“You see how he learns our secrets,” Madeline said to her aunt. “Now he will suddenly find he has to leave—he has forgotten to feed his cat—but his intention is to dart to Grey and Grenville and Brougham with the story. We must be more discreet in future, Auntie.”
“To be sure we must, though it won’t remain a secret for long if the resignation is accepted. Will it be, Eskott?”
“No such luck. Wellesley is too crafty to split the party wide open over himself. Too damaging for his future prospects. He’ll leave, for the time being, and woe betide those who have opposed him when he does get into power. He’ll resign, I expect.”
“No woolsack for you this year, my friend,” Madeline said.
“All things come to those who wait. Speaking of waiting, where is Henry today?”
“He is not working today. He usually takes Saturdays off to look after his own business matters.”
“Having his curls trimmed, is he? As you are left alone and pining, might I induce you to come over and help me entertain a bishop this afternoon? A demmed dull dog, who is battening himself and his family on me for the week. You and Lady Margaret come to tea and amuse the ladies for me.”
“I thought you would enjoy that part of the visit yourself,” Madeline said with a pert smile.
“You wouldn’t think so if you had got a look at the ladies in question. Bring your Bibles, and any stray hymnals you have lying about the house. Be sure to wear two or three shawls too, if you plan to appear in that dashing gown, Maddie.”
“This modest old thing? Why there isn’t a square inch of my sinful flesh showing. What’s wrong with it?”
“It clings. It is clear to the most disinterested observer that you have a waist. The bishop’s ladies wear theirs hanging loose. I suspect the daughter might have something worth seeing too, if she weren’t so bundled up in blankets. I don’t know whether it was her or her mama who draped my fine Grecian nude statue of Aphrodite in a shawl. I am blaming it on Maude, the daughter.”
“Shall we oblige Eskott, Auntie?” Madeline asked. “We might as well. I have nothing better to do, and will end up ordering a new gown if I go to Bond Street.”
Lady Margaret was delighted to see a new closeness springing up between Eskott and Madeline. “We’ll be happy to go. What time do you want us?”
“Three will be fine. Any gossip you can scrape together regarding the outcome of the visit to Carlton House will be very acceptable too. The ladies are interested in politics.”
“No doubt you will tell us when we arrive what happened,” Madeline said. “You appear to know as much about it as we do.”
“We stop at nothing to find out what you are up to, in order to exploit all opportunities for making mischief. I may be sitting on that woolsack yet. I must go now and feed my cat. See you at three.”
Madeline and Margaret exchanged a knowing nod at his true errand—off to report to Grey and Grenville. The little smile on Madeline’s face caused her aunt to hope she was noticing how well Eskott looked that morning. The excitement of the pending cabinet resignation had lent a glow to his eyes, a heightening to his usually rather pale complexion.
“He would make an excellent minister, would he not?” Margaret asked innocently.
Her niece was not listening. Her next speech showed it clearly. “How did he know about the resignation? I’m sure it was not spoken of last night.”
“He didn’t
know,
he guessed.”
“But how did he guess so accurately? I only had an inkling myself because I happened to look over Henry’s shoulder at a letter he was writing for Papa that alluded to it. Even that did not use the word
resignation,
but
last resort,
which I took to mean resignation.”
“There could be a leak in the ship of state. I have often heard your father tell of such a thing during the days of Pitt’s—the younger Pitt’s, regime. Thurwell was the fellow doing it, I believe. They caught him red-handed. Just as he was swearing to Pitt he was innocent, a page boy came in and handed him his hat—told him he had left it in some chamber where the Whigs were known to be meeting. Sheridan and Fox were in on it. What a storm it caused. Thurwell was after some great position for himself, and like the present situation, the government was expected to fall at any moment. It usually seems to bring the lower forms of bugs out of the woodwork, to scavenge for scraps. I’ll mention it to Fordwich, and see what he thinks.”
“Yes, I think we had better do that.”
“It won’t be necessary to mention
we
were goose enough to confirm Eskott’s suspicions.”
“I think not, but we must be more discreet from now on.”
Chapter Thirteen
They told Fordwich their fears. He was concerned at the
possibility of a leak in the cabinet, but in the end concluded that none of his associates was capable of such wanton treachery as Eskott’s knowledge would indicate.
“Someone let an indiscreet word drop at Perceval’s party. Parties are always dangerous, with so much wine flowing. We ought not to attend them when delicate negotiations are going forth. If he had been told by anyone, he would have had the thing straight. Our plan was not to resign if Canning was invited in, but if Wellesley did not resign. But he is resigning so that is an end to it.”
Lord Wellesley was soon driving up to Carlton House in full dress, to hand the seals of his office over to the regent, who expressed every distaste for the business. This success went to the cabinet’s head, and they began preparing other nasty surprises for the beleaguered prince.
It was known in a vague, general way that something else was brewing, but the precise nature of it was unclear to the Whigs. The excitement was enough to give an old man, which Fordwich was, an acute case of indigestion. He was not so incapacitated as to be left out of affairs entirely. He was sent to his bed by the prince’s own physician. Sir William Knighton, where his colleagues called daily and also dispatched to him vast boxes of correspondence to keep him abreast of developments.
The precarious state of the party did not restrict social doings in the least. Eskott still had two bishop’s daughters and one wife to be entertained. They were vastly dull creatures, Lady Margaret declared, but she was agreeable to show them around the town when Madeline suggested it. Indeed she was pleasantly surprised at such condescension from Madeline. She did not realize Eskott was owed a special favor for having rescued Henry. She did know Henry was busier than usual with Fordwich home in bed, and sincerely hoped the absence of his handsome face would put him a little out of Maddie’s mind.
In fact, it took its other well-known course, and made her fonder of him, or at least lonesome for more of his company. She approved of his devotion to duty; it was heartening to see him pitch himself eagerly into the new load of work. There was a deal of running back and forth to be done, and Henry preferred trotting about in his carriage to sitting over a desk.
After the bishop’s ladies had seen all the interesting churches, and a few dozen of the uninteresting ones, they were induced to join the more enjoyable business of touring the shops. It was after this last outing that Lady Madeline’s carriage drew up in front of Eskott’s house to deposit his guests at his doorstep.
“We’ll just step in and say how-do-you-do to Eskott,” Lady Margaret decreed, always busy to pitch Maddie into his company.
“He won’t be home at five o’clock,” Madeline pointed out.
“It is only a step. Let us go and see.”
Eskott had just returned minutes before. “I stopped around at St. James’s Street to see if you had gone back there,” he said, welcoming them. “Have you shopped the stores empty?”
The few parcels being carried in indicated nothing of the sort; they were few and small.
“Not quite,” Madeline replied, with a little peep at the scanty packages. “But even window shopping is fatiguing. We would be happy for a cup of tea or a glass of wine.”
“You have earned it,” he answered, the swift, secret smile that passed between them expressing a whole outline of the afternoon’s tedious rooting. “I didn’t see Fordwich at the House today. I hope he is not ill.”
“A slight indisposition,” Lady Margaret assured him. “Nothing serious. It is business as usual, but from his bed. The red dispatch boxes are coming in thick and fast. Some new imbroglio going on.”
“Don’t bother perking up your sharp ears,” Madeline warned. “We don’t know a thing about it. Perhaps you can tell us?”
“I stopped by your place in the hope you would let fall some revealing remarks. We are all at a loss.”
“Better go to Lord Minchin’s ball tonight and see what you can hear over the punch bowl,” Madeline suggested.
“Are you going?”
“No, with Papa feeling under the weather, we are using it as an excuse to stay home and get to bed before midnight for a change.”
The bishop’s wife opened her eyes wide at this telling speech. The conversation turned to topics that could include the ecclesiastical ladies till the tea was finished.
“I’ll stop by tomorrow and see how your father goes on,” Eskott said as he escorted the visitors to the door. His houseguests were already on their way up the stairs with their parcels. “Thank you very much for helping me. They say you are extremely obliging, which tells me you have had a very dull scald of it these past days.”
“Not in the least. I have been meaning to count all the buttons in all the shops of London for some time now. Somehow I never got around to it. You know how it is,” Madeline told him.
“You don’t have to tell me; I owe you a favor.”
“No, we are
even
now, dear Eskott,” she answered cryptically. Her aunt frowned in curiosity, wondering what secret she was being left out of. The slyest questioning all the way home told her nothing.
The matter fell from her mind the moment they stepped in the front door of their own home. Fordwich stood in the hallway with his housecoat on, his hair all awry and his cheeks red with anger. The butler was the object of his tirade, which was in full swing.
“I tell you the letters have been opened!” he shouted. “The seals broken and very clumsily closed up again. I have left orders that the dispatch boxes are to be brought up to me the
instant
they arrive.”
“Now Fordwich, calm yourself,” his sister said. “Go back to bed. You’ll catch your death of cold in this drafty hall without proper dress. What are you doing downstairs?”
“I came down the minute I got a look at this correspondence. How long was it sitting on that table by the door, for any chance caller to tamper with?” he demanded of the butler.
“I just went down to the kitchen to have a cup of tea, your lordship. I wasn’t gone above half an hour. The downstairs footman said he would tend the door while I was gone. He was in the study dusting the top shelves, for the maids don’t like climbing up the ladder. No one came except the courier from Westminster. The footman left the box for me to take up to you.”
“Then it is someone in my own household who is spying,” Fordwich decided.
“Rubbish, the letters were opened and resealed before they left Westminster,” Lady Margaret countered. “Is there something very important in them?”
Fordwich did not actually reply, but his mutterings as he turned to the stairs to go back to his bed indicated that he had not actually taken time to read the letters.
“He is nervous as a kitten,” Madeline remarked, looking after him.
“He’s always on the fidgets when he is ill. All men are. I daresay the ministers have been worrying about their secrets since Eskott knew all about the great mass resignation. I’ll go up and calm him.”
When her aunt had gone, Madeline turned to the butler. “Is Mr. Aldred in father’s study?” she asked.
“No, ma’am. He left an hour ago. Took some message to Lord Eldon for his lordship, I believe.”
“Thank you. About the dispatch box, Evans—when did it arrive?”
“While I was at tea, ma’am. Less than an hour ago. Mr. Aldred was putting on his coat when I left. ‘I’ll see myself out, Evans,’ he said to me.”
“I see. Were you back at the door when Lord Eskott came to call?”
“Why, he didn’t come, milady. I didn’t let him in, and the footman said no one came. But then Lord Eskott doesn’t always bother to knock, does he? He might have just stepped in, and seeing no one about, gone out again without disturbing us.”
“That must be it. I spoke to him just now, and he told me he had been here. That’s all, Evans. Tell Cook we’ll dine a little late this evening. Papa will be having a tray in his room, and Lady Margaret and myself have just had tea.”
After putting off her pelisse, she went to her father’s room, to see Lady Margaret and Fordwich in quiet, worried conversation. “What’s the matter? Was there something important in the box?”
“Yes, information we would not wish the opposition to get hold of just yet. I’ve told Meggie, and I don’t mind telling you, Maddie, as you are not going out anywhere this evening, and soon it will be public knowledge. Do not speak of it to anyone. The fact is, Perceval is at loggerheads with the prince over Lord Sidmouth’s appointment as lord president of the Council.”
“Is that wise, Papa, to push Sidmouth forward? The prince hates him—his father’s prime minister. Sidmouth is generally blamed for not giving the regent his military promotion, which he wanted so much. Why must it be done at this time?”
“Perceval’s doings. Sidmouth is able and conscientious—a good man. We can use him. The fact is, the prince is quoted here as saying he has no confidence in Sidmouth and, more significantly, that he has no confidence in any person who forces Sidmouth on him. If the Whigs have got hold of this piece of information—if they should decide to hold their hand on the matter of Catholic Emancipation, for instance, they could surely get themselves appointed as the government tomorrow.”
“Why does Perceval persist then?”
“He means to show he has the upper hand, that he is not a puppet to anyone. Perhaps he has Lady Hertford’s support, behind her hand as it were, but in any case, you can see we do not wish our enemies to know what we are about till the thing is done. Send for Aldred. I’ll dispatch a note to Westminster and let them know about this affair—the letters being tampered with. They’ll be there till all hours tonight if I know anything.”