But as it was, she had played right into the Duke’s hands and given him tremendous power over her—over both of them, truth be told.
Mr. Coleman had learned, from years in the cutthroat world of commerce, that information was power. Thus he had paid spies stationed throughout the house. Many of the servants were too loyal to the Duke and to the name of Gresham to be bought. But there always a few willing to turn coat for a few coins.
So by the time the Duchess approached her father, Mr. Coleman already was up to date on the latest exchanges between Duke and Duchess. He knew about the Duke’s threats of capital punishment, of divorce on grounds of insanity, of financial ruin of both Colemans.
He took those threats with deadly seriousness. The Duke had always had much more power than he knew or cared to use. But now, with another woman in the picture, the Duke meant what he threatened. And he had the power to carry out those threats.
So he laid before his daughter his proposed multi-pronged attacks on the Duke. These actions would save them both. But some of what was needed would be quite distasteful, and would require a cool head. The Duchess had to be fully committed to their schemes before they could begin.
First, the Duchess needed to get pregnant immediately. By another man, if necessary—for clearly The Duke would never again willingly visit his wife’s bed.
A son, a grandson, was all that could save them. It was his daughter’s best protection, even in the event of divorce. For sooner or later, the son would himself be Duke, and in the meantime, his loyalty to his poor, wronged mother—and thus her continued access to the boy’s fortune—could be manipulated.
Second, if at all possible, the Duke must die. He could meet with some accident, or seem to have shot himself while cleaning his hunting musket. The means didn’t matter. But with her husband gone and a child in her belly, the Duchess could sit pretty for the rest of her life.
Third—and least important, if the first two schemes were accomplished—was that if the gypsy wench survived, she must be fully discredited. For she might bear a son before the Duchess did, and in the absence of a rightful male heir, a bastard son could be legitimized by an Act of Parliament.
No, the hussy must be neutralized—locked up in prison on some trumped-up charges, perhaps—so that the legitimization of any child of hers would be untenable. Morals charges would be the best. That would cast doubt on the very paternity of any child she did bear.
Mr. Coleman had thought these schemes through in every particular. He sat his daughter down, and he proceeded to explain to her all that would need to be done to accomplish their goals.
The bloody Duke of Gresham—a mere weak shadow of his formidable late father, by the way—was not going to defeat the Colemans.
Chapter 32
Battle Lines Are Drawn
Joanna’s fever broke, and she awakened. The first sight that met her eyes, when she emerged from her coma, was Christy, kneeling by her bed, clutching her hand.
When she spoke again for the first time, it was to say his name. Christopher buried his face against her, tears streaming from his fine hazel eyes.
“Joanna. Joanna.” He could not stop saying her name.
It was a long path toward full recovery, but Christopher seemed determined that Joanna would have every aid, every comfort.
When she was well enough to rise from the sickbed and encounter other servants, Joanna learned something beyond anything she could have imagined. Everyone knew the Duke loved her. Everyone now assumed that Hannah was the child of both of them, and most seemed comfortable with the idea.
Nearly everyone at Gresham Manor, it seemed, was happy for them, was rooting for the success of their love. There was no more need to hide.
* * *
Joanna’s recovery gave the Colemans no joy. Things were at a crisis point.
Mr. Coleman had thought long and hard about who could be secretly enlisted as his daughter’s lover. Some simple-minded hayseed would not do.
It would have to be someone with some degree of intelligence. Someone whose loyalty was entirely for sale—better yet, someone who despised the Gresham family and would enjoy doing them serious harm.
Someone who, with the job done, would be willing to go far away and never present himself to the Colemans again.
The more he thought, the more he concluded Brown, the estate manager, would be the ideal candidate.
Mr. Coleman observed the man from afar one day. A middle-aged man in his prime, handsome and well-spoken in his way, it would be no insult to the Duchess to have to consort with him. He was no doubt more of a man than his employer, the Duke.
And he was venal. He respected the raw power of new money far more than the false authority that arose from centuries-old feudal ties.
More than that, Brown was ambitious. No doubt he wouldn’t want to remain a country estate manager all his life. Nor was he sentimental—having done his part and collected a sizable reward for his efforts, he was not one who would linger about, writing heartbroken sonnets to Her Grace.
“Brown,” Mr. Coleman said. “A confidential word in your office? At your convenience, of course.”
“At your convenience, sir,” Brown replied. He clearly knew how the game was played. “I will be about all afternoon. You have only to say the word—I am your servant, sir.”
So they met in the small, tidy office, with its shelves of meticulous rent rolls and accounts. Mr. Coleman closed the door firmly behind himself, before he took a seat.
“Look, Brown, I am not going to beat about the bush with you. You’re one of the very few people I trust around this sorry place. One of the only ones who isn’t an utter fool. May I speak freely, and in certainty of your utmost discretion?”
“I repeat, sir, I am your servant. In whatever you may need from me.”
“All right, then. This Dukedom is in a terrible state. The Duke has no interest in his lovely wife, my daughter, and it seems there may never be an heir. Lord knows what’s wrong with the man—I can’t say I care. You know about the entail, I assume?”
“Of course, sir. I make it my business to understand these things.”
“Indeed. Well, the bottom line is this: if the Duke dies without a male heir, we will all be tossed in the rubbish heap, when a stranger comes in as the new Duke. You, me, and my daughter. My own considerable fortune, my daughter’s extensive inheritance—all will go to some outsider.”
“Those thoughts had already occurred to me, Mr. Coleman. And if I may add—with no disrespect intended—His Grace’s new infatuation is only going to make him less interested in doing his proper duty by his lady wife. The Dukedom will be ruined, and all of our hard work will be for naught. But tell me, how can I help you and Her Grace avert this tragedy?”
“Good man,” Mr. Coleman said with a smile. “Listen to me carefully.”
It was arranged that, with the Duke so preoccupied by his sick little concubine in the kitchens, Brown easily could be spirited into the Duchess’s chambers at night, until she found herself with child.
Brown, to his credit, did not seem shocked in the slightest. “We are both men of the world,” his expression seemed to say.
“You will treat her with utmost respect, Brown. And I swear, if you ever divulge this arrangement, you will be found dead in a ditch somewhere. I have friends. Do we understand each other?”
“Perfectly, Mr. Coleman. You need have no concerns.
“But, if I may ask—apart from Her Grace’s exquisite charms, which are undeniable by any man—what, precisely, will I gain from all this? I will be putting myself at some risk.”
Mr. Coleman, reaching for a sharpened quill from those in a stand on Brown’s desk, dipped the quill in ink, scribbled a number on a scrap of paper and passed it over to the estate manager.
In spite of himself, Brown whistled aloud. It was a fortune. Mr. Coleman knew it was enough to make Brown one of the gentry in his own right.
“You will receive half this amount in bankn
otes when Her Grace delivers a male heir. You will receive the other half, in gold, when I receive proof you have landed and established permanent residence in New South Wales, Australia. From that point onward, you will never return to England. You will have no further contact with any of us. But you will be a very rich man. Agreed?”
“Agreed, sir.”
* * *
While Joanna and Christopher reveled openly in their newfound love for each other and for their daughter, the Duchess was spending each night, after the evening meal, in preparing herself for her lowborn lover.
She brushed out her long, blond hair, anointed herself with musky perfumes, and dressed in silken night garments. The Duke had not found her desirable, but surely this man must worship the ground she walked on.
A Duchess, and so beautiful! No doubt he never thought he would be given such a privilege, not even in his wildest dreams.
The Duchess was not sure what to expect, but she imagined Brown would show manly passion, yet be pathetically grateful to her.
The first night the discreet little personal maid had showed him in to her bedchamber, the Duchess had arranged her flowing silken robes about the chaise longue on which she rested.
She reached up and tossed back her magnificent yellow hair with her hand, to heighten his awareness of it. She let her gown slip just a little from her pearly white shoulders.
“Sit, Brown,” she commanded, very much the lady of the mansion. “Tell me your first name. I should know you better.”
“Brown will do just fine, Your Grace. My first name is really none of your concern.”
“Excuse me?” she said, her seductive act slipping and a little of her shrillness showing through.
“Look, Your Grace, let’s not make more out of this than it is. I have no more wish to bed you than I assume you do to see yourself bedded. I’m here because your father has promised me money. A great deal of money. So shall we stop all the pretense and get the job over with? I’d like to put as little time as possible into this job every night. If we’re quick, I can still make it to town, to The Shield and Crown before last call.”
She sat there, paralyzed in shock. “When my father hears of this, Brown—”
“Tell your father whatever you like. He won’t care. I’m here on his shilling, because he knows no man would take you for nothing.”
* * *
Strangely, it seemed that the stronger Joanna was growing, the weaker the Duke became. He seemed to suffer from a stomach ailment. He could keep no food down. He started vomiting blood.
The physician came, but he professed himself puzzled after he examined the Duke. He had no ready explanation. It wasn’t influenza. It did not appear to be an ulcerated wound in his stomach.
From a strong man in the prime of health, the Duke grew weaker and more emaciated every day.
No one knew where the rumors started, but some of the servants began to remind themselves that Joanna was a gypsy, after all. Those pagans could not be trusted. It was known they dealt in the black arts, in spells and poisons, in wicked witchcraft. They knew things good Christian folk did not wish to know.
The Duke had been a faithful husband and a righteous man for as long as many of them had known him. He was never one for philandering among loose women.
So how was it then, that within weeks of her arrival, Joanna had turned the house upside down, had seduced the Duke so that he openly, shamelessly now displayed his illicit lust for her instead of for his lawful wife?
No one liked the Duchess, but still, right was right. “Thou shalt not covet another man’s wife,” the Good Book said. Or in this case, another woman’s husband.
Her Grace’s personal maid fanned the flames. Had she not seen that wicked Joanna leave the Manor several times, always on the night of a full moon, to gather strange herbs in her apron? Was she not the one who had by far the most access to the poor Duke these days?
Maybe Joanna had bound the poor man with a love spell that had gone wrong. Maybe she was keeping him in a weakened state, for some evil reason of her own—perhaps to gain money, or to win the promise of a marriage if Her Grace were to die?
What if the sad, long-suffering Duchess was meant to be the next victim?
How quickly popularity changes to suspicion, and suspicion to outright accusation.
Hearing the theory that not only the Duke, but his daughter, also, might be in danger from the witch among them, Mr. Coleman mounted a very public search of Joanna’s room. He made sure others, including Cook, were with him during the search.
Mr. Coleman knew he would find at least one suspicious item, for he had gotten the Duchess’s personal maid to plant it there for him. It was an old pamphlet written in strange characters. In truth, it was a copy made by an archaeologist of the runes drawn on some prehistoric cave walls in the north of England.
But no one in these parts would know that. It could easily be explained as a dangerous hex written in the witches’ secret language. In fact, Mr. Coleman knew of an old professor who, for the right amount of money, would testify as needed about the evil spell the writing cast.
Mr. Coleman found even more than he expected in the search. Among Joanna’s few articles of clothing—the colorful gypsy garb she had arrived in, which was now supplanted by a proper servant’s dress and apron—was the amulet made by Maggie Mae.
“Look at this!” he hollered at Cook, who seemed the most doubtful in the group. “Can you deny the evidence of your own eyes? What herbs are these, what pagan vessel holds the potion? What manner of wicked witchcraft is this?”
He waved the amulet before everyone’s eyes. “What did the Duchess’s personal maid already bear witness to? That this sorceress leaves Gresham Manor on nights when the moon is full, to pick herbs for her potions? Here’s your proof! Where’s the magistrate? Someone fetch Sir William Dobbie! I want this wretch taken away in irons, till she can stand trial. Witchcraft is still a capital crime in this country. I’ll see the wench burned at the stake!”
So Joanna, without even a chance to say farewell to Hannah, was marched away between armed guards, to await her trial in Gresham Town Gaol. And the Duke lay in his bed, too sick to intervene.
* * *
A few nights later, Brown was sitting alone in the estate office, writing a private letter by candlelight. He had only just left the Duchess’s bed.
It was an unpleasant task, but she was a healthy woman. Surely a month or two of persistent application to his task, and she would fall pregnant. A new life and riches he could never have imagined were well within his reach.
Brown had an elder brother who had emigrated to Botany Bay in Australia. Some might say he was transported there against his will, to serve a lifetime of exile for some chicanery he had committed.
It no longer mattered, though, for once a man reached New South Wales, a new life, a new identity awaited him, should he seize hold of it. The elder Brown brother was apparently doing well, buying and developing open land and lording over it like quite the grandee.
In fact, the man was becoming quite insufferable. His letters never failed to hint that his ventures, however illegal, had paid off. The younger Brown was the fool, he suggested, for slogging honestly for years at some menial country post, hardly earning more than his keep from aristocrats who despised him.
Well, the elder brother was going to be in for quite a shock, when Brown arrived in Australia a rich man. That would change his tune quickly enough!
“My dear Brother,” Brown wrote, smirking to himself. “It will come as a surprise to you, I am sure, when I soon join you in the antipodes. You will find me much changed. True wealth changes a man, they say. The story happened like this….”
Delighted to report his successes to a jealous sibling, Brown wrote late into the night. He trusted he captured every little detail, so that his brother might read of his schemes with awe and admiration.
Chapter 33
A Lawyer, A Sheep Herder, and A Fiddler Get Involved
The Duke grew weaker every day. “He continues to decline,” Mr. Coleman commented to Brown. “It speaks to the continued potency of whatever that black-haired wench was dosing him with. I begin to doubt he’ll be with us long.”
And the Duchess, while not yet with child, was sure to be in the family way quite shortly. She was drawn and depressed, with much of her feisty spirit diminished. That might well signal a pregnancy.
Or it might be in reaction to her now-nightly bedroom ordeal. But Mr. Coleman was sure, in the fullness of time, that she would see this had been a necessary evil, to be endured for her own good.
Brown, by contrast, was strutting around like the rooster of the barnyard these days. But his usefulness would soon be over, and the Colemans would then be rid of him permanently.
All in all, things were going rather well.
* * *
Around the same time, the Duke’s boyhood schoolmate Sir Reginald Smyth, K.C.—that prominent barrister who had been knighted by the King himself—heard with dismay about the Duke’s illness. He rode his horse immediately over to Gresham Manor to visit his friend.
It seemed suspicious to him that several people attempted to prevent him from seeing the Duke. First the estate manager, then the Duchess, then finally Mr. Coleman offered excuses why His Grace could not be seen.
Sir Reginald had fought enough sordid cases in the Old Bailey, against colleagues far sharper than this crowd. He knew a rat when he smelled one.
Tamed By The Marquess (Steamy Historical Regency) Page 23
