Formidable Lord Quentin

by Patricia Rice

  “Do you ever have real parties with dancing and people my age?” Syd asked wistfully.

  “We will.” Bell didn’t know how or when, but she would make it happen. Syd was much too young and unpolished to be introduced to the sophisticated society functions that Bell attended, but young people must gather somewhere. She added one more thing to her growing list to do.

  She loved challenges and it was wonderful to have her family back. This might turn out to be the most exciting summer she’d ever had. Conquering society had been terrifying, but now that she’d done it, she was confident she could push her sisters to the highest peaks.

  A footman arrived carrying a visitor’s card. Bell glanced at the card and pushed back her chair. “Have Mr. Summerby taken to the study, please. I will be right with him.” She picked up the papers she’d been trying to peruse while her sisters chattered. “We should be ready to take the shops by storm this morning. Wear your new gloves and forget those dreadful Methodist bonnets. Try the hats you picked from my wardrobe, and we’ll be on our way in an hour.”

  That stopped any further demands for parties or arguments over politics. Shopping was a fabulous distraction, for now. Bell didn’t know what she’d do once they realized all her friends were married and too caught up in their own lives to include the younger set. Bell might be content with a night at the opera or a card game with an elderly acquaintance. Her sisters wouldn’t be. She couldn’t rely on Jocelyn to keep them entertained—political dinner parties were really not the thing for young girls.

  But neither was Scotland.

  Mr. Summerby rose from the wing chair when she entered. Bespectacled, with receding gray hair, and a definite paunch beneath his unadorned waistcoat, he looked every part a fastidious solicitor. Bell had no idea of his age, but his face bore wrinkle lines only about his eyes. She’d hired him upon a friend’s advice after Edward’s death, when Edward’s solicitor had insisted that she needed a man to look after her investments—and that man should be him.

  Summerby, on the other hand, had agreeably accepted her orders, even when she’d been giving away fortunes to her protégées. If he made suggestions, he didn’t argue if she rejected them. That didn’t happen often. His recommendations had always been superb.

  “Butler brought you tea?” Bell inquired. “Most excellent.” Edward had always called his butler by the name of Butler until no one remembered the servant’s real name. Bell had tried asking once, but the staid retainer had appeared horrified at the idea of change.

  “I thank you for coming out, sir. This is a delicate matter, and I didn’t know how to phrase it in a letter.”

  “For you, my lady, I would sail the Thames,” Summerby said with a twinkle behind his glasses. “Your projects always keep me on my toes.”

  “Yes, well, suing a marquess for guardianship ought to have you ballet dancing. I hope I will not be adding one too many challenges to your repertoire.” Bell took the seat behind the desk and produced her notes.

  The solicitor returned to his chair and opened the portfolio he’d brought with him. “Your generous fees allow me to hire more assistants. I am at your disposal. I have notified the marquess of your father’s will, as is required. I’ve not heard back from him. Your brother’s credentials have been filed with the courts. Unless there is some complaint, there should be no difficulty with his claim to the title.”

  “My father might have been an inveterate gambler, but he knew all about English courts,” Bell said dryly. “I’m sure he was more than happy to cough up whatever sum it took to ensure that his heir claimed his worthless title rather than allow the crown to have it. That may be a problem.”

  Mr. Summerby looked at her over his spectacles and politely waited for explanation.

  Bell tapped her fingers on the paper, looking for a way to state the matter so as not to sound like an hysterical female. “The marquess may not be the only one we must take to court. My father had a younger brother. Uncle Jim was raised with my father and treated by my grandfather as one of the family. My grandmother was deceased, but Jim’s mother never lived with us. I had assumed he was illegitimate, but I could be wrong. If he has been acting in my father’s place, it’s to be expected that everyone will assume my father looked on him as his heir. Knowing my father, he may even have even encouraged that belief, since he had only daughters when he left. I doubt that proof one way or another can be found.”

  Summerby clasped his hands over his paunch and waited.

  Satisfied that he understood the first part of her difficulty, she continued. “Jim is not educated but he knows how to grab advantages, even if they may be illegal. He will not willingly release any control of the estate that he’s achieved. One of the many reasons I adored Edward when I married him was that he legally bound and gagged Jim so thoroughly that he’s not once come after me for money. I found this document in Edward’s files after his death.” She shoved a piece of paper across the desk.

  Summerby scanned it. “Edward was a brilliant businessman, no doubt about it. So part of your settlement was that this uncle was granted a life estate in the earl’s land as long as he made no demands on you or yours.”

  “Which is why I’ve never inquired into my father’s affairs. The lands were not part of my dowry, and I had no wish to ever speak with Uncle Jim. The man is a lazy bully with a nasty temper. I was happy to be rid of him.”

  “But now . . . you have a little brother who will inherit those lands, and when he comes of age, he will have some say in their management. And this personage may even attempt to disqualify the boy’s legitimacy.”

  Bell took a deep breath and tried not to cry. “Not only that. There is plenty of time to worry over land management, and I don’t doubt our eventual ability to establish Kit’s claim. My concern is more immediate. I have just learned that . . .” How did she say it without sounding a fool? “I had a mare, a powerful Thoroughbred I raised and nurtured after her dam died when I was only fifteen. Little Dream won every race I ever entered except that last one.” When the mare had stepped into a mud hole and thrown Bell over her head, thus losing the match, the farm, and her freedom, but that was neither here nor there.

  Summerby frowned and polished his glasses. Courteously, he waited.

  “When Edward agreed that my father could take all his animals with him, he told me that Little Dream was part of the bargain, and that I could not keep her.”

  The mare had been the mother and confidante Bell had never had, the freedom and independence that had saved her sanity, the proof that she was more than an uneducated worthless female. Losing the horse had been akin to losing herself.

  She’d tried to understand her father’s decision at the time. Little Dream had been extremely valuable. Her family needed the money her horse could earn. She’d bit back her tears, surrendered a little piece of her soul, and grown up quickly.

  Taking a deep breath and letting her eyes dry, she continued with determination. “I have just learned that the mare was with foal and couldn’t be taken, so my father left her with Uncle Jim. I want her back. I want her and her offspring back. And I will not take no for an answer. Jim is a brute who beats animals. He has no doubt ruined my mare, but I will not let her die at his hands if it can be prevented.”

  Summerby nodded and began taking notes.

  ***

  With the letter from his father scorching a hole in his coat pocket, Quent strode stiffly toward the Belden townhouse. He clenched his walking stick so hard, he had to loosen his grip so as not to break the expensive piece.

  He despised having his hand forced. He’d requested that his father be reasonable and give him time to find a compromise. But no, the old man had seen the glint of potential gold, and his resentment toward the late marquess raised its ugly head. Quent growled and a mangy dog dashed out of his way.

  Send the wenches and the new earl of Wexford here, the letter had commanded. Quent could practically hear the glee in his father’s voice. We’ll marry the g
irls off to your brothers and betroth the earl to your niece. The dowager can afford to dower them handsomely.

  If her hand were forced, Bell would no doubt tie any dower funds up in a trust so tight that his father couldn’t lay hands on it. Not that his father cared as long as more of his liabilities were bartered off and provided for, whether they liked it or not.

  The marquess thought in terms of assets and liabilities when it came to family members. Bell would tear the old man limb from limb if she knew.

  In resentment that his request for compromise had been ignored, Quent had dashed off his own demand: Give Bell the guardianship or the manor won’t be seeing a new roof. He could almost hear the old man weighing the coins on either side of that argument. Their battles always ended in a counting of coins. Quent almost preferred swords.

  A drunk in disheveled tail coat returning home from an evening’s revels staggered into Quent’s path, then righted himself and nearly fell onto an elderly lady. With a snarl, Quent grabbed the fellow by his wilted linen and yanked him upright, daring him to take offense.

  The drunk obliged and swung his fist. Quent caught it, twisted his opponent’s arm behind his back, and shoved him on his way. The drunk yelled. The lady cooed. The altercation didn’t provide satisfaction. He stalked on.

  Belle had not called on his aid once in the past week—an ominous sign on top of the disaster in his pocket. Reaching her door, he rapped with his walking stick, harder than entirely necessary. Behind him, the drunk still staggered and shouted aimlessly.

  Quent had a need to beat someone, but even he must admit that complete strangers might not be the best target. Bell’s drunken father would be his preference, but digging up a moldering corpse might be considered a bit odd.

  And he understood his own father’s desperation too well to consider taking a stout stick to the old man.

  Wondering what was taking Bell’s servants so long to answer, Quent stretched his shoulders in his close-fitting jacket in a futile effort to relax.

  He twirled his stick and promised himself that in a moment he would be holding a snifter of the late marquess’s best brandy. The servants knew his preference, and he could settle into the handsome study with the latest newssheets until Bell deigned to acknowledge him. The late marquess might have been a pathetic old miser, but Quent respected his penchant for fine furniture and valuable books.

  Still, no one answered his knock. Quent twisted his neckcloth in the heat. The whole household could not have taken a day off. He rapped again, more sharply. This time, a harassed looking footman answered, gazed at Quent in dismay, and offered entrance. The Chippendale tables in the foyer lacked the luster they’d possessed last week. The tall clock didn’t seem to have been wound.

  Howls of fury and outrage echoed from the normally tranquil upper stories. The footman raced off to the nether parts of the house.

  Before Quent could find his own way to the study, a savage war whoop erupted on the stairs above him, accompanied by a clatter of boots. Unprepared to be assaulted in Belle’s normally serene haven, Quent held his stick at readiness and braced himself for whatever descended.

  He set the stick down again when his four-foot high attacker appeared on the landing clothed only in knee-length shirt and riding boots. Smears of red adorned his chubby cheeks, a bedraggled peacock feather hung from a braided lock, and he wielded what appeared to be a wooden kitchen mallet.

  The brigand leapt from the last few stairs squalling war cries. With the benefit of experience, Quent grabbed him by his shirt back before he could cause harm, then dangled the imp above the floor. More whoops and shouts ensued but Quent’s arm was longer than the wild Indian’s legs, so he averted any damage.

  Shaking his head at having his peace marred so precipitously, Quent marched the brat into the study and looked around. Spying the seven-foot-tall mahogany breakfront, he lodged the lad on top of it where he couldn’t leap down. Howling, the boy kicked his boot heels into the delicate inlaid wood, but that was Bell’s problem.

  Quent turned and glared at the startled, bespectacled young man sitting in Edward’s sumptuous desk chair—a chair Quent had coveted but not dared to usurp. Worse yet, the intruder was reading one of the rare Shakespearean folios from the locked cabinet, folios Quent had longed to peruse but felt he hadn’t earned the right to ask for.

  “Which one are you?” Quent bellowed as the young man awkwardly struggled to put the folio together, push back the overlarge chair, and rise.

  “Uh, Albert Thomas,” the man said. “His lordship’s tutor.” He glanced up at the boy swinging the wooden mallet as if it were a hatchet and winced as his lordship whooped, undeterred by his lofty position.

  “I was told you were an experienced tutor,” Quent yelled. He never yelled. He’d developed the patience of seven saints over the years of dealing with his large family. But he had an explosive letter in his pocket and the burden of nearly half a dozen lives—that weren’t his family or responsibility—on his shoulders, and he was eminently Unhappy.

  “I am experienced, sir,” Thomas said, removing his spectacles and studying the rambunctious earl’s perch worriedly. “But my former student Lord Heathmont was . . .”

  Quent threw up his hands. “A cripple, right. No savage war whoops or running amuck for Heathmont. He made it into Oxford and is doing well, is he?”

  “Yes, sir, milord, uh . . .”

  Quent snatched the mallet from the boy when it became obvious the tutor wouldn’t. When the half-dressed earl protested, Quent pointed the mallet at him. “I will leave you up there for the rest of the day if you don’t quiet down immediately.”

  The six-year-old earl of Wexford pouted his bottom lip, crossed his arms belligerently, and glared.

  Satisfied, Quent donned his civilized demeanor again and held out his hand to the tutor. “Hoyt, friend of the family.” He wasn’t in the habit of using the honorific lord that he’d acquired with his father’s recent ascension to the marquisate.

  The tutor’s handshake was firm enough. “Lord Quentin, the gentleman who referred me? It’s an honor, sir.”

  A man needed more than a handshake to deal with a ruffian. Quent continued, “If you feel you are not capable of dealing with a healthy young lad, then we’ll give you one week’s notice to find another position.”

  “Uh, yes, sir. Lady Isabell said . . .” He swallowed hard at Quent’s glare. “Yes, sir. I’m certain I can learn to manage. Perhaps I should take him to the park more often so he might work off some energy.”

  “Yes, perhaps you might. Has he been given a valet yet? Or are the nursemaids still dressing him?”

  “Umm, he just acquired a valet, sir. His wardrobe is not quite complete, but I’m fairly certain . . .” He glanced at the boy’s strange attire. “I’m fairly certain he owns breeches.”

  The study door slammed open and a disheveled Bell flew in.

  Quent had never seen the dignified marchioness less than composed. She always dressed in immaculate, fashionable gowns unmarred by the city’s filth and held herself with the calm authority and grace of her title. She never appeared in public unless her shining chestnut tresses were elaborately coiffed in the latest style.

  The furious termagant propping her fists on her hips and glaring at the miscreant on the cabinet was not the gracious lady he knew.

  Silken curls had lost their pins and hung in lopsided disarray. Her shapeless morning gown—at three in the afternoon—was dusted with a fine powder of unknown origin. When she crossed the carpet and stood on her toes to grab her brother’s leg and yank off his boot, Quentin noticed that she was barefoot.

  Barefoot. He stared in fascination.

  “I should leave you up there until bedtime and feed you only bread and water,” she scolded. “You have ruined my paints and your sister’s gown. You are much too old to act the part of a toddler who doesn’t know how to behave.”

  “I want my pony!” the lad retorted. “You promised me a pony!”

&n
bsp; “And you think you will acquire it faster if you act the part of infant?” she shouted back at him.

  The marchioness had facets that Quent hadn’t known existed. The pink in her cheeks looked natural. Her eyes flashed green fires. And those lovely slender toes . . . Quent raised his eyes heavenward. He would be pondering ankles and calves next, and then he would have to leave until he was decent.

  “Perhaps if Mr. Thomas takes him to the park and makes him memorize the name of every tree, he might be allowed a better seat when he returns, although bread and water sounds suitable if he doesn’t behave in the park,” Quent suggested.

  Bell turned and glared at him. “And where the devil have you been? You send me a tutor who can’t teach and a valet who can’t keep breeches on him and you disappear off the face of the earth.”

  Quent raised his eyebrows. “I wasn’t aware that my presence was required. I had rather thought you’d be happily entertaining your sisters.”

  “Get me down, get me down!” the boy chanted from his perch.

  “Umm, I’ll take him to the park, if uh . . .” The tutor glanced uncertainly at the tall breakfront.

  Mr. Thomas wasn’t any taller than Bell. With a growl of disgust, Quent yanked off the boy’s other boot. Then he lifted the wary earl down and handed him to the tutor, who staggered under the boy’s rather hefty size and set him down.

  “Put a leash on him if you must,” Quent suggested.

  Bell smacked his arm, grabbed her brother’s shoulder, and marched him from the study, leaving the two men to stare at each other blankly.

  Contemplating fleeing, Quent swung his walking stick and prayed to the almighty for guidance. He had never wanted more family. He’d fled to London a decade ago to escape the extremely large, stubborn, argumentative one he had. Wives and children had never been part of his horizon.

  Despite all that, he had come here determined to do the proper thing—but bare toes had reduced his mind to rubble that had nothing to do with propriety.

  “The boy knows his letters, does he?” he finally asked, wondering how soon he should send a servant to remind Bell that he was here.