Never Deceive a Duke

by Liz Carlyle

  “Fine,” said the baron, “then he’s a valet. Let us discuss this later, hmm?”

  Metcaff’s disdain was apparent. “Well, which is he then?” the footman asked querulously. “A valet or a secretary?”

  “Both,” snapped Kemble, who had silently crept up on them all. “I’m to do both jobs—and yours too, Mr. Metcaff, if you don’t wipe that condescending smirk off your face.”

  The footman faltered. “But I have to know where to put him!” he protested to Coggins. “Up? Or down?”

  Gareth was resigned to the inevitable. He had already been through this with Xanthia. Once Kemble got a toe in the door and a notion in his head, there was no getting rid of him. “Up,” he grumbled. “He’s a secretary. Put him up.”

  “Oh, heavens, no!” said Kemble. “Put me belowstairs, Metcaff, by all means.”

  Gareth hesitated. “But if you are to be an upper servant,” he explained, “then I think—”

  Kemble laid a stilling hand on his arm. “But that is the very beauty of the situation, Your Grace,” he said airily. “You no longer need to think. I am here to do that for you. I shall go down. And that is the end of it. Now let us waste no more of Mr. Metcaff’s incredibly valuable time. I am going to find the study and pour myself something for my overwrought nerves. Cheerio, all.”

  “I’m damned glad to see you, Rothewell,” said Gareth after the gentlemen’s portmanteaus had been taken up the stairs and inside. “But to be honest, I’m shocked. What brings you?”

  The baron was gazing approvingly about the great hall. “Magnificent!” he said, his eyes lighting on the Poussin to the left of the massive Carrera marble chimneypiece. “Oh—what brings me? Well, boredom, I daresay. Your letter sounded intriguing—after all, you’ve never before asked for my advice. And this duchess of yours—”

  “No, no, she isn’t anyone’s duchess,” warned Gareth. “She is my cousin’s widow.”

  “And widows are fair game,” said Rothewell, sotto voce. “A delicate beauty, you said?”

  Gareth felt his expression harden. “Don’t even think about it, Kieran,” he warned. “She is not that sort of woman. Go back to Town and take up with Mrs. Ambrose again, if that’s what you are looking for.”

  Rothewell’s black eyebrows went up a notch. “Me?—” he said archly. “I have simply come to the country for a little fresh air, and to see what sort of intrigue my old friend has got himself mixed up in. But what I wonder, Gareth, is this—what are you looking for?”

  “I can’t think what you mean.”

  Rothewell just shook his head. “There was something in your letter,” he mused. “Something written just between the lines. Alas, however, I cannot help you there; you must deal with such emotions yourself. But those other little mysteries—now they do bear a closer scrutiny.”

  “I thank you for taking my concerns so seriously, but I still don’t understand why you’ve brought Kemble,” Gareth complained, jerking his head in the direction of the study. “He doesn’t even like me.”

  “And he mortally hates me,” said Rothewell. “But I called in a favor, and—”

  “What favor?” snapped Gareth. “You’ve never done anyone a favor in your life.”

  Rothewell shrugged. “Zee’s favor,” he admitted. “Kemble and his cohorts at the Home Office owed her hugely for that debacle with the contraband rifles a few weeks back.”

  “What, those French smugglers?” Gareth was incredulous. “She’s lucky Nash didn’t kill her.”

  “Nash turned out to be innocent, you will recall,” said Rothewell.

  “Yes, but she didn’t know that.”

  Rothewell stopped on the landing and set a hand on Gareth’s shoulder. “Look, she read your letter, old chap,” he said in a resigned voice. “And she told me I was to bring him. By the by, Kem has the strangest notion you’ve murdered your uncle. You haven’t, have you?”

  “I don’t even have a bloody uncle,” he said. “And I thought Zee was in the Adriatic.”

  Rothewell patted his back paternally. “Just a slight delay,” he said. “They will be off shortly. I think you should retain Kemble’s services, old chap. Perhaps an unbiased opinion is in order here?”

  “My opinion is not biased,” said Gareth a little hotly.

  “Indeed?” The inky eyebrows went up again. “Are you quite sure of that, old chap? Don’t you wish to know the truth about your lovely widow?”

  “I know the truth,” he snapped. “What I wish to do is clear her name—though that’s none of my business either.”

  Rothewell looked unaffected. “Why not simply use Kemble for what he’s worth, then?” he suggested. “To give the devil his due, the old boy’s sharp as a tack, and just a tad vicious. You might find him of some use as a servant.”

  “As a servant?” Gareth looked at him incredulously. “The man is in my study, drinking my brandy. Does he look like a servant to you?”

  Kemble was indeed comfortably ensconced in the study, seated in the brown leather wing chair which had already become Gareth’s favorite, and sipping rather tentatively at a snifter of what looked like the good cognac. The man certainly had a taste for life’s most expensive luxuries—and a nose for sniffing them out.

  “An excellent and well-aged eau-de-vie, Lloyd,” he said, raising his glass as they entered. “So far as cognac goes, of course. My nerves feel much restored.”

  “Help yourself, Rothewell,” said Gareth, motioning toward the decanter. “It is too bloody early for me.”

  Rothewell, too, declined. He very clearly had something besides drinking and whoring on his mind, a somewhat uncommon occurrence. They took seats around the tea table, and Kemble began to ask questions—pointed, very specific questions about Warneham, his death, and the estate in general. In time, he left his chair and began to pace as they talked. Rothewell, too, was listening. He was taking Gareth’s concerns with surprising gravity—and truth be told, Gareth was damned glad to see him.

  After an hour spent sequestered thus, Gareth felt oddly encouraged. He relaxed in his chair and watched Kemble stroll back and forth before the wide bank of windows which overlooked the north gardens. Gareth was beginning to see a decided advantage to Rothewell’s plan. Kemble could be his tool; his eyes and ears in the house and about the village. Kemble would be able to ask questions and elicit information the servants would never volunteer to their employer. He now understood quite clearly why Kemble had insisted on being placed belowstairs.

  At last, Kemble stopped and set his brandy glass down on the corner of Gareth’s desk. “Your cousin sounds like a singularly unpleasant fellow,” he remarked. “I daresay any number of people should have liked to see him dead.”

  “Myself amongst them,” Gareth admitted.

  Rothewell was looking uncharacteristically pensive. “I think you’d best let Kemble take this on, old chap,” he said. “I cannot stay—no one here is going to tell me anything anyway—but I have done the next best thing. I have brought you Kemble.”

  “And I am grateful, Kieran,” Gareth replied. “It’s damned good of you. But why did Xanthia think this so important?”

  Rothewell hesitated. “Your duchess does indeed have a dark cloud hanging over her head,” he said at last. “It is not your imagination.”

  Gareth studied him. “What, precisely, are you saying?”

  Rothewell lifted one shoulder. “Zee and I took it upon ourselves to ask a few questions in Town,” he murmured. “Our cousin Pamela, Lady Sharpe, is well connected, you will recall.”

  “And?—” Gareth leaned forward in his chair.

  “Pamela says there were some unfortunate rumors after the duchess’s first husband died,” Rothewell said quietly. “Rumors that she had a sort of mental collapse. Then this second death…well, it bodes ill for her, that’s all. There have been whispers. People wonder if she mightn’t be a little mad.”

  “I think the notion absurd.” Gareth managed to keep his tone calm. “The woman is perfectly san
e.”

  He neglected to mention, however, his conversation with Dr. Osborne. Nor did he report what had happened between them that night on the rampart, and Antonia’s strange behavior afterward. He should have done so. Even in that moment, Gareth knew he was withholding what might be important information. And yet he said nothing. It was a very bad sign, and he knew it.

  Gareth looked at Kemble assessingly. “I should like you to take this on, Mr. Kemble,” he said. “But it will require some time. Can you leave your business unattended?”

  Kemble sniffed. “I owe a debt of honor to Lady Nash,” he said a little haughtily. “Maurice can keep an eye on the shop from upstairs, I daresay. Besides, Lloyd, you need all the help you can get. If I cannot clear your lovely duchess’s good name, I can—at the very least—burn those burgundy draperies.”

  At that, Gareth laughed, rose from his chair, and offered his guests a tour of the shops and barns. A former plantation owner, Rothewell leapt at the chance to see the new threshing machine. Kemble declared that manure gave him hives and promptly withdrew.

  True to his word, Kemble began his new career as valet with an enthusiasm which was as impressive as it was unnecessary. When Gareth returned to his suite to dress for dinner, it was to find half his wardrobe heaped in tidy piles. A few garments were laid over a chair, and the larger part lay upon the bed. Kemble greeted him at the dressing room door, Gareth’s favorite riding coat draped across his arm.

  After eying it suspiciously, Gareth went at once to his side table and poured them both another brandy. “How long can you be away, Kemble?” he asked, passing one of the glasses.

  “For as long as it takes, and not an instant more,” said Kemble, who promptly downed the brandy. “I despise the country. And since I haven’t valeted for anyone in almost a decade—”

  “You mean you actually were a valet?”

  Kemble looked at him curiously. “What, you think I make this up as I go along?” he said with a disdainful sniff. “Valeting is a science, Lloyd. One does not pick it up in one’s spare time.”

  “I am just shocked to learn that not all of your careers have been shady,” said Gareth, grinning.

  “One or two, perhaps.” Kemble picked up a brown riding coat and gave it a good snap. “Actually, your wardrobe is not entirely hopeless, Lloyd—I beg your pardon—Your Grace. Funny how I cannot quite come to grips with that new title.”

  “Nor can I,” muttered Gareth.

  “This riding jacket, for example,” Kemble went on. “The cut is marvelous and the fabric acceptable. The color, however—” He halted, and glanced at Gareth’s hair. “Actually, this might work. You have that tall, blond Adonis look, and a good suntan still. Maurice says tobacco always lifts one’s natural—”

  “I’m not much of a smoker,” Gareth interjected.

  Kemble cut him a withering glance. “Tobacco is a color, Your Grace.”

  “Ah, and I thought it merely a vice.”

  Kemble tossed the coat into the pile on the bed. “Speaking of vices, I saw your arrogant footman under the servants’ stairwell groping one of the scullery maids.”

  “Groping?” Gareth felt a surge of anger. “By God, she’d best have been willing.”

  “Desperately unwilling, I think,” Kemble speculated. “Either that or she was playing hard to get like a Drury Lane professional. I don’t like the look of him.”

  “Nor do I.”

  “Shall I get rid of him?”

  “What, and deny me the pleasure?” Gareth answered. “I won’t have that bastard oppressing someone smaller and weaker than himself. Find out what happened.”

  Kemble lifted both brows. “My, you sound serious,” he murmured. “Just give me a few days to earn the trust of the other servants, and I’ll get at the truth of it.”

  “Yes, you do that.” Gareth fell back into his chair and forced his temper to calm. “Kemble, tell me again why you agreed to this scheme of Xanthia’s?” he said, changing the subject. “What, precisely, did she say to you?”

  “Well, now, let me see!” Kemble laid a finger along his cheek. “Lady Nash’s orders said I was firstly to improve your wardrobe to one worthy of a duke. And secondly, to discover who killed your nasty uncle—”

  “—cousin.”

  “Whatever.” Kemble tossed his hand. “And thirdly, to determine if the duchess is truly worthy of your regard.”

  “If she’s what?—”

  “Worthy of your regard.”

  “Xanthia has a lot of nerve putting words into my mouth.”

  “She did not need to,” said Kemble. “Did you read that letter you wrote, or did you channel it from the netherworld, then simply toss it in the morning’s post?”

  “I know what the letter said, damn it,” Gareth grumbled. “And it said nothing about my being infatuated with the duchess.”

  Kemble pressed his fingertips to his chest. “Infatuated?” he said, his eyes widening dramatically. “My, this does sound fascinating. But regard is a far simpler emotion, Lloyd, and your concern for her was writ plain upon the paper. Let me see—‘a lovely, fragile creature who immediately captures one’s eye and one’s sympathy.’ I believe that’s what you said.”

  “Yes, perhaps.” Gareth propped his chin in his hand. “I don’t precisely recall.”

  “And, as it happens, I know a good bit about the object of your—er, your regard.”

  Gareth’s chin came up. “Do you? How?”

  Kemble smiled and went back into the dressing room. “In my line of work, Your Grace, it pays to know such things,” he said, addressing a stack of folded shirts.

  “See, there’s another question,” said Gareth. “Precisely what the devil is your line of work, anyway?”

  Kemble poked his head out and flashed an amiable smile. “Why, I am just a simple shopkeeper in the Strand,” he said. “A purveyor of unusual antiquities, paintings, and objets d’art.”

  Gareth narrowed one eye. “Now, why is it I’ve never quite believed that?”

  “I couldn’t say.” With a graceful flick of his wrist, Kemble tossed one of the shirts onto the chair. “Certainly the police never do. They have the oddest notion I’m a fence for stolen artwork.”

  “Lovely,” said Gareth. “My first week at Selsdon, and I’ve let in a professional receiver and a chronically inebriated madman. But what the hell, right? You said you knew something of the duchess? Let’s hear it.”

  Kemble was sorting stockings now. “Merely the particulars of her background,” he answered. “None of the dirt—yet.”

  Gareth opened his mouth to protest, then thought better of it. “Go on.”

  “Antonia Notting is the second child of the Earl of Swinburne.” Kemble kept rolling and unrolling Gareth’s stockings as he talked. “The family has pots of money. Her father recently married some whey-faced debutante of no significance. Antonia’s elder brother James, Viscount Albridge, is a rake of the worst sort, and a favorite with the bookmakers. He runs with a fast, dangerous crowd, one of whom used to be his sister’s husband, Eric, Lord Lambeth—a minor baron with a major conceit. They married in the middle of her first season. She was just seventeen.”

  “Heavens,” said Gareth sardonically. “You are like a Debrett’s and a Covent Garden scandal rag all rolled into one.”

  Kemble smiled smugly. “And yet you hang on my every word!” He crammed his hand down one of Gareth’s stockings and held it to the light. “Ah, threadbare in the heel.” He tossed it onto the bed.

  It was an especially warm, woolly stocking, but Gareth did not argue. He knew when a battle was not worth fighting. “By the way,” he said reluctantly, “I am going to need some new clothes, am I not?”

  “An entire wardrobe, give or take.” Kemble tossed another sock.

  “I was wondering,” said Gareth, “if you could possibly get your friend Monsieur Giroux to take me on. Giroux & Chenault are the very best, I know, but Xanthia says they aren’t taking new clients.”

  Kemb
le smiled knowingly. “Maurice will do whatever I ask,” he said. “Perhaps I shall discuss it with him when I get home—if you prove yourself worthy of his extraordinary talents.”

  “Prove myself? In what way?” Gareth demanded. “Look, just forget I asked. What of this Lord Lambeth? Just tell me what sort of fellow he was.”

  “Breathtaking,” said Kemble. “I actually knew him vaguely. But he’s been dead at least three years now—so your duchess cannot have been married to Warneham for very long.”

  No, not long at all. Gareth considered it. Antonia must have wed Warneham almost as soon as her mourning had ended. Not that there was anything wrong with that. “Why did she marry him?” he said abruptly. “Lord Lambeth, I mean?”

  Kemble trilled with laughter. “Oh, it was a passionate love-match!” he said. “She loved Lord Lambeth desperately—and he did, too. So they had something in common.”

  Gareth laughed. “You are a cruel man, Mr. Kemble.”

  “No,” he said with a mystical wave of his hand, “I am Cassandra, Seer of the Truth. Besides, Lambeth left a mistress and two children in Hampstead, and a string of more salacious sex partners over in Soho. Does that sound like love to you?”

  Gareth was beginning to wonder if he knew what love was. “I don’t know,” he said. “How did he die?”

  Kemble shrugged. “As he lived,” he answered. “Most men do, you know. I heard that he overturned his curricle driving too fast in the rain, but it happened at his country house, so I don’t know the gory details—yet.”

  “You keep saying that word in a way which gives me shivers,” Gareth said. “I’ve heard enough, I think.”

  “Very well,” said Kemble. “Then I shan’t tell you who killed your uncle.”

  Gareth’s head jerked up. “Did someone kill him? Do you know who?”

  Kemble smiled. “Most likely, and not yet,” he answered. “Nasty people usually meet a nasty end.”

  Gareth sipped pensively at his brandy. “I want you to find out precisely what happened, Kemble,” he finally said. “Find out the truth—and don’t spare the horses doing it, either.”