Chapter 1
Chapter One
“I’m afraid there’s a challenge to the will, my lord.”
Graeme Blatchfield, new Earl of Chilcombe, suppressed a shudder. He wasn’t yet used to this elevated rank, and the news the solicitor’s clerk imparted was more than an unhappy wrinkle in his plans.
The young clerk, Mr. Emory, couldn’t be much more than twenty. He had the pale skin, gaunt look, and ink-stained fingers of a conscientious fellow who spent too much time at his desk, and he was visibly nervous about bringing a client bad news.
Summoned by duty, Graeme had just arrived in England.
HMS Phoebe had rescued him from an anticipated long delay in Cape Town and cruised into Portsmouth without fanfare, delivering him months earlier than expected.
At the port’s busy Keppel’s Head Hotel, he’d had his first hot bath, hearty meal, and comfortable bed in many weeks.
Mail had awaited him. The College of Arms’s letter confirmed his title; the King’s writ summoned him to take his seat in the Lords; and the Foreign Office’s directive required an in-person report on his last assignment.
Aside from the official demands, there was a letter from the earl’s steward reporting that his homes and estates were in better order.
Better than what? That information went unmentioned.
The letter from the Chilcombe solicitor, Mr. Fleming, had been cryptic as well. Though his late cousin, Archie, had slipped this mortal coil over a year ago, his will had unexpectedly not been settled.
Restless after so many months on ship, Graeme borrowed a horse in Portsmouth and rode most of the way behind the chaise hauling his trunk, traveling as far as Kingston Upon Thames.
Stiff and sore from a day spent on horseback, he’d decided, in his first exercise of aristocratic privilege, to summon Mr. Fleming to his private sitting room at the inn.
Mr. Fleming hadn’t appeared, being away in Suffolk on some important business. Emory had come in his place.
So much for the new Lord Chilcombe’s noble power in summoning the solicitor.
“It may be some time before it can be resolved,” the young man said.
Graeme tethered his temper. The long journey had given him months to stew and speculate, and to remind himself that the career he wanted was not in Parliament. His plan to arrange for management of the Chilcombe estate and be off to a new diplomatic assignment might have hit a sizeable obstacle.
“Go on, Emory,” he said.
“It is rather complex, I’m afraid. It has to do with a new will containing changes, the principal of which pertains to a cottage and property called Bluebelle Lodge.
The late earl’s will, executed at the time of his marriage…
well, it was a complicated arrangement hammered out as part of the marriage settlements with the previous owner of Bluebelle Lodge, Mr. Davies, who was also Lady Chilcombe’s guardian.
The gist of it was that the property was to go to the countess in lieu of any of the normal support she would receive by means of dower or jointure. ”
Lady Chilcombe. Blythe. He felt a rush of longing and quickly suppressed it.
There’d been a letter waiting in Portsmouth from her as well, brief and more formal than a diplomat’s missive. He’d been wondering whether she’d taken up residence in a dower house, if there was one at Risley Manor.
“Someone is contesting her claim to the property?” he asked.
“It’s more complicated than that. There apparently was a dispute about boundary lines.
Mr. Davies’ widow predeceased Lord Chilcombe, leaving the property to the Chilcombe estate.
It has been alleged that Bluebelle Lodge was not the previous owner’s or his wife’s to bequeath. Nor, subsequently, Lord Chilcombe’s.”
Graeme remembered Davies, a genial older man, and his affectionate wife, who’d once been Blythe’s governess. The childless couple had welcomed Blythe into their home when her parents both took ill and died, leaving her orphaned.
“What a bloody mess,” he said. “Go on.”
Emory blinked and sat up straighter.
“As a means to easily settle the matter of the disputed property—the earl being quite ill at the time—a new will was purportedly executed, leaving the property to the claimant instead of Lady Chilcombe.”
“And so, Lady Chilcombe is left with… what?”
A long pause ensued. “It seems that she will receive the small dowry she brought to the marriage—five hundred pounds—as well as her wardrobe and the jewels that are not part of the estate.” His voice sounded tight and he cleared his throat.
“As I mentioned, in the marriage settlement, she waived her right to dower or jointure. This fact is acknowledged in the putative new will in which the late earl left her…” Mr. Fleming paused, his color rising. “One pound.”
One pound.
Blythe had been disinherited.
Why?
Memories of the bright, cheerful, beautiful girl she’d once been flooded him. He held them back along with the anger that rose in his throat.
“I should like to see this new will,” he said.
“As would Mr. Fleming, my lord. He has only seen what is claimed to be a fair copy of it. He did not draft it. He had no knowledge of a boundary dispute, else he would have directed a review of the devolution of title among the documents stored at Risley Manor and Bluebelle Lodge. Mr. Fleming has been the Chilcombe solicitor for the last twelve years and is very careful about due diligence.”
“I see,” Graeme said. And he did. He’d known his cousin Archie was a villain; perhaps he was also an idiot.
Or the property claimant had blackmailed him.
“Mr. Fleming will certainly show you both the copy of the putative will and the original will, executed at the time of the earl’s marriage, as well as the marriage settlement, but they are held at Mr. Fleming’s chambers.”
“How long do we expect the matter to drag on?”
“As to that, I cannot say, my lord. The Pregorative Court of Canterbury was reluctant to proceed with this thorny matter until after your arrival.”
Thorny matter indeed. A will executed shortly before the earl’s death, a will that violated the terms of the marriage agreement—what had Blythe done to deserve that?
“The countess is challenging this new will?” he asked.
“Actually, it is the old will that is being challenged, as no one has seen more than a copy of the new one the earl is alleged to have executed.”
“Ah, yes, you did mention that.”
“Risley Manor has been searched for a copy, to no avail.”
Which begged the question, was there a new will? Perhaps he’d pursue that question with an inquiry agent.
The whole matter reeked of fraud. He couldn’t imagine why the court had not dismissed the challenge. Unless…
“Speak plainly, man. Challenged by whom?” he asked.
“The Marquess of Diddenton.”
Diddenton. Graeme dredged up a memory of a boozy dinner on board a naval ship in the San Francisco harbor where Diddenton’s name had come up.
He was a powerful peer with connections to the British East India Company and the Canton opium houses, as well as highly placed friends in the Foreign Office.
He was thus, perhaps, also a man with the power to help—or harm—a man’s diplomatic career.
Emory cleared his throat. “My lord, may I move on to a discussion of the entailed property?”
After Emory left, Graeme found his way to the busy taproom, the clerk’s news settling like a dark cloud around him.
If the few rumors he’d heard through the years were true, Archie had lived a sordid life. The solicitor’s clerk had confirmed that he’d died a pathetic death as well as leaving a bloody mess with that business of a new will.
The last time Graeme saw his cousin, Archie had been deep in his cups, celebrating his accomplishment of siring a baby boy with the countess. Graeme’s father, older brother, and an older male cousin, each in line to the title before Graeme, had been alive then too.
The title might be useful but he’d never wanted it. He’d never envied Archie anything except—for a brief foolish moment—Blythe.
He paused at the bar and ordered a pint and then made his way to a table, thinking. What he was sorely lacking was gossip. The sort that filled in the cracks, the empty pauses, and the unmentioned scandal.
As to scandal… He’d ruthlessly forced Blythe from his thoughts years ago.
And yet… the news of his cousin’s death, hand-carried to him in the Columbia District of Canada, had stirred memories and piqued his curiosity.
Blythe was free now. What sort of woman had she become? And how soon could he see her?
A pert barmaid brought him a brimming mug and he quaffed a hearty gulp.
“Ho, there’s a man I recognize.”
The voice came from a tangle of gentlemen who’d just entered. One of them disengaged and approached his table.
“Blatchfield, is that truly you? Are you going to cut me now that you’re an earl?”
“Morley?” Graeme stood and extended a hand.
Manus Morley had been a schoolmate, one Graeme had rescued from trouble more than once.
They’d run into each other in Paris several years earlier and Graeme, there serving on Wellington’s staff, had introduced his old schoolmate to Paris’s fashionable haunts.
“You’re a welcome sight.” He clapped the younger man on the back, pulled out a chair, and signaled to the servant.
A baron’s younger son, Morley had the handsome looks and cheerful manners that gave him entrée to society.
He was just the man Graeme needed to talk to: a wag, good at gleaning gossip and willing to share it.
Morley put up his hands. “’Fraid I can’t join you tonight. Just came over on the packet. I ran into those fellows and shared a coach. Heading up to town with them. But damn if I’m not happy to see you.”
“I’ve just arrived myself. Making my way to Chilcombe House tomorrow.” Graeme leaned in and smiled. Morley was a good enough friend that there was no need to beat around the bush. “Is there anything I should know before I arrive there?”
“Well.” Morley’s eyes glittered and he laughed. “I may be behind on the news, but I did hear that Lady Chilcombe has come out of mourning with fanfare.” He cocked his head, eyes filled with mischief. “She christened her return to society with a grand ball at Chilcombe House.”
“She’s at Chilcombe House?”
Morley nodded.
A fluttering of awareness quickened his heart, and his fingers thrummed the table. He’d see her as soon as tomorrow afternoon.
Blythe as a merry-making widow. For the short time he was here, he’d have to enter society. If she was well established in the ton, perhaps she could ease his path there.
Perhaps she could ease more than his path with the ton.
The longing he felt… it was only to satisfy his curiosity before sending her off to… to somewhere.
“She’s only just recently returned to town,” Morley said. “Before that… well, she was away for some months, but no one quite knows where.” At Graeme’s frown, he held up his hands defensively. “Not speaking ill of her, but—”
The barmaid’s appearance interrupted Morley’s next thought. Still standing, he accepted the tankard.
“But… you’re brimful of, er, intelligence?” Graeme raised his drink, saluting his friend. Good intelligence gathering allowed a man to gossip, and gossip often held nuggets of truth. Sometimes boulders.
“Not quite brimful…” Morley glanced around and lowered his voice.
“It pays to keep my ear to the ground. I’ve had to make my own way after Father died, you know, and I’ve been dabbling as an inquiry agent.
I’ll see if I can learn anything else. Look for me at White’s tomorrow afternoon.
Or better yet—I’ll call on you and escort you to the club myself. ”
Morley glanced back at his friends, and Graeme had a sudden thought. He’d never spent much time in London but he’d heard that gossip there spread quickly.
“Do me a favor, Morley,” he said. “Don’t tell anyone I’m back.”
Morley blinked, his lips quirking. “Ah. A surprise arrival. I’ll tell these fellows you’re a client.”
Graeme raised an eyebrow. “We’ll talk tomorrow then.”