The Missing Heir

by Ranstrom, Gail

  Dianthe put her teacup aside and frowned with concern. “What is it, Aunt Grace? Another letter from Lord Barrington?”

  “No. I almost wish it were. ’Twould be easier to deal with.”

  “Is it from Miss Talbot?”

  Grace shook her head and passed the page to Dianthe. She stood and paced the breadth of the sitting room. How could things have gotten so out of hand? Could it be just a week ago that her life had been calm and completely within her control? Where had it all gone wrong? Laura Talbot? No, of course not. The Wednesday League had been involved in much more complicated and dangerous investigations than this one.

  Behind her she heard a gasp and knew Dianthe had reached the part of the letter where her solicitor explained that her funds had been frozen. She shrugged. She had never been acquisitive or even cared about how much money she had in her accounts. She only needed enough to ensure her independence, and if the court decided in favor of the old will, she would still have an annuity and dower rights unless the truth were known—then complete disinheritance was a distinct possibility. And complete disinheritance meant poverty, and poverty meant a return to Leland’s control. And Leland’s control would surely destroy her. Destroy her as surely as if he refused to take her in. Either way, the future would be grim, indeed.

  She stopped her pacing and turned to study Dianthe. The girl’s head was bowed over the letter from Mr. Ogilby. Dianthe was almost heartbreakingly beautiful. Her pale blond hair fell to the middle of her back in silken shimmers and her clear blue eyes were so innocent and open that Grace feared for her. Women without artifice, beautiful women, did not fare well in London society. They were too easy prey for scoundrels. Everywhere they went, at least three men danced attendance on Dianthe, and Grace had been approached by several men who wanted to know whom they might address for permission to call. She had instructed them to ask Dianthe herself and, so far, none had come calling. For Dianthe’s sake, if nothing else, Grace needed to keep herself focused and solvent. For Laura Talbot’s sake, as well.

  She would sooner become a kept mistress to one of the many men who’d suggested that in the past four years than be returned to Leland’s control or leave Dianthe to her own devices. But then she’d have to bed them! She’d managed to avoid that so far, and hoped to continue her success.

  Bed them? Adam Hawthorne’s face rose to her mind, as it had looked last night in the coach. Heavy-lidded eyes boring into hers, stripping away her defenses and peeking beneath her carefully constructed lies! Oh, what she would give to stop living those lies! To stop pretending to be something she wasn’t. To surrender herself to Adam’s passion. She had never thought she would allow such intimacies again but, last night, she had nearly succumbed entirely. She was still oddly restless when she thought about it.

  Adam! Ah, that was when her problems began. From the moment he’d arrived on her doorstep, her life had spun out of control. Everything had changed—from her ability to maintain her cool self-possession to calling into question decisions she’d made years ago.

  Guilt washed through her as she sat in the overstuffed chair by the fireplace. No, she could never begrudge Adam his return home, nor could she blame him for her confusion. He had more right to be here than she. Heavens, she could not leave, but how could she get through the next several weeks until she’d cornered Lord Geoffrey and liberated Miss Talbot? She had to focus on that alone.

  “Goodness, Aunt Grace,” Dianthe said. “What are we going to do?”

  “Nothing can be done. Mr. Ogilby said he would pay our daily expenses out of my funds until the court has made a decision. We will not be out of a home or starve. We shall simply have to budget our remaining resources and refrain from any unnecessary purchases.”

  “Your lovely new gown at Madame Marie’s? Will you be able to pay for it?”

  “I have reimbursed madame for the materials, but I will have to ask her to wait for the remainder. I shall insist she keep the gown until she is fully reimbursed, of course.”

  “And—” Dianthe paused, looking more concerned than Grace had ever seen her “—what of your gambling? How will that be accomplished without funds?”

  “Oh, drat!” Grace stood and began pacing again. How could she ever persuade Geoffrey Morgan to wager with her if he knew she had no money? Grace was too savvy in the ways of London gossip to think this sort of news would be secret for long. Lord Geoffrey would hear of it within a day or two at the most. She must think of a way to counteract rumors or, at least, the effects. She turned back to Dianthe. “This news could not have come at a worse time! I shall have to find money somewhere.”

  “I confess I am worried about Miss Talbot,” Dianthe said. She frowned and appeared to search for words. “I am deeply disturbed by the way her brother talks to her—as if she has no brains at all. At one point last evening, when Miss Talbot conversed with a young man of whom her brother did not approve, he squeezed her arm so tightly that she had bruises. Then, when someone asked her about them later, she lied about how she had come by them. It put me in mind of Squire Samuels again, and you know what that means.”

  Yes, indeed. Dianthe could have been describing Grace’s relationship with Leland, and when she recalled the day before when she’d lied to Dianthe about the bruises she’d received at Barrington’s hands, she could not still the shudder that ran through her. She wondered if Dianthe would have guessed the truth about Leland if she’d visited the Yorks more often. No, she could not abandon Laura Talbot. In fact, she would beg, borrow or steal whatever was necessary to save the girl from a loveless marriage and an abusive brother.

  “Yes, Dianthe, I know,” she said. “I shall do whatever is necessary to secure Miss Talbot’s happy future.”

  Coming in through the kitchen door from the stables, Adam was passing the sitting room on his way to the stairs when he overheard Dianthe ask Grace in dismay what they were going to do. Grace had gotten the notice from Mr. Ogilby, then. An unexpected twinge of conscience made him uneasy. It was, after all, his fault that Grace couldn’t pay her bills.

  Things had certainly become twisted since he’d come to live at Bloomsbury Square. One moment Grace looked suspicious as hell and the next she was so innocently straightforward that he could not suspect her of anything devious or underhanded.

  “I shall have to find money somewhere.”

  That statement stopped him dead in his tracks. Was Grace that desperate to gamble? He went back to the sitting room door and listened for a moment, but the conversation had turned to Laura Talbot.

  “I shall do whatever is necessary to secure Miss Talbot’s happy future.”

  What did this Miss Talbot have to do with any of this? How was Grace responsible for her? And what would that have to do with her gambling? And exactly how far would Grace go to secure Miss Talbot’s future?

  He shook his head, suddenly sick of all the secrets. Something very odd was afoot, and he’d damn well find out what it was.

  Chapter Nine

  Late afternoon sun streamed through the leaded glass panes of the library windows, illuminating the neatly stacked rows of books. Grace knew it had to be here somewhere. There could only be eight or nine hundred volumes or so in the entire collection. She moved the stepladder again and climbed to the highest shelf. She’d last seen it where Basil kept the books he felt were unsuitable for women, well out of her reach.

  Human Physiology or some such obscure title. Or was it Human Anatomy? Perhaps it was with the biology or medical volumes. She needed the book because this was not a question she could ask a doctor. Or was it? Would a doctor feel the same need to protect her delicacy now that it was presumed she was an independent widow?

  “Doing the high dusting?” a feminine voice asked.

  Grace glanced over her shoulder. Charity MacGregor was standing in the doorway. She had forgotten she had asked Charity to come for tea today. Relief washed through her. Charity’s uncle had been a doctor! Perhaps she would know.

  “No, jus
t looking for an elusive volume,” she confessed as she backed down the ladder. She pulled Charity into the room and closed the door. “I am glad you’re here, Charity. I’d like to have some rather frank words with you.”

  “Heavens. This sounds serious.” Charity pulled her gloves off and removed her bonnet before taking a chair. “I hope nothing is wrong, Grace. Is it Morgan? Is he troubling you?”

  “Yes. I mean, no. It is not Lord Geoffrey, it is…something else. I hoped you might be able to answer a few questions.”

  “Anything, Grace.” She gestured at the teapot on the low table in the center of the group of chairs. “May I?”

  “Please do.” Grace sat across from Charity and glanced at the clock on her desk. She only had a few minutes before Dianthe would be down for tea and she did not want this to be a group discussion. The subject was not fit for Dianthe’s ears.

  She breathed deeply and launched forth. “I have recently had occasion…well, suffice it to say that the subject of virginity came up.”

  “We are certainly no virgins, Grace.” Charity paused and a little blush stole up her cheeks. “And Drew makes certain of it often.”

  “Of course not.” Grace smiled. “The question is more academic than personal. To wit, how would a man know, with any degree of certainty, whether his bride is a virgin or not?”

  “And you are asking me?” Charity’s mouth drew up in a smile and she looked as if she would laugh. “Wouldn’t a man know the answer to that better than a woman?”

  “Possibly. But I do not want to have this conversation with a man. I thought you might have overheard discussions, or had occasion to glance at medical texts. I know your uncle was a doctor, and thought…well, that you could…uh…” She shrugged.

  Charity giggled and winked. “I knew sneaking into my uncle’s study to look at those books would prove invaluable some day.” She sat back in her chair and took a sip of tea. “Well, I cannot say with certainty. But neither could a man. I used to wonder about that myself. And I wondered how many virtuous women were shamed or shunned by their husbands because some childhood accident or simple deficiency deprived her of that little membrane.”

  Grace knew about the membrane, but, “Then you think men cannot positively know?”

  “Absolutely not,” she declared, “unless the barrier is obviously present and there is bleeding. An examination by a qualified physician could verify if the membrane was still there, but not what might have broken or removed it, if not. But then, of course, the membrane could be ruptured by the examination. And I gather the blood evidence can be anywhere from nonexistent, to a drop, to near hemorrhage.”

  “So you think not every virgin has a maidenhead?”

  Charity shrugged. “I suppose. And conversely, I’ve heard that many not-so-innocent brides have been able to effectively deceive their grooms.”

  Grace nodded. “So if one could feign innocence, it stands to reason that one could also feign experience?”

  “I suppose, but what would be the advantage to feigning experience?”

  Grace’s entire future hinged upon it, that’s what—her right to inherit from Basil, most importantly. Surely, with all Basil’s groping and desperate attempts to force himself into her, there would be no trace left of her maidenhead. In fact, she recalled one such incident when she had experienced some bleeding. At the time she had thought it was due to abrasion, but perhaps not. Yes, it was unlikely that there would be anything left that could prove absolutely that her marriage had been unconsummated.

  Nearly weak with relief, she sat back in her chair and exhaled. “How odd that I have been unable to find anything that would answer that question,” she mused.

  Charity giggled. “Not so odd when you consider who writes those books. But what has you thinking about such things?”

  “Just, uh, recent events.”

  “Oh! Say it is not Miss Talbot! If her brother ever found out that she was not a virgin, I cannot imagine what would happen. And Lord Geoffrey! Why he’d renounce her!”

  “No, not Miss Talbot.” Grace laughed, feeling at least twenty pounds lighter. “Purely academic.”

  Charity raised her eyebrows. “Who in the world are you having these interesting conversations with?”

  The sound of footsteps on the stairway and a light voice humming carried to her from beyond the door. It would be Dianthe. Perfect timing.

  Lord Barrington’s clerk stood as Adam entered the outer office. He looked even more frightened than he had when Adam had arrived in buckskins, and Adam wondered if Barrington had left instructions to deny him an appointment. Well, he’d test that resolve right now.

  “Barrington,” he said, letting the single word speak for him.

  “Not in, sir. If you will leave your name, I will send you an appointment date.”

  “I’ll wait.” Adam glanced at the straight-backed chair opposite the clerk’s cramped desk.

  “But, sir. Lord Barrington is not in.”

  “Check his office,” he suggested.

  The clerk flushed and glanced toward Barrington’s private office. “I, um…”

  Adam looked toward the clerk’s desk again and read the miniscule name plaque. “Save it, Jameson. I know he’s here. I don’t care what he’s in the middle of, or whom he is meeting with, I’ll wait until he sees me.”

  “But—”

  “I suggest, for both our sakes, that you let him know I’m waiting.”

  Adam saw the signs of surrender in the man’s eyes. Jameson edged toward Barrington’s door. “If you’ll take a seat, sir.”

  But he was not inclined to follow instructions. He crossed his arms and leaned one shoulder against the wall in an attitude of expectancy. The clerk slipped through Barrington’s door and closed it quickly, as if afraid that Adam would force his way through. Not a bad idea, actually. But he was not quite that desperate yet.

  A few moments later Jameson, flushed and pinched-looking, exited the office and nodded to Adam. “You may go in now, sir.”

  He found Barrington sitting behind his desk, a scowl fixed on his face. Was the man embarrassed by his boorish behavior two nights ago, or was he angry with Adam for some reason?

  “What do you want, Hawthorne?” he asked.

  “The name I asked you for, Lord Barrington. I am still waiting.”

  “Name?” Barrington dropped his pen on his blotter. “Ah, yes. The field commander at Fort Garry, was it not?”

  “No. The military attaché,” he corrected. He’d be willing to wager Barrington knew full well what name he wanted.

  “Haven’t come across those records, yet. I told you I’d send it along when I found it.”

  Barrington was lying. He knew precisely where to find that information. Adam was finished with diplomacy. “Since this task seems to be beyond your skills or capacity, I withdraw my request. I shall find the name on my own.”

  Barrington’s jaw tightened and his eyes narrowed. Ah, it was personal. Having accomplished what he’d come for, Adam turned and headed for the door.

  “Hawthorne?”

  He turned, one hand on the knob. Naked contempt shown in Barrington’s eyes.

  “Keep out of Grace’s business. You have no idea what you are trifling with.”

  A flash of Grace braced for attack with the poker clutched between her hands rose to taunt him and a primal anger surged upward. Releasing the knob, he crossed the room to Barrington’s desk and leaned over it, his fists on the desk’s surface. In a low, deadly tone, he said, “There is nothing trifling about what I am doing, Barrington. Leave Grace alone. If I hear that you’ve so much as touched the hem of her skirt again, I’ll come looking for you, and it won’t be good.”

  Barrington sneered. “You’ve been too long in the colonies.”

  Or not long enough, he thought, heading back for the door.

  “Watch your back, or you’ll be her next victim.”

  Adam threw the door open and the glass pane rattled in its frame. He was halfw
ay down the stairs before the words sank in. What the hell did the man mean? How would he be Grace’s next victim? Her next conquest? Too late for that warning!

  Adam was waiting for Freddie Carter by the time he arrived at the Eagle Tavern. He tossed his whiskey down and pulled Freddie outside into the creeping darkness. The square was filled with peddlers hawking their merchandise, and coaches passed slowly, looking for fares.

  Adam took the reins of his horse from the lad he’d paid to watch him. “I haven’t much time, Carter. I have an engagement in scarce an hour.”

  “Urgent business?”

  He smiled. “You could say that. But I needed to talk to you. Barrington is not going to give me the name I requested. I want you to put everything else aside and get me it for me.”

  Freddie cocked an eyebrow. “What can you give me to go on?”

  “The man would be military, likely an officer, attached to the forces at Fort Garry in ’16. He’d be in a position to receive military packets from the War Office and report back to them. His name should be on several lists. Look for a report of an attack on an Indian village southeast of Winnipeg in December of 1815 or January of ’16. Who signed it? That’s the name I want.”

  Freddie nodded, all trace of amusement gone. “I’ll see what I can do. It is not always easy to gain access to War Office records, but I have some friends who owe me favors.”

  Adam clapped the man on the arm. “My thanks, Carter. And don’t use my name in military circles. I’m afraid it won’t open any doors for you. I’ve made an enemy of Barrington.”

  A short bark of laughter was Carter’s only response.

  “Day or night, the minute—the very second—you have that information, I want to know.”

  “I’ll find you. And what of the investigation on Mrs. Forbush?”

  “I’ll take care of Mrs. Forbush,” Adam said, turning to go.

  “Take good care, Adam. It seems she has some very powerful friends. And a few enemies, too.”

  Adam turned back. “Is there something I should know about those enemies?”