by Liz Carlyle
He sensed rather than saw the disdain flick over her face. “No, I think I’m off.” Lip sneering, she slammed the door.
Emotionlessly, he turned back to Peters. “Where’s Hoke now?”
“Pinkie stopped him in the entrance hall, sir.”
“Alas, poor Reggie,” said Quartermaine, setting his bottle down. “Shall I set loose the hounds, old chap? Or is there a bit of blood yet to be wrung from the Hoke turnip?”
Peters laughed. “Oh, there’s blood,” he said. “That’s why you should come upstairs.”
That elevated Quartermaine’s brows another notch. “Indeed?” he said. “You shock me, Peters. I thought old Reggie entirely done in.”
“He implies he’s to meet some of his cronies here in half an hour for something deep,” Peters suggested. “But he needs cash to stake at the card table, and he’s in a mood to bargain.”
Quartermaine sipped musingly at his brandy. “Well, I’ve never been known to sneer at a bargain,” he said, rising. “But bring him down here. I’d rather not put my coat back on.”
Peters bowed. “Certainly, sir.”
Quartermaine followed Peters back through the suite and into the adjacent study where the heart of the club was centered. No bacchanalia or whoring went on within these walls; the Quartermaine Club was simply a circumspect, high-stakes gaming salon where many a noble scion had sent ten generations of wealth shooting down a rat hole beneath Ned Quartermaine’s watchful eye.
But it was wealth, not blood, that determined whether a man—or a woman—could gain entrée to Quartermaine’s world. Blue blood alone was next to worthless in his estimation—and he had enough of it in him to know.
Suddenly Quartermaine realized he still held the pearls in his hand. On a pinprick of irritation, he jerked open the drawer of his desk and let them slither into it, a cascade of creamy perfection. Then he took a cigar and went to the French windows that opened onto his garden.
The ash soon glowed orange in the dark. He could hear the rattle of a carriage coming up fast from the direction of St. James’s Palace. The cry of a newspaper hawker in the street. And then the silence fell again. What the devil was keeping Lord Reginald?
Perhaps the craven bastard had turned tail and run back up St. James’s Place to cower in one of his posh clubs. It little concerned him. Quartermaine always got his money—one way or another. He puffed again at the cigar and pondered at his leisure how best that might be done, for patience, he’d learnt, was truly a virtue.
Suddenly his front office door burst open in a great clamor, with his doorman Pinkie Ringgold shouting down a red-faced Lord Reggie as he shoved him into the room.
Reggie spat back, insulting Pinkie’s parentage. Pinkie reciprocated by twisting Reggie’s arm halfway up his back. The resulting howl could have raised the dead.
“Quiet!” commanded Quartermaine.
Silence fell like a shroud.
“Release him,” Quartermaine ordered, “now.”
“But the blighter tried ter slip past me!” The portly doorman swelled with indignation. “Reckon ’ee finks I’m dumb as I look.”
“Which would be his mistake,” said Quartermaine in a voice quiet as the grave. “This, however, was yours. Ah, Peters. There you are. Pinkie, you’re within an inch of incurring my wrath. Kindly get out.”
Pinkie snarled again at Reggie as he passed by Peters, then thumped the door behind him as he exited.
“I want that upstart dismissed, Peters,” snapped Reggie.
“Thank you,” said Peters smoothly, “for your opinion.”
Without asking either to sit, Quartermaine circled around his desk to hitch one hip on its corner. Absent his coat and cravat, his shirtsleeves still rolled to the elbow, it was a pose of utter relaxation. A pose a man might assume late at night in the comfort of his own home—which this was.
“Good evening, Lord Reginald,” he said evenly. “Peters tells me you’ve come to settle your debts with the house.”
Reggie’s uneasy gaze flicked toward Peters. Then, with a sound of disdain, he gave his lapels a neatening tug. “I can’t think what sort of establishment you mean to run here, Quartermaine,” he muttered, “what with those Whitechapel thugs shadowing the doors.”
With a faint smile, Quartermaine made an expansive gesture. “My apologies, Lord Reginald,” he said, “but it may shock you to know there are occasionally gentlemen who do not mean to settle their house accounts. Ah, but my terminology is amiss, is it not? Such a fellow would not actually be a gentleman, would he?”
Reggie shrugged as if his coat were still uncomfortable. “Indeed not.”
“But there, enough about our paltry establishment,” said Quartermaine silkily. “Let’s talk about you. Specifically, you propose some sort of bargain?”
Resignation was dawning in Reggie’s eyes, but he was far too clever to admit it. Instead, he reached inside his coat and extracted a fold of letter paper.
No, not letter paper, Quartermaine realized when Reggie handed it to him. It was a legal document. After reaching across the desk for his gold-rimmed spectacles Quartermaine separated and scanned the papers, quietly refolded them, then lifted his gaze to Reggie’s.
“And what, pray, am I to do with this?” he said, drawing the sheaf through his fingers.
“Why, not a thing,” said Reggie lightly. “As I told your man Peters here, I produce it merely to prove I’m solvent. Or perhaps, even, to borrow against it?”
“But I’m not a bank,” said Quartermaine, “and this, Lord Reginald, is a deed—along with an unsigned conveyance of said deed.”
Reggie’s gaze shifted uneasily. “Well, I’d meant to sell it,” he admitted. “I never use the old place; it’s just a little Somerset country house—a sort of shooting box, really, near the moors. But the deal fell through. Still, Quartermaine, the place is mine. I can sell it if I must.”
“Lord Reginald,” said Quartermaine quietly, “you owe me several thousand pounds. So I very much feel you do have to sell it.”
Reggie looked at him as if he were stupid. “As I just said, the arrangement fell through.”
“But your notes of hand were due—well, last month, two of them, if memory serves.” Quartermaine snapped out the paper and pointed. “Tell me, Lord Reginald, is this the amount your buyer offered?”
“Well, yes,” he said uneasily. “My solicitor drew it up.”
“And was it a fair price?”
Reggie was caught between a rock and an ungentlemanly admission. He chose the rock. “Quite fair,” he said, lifting his nose, “otherwise, I should never have agreed to it. As I said, Quartermaine, I’ve no use for the moldering old place.”
Quartermaine refolded the papers, and thought of the strand of pearls in his desk, and of his own failings. Perhaps he ought not laugh at poor Reggie. Perhaps he was no better.
But he was laughing—and Reggie knew it. Still, it would take a bigger set of bollocks than Reggie possessed to play the haughty blueblood in the face of a man to whom one owed such a frightful amount of money.
Quartermaine laid his spectacles aside. “So let me understand, Lord Reginald,” he continued. “You were doing the honorable thing: attempting to sell your small, superfluous, and unentailed estate so that you could settle your debts to me and pocket the balance. Do I have that right?”
It wasn’t anything close to right, and all three of them knew it. Reggie’s intent had been to sell the house in a fevered pitch for perhaps two-thirds its value in order to obtain quick cash in hand, and then stake himself at the tables with the naive but eternal hope of every bad gambler: that all would come aright in the end, and he would pay Quartermaine with his winnings in due course.
In due course meaning when he damned well pleased.
Quartermaine, however, was better pleased to be paid now.
He thwacked the side of his knee with the fold of paper. “I think you had a solid plan, Lord Reginald,” he said pensively. “It’s hardly your fault y
our buyer reneged.”
“Indeed not,” said Reggie haughtily. “We had a gentlemen’s agreement.”
“As do you and I,” said Quartermaine, “though admittedly I cannot quite account myself a gentleman, can I, Lord Reginald?”
Reggie must have felt a stab of magnanimity. “Well, you’re better bred than some fellows I know,” he acknowledged, “and it’s hardly your fault that your mother was a—well, never mind that.” He gave a stiff, awkward bow at the neck. “May I get on about my evening, Quartermaine?”
“But first, back to the real estate,” said Quartermaine. “What is the place called? What is its condition?”
The wariness in Reggie’s eyes deepened. “Heatherfields,” he said, “and I told you, it’s just a little manor on the edge of Exmoor. The condition, so far as I know, is passable. Some old family retainers tend it.”
“Tenant farms?”
“Three. All let, I think, along with the home acreage.” Reggie smiled thinly. “I don’t account myself much of a farmer.”
“I see.” Quartermaine smiled faintly. “Well, I’ll tell you what I shall do, Lord Reginald. I shall take the moldering old place off your hands for the price your buyer offered—less, of course, what you owe me. And I’ll do it now. In cash. Peters, unlock the cashbox and call down … what’s that solicitor’s name? Bradley?”
“Bradson, sir,” said Peters, already fumbling for the key that hung from his watch chain. He shot a smile at their guest. “He’s just upstairs, Lord Reginald, at the basset table. He owes us a favor or two. I’m sure he’ll see to the deed of conveyance.”
“We’ll need three witnesses,” said Quartermaine. “Bring Pinkie back, and fetch a footman who can read and write.” Here, he turned to settle his watchful gaze on Reggie. “Doesn’t that sound expedient, my lord? Soon you may go on about your evening—and with a tidy bit of cash in hand, unless either my memory or my arithmetic fails me.”
Neither did.
Half an hour later, with Reggie looking pale and beaten, the deal was inked. Quartermaine offered Armagnac all around. Bradson took him up on it.
Reggie took his money and left.
“Well, that’s that,” said Peters cheerfully, shutting the great chest’s doors when they were finished. “I thought it all went rather smoothly.”
“Well done, old chap.” Quartermaine chuckled, tossing the deed into his desk with Annie’s pearls. “I cannot believe Reggie was fool enough to flash that paper at you.”
“Desperate men, desperate means,” said Peters. “He thought it might get him through the door.”
“And so it did.” Quartermaine shoved the drawer shut, and the laughter fell away. “Peters,” he went on, “I need to go away for a time. A few weeks, perhaps.”
Peters turned quizzically, but Quartermaine did not answer the unasked question. Peters had grown accustomed, over the years, to his disappearing with little explanation.
“Will you be all right here on your own awhile?” he said instead.
“Oh, indeed, sir,” he said. “Off to gloat over your shooting box, perhaps?”
“Something like that,” said Quartermaine, staring at the closed drawer.
Peters hesitated a heartbeat. “What do you mean to do with the house, sir,” he said, “if you don’t mind my asking? I’ve never known you to hunt or shoot.”
At last Quartermaine lifted his gaze from the drawer. “It is a gift,” he said quietly, “for Annie.”
CHAPTER 2
In Which the Lovelorn
Are Cruelly Parted
It was a glorious afternoon three days after the rain had passed when Kate finally found herself riding alone across one corner of Bellecombe to examine the rectory’s construction. Her path took her past several of the estate’s tenancies, and along the back of the village, which edged the estate’s largest farm.
Everywhere she looked, Kate beheld improvements. New roofs, better fencing, and even a new granary. Every ha’penny she and Anstruther, Bellecombe’s steward, had managed to wring from the estate had been plowed back in again. Her grandfather would have envied Kate the chance to rebuild those things her father and brother had indirectly torn asunder. And he would have been proud, she hoped.
As the bridle path veered nearer the village, Kate passed by one of her tenant farmers bringing in the last of his hay. Touching her crop to her hat brim by way of greeting, she drew up her mare, Athena.
“Good day, Shearn,” she said.
“M’lady!” Mr. Shearn tossed his rake to one of his sons. “Ike, pitch a spell, and Tom’ll rake arter,” he ordered, mopping his face with a handkerchief. “Whip it, now, in ’vore the rain come back!”
Sidling her mount nearer, Kate glanced skyward. “More rain?”
The old man winked. “Oh, I doubt it, m’lady, but I must keep the lads at it,” he said, grinning. “Well, now. ’Tis good to see you out o’ that gloomy estate office.”
“I ran away when Anstruther wasn’t looking.” Kate leaned forward to run a hand down Athena’s withers. “Tell me, how does Mrs. Shearn go on?”
The Shearns’ cottage had been the one Anstruther had declared most in need of repair, and the cost had been a little daunting. Not just a new roof, but also a new chimney and a better shed for Mrs. Shearn’s famed milch cow.
After passing a moment chatting with Shearn, Kate set off again, thinking of the esteem in which his tenants had held her grandfather. Indeed, the late Lord d’Allenay had always tried to put Bellecombe first, but in his heart, his children had ruled. Particularly Kate’s father, James. And after him, her brother, Stephen. Yes, Kate had come to understand that James and Stephen Wentworth had been spendthrifts and gamblers of the worst sort.
The losing sort.
So what else could Grandpapa do save bail them out? The payment of a gentleman’s debts was a matter of honor, plain and simple. But then Papa had died, and Stephen after him, and at last the awful bloodletting that had drained Bellecombe had been stanched in the most tragic of ways.
The ancient barony of d’Allenay held the unusual distinction of descending through heirs general, which meant that, if there were no sons, a daughter might do. So it had been decreed that Kate could hold the title. But she could not be permitted to sit in the House of Lords or hold any of the family’s hereditary honors. That would have fallen to her husband.
Assuming she’d ever found one.
On a sigh, Kate cut Athena around a grove of trees, watching as the parish’s new rectory—or at least the large, muddy spot allotted it—came into view. Already the foundation was in the process of being laid up by the masons Anstruther had brought down from Bristol. This being the workers’ half day, however, all was silent.
Her uncle Upshaw, on whom Kate could always depend for sound business advice, had thought her quite mad to undertake such expenses until she’d explained her logic. The glebe holdings had not been expanded in a hundred years. The old rectory was small and beset by woodworm. Those were reasons enough, certainly, to do the right thing by the Church.
But Kate had had a better, more pressing reason.
Her fears. Fears that were abruptly renewed when she turned Athena through the gate and saw the other side of the new lumber pile. The earth being soft from rain, the Reverend Mr. Burnham didn’t hear her approach and was instead assiduously—and enthusiastically—availing himself of the sins of the flesh.
Kate turned her face a little away. “Richard Burnham!” she said in a loud, carrying voice. “Kindly unhand my sister!”
The guilty couple sprang apart, Nancy’s lips swollen, her fingers tangled in his hair.
“Oh, Lord,” prayed the rector.
Oh, you had better pray, thought Kate. You had better pray the minx won’t have you.
There came a sharp, feminine sigh of irritation. Kate turned fully around to see that Mr. Burnham had set Nancy away. Angrily spurring her horse forward, she could see her sister’s cheeks were flushed bright pink beneath her riot of re
d-gold curls, her eyes swimming with angry tears as she glowered up at her swain.
Burnham’s face had gone tight. “Yes, you will go back,” he ordered Nancy, hands braced hard on her shoulders. “And you will go now.”
“No! I shan’t!” cried Nancy. “Let’s have it out here and now—all of us.”
“This is for me to deal with.” Burnham let his hands drop. “We must have patience, my dear.”
Nancy cut a nasty glance up at her sister. “Oh, yes, by all means, let us have more patience!” she said hotly. “Soon I shall be a dried-up old spinster, too!”
“My dear,” said Burnham quietly, “that remark was ugly, and it was unworthy of you.”
“I don’t care!” cried Nancy. “Why should I grow old alone just because Kate shall?” Then, shooting her sister one last, killing glance, the girl turned on one heel and marched in the direction of the village.
“Nancy, wait,” Kate ordered. “I wish to speak with you.”
“No!” Her sister spun around and kept walking backward, hands fisted at her sides. “I have nothing to say to you, Kate! Not when you’re determined to ruin my life!”
Burnham dragged a hand through his unruly locks, looking as if he’d been plowed down by a mail coach. Really, it seemed unfair for a man of the cloth to be so young—and so handsome. But the living was Kate’s to bestow. And bestow it she had—taken in, no doubt, by those soft curls and innocent eyes.
“Mr. Burnham,” Kate began in her most imperious tone, “my sister is inexperienced in the ways of the world.”
Burnham looked as if he wished to wring his hat. Alas, he did not have one. Perhaps Nancy had knocked it off in her exertions. “B-but I love her!” he declared. “I wish to marry her. You know that I do.”
“Indeed, I do,” returned Kate grimly, “and it is only that which keeps me from shooting you where you stand.”
Blanching, he lifted both hands.
“Oh, come, Richard!” Kate draped one hand over the pommel of her saddle. “I like you too well to shoot you. But my sister’s leading you a merry dance—and she’ll do it the rest of your days if you’re fool enough to let her.”
