“If Castleford has learned anything useful, you could have too,” Summerhays mused. “Yet you never did. Which must mean you never tried.”
“I relied on someone else to look into it, all the while doubting there was anything to learn.” An error on the first count, and the second too, it had turned out. “I assumed if there were anything to it, Thornridge would settle half a loaf on me through acknowledgment, to discourage my claims to more.”
“Instead he sought to make you invisible.”
Thoroughly. “I have become rather comfortable with invisible as a result.”
“He does not want the tedious parts, is what he means,” Hawkeswell said to Summerhays. “He does not want the responsibilities. Well, you don’t get to decide and choose, Albrighton. If you are born to it, you are stuck with it.”
“I doubt that is true. The evidence would have to pass muster with the most critical and suspicious examiners. It could take years. It isn’t that I don’t want it, Hawkeswell. I don’t want to devote my life to fighting for it, and making every other choice with an eye to being acceptable for it.”
The door opened again. A different servant entered, one with more braid and decoration on his livery. Hawkeswell’s manner had summoned forth an officer of the army.
“His Grace commanded that you be brought to his apartment, m’lord. If all of you would follow me.”
“I
am most displeased,”Castleford announced as they filed into his dressing room. His valet, who had been buttoning a deep blue brocade morning robe on him, froze and glanced up dolefully.
“Not with you, man. Get on with it,” Castleford snapped. He glared over the valet’s head at Hawkeswell. “I have been on a horse for a week, and only dragged my sore ass home long after midnight this morning. Is it too much to ask for a few hours’ sleep?”
Hawkeswell appeared a bit chagrined, but not too much so. “Why not use your coach and spare your ass? That is what I do on long journeys.”
“I needed to move fast.” He shooed the valet away impatiently before all those buttons were done. He threw himself onto a sofa and propped his head on one hand. Self-satisfaction replaced annoyance. “They should have used me during the war, not you, Albrighton. I have a knack for this investigating business. My analytical powers even impressed me this week.”
“Being a duke probably helps too.”
“In investigating? Probably so.”
“Also in impressing yourself, and in convincing yourself you have the right to interfere.”
Castleford looked at Summerhays. “These two are both piquish today, aren’t they?”
“Perhaps you could explain why you requested our presence, and they would be less so.”
“Requested, hell,” Hawkeswell muttered.
Castleford ignored him. “It is done, Albrighton. I know everything, and have the proof that your cousin usurped your title.”
Jonathan laughed. “Forgive me, but I am sure you exaggerate.”
“Not at all. Everything I needed was in the one sentence your mother gave you. She said the last earl had married her on his deathbed. That meant that either he had a special license—and my solicitor called at Doctors’ Commons and assures me none is on record—or they married in Scotland, or it was the sentimental, meaningless gesture of a man in love with his pregnant mistress.”
“Most likely the last, unfortunately,” Summerhays said.
“My assumption too, but I decided to look into the second, just in case.” He gazed ever so blandly at Jonathan. “Did you know that your estate includes a charming hunting lodge right over the Scottish border? You must promise to have us all there during grouse season. We will drink and shoot and have a fine time. Hawkeswell can come too, if he promises not to act like a child’s nurse and scold all the time.”
An odd sensation blossomed in Jonathan’s chest. Castleford was only being his smug, conceited self in speaking as if the matter were settled. And yet—something in the duke’s eyes suggested he really believed it.
“And?” Hawkeswell prompted with irritation.
“So I went there. Hence my sore ass. I did not want to waste too much time on this and thought riding cross-country would be best. I asked some polite and discreet questions and—”
“You are incapable of being discreet, so you are already turning this tale to make yourself look better,” Hawkeswell said.
Castleford sighed. He gave Summerhays his attention. “He really is annoying today. More than usual. Do you know why?”
“When he came for me, he was grousing about your very loud and very insistent servant pulling him out of bed at a very inconvenient moment.”
Castleford’s face fell. “My apologies, Grayson. No wonder you are out of sorts. It never entered my mind that married men took their pleasure in the daylight. I specifically waited until after dawn to send my man, for that very reason.”
That hardly appeased the married man in question. If anything, his glare darkened. “Continue, please. When you last broke your story, you were riding your sorry ass along the Scottish border, I believe, flouting your title and prerogatives, holding guns to men’s heads to learn what you wanted.”
“Damnation, one would think you were there with me. Well, the long and the short of it is I found them, so whatever I did worked.”
“Them?” Jonathan asked.
“The witnesses. Both still alive, thank God.”
That silenced everyone for a long, astonished moment.
“If your questions were not polite, or if you threw money around, there is no telling if they spoke truthfully, Castleford,” Summerhays said. “Even if they did, they may change their tale if Thornridge finds out this happened, and either threatens or pays them off.”
“He had already paid them off. Which is why I brought them back with me. I thought about how your cousin tried to get you killed, Albrighton, and decided these two fellows might come to no good once you go after that inheritance.”
Two pair of eyes swung their attention to Jonathan. Silence fell. Castleford looked around, perplexed at no longer being the center of the party. Then he realized why.
“Ah. They did not know about that, did they? I appear to have been indiscreet, Albrighton.” He shrugged. “Just as well. It must all come out in the end now.”
“These witnesses. Where are they?” Jonathan asked. His voice sounded far away to his own ears. The day had become unreal, as though he stood inside an invisible mist that subtly but unmistakably altered his perception.
“Hmmm. Where did I put them? I remember the older one smelled, which is why I rode my horse and avoided the hired carriage.” He stood. “I clear forget what I told the steward to do with them. Let us go find out.”
He led the way. Jonathan brought up the rear. A throbbing pulse in his head and chest spoke of an excitement that he could not quiet.
If there were witnesses, and Castleford had found them, that changed everything.
Chapter Twenty-seven
D
aphne closed the account book. She opened her reticule and extracted some pound notes. “I am confident it will be more in the future, Celia. In this short time the efficiencies of bringing the plants here have already improved our trade. With your arrangement with Mr. Bolton for summer flowers, and the contacts you are cultivating for fruits in winter, we will indeed flourish as you predicted.”
Celia tucked the money into a pocket on her apron. Color surrounded them everywhere. The wagons had brought many pots of forced blooms that would bring early spring scents and brightness to dozens of homes in the next few days.
She could take no joy in them, or even in Daphne’s company. Jonathan had been gone a long while now. More than five hours. She was beginning to wonder if he would ever come back.
That was stupid. Of course he would. He would return and look at her in that new way, that nostalgic gaze of this morning. He would explain how his expectations meant he could not marry just any woman. He would . . .
She hoped he was hearing the very best news. She truly did. It excited her that such a miracle of good fortune might befall him. But side by side with that joy was this grief, and she could not make it go away.
“I am glad my plan is working, Daphne. I am only sorry that it ties me here now. I would like to return to Cumberworth with you today, but these pots must be dealt with.”
“Why would you want to come with me? Your life is here now. So is your lover.”
Celia said nothing to that. Daphne understood too well, in her quick way.
“So that is why you have been oddly quiet today,” she said. “You are heartsick. Has he been cruel to you?”
“Not at all. This love has been wonderful. Beautiful. So moving that I forget myself.” She had to smile at the memories of all the ways he touched her heart. “The last part, the forgetting myself—it has been a mistake, I think.”
Daphne reached over and placed her hand over Celia’s sympathetically. She asked for no particulars, but offered what comfort her friendship might provide. She probably guessed, however. She probably agreed that Celia should never forget who she was, since no one else would.
No sound came from the garden, but they both turned their attention to the window at the same time. Shadows moved near the shrubbery, and Jonathan started down the garden path. Celia grasped the hand covering hers without thinking.
Daphne stood and came around to embrace her. “I will go now. Come to us if you want, and leave word for Mr. Drummond on how to deliver the plants. Verity and Audrianna are not far away at all too, if you need either counsel or consolation in the days ahead.”
She kissed Celia’s cheek in parting, and was out the front door just as Jonathan came in the back one.
H
e smelled hyacinth before he saw any of the flowers. It penetrated the wall and door as he approached. Only one bloom showed through the window, however. The fairest and rarest bloom of them all, with golden hair and pale skin and eyes that could capture the stars.
She smiled when he entered. She kissed him in greeting, then swept her arms toward the dense tapestry of vibrant colors and green textures draping those shelves.
“Spring has thoroughly come to one chamber in London,” she said.
“Why would people purchase from you what they will have in abundance for free in a couple of weeks?”
“Those little shoots outside are like a tease. They make people impatient. When fairer weather begins, they cannot wait. Even one pot is enough for some, although there are those who insist on thirty.”
He admired the blooms while she gave a little lesson on their names and varieties. She spoke quickly, as if both impatient with the small talk but also afraid to allow a moment for another topic to start.
Eventually she stopped. They stood side by side, looking at the indoor garden. He felt excitement in her, and even the tension of arousal that they always shared at some level when together. Sorrow touched all of it, however, and his heart as well.
“Are you not curious about what transpired with Castleford, Celia?”
“I have thought about little else since you left. Was it good news?”
“The best news. He had only to ask and people rushed to tell him all they knew. He learned what it could have taken me a lifetime to learn, if at all. He found witnesses who are terrified of my cousin, and well paid for silence. Castleford managed to terrify them better, and they admitted the truth.”
She embraced him. “I am so happy for you, Jonathan. More than you can know or guess. I watched you walk up the garden path and thought,
Of course he is an earl
.
How could anyone ever have met him and not known at once.
Your cousin no doubt did. You may have only been nine years in age, but he probably knew on seeing you that the title was not really his.”
Possibly. Or perhaps the determination of a woman sitting on his step for days suggested as much. But the witnesses, both retainers at that hunting lodge, had been paid from the start, even before his cousin reached his majority. The whole family had been in on it, most likely. Even Uncle Edward.
He shut away the loss he felt over that relationship and its long deceptions. He sat, and pulled Celia onto his lap so he could hold the comfort of her feminine warmth. Flowers surrounded his view of her face. Her smile expressed joy, but her eyes showed something else.
“You probably should find other chambers now,” she said.
“If you want. We will find a house closer to your friends.”
She licked her lips and tried hard to appear sensible, not distraught. “You should make the move alone, Jonathan. You must not give anyone cause to question your character while this is being settled.”
“That could be years. My cousin will do all he can to stop it.”
“You must behave very correctly or he may succeed in stopping it. He has many friends, and—”
He silenced her with a kiss. “I think that you have spent the hours I was gone applying Alessandra’s lessons to my fate, and concluding I cannot have you now. Is that true, Celia?”
“It cannot be what we had planned. You know that. You cannot marry such as me. As for having my love—until you marry—”
“I’ll be damned if I will marry another, and only marry the woman I love on my deathbed, the way my father did.” He cupped her soft face with his hand. “I did not return for so long because I went to Doctors’ Commons, to ask for a special license. Summerhays was good enough to use his influence, and it should be forthcoming in a few days. You and I will wed at once, so it is done before any of the rest of this starts.”
“You are talking like a madman now. These people have rules about such things.”
“Celia, every lord in the realm has an interest in making sure the only people to become peers are those born to it, and that a title does not pass down wrongly because of fraud. That is the foremost rule. There is a process for looking into claims like this. My birth will be what matters, that and the legality of that marriage. They do not give a damn about my character. I could be insane and fornicate with sheep every day, and it would make no difference.”