My Fair Lord

by Wilma Counts

  With that, he climbed up behind his lordship, who scarcely seemed aware of what was happening, and Jake reached around the man to grip the reins with one hand, the other holding fast to the body in front of him. Somewhat to Jake’s surprise, Lady Henrietta, simply did as he told her. When he and Lord Alfred finally arrived back at Blakemoor house, she had already sent for the doctor and had a footman ready to help Jake get his lordship up to his own chambers, where his valet and the footman helped him into a loose nightshirt and into bed.

  As this was taking place, Jake started toward his own room, but encountered Lady Henrietta hovering in the hall outside her uncle’s chambers. She was still dressed in her riding habit, though she had thrown off the heavy cloak; she looked pale and distraught. Jake simply opened his arms and, as though it were the most natural thing in the world, she moved into them, clinging to his shoulders and allowing the tears she had apparently been willing herself to hold back. She sobbed against his chest. Her hair had come loose in what must have been an energetic ride back to the stables. A soft strand played against his face. He was aware of the scent she always used, but there was also a hint of the atmosphere through which they had just ridden. He was intensely aware of the attractive woman in his arms, but beyond that he was conscious of his own feelings—his need to comfort and protect someone he truly cared for—feelings that had little to do with his one-time thought of “dalliance.” He laid his cheek against her head and just held her until her sobs subsided.

  Then she drew back, embarrassed, but she held his gaze. “Oh, I am so sorry. I . . . uh . . . I just—”

  “Never mind, my lady. You were worried and scared. I understand.” And he did understand her emotional reaction, but that hardly explained the sense of loss he had felt at her stepping away from him.

  A movement down the hall diverted their attention and they drew even farther apart.

  “Retta?” Viscount Heaton called. “What is going on? Is Uncle Alfred all right?” He directed a penetrating look at Jake and raised an eyebrow with his question.

  Jake watched as she quickly regained total control of herself and explained to her brother that their uncle was suffering a spell of difficult breathing and that she had sent for the doctor. “Mr. Bolton was most helpful,” she added. “I simply do not know what might have happened had he not been there.”

  On that note Jake bowed briefly and left the two of them to commiserate with each other as they waited for the doctor.

  * * * *

  Jake had changed from his damp clothing and was finishing his breakfast in the dining room when he was joined by Lady Georgiana and her companion who had heard of the morning’s crisis. Jake was still answering their questions as best he could when they were joined by Lady Henrietta, her brother, and an older man who was introduced to Jake as Lord Alfred’s doctor, Sir Cecil Lindstrom. Jake noted that, at some point, Lady Henrietta had changed into a yellow printed day dress; her appearance helped lift some of the gloom of the day. To Jake, the doctor appeared to be remarkably turned out for someone who must have been summoned before his own morning had fairly begun. With a full head of white hair, he was dressed impeccably and carried himself with an air of being conscious of his own place in the world. Obviously well known to all the others, Lindstrom barely acknowledged his introduction to Jake, which Jake took to mean that, at some point in the last few weeks, Lord Alfred had informed his friend that a Bow Street Runner was ensconced in Blakemoor house.

  Lindstrom instantly became the center of attention, but Lady Georgiana waited until the doctor and her niece and nephew had filled their plates and taken seats at the table before demanding, “Well, Cecil? How is he? I assume you would have informed us immediately were there cause for alarm.”

  “He is resting comfortably, I hope. I extracted some blood and gave him a draught to ease his discomfort.”

  Lady Georgiana sniffed. “Laudanum, I suppose. The cure-all of the day.”

  The doctor took a swallow from his coffee cup, set it down, and said, “As a matter of fact, yes. It is my professional opinion that he needs rest.”

  “So it is not merely his usual breathing problems with this kind of weather?” she pressed.

  “I do not think so. Or, I should say, it is not that alone. He was experiencing a very rapid heartbeat and said he felt faint during his morning ride. I suspect a problem with his heart, though not, I hope, a serious one.”

  “Uncle Alfred will rest for the rest of this day at least, and he will just have to give up his morning rides until this awful weather changes,” Lady Henrietta said. “Also, Sir Cecil has suggested that he should forgo his trips to Whitehall for the time being.”

  “He will not take kindly to that idea, and you know it,” her brother said.

  She shrugged. “He will do it, though, if we all insist.”

  “And we shall insist,” Lady Georgiana said firmly.

  “He can certainly work from home,” the doctor said. “He is, after all, quite used to doing so. I will just have a word with Morrow before I leave. I assume he has arrived by now?”

  “Oh, yes. He is probably already at Father’s desk in the library,” Viscount Heaton said, “but do take your time in finishing your breakfast. I want to say again how much we appreciate your coming to tend my uncle on such short notice.”

  “As I told you, Alfred is a dear friend. Inconvenience is but one of the conditions of my profession,” Lindstrom said expansively. “One learns to sleep when one can.”

  “I do so admire men of your dedication, Sir Cecil,” Madame Laurent said, smiling flirtatiously at the doctor. It was one of the longest speeches Jake had ever heard from her. A petite woman with dark blond hair tending to gray, she usually said very little in company. And here she was, asserting herself to attract the medical man’s attention.

  “Why, thank you, Madame Laurent. A lovely compliment from a lovely woman.”

  She blushed, but did not respond.

  Jake exchanged a glance with Lady Henrietta who seemed as intrigued as he at the exchange between her aunt’s companion and the doctor.

  Lindstrom rose, pronouncing himself already late for another appointment, but declared that he would “just have a word with Morrow about Lord Alfred’s workload for the next few days.”

  * * * *

  Secure in the knowledge that her uncle was all right, at least for the time being, Retta retreated to her own room for the rest of the morning. Now that the crisis was over, she found herself engaged in what had lately become a familiar dilemma: What to do about Mr. Bolton? More specifically, what to do about her feelings about the man. What on earth had possessed her to throw herself at him that way? True she was upset, but did she have to seek comfort in the first set of masculine arms available? Nor could she shake the feeling—which she dared not examine too closely—that she somehow belonged in those arms. Belonged? Where did that bit of utter nonsense come from?

  A few more weeks, eight perhaps, and he would be gone—out of her life, come what may. But that thought gave her little comfort. Indeed, it brought with it a sense of despair. She’d had a vague idea that other men could help to divert her attention from such a patently unsuitable match. So she had lately accepted invitations that might not otherwise have tempted her at all. The usually circumspect Lady Henrietta had indulged herself in at least two idle flirtations, and she had tacitly allowed Viscount Willitson to renew his suit. Her feelings of guilt over her undeniable attraction to Jake Bolton were now compounded by her guilt over so cavalierly using Willitson.

  It was in this state of angst that she met with her aunt later that afternoon. Aunt Georgiana had found Retta in their sitting room, a book open but unread in her lap.

  “Dr. Lindstrom arrived a while ago; he and I have just checked on our patient,” Aunt Georgiana said as she took a seat across from her niece. “He is still sleeping, though I do think he should have wakened
by now.”

  “How is his breathing?” Retta asked.

  “Regular. And the doctor listened to his heart and pronounced that regular too.”

  “He did not bleed him again, did he?” Retta could not contain her worried disapproval on that score.

  “No. He said he would perhaps do so tomorrow.”

  “By then Uncle Alfred should be alert enough to decide that for himself.”

  “Honestly, Retta. I do not know why you and Alfred have such an aversion to what is, after all, an established medical practice.”

  “An overused one, I think. And so does Uncle Alfred. He blames all that bleeding for prolonging his recovery when he first came home from Canada. Made him weaker, he said.”

  “Well, that is as may be, but we will see what the doctor says for the immediate situation tomorrow. We have all seen Alfred through these spells before, have we not?”

  “It is nothing more than the miasma of this awful fog,” Retta said, hoping fervently that it was true.

  “Yes. Well,” her aunt said, obviously wanting to change the subject. “I have been thinking. When Alfred is feeling better, we might have a small entertainment for the Christmas season—dinner and maybe some music or games afterwards. What do you think?”

  “Oh, yes!” Retta was immediately enthusiastic. “I have been missing the yule log and the caroling we always have in the country at this time of the year. Surely the flower sellers in Covent Garden will have greenery for sale.”

  “Such a gathering might also be a way to introduce your Mr. Bolton to interaction with society—in a small way, of course. He may then feel more comfortable when he actually makes his come out in February.”

  Retta was glad that both Aunt Georgiana and Uncle Alfred were reconciled to the “project,” but she giggled at the idea of Mr. Bolton’s making a “come out” like some adolescent debutante. She could not wait to share that little joke with her brother and her uncle. She enthusiastically endorsed the idea of an evening soiree to celebrate the Christmas season. It might help divert her mind from these other matters. To this end, she and Lady Georgiana spent the rest of the afternoon making up a guest list, and planning menus and entertainment.

  * * * *

  Jake, too, had gone to Lord Alfred’s chambers to inquire about the patient only to find that gentleman still sleeping. Jake had grown quite fond of the old man whose patriotism and quiet determination to be useful to his country Jake found so admirable. Of course the parallel with his own life had not escaped Jake. As a younger son of the aristocracy and possessing a fortune of his own, Lord Alfred might well have chosen to live out his days in self-indulgence and frivolous entertainments. But he had not made that choice at all.

  Now that Lord Alfred knew of his niece’s bet and her efforts to win it, Jake felt more comfortable in the old man’s presence. While he did not admit to it openly, he shared Lord Alfred’s view that the whole thing was pretty silly. Jake knew very well that the old man would not have tolerated this scheme in anyone but Lady Henrietta.

  Lady Henrietta had informed Jake of her uncle’s confronting her and her brother the day after it happened. Only once had Lord Alfred referred to the situation in Jake’s presence and then he had said only, “I just hope the lot of you know what you are doing.” But Jake had noted with some amusement that Lord Alfred often subtly offered his support to her by making casual remarks to Jake about this or that person in public office, sharing information that might be well known among the ton, but that might not have made its way into public discourse in the lower orders yet. For instance, Prince George, now that he was the Regent, seemed to be turning away from embracing the Whigs as he had done in his youth, to endorsing more of the Tory views with which the King sympathized. This shift in attitude had not been well received by his erstwhile cronies. Such matters might or might not be touched on in the newspapers, but Jake appreciated that these tidbits were things Lord Alfred thought he should know.

  Jake returned to his room and forced himself to study yet again the papers he had copied during his last foray in the library. He repeatedly tried various combinations of letters and numbers, trying to make sense of that second sheet and of the fragment Fenton had supplied. What if, in truth, there was no relationship at all between the two papers? But his gut kept telling him there was.

  He could not have explained just what it was that finally unlocked the puzzle for him, but in an “aha!” moment, the coded document suddenly seemed to make sense. Numbers corresponded to letters of the alphabet to make up words, and letters actually stood for numbers. But they were not consistent. Sometimes the letter would be, say, three letters—or numbers—from the conventional symbol. So a b was written as an f or a 6, or an h as a k or an 11. In some instances the code approached the alphabet straightforwardly—abcd—and in others, in reverse—zyxw. Moreover, the groupings of words or numbers switched the code so that two of them would use one approach and the next three, the other. Then the pattern would shift. Jake thought it somewhat crude as codes went, but it did work—look how long it had taken him to figure it out. He could hardly wait to share this information with Fenton.

  But he knew Fenton would foresee the next problem just as Jake himself did: Morrow was putting information from the office of the army’s Commander-in-Chief into a code. But for whom? And that whom had ramifications. Someone in England was passing this information to someone on the continent for some as yet unknown purpose. All right, Jake thought, we now know the what. We just need the whys and the whos. Still too many questions.

  By the time he was sure he had solved the mystery of the code, it was too late to contact Fenton. Jake cursed at the restrictions imposed by December’s early nightfall combined with the continuing fog. The next morning Lady Henrietta chose to forego their usual lesson. She was grilling him these days on a gentleman’s proper behavior in various situations as outlined in the book she had given him earlier such as which persons deserved a proper bow as opposed to those for whom a simple nod of the head would do. Instead, she sat with her uncle, who was alert and none too pleased to be confined to his bed. Under the pretext of taking a walk to stretch his legs, Jake left the house and made his way by a circuitous route to one of the busier commercial streets. He summoned a hackney cab and gave the driver a coin and a message to take to Fenton whom Jake knew to be staying with his parents at their town house. Luckily, the next day was Jake’s half-day off, so he was able to navigate his way to the pub he had designated in his message while it was still daylight. Murky and foggy though it was, native Londoners like cab drivers seemed to almost feel their way through the beleaguered city.

  “Good lord. This place is practically empty. The weather is so abominable that it manages to keep a proper Englishman from his pint! I do hope you have something pretty splendid to drag me out in this pea soup.” Fenton’s testiness was only half-feigned.

  “I think so, your highness.” They ordered and paid for drinks at the bar and took them to a corner table. “Have a look at this, Peter.” Jake laid the papers before his superior officer and explained the code.

  Fenton whistled. “Bless you, my son—this is pretty splendid. I knew having you in Blakemoor House was a good idea!”

  “Yes, but what now?” Jake asked. “We have no idea who his contacts are—or to whom they are giving the information. I had thought of following Morrow when he finishes of a day at Blakemoor House . . .”

  Fenton considered this silently for a few moments, then stroked his chin. “Hmm. No, I think it better that you stay in place—see if anyone contacts him there. I’ll have him followed by someone he doesn’t know at all. Henry Morrow—or Henri Moreau, if you please—will not stir from his quarters without our knowing about it.” He fell quiet again, then asked, “Do you think Lord Alfred knows what is going on? Is he involved?”

  “My gut says no, but it has been wrong before, you know.” Jake covered his em
otion by taking a long swallow from his mug.

  “Are you still blaming yourself for that ambush at Aranza? That was—what?—two years ago? Good God, man, how often must you be told that was not your fault?”

  “I trusted the wrong people,” Jake said.

  “Maybe. Maybe not. We never knew that for a certainty.”

  “Nevertheless, the battle of Pamplona—”

  “Would very likely have proceeded just as it did. Let it go, my friend.”

  “I have—I think. But I will never make that mistake again.”

  “Your instincts on the Peninsula were, more often than not, right on target. I trust them now, even if you do not. Others do as well.”

  “Thank you for that vote of confidence.” Jake knew that by “others” Fenton meant Castlereagh and Wellington.

  “Now, drink up and get back to work. Keep your eyes and ears open, but, for God’s sake, be careful! Richter’s death is the last one any of us want in this business.”

  “Yes, sir.” Jake gave him mock salute. They both rose and made their way back into the murky mess of the fog while they were still able to see at least a few feet in front of them.

  Three days later, the fog lifted. The atmosphere was clearer—and smelled better—but the weather had turned much colder. It rained nearly every day and often there were flakes of snow mixed in the rain. The city’s activities picked up, but were still curtailed by the weather.

  Chapter 11

  Ten days after Uncle Alfred’s spell in the park, a freak break in the weather allowed Londoners to resume normal activities, if only temporarily. It was still cold, but it had not rained for two days. Despite its being later than her usual morning ride, Retta was determined to give her precious Moonstar a good run and welcomed her uncle’s company for at least the beginning and end of the ride. Having made a remarkable recovery, Uncle Alfred had returned to his normal routine, though he still worked from home. He received visits from a number of his cronies, including not only Dr. Lindstrom, but also the Duke of York who had brought with him a packet of papers that required Lord Alfred’s attention. Retta thought the duke exaggerated, but she was grateful to him for giving her uncle something useful to do during his enforced seclusion.