Chapter 19 #2
“I am nearly certain,” I said to Sheldon, “that you are illegitimate. Dantry might have found the records at the Retreat that tell the tale, but this is the other dirty little secret Lord Huffnagel thinks he holds over the Arbuthnot family. Your thievery has apparently escaped his notice.”
Sheldon bounced to his feet. “I’m what?”
“Illegitimate,” Sir Clive said, producing a brandy bottle and several glasses. “Born outside the bonds of wedlock. A bastard.”
“Dantry? Claude? You will let me be insulted like this under our own roof?”
I rose and shoved Sheldon back into his seat. “Nobody in this room means you any harm—yet—and if you have an ounce of animal cunning, you will keep your mouth shut and your attitude humble.”
“But a bastard? I am the heir to the Dantry title. Heir presumptive, of course. I am mindful of that limitation, but still... Nobody who says otherwise should escape the wrath of decent…”
Sir Clive held out a glass of brandy. “The stage missed a profound talent when you decided to be a greedy, bleating fribble, boy. The earl ordered you to silence.”
Sir Clive passed around drinks to Dantry and me. Sheldon gulped his serving and shut his gob, suggesting even he knew who the true patriarch was in the Arbuthnot family.
“Dantry’s mother,” I said after sampling a very good vintage, “did lose her wits. The previous earl had put off marriage—he was not young when Dantry came along—but he’d married in hopes of filling his nursery in the expected tradition.
Her ladyship produced the required heir and became mentally unsound shortly thereafter. We know not why.”
“I checked,” Dantry said. “I found no record of any infirmity of that nature in her family, though an uncle had eight illegitimate children with six different women, and a cousin was suspected of taking her own life at the age of three-and-twenty. Odd, I grant you, but not proof of insanity. I found no evidence that any family member was committed to an asylum or otherwise confined for breach of the king’s peace. ”
He had likely done this sad homework in anticipation of fully disclosing the family’s situation to a prospective bride.
“In any event,” I went on, “her ladyship was confined, her situation did not improve, and the earl—a pragmatic man from some accounts—realized his mad wife could easily outlive him. He had no spare, his sole heir was a very small boy, and he himself was far from young. He came up with a solution that was neither original nor legal, but has been known to work.”
“Papa told me my mother had died,” Dantry said, tracing a finger around the rim of his glass.
“The cause was supposedly lung fever. I recall the occasion because, initially, I was so pleased that Papa would come up to the nursery.
In the ordinary course, I was brought down to him in his study once a week, and of course, we attended divine services together.
“He came up to the nursery that day, and on that occasion, Papa was notably sad.”
“And,” I added, “he was lying. Your mother was very much alive and living less than a mile from the Dovecote under circumstances unlikely to contribute to her mental health.”
“This is outrageous,” Sheldon said, pouring himself another brandy. “Preposterous. Nobody will believe any of this poppycock.”
Dantry didn’t so much as glance at his brother.
“Papa observed six months of mourning, which was the protocol of the day for the death of a spouse, and then he remarried, which qualified as the nearest thing to protocol at that time. The second countess was, like my mother, young, gay, and lively. I was shortly informed that I was to have a younger sibling.”
Sheldon peered at him. “Do you mean to say my mama was with child when she married him?”
Sir Clive waved a hand. “Times were different. Your father was a practical man with a stifling sense of duty. How he upheld that duty was wrong, but his motives for doing so would have been understandable to his peers, despite the bigamy involved.”
Sheldon downed the rest of his second drink at one go. “Was it bigamy?”
“I haven’t seen the records at the Retreat yet,” Dantry replied, “but I talked to the staff. None of them recalls the countess personally, but they recall older retainers quietly alluding to her sad fate and to Papa’s dirty tricks.
Mrs. Blumenthal wasn’t on hand back then to ensure the staff were nearly as isolated from village life as the inmates were.
Then too, the countess’s situation was scandalous well beyond the usual madhouse tragedies. ”
“Huffnagel will have ensured the records have been kept safe,” I said, “the better to blackmail all and sundry if and when other measures failed.”
“That is the baron’s notion of holding high cards.” Sir Clive scowled at his brandy. “My gun is still loaded. Such a pity grouse have gone out of season.”
He would not do anything foolish, lest Her Grace deal with him severely.
“You must decide what becomes of Huffnagel,” I said.
“He thinks you will let him off rather than face scandal, though that course would give him a permanent upper hand. Sheldon is doubtless reluctant to be labeled a bastard, and you have something else to consider: If the old earl committed bigamy, then he was a felon, and felons can be stripped of their titles posthumously.”
Even Sir Clive apparently hadn’t considered this perspective.
I wasn’t quite finished. “Revealing Huffnagel for the kidnapper and embezzler he is—you are not the only thief in the shire, Sheldon—might well mean the end of the Dantry earldom, and a scandalous end it would be. One other consideration: Huffnagel can demand a trial before the Lords, and all of London would then know your business.”
Sheldon brightened. “You don’t want that, do you, Claude? You are the earl. Your son will be the earl after you—you should marry, by the way—and if not your son, with a little discretion, even I would be willing… What?”
“Insanity might show up on Dantry’s dam side,” Sir Clive said, “but the sheer stupidity among the Arbuthnots has been carried along the sire side for at least two generations.”
“Lord Julian.” Dantry rose and bowed. “You have my appreciation for this thorough analysis of the present situation and for freeing me from a difficult and dangerous situation. One marvels at your ingenuity, savoir faire, and tenacity. If you are ever in need, consider me your firm ally. I will express my thanks to the ladies in person.”
“You’ll discuss the more delicate matters with Miss Weatherby?”
“Thoroughly, and her counsel is ever trustworthy. For now, Sir Clive, if you would send for a magistrate of your choosing from the vicinity of Caldicott Hall?”
“You mean to charge Lord Huffnagel?” Sheldon asked.
“Of course, though before the magistrate arrives, I will discuss topics of a legal nature with the baron in private.”
“Don’t leave the Dovecote,” I said to Sheldon. I bowed to the earl and to Sir Clive and went in search of my beloved, whose own wise counsel was also ever trustworthy.
I found Hyperia in the conservatory, on a bench that looked out through one of the three glass walls to a prospect over the deer park. Much of the grass was free of snow, but in shady spots and along the tree line, winter’s touch was still evident.
“The snow should be gone by tomorrow,” Hyperia said. “We never did get that next cold snap Sir Clive was predicting.”
“Maybe he meant to predict a mere chilly snap.” I took the place beside her. “You haven’t cut any flowers.”
“I couldn’t. The daffodils are among my favorites.
They will push up through snow and frost and bitter winds, and they will bloom into little suns of fragrance and good cheer when the other flowers are still too timid to be seen.
I could not cut such fierce, courageous little blessings down merely to brighten the atrium. ”
She took my hand. “Their earthly span is short enough,” she went on, “but they should enjoy every hour they can with the support of roots, sunshine, and comrades. Besides, you simply needed an excuse to discuss unsavory repercussions with the Arbuthnot menfolk.”
Social ruin was unsavory, though not necessarily dishonorable.
“They have few good options, Perry. If Dantry allows Huffnagel to go free, Huffnagel will threaten the earl with scandal anytime Dantry puts a foot wrong or refuses to ‘invest’ in Huffnagel’s tired mines.
The baron will extort Dantry’s agreement to give Fletcher that rubbishing enclosure and extort yet more from Fletcher directly.
Huffnagel will keep his greedy fingers firmly sunk into the Retreat’s coffers, and who knows how many other denizens thereof have family dwelling under the threat of Huffnagel’s mischief? ”
“Miss Weatherby referred to him as a plague upon the shire.”
“While Sheldon has been a plague upon his brother.”
“Miss Weatherby’s solution, which has the duchess’s support, is to send Sheldon and Huffnagel to opposite ends of the earth. Huffnagel can have his trial before the Lords if he wishes, or he can accept transportation for malfeasance regarding the Retreat’s finances.”
“No mention of the Arbuthnots whatsoever?”
“Dantry doesn’t exactly have allies in the Lords, but he’s one of them.
The peerage and the wealthy gentry have been consigning their dotty aunts and inebriate younger sons to the Retreats of this world for generations.
In a sense, those families have been victimized by places like the Retreat, especially when funds remitted weren’t used to provide a comfortable situation for a slow-witted or melancholic relative, but instead to keep Huffnagel’s hounds in ham bones. ”
I was more sympathetic to the residents forced to bide behind cold walls and locked doors, to subsist on a “bland diet,” when they’d committed no crimes and posed no threat to anybody.
Prisoners of prejudice. “Miss Weatherby believes Huffnagel will accept transportation?”
“She has deputed Sir Clive to convince Huffnagel that transportation is his best option.”
“On the basis of what argument?”
“I am not certain, but I believe threatening those two geriatric beagles might come into it.”
“Sir Clive wouldn’t harm a hair on their doggy heads.”
“You and I know that. Sir Clive would, though, remind Huffnagel that your mother has the ear of the Regent and is highly regarded throughout the length and breadth of the peerage. She is well aware that you were admitted to the Retreat and confined there with no legal consent from any authorized party, and then you were pursued by Huffnagel at gunpoint as you ran all but barefoot for your life. I saw him fire at you, Julian, while those wretched dogs were baying for your blood, and I will testify to that effect.”
“Gracious saints.” How… reassuring, to know that while I had been focusing on scandal and the Lords and the secrets Huffnagel might reveal, the ladies had held a more productive discussion.
“He won’t risk a trial, then. Not if you are willing to testify against him, and Her Grace maneuvers her artillery into a battery. ”
“The baron will be safer in the Antipodes, believe me.”
I did believe her. Huffnagel would be much safer among convicts and mosquitoes and lethal spiders than he’d ever be if Her Grace, Hyperia, or Miss Weatherby decided to air his linen in London.
“What of Sheldon?”
“He should emigrate to the United States.”
Another idea I hadn’t considered. “What have the Americans done to deserve him?”
“The Americans might give him a chance to grow up and make something of himself. Maybe in a land where titles are meaningless, that’s possible even for Sheldon.
He can be charming, and he has shown some initiative, albeit in a dubious direction.
Miss Weatherby is unwilling to ask Dantry to press charges against his own brother. ”
“How fortunate for Sheldon.”
“I feel fortunate.” Hyperia cuddled closer. “I am very soon to be married to a brave, resourceful, determined, and honorable gentleman whose kisses make me swoon.”
“Such flattery will leave me swooning, Miss West.” How dear, wonderful, and vital she was pressed to my side. How very kissable.
We did kiss at length. We did not swoon, except perhaps figuratively.
Our adventures had given us renewed appreciation for each other and for the wondrous gift of our shared mutual regard.
My bravery and determination would be tested keenly in the coming days, but that, of course, is a tale for another time!