“Oh, Wilson, that’s thoughtful. May I see it?”
With a little smile, he flipped open the lid...and Adela gasped.
Beautiful diamonds glittered on their velvet bed, all set in a pair of simple but elegant curlicues, and each stone more than a match for the family gems she would be wearing.
“Oh, Wilson...” she sighed, at a complete loss for anything else.
“Do you like them?” He still sounded anxious, lifting out the ornaments and tossing the box aside. “Here, see how the clip works...” He demonstrated one the ingenious fastenings. “Shall we try them?”
“Um...yes, I think we should.” Adela reached for her comb and neatly caught back sections of her hair, holding them in place while Wilson affixed first one of the diamond clips, then the other. It seemed odd for her husband alone to be attending to her toilette on the night of a grand ball, and Adela’s new maid had been mystified and a little crestfallen when told her services weren’t required. But the young woman had brightened again immediately on receipt of a generous bonus and extra day off to visit her family.
It wouldn’t have done for her to see her mistress donning not her beautiful blue-and-silver-gold gown...but instead one of the master’s country suits!
Still taken aback by the beauty of Wilson’s gift, Adela found her hands shook when she attempted to make an adjustment to her hair. But gently lowering her fingers, Wilson took over and performed the task perfectly, teasing a few soft, fetching shorter fronds around her face.
“There,” he said, clearly pleased with his efforts.
Adela laughed, smiling at her own reflection. Crooked nose and chicken pox marks notwithstanding, she acknowledged freely and without any qualm that she looked a picture.
Was it living with Wilson and being the recipient of his frequent and inventive lovemaking that had given her such a glow? Or was it because, even in the absence of spoken avowals of love, his obvious respect, companionship and affection had transformed into her a beauty? Perhaps it was simply the new confidence she felt inside herself that had initiated the change?
“Is there not one skill or task at which you don’t excel, husband dear?” she asked brightly, to hide the way her own radiant appearance shook her. “There’s a future for you as a ladies’ hairdresser should the government and the captains of industry ever dispense with your services.”
“I could call myself Monsieur Wilsonetti.” He waggled his dark brows playfully at her, and ran his fingertips down the smooth fall of her hair, where it hung down her back. “So, do you like the clips? I think they should perform their purpose admirably.”
“Wilson, they’re exquisite! Beyond beautiful...” Adela turned, reached around for the stroking hand and drew it to her lips, impressing a passionate kiss upon it. “It’s the most beautiful gift I’ve ever been given....” She kissed his fingers again, acknowledging a lie. His regard for her, which seemed to grow despite the unusual nature of their marriage, was a greater gift by far.
He dipped down slightly, and with his face beside hers, turned her to the mirror again, so his reflection could grin at her. “Good. I’m glad you like it...but you’re going to have to earn it tonight, my dear. We’ve got an adventure ahead of us, and alas, these pretty baubles must go in the box with everything else, and we’ll have to tie up your hair or plait it, ready for the cap.”
With a brisk kiss to her cheek, he straightened up, instantly businesslike again as he unlatched the clips, then stowed them away in the box, ready for transit in their carriage to Spencerleigh House.
* * *
IN AN UPPER bedroom window of the handsome south London villa, an oil lamp flickered.
“There. That’s the sign.” Wilson pointed toward it with a long, black gloved finger. His voice was low, and his pale eyes gleamed in a way that was almost unearthly behind the dark silk mask he was wearing, a match to the one that covered the upper part of Adela’s face.
“So the coast will be clear?” she whispered back to him. They were crouched behind abundant bushes in the corner of the garden of Blair Devine’s house, after having climbed the wall, Wilson having given her a leg up before shimmying over himself, his height giving him a distinct advantage as a climber.
“Yes. My new young friend, his footman—soon to be a footman of ours—was instructed to light the lamp once Devine has left for the ball.”
“What of his other servants?” Adela adjusted her position. She’d worn the borrowed trousers before, and others in her youth, but it still felt extremely odd to have so much cloth between her legs—the sturdy breeches and the narrow cut drawers she’d selected especially for the occasion. It wasn’t an unpleasant sensation. In fact, it was vaguely exciting in a perverse way, and she had to school her concentration so as not to give in to the lascivious thoughts that she’d had while first trying on the heather suit. It didn’t help that Wilson looked so mysterious and downright devastatingly attractive in his devilish silk mask.
“Don’t worry...a couple bottles of brandy, courtesy of my friend the local innkeeper, judiciously dosed with a little laudanum by Earnest, our footman friend, will have them snoozing by now...while he keeps watch at the other end of the lane.”
“So we appear to have all angles covered then, with Teale and the carriage around the corner at the other end?” She reached up to adjust her cap. Her hair was in a plait beneath it, and she’d jammed hat pins through the tweed for security, but it still felt precarious, and she kept having to push shorter strands back out of view.
“Quite so. And with luck, we should remain undisturbed and have more than sufficient time to get in, breach the safe and peruse the documents within.” He reached out and tapped her shoulder reassuringly. “Now come along, my dear...the game is on now. We’re about to break the law, and the sooner we’re about our task, the sooner we can be back in the carriage and on the way to Sybil’s grand event, just as if nothing had ever happened.” He winked. “And who wouldn’t believe I hadn’t been detained making love to my glorious wife? The perfect reason to be late to the affair.”
“Wilson, behave,” she mouthed to him, grinning despite the tension of the situation as she braced herself to move forward. They both wore black rubber-soled shoes, designed for sporting activity, in order to be silent and fleet of foot, if required.
Wilson took her gloved hand in his, then led her forward, skirting the edge of the garden, then scuttling to the next bit of cover afforded by bushes. Pausing for a moment, he whispered, “I might even be compelled to actually ravish you in the carriage, my dear, if we have time. The sight of you in those breeches is having quite an effect on me.”
“I hope you’ll be able to concentrate on the task in hand.”
“I’ll manage, never fear.” With that he urged her forward again, and they ran at a crouch until they reached the window to the room that Wilson had determined was Devine’s study.
First, her husband popped up his head and peered in, then he scanned the garden behind them, his sharp gaze darting hither and thither, checking all aspects. Cautiously edging to his side, Adela peeked into the room, too. It was unlit, but the remains of a small fire shed some radiance, creating ominous shadows and deep, dark corners.
“I think we may proceed,” Wilson whispered, then reached into the canvas satchel he had slung over his shoulder, the mate of which Adela carried.
She watched, entranced, as he employed a device that was a combination of a large rubber suction cup and a pair of protractors, ingeniously carving out a circle of the window glass, removing it in one piece, then reaching in through the aperture to open the window snib.
The room lay accessible before them, and first Wilson climbed nimbly over the sill, then he assisted Adela’s entrance, reaching though, gripping her strongly and lifting her to the sill, too, so he could help her down onto the carpet. With purpose, Wilson strode to an incredibly ugly and badly rendered painting of a horse, then ran his fingertips down the edge of the frame. With a barely audible c
lick it yielded to him, too, and when he swung it back out of the way, a green painted safe was revealed, squat and heavy and impressively defiant.
“Now for the more difficult task, my sweet.” His eyes glittered in the gloom, and Adela had to smile. Oh, how he relished this. Challenges. Difficulties. They were all meat and drink to her husband. He thrived on pitting his fine intellect and instincts against obstacles.
I wonder if that’s why he’s come to hold me in a better regard? Because I’m certainly not the easiest person to get along with?
But that was a question for another time. Now she had to help him. She drew a small dark lantern from her satchel, lit it carefully then set it on an adjacent chest of drawers to one side. Wilson handed her a leather pouch from his satchel, and she unrolled it, revealing not his usual set of tools, but those of a cracksman. As if stripping for action, he removed his black gloves and his mask, pushing them into his pocket. Adela removed mask and gloves, too.
For a moment or two, Wilson just stood there, his narrow hands pressed together in front of him, forefingers just touching his lips, thinking, assessing. To Adela he looked more than anything like a genie or mystic summoning a trancelike state of concentration, and she suspected that was more or less exactly what he was doing.
In a low, intense voice, he requested the first tool.
Adela wasn’t sure what she’d expected. Perhaps that the safe would spring open in short order for Wilson, because his skills were so much more refined than hers, and his equipment was far superior to the stiff hairpins she’d resorted to when she’d broken into Lord Rayworth’s secret library, and on the few other occasions she’d employed what Wilson had taught her. It seemed like a hundred years since the house party now, and as if it had been another world. How much had changed since she and Wilson had been thrown back into close orbit around each other, like two celestial bodies who’d swung away for a few years, but circled back under the power of a strange gravity.
Ten minutes passed, then another ten, punctuated by Wilson’s terse demands for items from the roll. The torsion wrench. The offset diamond pick. The short hook. She’d learned all their names and functions in preparation.
Eventually, though, when Adela’s nerves were almost shredded, there came a fearsomely ringing clunk, a noise that seemed infinitely louder than it actually was, and Wilson’s jubilant but quiet, “Excellent!”
A twist of the handle and the safe door swung open in a heavy arc.
Documents filled one entire shelf—small bundles and individual envelopes. Many looked like personal letters, some poignantly fastened with ribbons, as if they were keepsakes of love affairs, much like Sybil’s. Others appeared more formal, perhaps business documents and papers.
“You skim the love letters, Della. I’ll peruse these.” Wilson lifted out the far less romantic items, a frown creasing his brow. “Lord alone knows what the blackguard has been up to. I suspect far more than personal threats against incautious sweethearts are involved here.”
They took everything to the rug in front of the fire, where the best light was, and began to study them. Adela blessed her ability to rapidly scan and absorb the content of any given thing, her invaluable gift as an artist. But speedy as she was, her talent was rudimentary compared to Wilson’s amazing powers of comprehension. He was reading and assessing documents ten or twenty times as fast as she was, and she suspected his recall was far more detailed than hers.
Quickly, she found Sybil’s letters, tied with a familiar rose-pink ribbon, one Adela herself had given her as a birthday gift when they were girls. Her sister’s name was printed on a small slip of paper tucked into the bundle, and she noticed other names affixed to other bundles. With a pang, she prized off the ribbon and slipped it into her pocket. She didn’t intend to read the words. It seemed an invasion. Gingerly, she reached for one of the fire irons and poked the coals as quietly as she could.
“I’m sorry, my dear,” she whispered to her absent sister, then threw the envelopes into the flames, pressing them in with poker and watching until every scrap was consumed. Obliterating the letters was the only way to be sure. If she returned them to Sybil, she would keep them out of sentiment, and someday in the future, her marriage might be shattered because of them. Another heinous blackmailer and another traitorous maid would come along and the whole horrid business would start all over again.
What to do with the other bundles? Adela knew she’d made the correct choice for Sybil, but did she have the right to do the same for these other correspondents, these other lovers? Surely they should be left to decide for themselves? Gathering up all the bundles, she began stowing them into her satchel. It would be necessary to make discreet appointments, and visit their rightful owners.
“Good God!” It was a low exclamation, barely more than a let-out breath, but with the last of the letters in her hand, Adela turned toward Wilson. He’d clearly found, read and evaluated something momentous. “He has business letters, details of secret transactions...and yes, I do declare, political papers here. Where does he get all this? He must have a secret low life and connections that nobody in polite circles is aware of....” Wilson turned to her, frowning. “I suspect the man’s a filthy spy as well as some kind of master blackmailer.”
“Well, he always did boast to Mama about his influential friends. Seems he must have connections with the servants, and maybe the disgruntled clerks and secretaries of these people, too.”
“I agree,” said Wilson, still sifting through documents. “Ironic, isn’t it, though? He seems to have a profitable working relationship with underlings of all kinds, and yet by the sound of it he treats his own servants extremely shabbily. Come his downfall, which will be inevitable if I have anything to do with it, I must see that they all find decent places.”
Adela eyed her husband with ever-gathering respect. The more she had close dealings with him, the more she admired his principles. The wild, heedless boy had become a man of great integrity.
“Now, what have we here?” he went on, opening a last slim file, having stowed away the crucial documents in his satchel. He tilted it her way, and Adela saw Wilson’s own name inscribed on the manila.
He read in silence, taking what seemed an age for him, scanning and comparing several sheets, and then staring blankly.
“What is it? What’s wrong?”
He handed them to her, and Adela read quickly, scanning the words with growing shock.
The first document was a sworn affidavit, a statement by one Henry Rowson, groom to Mr. Arthur Edward Ruffington, describing how Rowson’s mistress, Mrs. Berta Ruffington, had already been secretly married to him when she’d wed Mr. Ruffington. Along with it there was their marriage certificate, and a second affidavit from a maid, detailing a conversion with Mrs. Ruffington in which she admitted that her only child, her son, Wilson, was fathered by Rowson.
The papers shook in Adela’s hand. How must Wilson be feeling? She reached out and rested her hand on his arm. “I’m sorry, Wilson. This must be a horrible shock for you.”
He turned to her, his face a curious amalgam of a slight smile and blankness, a jolted state. Then he shrugged in the firelight. “No, my dear, not a complete surprise. I always felt there was some secret my mother kept, but we didn’t converse much.... She didn’t seem to care for my company.”
“Oh, Wilson...” How sorry Adela felt for him. Her own mother was a silly woman sometimes, but she loved her girls, pretty or otherwise.
Wilson pursed his lips, tapping one long forefinger against them. “This explains much. My father, bless him, was always the best and kindest of parents, as if lavishing his love on me was a way of compensating, and assuring me that I wasn’t second best to him, and that he didn’t resent me for my birth. He must have known, but he didn’t want me to suffer for it.”
“And what of...of this other man?” asked Adela, surprised. What a rare and tolerant man Wilson’s father must have been.
Wilson’s expression grew more b
itter. Well, perhaps not bitter; he appeared more sad than anything, on closer inspection. “Would you believe that I barely noticed him? When I was home from school, I saw the lack of love between my parents. But...but, my God, Adela, Rowson was a servant. We exchanged the usual words. He seemed a decent man while he worked for us. He came with my mother from her previous household. She was a young widow....” Wilson heaved a sigh. This emotional conundrum was somehow beyond his cool brain. “I cannot imagine why she would marry him, and then not acknowledge it...not acknowledge me as the product of their union.”
Adela didn’t know what to say. She slid her arm around her husband’s shoulder, his comforter in this valley of the shadow of memories...and of present felony.
“I think I was a constant reminder of her mistake, who knows? And she certainly resented my father, too, perhaps for his easy tolerance.” Wilson gave Adela a perplexed look. “I’m not an expert on the human heart, my dear, but I could certainly tell from an early age that my mother didn’t really like either of us very much.”
How sad for him, denied a mother’s love. Denied knowledge of his true sire. The only compensation was that his faux father had given him affection.
“It could be fraudulent. It might all be lies.” Adela shook the papers.
“We’ll never know. Unless there are other documents or letters...other people my mother might have told. Witnesses... All the parties involved are deceased now, however.” Wilson waggled his fingers, indicating she should give him the affidavits. “I’d better show these to the Old Curmudgeon’s solicitors. It makes a good deal of difference to us, Adela.” He quirked his dark brows. “If I’m not my...my father’s son, I’m no longer Lord Millingford’s legitimate heir...at least I don’t think I am. I’ll be out of the frame like a shot once your grandfather discovers I’m not of his blood.” A crooked little grin formed on Wilson’s lips, real humor this time. “He’ll be forced to relent and bequeath his millions to you, my sweet, in the absence of somebody with a cock. Even if the title itself dies out...”
Portia Da Costa Page 30
