Chapter Twelve
Georgiana sat in the window seat of the music room, her knees drawn up in a manner no governess had ever managed to cure.
She had been crying for some time. Thursday had passed without her going to Rowland, and now only the night stood between her and the day upon which he had threatened to publish her letters.
The house had been waiting since noon. Twice Selina had gone to the window at the sound of wheels in the square and returned without remark. Nobody had spoken Rowland’s name since breakfast.
Georgiana heard her brother in the doorway and did not turn.
“You need not sit down, Nathaniel. I know that face. It is the one you wear before telling me something is for my own good, and I have not the strength for my own good tonight.”
Nathaniel crossed the room and sat beside her.
She looked at him then, startled despite herself. He had always stood when delivering unwelcome truths, as though authority required the advantage of height.
“I am poor at comfort,” he said.
“Yes.” Georgiana wiped her cheek with the heel of her hand. “You are.”
“But I am here.”
The answer appeared to disarm her. The strain in her face loosened, though the tears continued.
“That is better,” she said after a moment. “I did not know it would be.”
Nathaniel looked down at his hands. “Neither did I.”
She leant against him cautiously, as though expecting him to correct the impropriety of the posture. When he did not, she rested her head upon his shoulder.
“They will appear tomorrow,” she said into his coat. “Everyone will read them, and whatever follows will touch you and Selina as well. I wrote them. Nobody compelled me.”
“I cannot promise that they will not appear.” Nathaniel felt her stiffen and continued before instinct could tempt him into a certainty he did not possess.
“I can promise that you will not face what follows alone. Selina and I are doing everything within our power, and there are others working quietly on our behalf. Rowland must contend with all of us now.”
“That does not sound like very much when tomorrow is Friday.”
“No,” he admitted. “But it is the truth, and it is what I have to give you.”
Georgiana was silent for a while. A carriage passed on the far side of the square without stopping.
“I should have listened to her.”
“Yes.”
“And to you.”
Nathaniel considered that. “Occasionally.”
A wet, unwilling laugh escaped her.
He remained beside her while she cried, resisting every impulse to explain, correct or promise. Over her bowed head, he saw Selina standing in the doorway.
She had plainly come in search of Georgiana. Her gaze moved from the girl’s head upon his shoulder to his face. For one unguarded moment, something softened in her expression. Then she stepped back and left them alone.
When Georgiana had grown calmer, Nathaniel summoned her maid and saw her settled with a warm drink. He remained in the passage after the door closed, then went in search of his wife.
***
He found Selina in the conservatory. The room was unlit, save for the moonlight passing through the glass, and cold enough that the orange trees had been covered against the night. She stood among their shrouded forms with her back to him.
“You withdrew,” he said.
“You had no need of me.”
“I have come to thank you.”
She turned. “For leaving?”
“For making it possible for me to stay. Georgiana would not have leant upon me a month ago. I should not have known how to let her.”
“I did not teach you to love your sister.”
“No. You taught me that she could not always recognise love in the form in which I offered it.”
“You gave her rules when she needed to be heard. I merely translated.”
“You undervalue translation.”
A faint smile touched her mouth. “It is an occupational failing.”
Nathaniel came nearer, stopping at a distance that left the choice of closing it to either of them.
“And me?” he asked. “Do I require translation?”
Her smile faded, though not from displeasure. She regarded him with a care that made the cold room seem suddenly close.
“You require a rather thicker dictionary.”
He laughed softly. The sound altered the silence between them.
For a moment neither moved. Nathaniel became conscious of the small distance separating them, of her face in the uncertain light and of the fact that she had not stepped away. He wanted to kiss her. The desire was neither strategic nor convenient, and could no longer be mistaken for either.
His gaze fell briefly to her mouth before returning to her eyes.
Selina’s breath changed.
Nathaniel kept his hands at his sides.
“You almost never use my name,” she said.
“Do I not? I had not noticed.”
It was a poor lie, and her expression told him so.
“I have. Why?”
Once, he might have evaded the question. Their agreement no longer permitted it.
“Because I think it too often already.”
Her composure faltered.
“I want to kiss you,” he said. “But I shall not mistake wanting it for permission.”
She remained where she was. For one suspended moment he thought she might close the distance herself.
Instead, she drew a slow breath and stepped back.
“You are a very strange man, Your Grace.”
“I have been called worse.”
“I have known men who would have taken the kiss and afterwards persuaded themselves that I had invited it.”
“I will not.”
“No.” She held his gaze. “I believe you.”
The trust in those three words cost him more restraint than doubt would have done.
“If there is ever to be such a moment,” he said, “the choice will be yours as much as mine.”
Selina took another step back, and the shadows reclaimed her face.
“Good night, Your Grace.”
“Good night.”
He did not say her name.
She left him among the covered orange trees. Nathaniel remained there until the cold compelled him to follow.
***
Friday came.
The morning papers arrived with the coffee.
Nathaniel read each one from the first column to the last, then sent a footman to obtain the cheaper sheets Wexford House did not ordinarily admit.
They contained a countess’s gaming debts, a bishop’s coachman and an actress at Drury Lane, but nothing about Georgiana or her letters.
Selina entered while he was examining the final page. She looked at the papers spread across the table, pulled out a chair and reached for the nearest sheet.
Nathaniel let her read.
When she reached the end, she turned it over, found the reverse blank and laid it down.
“Nothing,” she said.
“Nothing.”
Georgiana received the news with a relief too great to disturb. Nathaniel did not tell her that Rowland’s silence might signify delay rather than surrender. For that morning, it was enough that her name had not appeared.
By evening, however, relief had given way to uncertainty.
Nathaniel and Selina sat in the library with the discarded sheets between them.
“Perhaps he was bluffing,” Nathaniel said.
“Perhaps.”
“You do not believe it.”
“I do not know what to believe.” Selina smoothed the edge of one paper. “He demanded eleven hundred pounds and received no answer. He ordered Georgiana to meet him again, and again she did not. Yet the day upon which he promised to publish has nearly passed, and he has done nothing.”
“He may lack the means.”
“Or he may have changed his purpose. Either would explain the silence.”
Nathaniel looked at the printed columns without seeing them. “You think there is another move.”
“I think it would be dangerous to assume that there is not. He has lost the force of this particular threat, but not the letters themselves. Nor has he lost whatever understanding exists between him and Giles.”
“Then we find out what that understanding is.”
“Yes.” Selina gathered the sheets and squared their edges against the table. “Before either man decides how next to use it.”
The clock in the hall struck one. Neither of them had noticed the hour.
***
Sowerby’s second report lay upon Nathaniel’s desk the following morning.
CONFIDENTIAL,
FOR THE PRIVATE ATTENTION OF HIS GRACE THE DUKE OF WEXFORD
Second Report on the Affairs of Mr Felix Rowland
Prepared by J. Sowerby, Confidential Agent
Summary of Findings
My first report established that the largest of Mr Rowland’s outstanding obligations is held by the Earl of Merrow. I am now satisfied that the connection between the two gentlemen is not the ordinary, arm’s-length relation of debtor and creditor.
Meetings Observed
I have traced three private meetings between Mr Rowland and Lord Merrow, each held at a chophouse off the Strand.
Neither gentleman appears to have any independent business there.
The frequency of these meetings, together with the precautions taken on entering and leaving, indicates a deliberate understanding between them.
Documentary Evidence
By means I will not commit to paper, I have had sight of a memorandum in Lord Merrow’s hand. Its language is guarded, but it promises the discharge of a portion of Mr Rowland’s debt in return for services rendered in a matter concerning “the D. of W.’s household.”
Conclusion
The evidence strongly indicates that Lord Merrow and Mr Rowland are acting in concert, and have done so since before the masquerade.
Lord Merrow appears to have supplied knowledge of the Calvert family and the claim concerning the late Lady Merrow’s jewels.
Mr Rowland supplied his access to Lady Georgiana and possession of her letters.
I cannot yet establish every particular of their intended design. I am satisfied, however, that neither gentleman’s actions can safely be considered apart from those of the other.
I await Your Grace’s further instruction.
J. Sowerby
Nathaniel read the report twice.
It supplied an answer, though not yet the whole of one.
Rowland’s recognition of Selina at the assembly had not been chance.
Giles had known where she was and what she had become.
The false claim concerning the jewels bore the knowledge of a man who had been present during the administration of the estate, while Rowland possessed the letters with which pressure might be applied to Wexford’s household.
Nathaniel placed the report upon the desk and went to the window.
Friday’s silence no longer appeared an isolated failure. Rowland had not been acting alone, and whatever restraint had kept the letters from the presses might have belonged to Giles as readily as to him.
The memorandum mattered. Guarded though its language was, Giles had put the arrangement into his own hand. It was not yet enough to expose them without risk to Georgiana and Selina, but it was a point at which the conspiracy might be made to divide.
Nathaniel stood in the cold morning light and considered the order in which the pressure must be applied.
If Rowland believed Giles intended to sacrifice him, he might turn upon his creditor. If Giles believed Rowland had become careless, he might withdraw his protection. Their strength lay in the confidence that neither would move without the other.
Nathaniel intended to disturb that confidence.
He drew the bell and sent for Selina. The report concerned her family, her name and the house that had become hers. He would not make the mistake of deciding alone what should be done with it.