Chapter 27
“Icannot believe I have never been to Weverton before,” Thalia said with a bright smile, her gaze turned out toward the passing countryside.
Henry watched her with no small amount of disbelief. How could she smile at all, when they were soon going to meet with a potential suspect?
He had been restless since the letter arrived with news of Walter’s return.
On the one hand, he could not believe that his brother would attempt to harm Thalia.
On the other, he could not rule it out entirely when Walter was, all of a sudden, back in England.
It was not as if it was a short journey from Morocco to his homeland.
And he was very precise about the date of his return. What if he has been in England for weeks already? No one would have had any cause to inform Henry if Walter had hidden away somewhere, hatching his plan.
By his reckoning, if Walter had chartered a vessel and a captain to bring him home directly, he could have managed it in a fortnight. Expensive, certainly, but Henry had sent a large sum of money a few months ago, at Walter’s request.
“It is pleasant enough,” Henry said tightly.
Thalia looked at him, her face so radiant in the light of the Spring afternoon. “What is the matter?”
“I am just thinking about what needs to be done,” he replied. “That is all.”
“It is a party, Henry. The only thing you need to do is enjoy yourself,” she insisted. “That is what I mean to do.”
He frowned. “You are not worried?”
“Not at all. I have had several days to consider every angle,” she said, fidgeting with her reticule. “I think it is a coincidence. Your first instinct was that your brother could not possibly be responsible, and I am inclined to trust it.”
The way she toyed with the beading of the small bag suggested otherwise, as understanding dawned upon Henry. She was pretending to be cheerful. If she were to give into her nerves, she would probably not be able to attend the party at all.
So, with a nod, Henry played along. “I think so too.”
“You do?” Her shoulders seemed to relax.
“Indeed. If he wished to take my place, he would have done it years ago, when we lived in the same manor and could easily conjure an ‘accident’ to be rid of me,” Henry answered. “Instead, he moved further away.”
Thalia’s smile finally reached her eyes. “Yes, exactly.” She took a deep breath, repeating more quietly, “Exactly.”
Henry searched the gardens of Weverton for any sign of his brother, but there were a surprising amount of guests in attendance, making the task almost impossible. After all, he was looking for someone who might look very different from the way he remembered Walter.
“You are too kind!” he heard Thalia chirp, drawing his attention. “Certainly, we would be happy to attend.”
She had transformed the moment she set foot onto the Weverton grounds, becoming a capable socialite who moved through the crowd with grace and confidence. A far cry from the nervous creature she had been at Catherine’s ball, sticking close to Henry’s side for safety and reassurance.
Naturally, he wanted his wife to feel at ease, but there was something so… false about the performance of it. Like a caricature of a duchess. And he did not know if he cared for it.
Where is the wit, the fieriness, the real you? Where is the Thalia who would roll her eyes at this simpering display?
He walked the short distance to her and offered a polite greeting to her acquaintance, an older lady with earrings so heavy it looked as if her lobes had melted. Subtly, he put his arm around his wife’s waist and pulled her closer to his side.
“What is my darling wife agreeing to?” he asked with a laugh, a secret smile playing upon his lips as he felt Thalia shiver; the pleasant kind.
The older lady hid a chuckle behind her fan. “Oh, Your Grace, I was just inviting you both to dine with us next month. A small party for my birthday.”
“I do not think she will be satisfied until we do not have a single evening free in our calendar,” he joked, holding her waist a little tighter, feeling that shiver again. “Why, I shall have to tell my friends that I cannot see them until November.”
The lady laughed, and so did Thalia, though hers was rather more bemused.
A short while later, as the older lady moved on to speak with some other acquaintances, Thalia squinted up at him. “Are you well? Have you imbibed too much?”
“Whatever do you mean?” he replied innocently.
“You are behaving very… oddly.”
He dipped his head, whispering close to her ear, “You said I should enjoy myself. That is what I intend to do.”
He considered kissing the curve of her neck, drawn by the sweet scent of her skin and the slight tremble of her as his breath caressed that spot. But people were watching, and he could not risk them garnering too much attention from the scandal sheets.
“Brother!” a lively voice that could only belong to one person made his decision for him, as Henry drew back from temptation.
Striding across the terrace as if he were in the midst of a parade, attired in the most astonishing garments of purple and red silk, no top hat upon his head for propriety, was Walter. An older, more sun-browned, more cheerful Walter.
“I wondered if, perhaps, you had decided to abandon your own welcome party,” Henry said, extending a hand to his brother.
But Walter walked right past it, and put his arms around Henry, pulling him in for a fierce hug. “I arrived fashionably late, but I thought it poor form to abandon it altogether, though I am certain I shall catch a chill in this weather.” He pulled back. “You look tired, Brother.”
“And you look… as if you ought to be somewhere far more exotic,” Henry replied, taking in the strange garments.
It was a suit, that was unmistakable, but the upper garment was longer than a tailcoat and all one length, with delicately embroidered patterns across the purple and red silk, silver buttons up the front.
And a short collar that stuck up around the neck.
The trousers, too, were unusual: looser than the English style, as if they might be rather comfortable.
“You cannot be in tight attire in Morocco, or you will boil alive. Although, that does not stop some English visitors from trying… and immediately regretting it.” Walter grinned, his dark hair almost past his shoulders, his blue eyes alight with vigor and vitality.
He broke away from Henry and moved to stand in front of Thalia, not hesitating to take hold of both her hands. “And you must be the divine duchess that I have heard almost nothing about. I relish a mystery.” He glanced back at Henry. “You could have mentioned that she was the rarest of beauties.”
Thalia blushed furiously. “I confess, I have only recently heard more about you, so we are equal in our mystery.”
“Then, let us talk and solve it,” Walter said with a wink.
Feeling as if he were about to be outcharmed by his brother, Henry let his fingertips stroke small circles against Thalia’s back.
“Why would you lie so atrociously, Walter? Have you forgotten the endless pages and sonnets I wrote to you, proclaiming my wife’s extraordinary beauty?
” he said. “She is witty, too, though I do not have the wit to put that into poetry.”
“You have not written any such thing,” Thalia chided mildly, her face flushing a deeper shade of pink. “I am surprised you even mentioned me, when we were apart for years.”
“You are right,” Henry replied softly, smiling. “Now that I think of it, they were just my thoughts. The things I, perhaps, wanted to write.”
Thalia stared at him as if she had lost her memories again. Encouraged by the bewilderment, believing that this might be the way to woo her at last, he let his fingertips pause at her waist.
“I have just realized something,” he said.
“What?” Walter replied, seeming just as confused by his brother’s actions.
But Henry ignored Walter, his attention fixed on Thalia. “I have no idea if you are ticklish or not.”
“No!” Thalia yelped, half-laughing, half-scolding. “No! Do not dare! I am not ticklish and—”
He tickled her, realizing also that he had never tickled anyone in his life. She shrieked as he did so, wriggling to try and escape the ticklish touch, fighting to swallow the laugh that spilled from her mouth between yelps.
“Stop it!” she gasped, her hands grasping at his lapels. “I beg of you, stop it. People are watching.”
There was a note of anger in her voice, though not the usual kind. This was gentler, more shocked than truly furious.
He stopped at once, a smirk upon his lips. “My apologies. I just had to know.” He glanced from his wife to his brother. “Can I fetch anyone a fruit ice on this fine day? I saw some in very unusual colors on the refreshments table.”
“Bring me the strangest you can find,” Walter accepted.
Thalia gave a small, breathless nod. “A red one, if they have it… as long as it is not cherry. I cannot abide cherry.”
“I am learning so much about you,” Henry said, bringing Thalia’s hand to his lips to steal a kiss before he turned and walked off to the refreshments.
It is the playfulness she likes. Indeed, I fear I have been much too serious for far too long.
If he was ever going to propose a change to the terms of their deal, he needed her to fall in love. He needed to make her mother’s wish come true, for if he could not do that, then they were better off apart.
His friends had been right from the beginning; it was high time he courted his wife.
Walter gave a low whistle. “It seems my brother is very much changed. I doubt I have seen him so playful in… Goodness, I doubt I have ever seen him so playful.” He looked at Thalia with a smile. “What on earth have you done to him, Duchess?”
“I… do not know,” she replied, as amused as she was bemused. “It must be the fresh air; he has been cooped up in his study for days.”
Walter chuckled. “Ah, so he is not completely changed then.”
He offered his arm to Thalia, which she took without hesitation, surprised to discover that she felt no threat from Walter whatsoever. If she had ever seriously suspected him of being her attacker, all of that had vanished the moment she met him.
No one who dressed and behaved so loudly could be stealthy enough to attack her. Moreover, she had this sense that she would know her attacker if she saw them, the sight of them bringing back her memory of the night she fell. Like seeing the diary.
She had no such feeling about Walter.
“I confess, I have worried about my brother over the years. When he wrote to tell me he was married, I did not know whether to be glad for him or sad for his bride,” Walter said as they slowly walked the terrace.
“He has always been solitary. Serious. And those traits do not make for a good husband.”
Thalia sighed. “I was happy enough with the arrangement.”
“I have often wondered what he would be like if he had been raised by a different father,” Walter continued. “If we both had. He was forced to be serious, disciplined, diligent, which is somewhat ironic when you consider who he was training to replace.”
Thalia nodded slowly. “He has told me about your father.”
A funny look of wry amusement flickered across Walter’s face for a second. “I was actually the lucky one,” he said, the expression changing into one of relief. “The spare son with no demands made upon him, able to live however I pleased. I was the favorite once.”
“Yes, Henry said.”
Walter laughed. “I was foul to him when I was a boy. It is one of only two regrets I have in my life. Three, perhaps.”
“Is that not boyhood, to be at odds with one another?” Thalia said kindly, warming more and more to this interesting man.
Walter shook his head. “No, I was far fouler than the usual brotherly struggles. I was a terror. He was secretly thrilled when I was sent to Harrow instead of Eton, but then I was thrown out of Harrow and ended up at Eton, ruining the end of his education there. Then, of course, he went to Oxford, and I began my revels, causing trouble, getting into scandals. He was surprisingly kind to me during that time, and… our relationship softened. I learned to respect him, albeit a little late.”
“They do say it is better late than never,” Thalia said, her heart aching.
It seemed that she and Walter were more alike than she had suspected, for she had learned to respect Henry, and she had learned that she loved him. The problem was, she did not know if things might have been easier if she had not learned how.
“This teasing is new, though,” she remarked, desperate to lighten the mood. “If he tickles me again, I shall not be held responsible for elbowing him in the stomach. My limbs do as they please when I am tickled. And he is so annoyingly unflappable that I do not know how to tease him in return!”
Walter grinned. “Fortunately, you have come to the right man. No one knows how to tease Henry better than I do.” He stretched out his hands and pretended to crack his knuckles. “There is one thing that has been guaranteed to infuriate him since childhood.”
“Tell me,” Thalia urged, hesitating before she added, “Although, nothing too mean. I want mild revenge for the tickling, not a fight.”
Walter took Thalia’s hand again, patting it lightly.
“I think we shall get along wonderfully, you and I.” He lowered his voice to a dramatic whisper.
“Now, listen closely: Henry has always hated anything that is not in order. He hates it when someone ruffles his hair, when someone points out that his cravat is crooked, and, most of all, he loathes it when someone calls him ‘Henners.’”
Just then, Henry reappeared, holding three ornate glasses of vibrantly colored shaved ice in his hands… wearing a look so sweet, so endearing, so excited that she did not have the heart to tease him.
Walter waited, as if expecting her to go ahead with her mild revenge, but when she took her glass of fruit ice and said nothing but ‘thank you,’ a softness fell across the younger brother’s face. As if she had passed some test she had not known she was part of.
“I think we should have fun this afternoon,” she said.
Walter nodded, spooning purple-colored ice into his mouth. “I could not agree more.”
“Nor could I,” Henry said, as his hand rested on the small of Thalia’s back for a moment, as if to let her know that he was not going anywhere.
But you will, her heart keened. Soon, you will.