Gideon could not believe that his father had anything to be ashamed of. How, then, to account for this sudden sick feeling coming over him?
“That is a price we will have to pay.” He reached with his left hand to take hold of Henry’s collar to haul him to his feet, but the other man moved quickly, too. He grabbed Gideon by his neckcloth and pulled his face close.
“Look at me, St. Mars!” He bared his teeth in a vicious snarl. “Look at my features—and pretend you do not see.”
A sudden motion in Gideon’s mind—like the raising of a window—an awareness that those hawk-like features should have brought him years ago—made Gideon recoil. His pulse began to race.
They were locked in a deadly grasp, two faces bared in the candlelight, Gideon’s sword forgotten, although its point still threatened James Henry’s throat.
Look at me, he had said, as if the answer was written in his face.
Gideon looked, and he saw his father’s craggy eyebrows—thinner and tamer because they adorned a younger man. He saw his father’s light brown eyes.
And there were other signs, too—in the determination he knew they both possessed, in the anger they both had failed to control, and in sheer physical strength. It did not matter that James Henry was square and Gideon slight, or that he lacked James Henry’s restraint. He could no longer ignore the traits staring back at him. And he wondered how he had been so blind all of these years.
But James had never let on, and their father, who should have told him, had kept his older son a secret while bringing him steadily into the family.
Now Gideon knew the reason for those quarter-day payments. Lord Hawkhurst had seen fit to make an allowance to his bastard son, the eldest boy, who would never inherit his father’s fortune.
And if the shock in James Henry’s expression meant what Gideon thought it did, he had believed that Gideon had known all along. Had known—and had ignored him.
How he must have hated him, the brother who would not acknowledge him, who treated him like a servant, no matter how politely.
And mistrusted him, too. For Gideon realized his jealousy must have shown. He had begun to resent his father’s preference years ago, but he had never known why. Now that he did, he did not know what to make of his behaviour.
In the same instant, the two men released their holds. Gideon removed the point of his sword from James Henry’s throat.
“I did not know,” was all he could manage as he moved backwards off the bed.
James lifted his fingers to the wound on his neck. The cut had already clotted. Soberly, and with a pallid face, he raised himself to sit and felt for the wound again. “I find that hard to believe,” he said.
“It is true, nonetheless. You have not answered me. Did you kill our father?”
His verbal acknowledgement took James aback even as he protested, “I would ask you the same! You had more reason to do it. Why should I?”
“I don’t know.” Confusion was making mincemeat of his brain. Now that one of his suspicions had proved false, he felt so tired. Besides the lateness of the hour and the strain of his climb, he felt as if the breath had been knocked out of him.
“Who was your mother?”
If James was surprised by his change of subject, he did not show it. “She was a refugee.”
“A Huguenot?”
“Yes. From the merchant class. My grandfather lived near your estate of St. Mars. That was where our—our father met her. Later, at Versailles, he began to suspect that Louis would revoke the Edict of Nantes and attack the Huguenots. He persuaded my grandfather to bring his family to England. They opened an inn with the money they had taken out of France. It was when they came to England—when she was grateful—that our father seduced her.”
Gideon winced, as much from the bald way in which it had been stated as from the word itself. “Is she still alive?”
“No. She died in the last smallpox. I was not with her. My lord had already sent me to be instructed to become his receiver-general.”
Hating to meet his half-brother’s eyes, but determined to meet them, Gideon raised his gaze before asking the painful question. “Did you ever talk? You and my father? Did he explain why he did not marry your mother?”
James Henry shrugged in a gesture that betrayed his Gallic blood, his expression a careful blank. “I had already heard the explanation from my mother. We were not wealthy enough. My mother had no dowry to tempt an earl. There was also our religion.” He gave a laugh.
“He gave me my name, though. He insisted I should be called after the Pretender.”
Gideon understood the irony that tinged his laugh. Their father had insisted on naming his son, but had not cared enough about him to marry his mother or to acknowledge him. Lord Hawkhurst’s excuses were the ones that any noble would have used. Their code of honour extended to men, seldom to women. He wondered if James had been able to accept the reasons as easily as their father had.
“He never spoke to you of this?”
“Not until he lay dying. I tried to get him to name his assailant, but his mind was wandering. All he would say was that he had injured the man.” His gaze shifted to Gideon’s shoulder, then to his face, and his eyes grew hard.
“I did not kill him.” Gideon fought a spurt of rage. After a moment, he went on, “What else did he say?”
“He told me that he had transferred this house into my name and that his will would insure me a living as receiver-general to his heir.”
“Did he leave no words for me?”
“None.”
His cold answer, delivered with a satisfaction he did not even attempt to hide, filled Gideon with an anguish he could hardly bear.
He gripped his sword. The impulse to slash at something became so fierce, he almost gave into it now. But a change in his brother’s expression stopped him.
James was staring at him angrily, as if the emotion he read in Gideon’s face had confirmed his worst suspicions.
Gideon’s fury collapsed. He tried to speak, but frustration clogged his throat.
He stood immobile, until he finally managed to say, “I loved my father. I would never have harmed him. I know he was angry, but I would not let him keep me from marrying the woman I love. He understood there was nothing he could do to stop me. So, you see, I had no motive.”
Reading nothing on his brother’s face—neither belief nor condemnation—he did his best to conceal the emotions that were eating him alive. Slowly placing his sword in its sheath, he started backing towards the door.
“With your permission, I shall let myself out. I had rather not leave by the way I came in.”
James’s relief showed in the slight relaxation of his posture.
Gideon said, “I have taken some money from the chest at the Abbey. You will find my signature for it in your book. When I need more, I shall either apply to you, or find a way to take it myself.”
His statement was a challenge, but his receiver-general—his brother—answered not a word.
Disappointed—for he had hoped for a small sign that his brother believed him—Gideon hardened his heart. With insolent grace, he swept James Henry a bow, grasped the door latch behind him, and fled from the room.
He took the stairs in leaps, afraid that James might take the opportunity to aim a pistol at his back.
And other demons were there, nipping at his heels and howling in his ears.
Once outside, he searched quickly for Tom, but Tom had heard his fumblings with the front door and had ridden around to meet him. Gideon spied him coming around the side of the house.
He snatched at Penny’s reins.
“What happened in there, my lord? I was about to go in after you.”
“I’m all right. But we should leave. And fast.”
Tom held his tongue, and soon they were galloping north. Back to the Fox and Goose. As their pace slowed to a walk and they began the long, twisted journey through the Weald, Gideon’s thoughts were as dark as a blacksm
ith’s pit.
He should not care that his father had used his last few moments of breath to console his other son. He should not care that another son existed or that another woman had once tempted his father’s heart.
He should not care that his father had left him ignorant of this. Or that his brother would accuse him of murder now.
But the expression in James Henry’s eyes when he had seen the anger welling inside him would haunt Gideon all the way back to the inn and through his tortured sleep.
On the following afternoon, Hester Kean found herself at the Theatre-Royal in Drury Lane, acting as Isabella’s chaperone. Mrs. Mayfield, who normally would have reserved this pleasant duty for herself, had taken to her bed with a nervous cholic. Hester had dosed her with a potion of her own, a mixture of Dr. Stephen’s water and powder of rhubarb, but Mrs. Mayfield had felt no relief. With a great sense of ill-use, she had pressed Hester to take her place so that Isabella would not be made to forego the delights of the theatre when she had suffered such a cruel blow. That very morning, the Duke of Bournemouth had announced his engagement to the daughter of a German prince.
The disappointment seemed not to have crushed Isabella, for she was enjoying a spirited flirtation with Lord Kirkland, their host. His footmen, dispatched in the forenoon to hold their places, had managed to secure this box on the stage. So they were looking down on the actors in comfort, while the majority of patrons elbowed each other in the pit. Like the fops in the neighbouring box, Lord Kirkland had spent a great deal of his time grooming his shoulder-length wig with an embellished ivory and tortoise shell comb, in order to attract the ladies’ admiration. The lustrous female hair, which surely must have come from France, would have cost him all of three hundred pounds. He suitably lavished it with as much attention as he gave the flimsy piece of lace that failed to cover Isabella’s breasts.
Hester had found the pair’s conversation, which consisted chiefly of Lord Kirkland’s lewd suggestions and Isabella’s giggle, scarcely bearable. As a chaperone, she was a failure, for her presence had proved no deterrent to their vastly unbecoming behaviour. Since Hester was certain, though, that her aunt would not have her interfere with Isabella’s fun unless their host’s advances surpassed the conduct of his neighbours’, she had said nothing as yet. She had derived her only pleasure in the evening from the play itself.
And she had enjoyed it, despite the double entendres and the lewd gestures which had provoked shouts and guffaws from the pit, for coming from a country village, she had never been treated to plays or spectacles. Improper conduct and rude notions were several times more amusing on stage than they were in real life, perhaps because the author devoted more wit to his lines. Unfortunately, most of the audience, including Lord Kirkland, failed to perceive the difference between the cleverness on stage and the foolishness in their chairs.
Was it too much to ask for a kindred soul who would also prefer such goings-on to be kept in private? Hester closed her eyes and her imagination took her away from the rowdy scene. She escaped to a place where ignorance and vanity had no place.
She became so engrossed in a vision of an elegant stone house and a husband who treated her with affection and conversed with sense, that she forgot her duty, until Lord Kirkland’s low, insistent tone pulled her back.
“Just one, my angel. That’s all I ask. Just one touch of your hair. Your cousin has drifted asleep. No one else will see.”
“No, you mustn’t. Oh—!”
Isabella’s gasp, instead of the firm no Hester would have preferred to hear, caused her to open her eyes. Lord Kirkland had possessed himself of a lock of Isabella’s hair. And while he stroked it, the back of his fingers stroked her breast.
Breathing in heavy gasps, like a footman towards the end of a race, Isabella seemed frozen in place, her eyes wide as coachwheels. And she did nothing to stop him.
Grinning at her enraptured expression, Lord Kirkland moved to work his hand inside her dress.
Hester sprang to her feet. “If you will excuse us, my lord, Isabella and I must go.”
Lord Kirkland snatched his hand from beneath Isabella’s lace, but where he had touched her, she glowed a pleasured red.
Hiding his annoyance, his lordship made Hester a mocking bow. “It shall be as you say, Mrs. Kean, but I regret the hour that takes Mrs. Mayfield away. I hope to be granted more of . . . the pleasures of her company very soon.”
His look was full of meaning. Isabella’s mother might encourage her to flirt, but she would be furious if she learned that Isabella had behaved so freely with Lord Kirkland. Though a peer, he had little to recommend him but a title. His debts were said to be as legendary as his estate was scant. Mrs. Mayfield would have to be desperate before she would allow Isabella to take him for a husband. Even Mr. Letchworth, who had recently resumed his attentions, would be a preferable catch in her eyes.
Creditors were now almost constantly at her door. With her excessive spending to enhance Isabella’s charms, Mrs. Mayfield had come near to ruining herself. It had taken all Hester’s tact and management to persuade the most importunate tradesmen to accept the small bits she could pry from her aunt’s tight fist. The merchants in the Strand had refused to extend her any more credit, so Isabella had been reduced to retrimming her gowns.
Hester gave no hint of these thoughts as she draped her cousin’s cloak over her shoulders, but she kept a sharp eye on the pair as they exited the box.
As they made their way through the anteroom, a bustle in the corridor ahead drew their attention. Sir Harrowby, who had paid them a visit between acts, had just emerged from his box. A group of his friends had collected around him, as he read the note a messenger had brought.
As they passed him, an oath escaped his lips.
“What’s towards, Harrowby?” one of his companions asked as they jostled each other, trying to hear.
Turning pale, he stammered out words that quickly spread. They reached Hester and her party before they went out the door.
Lord St. Mars had been arrested for his father’s murder.
Isabella gave a shocked gasp. But Hester could not utter a sound. Her heart seemed to have stopped inside her chest. She felt no air in her lungs, no blood in her veins. Nothing but a terrible stillness and an ache that seemed to stem from her head.
Aware that she could not give in to distress here at the theatre, she forced herself to breathe. The stale scent of perfumed bodies nearly choked her, but she pulled herself outside, past Sir Harrowby’s friends who were congratulating him on his certain inheritance of the Hawkhurst title and lands.
He seemed dazed, whether by good fortune or grief, she could not tell.
Outside the air was hardly better with the stench of refuse and coal smoke, but at least it was free of the heavy perfumes the ladies and gentlemen wore. Hester declined Lord Kirkland’s improper invitation to show them his collection of curiosities and insisted that he call chairs to carry them home, pleading an indisposition of her own.
Leaving him to deal with the quarrelsome chairmen, she saw Isabella into one chair, before taking another. With her curtain closed, Hester could finally relinquish her pretense of calm. She buried her face in one hand and tried to weep, but her stunned mind denied her that relief. The tears that might have soothed her remained painfully lodged in her throat.
They were still there when she and Isabella arrived at Mrs. Mayfield’s house. As Hester descended, she saw that Lord Kirkland had used the unchaperoned minutes to his advantage. He had walked the whole way beside Isabella’s chair. Whether or not he had kept his hands outside the curtains, which Hester doubted, he had somehow managed to provoke more breathless blushes from her cousin. Still feeling stunned, Hester could hardly muster the strength to be annoyed, not when she desperately wished for the privacy of her own room to reflect on what could be done to help St. Mars.
Mrs. Mayfield had been waiting to hear a report of their evening. She intercepted them at the top of the stairs.
/> “Well, my dearest,” she said, palely anxious now that the Duke was out of play. “Did you enjoy yourself? Did you meet with any interesting gentlemen?”
“Oh, yes, Mama.” Isabella concealed the excitement that had aroused her that evening. “Everyone was there. Sir Harrowby paid us a visit to Lord Kirkland’s box, and he brought two very handsome gentlemen with him. Their clothes were as fine as anything I’ve ever seen.
“And Lord Kirkland was so good to us. You would have enjoyed yourself, Mama. I am certain I did.”
Mrs. Mayfield missed the subtle hint. She ignored the reference to their host and fixed instead on her intended target.
“Sir Harrowby paid you a visit? Did he seem well? Had he any recent news from Rotherham Abbey?”
Hester had hoped to conceal the news from her aunt, at least until tomorrow. She did not think she could bear to hear her speculate on how this would affect Isabella’s chances. But Isabella was quick to latch on to the change of subject.
“Oh, yes! He had a message from there just as we were leaving. A man must have ridden all the way from Hawkhurst to tell him. Lord St. Mars has been taken up for murder, Mama!”
Hester found she couldn’t tear her gaze away from Mrs. Mayfield’s face. Where there should have been shock, she revealed a sense of deeply felt relief. Suddenly, her pallor was gone, along with the pinched look she had worn of late. In her glowing eyes, hope triumphed again.
“Thank God,” she said, not bothering to hide her greed. “First thing tomorrow, I shall write Sir Harrowby a note. We will invite him to call on us immediately. Isabella, you must wear your most becoming gown, the Pudsway silk with the silver lace. I will dress your hair myself. We must be ready to receive him at any hour.”
Hester couldn’t bear to hear her aunt’s plans now. “If you will excuse me,” she said, “I will leave you both. Good night, Isabella . . . Aunt.”
“Come into my room,” Mrs. Mayfield said to her daughter, ignoring Hester. She pulled Isabella through the door behind her. “I will tell you what you need to do.”
They disappeared inside.
The Birth of Blue Satan Page 17
