Chapter 13 #2
He shook his head. “Just that it’s common knowledge that he came into a lot of money after the ’45. He was one of the special investigators sent to look into accusations of Jacobite sympathies, and everyone knows there were some Stuart sympathizers ready to pay to have their activities overlooked.”
Chastity remembered that Verity had remarked on the same thing, but there didn’t seem to be anything in it to explain events.
She went to the window. It overlooked a small garden shielded from other houses by tall trees.
Again, very private. A guard stood in the garden watching her.
So much for that escape route. “How do you come to be here?” she asked her brother.
“Where do you expect me to be? Lounging in a coffee house? I’m here looking for Verity. When we found you’d disappeared, I thought she must be with you and reasonably safe. Now, I’m worried all the more. Do you swear you don’t know her whereabouts, Chastity?”
Chastity reminded herself that she didn’t know Verity’s exact whereabouts. She could be in any room of Mrs. Garnet’s house, or in the garden, or even out of doors if well-disguised. “I swear,” she said firmly.
Fort accepted it. He paced restlessly. “And I’d go odds Frazer was telling the truth when we asked him.”
“What was his reaction?”
“Great concern. He wanted to set off in search himself, but we persuaded him to stay here in case Verity tries to seek his help. Though why the devil she’d go to him, not us, I don’t know.
” He turned and glared at Chastity. “I don’t know why you couldn’t stay where you were put, or why you’d want a worm like Henry Vernham in your bed—”
“I didn’t!”
“Then why the devil was he there?” he bellowed.
“How the devil would I know?” she shouted back.
He slapped her. “Watch your tongue, you trollop.”
Chastity covered her stinging cheek, tears in her eyes. During her masquerade she’d grown used to expressing herself as no young lady would.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m half out of my mind with worry, too, Fort.” Then she said, with all the intensity she could, “I didn’t invite Henry Vernham to my bed. I swear it. I detest the man. He tried to rape me!”
He was unimpressed. “So you claimed at the time, but it won’t wash, sister dear. No one heard a scream out of you until you were caught.”
“I was asleep until you all burst in!”
“You expect me to believe that a naked man climbed into your bed and half undressed you without you waking up?”
“Yes, I do. Others may not believe me, but you should, Fort. I’ve always slept sound. Don’t you remember the time you carried me fast asleep into the corridor and put me under the dragon-stand, so I screamed the house down when I woke to find its jaws about to engulf me?”
A smile twitched his lips. “True, but you were only ten then.”
“I’m still the same.”
He frowned over it. “But Henry Vernham could hardly have known that. If you didn’t invite him, he could only expect you to set up a screech, and he’d be a dead man.
Look, Chastity,” he said quite kindly, “you doubtless made an error of judgment. No one would condemn you utterly for that, and he is a handsome man if you like that style. But you should have married him. It was your only choice.”
“Even if he sneaked into my bed with just that plan in mind?”
“How could he know he’d be interrupted, or that Father would take the kinder view and think of marriage?”
Because Father arranged it so, Chastity wanted to scream, but Fort would never believe it. “He had offered for me and been approved by Father.”
“Because you wanted him. You can’t play hot and cold, my girl.”
“Who said I wanted him?”
“Father.”
“Father was—” She bit back the word. “He was mistaken. Oh, Fort, believe me. Why would I want to marry Vernham? I don’t find him handsome, and he didn’t even have wealth and a title to sugar the dish.”
He frowned, and she thought she had finally made an impression. “Are you saying you’re still untouched?”
She opened her mouth to say yes, but then closed it and swallowed. She’d give up the past night to be able to say yes, but her innocence was gone. “No,” she whispered.
She saw the pained disappointment set on his face. “But not Vernham?” he commented bitingly. “How busy you’ve been. Who then had the honor of my sister’s deflowering? Give me a name and I’ll see him dead.”
“I can’t.”
He grabbed her. “A name!”
She stayed mute. He shook her, then threw her onto the floor. “Did you roll in the hedgerow with a stranger, then? How many have there been since? God, you sicken me! Where did you come from, to be like this?”
He loomed over her, rage darkening his face, hands in big fists capable of smashing her bones. She thought he’d thrash her. Then he turned and slammed out of the room. She heard the key turn. She sank her head in her hands.
Unless her father condemned himself in his own words, neither Fort nor anyone else would believe the tale. It was just too incredible. She almost doubted it herself.
And now she had to worry about Cyn. If his part in this mess ever came out, Fort would tear him apart.
She had to get away. She doubted she could hold out against her father again, and she mustn’t let Cyn’s name pass her lips. She checked the chimney, but as she’d thought, it was too narrow. Only the smallest climbing boy could work his way up there.
Without much hope she considered the door. A squint down the keyhole showed the key was still in there, but she doubted it would do her much good. To test her hypothesis she knocked on the door.
“Yes, milady,” said a man quite respectfully. As she’d thought, there was a guard at both window and door.
“I would like something to drink,” she said, to explain her action.
“Right,” the man said, but he didn’t leave. She heard him call out. “Oy, Jackie, Lady Chastity wants a drink.”
Within minutes, they brought Chastity a wooden beaker of water, and some biscuits. No plate. They were being careful not to give her anything that could be of use.
Alone again, Chastity regarded a Shrewsbury biscuit sadly, and ate it slowly in tribute to Cyn Malloren. It wasn’t as good as the fresh ones they had bought in Shaftesbury, but the memories were sweet.
Thinking of Cyn stirred her spirit. She wasn’t the bewildered girl of months ago, when last she had been her father’s prisoner. Her experiences had toughened her, but it was Cyn Malloren who had lit her spirit. She knew now she had a right to be strong, a right to be angry.
Unfortunately, that didn’t stop her from being afraid.
She knew her father was a man to be feared.
When she had opposed him over her marriage, she had not realized the lengths he would go, the depths of his cruelty.
She had survived by a kind of numb fatalism.
Now, she trembled every time she thought of being once more in his power.
She hated to just wait, so she prowled the room again, but found no escape.
She remembered Fort’s comment about clothes and knew she would be forced to change, doubtless into some ugly, penitential clothing.
That made her think of Lady Trelyn’s letter.
She certainly didn’t want it to be found on her.
Her heart almost stopped at the thought of those explanations.
Listening desperately for approaching footsteps, she looked for a hiding place in the stark room.
There were no loose floor-boards, no nooks and crannies.
She began to think of trying to eat the thing, but then she found that the wooden mantelpiece had pulled a little from the wall, leaving a gap.
Shuddering with relief, she forced the letter into the space.
She would retrieve it if she could do so safely, but if not it could stay there, doubtless to titillate some householder in years to come.
She wondered sickly if there was any possibility of Fort recognizing her as his dancing partner of the night before. That would be her end for sure. How could she explain her presence at what was doubtless the most notorious orgy of the decade?
She checked all her pockets again, making sure they held nothing to make matters worse.
Satisfied at last, she sat and leaned her head against a wall.
It was chill in the room and she was glad of the groom’s clothes over Victor’s.
She wished she had the riding cloak too.
It was very quiet. She wondered what time it was, and after a while, heard a distant clock chime two.
With luck, Cyn and Nathaniel were on their way, but in case they had been delayed, she must hold out as long as possible. She’d ridden hard the day before and missed sleep last night. Despite her fears, she dozed off. She dreamed of a shipwreck, of being thrown this way and that . . .
“Plague take you, Chastity. Wake up!”
She blinked her eyes open to find Fort shaking her, and more with concern than anger. When he saw she was awake, he let her go.
“You really do sleep sound, don’t you?” He looked thoughtful. Perhaps he was beginning to believe part of her story. She had little thought for that now. Her father was here, Lindle at his shoulder. She scrambled to her feet.
The Earl of Walgrave had married late in life and was now over sixty, but he was a robust, impressive man with shrewd blue eyes, a noble nose, and fleshy jowls.
He was dressed plainly for traveling in brown velvet, lightly laced with gold, and a gray bagwig, but simplicity did not diminish his presence.
He filled the room. He carried an elaborate but light gold-headed bamboo cane. Chastity remembered that cane.
“Thank you, Thornhill,” said the earl coolly. “You may leave.”
Chastity flung Fort an appeal with her eyes.
Perhaps he noted it. He still looked thoughtful. “I’d like to stay, sir. If, as you think, she knows where Verity is, I’d like to be the first to learn it. Heaven knows what perils my poor sister may be risking.”