The Heiresses

by Allison Rushby

  For want of something to say, Ro continued with her story. “The three of us never met until a few months ago, just before our eighteenth birthdays, after our father’s death.”

  The duke ceased his pacing for an instant to inspect the photograph once more. “I have an eighteen-year-old daughter,” he said, as if speaking to himself. “Demeter and I had a daughter. Clio. Where is she now?” He glanced over at Ro.

  “In London. Her mother is still in the country, but Clio is living with Hestia for the moment. We all are, actually.” Ro felt the situation did not justify elaborating on Thalia’s current situation or whereabouts. “Hestia and I thought, perhaps, you would like to meet Clio? We did not want to bring her here today. We thought the shock might be too great for both of you.”

  The duke bobbed his head soundlessly, returning to the photograph once more. It was as if he could not bear to drag his eyes from it for even a second. “A daughter,” he mused again. “She is the very image of Penelope. It is amazing. If I did not know Hestia as I do, I would think this some kind of elaborate hoax.” He managed to meet Ro’s gaze now.

  “There have been many times over the past few months where I have thought the same thing,” Ro answered him. “But I now see that where my father was involved, almost any kind of duplicity was possible.” She stood from her chair. “I will leave the photographs with you, Your Grace,” Ro said, seeing that if she were to take them with her, she may very well have to wrestle the man to the ground in order for him to part with the images of his newfound daughter. “Would the same time tomorrow be all right to call? Ten o’clock?”

  “Yes, yes. That would be fine.” The duke barely acknowledged Ro’s obvious departure.

  “Thank you, Your Grace. I’ll see myself out,” Ro replied quietly, already starting to slip as unobtrusively across the room as she possibly could. She did not want to disturb his reverent gaze for even another second.

  * * *

  In her vast bed, Clio turned for what felt like the five hundredth time that night, dragging the lavender-scented sheets with her. It had been what would most likely always rank as the strangest evening of her life. Thalia had returned from the nursing home in the afternoon, which had led to a rather strained evening meal, with Hestia, Ro, and Clio trying to be jolly, while Thalia made her usual cutting remarks at every twist and turn of the conversation. After they had eaten, Thalia said she was going for an evening stroll. This, of course, had set everyone on edge, with Thalia telling them they didn’t trust her (which they didn’t) and that everyone was welcome to join her if they so wanted. In the end, she had closed the front door behind her with a bang, after telling the other women that if she wasn’t back in an hour, they might send the police after her.

  Clio had thought, perhaps, that either Hestia or Ro would have called Thalia’s bluff and walked with her, but they had instead used the opportunity of Thalia’s absence to inform her that they had located her real father. Hestia had even managed to find a photograph of him in the newspaper. Clio had had to sit down upon seeing the photograph. There was no mistaking the likeness—the hair, the eyes, the skin. Ro told her that his young daughter’s looks matched her own even more so.

  While Clio sat, trying very hard to take this all in, Hestia had burbled on about what a good man he was, this father of hers, the causes he supported, how they had been friends for a long time, about some odd family disagreement involving some pistols of all things, and how the situation had come to pass between him and Demeter. Clio had frowned ever harder as she listened, her mind striving to place each fact on top of the other, rather like building blocks, but whenever she thought she was getting somewhere, she had then seemed to remember something else and the whole pile tumbled once more. “Does Charles know?” she had finally asked, for want of something to say.

  “I don’t think so,” Ro had replied.

  “So…” Clio had exhaled. “It would seem my father is a duke. At least we know the truth. And he has admitted to his affair with our mother, which is something.” Clio had left the rest go unsaid. Even she knew enough about the aristocracy to realize that the illegitimate child of a duke was no lady and never would be.

  Now, in bed, this evening encounter swirled in her head, along with the knowledge that today she would meet her father. Her other father. Even though Clio now knew she was most certainly illegitimate, at least her father sounded like a better man than Ro and Thalia’s. And how incredible that she seemed to have picked up yet another relation along the way to add to her menagerie. Ro had mentioned her father had a young daughter, which meant that she could now claim three half sisters and a father. Would this odd collecting of relations here and there ever end?

  And then, of course, there was the added shock of Hestia taking her aside after Thalia had returned home and both Thalia and Ro had retired for the evening. Hestia had informed her Edwin had been to see her to ask for Clio’s hand in marriage.

  Clio had gasped at this news. Edwin’s proposal had seemed such a spur-of-the-moment thing—almost as if it had popped out unknowingly. But now she saw that it was quite the opposite—it had popped out after being bottled up for some time. How extraordinary. “What did you tell him?” she asked Hestia, her eyes like saucers.

  “I told him you were a grown woman with a mind of your own and that you could make your own decisions as to with whom you would like to spend the rest of your life,” Hestia had told her. “Has he asked you?”

  Clio had nodded, dumbly.

  “And?”

  “Well, he asked me in the garden of Thalia’s nursing home. I thought that it was all highly inappropriate. In fact, I first thought he was joking.”

  Hestia had raised her eyebrows. “So you turned him down. Well, perhaps that is for the best. He does have quite the reputation you know, my dear.”

  Clio had nodded again. “It’s a shame. Because … well, I do believe he is quite a good man under all the silliness and the truncheon stealing.”

  “You can always change your mind,” Hestia had said to placate her.

  “Maybe,” Clio had replied, uncertain. “But I don’t think so.”

  * * *

  Meanwhile, in her own bedroom, Ro woke to the distinct sound of breaking glass in a nearby room. She sat upright in her bed, her hand over her racing heart, then ran straight for the door. Was it Clio’s room? Or was it Thalia’s, across the hall? She wasn’t sure.

  In the corridor, all was still. Just as she was about to call out, Thalia appeared, rounding the stairs. She wore a nightdress and was carrying a bowl of grapes. “What was—” Thalia began, as Ro caught a movement out of the corner of her eye.

  “Who’s there?” She saw Thalia’s door, slightly ajar, move a touch. “Who is it?” Had someone broken Thalia’s window? Did they have an intruder in the house? Footsteps ran across the darkened room, away from the door, confirming her thoughts. Was it that woman again? The one who had attacked her and scared Clio?

  Her heart beating with anticipation of what she might find, Ro crossed the hall in two long steps, kicked the door open with her foot, and flicked on the light switch.

  But what she saw in the then illuminated bedroom was not what she expected to find at all. There was no broken window, only an accidentally pushed-over bedside lamp. There was no strange, frenzied, dark-clothed woman, no thief with a pillowcase full of stolen silver and fine jewelry.

  What Ro saw was something even more shocking.

  Because there, in the middle of the room, wrapped in nothing but one of Thalia’s bed sheets …

  … was Vincent.

  A Father’s Sins

  Ro took a quick step forward and slapped her sister sharply across the cheek. “How could you?” she asked Thalia. “How could you do that to me?”

  Thalia inhaled sharply before stepping backward, pulling her peach silk dressing gown tighter with one hand as her other reached up to touch her reddening cheek. “I will admit I deserved and expected that, but really, darling, what a
question! How could I?” Thalia actually had the audacity to look slightly cross. “The truth is, as much as you’d like to think I did, I didn’t sleep with your silly little boyfriend. Not that he didn’t want to. He would have, believe me. Why do you think I ran off to get these?”—she held up the bowl of grapes—“I had to get him off me somehow. Honestly, this is the biggest favor I’ll ever do for you. You could at least be slightly grateful.”

  “Favor?! Grateful?!” Ro yelled as the door to her right opened and a yawning Clio entered the scene. “How can you say that?!” It was at this moment Ro knew Thalia was truly capable of anything. Since the three sisters had learned they must fight for the inheritance that should rightfully be theirs, Thalia had proved this time and time again. Why did she always give her the benefit of the doubt? What kind of sister behaved in such a fashion? Well, no longer, Ro thought. No longer …

  In front of Ro’s hardening expression, Thalia continued. “This was the only way I could think of that would make you wake up and see what a dirty little social climber he really is! Goodness, please don’t think for a moment that I enjoyed any of it,” she scoffed. “Really, I have no idea how you endured him. All that ridiculous kissing of every imaginable body part. On and on, endlessly. It was all terribly … moist.” She pawed at her own throat with this. “Anyway, that’s it. If he would be willing to sleep with me, you can hardly want him now, can you?”

  Clio glanced from one sister to the other, frowning. “What on earth is going on here?”

  “Vincent is in Thalia’s bedroom,” Ro replied, her voice flat.

  Clio’s eyes widened. “What? But…”

  “Invited willingly by Thalia, it seems,” Ro explained. “One might even say lured.”

  With this, the door to Thalia’s bedroom opened further and a sheepish-looking Vincent emerged, now fully clothed. “Ro, I…”

  Ro held up a hand. Barely able to look at him, she chose instead to ignore his presence and glanced away.

  Thalia took her lead and refrained from acknowledging Vincent’s presence. “Don’t you see? If he’d even consider sleeping with me, your sister, what else has he been up to? Has he any scruples? Really, ask yourself that, Ro. You do need to.”

  “Ro…,” Vincent entreated.

  But Ro continued to refuse to look at him. “Just go,” she whispered, her eyes fixed to the recurring rectangular pattern on the wallpaper.

  “Yes, do,” Thalia seconded. “You can see yourself out.”

  Clio said nothing, but watched the scene unfold before her, horrified, as Vincent slowly walked down the hallway toward the main staircase, his gaze remaining on Ro until he turned the corner and was gone.

  “Right,” Thalia said, almost cheerfully. “Now that Vincent’s off to ravish ten other girls for their fortune and Ro is focused on the job at hand, we can get on with business.”

  “Business?” Clio echoed.

  “Yes, business. The business of your real father, that is. I mean, it really is unbelievable luck—Clio’s father being the Duke of Hastings. Powerful! Political! He’s the kind of man who could ruin Charles’s pathetic little political ambitions with just a few words to the right men. Don’t you think?”

  “I … suppose so,” Clio said. “But…”

  “But nothing.” Thalia barely paused for breath as Ro continued to shoot daggers at her with her eyes. “I might not be the brains of this threesome, but I know what people want and I know what they’ll do to get it, too.”

  “But we can’t tell Charles I have a different father,” Clio said slowly. “Then he’ll know I’m illegitimate. He’ll know William was not my father after all and that I’m not entitled to any of our mother’s fortune.”

  “This is true,” Thalia continued. “But, trust me, you are far more useful to Charles as the Duke of Hastings’s daughter. After all, won’t your father be furious when he finds out that some young whippersnapper is toying with his daughter’s emotions by holding on tight to an inheritance that is not rightfully his—a fortune that is actually the duke’s dead beloved’s? I’d guess that Charles will hand our mother’s money over to us tied up with a bright red ribbon when good old Felix gives him a quick visit.”

  “It is a good point,” Clio said quietly, glancing at Ro who continued to glare. “But I haven’t even met him yet. I can’t go asking him to—”

  Thalia cut her off. “Of course you can! And if you won’t ask him, I’ll ask him for you. That’s what papas are for, my dear. He should have already fought many battles on your behalf so far. You’ll only be asking him for what’s due. Wait! What’s wrong?” Thalia called out as Ro turned abruptly and stalked away without a backward glance.

  “What’s wrong?” she hissed without turning around. “I’ll tell you what’s wrong. You make me sick. You make me sick and I never want to set eyes on you again.” And, with this, Ro slammed her bedroom door behind her.

  * * *

  Clio had the least restful night of her entire life. The moment her eyes began to droop, she would remember who she was due to meet in the morning and then her eyelids would snap open and her heart would race once more. Being woken by Thalia and Ro’s argument outside her room did not help in the slightest, either. It was only as dawn was breaking when Ro, unable to sleep also, had knocked softly, seen Clio was awake, and climbed into her bed with a tear-stained face, that she was finally able to drift away and find some peace.…

  “Clio?”

  Clio rolled over in her bed to see Ro standing on the other side, fully dressed. Sunshine peeped through the drapes. “What time is it?” she asked, squinting.

  “That’s why I’ve come to get you. It’s nine o’clock. I’ve brought you up some breakfast.” Ro gestured toward Clio’s dressing table, where a tray was set.

  It was only then that it all came flooding back and Clio recalled the events of last night and that she would be meeting her father, her real father, in less than an hour.

  “And there’s somebody here to see you.” Ro patted her arm, then bent down and quickly stood up once more, placing something on the bed.

  Haggis McTavish.

  He proceeded to try to lick Clio in any and every way possible, which she was thankful for—at least deflecting his advances was a welcome distraction. For Ro also, she thought. “Are you all right, Ro?” she asked, doubtfully.

  “Yes,” a puffy-faced Ro answered. “Though I’ve been better.” She endeavored to pin Haggis McTavish down in order to give him a pat, but he proceeded to bound around the bed excitedly, lapping up the attention. “Come on, you.” Ro scooped up a very silly Haggis McTavish as he bolted from the end of the bed toward Clio once more. “And you”—her eyes flicked to Clio—“have something to eat and get dressed. I’ll check in on you again soon and then we’ll set off.”

  * * *

  Clio held her breath nervously as the clock ticked away in the Duke of Hastings’s study. The introductions had been made, the small talk had petered out, and now … well, Clio had no idea what was supposed to happen now. Certainly, she was not about to burst forth and ask her father for help with Charles, despite Thalia insisting she must. She had barely said ten words to him yet! Clio shifted in her seat, feeling ill at ease. Her dress, borrowed from Thalia, felt all wrong. A colorful confection of royal blue, with a rather showy number of crisp pleats, Thalia had insisted in finishing it off with a matching scarf, knotted jauntily at the neck. The scarf, in particular, felt like a farce. It suggested the owner was gay and carefree and Clio felt anything but, especially since Ro had left her side. Now it was just her and … him. Her real father. The duke.

  “You…,” the duke started to say.

  “I…,” she said at the same time.

  The pair both stopped short, embarrassed.

  “Please, continue,” the duke told Clio, gesturing with one hand.

  “I was about to say that I’m not really sure what to call you,” Clio said quietly, her eyes not quite meeting his. But she did notice his seemin
gly relaxed pose in the armchair he sat in now. How could he not be nervous? It was all Clio could do to remain seated and not pace the room like a caged lion. Slowly, Clio’s eyes rose to meet his, and upon doing so, she was somewhat pleased to see that this was where his anxiety lay—in his dark eyes. He wasn’t as at ease as he would have her think. “I can’t call you Papa, as I know your daughter must. And Your Grace, or Duke seems…”

  “Somewhat ridiculous, given our situation?” The duke chuckled slightly now, bringing a warmth to his expression.

  Clio dipped her head, smiling slightly. “Well, I was about to say ‘a little formal,’ but I think ridiculous will do nicely.”

  “Perhaps you should call me Felix, as Hestia does?” the duke tried.

  Clio thought about this for a moment. “I think that would do very well,” she eventually answered. Her eyes strayed once more to the photograph of Felix’s wife and child. Ro had mentioned she had seen it in his study and Clio had found herself seeking it out as soon as she had entered the room. Now she could barely keep her eyes from it. She forced herself to glance at her father. “Now I see where my looks come from,” she said, by way of conversation. “I had always wondered. And now I know.”

  “Your looks might very well come from me, my dear, but you are far more like your mother than you think.”

  Clio thought Felix was being kind. “But you have seen my sisters. Well, Ro, at least. And a photograph of Thalia. You must see there is nothing of my mother in me.”

  Felix sat forward slightly in his seat. “Now you are simply wrong. You have her countenance. Her grace. There is much of your mother in you, believe me. I see her in your every movement, Clio.”

  Silence enveloped the room. Clio knew if she spoke, she would most likely cry. What Felix had just told her—he would never know how much his words had meant. All this time, having to look at her sisters’ faces … to know that there was something, anything, of her mother in her, meant so very much.