The remaining text on the paper read, “hand in marriage will bring the small island to me as my wife’s property. Once I have gotten an heir on her, we shall be able to put all in train. You need worry no farther, Cottleroy’s debts will keep him in line, and the small island will do nicely for extending our base.”
No wonder Goldstone had been livid that his boot had been savaged. Had he placed this paper there as a message to someone? Or had it fallen into the boot by accident? Island? Her island? It was unthinkable! Her property, her body—it was as if she was of no greater worth than the torn paper.
She blew out the candle, and lay down once more. Was her father auctioning her off to pay off some paltry debts? Or was there some other significance? The traitorous tears trickled from her eyes once more.
Trapped, enslaved and blocked at every turn. Oh, please God, keep me from marrying Lord Goldstone.
Chapter 11
Roger sat at his breakfast table puzzling through the events of the previous day. He wanted to call on Lady Dahlia but wasn’t sure what excuse he could offer. Perhaps, a discreet inquiry to her brother? Ordinarily, he and Bochil didn’t move in the same circles since the latter was a few years younger and had not entered the military. But those were the circles in which he needed to move if he were to carry out Major Tomlinson’s request.
There was also the mounting pile of operating expenses. How was it that the townhouse was suddenly accruing more costs than it had a week ago? Or had it been operating at a deficit all this time, and he had been unaware of it? He had brought only himself, Herbert and four more staff. That should not have so deeply increased the expenses. He would have to speak with Aunt Garrity and get to the bottom of this. She had always seemed to be a frugal woman. Perhaps there was more to Uncle Deacon Garrity’s penury than the threadbare simplicity of his limited income.
He sighed. The eggs and shaved ham on his plate had less appeal than when he loaded them up. Life had been much simpler when all he had worried about had been fencing and pugilism practice in the mornings, exercising his horses in the afternoon, picking up a game of cards or a light dalliance with an opera singer or dancer in the evening. But that was what had, in part, brought him to this pass. He sipped his strong tea and scooped up a forkful of eggs.
I’ll send the footman around to Bochil, look in on the gentlemen who sent cards, and then perhaps call on Lady Amory. Best to begin where I have a foot in the door.
He must find an excuse to see Lady Dahlia again. There were no guarantees that she would receive him, but she had not seemed to find him repulsive. And he found her delightful.
“I have been an idiot,” he remarked aloud to his eggs. “Now I shall pay for it.”
“Oh, it is not so bad as all that, Nephew.” Aunt Garrity entered the room.
“Aunt! Just the person I want to see.” Now that he had begun, he found it hard to go on. How did you ask a genteel lady about household expenses?
“And I’ve been wanted to speak with you, Nephew. Your young cook is hard pressed to produce dinners that are up to standard on the supplies that are in the house, and part of the fodder in the stable was moldy and had to be replaced.” Aunt Garrity loaded her plate with an astonishing amount of food for so spare a woman. “Your housekeeper in residence has been surprisingly lax. Did you not even call here in the last two years?”
“I lived at my club,” he said woodenly. “There was nothing here for me.”
“I suppose,” his aunt said, “that is understandable. And it would not do to let the place stand empty. Did you not think of letting it? Houses in town are quite dear, and you could have realized no small amount of income from it.”
“I honestly didn’t think of it. Who would have wanted it? Most of the peerage have their own houses.”
“Oh, any number of people, really. Not everyone with a daughter to present or business within the city has their own house. Some would have been glad of it just for the prestige of the location.” She sipped her tea. “Really, Nephew, it is high time you were thinking about your responsibilities. I’m surprised that Mr. Sharp did not take you to task sooner.”
“I suppose that you can explain, then, why the expenses for this house have risen sharply in the less than the two days that we have been in residence.” He kept his tone level, doing his best not to snarl at her.
“I can. First, you are in residence, so the tradesmen who would have normally sent their bills to Mr. Sharp have brought them here. Second, the state of the pantry was little better than that of the corn bins in the stable. It is a miracle the staff have not poisoned themselves or fallen ill of starvation in the last few months.” Aunt Garrity buttered a soft roll and devoured it with rapt attention.
“Aunt, I came here to see if I could better my fortunes. Will there be an end to these added expenses or should I expect this rate of expenditure to continue?”
His aunt sighed. “A house does not run on air, Nephew. However, the larder is now restocked, and so are the stables. We should do well enough for a week or two, although the linens are in a sad condition. They can be washed and aired, but the mice have been at them and several of the sheets will be good for nothing but rags, although others can be mended and used. It will give the housemaids something to do in their spare time.”
“I can easily sleep on mended sheets, Aunt Garrity. Please keep the expenses down. We are not entertaining, so we need not have lavish meals. Simple fare will do nicely. I am not an epicurean.”
“Very well, Nephew. I’ll instruct the cook to prepare country meals. Will you keep town hours or country hours?” She folded her lips primly as if to keep more bitter words inside them.
“Town hours, unfortunately. I have some things to attend that will require my attention, and I will need to conform to other peoples’ schedules.” Roger pushed his plate back, his appetite, such as it was, quite gone. “I’ll be making morning calls today. Please forward the bills to Mr. Sharp and ask him to send me an accounting.”
Perhaps they would have said more, but just then the butler came to the door of the little dining room. “Your Grace, the stableman would like a word, if he may.”
Roger sighed. If one of the team was lame, it was best that he should hear about it now.
The stableman came in, bowed low, tugging at his forelock in the old country style. “Sorry to be disturbin’ Yer Grace,” he said, then stood, turning his cap around and around in his hands. “But I thought ye should know afore you drove out anywheres today.”
“I am listening,” said the Duke.
“Yer Grace, some’un put burrs under the roans’ harnesses. The girls were right fretted when they were brought in.”
“You are sure of that?” Roger asked, with some alarm.”
“Deed I am, Yer Grace. An’ right sorry I am to be bringin’ such news.”
“No, no. You did quite right. The mischief must have been done while young Bochil and I were escorting his sister to do her shopping. I will come look at them directly, and I will take one of the stable lads with me today so that I am not leaving the pair in the hands of strangers.”
* * *
Roger held his anger in check with some difficulty as he ran his hands under the mares’ harnesses, noticing the little raw spots where the groom had rubbed liniment over the small wounds. He noted with approval that the harnesses had been carefully padded at each place so that it would not rub and irritate the sore spots. “I am so sorry, girls,” he murmured to the horses, “So sorry. I should have known you wouldn’t misbehave so without cause.”
“We found it right away, Yer Grace,” the stable boy said nervously. “You din’t drive real fast, so they didn’t take no harm, nor not much anyways.”
“I’m grateful for the care taken,” the Duke said. “I am just sorry I did not stop the curricle and check them when they started shying at the shadows on the cobblestones.”
Just then Herbert clattered down the side steps. “Ah, good! I’ve caught you before you leave
,” he said. “Your Grace, I’ll be your tiger today. You can dismiss the boy.”
“Herbert! I would not presume!” Roger looked quizzically at his valet.
“No, but I would. I’ve just heard what happened yesterday to the mares. You will not go out with no more than a child to guard your back today. You have angered someone, Your Grace.”
“A rival for the hand of a maiden most fair, Herbert. Or at least I think that is the cause.”
“Love and war,” Herbert said. “The two are often most perilously entwined.”
“I fear you might have the right of it, my good friend. Well, you had my back on Napoleon’s bloody fields; I shall think no less of you for wanting to guard that same back in London town.”
“It would seem that the field of battle is no less bloody here, Your Grace, than it was in France. If you had needed to drive much farther, the mares would have bolted in pain and fear. Poor girls, they’ve never been treated so in all their tender lives.” Herbert gently patted the sleek neck of one of the horses. “Someone wished to do you serious damage.”
“Come on up, then, Herbert. I will tell you all about it. For it seems that there might be several things afoot, and you’ll help me best if you know the whole of it.”
Roger gave the horses a few final pats and fed them each slivers of apple he had taken from the breakfast sideboard. The two men then mounted the curricle, Roger on the seat and Herbert taking the perch behind. In a few quick words, Roger laid out the situation.
“Let me see if I have the s straitof it, Your Grace,” Herbert said. “Someone has developed an insurance fraud, and Major Tomlinson wants your help in flushing out the culprit?”
“Essentially correct, Herbert. In addition, Major Tomlinson believes that someone in “the gentry”, as he put it, is responsible for some part or even the whole of the scheme. Lloyd’s is hot for them because that worthy company has paid out several thousand pounds because whole ships have been lost without a trace.”
“It would seem that you picked a poor time to retire, Your Grace,” Herbert said.
“Indeed,” Roger replied. “Well, Captain Kingman has been asked out of retirement, although not to serve so openly as before. And it is an unfamiliar battlefield to which I am called. Diplomacy is not my long suit.”
“Well-a-day,” said Herbert, “I am here, Your Grace. We will not be stealing chickens, I will warrant, but we might need such guile for this foray against the enemy. Would that the foe were better defined.”
“Indeed, you have the crux of it,” Roger said, grimly. “Defining the foe is our task precisely.”
“How will you go about it, Your Grace?” Herbert asked.
“I’ll start as I did yesterday. I have some cards of men who will be “at home” to me this morning. I will also pay my respects to Lady Amory and to Lady Witley, as well as call on young Bochil.”
“Oh, ho! A little courtship going on there, Your Grace?” Herbert waggled his eyebrows.
“Of Bochil? Lord no. The boy has managed to make a profit on sheep, of all things. I’m apprentice to his mastery of the subject.” Roger deftly steered the mares around a large box that had been dropped in the street.
“And what of the sister, Your Grace?” Herbert asked innocently.
“Oh, well, now then…” Roger said. “She is a pearl of the first water, beautiful, intelligent, and not a chatterbox.”
“And possessed of a fortune.Though not desirous of marriage. You might have your work cut out there, Your Grace.”
“She’s what? Oh, Herbert, I’ve given up chasing the heiress with a fortune rainbow. Besides, her father is unlikely to countenance my paying court with my fortunes in their current state. She tells me she will come into a small inheritance from her mother in a few weeks when she has reached her majority.”
“Below stairs gossip has it that the inheritance was set up by her grandfather, as canny a man as ever handled affairs of business. She will come into some property, as well as enough to support herself and a small household with ease if it is properly managed. Even if her father cuts her off without a penny, she’ll not be a charge upon her husband.” Herbert said quietly.
“And I let slip that I have mismanaged my finances. I am such a goose cap, Herbert. Here I am on what amounts to a diplomatic mission, and I can’t even handle my own affairs of the heart.”
“The latter might be the more difficult, Your Grace. You feel that you could truly care for the Lady?”
“Oh, Herbert, even if she came in a ragged gown without a penny. She is the non pareil for whom I have been searching. Knowledgeable, wise and yet so innocent, I would swear that she was fresh from the school room.”
“But has recently finished her fourth London season, so the rumor has it. Her father must be fair desperate to get her wed. I hear there are two more sisters.
“Rose and Violet. Pretty misses. We saw them, Herbert, on that first day as we rode into London. She is the lady we saw playing ball with two younger ladies who turn out to be her sisters. She was buying birthday gifts for them yesterday.”
“That is astounding, Roger!” Herbert was jolted out of his public persona as perfect servant. “So, heiresses do walk in the park.”
“Indeed. But not unattended. The stripling lad who was with her is her older brother. He is not so downy a youth as he appeared at a distance.”
“I would say not,” Herbert agreed, recovering himself. “How much older?”
“Three or four years, I should say. He will go to Oxford for his final year this fall. I was fortunate to catch him at home. His was one of the names given to me by Jeremy.”
“What a tangle, Your Grace,” Herbert said, “and that is no mistake. What will you do?”
“I’ll begin by calling on the two gentleman who left their cards for me yesterday and see what I can do toward unraveling at least this one snarl of fortune.”
“Better you than I,” Herbert said, “I’m even less the diplomat than yourself, Your Grace.”
“That is not saying much, my friend. I’ll just mention shipping and assurance companies and insurance. Shake the tree a little, and see what tumbles out, you know?”
“Well, I wish you luck. I will tend the horses and see to it that they get no more burrs. You to your work, I to mine.”
With that, Herbert swung himself down off the perch, and walked quickly to the horses’ heads. Roger stepped down from the curricle, squared his shoulders and went to the front door of the first house on his list.
He put on his most affable social face and prepared to search among the ton for the dastard who might be swelling his fortunes through fraud and sabotage.
Will the small retainer the Major is going to give to me and a flock of sheep be enough to repair my fortunes sufficiently to win the right to pay court to Lady Dahlia?
Chapter 12
Dahlia woke with a heavy head and even heavier heart. Confined to her rooms, she could scarcely hope to avoid Lord Goldstone. Suzanne brought her breakfast and tried to make cheerful conversation as was their usual habit. Dahlia responded by rote and picked at the soft rolls and pickled herring.
“I brought your favorite, My Lady.” Suzanne poured tea, added honey and squeezed half a lemon into it. “Miss Emma said you were to have lemon in your tea today because she feared for your throat.”
“That was kind of her.” Dahlia sipped at the tea, finding that the lemon did reveal that her throat was raw. “Thank you, Suzanne. Leave the tray. I’ll ring to have it removed later.”
“I’m to remove it,” Suzanne protested.
“And you shall,” Dahlia replied, “just not right now. Please, Suzanne, I need some time alone to think and if I try to eat this in haste it will make me ill.”
Dahlia already felt ill. She could not remain here, in her father’s house, and succumb to a marriage to Lord Goldstone. At the same time, she had no idea to what fate she was condemning her father by not submitting to the marriage he had arranged for her.
“Please, Suzanne. I promise I will eat it if you will just leave it here.”
“Very well, My Lady. I’ll work in the upper linen closet until you are ready.” Suzanne bobbed a brief curtsy to punctuate her compliance.
“You are an angel to take the risk, Suzanne. I will ring for you shortly. When you return, could you bring me some extra lengths of muslin? I purchased some embroidery thread yesterday, and I wish to work on gifts for my sisters.”
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