Chapter 9

Chapter Nine

Her Grace perched on a bench along the water, a flute case open beside her. Her instrument was silver, and from it issued more of Robert Burns's work. The song likened love to a red, red rose, newly sprung in June. I found the tune sad, and even ironic. After several stanzas professing eternal devotion until all the seas ran dry, et cetera and so forth, the final verse became a parting wish. I love you truly, madly, forever, and really must be going, darling.

And fare thee weel, my only luve!

And fare thee weel awhile!

And I will come again, my luve,

Though it were ten thousand mile.

I took the place beside my mother when she lowered her instrument. "You play beautifully."

"I had a good teacher." She removed from the case the device for cleaning the flute, which put me in mind of an infantryman's ramrod.

"You don't have to stop on my account. I'm surprised nobody has press-ganged you into performing for the other guests."

"Hellie knows better. My music is personal. I don't mind taking the alto part in a chorus, but the rest of it is a private joy, not a public entertainment. You got some sleep."

How could she tell? "I did. You?"

"Some."

I did not want to launch into another interrogation, though I had more questions. I cast around for neutral ground that rose above small talk.

"Lady Ophelia has taken a notion to decamp to the Hall," I said. "She claimed to be overtaxed by yet more socializing."

"She does this almost every year. Tries to ignore the anniversary of Patrick's death, tries to soldier on, but has to call off the march for a few weeks. She'll come around, after the memories have had their due."

At least Godmama knew the specific date of her son's passing. My mother hadn't even that consolation where Harry was concerned. Nor did she know his final resting place or the particulars of his cause of death.

Which was harder, knowing or not knowing?

"Tell me about your flute teacher," I said. "His name was Pickering?"

She finished cleaning her instrument and laid the sections in their velvet bed, then closed and latched the case.

"John Pickering. One of those people who could pick up any instrument and soon get a recognizable tune from it. His least favorite was the piano. He said one could bang delicately or loudly, but the whole matter still came down to percussion. He favored the subtleties possible with the bow and breath."

Her tone was wistful, suggesting she and Pickering had argued the attributes of woodwinds over strings by the hour and enjoyed every moment.

"If he was so talented and an engaging, well-favored young fellow, do you know whether he's made his way to London?" Much easier to flit about Mayfair teaching Mozart to young misses than racket all about the Home Counties looking for work.

"I am honestly not sure what became of him. He gave no indication what his plans were. His last letter was a fond and final farewell. ‘The streams of our lives are flowing in different directions,' that sort of thing. I'm sure young men learn to write those epistles at university."

No, we did not. Only a particular sort of cad had a need for such a skill. Had his name even been John Pickering? "Did he tell you anything of his people, his education?"

Her Grace settled the case in her lap and gazed across the water. "He had a gentleman's upbringing and education, clearly. He was immaculately groomed at all times, his wardrobe spotless and in good repair. Faultless manners in any sort of company. He favored attar of roses for his ablutions, and his boots were never muddy.

"Excellent Latin and French," she went on. "Enough Greek to get by. His Italian seemed more than the smattering needed to navigate a libretto. His German was very competent. He was always posting letters to Vienna requesting this or that chamber score. He spoke of Vienna as his city on a hill, and I would not be surprised if he wasn't on the Continent somewhere."

"You've never tried to find him?"

"You'll never return to France?"

The duchess put the question quietly, and her query told me two things. First, Pickering had devastated her. The manner of his defection, the finality of it, had been a low, hard, unexpected blow. A betrayal. The parting itself had perhaps been inevitable, but he'd taken from her any control over the moment and means at a time when Her Grace had needed to be in charge of her own affairs, as it were.

Second, my mother grasped the depths of my own vulnerability to the past. The notion that Arthur would be racketing around France made me queasy, despite my all but ordering him to collect Banter and travel the Continent. To hear French spoken by a native similarly upset my digestion, though I myself commanded that degree of expertise with the language.

Or I had. "I take Your Grace's point, and I hope to never set foot in the place of my captivity again."

"But you did, after Waterloo."

"Briefly. Not much call for a reconnaissance officer when the battles are all won." With my fluent French and ability to blend in among various walks of life, I could easily have made myself useful to the army still occupying Paris.

I'd been on the verge of collapse after Waterloo, having overtaxed myself during the Hundred Days, and I'd compounded all the harm I'd suffered in captivity by heeding the call to rejoin Wellington's forces in Belgium.

"What do my lord's reconnaissance skills say about my missing letters?"

"That I'm overlooking important details. I've asked Lady Ophelia to nose about at the Hall for any other letters that passed between you and Pickering."

The duchess aimed a disgruntled glance my way. "Might you have inquired of me before taking that step, my lord?"

"I did not task her ladyship with a search for personal correspondence. You retained Pickering, you set out some terms of compensation, or somebody did on your behalf. He accepted those terms in writing before making the journey to the Hall. He didn't simply knock on the door of a duchess in mourning and convince her to add him to her household. How did you hear of him, anyway?"

Had Pickering's clientele been mere gentry, he might have found employment through self-introduction and impromptu market day concerts.

One did not earn the patronage of a duchess by auditioning in the local alehouse.

"I found him through word of mouth, I suppose. One is permitted visitors after the first few months of mourning, and I do keep up my correspondence. The agencies don't typically deal in music teachers or dancing masters. Why are you so preoccupied with my past?"

Her Grace was reluctant even to say Pickering's name. Truly, he'd served her a bad turn.

"I put these questions to you because I am frustrated by a lack of progress in my efforts to find your letters. Somebody has them. I'm convinced of that. Perhaps you won't receive a blackmail demand until the party has disbanded, but your thief has to be among those present at Tweed House."

"Or the thief was hired by somebody on the guest list. Hellie has been debating how much to explain to Lord Barrington. He's nobody's fool, for all that he can play the fool convincingly. I suspect he doesn't care for Gideon, for example, but his lordship knew better than to exclude Gideon from the guest list."

"Marchant would recall the slight?"

"Lord Barrington has three daughters to launch, and Lady Jessamine was only moderately well received in her first Season. She did not exactly take."

And the sins of the sister would be visited upon her siblings. How well I knew Mayfair's delight in any pretext for rendering judgment on the innocent. I debated explaining to the duchess just why the fair Jessamine might not have impressed the hostesses with her wit and candor.

Before I found words to convey particulars, Lord Barrington came sauntering along the path that ran beside the riverbank.

"What ho!" he called. "Two more refugees from the tedium of whacking balls with wooden mallets. Your Grace, my lord, good morning. If my wife or daughters inquire regarding my whereabouts, you are both sworn to secrecy."

I rose in greeting, and Her Grace got to her feet as well.

She offered our host a warmhearted smile. "My lips are sealed. I met only Lord Julian on my rambles. I'll see you both at lunch." She collected her flute and sashayed off across the park before I could offer the requisite parting bow.

"There goeth a damned fine woman," Barrington said. "Her Grace was a great comfort to my wife when Lord Cobbold went to his reward. Shall we sit a moment? Hellie doesn't mind that I'm truant from pall-mall—I play well enough to put the bachelors to the blush, and darling Jessie would skewer me for that—but this spot is so peaceful, and peace has been in short supply lately."

I resumed my seat. "I've been meaning to seek you out, Barrington. My thanks for your hospitality. Not every host would be as gracious about three unexpected guests on top of a full house."

"House ain't full. Not by half. Place could house a regiment, and in times past, it has. Hellie and your mama are friends. Not simply gracious acquaintances, friends. When Hellie was between husbands, Her Grace remained loyal. She introduced us, in fact, or reintroduced us."

Matchmaking was a duchess's privilege, almost her duty, but Lady Barrington wouldn't have been the beautiful, much younger second wife an earl would be expected to take.

"You knew Lady Barrington in her youth?"

"She's still in her youth, my lord. They all are and always will be, and that is holy writ, if you intend to prosper on this earth. My path had crossed Hellie's when she made her come out—I was out of mourning by then, and she was a pretty young thing.

"She was smitten with her young man," he went on. "He wasn't a viscount yet, but she didn't care a thing about the title. I dismissed them as just another fatuous young couple destined to grow older and wiser. I'd forgotten all about her. I wasn't looking to remarry, but five children have a way of impressing on a man the need for reinforcements."

"Particularly when three of those children are daughters."

"Precisely. Hellie has her hands full. Jess is a bit too much like her mother, and truth to tell, I have spoiled the girls."

"Too much like her mother?"

"Headstrong. I have cousins, my lord. I am by no means the last of my line, but Inez insisted that we were to have boys. I felt no urgency, but she did. If anything happened to me, her consequence depended on being the mother of the next earl. This was impressed upon me repeatedly, and she never quite recovered from the birth of our youngest."

"Do you miss her?" My question was impertinent, but if nothing else, my sojourn at Tweed House had made me aware that many, if not most, of my elders were dealing with life after multiple grievous losses. Spouses—sometimes more than one—children, again also in the plural, friends, parents, siblings…

Later life was not the time of ease and plenty I'd apparently assumed it would be. Why did that fact have to be impressed upon a seasoned soldier?

Lord Barrington produced a flask and offered it to me. I declined with a shake of my head.

"I do not miss Inez, my lord." He uncapped his pocket pistol and took a sip. "For a time I did, but the missing was selfish rather than sentimental. Poor me, I had nobody to bicker with and tease, no marital affections to enjoy when I so chose, nobody to manage my household as I preferred. I missed a wife, not necessarily my wife. I am ashamed, of course, but that doesn't change the truth. I am sad for Inez that she is not watching the children grow up. She never had a chance to preen as the mother of the next earl."

He glanced over his shoulder at Tweed House, from whence the sound of wood striking wood and an occasional shout of laughter rose.

"Inez was not, however, a restful woman," he said. "Never content, never at peace. Hellie is a gem. I adore my current wife. She could ask me to host a state visit, and I would beggar myself attempting to amuse the Regent for as long as he chose to impose himself on us."

The earl took another swig, then banged the cork back into the flask as if to punctuate his sentiments.

I put my next question carefully, not wishing to upset a happy marital applecart. "Will you nonetheless be relieved when the house party disbands?"

"Young man, how would you like to play the genial host while your firstborn makes a complete cake of herself where her younger sisters have front-row seats, your wife is run off her feet, your larders are stripped by a plundering horde, your staff grows surlier with each day, and your stores of hay and grain are decimated before winter even arrives?"

"Point taken." Nobody's fool, Her Grace had said, and she was right.

"I'm none too pleased about the duchess's purloined letters either. Hellie hasn't said anything, but one isn't entirely rusticated. Lord Julian Caldicott finds whatever or whoever has gone inconveniently missing, and he does so quietly, according to the talk in the clubs. Your mama's letters have disappeared. Hellie has misplaced a pair of Cobbie's old gloves. Mrs. Whittington is bemoaning the loss of a locket or brooch or some other gewgaw. Drayson is moping about as if his favorite snuffbox can't be found. My valet was vague on those details. You, I take it, are here to retrieve the listed items before the talk gets out of hand."

A slight emphasis on the last phrase revealed it to be a warning.

"I am, and to enjoy good company, including that of my own mother."

"Well, mind your step around our Jessie, please. I love my daughter, but she's at an age where good sense is in short supply,. I saw her regarding you at supper the other night with a particularly thoughtful expression. Her Grace, to say nothing of Miss West, would take it amiss if you were to be inveigled into the warming pantry by one of Jessie's silly schemes. On that excessively honest note of paternal long-suffering, I will bid you a good morning. Oh, and welcome to Tweed House."

He strolled on his way as another gust of laughter wafted from the side garden.

I remained on the bench, contemplating the exchange, which had been pleasant, enlightening, and nowhere near as spontaneous as Lord Barrington had made it seem. He was genuinely fond of and protective toward his family, and he respected my mother as well.

He even, apparently, had some respect for me, or for my investigative skills. He did not, however, want me as a son-in-law, despite the fact that I was a ducal heir and had all my teeth.

Well, no matter. I didn't want him for a papa-in-law, and I did seek to unravel the fate of the missing letters, the sooner the better. I wandered back in the direction of the house, turning over his lordship's recitations of ancient history, a widower's regrets, and a father's warnings.

Somewhere in his lamentations had been a detail that deserved further study, perhaps several details. I was still sifting and sorting when I spied Gideon Marchant among the pall-mall throng, Miss Frampton on his arm.

Once more unto the breach. I changed course and prepared to be agreeable to my fellow guests, though I hadn't even made my way to Mrs. Whittington's side before Marchant was hailing me, exactly as I'd hoped he would.

"My lord, good day. One heard you were asking after me. You know the delightful Miss Frampton?"

"I have had the honor. Miss Frampton, good morning. Are you cheering any particular team, or remaining above the affray?"

"Quite above it, my lord. I have four younger sisters and three younger brothers. Remaining above affrays, melees, and riots has become second nature of necessity."

She had a winsome smile and lovely brown eyes, though most of Society would call her plain and chubby.

"You are doubtless a model of decorum and a temple of long-suffering," I said. "But think of all the stories you have to tell on those younger siblings when they eventually struggle toward some sort of adulthood. Your armory of embarrassing memories ensures their eventual good behavior, if you'll only be patient."

She dimpled fetchingly. "This is doubtless the strategy employed by my lord's sisters, for here you are, all good manners and drollery. If you gentlemen will excuse me, I do believe Mrs. Whittington has forgotten her parasol by the punch table. I'll return it to her before it goes missing."

She dipped us half a curtsey on that odd note and made for the gazebo, where the punchbowl had been set up.

"That one will make somebody a very agreeable wife," Marchant said, "and that somebody might even be me."

"Matrimony at long last beckons to you?"

"Not particularly, but when one contemplates embarking on a political career without a wife, one does pause to reconsider. The Framptons are a good family, but not too good. Morticia is precisely the sort of female a member of Parliament ought to have at his side. Solid, not flashy. Well connected, but never the cynosure of all eyes and so forth. She'll organize the political dinners, run the household, and be grateful for those assignments. You were looking for me."

Hyperia would detest Marchant's view of marriage and of Miss Frampton. I detested the speculative eye he'd turned on Miss Frampton's retreating form.

"The matter I'd like to discuss is somewhat delicate, Marchant."

"You weren't at the whist tournament, and I do not typically lend coin to acquaintances, my lord."

That was as close to blatant rudeness as a man could travel without getting it all over his boots. "I have no need of a loan, but I do need information." I moved away from the field of play, and Marchant ambled along at my side.

Lord Drayson delivered a stout whack to his ball and sent an opponent's ball flying yards from the ideal course. A smattering of applause and humorous insults followed as he took his next shot.

"I am at your service, my lord."

"Her Grace has lost a trio of old letters of a private nature, and I have overheard conversations suggesting the duchess is not well liked by some parties at this gathering. I seek to return her letters to her and to narrow the places I should search for them. Who dislikes Her Grace so much they'd steal her personal correspondence? Lady Ophelia herself suggested I seek your counsel on this topic, though I apologize for involving you in a family difficulty."

I expected him to reply with some ribald innuendo, but he merely looked thoughtful as Drayson took a dramatic bow.

"The problem with Dorothea," he said, "is that she has become genuinely reserved, of necessity. She's hard to like because she's hard to know. What others take for hauteur is an overly trusting nature thrust into a highly visible position. She sometimes retreats into aloof dignity when in public and gets judged for it. If she were outspoken or silly or flirtatious, she'd be judged for that, too, of course. All of which is to say I doubt Her Grace has any enemies at this gathering. She's too careful for that. Let's leave the infantry to their amusements, shall we?"

His opinion wasn't exactly at odds with anything I knew of my mother, but the insight it conveyed was at odds with what I knew of him, though in keeping with Lady Ophelia's opinion of Marchant's status as a social spectator-at-large.

"You have made a study of Her Grace's situation?"

We maneuvered around those waiting in line for punch, and we kept walking until we reached the path that led to the dormant gardens.

"I observe what's before my eyes, your lordship. I am of an age with your mother, more or less, and we move in some of the same circles."

"Hence my question about who would spread slander against her."

"What specific slander?"

I trusted Marchant would not repeat the gossip, but I was still uncomfortable with the disclosure. "That she's flighty, flirtatious, given to unnecessary dramatics."

"All of which has no basis in reality, so we must conclude that whoever maligns Her Grace does so from a place of ignorance. I nominate Lady Jessamine. She all but hates her step-mother. Hellie and Dorothea are good friends, and thus Jessamine's ill will extends to Her Grace. The girl isn't very bright."

She also wasn't a girl , having been presented at court and thus indelibly declared ready for marriage.

"To the contrary, the insults aimed at my mother do have a basis in reality. She can be moody. Since my father's death, she has not consigned herself to a life of quiet contemplation, and I'm told she was a more vivacious creature as a new bride."

Marchant stopped and used the toe of his boot to sweep aside some yellow oak leaves fallen to the walkway. "Thus you believe that whoever has started this whispering campaign does know your mother well and has for some time. Then we see Lady Ophelia climbing into her coach, no explanation save ‘other engagements.' Very curious, that. I could add that Society believes you and your mother to be all but estranged, my lord. If you harbor filial grudges, pretending to fret over insults to your mother is the best way to hide the fact that they originated with you. Quite a tangle."

"You come close to insulting me, Marchant." Not for the first time.

I hadn't encountered this degree of expertise with verbal knives since I'd been interrogated by a diabolically clever French colonel. Girard had been equally skilled with actual knives, come to that, and he'd been my enemy. What excuse had Marchant for antagonizing me so relentlessly?

"If I am skeptical of your honor, my lord, I am merely returning a favor, hmm? I have known Dorothea since before she married your father. I am a noted observer of the passing scene and have sufficient influence that I have been asked to stand for Parliament later this year. I will doubtless win, by the by, given the nature of my sponsorship. You might conclude—erroneously, of course—that I've taken to stirring up talk where your mother is concerned. You speculate that I will then offer to quiet the talk if Her Grace will assist with my exorbitant campaign expenses."

His confidence in his electoral success meant some wealthy peer had tapped Marchant to run for a vacant seat. Lord Barrington could doubtless fill me in on those details, or I might put my questions to MacFadden. What a valet didn't know about his employer's prospects was hardly worth knowing.

"I do not question your honor, Marchant. I seek information. If you can't tell the difference between an interrogatory discussion and an insult, then I will apologize for having wasted your time." My reply was by way of an exploratory thrust, because I had put up with enough of Marchant's posturing.

He was being no help whatsoever, and his contrariness when given an opportunity to aid a lady—a lady, a widow, and friend—when she was unjustly defamed, endeared him to me not at all.

"Now, now, my lord. I do apologize. I know I can be a bit…"

I waited. I had no intention of conciliating this pompous churl, and besides that, his theorizing lacked logic. If he was truly assured of victory, he had no need—no motive—for extorting funds from Her Grace.

I wondered again who his people were and added to that query a curiosity about his means. If he was wealthy, as my mother believed, he'd not need a titled sponsor to stand for election.

"I can be arrogant," Marchant said, looking none too comfortable with the admission. "Too full of myself, overbearing even. You have neglected your mother, and the temptation to twit you bedevils me."

A weak apology wrapped in a false accusation. How had this man prospered in any setting? "You do not twit, Marchant. You egregiously overstep. I'll bid you good day."

He put a hand on my sleeve, then hastily reconsidered that presumption. "I apparently do not have the whole story where you and the duchess are concerned, and one doesn't want to pry. I apologize again for trespassing on delicate ground. As for who might be attempting to cast Dorothea's name into the mud… I have the sort of mind that can conjure up a nefarious motive for anybody on the premises."

Now we might be getting down to business. "Go on."

"Lady Canderport needs to get her daughter launched before the fair Lottie runs off to Scotland with any available fortune hunter. The settlements involved are not large, unless a fellow is pockets to let and thinks a viscount's daughter can help him rise in the world. That sort is thick on the ground."

"And it's my mother's duty to prevent such an outcome and see Lottie wed to a German prince instead?"

"To at least aid Lady Canderport's matchmaking efforts, which Dorothea has not bestirred herself to do. The same applies where Charles is concerned. He needs a wife, posthaste, being his father's heir and an articled Bond Street nitwit. His sister does all his thinking for him, and that tells you a great deal."

"Lady Canderport has a motive to malign my mother, then." And a propensity for tippling, a disquieting combination.

"The list doesn't stop there. Barrington fancied himself in love with your mother. She's a few years his senior, but they'd both lost a spouse, and one can choose for personal reasons the second time, true? Instead, she steered the earl in dear Hellie's direction, and Barrington might regret that maneuvering now that it's time to march Lady Jessamine to the altar."

There goeth a damned fine woman. I'd taken Barrington's words for honest admiration, not the muttering of a suitor scorned.

"Interesting theory, Marchant. Anybody else?"

"The other young ladies might be culpable of dramatics out of spite and frustration, or Lady Jessamine began a campaign, and they fell in with it. Miss West might regard your mother as competition for your loyalty, or perceive that the duchess did not force you to marry her before you joined up, and thus the young lady wants back some of her own. I can attribute vile motives to almost anybody, my lord. I have watched polite society at its games for decades. Bullbaiting can be more genteel than Mayfair at play."

He spoke with a touch of humor, but what came through as well was his disdain for the performers in the dramas he watched. His was not a sympathetic critique, but rather, one bordering on contempt.

"Is this why Parliament appeals?" I asked. "You can get your teeth into reform or the Irish question or something weightier than who cheats at whist?" If so, I might have to part with a smidgen of respect for Marchant, albeit grudgingly, and only a smidgen.

From time to time, many a former soldier looked about himself and asked, Was this what I risked my life to protect? Did good men die in their bloody and miserable thousands to ensure Prinny could waste a fortune on fireworks? Did John Bull suffer decades of privation only to find the Corn Laws threaten his children's survival more acutely than Napoleon ever did?

"I have been asked to serve in Parliament, my lord. One is supposed to respond when called, and besides, the whole business might well be diverting. I will wish you good luck identifying your mother's detractor, but I can tell you honestly,"—he leaned close enough that I caught a whiff of sandalwood from his person—"I would not waste time suspecting either Hellie or Mrs. Whittington."

Which I had not been doing. "Lady Barrington would not undertake mischief toward a titled guest at her own house party," I said. "What of Mrs. Whittington?"

"No motive whatsoever," Marchant said, his smile wistful. "Carola married the typical gouty, balding, portly senior officer and proceeded to dote on him without limit. Old Freddie was smart enough to reciprocate to the extent he could, and she honestly mourned his passing. She hasn't a grasping bone in her body and would gain nothing by betraying a woman she considers a friend.

"Test my assessment," he went on. "Try to draw Carola into a conversation maligning anybody short of the Corsican himself. You will earn yourself a deft change of topic and the mildest of reproofs. She might not have a title, but Carola Whittington is a true lady ."

And yet, Marchant had at least pretended to be considering marriage to Miss Frampton rather than court a woman he appeared to genuinely esteem.

"In my experience," I said slowly, "people who seem too good to be true generally are too good to be true." Informants too eager to share intelligence, servants too willing to gossip, fellow officers too willing to offer their flasks, women too available for trysting… I suspected them all of having ulterior motives, and my wariness had often been vindicated.

Marchant regarded the imposing fa?ade of Tweed House looming up over the back terrace. "I would trust Carola Whittington with my life, my lord. I can't say that about many people and certainly about none other at this gathering, meaning no insult to present company. I'll see you at lunch."

He strode off, the picture of the mature, urbane gentleman on his dignity. He'd trust Mrs. Whittington with his life, but could not contemplate entrusting her with his future.

Interesting.

I took a seat on the edge of the tiered fountain, the air slightly perfumed with the stink of the brackish water. Tomorrow morning, that water might be ice, so clear was the sky above and so sharp the late morning light.

As I pondered my discussion with Marchant, I concluded that he'd told me nothing of value about my mother's situation. By attributing foul motives to everybody, Marchant had neither narrowed the focus of my investigation, nor exonerated himself.

He put me in mind of the Spanish resistance that had from time to time aided Wellington's army. Some of those fellows had been brave patriots, more determined to rid Spain of the Corsican menace than Wellington had been himself. Others, though, had played all sides for personal gain, worn any disguise, declared loyalty to any cause, and stooped to any subterfuge, the better to further their own ends.

I came to fear I could be too much like them, willing to adopt any means to complete a mission. Marchant, by turns annoying, honest, overbearing, and then contrite, put me in mind of those bandits in patriot's clothing. Lady Ophelia was right to give him a wide berth.

I wished my mother had as well.