He turned back to the desk. It was not like his mother to burn old letters. If she’d had a plan, there would be some record of it. And he’d seen another letter, the day she suggested this meeting. He snapped his fingers in recognition.
In the inlaid box at her bedside. Thank God for the ineptitude of his mother’s servants. They’d not cleaned the room, other than to change the linens after removing the body. The box still stood beside the bed. He reached in and removed several packs of letters, neatly bound with ribbon.
Correspondence from St John, the egg-sucking rat. Each letter beginning, ‘Dearest Mother …’
Marcus marvelled at his brother’s ability to lie with a straight face and no tremor in the script from the laughter as he’d written those words. But St John had no doubt been asking for money, and that was never a laughing matter to him.
No bundle of letters from himself, he noticed. Not that the curt missives he was prone to send would have been cherished by the dowager.
Letters from the lawyers, arranging estate matters. She’d been well prepared to go when the time had come.
And, on the bottom, a small stack of letters on heavy, cream vellum.
Dearest Andrea,
It has been many years, nearly forty, since last we saw each other at Miss Farthing’s school, and I have thought of you often. I read of your marriage to the late duke, and of the births of your sons. At the time, I’d thought to send congratulations, but you can understand why this would have been unwise. Still, I thought of you, and kept you in my prayers, hoping you received the life you so richly deserved.
I write you now, hoping that you can help an old friend in a time of need. It is not for me that I write, but for the daughter of our mutual friend, Anthony. Miranda’s life has not been an easy one since the death of her mother, and her father’s subsequent troubles. She has no hope of making an appropriate match in the ordinary way.
I am led to believe that both your sons are, at this time, unmarried. Your eldest has not found another wife since the death in childbirth of the duchess some ten years past. I know how important the succession must be to you. And we both know how accidents can occur, especially to active young men, as I’m sure your sons are.
So, perhaps the matchmaking of a pair of old school friends might solve both the problems and see young Miranda and one of your sons settled.
I await your answer in hope,
Cecily Dawson
An odd letter, he thought. Not impossible to call on an old school friend for help, but rather unusual if there had been no word in forty years. He turned to the second in the stack.
Andrea,
I still await your answer concerning the matter of Lady Miranda Grey. I do not wish to come down to Devon and settle this face to face, but will if I must. Please respond.
Awaiting your answer,
Cecily Dawson
He arched an eyebrow. Stranger still. He turned to the third letter.
Andrea,
Thank you for your brief answer of the fourteenth, but I am afraid it will not suffice. If you fear that the girl is unchaste, please understand that she is more innocent in the ways of the bedroom than either of us was
at her age. And I wish her to remain so until she can make a match suitable to her station. Whatever happened to her father, young Miranda is not to blame for it. But she is poor as a church mouse and beset with offers of things other than marriage. I want to see her safely away from here before disaster strikes. If not your sons, then perhaps another eligible gentleman in your vicinity. Could you arrange an introduction for her? Shepherd her through your social circle? Any assistance would be greatly appreciated.
Yours in gratitude,
Cecily
He turned to the last letter in the stack.
Andrea,
I am sorry to hear of your failing health, but will not accept it as excuse for your denial of aid. If you are to go to meet our Maker any time soon, ask him if he heard my forty years of pleadings for justice to be done between us. I can forgive the ills you’ve caused me, but you also deserve a portion of blame for the sorry life this child has led. Rescue her now. Set her back up to the station she deserves and I’ll pray for your soul. Turn your back again and I’ll bring the girl to Devon myself to explain the circumstances to your family at the funeral.
Cecily Dawson
He sat back on the bed, staring at the letters in confusion.
Blackmail. And, knowing his mother, it was a case of chickens come home to roost. If she had been without guilt, she’d have destroyed the letters and he’d have known nothing about it. What could his mother have done to set her immortal soul in jeopardy? To make her so hated that an old friend would pray for her damnation?
Any number of things, he thought grimly, if this Cecily woman stood between her and a goal. A man, perhaps? His father, he hoped. It would make the comments about the succession fall into place. His mother had been more than conscious of the family honour and its place in history. The need for a legitimate heir.
And the need to keep secret things secret.
He had been, too, at one time, before bitter experience had lifted the scales from his eyes. Some families were so corrupt it was better to let them die without issue. Some honour did not deserve to be protected. Some secrets were better exposed to the light. It relieved them of their power to taint their surroundings and destroy the lives of those around them.
And what fresh shame did this girl have, that his family was responsible for? St John, most likely. Carrying another by-blow, to be shuffled quietly into the family deck.
He frowned. But that couldn’t be right. The letters spoke of old crimes. And when he’d come on the girl and St John together, there had been no sense of conspiracy. She’d seemed a complete stranger to him and to this house. Lost in her surroundings.
She was not a pretty girl, certainly. But he’d not seen her at her best. Her long dark hair was falling from its pins, bedraggled and wet. The gown she’d worn had never been fashionable and being soaked in the storm had made it even more shapeless. It clung to her tall, bony frame the way that the hair stuck to the sharp contours of her face. Everything about her was hard: the lines of her face and body, the set of her mouth, the look in her eyes.
He smiled. A woman after his own heart. Maybe they would do well together, after all.
She looked around in despair. So this was to be her new home. Not this room, she hoped. It was grand enough for a duchess.
Precisely why she did not belong in it.
She forced that thought out of her mind.
‘This is the life you belong to, not the life you’ve lived so far. The past is an aberration. The future is merely a return to the correct path.’
All right. She had better take Cici’s words to heart. Repeat them as often as necessary until they became the truth.
Of course, if this was the life she was meant to have, then dust and cobwebs were an inherent part of her destiny. She’d hoped, when she finally got to enjoy the comforts of a great house, she would not be expected to clean it first. This room had not been aired in years. It would take a stout ladder to get up to the sconces to scrub off the tarnish and the grime, and to the top of the undusted mantelpiece. Hell and damnation upon the head of the man who thought that high ceilings lent majesty to a room.
She pulled back the dusty curtains on the window to peer into the rain-streaked night. This might be the front of the house, and those lumps below could be the view of a formal