by Alice Kirks
But now, Bridget was caught. She had hoped that her admission of attraction to the intruder would bring Geoffrey closer to her, but all it had succeeded in doing was make it seem as though she and Lord Miles were meant to be. She could not go back on what she had said, but she also did not want Lord Miles to pursue her. What am I to do? Bridget wondered to herself.
Finally, Miles seemed to pull himself from his surprise at the lack of attention from Lady Bridget and replied to Lord Alymer. “I understand that it may be hard to believe what I am saying, Lord Alymer,” Miles said with a laughably small amount of regret, “but it is the truth. It was I who stole into your home and took the tankards. I hope that you might find it in your heart to forgive me someday.” Miles looked away from Lord Alymer dramatically.
Lord Alymer, however, seemed to be buying none of this. “Miles, you can tell me as many times as you’d like that this was all your doing, but I cannot believe you,” Lord Alymer insisted. “This is not something that someone with your strength of character would do.”
“And yet, it is,” Miles responded impatiently. “Must I prove to you that it was I?” It was obvious that Miles was becoming quite annoyed, and when he said his second sentence he was practically shouting at Lord Alymer. Miles regained his composure and continued with his act. “Ask me something that only the thief would know, and I shall answer it,” Miles encouraged Lord Alymer. Then, he quickly added, “Though it fills me with shame to recount my deed.”
Lord Alymer furrowed his brow and pursed his lips. “Alright then, as you wish,” he said. “What colour were the two jewels that were inside the tankards? No one other than me, Bridget, Deborah and their late mother knew of their existence prior to the thief taking them. If you are the scoundrel that you say you are, you will know the colours of the jewels.”
Lord Alymer looked to Miles expectantly, and Miles suddenly looked panicked. Bridget turned to her sister and giggled slightly, but her sister did not look amused. In fact, the moment that Bridget met her eye, Deborah turned away from her and refused to look at her. After a moment of confusion, Bridget turned her attention back to Miles. She knew that she and Deborah would be having a lengthy discussion about all of this after they were done here this afternoon.
Miles finally thought about the question for long enough that he came up with a response. “I cannot be expected to recall the colours of the jewels I feel so guilty about having taken, Lord Alymer,” Miles responded defensively. “I feel such regret for my actions that I never wish to think upon those jewels as long as I live!” Miles was really pulling out all of the stops with his drama right now, but not a single person in the present company seemed to believe what he was saying.
Lord Alymer shook his head, disappointed in Miles’ answer. “Young man, those jewels are so breathtakingly stunning that if you had truly laid eyes on them you would never have forgotten what they looked like for the rest of your living days,” Lord Alymer said.
Miles opened and closed his mouth a few times, trying to find some other excuse to provide Lord Alymer with, but he came up with nothing. Bridget was becoming more suspicious of his confession by the second. “It is my belief,” Lord Alymer continued, “that you are confessing to this because you are hiding someone, Lord Miles. Am I incorrect in my assumption?”
Miles looked from Lord Alymer to Geoffrey to Deborah and finally to Bridget, trying to decide if agreeing to Lord Alymer’s suggestion would be a good idea. But Bridget watched each of the individuals’ faces, and saw that none of them were offering Miles any assistance.
After a few moments of silence from Miles, Lord Alymer continued, “I shall take your silence as an agreement. I will not ask you for an explanation, as I believe that your intentions with this confession were noble. I believe that you are protecting a misguided person, Miles, and I commend you for your nobility in this matter. You were willing to take the blame for this individual, whoever he is, and that should be applauded. However, I would encourage you to give the guilty party up as there is no reason for you to be punished for something that another person did. I shall return to the manor and hope that by the time you all arrive back, Miles is prepared to give up the suspect.”
With that, Lord Alymer turned Cherry around and trotted back in the direction of the house. An uncomfortable silence fell over the four remaining riders. Without saying anything, Deborah turned her horse and followed her father and so Bridget decided to do the same. There was no point in staying in the presence of the brothers when there was so much to be discussed between them...alone.
And so, Bridget encouraged Nancy to go faster to catch up with Deborah and Feathers. When she finally came up by Deborah’s side, Bridget began speaking rapidly. “Deborah, I am so sorry for what transpired just now, I only admitted to finding the thief alluring because I thought it would...” But Bridget trailed off when she saw the stony look on her sister’s face.
“I do not care why you admitted it, sister,” Deborah said coldly. “While I still believe that you have no interest in courting Lord Miles, I do not believe that he has any more interest in courting me. I cannot think of a reason why he would have changed so suddenly, but I must say that I have no desire to discuss any of this further. I should like some time to myself when we arrive home, and when we speak again, I would like no mention of the intruder or Lord Miles.” Deborah kicked her heels into Feathers’ side and took off cantering towards the house, leaving Bridget in her dust.
As Bridget stared at her sister’s shrinking outline, the bad feeling that she had been trying to ignore in the pit of her stomach grew larger. Had she known that seeing the intruder would be the cause of all of these complications in her life, she would never have left her room when she heard those sounds that night. But because she could do nothing to change the past, Bridget decided to obey her sister’s wishes.
However, Bridget did tell herself that the next time that she and Geoffrey were together, she would try to discover what had occurred between he and Miles that had made Miles hate her sister so.
Chapter 16
After Geoffrey and Miles had been left on their horses together, Geoffrey did not wish to speak to Miles. He was seething with rage, and so when Miles turned to him and said, “Well, what do you think of all of this, dear brother?” with undue pomp and self-importance, Geoffrey turned his horse away from his brother and trotted off in the direction of the Stanhope Estate.
Geoffrey could see Bridget and Deborah riding side by for a time, until Deborah took off without her sister. Geoffrey wondered if that had something to do with Miles’ sudden interest in Bridget. But instead of cantering to catch up with Lady Bridget, he gave her space and allowed each rider to have some time to themselves and think about what had just happened.
For Geoffrey, what bothered him the most was Miles’ erroneous confession to the theft. He was stunned that Miles would risk being punished for a crime that he had not committed. Geoffrey could not figure out for quite some time why Miles would have done something like that, or why he would have been making advances towards Lady Bridget instead of Lady Deborah, who he had seemed to prefer far more the last time they had seen the Stanhopes.
However, it all suddenly dawned on him. Miles had begun pursuing Bridget because he had figured out that was what Geoffrey had wanted to do. Their whole lives Miles had always wanted anything Geoffrey had or wanted, and now he was beginning to go after the lady that Geoffrey wished to court.
He was not surprised by this realisation; merely disappointed. He assumed that because Miles had discovered that he was not being given a portion of their father’s estate because of his childish decisions on the day of their father’s funeral, he was beginning to lash out at Geoffrey.
And then, when Lady Bridget had admitted that she thought the intruder was alluring (Geoffrey still was not sure why she had admitted that), Miles had confessed to being the thief. This was probably another attempt to get Lady Bridget in his favour, Geoffrey thought. There was no other reason
to admit to being the intruder, as it could not have been because Miles knew Geoffrey was the intruder, as he did not know that. Or did he? Geoffrey wondered. But then he reassured himself that Miles could not possibly have known. If he did, there would have been many more advances made by Miles to blackmail his brother.
Geoffrey was left wondering if Miles was truly attracted to Bridget, or if he was pursuing her simply to spite Geoffrey. He was reassured, however, that no matter the outcome of that question it had seemed that Bridget had not wanted Miles’ attention. Every time Miles had made a move towards her, Bridget had tried to get away from him. That could, however, have been because she knew that her sister was fond of Lord Miles. That did not completely erase the possibility that Bridget was attracted to Miles at all.
At the end of wondering all of this, Geoffrey was left with one conclusion: no matter what Geoffrey did, Miles was going to look like roses. If Geoffrey were to confess to the crime, it would look like Miles had admitted to being the culprit in an attempt to protect his brother. If Geoffrey did not confess to the crime, he was certain that Lord Alymer had it in his head that Miles had confessed to committing the crime to protect someone else.
As for Lady Bridget, if Geoffrey were to never admit that he was the thief then Bridget would be left to having Miles pursue her whether she liked him or not. And if he were to admit to being the real intruder, Bridget would think that his brother had made a sacrifice for him and might think that Geoffrey was a scoundrel.
No matter how sure Bridget seemed that she would be very taken with the person who ended up being the intruder, Geoffrey was not convinced she would maintain her feelings. While Bridget was an adventurous young woman, Geoffrey did not believe that she could be truly happy with someone like the thief she was imagining. He believed that characters like that were best left to the imagination.
Thieves like Geoffrey, however? Perhaps that was the kind of scamp that Bridget could fall in love with. But as Geoffrey trotted along, he wondered if that was just his own wishful thinking bleeding through. He loved the thought of pursuing Lady Bridget because she seemed to be just his type. However, after all that had transpired this afternoon, he was not sure how easy courting her would be.
Along with all of these thoughts, Geoffrey was also certain that if Lord Alymer found out he was the one behind the intrusion he would not be pleased with Geoffrey. He would recall how Geoffrey had led him to believe they were following every lead that came their way, when in reality Geoffrey was the one behind it all and was lying to Lord Alymer. Besides all of that, Geoffrey would be doing a great disservice to his late father who had vowed to severely punish the man responsible.
Taking all of these things into consideration made Geoffrey feel completely overwhelmed. When he finally returned back to the estate, his head was so full of things to think about, consider and be angry about that he simply returned his horse to the stable and went straight to his carriage.
He left Miles to deal with Lord Alymer by himself, for he did not care right now what was discussed between the two of them. For the time being, he decided it was a good idea to keep his mouth shut and try to locate the missing jewels. If those could be found, perhaps many of the problems currently plaguing Geoffrey would disappear.
Geoffrey returned to the Nott Estate and took to the library. He allowed himself the rest of the afternoon to escape into some good books, and did not allow his thoughts to be plagued by his troubles of the moment. He lit the fire, got comfortable in his favourite chair with a stack of books beside him, but just as he was settling in to his first book he fell fast asleep.
When Geoffrey awoke with a start some time later, he discovered it was dark outside. At first he felt ashamed that he had slept for so long, but when he remembered all of the problems that he had to go over that afternoon, in addition to the lengthy ride he had taken, he did not feel as badly for needing a rest.
He turned his chair around to face the large picture window that looked out over the estate that was now covered in a blanket of darkness. It seemed that once his mind was finally able to take a break, he was able to come to a decision about the whole thief problem with ease.
And so, having landed upon something he felt good about, Geoffrey got back into his carriage and went to the Stanhope Estate. When he arrived he asked to see Lord Alymer, and soon enough a servant led him to his study where Lord Alymer greeted him warmly.
“Lord Geoffrey,” Lord Alymer said, rising to shake his hand, “I am glad that you returned this evening, I was wondering what had become of you this afternoon.”
“I am sorry to have worried you, My Lord,” Geoffrey said apologetically.
Lord Alymer shook his head. “Never mind that. Did you come to speak to me about your brother’s rather surprising confession from this afternoon?” he asked.
Geoffrey nodded curtly. “That is most certainly the topic on my mind, My Lord. Did my brother come to tell you anything more this afternoon after I took my leave of you?” Geoffrey asked.
“No, nothing of importance,” Lord Alymer replied. “He did come to see me before he left, but it was only to once again insist that it was he who was responsible for the theft. I told him that I still did not believe him... do you, Lord Geoffrey?”
Geoffrey sighed. “My brother is a great many things, and while I find it difficult to believe that a thief is one of them, he is very insistent. That is why I came back here tonight. I wanted to tell you that my brother will be taking the blame for the theft, and that I am in the process of trying to recover the jewels.” Geoffrey tried to keep all of his explanation rather vague, while still keeping the details that Lord Alymer had already heard peppered throughout the story. “For this reason, I came to ask if you would allow me to grant him leniency.”
Lord Alymer looked baffled momentarily, but then nodded slowly. “Certainly. If there is to be any sort of punishment brought upon your brother, I should hope that it is most lenient. I believe, as I assume you do, that your brother is either protecting the real person who did this or is hiding something else from us about the crime. I do not believe that someone who is related to you and the late, great Lord Philip would do something like this to our family. It simply does not make sense to me,” Lord Alymer insisted.
Geoffrey nodded in agreement. “I am stunned at this turn of events as much as you are, Lord Alymer,” Geoffrey reassured him. Again, Geoffrey ensured that his wording neither confirmed nor denied what Lord Alymer had said, but still went along with what he was saying.
“As I thought you would be, my boy,” Lord Alymer said. “As long as my jewels are recovered and you can assure me the safety of my daughters and my home, I will drop the charges.”
Geoffrey felt a great relief wash over him. He smiled graciously at Lord Alymer, saying, “I am very relieved to hear that, Lord Alymer, and I thank you for your understanding and generosity in this matter. I will find your jewels and return them to you with the greatest haste, and I can personally assure you that your daughters and your household will be safe.”
That answer seemed to please Lord Alymer, and on the inside, Geoffrey was very proud of his wording of that sentence. He would never have promised anyone else such a thing, but because Geoffrey was personally responsible for the intrusion he was allowed to say that the Stanhopes would never be bothered the thief.
“I am very glad to hear that, Lord Geoffrey,” Lord Alymer said, smiling. “It seems that this grave problem that we had is figuring itself out quite nicely. I am very pleased by that, and am very pleased with the work you have been doing for us.” Lord Alymer paused and looked at Geoffrey very seriously. “I do not mean to bring emotion into any of this, but I feel I should say that were your father present to watch you taking on his position with such authority and grace, he would be very proud.”
A lump formed in Geoffrey’s throat. He had not expected Lord Alymer to mention anything about his father, and both the fact that he had and the fact that he had said his father would b
e proud of him made Geoffrey feel like the rug had been yanked out from under him.
He thought he had finally come to a conclusion with this issue that would resolve it well for all parties involved, but when he thought about his father and how deeply disappointed he would be in Geoffrey for his actions, he found himself unable to feel at ease.
But as he did not want to Lord Alymer to become aware of this fact, Geoffrey simply smiled at him.
