Chapter 25
After the warm milk and tea Martha had served the night before, everyone had been too exhausted for a proper reunion. Everyone, including Leopold, had retired before the tea was finished.
Yet despite the fatigue that still plagued him, Leopold had been awake since before dawn. The house was still quiet, but the quiet no longer felt like the emptiness of the days when Honora and Cecily were gone.
Now it felt temporary. He knew they were back, that Cecily was safe, and that Honora was upstairs, sleeping if she had managed it. That knowledge had changed the way Belgrave sounded to him. However, there was still a great deal of work to do.
He dipped his pen into the ink and looked down at the first letter he set out to write.
The magistrate.
His hand moved steadily as he wrote the formal complaint against Lady Isolde Carrington for the abduction of Honora and Cecily. He set out what had happened without embellishment.
The carriage arranged under false pretenses, the women removed from the expected route, two men holding them at the house outside Alton. Isolde had arranged the removal, then failed to pay the men what she promised them.
Leopold did not write that he wanted her punished. He did not need to. The facts would do that for him.
He signed the letter and set it aside.
The second was for the Earl of Penmere. That one was more difficult.
Not only had his father been friends with the earl, Leopold himself had worked with him on a few occasions.
The earl was a respectable man, enough so that the late duke had been delighted to arrange a marriage between Leopold and Isolde many years prior.
It would have been a perfect match, at least in the eyes of their noble peers.
But Leopold could see then that Isolde was no woman he would ever wish to marry, and he was glad that the arrangement had not come to pass.
Still, he had great respect for the earl.
Telling the nobleman what his daughter had done was almost as difficult for Leopold as he knew it would be for the earl to read.
My lord,
Your daughter has been implicated in the abduction of a young woman and an infant from Belgrave.
He stopped. The sentence looked too mild. He crumpled the letter and tossed it into the nearby bin and began again on a fresh piece of paper.
My lord,
I write to regretfully inform you that Isolde arranged for the removal of Miss Honora Bellamy and the infant, Cecily, from my estate. They were subsequently held against their will at a house outside Alton.
He paused, biting the inside of his cheek.
It felt wrong to deliver such news in a letter.
He was not even sure whether he should involve the earl.
But he thought about the gossip column in the newspaper, and he imagined the horror of such a reputable man learning about his daughter’s crimes the same way all of London would.
Once Leopold had finished with his letters, the truth would quickly be made public whether he wanted it to be or not.
Better that it comes from me first, Leopold thought, not without sadness.
He closed the letter efficiently, simply stating that he had written to the magistrate, that legal proceedings would ensue soon, and that he intended to see that Isolde was held culpable for what she had done.
He expressed his genuine remorse, but told the earl that Honora and Cecily deserved retribution for the atrocities they had suffered. His heart ached when he thought about how thin and frail they had looked when he had found them, and how sickly Cecily had been.
I will see that justice is served, he thought as he signed his name.
When he finished, he folded the letter and sealed it. He knew his guilt and remorse would linger. But he also knew he was doing the right thing. He prayed the earl would not be ostracized for his daughter’s actions. The only person who deserved to be punished was Isolde.
The third letter was for his solicitor. That one took the longest.
Mr. Hallett,
I write to instruct you on a matter that will require both discretion and speed. You are to prepare a public statement for The Morning Post, to be issued over my name and under your seal. Its contents are as follows.
First. The infant presently residing at Belgrave, known as Cecily, is to be acknowledged as a Belgrave by blood.
She is my niece. This is not a courtesy extended to a foundling, nor an act of charity on the part of this house, and the statement must leave no room for either reading.
She is family, and she is to be named and treated as such henceforth.
Second. Miss Honora Bellamy is to be named as the child’s aunt and as her nearest surviving relation on her mother’s side.
You will have heard, or will shortly hear, that Miss Bellamy entered my household under a name not her own.
That is true. This statement is not to deny it.
What the statement must make plain is that she did so in order to remain near the child, and that every other account of her conduct now circulating is false.
Miss Bellamy is not the child’s mother, as the claims state.
I want that point to be made perfectly clear, as well.
Third, and most difficult. Celestine Bellamy, recently deceased, was born at Belgrave to my father and mother.
She was my sister. She was removed from this house three days after her birth and raised in Wiltshire under an arrangement my father maintained by private payment for the remainder of his life.
I have the birth record in my possession and will furnish you with a copy under separate cover.
You will wish to advise me against the third item.
I expect it, and I have considered the objection already.
The family has spent thirty years protecting a secret at the cost of the person it was kept from, and I do not intend to spend a further thirty years protecting the reputation of men who are past caring what is said of them.
My sister existed. She will be named. And Miss Bellamy will be absolved of any wrongdoing in the entire situation.
A version of these events will shortly appear that is composed entirely of true particulars arranged to produce a falsehood. Ours must be the fuller account, and it must be the one that arrives with a record behind it. Facts alone will not answer. Facts in the proper order will.
Draft it plainly. I want no ornament in it and no appeal to sympathy. Send the draft to me before it goes further and be quick about it.
I remain,
The Duke of Belgrave
The words looked strange once written.
My sister.
He had spent years believing himself to be an only child. Now, there was a name attached to the empty space in his family’s history, and she had been dead for three months before he ever knew she existed.
Leopold set down the pen thoughtfully. He never could have imagined that his parents could keep such a secret from him. Even though he had never met Celestine, he felt grief.
He would have grown up with a sibling, which was something he had often thought about in his youth. He would have loved her fiercely and protected her against any of the judgments society might have passed on her.
She might even still be alive, if she had been able to live the life that had been her birthright.
Honora might not be grieving the sister she had known and clearly loved deeply.
And he might not be left longing for the sibling relationship he was robbed of.
But he would never know, and all because of a vain, selfish decision his parents made.
Barnaby had entered at some point without his noticing. He stood near the window holding a cup of tea, reading one of the letters in silence.
“You missed breakfast,” Barnaby said.
Leopold looked up. “When did you take that?”
“While you were staring through the bookshelf with a look of pure anger.”
“Thank you for helping yourself to the letters instead of seeing if all was well,” Leopold said dryly, but with no genuine irritation.
Barnaby crossed the room and took the first letter. He read it, set it aside, and picked up the second.
“You have been restrained.”
Leopold gave him a tired look. “I was tempted to be less so.”
“One certainly could not have blamed you if you were not.” Barnaby moved to the third and read it more slowly. “This will be in the paper tomorrow.”
“Yes. She left the Alton house before we arrived. We have people looking for her, but she is believed to be in London.”
Barnaby nodded once. “And she will retaliate.”
“I know.”
“She will give them her version.”
Leopold’s expression did not change. “I am counting on it.”
Barnaby lowered the letter. “That is an unusual thing to say.”
“She will name Honora.”
Barnaby understood at once. “And your solicitor will name everything she left out.”
“Yes.” Leopold looked at the third letter. “She cannot say anything about Celestine or give the reason why Honora came to Belgrave. The truth does not disappear because she has distorted it.”
Barnaby nodded. “Then let her try.”
Leopold looked at him.
Barnaby’s expression softened. “You know, for a man who spent most of his life avoiding public attention, you have chosen a method of exposure that will make it a remarkably difficult way to do so now.”
Leopold gave him a faint smile. “I have had a difficult month.”
“That is one way of putting it.”
***
Leopold lost track of how long he and Barnaby discussed the letters. After some time, they were collected and resealed, with Barnaby personally volunteering to post them. By the time Leopold returned to the study after seeing his friend out, the sun had risen properly over the grounds.
He stood at the window. Somewhere upstairs, a door opened and closed. For a moment, he wondered whether it was Honora. He hoped it was.