An Inadvisable Wager (The Curse of the Weatherby Ball Book 2)

by Eliza Lloyd

  “I don’t know. I’ve always thought they would be happy when Timothy and I moved on. There would be no more reason to stay away. No more reason to demand an accounting of your hard-earned income from the estate or the cost to care for two orphans.”

  “That is none of their business. And they are provided more than their fair share, even though they don’t need a single shilling.”

  They glanced at each other, reconsidering without the need to speak. “Tell us about this couple.” Lady Fortenay still sat up, back straight, determined that any decision was theirs alone even though Nora had backed them into a realistically uncomfortable corner.

  “Well,” Nora said, and proceeded to disclose everything she knew about Mr. and Mr. Brady. Timothy was growing bored with the conversation and started pacing behind Gabriel and Nora.

  After fifteen minutes, Nora had answered all their questions and Lord and Lady Fortenay agreed. “And, of course, I want you to meet them before we take any final decision. Gigi, it is for the best,” Nora said.

  “You are a wonderful girl. I couldn’t have asked for better,” she said to Nora. “When your father sent you to us, I was worried we were too old for a second family. But you and Timothy have kept us young. Now, suddenly, we are old again without you.”

  “You mean Mother,” Nora corrected. She glanced toward Gabriel and then Timothy. “You mean Mother,” she said again.

  Gabriel took notice of the quick glances Hester and James Burney shared. They did a lot of that; having spoken together for a good fifty years, words were often unnecessary.

  “Yes, dear heart, I meant your mother. Well, is everyone ready for tea?”

  “No, thank you, Gigi,” Timothy said.

  “I know you want to go fishing with Dill,” Gigi said.

  “Tomorrow. First, I must finish a letter to Cecily—Miss Sheldrick. You’ll pardon me?”

  Nora sat tense, a smile on her face while Lord Fortenay went to his desk. Gabriel took her hand and whispered, “You were masterful, Nora.”

  “Hmm. Was I?”

  “What is it?” he asked. Instead of a look of triumph, her expression appeared quite disturbed, a frown creasing her mouth and lines drawn on her forehead.

  “Nothing, probably. Something just seemed wrong. Lady Fortenay has never said it just like that. I’m just being overly sensitive to anything about Father and Mother with all the talk of Henbury Hall. I think.”

  Lady Fortenay also stood and walked toward the windows, tugging at her simple cross necklace. The tea and sweets arrived, bringing everyone together again. Nora had withdrawn, even as she sipped at her tea. Lady Fortenay was nervous and chatty.

  Gabriel wasn’t sure what he was watching, so he waded into the depths. “Lady Fortenay, I heard an interesting tale while in South Weald.”

  “About?”

  “Henbury Hall and how it was acquired.”

  Lady Fortenay poured more tea for her and James. “Oh, you must mean the night of gambling at Carlton House. Harold was my first cousin, you know. It was the only thing we talked about for six months. And that was after the year of excitement when he first received the earldom. He had many moments that defied the Blasington’s humble origins. I can hardly speak ill of Cousin Harold. He was the one who provided my dowry, which made it possible for me to marry Fortenay. For some reason he believed that a bluestocking was unable to obtain a husband without the benefit of a monetary reward,” Lady Fortenay said. Her smile seemed to reflect some past satisfaction.

  “Harold, dear,” Lord Fortenay said. “Carlow wants to know about Harold and Henbury Hall, not our courtship.”

  “Oh, he had such a humor. It’s one of the things which made him so popular with his men in the military. George inherited those characteristics. And, of course, inherited Henbury Hall after his older brother, John, died. George was the third earl of Wargrove, and a more ill-equipped young man there never was. At least for running an estate.”

  “What about the end of George’s life?”

  “Carlow, we don’t need to talk about Papa,” Nora said. “He was a petty thief. We all know that.”

  “Petty thief?” Lord Fortenay said. “He was accused of treason. One too many trips to France, if you ask me.”

  “James!” Lady Fortenay snapped.

  Gabriel sat up. “Is that why he was hanged?”

  “That’s not true, Grandy,” Nora said, still determined to stand up for her father.

  “He was legitimately accused. George couldn’t rightly disprove the accusations. And then there was a question of where he got all the money. Bribes, some said.” Lord Fortenay nodded solemnly.

  “Treason? Papa was a thief. Nothing more.” Nora’s lips were pressed together, and her face had gone white. “And there is no money!”

  “No, dear. There are no earls hanged without an overwhelming criminal charge. Overwhelming,” Lord Fortenay emphasized.

  “Even with the accusation, he still had time to dispose of his properties and make arrangements for his children?” Gabriel asked.

  “George was wicked clever but with a practical streak a mile long,” Lord Fortenay said. “He had his reasons.”

  “James, enough. This story doesn’t need to be relived. Not at this late date.”

  “It is time. Nora has a husband now and they are asking for the details. The truth. We should share what we know.”

  “What other reasons? What else is there to tell? There’s something about my mother, isn’t there?” Nora questioned.

  “Lord and Lady Fortenay, I have made certain promises to Nora and it would be best if all that you know is revealed. Nora has spent her life believing specific things that impact my life and our future together.”

  “Shouldn’t Timothy be here?” Nora said.

  “Forgive me, Nora, but I think it best if it is just the four of us for now.” Carlow turned to Nora’s guardians. “Is there any truth to the Henbury properties being illegitimately obtained, that you know of?”

  James cleared his throat. “We don’t know for certain, but we don’t believe so.”

  “My mother’s diaries…”

  “Dear heart, your mother was less than reliable when it came to anything pertaining to your father,” Lady Fortenay said. “And I am capable of fair judgment, equally related to both of your parents.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “When the accusations arose, your mother decided to abandon your father.”

  “That is another lie! How can you say that? Mother loved us. She made sure we were taken care of. She wouldn’t abandon us or Father.”

  “Your mother…was gone by then, true. She had left Henbury before you came to us.”

  “I was given her diaries as a remembrance.”

  “No, dear, they were sent to us after she died, and I gave them to you.”

  Nora turned to Carlow, her eyes wide with anxiety. Tears would follow if this conversation continued to deteriorate. But truth was often the only antidote. He took Nora’s hand in his and squeezed.

  “Your father, Lord Carlow, had become friends with the earl, I think from childhood. I don’t know when or how the properties were sold, but I do know after the earl was hanged, your father went to Henbury Hall and made arrangements to get the children to us.”

  “No!” Nora exclaimed, and pressed her hands over her mouth.

  Carlow stood and walked away, rubbing his brow. At her words, a memory assailed him. Crying children. The girl screaming for her father and mother. His father carrying the girl to a carriage. The little boy scared witless.

  “I think I was there,” he said, glancing from Nora to James and Hester and back again. “I was there.”

  Chapter Nine

  “I don’t believe any of this,” Nora said. “And I cannot listen to another word of it.”

  “What reason do we have to lie? What reason do any of us in this room have to lie?” Lady Fortenay said.

  “I don’t know. If this is the truth, what reason did you
have to lie for the last fifteen years?” Her memory of that day was clear, and it was Lord and Lady Fortenay who had loaded them in the carriage and traveled to Whitmarsh with them. “You brought us to Whitmarsh. I know it was you.”

  “It was your governess who traveled with you. Unfortunately, she could not stay with us.”

  Carlow had taken a chair away from the group, legs crossed and brow drawn. Whatever he was thinking about worried Nora. He roused himself enough to say, “I think we’ve had enough discussion for today. And we don’t want to say anything that cannot be taken back.”

  Nora dabbed at her eyes. She’d felt alone many times over the years. Today might have been the worst.

  “Oh, there is one more thing. I believe it was the right thing to do at the time, but you’re of an age now and hiding it from you no longer serves to protect you. My hope was to shield you from some of the more painful aspects of your young life,” Lady Fortenay said. “It was your mother’s last diary. The one she started when she left Henbury Hall. James, can you collect it for me? In your bottom desk drawer, toward the back.”

  “Certainly.”

  Gabriel came to stand behind Nora as Lady Fortenay handed the leather-bound book over.

  “Your mother died about six months after you and Timothy arrived at Whitmarsh. To me, she died when she abandoned her family,” Lady Fortenay said.

  “Why? How can two people be so selfish? Whatever Papa was doing, he had to know the dangers. Even his petty thievery angered people! And Mother? The wife of an earl?” Nora asked.

  “No, the wife of an accused traitor,” Grandy said gently.

  Nora set the diary on the table near her. “What does it say?” she asked. “You must have read it, or you would not have kept it secret.”

  “Oh, Nora. I can hardly speak it. Wait a few days. Read it privately. Forgive her.”

  “Have you?” Nora asked.

  “I should have never held a grudge because I didn’t know the whole truth or even the reasons behind any of their decisions. And I still don’t know the whole story.”

  “How bad is it?” Nora looked to Gabriel. He took the seat beside her and she reached for him. He had one characteristic she could not fault: he was a rock.

  “It won’t answer the questions you have. I fear it will only make your doubts about her grow.”

  “I should have never pursued this. Not one thing I believed has been true. And now I’ve ruined Carlow’s future just as my parents ruined mine—with lies and deception. I’m sorry, Gabriel. I am truly sorry.” She squeezed his hand. The pity in his expression dismayed her. Better there be outright disgust and hatred.

  Nora scooped up the book and hurried from the room. Where could she go? There was no place for her that wasn’t tainted by some aspect of their duplicity. And now her own duplicity.

  She shoved through the front door and walked down the lane, clutching the diary and the last of her vengeance. She walked past lilac bushes, wooden fences and a rock post marking the direction to Stinsford. Nora hustled down the road toward Dorchester until she came to Berber’s Pond where she walked over the dam and, taking a deep breath, ambled down the newly built wooden dock where Timothy and Dill fished occasionally. For her, the new planks might still give way just to show her that she could have confidence in nothing.

  She dangled her feet over the edge and stared into the mirrored water. Clutching the book, she held it over the water, ready to discard whatever hurt she would find between the pages.

  Had Mother abandoned Papa in his hour of greatest need? What could she possibly believe was more important than two young children at home? Two children who needed her.

  Nora pulled the diary back and held it to her chest. A clog of despair built in her chest. Why did she feel the pain so much more than Timothy? Why in the middle of discovering some new truth was he off fishing with the local waste-about? Tears rolled down her cheeks before an anguished blubber escaped her mouth. She pressed the back of her hand to her mouth. Several sobs shook her shoulders. When she thought she could breathe, another racking surge of tears appeared…and she hadn’t even read the diary yet.

  “I was in jest when I asked you the first time, but are you planning to hurl yourself into the water?”

  She wiped at her cheeks and turned to look at Carlow, shadowed by the sun behind him. “If I thought it would do any good. And this time, I think it might. I see you are wearing your favorite boots. Feel free to stay where it is safely dry while I put an end to this misery. How did you find me?”

  “I followed your boot tracks in the dust.”

  “Carlow, you can’t come following after me over every setback in my life. I am bound to have many more in the years to come.”

  As he sat on the boards, one knee pulled up, his other leg dangling over the edge, he said, “It sounds like you have made a decision about continuing our marriage, then?”

  “Why don’t you just drown me? Then no decisions have to be made except which dress to bury me in. And please don’t let it be any of the beautiful new gowns you’ve bought for me.”

  “You would come back to haunt me. And I’m not sure I am strong enough to hold you under.” He held a stalk of meadow grass and twirled it a bit before he placed it between his lips, completely sanguine about his wife’s anguish.

  “I think that was more a small praise than an actual threat,” she said, feeling a hint of a smile.

  “It was, dear.”

  “Nora the Avenger is not so easily defeated!”

  “Is that who I met at the lake the other day?” he asked.

  “What is left of her.” As an avenger, she had not accomplished her lofty dreams of vanquishing her enemy, let alone liking the enemy.

  “Are you going to read it? It probably won’t answer any of your questions about Henbury Hall, but it would give a clearer picture of your mother’s motivations. Maybe even your father’s. You and Timothy might be able to leave the past behind. Finally.”

  “Do you want me to read it?”

  “Honestly?” he asked.

  She nodded.

  “I want to read it. I want just a hint of what was going through your father’s head that set all this in motion.”

  “Do you really remember being there…at Henbury that day?”

  “You know how memories are. They come. They go. But I do remember what I think was that day. Not in vivid detail, but parts of it. I’m not sure why Father took me, other than I was the oldest and would inherit all one day. My memories seem to be tied to great sadness and such strong emotion. My feeling wasn’t about you but more about my father’s behavior. He wasn’t cruel or uncaring, just matter-of-fact.”

  “Have we been tied together all along, Carlow? Was I destined to seek you out for answers?”

  “Maybe, if you believe in that sort of thing.”

  “It seems as if yet another year has passed for us.”

  “That can’t be. We have not spent enough time in bed for that to be true.”

  She laughed, happy that at least Carlow wasn’t so troubled by the turmoil around him. “I wish you would stop being kind to me. I don’t deserve it.”

  “Nora, you have done nothing but amuse me since the night we met. I can certainly be kind in return. But I do want to know that we are in agreement going forward.” Carlow went on about getting the Bradys acclimated to life at Whitmarsh. Returning to London would follow.

  “But what about Timothy? Shouldn’t we take him with us to Henbury?”

  Carlow pushed to his feet and brushed his hands together. “I don’t think that is a good idea at this point. And he hasn’t asked.”

  Nora got to her feet, ignoring Carlow’s hand, but tripped on one of the wooden boards. The diary escaped her grip and flew upward. She squealed and reached for it. Carlow caught her upper arm and reached for the book, catching it as it tumbled toward the water, the pages fluttering.

  He hefted it, then handed it back. “At least you now know you don’t want to lose it
,” he offered matter-of-factly.

  “Thank you,” she said, pulling it close her chest again. She took a deep breath. “About Timothy—there is plenty of room. I promise he won’t be in the way. And you’ll be there to guide him about this courtship opportunity with Cecily Sheldrick.”

  “He is young. I don’t think we should…encourage this pursuit. At least not yet.”

  “Why not?” she asked as they strolled down the dock and stepped into the grassy growth around the pond. “She is from a very good family. And you and I would be there to chaperone him. I wouldn’t agree to anything unless we knew the family first. I don’t know. There are so many reasons to pursue such a marriage but it doesn’t seem right.”

  “I just find it strange that in the few weeks I’ve known you and Timothy, the Duke of Exeter’s name has inserted itself into your life in odd ways. I can easily accept the first one. Properties are lost and gained every year. I am less accepting of the second. Of all the young, unmarried debutants in London, Timothy just happens to be enamored with the Duke of Exeter’s granddaughter. I know events forty or fifty years apart should be entirely coincidental.”

  Weak with a sudden fear, she sat in the grass, her skirts pooling around her. Some past words bothered her. And a pearl necklace.

  “Nora?”

  “I have to read some of this now.”

  “We can return to the house, where it’s a little more comfortable.”

  “No, Carlow! We can’t. Three generations of Blasingtons have some connection to the duke. It’s no longer a coincidence.” She reached up for her husband, who in three weeks had become her confidante and protector. “Sit with me. Please.”

  As he sat beside her, she had such a longing for a private moment together, here on the grass-covered shore of Berber’s Pond, where they should have been picnicking instead of discovering family secrets that had torn at her since she was eight.

  She touched the cover, but Carlow placed his hand over hers. “It’s not too late to change your mind. Once you read it, there will be no altering or refuting her words.”