Chapter 13
Chapter Thirteen
The journey to town was long, the tedium inside the coach broken up by games, naps, food from the basket Blythe had prepared, and Lady Hermione’s story telling.
Radley, stout traveler that she was, rode part of the way up on top with Graeme’s valet. When it rained, she crammed inside the large vehicle with them. Coralie and Nicholas, who had never traveled farther than the village, enjoyed the new sights and the adventure.
It was well past dark when they crept into London, and the one footman left on duty admitted them. Maids went to hastily make up the nursery and Radley led both children upstairs, while Blythe promised to join them in moments.
“We didn’t expect you, my lord.” Adwick appeared, pulling on his coat, his tone bordering on peevish.
“Apologies, Adwick,” Graeme said. “It couldn’t be helped. My wards and Mr. Jarrow will be staying with us. I’ll need someone to carry a message tonight, and we’ll all need a light meal.”
“Not I,” Lady Hermione said. “I’m for bed. Good night, my dears.”
They wished her a good night too, and Graeme invited Mr. Jarrow and Blythe to join him in the library.
“I’ll be along in a moment,” she said, and both men left.
“The green room for Mr. Jarrow,” she told the butler, “and tell Cook, sandwiches in the library will do. Has my brother gone out?”
“Yes, my lady. He was to attend the theater and a ball afterwards.”
“Has he left any messages?”
“In fact, there is a letter he asked me to post to you first thing tomorrow.”
Her heart thumped wildly and all her fatigue vanished. “I’d like to see it immediately.”
“There are some other letters for you as well.”
She’d best look at all of them. Lunetta had promised to write again.
“I’ll wait here, while you may bring me those as well.”
When Adwick returned, she carried the letters upstairs to her chamber, where one of the footmen was settling her trunk.
Graeme would be sending a message to his friend to secure more men to guard the children, but surely that could not be arranged until the morrow. She hoped he and Jarrow would stay in tonight.
She herself would go to the nursery. Nicholas might be frightened by the new surroundings. Firstly though…
She picked up the unfranked letter and recognized Will’s scrawl.
Dear Blythe,
I believe I’ve found the person you’re seeking, though I’ve not spoken to her in person.
The house is in Soho on a not quite respectable street.
I’ve called there and though I duly paid my coin to the landlady, I was told your quarry was out, and it must have been true, as I went around to the back and peeked in the window.
I’ll try again on the morrow and will conduct this negotiation for you.
I have found two jewelers in the East End but otherwise have done nothing with the articles you left with me.
I have a fair idea of amounts and will represent you accordingly.
You need not return to town, in fact I hope you do not. Leave this to me.
Will
She tossed the letter onto her writing desk and glanced through the other correspondence, finding nothing from Lunetta. Well, she had promised to write in a week, and it had only been a few days.
Time was careening though.
A maid appeared to ready her room and help her into a new gown, and then she went to the nursery. Let the men talk among themselves. The children needed her first.
Morley had not been at White’s, but the footman had tracked him down at a rout in Mayfair. He’d immediately answered the summons and appeared.
Graeme introduced him to Jarrow.
“Glad you returned so quickly,” Morley said, accepting a brandy. “I’ve discovered the name of the surveyor Diddenton used to draw up the claimed property lines. He’s in Hertfordshire, working. I’ve sent a man to follow him.”
“One might infer that Diddenton bribed the surveyor,” Jarrow observed.
Morley nodded. “There’s a young lord looking into some of the marquess’s dodgy practices as well. Heir to Shaftesbury. He’s a reformer type—child labor in factories, climbing boys, lunatic asylums, etc.,. The family are Quakers.”
Graeme took his seat behind the desk. “Thank you, Morley. I’m not sure how that will help us though. Political sway, maybe?”
He sipped his brandy, fighting the fatigue dogging him. Blythe should be here to hear this.
“It’s a matter of the opium,” Morley said. “Diddenton’s a middleman. Has merchants that buy the opium from the Company’s people who grow it, and then Diddenton’s ships smuggle it into China in defiance of the Emperor’s edict. At great profit, of course.”
“And that brings us to that connection I mentioned,” Jarrow said. “There are those in the government worried about a war over opium with China.”
“And those like Shaftesbury’s son worried about opium here, especially in the Fens,” Morley said. “I hear tell the stalls sell a thousand vials every market day in Cambridge. I’m an Oxford man myself.”
The soggy landscape of the Fens was a breeding ground for damp air and the ague that plagued many of the inhabitants.
“The late earl was a Cambridge man.” Graeme drummed his fingers on the desk. “Perhaps he got started on the habit there.”
“Diddenton’s opium trade won’t matter to the consistory court,” Jarrow said. “Too many peers are making money from the trade. On the other hand, if the late earl was given too much, perhaps supplied by Diddenton’s son, we might be able to reopen the earl’s death.”
“Or at least stir a scandal that throws doubt on the marquess’s property claims,” Graeme said. “Perhaps even encourage witnesses to come forward and expose him as a fraud.”
“Reputation is important when a man defies decency and makes the sort of claim he’s made,” Jarrow said.
Blythe had returned to society after her year of mourning for the specific purpose of reestablishing her reputation, her place in the ton, in service of fighting Diddenton’s claims. Otherwise, she would have happily stayed at Bluebelle Lodge where he might have visited her, courted her properly, and got to know his new cousin, Coralie, and Nicholas.
Nicholas.
“Morley, I asked you to come tonight because of another matter. There’s a child we believe may be in danger.”
He told them about the vandalism at Bluebelle Lodge and Nicholas.
“I take it that’s the boy at the heart of some of the gossip,” Morley said.
Graeme nodded.
“I can send men to Hampshire—”
“The children are here now. I brought him and the girl to London.”
“The girl? Ah. Your cousin’s, er, illegitimate daughter. Well then, protection will be much easier to arrange.”
Morley departed, promising to return with at least one Bow Street man before morning.
“And what is your plan, Jarrow?” Graeme asked. “Lady Chilcombe was inclined to distrust your motives for accompanying us.”
“I never did have an opportunity to question her. I note that she didn’t join us tonight as promised. Not that I was planning to speak with her now.”
“She’s probably with the children.”
Jarrow frowned down at his glass. “Miss Coralie won’t be a child much longer. No matter the manner of her birth, she’s an earl’s daughter, and she’ll make some lucky man an intelligent wife. Beautiful, as well. Make sure he’s deserving.”
Graeme turned an astonished gaze on him, and Jarrow laughed.
“Miss Coralie is far too young for me… Now.”
“And in a few years? This is my young relation you’re speaking of.”
Jarrow shook his head. “I learned in the army to let the future take care of itself. But if you recall, I have an amiable, intelligent, and dare I say, pretty younger sister, so I’m facing the sort of worries you’ll very soon have yourself.
And if you launch Miss Coralie into society as my mother is attempting to do with my sister… ”
Jarrow grimaced, and Graeme wondered how many sensible suitors Mrs. Jarrow was driving away.
“I take your point,” he said. “Do you plan to offer your sister a London season once your father has recovered?”
Or passed away.
“Yes. Though, I’m not sure he’ll recover.
” Jarrow’s frown deepened. “From some of his notes, I believe he had suspicions about the earl’s death, but what and about whom…
well, I wish I could ask him. I truly don’t suspect Lady Chilcombe killed her husband.
I want to track down that nurse, or forgive me, mistress or whatever she was, if she’s still living.
I think she’ll shed light on the late earl’s death as well as this business of the will. ”
“That blasted will,” Graeme said. Blythe might have burned one copy—and he hoped she had, but there was surely another one that had disappeared from the estate’s muniment room.
He’d best find the woman before Jarrow did.
“First, though,” Jarrow said, “I must attend to personal business. I’m seeking a physician to travel to Hampshire and examine my father.”
Graeme sat up. “As it happens, Lady Chilcombe would like Nicholas to be seen by someone in town. The lad has bouts of fever and lung problems, she says. If you hear of a competent man, please let me know.”
“Certainly. I’ll seek out the woman after that.”
That would give him a day’s head start.
An hour past Jarrow’s departure for bed, Graeme had been dozing in the chair when Morley returned with a hard-faced man he introduced as Tibbs, a Bow Street Runner who would remain and stand guard that night.
Blythe’s brother Will had not arrived home yet. Adwick—who was also still up—said the captain often didn’t arrive home until well after dawn. Graeme briefed Tibbs about Will and the servants he might possibly encounter and then left him and a footman on duty.
Still, he couldn’t help worrying.
Assuming the nursery might be on the top floor, he made his way there, the urge to check on the children’s safety driving him.