She inclined her head. “And I shall see that she enjoys it thoroughly. I will also require a maid. French, I think.”
Richard gaped. “What possible good can that do?”
She tapped her finger on the table by his cup. “Think, Captain Everard. Your cousin has been raised in the wilderness. Her personal maid cannot possibly be versed in the latest styles.”
“As far as I know, she doesn’t even require a maid!”
She shook her head. “Every lady requires a maid. You, sir, have never had to pull on a ball gown alone. Having a maid to serve your cousin and me will solve that problem, won’t it?”
He hated it when she sounded so reasonable about such a triviality. “Very well.”
She nodded as if pleased by his answer. “And when the Season is over, you will set me up in a house, anywhere I want to go.”
A house? She had to know what she asked. Any lady who took such an offer from a gentleman would no longer be welcomed by the ton. Besides, he couldn’t believe she truly wanted to leave London, or that she lacked the funds to do so herself.
“That’s a tall order,” he returned. “Who knows where you’ll wish to settle? Shipping a household to Italy can cost a fortune.”
“Which you claim to have,” she pointed out.
More than he’d ever dreamed, if Samantha managed her Season as planned. But he was no longer so willing to lay that fortune at Claire’s feet. “My cousin inherited a great deal of the legacy,” he said. “I can’t in good conscience make promises against it without her approval.”
She gazed at him in obvious wonder. “An Everard taking orders from a slip of a girl. That must have cost you a great deal to admit.”
“Not as much as once.” He pushed the tea away. “If it’s a new house you fancy, I’ll agree to setting you up somewhere in England, Claire. No more. And your reputation will take a beating if our agreement ever becomes public knowledge.”
“Then we will keep it private,” she said. “I’m a longtime friend of the family, who is delighted to sponsor the new Lady Everard. That is all anyone need know.”
He hoped it would be so easy. “So, we’re agreed. A new wardrobe, a French maid and relocation in England at the end. Anything else?”
Her smile broadened. “Yes. If you’d be so good as to deliver the mirror in the sitting room to Mr. Devizes, I think I might be ready to journey to Cumberland to meet your cousin by this time tomorrow.”
Richard blinked. “Cumberland? Why would you go to Cumberland?”
“To meet your cousin, of course. To make sure she’s ready.”
“I planned to bring her to you after Easter.”
Claire’s smile was kind. “Nonsense. I’ve already sold the town house, and you just hired my cook. Where did you expect me to live until Easter, sir?”
He could only stare at her as she rose and collected the cup. “Now, then, go about your business. I shall see you on the morrow, and we will have several days to discuss matters on our way north.”
Several days with Claire? Some part of him brightened at the thought, and he immediately squashed it. What was wrong with him? Lady Claire Winthrop was entirely too good at manipulating his feelings. If she could get him to agree to a new wardrobe, a French maid and a new house in the space of a quarter hour, what more would he end up conceding after several days in Claire’s company?
And he still couldn’t entirely believe she had agreed to help him, constrained circumstances or not. Besides, how had her circumstances become so constrained? Her father had been wealthy; he’d been the one to insist that Richard find a way to care for Claire in style. Richard had always assumed her late husband was wealthy, otherwise, why not fulfill her promise to marry Richard? Surely her father and husband had provided for her in their wills or arranged some marriage portion. Had she gone through the money in a year’s time? Given their conversation, he could almost believe it.
But worse was the idea of what she might do to his purpose and plans. Over the last ten years, he’d navigated through waves as high as mountains, defended his cargo from bloodthirsty pirates and steered a convoy of merchant ships safely through treacherous passages. Yet, thrilling as those adventures had been, the idea of being with Claire the next few days thrilled him more.
And that fact concerned him greatly.
Chapter Four
Richard had little time to consider his feelings as he left Claire’s town house. He stopped at Everard House only long enough to leave his greatcoat and issue instructions about their plans to journey to Cumberland. He’d have to deal with Claire’s requirements later. Right now, he had another commission to complete before he left London.
His older brother Jerome and younger cousin Vaughn, who with him stood to inherit a fortune from their late uncle once Samantha successfully navigated her first Season, had pressed him to contact the Marquess of Widmore.
“The last note from Uncle said the marquess would know why he fought that duel the night he died,” Vaughn had insisted when the three met in the library of Dallsten Manor before Richard headed south. “Widmore can help us track Uncle’s killer.”
“And determine who else knows our secrets,” Jerome had reminded Richard. There was a new light in his brother’s blue eyes, a new surety in his step, now that he’d married his Adele. Richard envied him that.
“I cannot feel comfortable sending Samantha to London,” Jerome had added, “until I know what she’s facing.”
Richard had agreed. Ever since their uncle’s death, when the three of them had learned about Samantha’s existence, more and more secrets had come to light, like a flotilla of ships appearing out of a fog, and he didn’t think they had faced the last.
His uncle, Arthur, Lord Everard, had lived by his own rules and only late in life had realized the importance of family and faith. He had attempted to make up for his previous misdeeds by leaving the considerable Everard legacy—which included lands in six counties, sizeable investments in the Exchange and a fleet of sailing ships—to his daughter Samantha, with generous bequests to Jerome, Richard and Vaughn, which they could receive only when they had helped their new cousin enter Society.
Launching a lass wouldn’t be so daunting in other circumstances, Richard was sure. But the rumors surrounding Samantha’s birth and upbringing would be enough to set tongues wagging. The way his uncle had hidden her and her mother away, in the north of England, would raise questions about Samantha’s legitimacy. Yet Jerome had found a marriage certificate from Gretna Green in Scotland that indicated that her mother and Uncle had legally wed.
Still, questions remained. Why had his uncle kept his daughter a secret from the rest of the family and Society until his death? Why had he fought a duel the last night of his life without having one of his nephews act as his second, as was customary as well as his habit? And why had one of Samantha’s servants recently endangered Jerome’s life to steal a porcelain box that had been emptied of its contents?
All roads of inquiry had eventually led back to the Marquess of Widmore. But Richard wasn’t even sure the powerful lord would see him. Though the marquess had been a good friend of the family, he and Lord Everard had seen little of each other of late, according to Vaughn, as if their uncle had distanced himself from the fellow in the last months of his life. And Richard hadn’t seen the man since starting on his most recent sea voyage two years ago.
Besides, the marquess’s schedule would be full of appointments and social events. He wasn’t likely to find time for a sea captain he hadn’t seen for years. But at least Richard could leave his card.
He