Chapter Six

S arah walked briskly down the road, the tears stinging her eyes as she tried to gain control of her emotions.

‘Miss Shepherd,’ Lord Routledge called after her. She walked faster, not wanting him to see her like this.

His stride was much longer than hers and, despite her best efforts, he caught her just as she rounded the corner.

‘Wait, Miss Shepherd,’ he said, his voice laced with concern.

‘Thank you for your assistance,’ she said. Her voice was muffled by emotion, and the tears were starting to flow in earnest down her cheeks. ‘I doubt I would have been able to persuade Lord and Lady Shrewsbury to let me speak to their maid without your help.’ She spun and walked away.

After a minute she was aware Lord Routledge was following her. He kept pace easily, walking alongside her quietly, his head bent as if they were two old friends going for a companionable stroll.

‘You’ve done what you promised.’ The words came out sharper than she had intended, but she didn’t apologise. She was too upset at losing the trail of her sister to consider if she was being unforgivably rude.

‘I am not going to abandon you in the middle of London when you are so visibly distressed.’

She spun to face him, halting abruptly. ‘Why are you insisting on helping me? You do not know me. You do not know my sister. Don’t you have your own problems to solve? Or do you just like being surrounded by the misery of others so you don’t have to think about your own?’

Never before had she been so rude, but Sarah wanted to lash out, to hurt someone as she was hurting, and Lord Routledge was conveniently there. Immediately she felt ashamed of her outburst, but Lord Routledge looked unshaken.

‘Might I suggest we make a detour through the park? Some people swear by being surrounded by nature if they become overwhelmed.’

Seeing she wasn’t going to evade him that easily, Sarah shrugged and allowed Lord Routledge to lead her through a set of gates into Hyde Park. It was a warm day, the sun shining, and dozens of couples strolled arm in arm along the paths. Lord Routledge chose their route and, after ten minutes of walking, they reached a relatively secluded spot that overlooked a pretty fountain. There was an unoccupied bench and Sarah nodded in agreement when he suggested they sit.

For a long time neither of them spoke. The trickling sound of the water in the fountain was hypnotic. Sarah felt some of the overwhelming tension begin to ebb and then flow away.

‘I have a sister,’ Lord Routledge said quietly. ‘You asked me why I wanted to help you.’ He shrugged. ‘There are many complex reasons, but I think the most understandable is that I have a sister, and I hope that if she was ever in trouble someone would help her.’

Sarah cleared her throat, suddenly feeling ashamed of her outburst. Lord Routledge had been nothing but kind since she had met him, and she had been unforgivably rude.

‘I doubt your sister would get into this sort of mess,’ she said, her eyes fixed on the fountain.

‘I wouldn’t know.’

She looked up sharply and saw the sadness in his eyes. He’d looked that way when he had spoken about his late wife, and Sarah got the impression his life had been marred by tragedy.

‘My sister is fourteen years old, but my father has not let me see her since she was nine.’

‘That’s terrible.’

‘Yes. It is. He keeps her cloistered away on one of the family estates in Yorkshire. The only news I hear about her is what he deigns to impart. He says she has a governess and everything she needs, but he has lied to me before.’

‘Why will he not let you see her?’

Lord Routledge didn’t answer for a second, and she saw pain flashing across his face. ‘My father is a cruel and complex man, who derives pleasure from other people’s pain, but more than that he loves to be in control of everyone. He likes to have people dangling on a string like a puppet, and then he makes you dance to his tune.’ He shook his head. ‘Once I was old enough to strike out on my own, I rebelled, refused to conform. It culminated in my marriage to my late wife, whom he did not approve of one little bit. When I announced the wedding, he told me to call it off or I would never see Sophia, my sister, again.’

Sarah thought of all of the good times she had shared with Selina—the secret conversations in bed at night, the laughter they’d shared as they jumped over waves on the seashore. She couldn’t imagine someone telling her she could never see or speak to her sister again. Selina had only been gone for a few weeks, and already Sarah felt as though a piece of her heart had been ripped out.

‘I thought he was bluffing, that once he saw I would not be controlled by him he would relent, but I should have known better.’

‘He’s kept you from seeing your sister for all that time?’

‘Yes. So you see, Miss Shepherd, I cannot be there to protect her, from him or from anything else. It is always my hope that other people would show her kindness if she was in need of some.’

‘I am sorry. I shouldn’t have snapped at you. I lashed out, and you were closest and easiest to hurt,’ Sarah said, looking up and holding his gaze.

‘I understand why you are so upset. The talk with Agnes Pepper was not at all helpful.’

‘It was the last thing Selina mentioned in the letter. She was really excited about going to see Agnes Pepper. I’ve followed every other lead, chased down every other name she talked about. There’s nothing, no clue of where she would have looked next.’ She wrung her hands together, worrying at the skin at the side of her thumb with her nail. ‘It feels as though she has just disappeared into thin air. I do not know what to do.’

‘I will not force my help upon you, and I cannot promise to uncover anything that you have not, but sometimes a new perspective is all that is needed. If you want my assistance to go over everything, then I would be happy to offer it.’

She considered the man sitting next to her. Sarah normally liked to do things alone, without the help of anyone else, but here she would have to admit defeat. The stakes were too high for her to indulge her pride.

‘That would be very kind, thank you.’

‘Good,’ Lord Routledge said, clapping his hands together. ‘Where do we start?’

Three hours later they were back in Hyde Park, this time seated on a blanket on a patch of grass close to the Serpentine. It was a glorious day, although the clouds had just started to bubble up as they did when it was hot and humid, and there were plenty of families seated in a similar way dotted over the grass. A group of children giggled as they tried, without much luck, to set a paper boat floating on the water. Their nannies sat and gossiped, stretched out and enjoying the sunshine and freedom from the nursery.

Sarah had returned to her lodgings to collect the letters she had received from Selina, arranging to meet Lord Routledge back in the park a few hours later. It was a very public place for them to be discussing Selina’s disappearance, but they could hardly retire to either of their lodgings.

Carefully Sarah set out the letters in date order.

‘Unfortunately, Selina took all of the original letters, the ones sent by our father to our mother when they were courting. I did read them when we first discovered the truth after our mother’s death, but I cannot remember much. I was in shock, unable to take much in.’

‘So we have to rely on what your sister said in her letters, and from them try to work out where she might have looked for clues next.’

Sarah felt a sudden surge of anger towards her sister. It was typical of Selina to disappear without a thought for anyone else. She had always been flighty and carefree, never thinking about the consequences of her actions. Not that anything bad ever seemed to happen to Selina. Her natural charm and positive outlook always meant that, somehow, she landed on her feet, even when doing the most reckless of things.

‘That’s right.’

‘You must have discussed the situation with your sister, either when you found the letters or since. Did you talk about who you thought your father could be?’

Sarah thought back to the moment she had stumbled across the letters. It had been soon after their mother had passed away, and she had been clearing out the few personal effects their mother had kept private. There was a large wooden chest she kept locked, the key around her neck. Sarah had only seen inside a few times. She had always thought it contained her mother’s most valuable items of clothing, and perhaps the few pieces of jewellery she had that she didn’t wear day to day.

Under the layers of material, right at the very bottom of the trunk, she’d found the neatly tied bundle of letters. Immediately her instincts had told her these letters were important. Even without reading them, she had realised this was the reason her mother had kept the chest locked, not out of fear of thieves breaking in and stealing her valuables.

She’d handled the papers carefully, at first thinking they were letters from the father they had been told about, perhaps whilst he was posted away in the army, but once she had started reading the truth dawned quickly.

‘There was nothing specific in any of the letters, they were all very vague. He wrote of the tedious, never-ending round of balls and dinner parties in London, and how he wished he was in the countryside with our mother. That was why we suspected he may have been wealthy. Very few people attend the London balls.’

‘It does narrow it down quite considerably.’

‘He talked of his parents pushing him towards a certain young woman, but he only referenced her as Lady P. I know from her letters that Selina was trying to work out who Lady P could be, but she did not have any luck—or, at least, not that she told me.’ She screwed up her eyes, desperately trying to remember the details of her father’s letters. It was many months ago and, after reading all the letters through once, she had refused to read them again. It had been quite clear to her that their father, although likely wealthy and titled, had been a scoundrel. She was under no illusion that he had probably promised their mother marriage and a life as his wife, but instead had used her until he’d grown bored, then moved on to marry a woman of his own class.

‘Did the letters have a date on them?’

Sarah thought back, trying to recall all the details.

‘Seventeen ninety-two. Does that help?’

‘It may help with identifying Lady P. I do not know who was out in society that year, but if Lady P was an eligible young woman who had her debut that year, or possibly the year before, she should be easy to identify. Perhaps she went on to marry your father, perhaps she didn’t, but there will be someone who can remember the gossip of the season from twenty-three years ago.’

‘It’s that simple?’

He shrugged. ‘If you know the right people it is. Although I’m not sure it helps us find your sister. She would not have known anyone to ask about Lady P, so she couldn’t have had much luck following that trail. Shall we have a look at Selina’s letters?’

Sarah handed him the first one. She had most of the contents memorised—she had poured over them so many times.

‘In this one she details her journey to London and her hopes for finding our father,’ Sarah said as Lord Routledge’s eyes skimmed over it. ‘I do not think there is much of use in there.’ She handed him the second, and then the third. ‘She puts where she is staying, but that is the first place I went when I came to London. They hadn’t seen her for weeks and were grumbling about an unpaid bill. Thankfully the man who rented her a room finally took pity on me and gave me her bundle of things.’

‘Was there anything useful in there?’

‘No, just her clothes, and a few mementos from home.’

She waited for him to read the two letters, then handed him another. ‘This one she sent after her first week in London. She started by visiting some of the places mentioned by our father in his letters. There was a gentleman’s club and the opera house in Covent Garden.’

‘You have been there as well?’

‘Yes. Both turned me away pretty quickly, and from what she wrote I think they did the same to Selina.’

‘I cannot see either establishment entertaining enquiries from an unknown young woman who has no clear ties to the aristocracy.’

‘Then, in her letter the next week, she wrote she had tracked down a few of the people mentioned, although she had not been able to get close to them. In one letter our father writes of a Mr Peterson, apparently a friend from school, who was one of the few people who knew about the relationship. Selina expresses her excitement about possibly finding the man in this letter, although she had not worked out a way to get close to him.’ Sarah handed over the next two letters. ‘Although in the next one she talks of paying one of the serving staff at the gentleman’s club to point out Mr Peterson to her, and then approaching him when he left the club one evening. It sounds like he refused to speak to her, dismissed her without even listening to what she had to say.’

‘Mr Peterson,’ Lord Routledge mused, nodding his head. ‘He would be about the right age to have gone to school with a man who could be your father. I would guess that he is about fifty.’

‘You know him?’

‘London society is very small. I expect I am at least acquainted with your father.’

Sarah blinked, finding it difficult to believe.

‘Selina also talks of a woman mentioned in the letters, Mrs Otterly.’

‘She’s dead,’ Lord Routledge said, taking the last of the letters from Sarah.

‘Yes, apparently she died last year.’

‘She was old and I think a particularly bad winter fever carried her off.’

‘You really do know everyone, don’t you?’

He shrugged. ‘Most men of the aristocracy went to one of three or four schools, and then to Oxford or Cambridge to continue their education. We frequent the same gentlemen’s clubs, play cards at the same tables, attend the same balls and dinner parties. I would be most surprised if I didn’t at least know of your father, if he is as wealthy and well connected as you suspect.’

Sarah swallowed. She hadn’t come to London to find her father, all she wanted was her sister. Yet there was a real possibility that, with a little digging and help from Lord Routledge, she would succeed where Selina had failed. She might uncover the identity of the man who had abandoned them when they were just babies.

‘Do you...’ she began, then trailed off.

‘Do I have a suspicion of who he might be?’

Sarah nodded, not able to bring herself to put the question into words.

‘Not as yet, but I expect I could have a viable list for you in a few days. Do you want that?’

She shook her head, her instincts answering for her, and then sighed. ‘I suppose it would be helpful to know. There is the chance that Selina discovered his identity and went to see him, even though there is no indication of her being close to finding the truth in her letters. It would be foolish to spend all this time looking for her only to fail because I am too much of a coward to confront my father.’

‘I do not think you are a coward, Miss Shepherd,’ Lord Routledge said, his voice low and soft.

She looked up sharply and met his eye. For a moment it felt like everything else faded into the background. She forgot they were sitting in the middle of Hyde Park, and she felt an overwhelming urge to throw herself into his arms.

Quickly she rallied. She was feeling this way only because he was being kind. These past few months, ever since Selina had left, Sarah had felt so very alone. She had no one to confide in—she’d kept her friends at a distance, not wanting to tell them about her illegitimacy. Now Lord Routledge was here, offering help and asking nothing in return. It was as though he had been sent by a guardian angel, who had seen her struggling and delivered Lord Routledge to her with all his calmness and connections to the ton .

He reached out to take the last letter from her, his fingers brushing hers. She wasn’t sure if she imagined it, but she thought he lingered for a moment longer than was necessary, his little finger gently sweeping over her hand before he pulled away, breaking the contact.

Sarah quickly turned away, trying to regain her composure. She felt the skin on her chest and cheeks begin to flush, and she hoped if Lord Routledge noticed he would think it was from the sun and nothing more.

‘Is something amiss?’ he asked, looking at her with genuine concern.

Sarah shook her head, not trusting herself to speak. ‘I just need a minute.’ She gestured vaguely at the letters, hoping he would assume thinking about her sister had resulted in her feeling overwhelmed. She stood, taking a few steps away, looking out over the Serpentine but not really seeing anything.

To her surprise Lord Routledge stood too, moving behind her. He was careful to keep an appropriate distance away, there could be no hint of impropriety, watched as they were by the ladies and gentlemen strolling through the park, yet still she felt the heat of him. Sarah wanted to lean her head back, to rest against his shoulder and draw strength from him.

‘You’re being ridiculous,’ she muttered to herself. She barely knew the man. Their acquaintance had been intense over the last twenty-four hours, but there was no getting away from the fact that she had known him for less than a day.

‘We will find your sister, Miss Shepherd,’ Lord Routledge said, his words tickling her ear. More than anything right then she wanted to lean in, to bury herself in his chest and to feel his arms pull her close. She felt the heat rising in her body at the thought of their bodies being pressed so closely together and she tried to take a step away, but her feet refused to move.

Never had she felt such an intense attraction to a man, although over the last few years she had avoided most situations where she might meet someone she wanted to be with. Her mother had always advocated for a quiet, private life, forbidding Sarah and Selina from attending the local dances at the assembly rooms, discouraging them from stepping out with any young gentlemen who were keen to get to know them better. Sarah had been a dutiful daughter, going along with her mother’s wishes, even when she had not understood the motivation for them.

In the last six months since her mother’s death, Sarah had eschewed any chance of developing a relationship. She had been shaken by the discovery that all her life their mother had lived a lie. She had given her heart away when she was young, been promised the world, then left with two young children and no support from the man she thought had loved her. Sarah had seen the melancholy that had tainted her mother’s life. She’d resolved that she would focus on building her happiness in ways that were not reliant on other people. It had been one of the reasons she’d been so keen on taking the position as a music teacher to the family in Kent. It was a well-paid position for someone of her background, and the family seemed pleasant enough. She would have her own room and meals with the other servants. Sarah wasn’t na?ve enough to think that life would satisfy her for the next thirty or forty years, but it would be enough for now.

Slowly she regained her composure and turned to face Lord Routledge. He looked concerned, which somehow made him even more attractive.

With great resolve she told herself that a physical attraction was nothing that couldn’t be overcome. Lord Routledge was an attractive man, it would be a lie for anyone to say otherwise. And he was being kind to her. No doubt any young woman in her situation would feel a flutter of desire.

The key was not to act on anything—to accept Lord Routledge’s help and not scare him away by allowing her imagination to build something up that was not really there.

Sarah shivered suddenly and looked up at the sky. The day so far had been gloriously warm and, as they had entered Hyde Park for a second time, she had worried that her skin might turn pink from the intensity of the sun. Yet as they had been sitting, discussing the letters, great grey clouds had bubbled up and now covered the sky. There was a chill to the air that hadn’t been there minutes before. As Sarah looked up, a fat raindrop fell from the sky and landed on her upturned face.

‘The letters,’ she and Lord Routledge said in unison and they both dashed back to the blanket, gathering up Selina’s precious letters.

Lord Routledge tucked them inside his jacket and picked up the blanket, but by the time he had roughly folded it the rain had started in earnest. All around them nursemaids and governesses were gripping the hands of their young charges, pulling them away from the Serpentine and towards the paths that led out of the park.

Overhead the clouds grew even darker. Somewhere in the distance there was a rumble of thunder.

‘We need to shelter,’ Lord Routledge said, casting his eyes around for possibilities.

‘A tree?’

‘Over there,’ he said, pointing to a massive oak that stood some distance away. Its branches were heavy with leaves and there was ample room to stand underneath it. It was some distance away from the other trees, and as yet no one else had sheltered there.

With every second that passed the rain grew heavier, falling in great droplets that soon saturated the grass. Sarah eyed the tree, still fifty feet away, and then made the decision to run, picking up her skirts and taking off through the park. She was thankful for her sensible boots, glad she had not chosen anything more elegant. Though, an hour earlier, her feet had felt hot and she’d worried about her choice of clothing amongst the elegant young ladies, strolling through the park in their dainty shoes and light, almost sheer dresses.

After thirty seconds she made it to the shelter of the tree, Lord Routledge close behind her, and they bent their heads to step under the lower of the branches, heading for the trunk in the middle.

Sarah shivered. The rain had collected in droplets and was now running down her arms and her back. Her dress was sodden.

‘I would offer you my jacket,’ Lord Routledge said, ‘but I do not think it would do much to keep you warm.’

Henry brushed the excess water from his hair and glanced over at Miss Shepherd, then quickly looked away. The material of her dress was not thin, but the downpour had soaked through it and it now clung to her body as if it were moulded to her. He could see every curve, from the outline of her hips and waist to the swell of her breasts.

He tried to be gentlemanly, but after a moment he found himself looking again.

The attraction he felt was unsurprising when he thought of it rationally. He had been a widower for two years. He had never seriously considered taking a mistress—his life was complicated enough already, added to the fact that he barely got by on the little funds he had. There was no way he could support a mistress as well.

Given the length of his celibacy it should be no surprise that he felt attracted to a pretty young woman, yet it was inconvenient. He had promised to help her. The last thing he needed was to be fantasising about Miss Shepherd whilst they searched for her sister.

A flash of lightning forked across the sky, followed soon after by a rumble of thunder.

‘Suddenly I am questioning our choice to shelter under the tallest tree,’ Miss Shepherd murmured, looking at the sky with concern.

‘It is better than being out there in the open.’

‘I saw someone struck by lightning once,’ she said, biting her lip as the sky lit up again.

‘Actually struck by lightning?’

‘Yes. I come from a little seaside place, St Leonards. It neighbours Hastings.’

‘Of the famed battle?’

‘Yes. Hastings has these beautiful cliffs that stretch for miles. The views out to sea are unparalleled, and sometimes you can spot seals swimming offshore. On occasion, Selina and I would walk the few miles into Hastings and then climb the windy path up the cliffs, but once we were caught in a storm. It came about quickly, much like today, one minute glorious weather and then the next the sky clouded over.’ She shuddered, although whether from the memory or the dampness of her clothes, it was impossible to tell. ‘We had to walk slowly, the cliffs were sandstone and covered in grass on the top, but they became slippery. We were about to descend when there was a flash of lightning, and it struck a man walking on the path a few feet ahead of us.’

‘What happened to him?’

‘He died. Instantly I think. He just dropped to the ground. Selina and I rushed forward, thinking we might be able to help, but there was nothing to be done for him. One moment he was there and then suddenly he wasn’t.’

‘That must have been terrible to see.’

‘I couldn’t sleep for weeks after.’

‘You are remarkably calm today, being caught in a storm.’

‘My heart is pounding,’ she said, with a nervous little smile. He had the inexplicable urge to place his hand on her chest, to feel the thud of her heart within, and his hand was halfway there before he caught himself.

‘It happened about six years ago, and every time there was a storm I was so scared I would hide beneath a blanket. Selina would sit with me the whole time, telling me the storm would pass. She would do that even though she must have been petrified herself.’ Sarah bit her lip. ‘People don’t always see that side of her. She’s fun and charming and everyone loves her on first meeting, but they don’t always get to see the kind young woman underneath. Sometimes she can be selfish, but often it is only because she is impulsive, and when it matters she is the most generous person you could ever meet.’

‘We will find her.’

Miss Shepherd nodded as she looked up at him. Somehow her eyes appeared even greener today, and he found he couldn’t look away. She swayed towards him, and this time he couldn’t stop himself. He placed his hand around waist and drew her to him. She dipped her head, resting her forehead on his shoulder, and for a long moment they stood there, unmoving.

After a minute she looked up, a question in her eyes that he didn’t dare to answer. It would be so easy to dip his chin, to catch her lips with his own, to kiss her whilst the rain fell around them.

Eventually the rational part of him won and he cleared his throat, breaking the contact between them and stepping away. He turned, pretending to look out at the storm, thankful when another bolt of lightning forked across the sky.

‘I think the storm is getting further away.’ His voice was so gruff it was unrecognisable.

Miss Shepherd had turned so her back was to him, but he could see the tension in her shoulders. She was an impressionable young woman, away from home for the first time, in a situation that was highly stressful. No wonder she had sought comfort in him—there was nothing more to it than that. He had been kind to her and she had reached out in her moment of vulnerability.

For the next few minutes they watched the storm in silence. Miss Shepherd relaxed a little as the thunder and lightning moved away, and after five more minutes the rain eased as well.

‘I should return to my rooms. I am soaked to the skin,’ she said, turning to him with an overly bright smile.

‘Shall I escort you?’

‘There is no need. It is not too far, and now the storm has passed I will be perfectly fine.’

‘May I keep the letters and have a look over them? I will draw up a list of the people your sister mentions, and how best to approach them, as well as noting down some ideas of who could be your father.’

‘Thank you,’ Miss Shepherd said.

‘I am due to attend the opera tomorrow night, perhaps you might like to accompany me? I have a spare seat. We can talk in the interval.’

Her eyes widened. ‘The opera? Are you sure?’

It was a terrible idea. Half of the ton would be in attendance, and everyone would be curious to know who his companion was, especially as word would have got around that he was searching for a new wife. Yet, as he saw the excitement on her face, he realised he couldn’t withdraw the invitation.

‘Yes. We can say you are a distant relative, visiting London from the country.’ As long as they didn’t engage anyone he knew too well in conversation, then there was a chance the lie would be believed. ‘I will call for you at seven.’

‘Thank you.’