Forever and a Duke

by Grace Burrowes

  Naylor lounged back on the cushioned seat. “You won’t find a bent copper in my pockets, Mr. Edwards, but His Grace of Elsmore will be very interested in your little personal account book. You should never have kept it here, but then, you should not have been stealing from family.”

  “His Grace of Elsmore will see you hanged,” James said, taking a firm grip of his walking stick. Naylor appeared unarmed, but a knife was always a possibility. “And don’t think he can’t see it done quietly. A duke’s consequence is vast, and even Newgate will respect his wishes when it comes to ending your existence.”

  Naylor peered upward, at the shadows dancing on the ceiling. “You steal from family, but I am to be hanged, and Elsmore is to bribe the magistrates to see it done—do I have that right?”

  “Elsmore will protect the reputation of this bank,” James said, “and if that means spreading a bit of coin around to keep lips buttoned, he’ll see it done. I know him well, and I know how precarious a bank’s reputation is. You chose the wrong business to rob, Naylor.”

  “Except,” a quiet voice said behind James, “he’s not robbing anybody. Why are you here at this late hour, James?”

  Elsmore had silently closed the door behind James, though this was not a version of Elsmore James had seen before. His Grace wore no hint of lace or finery. He was attired all in black, even to his shirt and neckcloth. His head was bare, no watch chain, rings, or cravat pin lightened his attire. He was darkness made human, the opposite of the charming, sociable aristocrat James called cousin.

  “Elsmore, I’ve caught a thief in the very act of robbery. I know this fellow. He’s doubtless traveling under false colors again. When last I met him he went by the name of Tolliver. Lurks in unsavory taverns, and I have reason to know he’s been keeping a close eye on this very bank. He knew of the Butterfield matter. Every measure was taken to keep that incident from becoming public, and yet, he knew. That alone should incriminate him.”

  Elsmore advanced and James took a step back. James’s walking stick went sailing through the air, caught one-handed by the man still seated at the desk.

  “You have been stealing from the aunties,” Elsmore said, almost pleasantly. “Stealing from the widows and schoolboys, even stealing from my sisters. I can only conclude you’ve also been stealing from the bank customers. Doing a little three-for-five transcribing in the ten-pound column, James? Indulging in some creative rounding where the interest-bearing accounts are concerned?”

  Elsmore should not even know those terms. “You are mad. I make the occasional mistake, as anybody does when handling figures all day. If I’ve erred, I am happy to reimburse the bank from personal funds.”

  Naylor, or whoever he was, snorted. “I suspect the other side of this handsome desk also has a drawer with a false bottom, Your Grace, but I’ve yet to pick that lock.”

  “He admits to picking locks,” James said. “That man should be arrested.”

  Elsmore remained between James and the door. “You will be arrested. You will be tried for stealing, possibly for embezzling, and the court will pass sentence on you without any attempt on my part to keep the matter quiet.”

  “Elsmore, I am your heir. I am a manager at this bank, and if I am disgraced then you, the family, the bank…think, man. Do you really begrudge me the fruits of a little enterprise so much that you’ll bring ruin down on every employee and customer of this bank?”

  Naylor rose. “He has a point, Elsmore. I could quietly dispatch him for you. Solve a lot of problems and provide me with enough entertainment to last half the night.”

  Naylor’s dead-cold gaze unnerved James, but Elsmore’s silence turned worry into panic. “Elsmore, you will not ruin this bank simply to punish me. You aren’t a murderer.”

  The next silence was hellish.

  “You can’t let him be publicly hanged,” Naylor mused. “The scandal would pass, but a certain party isn’t keen on hangings of any sort. Won’t serve, Your Grace.”

  That got Elsmore’s attention. “No public hanging?”

  Naylor shook his head. “Our mutual acquaintance has strong feelings on that topic.”

  “Interesting.” Elsmore plucked the walking stick from Naylor’s grasp and tossed it at James. “You can pawn that in Dover for passage to someplace I won’t think to find you. Your greatcoat will bring some coin, as will your gloves and waistcoat. Rings, watch, sleeve buttons, and cravat pin all have value, as does the education I paid for. One question before you go.”

  He will allow me to live. Later James would puzzle out how to get to Dover without any funds. “Ask.”

  “Why slander my sister? Why spread lies about Rachel when she’s never done anything to hurt you?”

  “Because as soon as she marries, Samantha and Kathleen will each bring some bachelor up to scratch. I’ll lose access to their accounts, and their accounts are lucrative. You never begrudged them anything, never questioned their expenses no matter how extravagant. A few very discreet rumors in the ears of would-be suitors hardly amounted to slander. The aunties are getting old, the boy cousins only spend a few years at university, but a spinster sister or two…You would have bought them the stars if they’d asked it of you.”

  “While you, poor thing, had to pretend to work,” Elsmore said. “Is Edward part of your scheme?”

  “No. Nor is Howell. Howell is too decent, Edward is too careful. He does some lucrative brokering, but that’s the extent of his misconduct that I know of.”

  Naylor came around the desk and held out some banknotes. “Elsmore is also afflicted with decency. He doesn’t grasp that if you’re to slink off to some stinking hole in Amsterdam, you need the means to slink there. We can’t have you kicking your heels in Dover or Portsmouth causing embarrassment when the authorities find you. You don’t dare go to Paris, where familiar faces will ask awkward questions, and passage to Rome is too costly.”

  “I’ll go,” James said, eyeing the banknotes. “I’ll go and I’ll stay gone. I was planning on leaving soon anyway, and there’s no need to alert the authorities.”

  “The molly houses pay something,” Naylor said. “For a while. Then your looks begin to go, and the patrons aren’t as generous. Bon voyage.” He smiled and waved the money before James’s nose.

  Elsmore said nothing to that horrific taunt, so James snatched the banknotes and fled.

  * * *

  Rex spent the night wandering the streets of London. He avoided the worst neighborhoods, but he would have welcomed an opportunity to pummel a foolhardy footpad or two. None had obliged him, more’s the pity.

  His bank was riddled with problems. His close relatives had betrayed him, and the one person whose welfare most concerned him was probably not speaking to him.

  As the first glimmers of light streaked the eastern sky, he found himself at his own front door, though he didn’t particularly want to go inside. He did anyway, because all the problems he faced affected his family, and it was with them he proposed to embark on a few solutions.

  “Mama. Good morning. Couldn’t you sleep?” He’d come directly to the breakfast parlor from the front door. A few cups of hot tea were in order—or a few pots. A yawning maid was only beginning to lay out the buffet on the sideboard, but she took one look at Rex and slipped away.

  The duchess wore a dressing gown and shawl, her silver hair hung in a single, thick braid. The hour was early enough that candles were lit on the sideboard, while the sun had yet to break the horizon.

  “I missed you at the theater last night,” she said. “Your sisters are so much better behaved when you escort us. Are you only now finding your way home, Elsmore?” She perused his attire, the dark, nondescript ensemble Jackson Naylor had insisted upon.

  “Is this place home?” Rex asked, pouring a cup of tea from the silver pot on the sideboard. The sole purpose of the silver was to keep the tea hot longer than a ceramic pot would have. Had Eleanora ever used her silver teapot for that reason? He put a currant bun on a plate and lo
oked around for the butter because Eleanora did love her butter.

  “I don’t know if this is home, but we certainly spend a fair amount of time here,” Mama said, taking up the cup and the currant bun. “Do your sisters’ situations have you considering taking a bride?”

  “Yes and no.” Rex braced himself for one of Mama’s usual homilies. Lady Joanna Peabody was gracious, tolerant, and pretty. Miss Nehring was only the daughter of a viscount, but her family’s lineage went back to the Conqueror himself, and their resources were impressive. Then too, she was an only child, poor dear, Mama’s genteel reminder that Miss Nehring was an heiress.

  “Shall we sit?” Mama asked. “You can tell me about the yes part.”

  She took her customary seat at the foot of the table, and Rex assumed what was usually Kathleen’s place at Mama’s left hand.

  “Yes, I am thinking of marrying,” he said. “No, the recent tide of adoring bachelors has nothing to do with that.”

  “A lady has caught your eye?” Oh, the hope in her question. The pure, human hope. “I do think you and Lady Francesca Honeycutt would suit. She’s a bit of an original, but not too original. Aren’t you having any tea?”

  He’d poured the cup she held for himself, and Mama had assumed it was for her—an easy mistake to make when one was half asleep.

  “I’ll have a tray when I go up to my room. Lady Francesca is all that is lovely, but she and I would not suit. I can barely call her to mind, though I’m sure when she happened purely by chance to come upon me in the park—again—I would recognize her easily enough.”

  “You’re peckish,” Mama said, patting his hand. “Grab a cinnamon bun before you go upstairs, and please don’t let your sisters know you’ve been out prowling. That will not comport with the image they hold of you as the perfect fellow, though I do know a man has needs. Lady Francesca or Lady Joanna would be understanding about that. They grasp that perfection in a spouse is a hopeless objective.”

  “No, it is not.”

  Mama set down her currant bun. “You are now an authority on the married state?”

  “I am an authority on who and what could make me happy. The women you mention are all lovely, and they deserve adoring swains of their own, but they will never interrupt me. They won’t call me to account when I’m being ridiculously ducal. They won’t tell me the truth when flattery is the easier course. They will play games with their pin money rather than admit to me when they are short of funds. If a duke is to have only one honest ally in life, one person with whom he can absolutely be himself, shouldn’t that person be his duchess?”

  In the gloomy pre-dawn light, Mama’s expression became as wistful as a bride’s. “I was such a duchess once. Everybody was aghast that your papa married a mere baron’s daughter, everybody but the dowager duchess. She said new blood enlivens the line, and if you and your sisters are any indication, she was right. Her grandfather was a brewer.”

  Rex had forgotten this aspect of his own heritage, but then, polite society didn’t exactly fling it in his face. They doubtless whispered about it behind his back.

  “You would not object if I became engaged to a woman of questionable antecedents?” he asked.

  Mama set the teacup before him. “You should drink that. I don’t care for my tea piping hot. A woman cannot help her antecedents, Wrexham.”

  Not what he’d expected to hear. “Do you ever consider remarrying?”

  She shook her head. “To say that your father was the love of my life sounds trite. He could infuriate me like no other and make me laugh in a most unladylike fashion. We were friends, my boy. Best friends, which the poets don’t much mention, though that sort of love between spouses is precious and rare. I loved him—the man—and I will miss him until my dying day.”

  Rex took a taste of the tea, which was plain. The way he drank it when a headache was bearing down.

  “Mama, the lady doesn’t always make me laugh, but she makes me think. About how I manage my dukedom, about whether I’m happy, about where my duty truly lies.”

  “And she interrupts you and doesn’t mince her words with you?”

  “She doesn’t know how to mince words, and she’s a demon with ledger books and hidden patterns. She’s shy, though, and fierce. Life hasn’t been kind to her.”

  Mama took Rex’s hand. “Then for God’s sake, you should marry her. Snatch her up before some other duke sweeps her into his arms. We make poor decisions when we’re lonely, and if she’s missing you, she’ll be very lonely indeed.”

  Lonely enough to hide in France for the rest of her life?

  The tea was good and strong, also the way Rex liked it. “I’ll be making some changes at the bank.”

  “Change at the bank is overdue. Lady Jersey doesn’t say much, but in the occasional aside, I gather in her opinion our institution has grown a bit behindhand.”

  And Lady Jersey was herself a very experienced banker. “Do you mind if I abandon you to your breakfast? I have a few calls to pay.”

  “Looking like that?”

  Eleanora doesn’t care how I dress. “The matters I need to tend to are urgent.” Rex rose and kissed his mother’s cheek. “Thank you, Mama. I love you.”

  She waved her currant bun. “For God’s sake shave before you go out, and of course, the feeling is mutual. Tell the maid to bring up a pot of chocolate if you see her.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Rex left his mother munching her currant bun and smiling, while he took the stairs to his rooms two at a time.

  * * *

  “Elsmore was ready to see his own cousin hanged,” Jack said around a mouthful of omelet. “You would not have recognized your pet duke, Ellie. He was a whisker away from summoning the watch. Pour me a spot more tea, would you, love?”

  Jack had been eating steadily since retrieving breakfast from the chop house. In the light of a cold morning, he was gaunt and tired, no longer a charming schemer.

  Maybe he never would be again.

  “You expect me to believe that Elsmore would turn a family member over to the magistrate, bring scandal down on the bank, and ruin his own name over a few quid?” Ellie asked, pouring the tea. “He’s not stupid, Jack.”

  “He’s also not the Earl of Winston, Ellie, and thousands of pounds is not a few quid. Moreover, even Winston didn’t prey on his own family. You should have some eggs. You’re peaky and cross.”

  She’d waited up until Jack had come strolling back from his midnight errand, and then she’d tossed in her bed until sunrise. Where was Elsmore, and what would he do about an embezzling ducal heir?

  Ellie buttered a slice of toast. “How did His Grace leave matters?”

  “You should ask him. When I left the bank, he was going through Mr. James Dorset’s desk drawer by drawer. His Grace paid me handsomely from the small fortune we’d unearthed from one false bottom alone.”

  “A small fortune?”

  “We found two thousand pounds, Ellie, and that was simply the ready money Dorset stored on the premises in one drawer. My guess is, a safe in the man’s apartments will hold five times that amount. His jewelry box will bear investigation, as will his snuff boxes, wardrobe, mews…He could not have taken all of that with him. He and I were of a height. I’m tempted to have a look.”

  The toast was good, probably made from bread baked fresh that morning. “What about turning honest, Jack?”

  He took another bite of eggs. “Put in a word for me with your duke, Ellie. Another cousin was apparently brokering loans, and who’s to say additional mischief isn’t afoot?”

  “Elsmore will blame himself. That’s why he’s not turning James over to the authorities.” Ellie added a drizzle of honey to her toast and missed the cinnamon she’d enjoyed at Ambledown.

  She missed Elsmore, too, desperately. No need to state the obvious.

  “If your duke hasn’t laid information against Dorset yet,” Jack said. “I suspect he still might, though I told him you don’t favor hangings.”

  A t
oast crumb caught in Ellie’s throat. “Why would you tell him that?”

  “Because it’s the truth,” Jack said, thumping her on the back. “It will always be the truth. This is excellent bacon, but then, I haven’t had bacon since Michaelmas. Are you really determined to pike off to France?”

  “I miss Mama, Jack. I miss her every day, and my bank runs like a top now. I have some money put by, and she’s apparently never going to leave France. I will write to our grandparents and ask them to visit me there.”

  “Stubborn,” Jack said. “The Naylor womenfolk should be in Dr. Johnson’s lexicon under the definition of stubborn. Grandmama has threatened to travel to France on her own, you know. That dog would fancy a nibble of bacon. I suspect he’d fancy a nibble of me as well.”

  Wodin had kept Ellie and Voltaire company in the small hours of the night. “I’ll take him back to the duchess today. The sun’s out, and I could use some fresh air.”

  “You don’t mind if I bide here for a bit?” Jack asked, tearing a strip of bacon in half and tossing a portion to the dog.

  Wodin caught the treat with a snap of his teeth.

  “Stay as long as you like,” Ellie said. “I really am leaving for France.”

  “Then, Eleanora, you really are a fool. Your duke will tidy up his accounts at the bank whether you move to France or not, but what happens after that depends on you. You’ve spent your life looking for schemes before the schemers could take advantage, but that man’s only aim is to cherish you.”

  He’s not my duke. He will never be my duke. “Hush, you.”

  Jack tossed Wodin another bite of bacon. “I’ve said my piece. I can take the dog to the duchess for you.”

  Jackson Naylor offering to do favors was unnerving. “Wodin prefers my company. If you leave, lock up before you go.”

  Ellie wanted time to think, and rambling around London was good for that. She also wanted to say farewell to a duchess who’d never planned to wear a tiara. Perhaps Ellie should have a word with His Grace of Walden too.