Mr. Cavendish, I Presume (6 page)

“Ma’am, it’s late,” Grace tried to explain. She edged forward, then looked at the dowager intently as she said it again: “Ma’am.”

“You may instruct a footman to procure it for you in the morning,” Thomas said, wondering why he thought that something unspoken had just passed between the two women. He was fairly certain his grandmother did not take Grace into her confidence, and he knew that Grace did not return the gesture. He cleared his 48 Julia

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throat. “I will not have Miss Eversleigh undertaking such manual labor, and certainly not in the middle of the night.”

“I need the painting, Thomas,” the dowager said, but it was not her usual brittle snap. There was a catch in her voice, a weakness that was unnerving. And then she said, “Please.”

He closed his eyes. His grandmother never said please.

“Tomorrow,” he said, recomposing himself. “First thing if you wish it.”

“But—”

“No,” he interrupted. “I am sorry you were accosted this evening, and I shall certainly do whatever is necessary—
within reason
—to facilitate your comfort and health, but this does not include whimsical and ill-timed demands. Do you understand me?”

Her lips pursed, and he saw a flash of her usual, haughty self in her eyes. For some reason, he found this reassuring. It wasn’t that he viewed her usual, haughty self with much fondness, but the world was a more balanced place when everyone behaved as expected.

She stared at him angrily.

He stared back. “Grace,” he said sharply, without turning around, “go to bed.”

There was a long beat of silence, and then he heard Grace depart.

“You have no right to order her about that way,” his grandmother hissed.

“No,
you
have no right.”

“She is my companion.”

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49

“
Not
your slave.”

His grandmother’s hands shook. “You don’t understand. You could never understand.”

“For which I am eternally grateful,” he retorted.

Good Lord, the day he understood her was the day he ceased to like himself altogether. He’d spent a lifetime trying to please this woman, or if not that, then half a life trying to please her and the next half trying to avoid her. She had never liked him. Thomas could recall his childhood well enough to know that much. It did not bother him now; he’d long since realized she did not like anyone.

But apparently she once had. If his father’s resent-ful ramblings were any indication, Augusta Cavendish had adored her middle son, John. She had always bemoaned the fact that he had not been born the heir, and when Thomas’s father had unexpectedly inherited, she had made it abundantly clear that he was a weak substitute. John would have been a better duke, and if not him, then Charles, who, as the eldest, had been groomed for the spot. When he had perished, Reginald, born third, had been left alone with a bitter mother and a wife he did not like or respect. He had always felt that he had been forced to marry beneath him because no one thought he’d inherit, and he saw no reason not to make this opinion clear and loud.

For all that Reginald Cavendish and his mother appeared to detest one another, they were in truth remarkably alike. Neither one of them liked
anyone
, and certainly not Thomas, ducal heir or not.

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“It’s a pity we can’t choose our families,” Thomas murmured.

His grandmother looked at him sharply. He had not spoken loudly enough for her to make out his words, but his tone would have been clear enough to interpret.

“Leave me alone,” she said.

“What
happened
to you this evening?” Because this made no sense. Yes, perhaps she’d been accosted by highwaymen, and perhaps she’d even had a gun pointed at her chest. But Augusta Cavendish was no frail flower.

She’d be spitting nails when they laid her in her grave, of that he had no doubt.

Her lips parted and a vengeful gleam sparked in her eyes, but in the end she held her tongue. Her back straightened and her jaw tightened, and finally she said, “Leave.”

He shrugged. If she did not wish to allow him to play the dutiful grandson, then he considered himself ab-solved of the responsibility. “I heard they did not get your emeralds,” he said, heading for the door.

“Of course not,” she snapped.

He smiled. Mostly because she could not see it. “It was not well done of you,” he said, turning to face her when he reached the door. “Foisting them upon Miss Eversleigh.”

She scoffed at that, not dignifying his comment with a reply. He hadn’t expected her to; Augusta Cavendish would never have valued her companion over her emeralds.

“Sleep well, dear grandmother,” Thomas called out, stepping into the corridor. Then he popped his head Mr. Cavendish, I Presume

51

back into the doorway, just far enough to deliver a parting shot. “Or if you can’t manage that, be silent about it. I’d ask for invisibility, but you keep insisting you’re not a witch.”

“You are an unnatural grandson,” she hissed.

Thomas shrugged, deciding to allow her the last word. She’d had a difficult night. And he was tired.

And besides that, he didn’t really care.

Chapter 4

The most irritating part of it, Amelia thought as she sipped her tea, which had (of course) gone cold, was that she could have been reading a book.

Or riding her mare.

Or dipping her toes in a stream or learning to play chess or watching the footmen at home polish silver.

But instead she was here. In one of Belgrave Castle’s twelve drawing rooms, sipping cold tea, wondering if it would be impolite to eat the last biscuit, and jumping every time she heard footsteps in the hall.

“Oh, my heavens! Grace!” Elizabeth was exclaiming. “No wonder you appear so distracted!”

“Hmmm?” Amelia straightened. Apparently she had missed something of interest whilst pondering how to avoid her fiancé. Who, it was worth noting, might or might not be in love with Grace.

And had kissed
her
, anyway.

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53

Shabby behavior, indeed. Toward
both
of the ladies.

Amelia looked at Grace a bit more closely, pondering her dark hair and blue eyes, and realized that she was actually quite beautiful. This shouldn’t have come as a surprise; she’d known Grace her entire life. Before Grace had become the dowager’s companion, she’d been the daughter of a local squire.

Amelia supposed she still was, only now she was the daughter of a dead squire, which did not offer much in the way of livelihood or protection. But back when Grace’s family had been living, they were all part of the same general country set, and if perhaps the parents had not been close, the children certainly were.

She had probably seen Grace once every week; twice, she supposed, if one counted church.

But in truth, she hadn’t ever really thought about Grace’s appearance. It wasn’t that she didn’t care, or that she considered her beneath notice. It was just that

. . . well . . .
why?
Grace had always been simply there.

A regular and dependable part of her world. Elizabeth’s closest friend, tragically orphaned and then taken in by the dowager duchess.

Amelia reconsidered.
Taken in
was perhaps a euphemism. Truly, Grace worked hard for her keep. She might not be performing menial labor, but time spent with the dowager was exhausting.

As Amelia knew firsthand.

“I am quite recovered,” Grace said. “Just a bit tired, I’m afraid. I did not sleep well.”

“What happened?” Amelia asked, deciding there was no point in pretending she’d been listening.

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Elizabeth actually shoved her. “Grace and the dowager were accosted by highwaymen!”

“Really?”

Grace nodded. “Last night. On the way home from the assembly.”

Now this
was
interesting. “Did they take anything?”

Amelia asked, because really, it seemed a pertinent question.

“How can you be so dispassionate?” Elizabeth demanded. “They pointed a gun at her!” She turned to Grace. “Did they?”

“They did, actually.”

Amelia pondered this. Not the gun, but rather, her lack of horror at the retelling. Perhaps she was a cold person.

“Were you terrified?” Elizabeth asked breathlessly.

“I would have been. I would have swooned.”

“I wouldn’t have swooned,” Amelia remarked.

“Well, of course you wouldn’t,” Elizabeth said irritably. “You didn’t even gasp when Grace told you about it.”

“It sounds rather exciting, actually.” Amelia looked at Grace with great interest. “Was it?”

And Grace—good heavens, she blushed.

Amelia leaned forward, lips twitching. A blush could mean all sorts of things—all of them quite splendid.

She felt a rush of excitement in her chest, a heady, almost weightless sort of feeling—the sort one got when told a particularly juicy piece of gossip. “Was he handsome, then?”

Elizabeth looked at her as if she were mad. “Who?”

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“The highwayman, of course.”

Grace stammered something and pretended to drink her tea.

“He
was
,” Amelia said, feeling much better now. If Wyndham was in love with Grace . . . well, at least she did not return the emotion.

“He was wearing a
mask
,” Grace retorted.

“But you could still tell that he was handsome,”

Amelia urged.

“No!”

“Then his accent was terribly romantic. French? Italian?” Amelia actually shuddered with delight, thinking of all the Byron she’d read recently.
“Spanish.”

“You’ve gone mad,” Elizabeth said.

“He didn’t
have
an accent,” Grace said. “Well, not much of one. Scottish, perhaps? Irish? I couldn’t tell, precisely.”

Amelia sat back with a happy sigh. “A highwayman.

How romantic.”

“Amelia Willoughby!” her sister scolded. “Grace was just attacked at gunpoint, and you are calling it romantic?”

She would have responded with something very cutting and clever—because really, if one couldn’t be cutting and clever with one’s sister, who
could
one be cutting and clever with?—but at that moment she heard a noise in the hall.

“The dowager?” Elizabeth whispered to Grace with a grimace. It was so lovely when the dowager did
not
join them for tea.

“I don’t think so,” Grace replied. “She was still abed 56 Julia

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when I came down. She was rather . . . ehrm . . . distraught.”

“I should think so,” Elizabeth remarked. Then she gasped. “Did they make away with her emeralds?”

Grace shook her head. “We hid them. Under the seat cushions.”

“Oh, how clever!” Elizabeth said approvingly.

“Amelia, wouldn’t you agree . . . ”

But Amelia wasn’t listening. It had become apparent that the movements in the hall belonged to a more sure-footed individual than the dowager, and sure enough, Wyndham walked past the open doorway.

Conversation stopped. Elizabeth looked at Grace, and Grace looked at Amelia, and Amelia just kept looking at the now empty doorway. After a moment of held breath, Elizabeth turned to her sister and said, “I think he does not realize we are here.”

“I don’t care,” Amelia declared, which wasn’t
quite
the truth.

“I wonder where he went,” Grace murmured.

And then, like a trio of idiots (in Amelia’s opinion), they sat motionless, heads turned dumbly toward the doorway. A moment later they heard a grunt and a crash, and as one they rose (but still did not otherwise move) and watched.

“Bloody hell,” they heard the duke snap.

Elizabeth’s eyes widened. Amelia was rather warmed by the outburst. She approved of anything that indicated he was not in complete control of a situation.

“Careful with that,” they heard him say.

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57

A rather large painting moved past the doorway, two footmen struggling to keep it perpendicular to the ground. It was a singularly odd sight. The painting was a portrait—life-sized, which explained the difficulty in balancing it—and it was of a man, quite a handsome one, actually, standing with his foot on a large rock, looking very noble and proud.

Except for the fact that he was now tilted at a forty-five-degree angle, and—from Amelia’s vantage point—appeared to be bobbing up and down as he floated past. Which cut away significantly at noble and proud.

“Who was that?” she asked, once the painting had disappeared from sight.

“The dowager’s middle son,” Grace replied distract-edly. “He died twenty-nine years ago.”

Amelia thought it odd that Grace knew so precisely the date of his death. “Why are they moving the portrait?”

“The dowager wants it upstairs,” Grace murmured.

Amelia thought to ask why, but who knew why the dowager did anything? And besides, Wyndham chose that moment to walk past the doorway once again.

The three ladies watched in silence, and then, as if time were playing in reverse, he backed up a step and looked in. He was, as always, impeccably dressed, his shirt a crisp, snowy white, his waistcoat a marvelous brocade of deep blue. “Ladies,” he said.

They all three bobbed immediate curtsies.

He nodded curtly. “Pardon.” And was gone.

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“Well,” Elizabeth said, which was a good thing, because no one else seemed to have anything to fill the silence.

Amelia blinked, trying to figure out just what, precisely, she thought of this. She did not consider herself knowledgeable in the etiquette of kisses, or of the appropriate behavior after the event, but surely after what had happened the previous evening, she warranted more than a “pardon.”

“Perhaps we should leave,” Elizabeth said.

“No, you can’t,” Grace replied. “Not yet. The dowager wants to see Amelia.”

Amelia groaned.

“I’m sorry,” Grace said, and it was quite clear that she meant it. The dowager positively reveled in picking Amelia to pieces. If it wasn’t her posture, then it was her expression, and if it wasn’t her expression, then it was the new freckle on her nose.