Amanda Scott - [Dangerous 04] (41 page)

“Oh, thank God,” Letty exclaimed. “I’ll go straight up to her.”

“There is no need for that, my dear,” Miss Abby said from the doorway into the stair hall. “She is sleeping quite naturally now, and the doctor says we must let her get her rest. I don’t believe I know this gentleman,” she added gently.

Begging her pardon, Letty introduced Jervaulx.

Miss Abby’s eyes widened. “H-how do you do, my lord? Has dearest Letty told you …? Yes, I can see that she has told you everything.” Her countenance crumpled. “I daresay all our happiness has come to an end. Miranda will be so dreadfully vexed.”

“Don’t be cast down, Miss Abby,” Letty said. “I have an idea that may answer the purpose for everyone. Let us go straight up to Mrs. Linford before I tell you about it, though.”

Miss Abby looked unconvinced, but collecting herself, she said, “Then you had better order refreshments for everyone, Jackson.”

They found Mrs. Linford with Liza in the drawing room. Liza looked much her usual self, Letty thought, although at the sight of them, she had colored up to the roots of her hair.

Mrs. Linford murmured something to her, and she got to her feet and bobbed an awkward curtsy. “Is Justin going to play the pianoforte?” she asked.

“Not tonight,” he said. “Isn’t it time you were in bed?”

“I told her she could stay up,” Mrs. Linford said. “The events of this evening have distressed her, as one can well imagine they might.”

“Still, Aunt Miranda, I do think—”

She cut him off, saying, “Where have your manners gone begging, Justin? This gentleman looks vaguely familiar, and I imagine I know who he must be, but nonetheless …” She paused expectantly.

“This is Jervaulx, ma’am, Letty’s papa.”

Jervaulx nodded.

Mrs. Linford said, “I expect Abigail has given you our good news. We had a little mishap here earlier this evening, my lord.”

“He knows all about it,” Justin told her. “He knows everything.”

“Everything? Oh, dear.”

“Yes, precisely,” he said. “The game is up, ma’am.”

Looking dismayed, Mrs. Linford seemed to slump a little in her chair.

Letty said sharply, “Don’t talk to her like that, sir. Everything will be fine, ma’am, I promise you. I have an idea that I think you will approve.”

“Oh, my dear, if only—” She broke off when sounds of new arrivals wafted to their ears from the stair hall. “Who can that be, at this hour?”

Glancing at Justin and at Jervaulx, neither of whom offered to reply, Letty said, “I believe it must be my mother, ma’am, and Lady Sellafield, with Lord Witherspoon and Admiral Rame.”

“Merciful heavens,” Mrs. Linford said, turning pale.

“Papa!” exclaimed Liza. She jumped to her feet and ran toward the door, startling the marmalade cat, which had curled up on a pillow near the doorway. The cat darted through the doorway ahead of her, and a masculine oath sounded afterward, followed by a gurgle of laughter that Letty recognized as her mother’s.

“Well, that was not one’s usual ball, I must say,” Daintry said as she entered the room. She looked at her husband. “First an explosion, then an arrest, and then you and Wellington disappeared with my daughter. Then, out of the blue, this very kind gentleman arrives to tell me that my husband desires him to deliver me and two strangers to him like a parcel. You have some explaining to do, sir.”

Behind her, Admiral Rame entered with Liza clinging to his arm. “I tried to explain what I could, Jervaulx, but I hesitated to say very much, you know, not knowing exactly what you wished me to make known to Witherspoon.”

Letty scarcely heard what he said. She was staring at the admiral and Liza. “Did I hear her call you ‘Papa,’ sir?”

“Yes,” he said, putting his arm around the girl. “I guess you had not yet learned all of the secrets of your house, Lady Letitia. Liza is the result of a liaison I had with my housekeeper when I was a carefree bachelor, long before I married my darling wife. When her mother died suddenly, I was still in a position where I thought it necessary to keep her existence a secret. The dear ladies here were kind enough to take her in and treat her as befitted my daughter, which led at times to some confusion on her part, I fear. I have long meant to tell my wife about her, however, and I believe the time has come, don’t you?”

Witherspoon brushed past him. “What’s the meaning of all this? Who the devil are you, sir,” he said to Jervaulx, “and where is my wife? The admiral said I would find her here, but I do not understand how that can be the case.”

Lady Sellafield, who Letty suspected had come upstairs with Witherspoon, hesitated in the doorway, looking uncertainly at her son. He smiled reassuringly at her, then turned to Letty.

“No more secrets,” he said.

“No,” she said. “I think you had better handle this part. Then I’ll tell everyone what I think we should do next.”

He nodded, then turned back to his mother, saying baldly, “Ma’am, I think you should know that Catherine Witherspoon was nearly murdered here tonight.”

Lady Sellafield gasped and clutched a hand to her breast.

Witherspoon exclaimed, “What are you saying? Catherine? Impossible! She was in bed when I left the house. She has been feeling poorly for two days!”

“She told you that only so she could get out tonight to meet her lover,” Raventhorpe said. “If I seem brutal, sir, perhaps you will agree that you deserve no less. I mean to tell you exactly what transpired here, so that you can help us put the best face on it for public consumption. I do not care to have my family dragged through scandal, and I daresay you don’t want that, either.”

“Good heavens,” Witherspoon said, clearly very much shocked. “Did you say Catherine has taken a lover?”

“She has been meeting him here, just as you have been meeting my mother,” Raventhorpe said.

Witherspoon looked at Rame, then at Jervaulx. “I say, Raventhorpe, I can understand your resentment, but need we air this all before such an audience?”

Letty nearly spoke, but catching Justin’s eye, she subsided.

He said, “This house belongs to Lady Letitia, sir, and therefore, whether she likes it or not, her father and mother have a right to know what has gone on here. As for the admiral, I daresay there is little about this house that he does not know.”

“Who the devil was she daring to meet here?”

“Charles Morden. Yes, I daresay that shocks you, and you can discuss it with her if she recovers. I remind you that she was gravely injured tonight.”

“Dear me, I should go to her,” Witherspoon said belatedly.

“You need not hurry. Miss Abby says she is sleeping now, and a doctor is with her. I might add that Catherine risked her life tonight to protect young Liza there when the brute who seduced her attempted to force himself upon the child.”

“I’m not a child,” Liza said indignantly, “and what’s more, he likes me—”

Her words ended when the admiral unceremoniously put his hand over her mouth. “That will do, my dear,” he murmured. “You must not speak now unless someone speaks to you first.”

She nodded, resting her head lovingly against his hand.

“I don’t understand this at all,” Witherspoon complained.

“I daresay you don’t,” Justin said. “All you need to understand just now, however, is the need to make all tidy. You have much to answer for, sir.”

“Now, see here,” Witherspoon began.

“That attitude will avail you nothing,” Justin said. “I understand your feelings for my mother, and hers for you. I know you’ve been good friends for years, and I have a sneaking suspicion that one reason she is the only one in my family who never asks me for money is that you provide for her when my father does not.”

“If I have done so, it is none of your damned business.”

“Perhaps not,” Justin said. “I am well aware that members of our circle have long turned a blind eye to such relationships as yours. I think, however, that you will find less sympathy for them in the coming years. We no longer have profligate kings running our country, sir, and our virginal young queen takes a dim view of such practices, as you must know by now. In any event, this affair must stop.”

“I agree, Teddy,” Lady Sellafield said, speaking for the first time. “You have a duty to Catherine. I have long felt that, as you know if poor Justin does not. Had I not been so desperately lonely, and you so wonderfully understanding …”

“I know, my dear,” he said with a tenderness Letty would not have expected to hear in his voice. “Very well, I will attend to my duty. Poor Catherine. You need not worry that I shall scold her, Lady Letitia. I am in no course to do that.”

“Nor she to hear it, sir,” Letty said. “But perhaps, before you go to her, we might just decide what tale we will tell of this night.”

Justin said, “I’ve got that worked out, I think. The best thing would be to keep as near the truth as possible, so that whatever that villain Morden says will sound like he’s just trying to put a good face on his own actions.”

“You need not worry about Morden, sir,” Leyton said from the doorway.

Everyone turned instantly to stare at him.

Justin said, “What the devil do you mean? If Morden says anything at all, it will stir up a hornets’ nest. That alone …” His voice trailed to silence when Leyton shook his head. “What is it?”

“The poor devil appears to have shot himself whilst in custody, sir.”

“Where did he get a gun? I’d swear he had none on him.”

“They say that Sir John Conroy visited him briefly just before he did the dreadful deed. God rest his soul,” Leyton added piously.

“Well, that does make things easier. Thank you, Leyton. Perhaps you will just go now and tell Lady Letitia’s woman that she will be ready to leave in half an hour or so. We will ring when we want you,” he added, smiling at his man.

“Thank you, my lord. I’ll be glad to tell her.” Leyton left quickly.

Justin said thoughtfully, “Morden’s death, however convenient we may think it, does not alter what I said before. The nearer we can stay to the truth, the easier it will be for all of us. Therefore, I suggest we say simply that Lady Witherspoon fell and struck her head whilst visiting my great-aunts. We need not say when or how, and if people ask questions, we can say that it happened today. She can decide how much more to reveal to her intimates. No one will ask the rest of us for details.”

“That’s all very well,” Witherspoon said, “but I don’t know that we ought to say she was here when it happened. I can take her home and simply put it about that she fell down the stairs, or some such thing.”

“You must do as you think best, of course,” Justin said, “but your servants will know that is not true. On the other side of that coin, we all know that the servants here are a discreet lot.”

“But that’s just it,” Witherspoon protested. “Too many people know what goes on here. I’m sorry, ladies,” he added, looking wretched. “I know I should be the last to complain. Nonetheless, won’t people guess why Catherine was here?”

“We do have friends who visit without taking advantage of our private chambers,” Miss Abby said indignantly.

“And no one will be taking such advantage of them in future,” Justin said firmly. “I have decided to provide my aunts with—”

“Just a moment, sir,” Letty interjected. “You are encroaching upon my business now, not yours. I will decide what is best to do with my tenants.”

“I think we should decide,” Miss Abby said miserably.

“You shall do so,” Letty said. Looking directly at Justin, she added, “You may choose between Justin’s plan and mine.”

His eyes began to twinkle.

Her dignity still very much intact, Mrs. Linford said, “What do you suggest?”

Witherspoon, who had been looking from one speaker to another, said in a querulous voice, “You don’t need me for this discussion. I am going to see my wife. You and I can talk later, Sally. I hope your son don’t think it necessary to spill the beans to Sellafield. That
will
cause a scandal!”

“He won’t, Teddy,” Lady Sellafield said, patting him on the shoulder. “You run along up to Catherine now. Go on, Letty dear. Pay no heed to us.”

“Very well, ma’am, thank you,” Letty said. Turning to the old ladies, she said, “It has occurred to me that although Mr. Benthall’s very odd will stipulated that you would forfeit your tenancy if anyone else paid your rent, and also that I cannot increase that rent, it said nothing about a lower one. I submit that if I lower your rent to one pound a year, you will be able to make ends meet quite nicely.”

Miss Abby said worriedly, “That is kind of you, my dear, but I don’t think we could, you know. The upkeep on this house is very expensive.”

“Then I will make you an allowance,” she said.

“Out of the question,” Mrs. Linford said. “Even if your papa would allow it, and even though we know you would not constantly want to order our lives for us, it would be worse to be beholden to you, who are not related to us, than to our grand-nephew. I don’t know why Augustus put us in this dreadful fix,” she added irritably. “It was most thoughtless of him not to have left us some money.”

“He wasn’t thinking of you, Miranda,” the admiral said.

Everyone looked at him.

“Do you know what he
was
thinking, sir?” Letty demanded. “Because, I promise you, sir, none of us has the least notion.”

“Augustus was one of my chief correspondents whilst I was at sea,” the admiral said. “Whenever we put into port, I would find letters awaiting me, telling me all the gossip of the beau monde. I had intended to speak to you,” he added, turning to Jervaulx. “It seemed to me that you were the proper person. I did not realize that your daughter had taken the reins into her own hands.”

“She has a habit of doing that,” Jervaulx said evenly.

Daintry said hastily, “What do you know of her inheritance, sir?”

The admiral smiled at her. “I don’t know for a fact, my lady, but I can guess. Augustus and the sixth marquess were well acquainted, you know.”

“We know he was kin to my grandmother,” Jervaulx said cautiously.

“They disliked each other cordially,” the admiral said, “but he loathed Jervaulx with a passion. Said he had no sense of humor.”