“It does,” he said, “but only if Mother actually does know something that could be injurious to someone.”
“Or if that someone thinks she does. But what can she know,” Grey added, “that would be so dangerous as to justify this kind of hocus-pocus?”
Hal shook his head.
“I don’t see how she can have evidence of anything concrete; if she had, surely she would have produced it at the time of the … the scandal. All she might know would be the identity of someone who was not only a Jacobite at the time, but a man who had substantial position—and likely still does.”
That made sense. Anti-Jacobite feeling had died down of latter years, with the defeat of Charles Stuart’s army, but an accusation of Jacobitism was still an effective tarbrush, wielded by politicians or the press.
“Longstreet would have been vulnerable to a threat of exposure then, and would be now,” Grey said. “What about Captain Rigby?”
Hal actually smiled at that.
“I suppose so,” he said. “He’s presently Director of the Foundling Hospital.” He unfolded another motto, laughed, and read it aloud: “A conclusion is simply the place where one grows tired of thinking.”
Grey smiled at that, and stood up.
“Then I suppose we’ve reached a conclusion for now. Will you tell me what you discover regarding Longstreet?”
A flicker of something passed through his brother’s eyes, but was gone too quickly for Grey to interpret it.
“I’ll tell you anything you need to know,” Hal said. “In the meantime, haven’t you business to do?”
“I have,” Grey said, and left. Hidden in his hand, he carried the last slip of paper he had taken from the automaton’s jar. The one you love is closer than you think, it said.
Six days until the wedding. Four days—perhaps five—until Percy Wainwright returned from Ireland.
Hal had not been joking about allowing him no time to sleep. Grey could feel the regiment beginning to rise from winter quarters and prepare for war, like a bear shaking off the sleep of hibernation, feeling the first rumblings of appetite. And men, like bears, must be fed.
Unlike bears, they must also be clothed, housed, armed, trained, disciplined, and moved from place to place. And then, of course, there was the military hierarchy, a many-headed beast with voracious appetites of its own.
Grey’s days were a blur of activity, rushing from Whitehall offices to shipping offices, holding daily councils of war with the other officers, receiving and reviewing daily reports from the captains, writing daily summary reports for the colonels, reading orders, writing orders, hastily donning dress uniform and dashing out to leap on a horse in time to take his place at the head of a column to march through the London streets in a guildhall procession to the cheers of a crowd, then throwing the reins to a groom and brushing the horsehair from his uniform in a carriage on his way to a ball at Richard Joffrey’s house, where he must dance with the ladies and confer in corners with the gentlemen, the ministers who ran the machine of war, and the merchants who greased its gears.
The one redeeming aspect of such affairs was that food was served, often his only opportunity to eat since breakfast.
It was at one such gathering that Hal came up beside him and said quietly, “Lord Creemore is ill.”
Such was Grey’s state of starvation and mental preoccupation that he didn’t recall at once who Lord Creemore was, and said merely, “Oh? Pity,” without taking his attention from the sardines on toast he had accepted from a passing footman.
Hal gave him a narrow look, and repeated with some emphasis, “Lord Creemore is ill. Very ill, I’m told. He hasn’t been out of his house in two months.”
“Ah!” said Grey, realization dawning. “George Longstreet.” He ate the sardines in two bites and washed them down with a gulp of champagne. “Probably not in any condition to hire thugs and plant documents, you think?”
“I think not. Here comes that tedious ass Adams; you talk to him—if I do, I’ll throttle him.” With a perfunctory nod, Hal strode past the Ordnance minister and shouldered his way into the crowd. Sighing, Grey drained his champagne glass, put it on a passing tray, and took a fresh one.
“Mr. Adams,” he said. “Your servant, sir.”
“Wasn’t that Lord Melton?” Bernard Adams, who was short of sight, squinted dubiously toward the end of the room where Hal had made his escape. “I wanted to speak with him, regarding the extravagance of his request for …”
Grey drained another glass, listening to the tall clock in the corner chiming midnight, and thought how pleasant it would be to turn into a pumpkin and sit inert at Adams’s feet, impervious to the man’s blather.
Instead, he fixed his eyes on the mole to the right of Adams’s mouth, nodding and grimacing periodically as he worked his way methodically through three more glasses of champagne and a plate of bacon savories.
Dropping into bed three hours later, in a haze of fatigue and alcohol, he managed to remain awake for a few seconds, in which he wondered whether he would recognize Percy Wainwright upon his return from Ireland, let alone remember what to do with him.
Chapter 17
In Which a Marriage Takes Place,
among Other Things
On the 27th of February, the marriage of General Sir of George Stanley and Benedicta, Dowager Countess Melton, was celebrated at the church of St. Margaret’s, the parish church of Westminster Abbey.
It was not a large wedding, but one done in the best of taste, as Horace Walpole, one of the guests, remarked approvingly. Olivia had had the church decorated simply with evergreen boughs, done up in ribbons of gold tissue, and the scent of pine and cedar lent a welcome freshness to the at mosphere of ancient wax and bodies kept too long enclosed. Composed in equal parts of military dignitaries, politicals, and social ornaments, the congregation shone nearly as brightly as the four hundred candles, a-glimmer with gold lace and diamonds.
“With my goods I thee endow, with my body I thee worship …”
Grey, in the front pew with Percy Wainwright, was close enough to see the expression on the general’s face, which surprised him with its soft intensity. He was the more surprised—and not a little taken aback—to catch an answering flash of response from the countess’s eyes.
He experienced that peculiar crawling of the flesh that attends any child’s sudden realization that a parent must not only have engaged at some comfortably primeval date in the theoretical carnal act that resulted in his own existence—but was capable of doing it again in the all-too-physical present.
He glanced quickly at Percy, to see whether this frisson of horror was shared, but saw only an expression of subdued wistfulness on Percy’s mobile face. Of course it would not be the same, he reminded himself; the general was in fact not Percy’s father. There would be no bar to his imagining—he choked that line of thought off at the root, staring hard at Percy in order to avoid looking at the wedding couple.
The light from one of the stained-glass windows caught a few tiny dark bristles, missed in shaving, just beneath Percy’s lower lip. It shone through the amber irises of his eyes and touched his flesh with rose and gold.
Grey sincerely hoped that his new brother was not thinking—Percy looked suddenly sideways and met his eyes. Grey took a deep breath and looked away, fixing his gaze on a stained-glass window illustrating the martyrdom of Saint Lawrence, roasted on a gridiron.
They stood close together, the full skirts of their coats brushing. He felt a stirring among the folds of blue velvet, and Percy’s hand brushed his.
No more than a touch, but he breathed deep, and embarrassment faded into awareness.
Tonight.
They had made a solemn pact, the two of them. After the wedding breakfast, they would go away and spend the rest of the day—and the night—together, though hell should bar the way.
Grey crooked one finger round one of Percy’s, very briefly, then let go. He realized that his thoughts had gone well beyond
the limits of what was suitable in church, and tried to force his attention back to the solemn spiritual event being enacted in front of him. Though why the church had thought to put things like “with my body I thee worship” into the service …
He caught sight of Olivia, discreetly lurking behind one of the slender stone pillars—far too slender to hide her current grand proportions. He smiled, then noticed that her face was pale, set in a pained grimace. No doubt recalling her own nuptials and missing Malcolm, he thought sympathetically.
It might be two years before the gallant Captain Stubbs returned, by which time his first offspring would be—
Olivia’s grimace deepened, and her face went purple. Grey gripped the back of the pew in sudden consternation, and Percy glanced curiously at him. Grey lifted his chin, trying to indicate Olivia’s alarming behavior, but Percy’s view of her was blocked by the pillar and a carved wooden screen. He frowned at Grey in puzzlement, and Grey leaned forward a bit, trying to see whether—but Olivia had disappeared.
The bishop was discoursing comfortably upon the honorable estate of marriage and looked well set to continue upon this course for some time. Grey tried by means of various small jerks of the head and grimacing of his own to alert one of the women on the other side of the aisle, but—beyond frowns of puzzlement from the elderly Havisham sisters and a flirtatious glance behind her fan from Lady Sheridan—was unable to elicit any response.
“What is it?” Percy whispered.
“Don’t know.” She couldn’t possibly have fainted without someone noticing. Perhaps gone outside for air?
“Maybe nothing. Stay here,” he whispered back, and slipping past Percy, left the pew as quietly as he might and walked rapidly down the side aisle, head lowered and the back of his hand pressed to his mouth, as though he might be indisposed.
He reached the vestibule and flung open the heavy outer door, causing a premature flurry of “hurrahs!” and a smart clash of swords from the waiting honor guard, who snapped into formation, making an archway for the happy couple.
Contorting his face into what he hoped was apology, Grey made abortive waving motions at the indignant swordsmen and shut the door hastily upon a chorus of disgruntled oaths.
Muttering a few of his own, he made his way back into the church and along the right-hand aisle, glancing furtively into the alcove that held the baptismal font, up into the crowded galleries—for God’s sake, an enormously pregnant woman could not simply vanish in the midst of a crowded church!
He ducked into the secluded side chapel, but no one was there. A single candle burned before the statue on the altar, a rather blank-faced thing with outspread hands—Christ Intercessor, he thought Olivia had said it was. At this point, though, he’d take help where he could get it.
“Ah … perhaps you wouldn’t mind lending a hand?” he whispered, not knowing any official prayers for the purpose. “If you please.” With a polite nod, he withdrew and resumed his hunt, this time going back down the nave toward the door. What if she had meant to go out, but been overcome before reaching the egress?
He scanned the pews covertly as he passed, in case she might merely have gone to sit down with friends, but received nothing save curious looks from the inhabitants. He reached the door to the vestibule again, and hesitated, unsure where to search next. Whether by heavenly intercession or luck, at this point he spotted a small wooden door set inconspicuously in the shadows beneath the organ gallery.
He tried the door, and finding it unlocked, pushed it cautiously inward—only to have it stick halfway. He was about to give it a healthy shove, when he perceived the foot just beyond it, clad in a lemon-yellow silk slipper.
“Olivia!” He thrust his head through the opening, and found his cousin seated on the bottom step of a small stairway, looking like an untidy heap of lemon-yellow laundry. Seeing him, she withdrew her foot, allowing him to open the door enough to sidle through.
“Olivia! Are you unwell?”
“No!” she hissed. “For heaven’s sake, keep your voice down, John!”
“Shall I fetch someone to you?” he whispered, bending down to look at her. There was not much light here, only what filtered down the stairwell from the loft above. As the light was coming through a window over the loft, it fell down the stairs in a wash of the most delicate hues, with watery lozenges of pink and blue and gold that made Olivia appear to be sitting at the foot of a rainbow.
“No, no,” she assured him. “I only felt tired and wanted to sit down for a bit.”
He glanced skeptically at their surroundings.
“And you decided to sit down here, rather than in a pew. Quite. Will I go and fetch you some water?” The nearest water to hand was likely the baptismal font, and the only vessel in which he could carry it was his hat, which he had inadvertently brought away with him. Still …
“I don’t need—” Her voice broke off and she arched her back a little, eyes and lips squeezing shut. She put one hand behind her, pressing a fist into her lower back. Her face had gone purple again; he could see that, despite the light.
He wished to rush back into the church and fetch a woman to her at once, but was afraid to leave her thus in mid-spasm. He’d been in the general vicinity of women birthing—soldiers’ wives and camp followers—but had never witnessed the process at close quarters. His impression was that it involved a good deal of screaming, though; Olivia wasn’t doing that. Yet.
She blew out air through pursed lips, relaxed, and opened her eyes.
“How long have you been doing … that?” He gestured delicately at her bulging midsection. Not that the answer would be of help; he hadn’t any notion how long this process was meant to take.
“Only since this morning,” she assured him, and put a hand to the small of her back, grimacing again. He wished she wouldn’t; she looked like nothing so much as one of the gargoyles on the pediment outside. “Don’t worry, everybody says first babies take ages. Days, sometimes,” she added, letting out held breath in a gasp.
“In your position, I think I would not find that an encouraging thought at the moment.” He turned, hand to the door. “I’m going to fetch someone.”
“No!” She sprang to her feet, surprising him extremely, as he hadn’t thought she could move at all, let alone so fast. She clung ferociously to his arm. “Nothing is going to interfere with this wedding, do you hear me? Nothing!”
“But you—”
“No!” Her face was an inch from his, eyes bulging in a commanding stare that would not have disgraced a sergeant conducting drills on the square. “I’ve worked over these arrangements for six months, and I won’t have them undone now! Don’t you take one step out there!”
He paused, but she clearly meant it. And she wasn’t letting go of his sleeve, either. He sighed and gave in—for the moment.
“All right. For heaven’s sake, though, sit down.”
Instead, she clenched her teeth and pressed suddenly hard against the door, grinding her back against the wood. Her belly had firmed up in some indefinable fashion, so that it seemed even larger, if such a thing was possible. There was so little room at the foot of the stairs that the enormous swell of it brushed against him, and the air was filled with the smell of sweat and something sweetly animal, completely overpowering the feeble scents of powder and eau de toilette.
She was clenching her hands, as well as her teeth, and he found that he was doing precisely the same thing. Also holding his breath.
She relaxed and exhaled, and so did he.
“For God’s sake, Olivia!”
She was leaning against the door, feet braced, hands cupping her enormous belly, her eyes still closed, breathing. She opened one eye and looked at him.
“You,” she said. “Be quiet.” And closed it again.
He eyed her bulk. He couldn’t escape to fetch help, with her leaning against the door. In normal circumstances, he could have removed her, but the circumstances were anything but normal. She had wedged herself sol
idly into the doorframe, and he could see no convenient way of getting to grips with her.
Besides, she was panting like a bellows. What if she had another of those alarming spasms, just as he was in the act of dragging her from the—a draft of cool air struck the back of his neck, and he glanced up, startled.
Up. He glanced back at Olivia, whose eyes were still closed in a frown of the most ferocious determination, then wheeled and sprinted up the stair before she could stop him.
He popped up next to the child working the bellows, who gaped at sight of him and left off pumping. A hiss from the organist started him again, though he continued to stare at Grey. The organist, hands and feet poised over manuals, pedals, and stops, ignored him completely, peering instead into a small mirror mounted on the organ, which allowed him to see the proceedings at the altar below.
Grey went hastily to the railing, just in time to see General Stanley sweep his mother into an embrace of such exuberant and obvious affection that the congregation broke into applause. Frantic, Grey jabbed his hands into his pockets, looking for some small missile, and came up with a paper of the boiled sweets he had bought for Percy, who had a sweet tooth.
Who? Anyone, he thought. Any woman, at least. All heads were turned toward the altar, where the bishop was raising his hands for the final blessing. Taking a deep breath and commending his soul to God, Grey pegged one of the sweets into the congregation. He’d aimed to strike the pew near Lady Anthony, one of his mother’s close friends seated near the back. Instead, he struck her husband, Sir Paul, squarely in the back of the neck. The baronet jerked and clapped a hand to the spot, as though stung by a bee.
Sir Paul glared wildly round, looking in every direction but up. Grey picked another sweet and was searching for a better target, when a small stir toward the front made him look there. Percy Wainwright had made his way out of the pew, and was heading for the back of the church, nearby heads turning curiously to follow him.
Abandoning his strategy, Grey raced past the organist and down the stairs. Almost too late, he saw Olivia, collapsed again at the foot of the stairs. Panicked at the thought of help escaping, he put both hands against the narrow walls and vaulted over her, coming down with a thump at the foot of the stair. He snatched open the door, just in time to find Percy outside it, looking startled.
The Lord John Series 4-Book Bundle Page 77
