Chapter 20
Chapter Twenty
“Your Grace, how kind of you to receive me.”
Frances inclined her head with all the calm courtesy that had been trained into her long before she had ever imagined becoming a duchess.
“Viscountess Ashford, the kindness is yours. I had not expected the pleasure of callers this afternoon.”
Lady Evelyn Ashford smiled as she took the chair opposite Frances, arranging her skirts with elegant care. She was a beautiful woman, perhaps a little past youth but far from faded, with smooth dark hair beneath a fashionable bonnet and eyes that seemed, at first glance, pleasantly warm.
“I could not remain away,” she confessed with a smile. “Not after such happy news. I had to offer my congratulations in person. A wedding is always a joyful occasion, particularly one so… unexpected.”
The pause was delicate, almost harmless.
Frances smiled. “Thank you. His Grace and I are grateful for your good wishes.”
“How charmingly said.” Lady Ashford accepted the cup of tea Frances offered her. “And how well you have settled already. Sinclair House suits you.”
“I am glad you think so.”
“Oh, very much. Some women look swallowed by a great house. You do not. You have presence enough for it.”
It was a compliment. Frances knew how to receive one.
“You are generous.”
“Merely observant.” Lady Ashford took a small sip of tea. “And His Grace must be relieved.”
Frances’ fingers stilled upon her saucer. “Relieved?”
“To have matters set right so neatly,” Lady Ashford pointed out, still smiling. “Society can be unkind, as you must know better than most. A wedding quiets so many unpleasant whispers.”
Frances set her cup down with care. “One hopes society may find kinder occupations.”
Lady Ashford laughed softly. “One may always hope, Your Grace.”
There it was again, that faint pressure beneath the words, like the tip of a knife beneath silk. Frances watched her more closely.
Lady Ashford’s gaze drifted toward the door, then back again. “And the child? I hope the little one is well.”
The question was spoken lightly. Frances felt something tighten inside her.
“The baby is quite well, thank you.”
“How fortunate. Infants can be delicate creatures, especially when their beginnings are not altogether… settled.”
Frances kept her expression pleasant. “All infants deserve care, whatever their beginnings.”
“Indeed. A noble sentiment.” Lady Ashford leaned back slightly. “And is she here, then? In the house?”
Frances’ unease sharpened. “She is being cared for.”
“By you?”
The directness of it struck like a hand laid too suddenly upon her arm.
Frances looked at her. “By the entire household.”
“Of course.” Lady Ashford smiled again, but the warmth had thinned. “Forgive me. I ask only because… well, you see, people tend to be curious.”
“People often tend to be curious about matters that do not concern them.” Frances spoke calmly, but the edge was just beneath the surface.
“How true.” The viscountess lowered her eyes to her tea. “Still, curiosity grows when a child is involved. A nameless child, a hidden child. Also, a child around whom a marriage so suddenly forms.”
The room seemed to cool.
Frances sat very still. “You speak plainly, my lady.”
Lady Ashford smiled even more broadly. “Oh, my dear, I speak as a friend.”
“Do you?”
Lady Ashford looked up. “I should like to be one.”
Frances did not answer at once. Beyond the windows, the afternoon was pale and windless.
Somewhere in the house, a door closed softly.
They were nothing but ordinary sounds between ordinary walls, during ordinary tea cooling between them.
Yet Frances felt as though something had entered the room that did not belong there.
“If friendship is your purpose,” Frances stated, “then I must confess I find your questions rather strange.”
“Strange?” Lady Ashford repeated, with a delicate lift of her brows.
“Too exact.”
The viscountess was quiet for half a moment. Then, she smiled.
“My dear duchess, exactness is not a fault when reputation is at stake.”
Frances’ pulse gave one hard beat.
“Reputation,” she echoed.
“Yes.” Lady Ashford set her cup down. “You are newly married. You are young, perhaps not yet accustomed to the care required in such a position. A duchess must understand what may be permitted to circulate and what must be corrected before it takes root.”
Frances focused hard on composing herself. “How considerate of you to instruct me.”
“I mean no offense.”
“And yet you have come into my home to ask whether the child is hidden, nameless, and connected to my marriage.”
Lady Ashford’s expression remained light, but something in her eyes sharpened. “I ask because others will ask with far less sympathy.”
“Then others may be disappointed.”
“Or emboldened,” the viscountess corrected quietly. “Silence can be very dangerous, Your Grace.”
Frances felt the words settle in the air between them. They were not idle, nor merely curious. They were dangerous.
She looked at Lady Ashford more carefully now, searching for some clue in the smoothness of her face, the carefully moderated voice, or the poised hands resting in her lap.
There was nothing. That was what unsettled Frances most. She could find no vulgar eagerness and no visible malice, only precision.
It was as if Lady Ashford had not come to learn, but rather as if she had come to test.
Frances lifted her chin. “You seem remarkably concerned with His Grace’s household.”
The woman shrugged playfully. “Surely, concern is not a crime, dear.”
“No,” Frances agreed. “But intrusion is discourteous.”
A faint color rose in Lady Ashford’s cheeks, though she mastered it quickly. “I had not expected you to be defensive.”
“I had not expected to be interrogated.”
“Interrogated?” Lady Ashford gave a soft laugh. “Surely that is too strong a word.”
“Is it?”
Before the viscountess could answer, a voice came from the doorway.
“No.”
Frances turned, only to find Andrew standing just inside the room. He had entered without either of them hearing him, or else they had been too absorbed to notice. His gaze was not on Frances. It was fixed entirely upon Lady Ashford, and all the charm he wore so easily in society had vanished.
He, on the other hand, looked utterly cold.
Lady Ashford rose at once. “Your Grace.”
Andrew did not bow.
“Lady Ashford,” he addressed her. “You will forgive me if I do not pretend this is a welcome visit.”
Frances stared at him.
The viscountess’s smile faltered only slightly. “I called to offer my congratulations.”
“I heard enough to know you did not come for that.”
A silence followed. Frances felt it press against her skin.
Lady Ashford recovered herself with admirable speed. “You misunderstand me, Your Grace. I was only expressing concern for Her Grace. These are delicate circumstances, and I thought–”
“You thought to question my wife about a child in my care.” His voice remained low, but there was something in it that made Frances’ breath catch.
Lady Ashford’s hand tightened upon the back of her chair. “Society is already asking questions. It is not unreasonable that–”
“It is entirely unreasonable in my house.”
Frances looked from one to the other. Andrew had not moved farther into the room, yet somehow he had taken command of all of it. Even the space around Lady Ashford seemed to narrow.
“Your Grace,” the viscountess said carefully, “I believe you mistake friendly advice for interference.”
“I mistake nothing.”
Her expression hardened for the first time. Only a little, but Frances saw it.
“You have no place questioning my household,” he told her. “You have no place speaking to my duchess in this manner. And you have no place here, now.”
Lady Ashford went still. Frances’ heart was beating too quickly.
My duchess.
The words ought to have sounded possessive in a way she would resent. Instead, spoken in that cold, steady voice, they felt like a shield thrown between her and something she had not yet seen clearly.
The viscountess drew herself up. “Surely there is no need for such severity.”
“There is every need,” he demanded.
“I came as a guest.”
“And you will leave as one who has forgotten herself.”
Color flared fully in Lady Ashford’s face then. “Your Grace, I must protest–”
“No.” Andrew’s voice cut cleanly through hers. “What you must do is leave.”
Frances stood slowly, though she did not know why.
Perhaps she meant to soften the moment, to restore some fragment of propriety before it shattered entirely.
But Andrew did not look at her. He kept his attention upon Lady Ashford with a focus so absolute that Frances understood, with a sudden twist of unease, that he was not merely angry. He was alarmed.
Lady Ashford must have understood it too, for her composure wavered.
“I assure you,” she answered more quietly now, “I intended no harm.”
“Then you will find it easy not to repeat it.” Andrew stepped aside, leaving the doorway clear. “You will not approach Her Grace again.”
The viscountess’s lips parted. “That is hardly necessary.”
“It is not a request.”
Another silence followed. At last, Lady Ashford gathered her gloves from the table. Her movements were precise, but not quite steady. She turned to Frances and offered a small, strained smile.
“Your Grace, I fear I have caused offense where none was intended.”
Frances found her own voice only after a moment. “Good afternoon, Lady Ashford.”
The viscountess held her gaze for a beat too long. Then, she turned and left.
Andrew remained where he was until her footsteps had faded down the corridor.
Only then did he move, crossing to the window and looking out as if to ensure she had truly gone.
Frances watched him, unsettled by the line of his shoulders, by the hard set of his jaw, by the way his hand closed once into a fist before he released it.
“She was only asking questions,” Frances told him, though she did not quite believe it.
Andrew turned back to her.
“No,” he said. “She was not.”
The answer sent a chill through her. Frances looked toward the abandoned teacup on the table, the pale rim marked where Lady Ashford had drunk from it.
It was supposed to be a simple visit, a polite call and congratulations offered in a pretty voice. And yet, the room no longer felt safe.
She looked at him then, truly looked, and saw that whatever had frightened him had not begun with Lady Ashford’s visit.
It had been there before, buried beneath his control, waiting for the proper question to expose it.
And Frances, who had thought herself merely uneasy a moment before, felt the unease deepen into something colder, because Andrew had not reacted like a man protecting a rumor.
He had reacted like a man guarding a dangerous secret.