Chapter 15
Chapter
Fifteen
A Grandmother’s Concern
Iwas just finishing the note to Steele before heading out again when someone entered the morning room. Intent on choosing my words with care, I did not glance up at once.
“You are investigating,” a voice observed from the doorway.
I closed my eyes for a brief instant. Claire.
Cosmos had invited her to luncheon, after which they intended to visit Kew Gardens. One of his rare specimens had bloomed at last, and he was keen to display it to an appreciative audience. Claire, I suspected, was rather less interested in the flower than in the gentleman presenting it.
“I am not,” I said evenly, adding the final line of my note and blotting the page with perhaps more force than strictly necessary.
“You are,” she replied, with infuriating certainty. “Your shoulders are doing that thing they do when you are displeased with the state of the world and contemplating action.” She tilted her head, studying me. “Preferably involving a duke.”
Heat crept up my neck. “Do not be absurd.”
“It is one of my few unquestionable talents,” she said cheerfully, crossing the room and settling herself on the edge of the chair opposite me. “Reading people. Especially you. Now—what are you investigating?”
I set my quill aside. There was little point in pretense where Claire was concerned. She had known me too long, and too well, and more importantly, she possessed a rare discretion. One might confide in her without fear of whispers finding their way into drawing rooms or onto calling cards.
If I told her what I had learned at the modiste—about the woman who offered promises of better employment, and the house to which at least one of the missing girls had been lured—she might see something I had not. And she might insist upon knowing where I meant to go and why.
That would be a good thing, I told myself. It would not do to walk knowingly into danger without at least one sensible person having been forewarned.
“Young women have gone missing,” I said at last. “Maids, seamstresses, laundry girls. One was found dead in the Thames. And Scotland Yard has done nothing.”
Claire’s color drained at once. Her gloved hands clasped so tightly in her lap that the leather creaked. “And you are looking into it?”
I nodded. “Steele and I both. We engaged the enquiry agent who assisted us before. Through him, we learned how some of the girls disappeared. One vanished while fetching clean linen from a laundry. Today, at Madame Delacroix’s, I discovered that a seamstress was persuaded to accept more lucrative employment at a house in Chelsea. ”
Her gaze sharpened. “And you intend to explore this yourself.”
“Yes. I am writing to Steele now—to inform him of what I have learned, and of what I mean to do.”
“Which is to visit Chelsea,” she said, with grim clarity. She knew me so well.
“Yes.”
“By yourself?” She surged to her feet. “That will not do, Rosalynd. It will not do at all. You should ask him to go with you.”
“I have to. Steele would be impossible to miss. A duke making discreet enquiries in Chelsea would attract precisely the sort of attention we wish to avoid.”
She frowned, clearly unconvinced.
“I will not go entirely by myself,” I added. “I shall take a footman with me, if that offers any consolation.”
Claire exhaled, though it was hardly a sound of relief. “I suppose that is something. But if you locate the house, you must not enter it unaccompanied. Have the footman remain with you at all times.”
“I—”
A sharp knock cut across the room before I could finish, and Honeycutt stepped inside with his usual air of grave propriety.
“My lady, the Dowager Countess has arrived. She requests a word.”
This was all I needed. But there was no help for it. “Show her in.”
“She only means well,” Claire said after Honeycutt departed.
“Yes, I know.” Above all, I knew Grandmother loved me.
Claire gazed at me with worried eyes. “Take care, Rosalynd. We wouldn’t want you to get hurt.”
“Grandmother does have a rather sharp tongue.”
Claire laughed. “I best be off before she arrives. If you need reinforcements, I’ll be with Cosmos in the library. He is engaged in some archaeological excavation of the shelves in search of a reference to a rare flower.”
“Claire,” I said quietly—a warning rather than a reproach.
She paused and turned back. “You need not concern yourself about him, Rosalynd. The very last thing I would do is cause him harm.” Her expression softened, and for a fleeting moment, she looked almost surprised by herself. “To my own astonishment, I find that I—”
Another knock, more peremptory this time.
Honeycutt stepped inside and announced, “Her Ladyship, the Dowager Countess of Rosehaven.”
“Lady Rosehaven.” Claire curtsied and slipped out without another word, leaving me alone to face the formidable presence now crossing the threshold.
“Grandmother, how pleasant to see you.”
Her eyes—keen, incisive—took in every inch of me with the thoroughness of a general reviewing a regiment. The years had etched fine lines at the corners, but nothing escaped her scrutiny.
“I hope I’m not intruding.”
“Of course not,” I said, though intruding was something she never hesitated to do. I crossed the room and kissed her cheek. Her scent—lavender and starch—was both comforting and disapproving. A rare combination.
“You look tired,” she said, settling on the settee.
“I have been occupied.”
“I am very aware of that, unfortunately.” She inclined her head toward the sofa across from her. “Please sit. I do not wish to strain my neck looking up at you.”
I complied. “Would you like some tea?”
“No. Thank you.” Grandmother folded her hands over the top of her cane. “I had a visit from Lady Marwood this morning.”
“My condolences.”
“Do not attempt flippancy, Rosalynd. It seldom works, and never when I am already displeased.”
A cold pebble formed in my stomach. “You are displeased, then.”
“I am concerned.” Her gaze sharpened. “Did you imagine I would not hear of your recent adventures with the Duke of Steele?”
“People talk a great deal, Grandmother. I cannot control what they choose to say.”
“You can control what you give them to say.”
“That is unfair.”
“It is accurate.” She tapped her cane once against the carpet. Then again. A measured cadence, as though marking each count of an indictment.
“Lady Marwood was eager to recount her triumph,” she continued. “Naturally, she spoke of her ball. The gowns. The floral arrangements. The distinction of her guest list.” Her eyes did not leave mine. “And then she spoke of you. And of Steele.”
“Of course she did.”
“Do not be impertinent, Rosalynd. It does not suit you.”
“My apologies.” I tried to keep my voice steady. “What did she say?”
“You arrived with Cosmos, Chrissie, and Lady Edmunds. Steele arrived later. Within half a minute, he cut through the throng and located you. After a short conversation, the three of you and Steele vanished from view.”
“We stepped out for air. The ballrooms were overheated.”
“Lady Marwood keeps careful watch over her terrace,” my grandmother continued, “particularly because of the alcoves. No one saw you there for at least twenty minutes.”
The pebble in my stomach grew heavier. “I was with Cosmos and Claire,” I said. “Surely there can be no objection to that.” A small prevarication. We had been together for at least part of that time.
“Do not insult my intelligence.” Her tone did not rise, which made it far more dangerous. “Cosmos and Claire were observed strolling the garden together. Neither of them was with you. Nor with Steele.”
I drew a careful breath. “He and I needed to speak.”
“I am not enquiring into what you did,” she said, lifting her chin. “I trust you retain sufficient sense not to surrender your wits.” Her gaze sharpened. “What concerns me is that you felt comfortable enough with the Duke of Steele to absent yourself in such a manner at all.”
“He is hardly a rake skulking in corridors in search of debutantes. He is a duke. And a friend. We had matters to discuss.”
“Matters that could not be addressed in the presence of others?”
“That is correct.”
Her gaze lingered on me, no longer sharp, but searching. “You are too calm,” she said at last. “And that troubles me.”
She paused, her expression shifting in a way I had rarely seen—less judgment, more memory.
“When your father fell in love with your mother,” she continued quietly, “he sounded very much the same. He insisted I was mistaken. That I misread what was plainly before me.” A faint, rueful breath escaped her.
“At the time, I feared he had set his heart upon a foolish girl—one who seemed to possess more hair than sense.”
“Mama was not foolish,” I said at once.
“No, she wasn’t,” my grandmother replied gently.
“But I did not learn that until later, God forgive me.” Her eyes softened, fixed somewhere beyond the room.
“After she married your father, she became a devoted wife and a remarkable mother. She made him profoundly happy.” A beat. “For that, I shall always be grateful.”
She straightened, the present returning to her with measured resolve.
“My point, Rosalynd, is this: you are behaving in much the same manner. Your attachment to Steele is evident to anyone with a set of working eyes.” Her gaze met mine steadily. “And his attachment to you is equally plain.”
“You imply Steele and I share some sort of romantic understanding,” I said. “We don’t.” The lie felt absurd even as it left my tongue.
“I imply nothing. I state, plain and clear, that you are in danger of forming a deep attachment to a man whose life you do not fully comprehend. A man who does not wish to marry.”
“I do not wish to marry either.”