Chapter 12
Christopher’s first question was where they had hidden the register.
He directed it to Samuel Dyer before taking his seat, as though the state dining room had been arranged for the recovery of property wrongfully kept from him rather than a conference he had spent three days attempting to prevent.
“The original remains in the parish vestry,” Dyer said. “Where it was found, examined, wrapped, sealed, and returned to the press under two parish keys.”
Christopher stopped behind his chair.
The fire at the eastern end of the room had been built small enough to preserve the papers from heat and large enough to suggest Rothbury House had not forgotten hospitality altogether.
Its light reached the long dining table only in a restrained red reflection upon the silver inkstands.
Every serving dish, candelabrum, and ornament had been removed.
Cold plate would have been an unfortunate decoration after Henry’s sale.
In their place stood ordered packets of legal paper.
Three sealed sets occupied the centre of the table: the bank records, the parish copies, and the sworn observations. Each remained before the solicitor responsible for its custody. No document lay loose except the agenda Dyer had prepared and the blank record sheets before his clerk.
The parties had been seated according to function rather than rank.
Margaret sat midway along the south side as co-trustee, with Mr. Latham, her independent legal adviser, at her right.
Dyer sat beyond him as solicitor to Waterloo House.
Henry occupied the chair at the western end, placed where he could see both sides without presiding over either.
Croft sat opposite Margaret. Christopher and Mr. Harcourt took the north side, near enough to confer and too far from the evidence to handle it without asking.
The churchwarden and the stationer who had examined the replacement leaf sat at a smaller table near the windows. Lady Georgiana had selected a chair beside the fire and moved it two feet nearer the proceedings after a footman assured her that the original position was considered comfortable.
“No one has hidden anything,” Dyer continued. “The register is parish property. Its remaining there preserves custody and prevents the alteration alleged by either side from being compounded by another removal.”
Christopher looked toward the sealed parish packet. “Then we are expected to accept a copy produced under the supervision of Henry’s wife.”
Margaret opened the agenda.
Henry felt the insult arrive in the room and remain unanswered for precisely as long as her authority required.
Dyer said, “You are expected to hear sworn observations made by the incumbent, churchwarden, and independent stationer. Her Grace supervised neither their memories nor their signatures.”
“She initiated the search.”
“She requested lawful inspection as co-trustee after you relied upon a parish extract to challenge her appointment.”
“As his wife.”
“As co-trustee,” Margaret said.
Her voice did not rise. Under pressure, warmth left it before volume did.
Christopher turned toward her. “The distinction is convenient.”
“It is written.”
Mr. Latham untied the narrow tape around the first settlement packet.
“It is also supported by independent advice obtained before the marriage, separate trustees of the settlement, a protected income not controlled by His Grace, and an office conferred under the terms of the Waterloo deed. Her Grace’s interest is disclosed. It is not therefore erased.”
Harcourt placed one finger upon his own notes. “The office depends upon an appointment made by a man whose authority is disputed.”
“Yes,” Latham said. “That dispute is why we are here. It is not a reason to treat every person affected by the dispute as incapable of speaking.”
Christopher looked at Henry. “You have given your wife an unusually long table from which to defend you.”
Henry kept both hands upon the chair arms.
The distance between them was twelve feet, one table corner, and enough witnesses to make violence both absurd and expensive. He had measured it when Christopher entered. The habit required no consent from reason.
He could have answered the insult as husband, duke, or former colonel.
All three answers would have turned Margaret into the subject of his defense.
“She is not here to defend me,” he said. “She is here to defend her office. Address it.”
Christopher’s expression altered at being denied the simpler quarrel.
Dyer looked down the agenda. “This conference is not a court and will not determine the succession. It has been convened because the pending restraint application, Sir Reginald’s closure notice, and the motion against Her Grace rely upon overlapping assertions of fact.
We are here to identify what remains disputed, what undertakings may be given, and what action the trustees propose to take before the formal application proceeds. ”
“Then we begin with standing,” Croft said.
He had worn black, relieved only by a silver waistcoat that reflected the inkstands whenever he moved. His careful barbering and composed sorrow gave him the appearance of a man obliged to explain why other people’s distress must be arranged more economically.
“The House cannot be governed,” he continued, “by a woman whose authority and financial security both arise from marriage to the claimant whose acts are restrained.”
Margaret looked at him. “My financial security does not arise from the trust.”
“It arises from the duke.”
“It arises from property placed beyond his sole control before I married him.”
“At his expense.”
“Payment and control are not the same object.”
Croft smiled faintly. “An elegant distinction among spouses.”
Latham drew one sheet from the settlement packet and passed it to Dyer rather than across the table.
“The trustees of the marriage settlement have supplied a certificate confirming that the separate-use provisions were executed before the ceremony, that Her Grace received independent advice, and that neither her trust office nor her Waterloo salary is assigned to His Grace. The private sums are not produced because they are irrelevant to Sir Reginald’s motion. ”
“They would show dependence,” Croft said.
“They would show amount,” Margaret replied. “Dependence is established by power, not arithmetic.”
Henry watched Dyer enter the exchange upon the record.
Three weeks earlier, he might have taken pride in having settled enough upon Margaret to defeat Croft’s accusation.
The thought now showed its error plainly.
Money Henry had provided became protection only because he had surrendered control of it.
Margaret’s standing did not become his achievement merely because he had paid part of its cost.
Harcourt said, “The motion alleges collusion in the disposal of assets intended for Waterloo House.”
“The plate was not a trust asset,” Dyer said.
“It carried the Rothbury arms.”
“So do several objects that belong absolutely to Lady Georgiana. Heraldry does not settle ownership.”
Lady Georgiana looked up from the memorandum she had been reading. “If arms established title, half the silver in England would belong to men who cannot afford breakfast.”
Harcourt inclined his head without inviting further assistance.
Dyer continued. “The probate inventory and codicil establish that the sold service belonged personally to His Grace. His affidavit further establishes that Her Grace was neither consulted nor informed before the sale. That admission harms his conduct. It defeats the alleged collusion.”
Croft folded his hands. “A wife’s ignorance may be difficult to distinguish from a wife’s convenient denial.”
Henry’s fingers closed once upon the chair arms.
Margaret did not look toward him.
She said, “You served the allegation within hours of the sale. I answered it by travelling to the parish under independent instruction and producing evidence unrelated to the plate. If I were colluding in a concealed transfer, I selected a remarkably indirect route to assist it.”
“The parish inquiry assists your husband’s title.”
“It also assists the trust in determining whether the document you used against my office was false.”
Croft’s courtesy sharpened. “You possess an interest in both conclusions.”
“Yes. An interest is not incapacity. If it were, no trustee could decide a matter affecting the property he administers, and you would have retired before delivering your first notice.”
Dyer’s clerk bent over the page. Henry saw the movement at the corner of his vision and resisted the inappropriate wish to know whether the sentence had been captured exactly.
Dyer turned to Christopher. “Do you maintain your objection to Her Grace being heard?”
“I maintain that her evidence should be treated as interested.”
“All evidence is treated according to source, opportunity, consistency, and corroboration. The objection is recorded. We will proceed.”
Christopher sat.
His chair legs struck the polished floor with greater force than necessary. The sound travelled along the table and died beneath the painted ceiling.
Dyer opened the parish packet.
He did not hand the contents to Henry, Margaret, Croft, or Harcourt. He placed the sworn stationer’s statement upon a wooden reading stand and directed his clerk to provide Harcourt with the certified duplicate already served.
“The original register has not travelled,” he said. “The stationer will describe what he observed in the vestry. Mr. Harcourt may question him afterward.”
The stationer rose from the witness table.
His black coat had been brushed for the occasion, but a pale line of paper dust remained at one cuff.
He looked at the gilded dining room with the caution of a tradesman accustomed to entering great houses only when something valuable had split at the spine.
Dyer asked him to state his trade and experience.