Chapter Twenty-Two
Farnham’s black deeds came home to roost the following day.
Allan and Mel had gone to visit the Bishop of London, to seek a license.
They arrived back, mission accomplished, to the news that Farnham was in custody.
In the prison infirmary, in fact. News of his crimes had filtered out, despite the king’s prohibition on any details reaching the masses.
He had been identified, and the citizens who enthusiastically apprehended him on behalf of the Crown had beaten him bloody.
“They say he will probably recover enough to be hanged,” said Gerard, with great satisfaction.
The Teign butler, too, had been arrested, as had all the warders and some of the footmen. And the far reaches of the cellars at the Teign townhouse were being excavated under the supervision of a magistrate.
However, no one had seen hide nor hair of Teign.
And so it continued for the next two weeks, while those sent out of London to track the marquess down reported back, one by one, that they had found no trace of him.
Meanwhile, Mel and Allan prepared for their wedding, and so did Phineas and Harmony.
Phineas had proposed a few days after Allan, and he and Harmony planned to marry at the end of January, when Nottwick would be back in London after a lightning trip to his country estate.
Dellborough was continuing to take an interest in what the newssheets were calling “the Teign Affair”. How much of an interest, Allan discovered the day before his wedding, when he received a visit from a royal herald with an invitation to wait upon the king that afternoon.
Fortunately, Dellborough was at home, and knew exactly what Allan should wear, how early he should arrive for the appointment, how he should enter and leave the room, and a dozen other things regarding etiquette when meeting royalty.
“Praise never goes amiss,” Dellborough advised. “The king enjoys being admired.”
“Do you know what this is about?” Allan asked, but the duke was not forthcoming, saying only, “It might be about a suggestion I made, but I shall say no more in case I am mistaken.”
The king was vastly overweight and in poor health, but Allan caught flashes of the charm that had so enchanted the masses when the royal gentleman they called their Prince Florian was a young man. “Terrible business, this, with your father,” the king said.
Allan agreed.
“Fathers can be the devil,” the king mused. “Mind you, mine was mad—not saying yours is, Kemble, though one wonders.” He shook his head. “Such elaborate schemes. Must be touched in the upper stories, don’t you think?”
“He could not bear any kind of opposition, Your Majesty,” Allan ventured. “I believe his wives showed too much backbone for him, though they had little enough, poor things. But those women we rescued had no chance to resist at all.”
“You resisted,” the king commented. “Dellborough told me all about it. His father was a friend of my father’s, you know.
Nice fellow, Dellborough. He tells me that Teign’s title needs to be surrendered.
Not attainted, you understand. Removed, so you can inherit and take on the responsibilities.
Estates. House of Lords. All that. What do you think, Kemble? ”
Allan realized he was gaping like a fish and shut his mouth while he tried to formulate an answer.
“My father has disgraced the title and the British peerage, Your Majesty. His behavior is a smudge on your reign.” The king frowned, and Allan hastened to add, “Though you removed it, of course, with your instant response, as soon as you knew what the man was doing.”
“Yes, quite so,” replied the king, with a smug smile.
“Very well, Teign. It shall have to go before the House of Lords, of course, but I see no difficulty. Here. You shall need these.” He gestured to the man who stood on his right and slightly to the rear, and the man stepped forward to hand Allan a card folder of papers, tied with ribbon.
“That shall be all, Teign,” said the king. He sighed. “I have another meeting, but I am glad we have had this little chat.”
Still unsteady after being called by his father’s title twice in less than a minute, Allan backed away. After he was out of the room, he opened the folder. The covering sheet announced that it was for the lawyers, servants, and men of business employed by the Marquess of Teign.
Beyond was a letter to the senior partner of each group, the house steward or butler of each house, and the land steward of each estate, telling them that the king was taking steps to have Augustus Sheppard, Sixth Marquess of Teign, stripped of his title.
Each letter then further instructed the recipient to treat Allan Sheppard, Earl of Kemble, as the Seventh Marquess of Teign until such time as he fully inherited the title.
“Of course,” said Dellborough, who had been standing silently beside him as he read, “the king is a little beforehand addressing you as Teign, but the papers were drawn up by the Crown’s best lawyers.
You are in charge now, Kemble. And when the ‘i’s have all been dotted and the ‘t’s crossed, you shall be the seventh marquess. ”
Dellborough seemed to think he was giving Allan good news, but to Allan, telling him he was about to receive the title seemed more like a curse.
Particularly when he arrived back and told Melody what had happened.
She pointed out the positives, of course.
“I know you didn’t want this, Allan, but being wealthy and titled is a good thing.
You will now have the power and the wealth to support your brothers, and to assist them in achieving their dreams.”
Baldwin, too, could see the benefits. “Wherever Teign has gone, unless he has private assets, he no longer has wealth to hire bullies or lawyers.”
And Phineas also had a suggestion to make the best of the current circumstances. “You should call the men of business and stewards together, as soon as possible, and tell them to give him nothing, and to let you know if he gets in touch.”
All of which was true, but it didn’t explain why Melody had resumed that bland expression that hid her thoughts. She had withdrawn from him, too, returning his smiles with an absent one of her own, and moving away from his touch.
He waited for privacy before he challenged her. “Melody, what is wrong? Do you not want the title? I don’t have to be the marquess. I can leave Baldwin as my proxy and we shall run away with our daughters. Don’t leave me, my love. I can give up everything else, but not you, and not Lydia.”
Her mask slipped, and she gazed at him, her face expressing a mix of wonder and confusion.
“But Allan, you cannot have thought. I cannot be your marchioness. My birth is barely acceptable, and I have been working for a living for years. Add to that, I am old. I might not be able to give you an heir.”
In his relief that all her reasons were about social expectations and none about not wanting him, the first words that came to his tongue were, Is that the maggot you have in your head? Fortunately, he managed to trap the infelicitous words before he spoke them.
“If you cannot be my marchioness, I shall have no other, my dearest love,” he said instead.
“Your class is high enough to be acceptable to the Society hags who monitor such things. If it wasn’t, I wouldn’t care, except I should not like to see you being bullied by ladies who are not fit to kiss your slippers. ”
He thought of another point. “Besides, you have a duchess and at least two marchionesses on your side, and more than one countess. Also, your sisters-in-law. Together, the eight of you hardly need anyone else’s approval, and only someone who is tired of living would dare to bully any of you.
Can you imagine what Clara would do to them? ”
To his relief, Melody giggled. Only a little splutter of a laugh, but a vast improvement.
“As to your age, you are thirty-two and I am thirty-eight. You are old enough and experienced enough to make a fit mate for me, and young enough to still give me more children, if God is kind. And if we have only daughters, or if our nurseries remain empty, I have one nephew and shall almost certainly have more in time.”
His last argument brought a grin to his face when he thought of it. “As to your work, have you not solved many mysteries for fashionable families?”
“A dozen or more,” Melody acknowledged. “They know how I have spent the past six years, and will tell their friends.”
“Two points, heart of my heart. One. They cannot disclose what they know without also disclosing that Aunt Agnes stole the watch, or James Junior seduced the neighbor’s daughter.”
He had invented Aunt Agnes and James Junior, for she was discreet to a fault when talking about former cases. Still, from his expression, his point was made.
“Second, the Duchess of Kempbury was in the same line of work, and she is accepted everywhere.”
Silence while he allowed her to digest his responses. After a while, she murmured, in a voice so quiet that he had to lean close to hear it, “Are you saying you do not mind?”
He took advantage of the closeness to kiss her, drawing away after an intense and passionate embrace just far enough to say, “Any other course of action, I would mind like hell. I love you, Melody Blackmore, and if you love me, we shall work out the rest.”
“I love you,” she told him. “That has never been the question.”
“Then let us have our wedding so we can face this latest challenge together. Will you, darling? I cannot promise you peace and unsullied happiness, but I can promise you my loyal and unwavering love, from now until the day I meet my maker. Yes, and beyond.”