I did not assume any such thing. “Is that their preference?”
“Well, it’s what we thought,” Liam said. “If you were to become lord; and you did.”
“The ladies were dismayed by Rotterdam and London,” Rachel said. “We have all found London crowded and filthy. The Lady Dorshire thought the family manor quite lovely—what we could see of it from the road. We all thought it would be best for the children to grow up in such a place if it were an option.”
I thought of the house of my birth and childhood and suppressed a shudder. It had been a large empty manse full of taciturn servants; and then, of course, there were the unpleasant memories from my last years there. “I am not keen to return there.”
“The children will live with us,” Gaston said.
I smiled. “Aye. They will not live two days away by coach.”
Rachel and Theodore looked as if they would protest, but they quickly shrugged with resignation.
“We will need a much larger house in the city, then,” Rachel said.
“Perhaps a place close to the city, but not actually in it,” Theodore suggested.
I wondered if my days would soon be filled with riding about, purse in hand, to find a residence.
“Perhaps Whyse knows of something,” the Marquis said and buttered a roll.
He probably did. “Or he can arrange something,” I said.
The Marquis chuckled, but the others appeared alarmed.
I sighed. “I am not above someone being urged or ordered to move if it will allow me to live happily with my loved ones under one roof. Those that shall wish that,” I amended to Striker.
He was grinning. “Will, truly, I think we’ll try and do whatever you want. You’re the one with the hardest task.”
“Thank you,” I said solemnly. “For acknowledging that: I do not relish how I shall be forced to spend my time.”
“We don’t have to stay,” Liam said.
I looked about at their concerned faces, and saw Liam’s words echoed in my man’s eyes. I shook my head. “Nay, we do not, but… I owe it to… everyone, including myself, to try. I imagine I will complain a bit, though. Nay, I shall probably whine incessantly. And I will wish for certain concessions, like a large house I can live in with everyone.”
I saw no argument from any of them.
“I want to see the children,” Gaston said. “I know it is planned for Sarah to attend the funeral, but what of the others? Can everyone be brought here, or should we wait until we are in Dorshire for the burial?”
“I understand your wish to see them,” Theodore said. “We have not seen Elizabeth in weeks. You of course, have not even seen your sons; nor even the girl. But, though Sarah and perhaps the rest of the ladies can arrive here in a few days, packing up the entire household will slow them considerably, and be quite the disruption to the children. Yet, I suppose they will all be moving soon enough anyway—at least to Rolland Hall for the time being until we can find another house.”
Gaston sighed. “You are correct: it makes no sense to disrupt the children to bring them all here if they will only be moving a short distance to their temporary new home anyway. I will wait. What is another week or so?” He smiled ruefully.
“I will send word that they should prepare to leave the rented house; and that in the end we will all be returning to London,” Theodore said.
“I will write them,” I said. “I am the one making the demands: I will take responsibility for them.”
I did not write them that night, though. Gaston was the one to put pen to parchment and finish my missive to our ladies. While he was at that task, I told our friends of our voyage to Cow Island and how we were trapped into going to Panama. Striker drank brandy and cursed his not having been with us. Liam and the Marquis laughed a great deal, and praised God they had not been with us. And Rachel and Theodore appeared quite alarmed that such things occurred in the world at all.
When Gaston joined us to hand a sealed letter to Theodore, his father embraced him fervently.
“Never again, my son, will you need to face such trials,” the Marquis said.
Gaston did not ask what trials we spoke of, but his look to me said he was as aware as I of how very little our people seemed to understand about what we faced now.
We at last bid them good night and escaped to our room.
“I wish to ask my father if this is how one becomes… lordly,” Gaston said after the door was safely closed.
“How do you mean?”
“You—we—must order everyone about to insure our wants and needs are met: for you to do as you must and support us all.”
I grimaced. His words echoed thoughts I had not wished to examine. “Perhaps we have been the lords in their lives all along. We are the lead cart. They are tossed behind to follow us if they will. We have ever decided the road.”
“So why do I feel this is different than it was before?” he asked.
I snorted with my own bemusement. “I do not know; but oui, I feel that too.”
He frowned in thought. “I guess I expected this to be the end of the road: that it would become level because now…”
“Our trials are behind us. My father is dead; we are well; we have a country; and money, and my title, and your nobility, and peace with your father, and children, and…”
He smiled. “And the road keeps going uphill.”
“With possible ambuscades at every turn as you imagined last night.”
He shrugged. “I suppose it is as you said: a life without adventure is not worth living.”
“I have been known to say the most foolish things…”
With a laugh, he toppled me onto the bed. He kissed me deeply and his gaze was solemn when he released me. “Wherever we all live, you and I will need a truly private place.”
To my surprise, my cock stirred for the first time in days at his implication. “Oui,” I said with equal solemnity, and then I pulled him to me.
In the aftermath of Heaven’s glow, I finally felt we had passed through the fire and emerged unscathed. Everything felt real again. I drifted to sleep, not in desperate exhaustion, but in a surfeit of pleasant emotion. I vowed to dream of frolicking.
We slept well and woke early the next day, much to Theodore’s delight. He ushered us into the study after a delicious breakfast; and sat behind my father’s desk with Gaston and me and the Marquis in chairs arrayed before the slab of mahogany. I noted he looked quite proper, there at my father’s desk. He looked as if he could make use of such an expanse—and indeed he had: there were documents and tablets everywhere.
“Your father’s last will and testament will not be read until after the funeral service,” Theodore said. “However, there will be nothing in it to surprise us. All your father’s holdings will be transferred to you as his sole heir.”
“Truly?” I asked. “Despite all that happened, he still had me as his sole heir?”
The Marquis and Theodore exchanged a look I found suspicious.
“That is what the document that will be read says,” the Marquis said. “We have seen it.”
I barked with amusement. “Did it bear my father’s signature—or a reasonable facsimile?”
“Mister Barney attested it was the only document,” Theodore said with a touch of guilt. “And Whyse has assured us no one will contest it.”
“Well, damn, it is good to be favored by the king,” I said sincerely.
Theodore sighed and handed me a small sack that clanked heavily on the desk. “Those things are the personal items Jenkins retrieved from the bodies.”
The first thing I withdrew from the sack was a sterling snuff box with Shane’s initials. “What of my cousin’s will?” I asked.
Theodore shrugged. “He was not known to have executed one. All say he held no property to convey.”
“Has anyone looked through his things?” I asked.
“Non, we were not sure who might wish to,” Theodore said. “His servants were dismiss
ed. We insured they took nothing of value with them.”
“I will see to his things,” I said.
“He truly shot your father to defend you?” the Marquis asked quietly. “After all that passed between you?”
I smiled sadly. “Not all that passed between us was bad. I forgave him, and in the end I think he wished to make amends.”
The Marquis sighed. “It is sad, then. He was viewed by all we have spoken with as something akin to your father’s unfortunate and unruly dog.”
I nodded. “That is indeed the state to which my father reduced him.”
I had been pulling other items from the sack as we spoke. I now held my father’s signet ring: the one with the Dorshire arms. I placed it on my index finger.
“So, what has he left me?” I asked.
“He owned an array of business interests: some outright, and others only by a percentage of investment,” Theodore said. “I have been given a list of the ones the king would have you pass to the Crown.”
“Do I stand any chance of contesting these gifts?” I asked.
“Non,” Theodore said firmly.
“Then I do not wish to hear the list. Let it be as if they never existed,” I said with a shrug.
Theodore nodded and set the list aside and picked up another one. “This then, is the list of properties you are expected to divest yourself of to Gaston or your family.”
“Perhaps we should wait on these properties until I can discuss them with Sarah,” I said.
Theodore glanced toward the open study doors. There were only the four of us in the room. Striker and Liam had gone with Captain Horn to hire men to replace the ones that left with Jenkins, and Rachel was busy instructing maids.
“Perhaps we should discuss them now, before there is a chance for dissension,” Theodore said.
“Has Sarah or Striker expressed an interest?” I asked. “And is there any reason to believe my other sister or her husband expect anything?”
“I know nothing of Lady Beaucrest.” Theodore said. “Your father’s primary solicitor, Mister Barney, has made no mention of her, nor has Whyse’s solicitor, Mister Milton. They have also not acknowledged Mistress Striker’s existence; so I am not sure whether your father never intended to leave them anything, or whether Whyse has swept all such concerns aside with little thought for the ladies. Lady Beaucrest is married to a lord, however, so other than land, it is not as if he or she should benefit from the common interests.
“As for the Strikers, I feel there is an expectation on your sister’s part,” Theodore said. “It is, of course, your decision, but I feel you should know in advance what you have to give away.”
“Your sister has been very frustrated to not be involved in these negotiations,” the Marquis said. “Of course she knows that is impossible, but she still rails. She is with child again,” he added as an afterthought.
I frowned. “She has become quite the brood mare.”
“She wishes to support quite a brood—possibly all sons,” Theodore said. “And her husband only has partial ownership of a vessel.”
And, of course, she was my father’s child more than I ever was. I sighed.
“You have five children, two of them will need dowries, and two of them will not inherit a title or estate.” the Marquis said. “And, you and my son both possess philanthropic urges, and I am sure my son will wish to start a hospital of some kind—all of which will be a drain upon the estate’s fortune.”
He was smiling genially, but Gaston and I hunkered down in our chairs like scolded boys.
“Well, when you speak of it in those terms…” I said. I shrugged. “What might Sarah want that we could afford to part with?”
Theodore was chuckling. “Well, there is the damn plantation on Jamaica.”
I swore quietly with amusement. “Can we not simply sell it?”
“Oui, we could. There are also several West Indies shipping concerns your father invested in—none of which I knew about,” he added with anger.
“Is there anything you might want?” I asked.
He awarded me an incredulous look. “Will, I will spend the rest of my days managing your affairs. It will take all my time, and I will require a staff. Your father has three solicitors and they have a small army of clerks. And your father spent most of his time at this endeavor. I will not have time to manage ought else.”
“Oh,” I said. “Well, insure that you are well-compensated,” I teased.
He appeared torn between pounding his head on my father’s desk and laughing. “Why do you think I am going to manage your affairs?”
“To insure I do not make a total mess of things,” I said; not sure if he was being rhetorical or not.
“Just so,” he said—without a smile.
“Truly, Theodore, I do not know how we would manage this without you, but if this is a thing you would rather not…”
“Oh, hush,” he said with a grin. “I find utter delight in sticking it to these fat London bastards.”
“Well, as long as you derive some personal benefit,” I said.
“As for Sarah, there is an English shipping company,” he said seriously. “It is quite profitable: approximately…” He consulted a paper and made a calculation on a tablet. “Twenty percent of the annual income of the remaining properties.”
“Enough to support Striker and Sarah comfortably?” I asked.
“Oh, oui. And if well-managed, and perhaps with the addition of the West Indies interests, the Bard, Dickey, Cudro and Ash—if they will all still be considered the Striker’s business partners—can live quite comfortably too.”
If they are all still alive, I could not help but think. “Fine then, let Striker and the R and R Merchant Company have the shipping interests. And the other eighty percent of our income?”
He smiled grimly. “Will likely be reduced by your not wishing to pursue your father’s policies in all ways—as will the estate’s: since much of that is derived from land rents. I have assumed that you will wish for your landholders to be allowed to keep enough money to live, and that you will want your employees to be paid a decent wage.”
“Oui,” I said with a grin. “Am I to understand this will greatly reduce our income?”
He shrugged. “I would not say greatly, but it will affect it, oui. And changes in policies will likely anger the men who manage these enterprises.”
I shrugged.
He sighed. “There might well be a substantial loss of income for a year or two until we can change the way things have been done and establish new procedures and policies.”
“Can we afford that?” I asked.
“Oui, without problem,” he said with assurance, “as long as we do not go mad buying estates or establishing hospitals or the like—for a few years. If you transfer the remaining assets—other than the shipping concerns—to Gaston, he will stand to earn at least six thousand pounds a year if all goes well—once matters are stable again and we have new management in place. That is not counting what you can receive from the estate’s fortune—if you choose to draw upon it. That would be another two thousand pounds. In addition to this, there is over fifteen thousand pounds in gold and coin—that we know of. There very well may be money secreted away in the houses we do not know about.”
I whistled appreciatively. “How much damn money was my father making per year—pursuing his policies and with the assets being transferred to the king?”
“At least fifteen thousand a year,” Theodore said.
“What in the name of… What was he doing with all that money?” I asked.
“Well, purchasing and expanding his business interests—some of which have not performed well and I suggest we address or sell—and supporting the estate parish quite handsomely, and…” he shrugged. “According to Jenkins and one of the solicitor’s, Shane cost your father at least three thousand pounds a year.”
“As no one man could possibly drink that much, even if he bought drinks for every man in every
tavern he visited, I must assume it was some kind of blackmail money,” I said.
“Very astute,” Theodore said.
“I guess they could not kill everyone he bedded,” I said sadly.
“Oui, and two of the payments were to the parents of youths purportedly killed in duels,” Theodore said.
“Will we still owe them?” I asked.
“I do not know. These are matters that need to be attended to.”
“Tell me what I can do to assist,” I said.
“For those matters, let us see if we are approached by the parties concerned once they learn of Shane’s and your father’s demise. As for the rest… Your task is to please the king and maintain your title.”
I nodded. “I would be involved in other things as well.”
He smiled sincerely. “We will need you to be involved—and not merely as a figurehead of this grand enterprise, if that is what you fear.”
I grinned. “Good, I am already here; I might as well pull my weight.”
Gaston chuckled.
I did too. “We will shepherd this grand enterprise into the future so that it might be of use to the children,” I said. “All the children: ours, the Strikers’, Elizabeth, Liam’s son, and any other offspring we might find ourselves saddled with. I would have them all educated and provided with fortunes so that they might pursue what endeavors they choose; and not have the cast of their lives determined by their marriage prospects or who they curry favor with at court.”
“Well, then,” Theodore said with a smile, “let us do that. As for the adults… I have assumed Liam, Rucker, Bones, Hannah, and Sam will be part of your household. And we have assumed that business associates such as the Bard and Dickey, Cudro and Ash—God preserve them wherever they are—and Julio and Davey will be business associates of the Strikers and therefore more involved with the Strikers’ business interests than your affairs.”
“Julio and Davey are here?” I asked. At Theodore’s nod and frown, Gaston and I smiled. “We were not sure they boarded the Magdalene.”
“Oui, all came, the only thing we left behind was your fat horse,” Theodore said.
“I would have him found and brought here,” I said. “Carefully.”
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