm he needed to assuage his guilt. “I am responsible for this,” he muttered. “Dear God, forgive me. Has he mistreated you?”
She shook her head. “No, but the guarantees he wants you to make are impossible.” Clearly, she was trying to hold back her fear. They both knew how vulnerable she was. Evidence that would see Debenham swing was in Government hands now, and Debenham was a vengeful man. He’d have no compunction in killing Kitty for no other purpose than revenge against her and Silverton.
“Enough!” Debenham brought out an elegant silver blade at the same time as he gripped Kitty’s wrist and jerked her out of Silverton’s embrace and into his. With a smile, he drew her back toward the window. “We can both go now if you choose,” he said, indicating the drop to the churning river below
while the paddles pounded their deadly rhythm.
Kitty’s gasp raked across Silverton’s conscience as if Debenham’s blade had already done its work.
“I’m a ruined man and this woman is the cause. She has delivered me to you like a lion to the slaughter, and I want my revenge. Only my complete exoneration will save her.”
The bleak horror in Kitty’s eyes reflected Silverton’s.
“The box is out of my hands. You know that, Debenham. But you are no murderer. Not in cold blood. Not even you could do that.”
“I think I am capable of rather a lot when my life is hanging in the balance. It would give me a great deal of satisfaction, in fact, to take Miss Bijou with me to the grave since I was unable to take her to bed.” He chuckled. “I want what you had, Silverton. And which you threw away.”
A little piece of Silverton seemed to crack and disintegrate. Yes, he had thrown it away. Thrown away his chance of true happiness, by sacrificing Kitty at the altar of respectability and family expectations. And now he would be all but responsible for throwing away her very life.
Very slowly, he stepped forward. The blade was sitting almost gently against the soft white skin of Kitty’s throat. It was a small and deadly knife. Just one neat thrust was all that was needed to end Kitty’s life, and here Silverton was, bargaining Debenham’s life for hers. He’d never felt more powerless. With the box and its secrets out of Silverton’s hands, how could he possibly give promises Debenham knew he was in no position to keep? Secrets he may well not, as far as Debenham was concerned.
“I can bargain for your life if you promise not to harm Kitty. I’m in a position to do that.” Silverton hoped the dread in his voice wasn’t as clear to Debenham as it was to him. Debenham had always fed on fear and dread. Silverton had not had a huge respect for Lady Debenham, but he remembered feeling pity for her on occasion.
“And how can you do that, Silverton?” It was a sneer, and indeed, how could Silverton? He had connections and influence, but he had no means of effecting an outcome any more than Debenham right at this moment.
Lady Unveiled - The Cuckold's Conspiracy (Daughters of Sin Book 5) Page 24
