Daring Masquerade

by Mary Balogh

  The efficiency of this system had been proved several times over the year since Nicholas had become aware of it. Now he used the network to spread the word that Sir Harry Tate, a young gentleman bearing a remarkable resemblance to Mr. Nicholas Seyton, was to join the house party at Barton Abbey the following week. An important part of the message, of course, was that the earl was not to be informed of the interesting resemblance between this visiting baronet and the bastard grandson of the late earl.

  Nicholas felt no qualms about the workability of this scheme. The only people he had to fear were the soldiers of the coast guard, some of whom had met him when his grandfather was still alive. They were the only people he would have to avoid at all costs.

  And then, of course, there was Katherine Mannering. It was very unlikely that she would recognize him from his appearance. Some details might give him away: his smile, perhaps; some chance mannerism that he was unaware of; his voice. He was thankful, at least, that he had always talked to her in that French accent, which she must have realized was fake, but which might now make his own voice less recognizable. But he was going to have to playact a little. He must practice over the days ahead.

  He had not told Dalrymple about Katherine. He had not seen any necessity to do so. He had also not mentioned what she had told him that evening as he took her back to Barton Abbey. In fact, he had not thought of it a great deal himself until his journey home from Wiltshire. What on earth was the earl searching for in the library? He had not been there long enough to have lost anything. And he had been away for twenty years. Of course, perhaps he was not searching at all. Perhaps there was a perfectly reasonable explanation for what Katherine had seen.

  But Nicholas had so little to work with by way of evidence. His mind was prepared to grapple with anything that appeared in any way out of the ordinary. Assuming the earl was searching, what was he searching for twenty years after he had left? That letter from Nicholas’ mother? The old earl, always methodical and well-organized in his business dealings, had not been able to produce that letter for his grandson, yet he had not destroyed it. It had just disappeared, he had said, and the loss had annoyed him for years. He would have liked to have that at least to give his grandson when he himself was on his deathbed.

  For how long had that letter been missing? Had Clive taken it? Or had it been lost some other way and he too wondered about its whereabouts? But would a man search for something lost twenty years before in a house that had been inhabited for all of those twenty years?

  Would he? Nicholas tried to put himself in Clive’s place. He tried to think himself into his position. He had defrauded a boy of his birthright, and documentary evidence that could lead to an exposure of that fraud had disappeared in a building that he searched and left almost five years later. Twenty years after that his fraud finally paid off in a big way and he returned to that same building. Obviously that document had not been found in the meanwhile, or his fraud would also have been exposed. What would he do?

  Nicholas knew what he would do. He would search, against all reason. He would feel anxious and insecure until he had found that letter.

  If it was the letter. It was actually very unlikely that that would have disappeared purely by accident. What else could there be, equally important, perhaps even more so? What other document? It must be paper if the new earl was searching between the pages of books for it. Anything he had brought back with Nicholas as a baby he surely would have guarded with such care that it could not be lost. It would have to be something else. Something his father had brought back from France with him, perhaps?

  What would his father have brought back? Nicholas had not been born yet, presumably. If he had and if his father and mother had been married, then surely he would have brought the two of them home with him. And they probably had not been married long. Again, if they had, surely his father would have broken the news to the old earl sometime before his death. His father and mother must have been married, then, shortly before the former’s return to England. But if they were married, then his father must have intended to return for his wife and child after the latter’s birth. Yet he had not told the earl during the few days that elapsed between the day of his return and the day of his death.

  Had he been afraid, then, to broach the topic? What would he have brought with him from France? Some letter from his wife? He would have destroyed that surely if he did not wish anyone to see it. Papers, some certificate, to prove that the marriage really had taken place? Would he have felt that such papers would be necessary to prove the truth to his father when he finally summoned the courage to break the news to him? What would he have done with those papers in the meantime? He probably would have kept them safe in his room.

  Yet if that were the case, they would have been found soon after his death, either by the earl or by his cousin Clive. Nicholas frowned. He was concentrating very hard to try to think his way back into the past. Had he completely missed the mark? His grandfather had never talked a great deal about his father. But from the little he had said, Nicholas had gathered that the earl had somewhat despised his son for timidity. If it were true and his father had been unnaturally afraid of revealing the truth about his marriage to the earl, how would he have felt about leaving those marriage papers in his room, even if they were safely secreted in a drawer? Would he have tried to hide them in a safer place?

  The idea seemed absurd. Was it possible? But even if it were so, would Clive have reasoned the same way as he was doing now and be searching for those papers on the remote possibility that they had ever existed?

  Nicholas became so deeply engrossed in his own thoughts that he drew his horse almost to a complete halt on the road. His father and Clive Seyton had been very close until the former’s death, far more like brothers than cousins. He had learned that both from his grandfather and from some of the servants. If his father was too terrified to tell the earl about his marriage, was it possible that he had confided in his cousin? And would he have told his cousin about the papers without, perhaps, telling him where he had hidden them?

  Again the idea seemed absurd. Perhaps he was trying to be just too clever, Nicholas thought. He was not even quite sure that his parents had been married. He was not quite sure that the new earl was deliberately withholding information from him. He was not quite sure that the earl was now searching for something. Every other conjecture he had worked out painstakingly in his mind might be so many wild thoughts with no substance whatsoever.

  Perhaps. But he meant to pursue those conjectures, nevertheless. He had become too involved in uncovering the secrets of his own past to shrug off the whole matter now. Even if he was illegitimate, even if his mother was a street prostitute, he had to know the truth now. He could rest once he knew the truth, even if it confirmed all his worst fears. He could not rest with the uncertainties. Especially when those uncertainties held the possibility that he had lived all his life under a great injustice.

  Nicholas spurred his horse on. He was close enough to home that he must ride with more caution. He did not wish to risk being seen by any of the family at the Abbey, Katherine Mannering included. They might recall next week that Sir Harry Tate had been ambling along the road nearby only the week before. And he did not want any members of the coast guard to see him and know that Mr. Nicholas Seyton was indeed still in the area. He drew his horse off the road after a while and took the safer route across country.

  Chapter 7

  Kate had not expected to be present for the arrival of the guests the following week. She had taken the label of servant much to heart. But Lady Thelma, who was not naturally sociable, felt the need of her companion’s presence as moral support. Wearing her best day dress, therefore, a light brown muslin, her hair smoothed back from her face and dressed in a neat bun at her neck, Kate witnessed the arrival of all the guests and was presented to each of them.

  Lord Barton’s sister and her husband were the first to arrive. Lady Toucher looked remarkably like her brother
: fair-haired and rather plump. She seemed somewhat placid in nature. She nodded kindly at Kate and remarked that she was pleased to know that dear Thelma had the company of a sensible young lady. Kate was not at all sure why the aunt had decided at one glance that she was sensible. Her hairstyle and the color and plain style of her dress, perhaps?

  Two of Thelma’s particular friends were the next to arrive, with the mother of one of them as chaperon. The Honorable Miss Christine Barr-Smythe had a tendency to squeal as a reaction to any emotion, while Miss Julie Carstairs had an equal addiction to giggling. Kate noticed the good-humored expression of Mrs. Carstairs and thought sympathetically that the lady must have needed all her good nature to tolerate the company of those two girls on the journey from London. Each reacted in her characteristic way to the first sight of the great hall of Barton Abbey and Thelma waiting there to greet them.

  Lord Barton’s cousin on his mother’s side arrived soon after these ladies, bringing with him his wife and daughter. Sir Peregrine Lacey and his lady appeared to be a quiet and genteel couple, Kate judged. Their daughter Angela must be close to her own age. She was a tall, graceful girl with masses of very dark hair. She appeared serious and quiet and would perhaps be a welcome contrast to Thelma’s two friends.

  Another relative of the earl’s was next to arrive. Everyone else was already in the drawing room taking tea when Mr. Charles Dalrymple, a distant cousin of the earl’s, was announced by the butler. Kate took particular note of him, as he had written to Lord Barton a few days before asking if he might bring another guest with him. And indeed the butler also announced Sir Harry Tate.

  Mr. Dalrymple was a tall thin young man, rather stooped in the shoulders, as if he were conscious of his height. He had sharp features and an aristocratic air. But he had kindly eyes, Kate noticed. She always noticed people’s eyes, as she believed firmly that they were a mirror of the soul. She rose to her feet when the two gentlemen were announced, as indeed did everyone else. She curtsied when she was presented.

  She turned her attention in some curiosity to the mysterious Sir Harry Tate. Neither Lord Barton nor Lord Stoughton had ever met him, but of course good breeding had dictated that they reply to Mr. Dalrymple’s letter assuring him that his friend would be very welcome at Barton Abbey. Kate secretly thought it rather forward of the man to push himself thus into a house party where he knew no one, including the host. Surely a normally sensitive gentleman would have insisted to his friend that he would return home or direct his travels elsewhere under such circumstances.

  Having looked rather hard at Sir Harry for a few minutes, however, during the bustle of everyone’s sitting down again and Thelma pouring tea for the newcomers, Kate was less surprised. The man was extremely handsome, having a physique and facial features in which it would be difficult to find a single fault, and thick dark hair to boot. But he clearly was well aware of his good looks and had a noticeable air of conceit. He was dressed impeccably, his Hessian boots shining like a mirror though he must have worn them during his journey, his coat of dark green superfine tightly fitting at shoulders that obviously need no padding, his neckcloth knotted to perfection and yet not over fussy, his shirt points high and starched and yet not quite high enough to restrict the movement of his head. His shining dark hair was short and fashionably disheveled.

  She could not find fault with any of these details, Kate admitted to herself. One could not blame a gentleman for dressing well or accuse him of conceit merely because he had good taste. It was his face that made her immediately dislike him. He looked at the company in the drawing room along a straight and well-shaped nose with cynical blue eyes, their lids half-lowered to give him a bored expression. His mouth, which was not at all misshapen by nature, was marred by the suggestion of a sneer that drew it up slightly at one corner. His voice, when he had greeted Lord Barton and the other people present, had drawled a little, again as if he found the whole procedure tedious.

  His whole attitude suggested an air of superiority. How could he have had the effrontery to come here with such an attitude when he had not even been invited? Kate wondered indignantly. She felt like shaking the Misses Barr-Smythe and Carstairs, who were seated close together and were in the process of nudging each other significantly and stealing glances at the very handsome figure of the sneering guest.

  Well, she did not like him anyway, Kate decided, and she was not going to humble herself before the likes of him, servant though she was in this house. She rose to her feet to take Lady Toucher’s cup across to the tea tray in order to fill it again. She could almost feel the eyes of the man on her and looked defiantly at him as she sat down again, chin in the air. He was viewing her with that bored expression. When he met her look, he deliberately let his eyes roam over her from head to foot, one of his hands playing with the riband of his quizzing glass, and lifted one cynical eyebrow as he looked up into her face again. Kate’s nostrils flared, and she refused to break the eye contact. He looked away eventually with a slight half-smile.

  “It must be thirty years and more since I was here last, Clive,” Lady Toucher was saying. “It is hard to believe. The place has not changed a great deal, has it?”

  “Uncle was always at pains to keep everything in good order,” the earl replied, “after creating the library out of the state bedchamber, of course. But that was before our time, Alice.”

  “I am so looking forward to being shown the house and park, Clive,” Lady Barbara Lacey said. “Barton Abbey is so renowned for its magnificence. I am quite delighted that it now belongs to Peregrine’s cousin and we have a reason to visit. If the grand hall and the staircase and this room are any indication, then the stories have not been exaggerated.”

  “Tomorrow morning will be the best time for a tour,” Lord Barton said, acknowledging the compliment with a gracious nod of the head. “Today I am sure you will all wish to rest before dinner. And a few of our guests are still to arrive.”

  “I really should have come down to visit Uncle when he was still alive,” the earl’s sister said. “But Toucher always opposed my wish, you know, after our marriage. He did not want me exposed to the awkward situation of having to meet that son of poor Jonathan’s.”

  “Quite so,” the earl agreed.

  “Whatever happened to him, Clive?” she asked.

  “Took himself off to Shropshire, I imagine,” Lord Barton said. “Uncle left him some property there, you know.”

  “Well, I am glad to hear it,” Lady Toucher said, “Poor boy. I always felt that he was not to blame for the circumstances of his birth.”

  “Do you speak of Nicholas Seyton?” Charles Dalrymple asked. “I knew him at Cambridge, you know. Splendid fellow.”

  Kate directed her gaze and the whole of her attention on Mr. Dalrymple.

  “Oh, did you?” Lady Toucher said. “I am so glad.”

  “I had hoped to see him here again,” Dalrymple continued, looking politely at Lord Barton. “I had not realized he had moved away. He was very attached to both the Abbey and his grandfather, as I remember.”

  “I imagine he felt the awkwardness of his situation after my uncle died,” the earl said. “Mrs. Carstairs, will you have more tea? Mrs. Mannering will pour.”

  “Is that the same Seyton as you had visiting some years ago when I arrived, Charles?” the rather bored drawl of Sir Harry Tate asked. “I must confess that I found the situation something of an embarrassment. One is not used to associating with persons of doubtful birth.”

  “Seyton was raised here,” his friend replied. “He was as well-bred and as well-educated as you or I, Harry.” Sir Harry turned his lazy eyes on Lord Barton, “And how, pray, did the bastard come to be taken in here?” he asked. “My information was that the late Earl of Barton was something of a high stickler.”

  The earl seemed reluctant to reply. But all his guests appeared interested in this slightly scandalous turn the conversation had taken. He smiled. “He was brought here as a child soon after the sudden death o
f my cousin, his father,” he said. “In his grief, my uncle took him in. After that, I suppose he did not like to turn him off again. And he did well by the boy. He left him the means with which to live independently.”

  “Mr. Nicholas Seyton is a fortunate young man,” Sir Harry said with a languid sigh. “The aristocracy would be soon beggared, my lord, if all by-blows had to be provided for. And what happened to the mother, pray?”

  “I believe my uncle settled with her,” the earl said. “It is not difficult to deal with such creatures, I understand. But I am sure we should not bore the ladies with such ancient and rather unsavory history. Perhaps you would like to retire to your room with the young ladies, Mrs. Carstairs? You will wish to rest before dinner.” Kate was bristling with indignation against the insufferable snobbery of Sir Harry Tate. Even so, she was disappointed that Lord Barton had so effectively put an end to that particular line of conversation. She rose to her feet to accompany the ladies to the west wing, where the bedchambers were situated.

  She realized almost simultaneously that the conversation about Nicholas Seyton would soon have been interrupted anyway. Even before the ladies had had time to withdraw, the butler was ushering in two new arrivals, both young friends of Lord Stoughton whom she had seen in London. Mr. Sidney Moreton and Lord Poole were both dressed with the flashiness and exaggeration of young dandies. They had always somewhat amused Kate, though Lord Poole could be something of a nuisance, since he fancied himself a ladies’ man and liked to direct his gallantries her way. Mr. Moreton, small, slim, and quite undistinguished in any way Kate could see, was the young man whom Thelma secretly sighed over. He was not averse to Thelma’s charms, either, if one could judge by the flush that rose along his neck and up into his face as he bowed over her hand.