Ariadne's Diadem (21 page)

Penelope sank onto the bench, and Sylvanus tried to gather his breath before speaking. “First I must know how you progressed with Anne.”

Gervase exhaled slowly and shook his head. “She’ll never confess her true feelings to me.”

The faun sighed too. “Well, that’s a pity, because we found out something dreadful tonight. To begin with, your cousin is calling himself Oadby.” He began to relate what they’d overheard.

Gervase interrupted at the mention of the so-called sister. “Kitty? Are you sure that was her name?”

“Yes.”

“Hugh hasn’t got a sister, but I certainly suspect I know who she is.” It had to be Kitty Longton, who hailed from Oadby in Leicestershire, if his memory served him well. So the scheming denizen of Drury Lane was still hot in pursuit of a fine title, and Hugh had the gall to bring her to within a few miles of Llandower! Renewed dislike and contempt sliced through Gervase, for he could never think of Kitty without recalling what she’d done to her helpless little brother. She was a fitting leman for the likes of Hugh Mowbray!

Sylvanus looked curiously at him. “Hugh seems to think you know something terrible from her past.”

“I do.” Gervase related the story of the terrible orphanage.

Sylvanus drew a long, disapproving breath. “Well, your cousin is set to make this monstrous woman his duchess.”

Gervase stared at him. “He can’t. My father’s will restricts him to marrying Anne in order to gain the title.”

“Well, he’s thought of a way around that particular obstacle.” The faun told him what Hugh intended to do.

Gervase was alarmed. “Are you
quite
sure that’s what you heard?”

“Sure beyond all doubt. We could hear quite plainly through the door, couldn’t we, Penelope?”

The nymph nodded. “There’s no mistake. He intends to make it seem like a terrible accident, and in order to fool Mrs. Jenkins, he will go through all the motions of trying to save Anne, but all the time he’ll be making sure she drowns. It’s horrible.”

Gervase leaned weakly back against the pillar and closed his eyes. Sweet Jesu, Anne...

Chapter Twenty-three

Kitty slept alone in the White Boar’s principal bedchamber, Hugh having returned to his own room in order to preserve the story of Mr. and Miss Oadby. The actress’s brow was clear as she dreamed of the jewels, silks, and privilege that would be hers once Hugh had disposed of Anne. She stirred slightly as the sound of an approaching carriage disturbed the silence of the country night, and she stirred a little more as the vehicle halted at the inn, but she didn’t awaken.

In the next room, however, Hugh sat up with a start. He flung the bedclothes back and got up to see what had awoken him. He was naked, and the night air was cool upon his hot skin as he looked down at the newly arrived carriage. Its lamps pierced the darkness, and the only other light came from a lantern held by the sleepy landlord as the coachman lowered the steps for the occupants to alight. Hugh saw them only from above, a gentleman in a top hat and a lady with her hood raised, but he was struck by the immense concern the lady showed regarding a padlocked chest that was lashed to the rear of the carriage. The rest of the luggage could be brought up in the morning, she declared in an affected, nasal tone, but the chest had to be taken to their room without further ado. After instructing two grooms to attend to the matter, the landlord led the new arrivals into the inn, and they passed out of sight.

Hugh was most curious as to what such a weighty and apparently important item of luggage might contain—something valuable, that was certain. The contents of the mysterious chest faded from his thoughts as he reached for a cigar from the pocket of his coat, which had been left over the back of a chair. His lucifers were there too, and a moment later a curl of smoke drifted past the window as he gazed up at the starlit sky. By this time tomorrow night, he would be free of Anne Willowby, and the future he had always coveted would be his once and for all. “Hugh Mowbray, ninth Duke of Wroxford.” He murmured the title aloud and smiled. How gratifyingly grand it sounded.

He was brought back to the present by the sound of voices in the passage as the landlord conducted the new arrivals to a nearby room. The heavier footsteps of the two grooms followed as they staggered beneath the weight of the chest. Candlelight flickered beneath the door, and the lady’s nasal whine was only too apparent as she complained that the accommodation was not as specifically requested, but it wasn’t until her husband added his comments that Hugh froze, for the voice belonged to Sir Thomas Fanhope! A door opened, there was a terse exchange, then the door slammed, and the irritated innkeeper stomped past once more, muttering something under his breath about damned unreasonable nobs.

Hugh was so dismayed that he forgot the cigar, but he was reminded very abruptly when some hot ash fell into the forest of hair at his loins. With an alarmed gasp he dashed the ash away, but with little burning pinpricks it scattered over a certain exceedingly tender and vital organ instead. Holding himself and stifling little yelps of pain, he stubbed the cigar on the plate next to his unfinished bread and cheese supper, then hurried to the washstand to scoop cold water over the area in question. He dabbed himself dry with a towel and examined himself as carefully as he could in the darkness. He breathed out with relief, for his masculinity didn’t seem to have suffered too greatly.

He tossed a dark look toward the door. God
curse
Fanhope and his miserable spouse! Why couldn’t they have kept to their original timetable? Would they still be here tomorrow night when he did away with the Willowby creature? Damn it, he wasn’t even sure if they knew of Gervase’s enforced betrothal, and if they did, would they know the lady concerned was Anne Willowby of Llandower? This was a complication he could do without! His mind raced, but then he calmed a little. No one at the White Boar knew that Oadby and the ninth Duke of Wroxford were the same person, and since the Fanhopes were en route for the other side of the Atlantic, they would most likely have departed for Bristol by the time news of the unfortunate duke’s frantic attempts to save his fiancée began to spread. Their presence in the meantime still made things awkward, though, and Kitty had to be told before morning, so that a contingency plan could be formed to explain the use of the false identities.

Putting on his dressing gown, Hugh listened at the door before slipping out into the deserted passage. He could see candlelight shining from beneath the Fanhopes’ door further along, but apart from that all was quiet as he went to Kitty’s room adjacent to his own and tapped stealthily. “Kitty?” he whispered, but she didn’t respond, so he raised his hand to knock again.

Suddenly the door of the Fanhopes’ room opened, and to Hugh’s further dismay a resentful Sir Thomas emerged with a candle. He was thirty-five years old, of medium height, with blond hair and the sort of complexion that flushed easily, and was fashionably attired in a pea-green coat and cream trousers. His figure, formerly spare and in the peak of condition, had softened since his marriage, but he hadn’t lost his much-admired looks, which Hugh had always jealously dismissed as overrated. He was clearly under instructions to remonstrate yet again with the landlord, and didn’t perceive Hugh until the last moment. His china blue eyes widened. “Good God! Mowbray!” he cried, halting in amazement.

“Er, Fanhope, fancy meeting you here.” Hugh summoned a smile of sorts. There was no love lost between them, but they had always been civil.

“What in God’s name are you doing here? I thought you had accompanied Gervase to Italy so that he could postpone his betrothal to that Elmley woman. Was it Elmley? Maybe it was Beechley. Some tree or other, anyway, and she lives in the depths of Scotland or some other far-flung comer.” Sir Thomas eyed him again. “Here with a piece of muslin, eh?” he asked, having perceived that Hugh had been knocking at the door, which clearly wouldn’t happen if it was his own room.

“Yes. Someone we both know, actually.” The damned fellow had to be confided in to some extent; there was no other course.

Sir Thomas became still. “Are you saying it’s Kitty?”

Hugh nodded, and the other glanced hauntedly back along the passage. It was an action that spoke volumes of how much he dreaded his wife. Hugh thought quickly. “Look, can we talk in my room for a moment?”

“Talk? Well, I suppose so, but it had better not take long. I’m supposed to be putting the landlord in his place. We ordered the best room, but a Miss Oadby has taken it, and my wife is not pleased.”

Once inside, Hugh closed the door, and they faced each other. “Clearly you have not heard that Gervase is dead,” he said bluntly.

Sir Thomas’s jaw dropped. “Eh?”

Hugh told him the doctored version of events in Italy, and his accession to the title. He carefully omitted all mention of Anne Willowby, of whom it seemed Sir Thomas knew very little, and he trod very carefully when it came to the matter of Kitty. “You know how I’ve always wanted Kitty, but she wouldn’t glance at me because I didn’t have a title or fortune? Well, I have both now, and I’m enjoying the benefit, if you know what I mean.”

After his initial shock about Gervase’s fate, Sir Thomas gave a wistful grin. “Oh, yes, I know what you mean,” he murmured, noticing the unfinished bread and cheese and helping himself to a portion of the latter.

Before he realized it, a sudden question leapt to Hugh’s lips. “I don’t suppose you know why my cousin ended things so abruptly with her?”

Sir Thomas paused. “She told me
she
was the one who ended it. Not that I believed her, mind you, for she wanted to be his duchess, so nothing on God’s earth would have induced her to give him his congé. Besides, when she took up with me, it was clear she was afraid he’d tell me about something in her past. He didn’t, but she certainly thought he would. By Gad, this is a tasty bit of goat’s milk cheese,” he declared with relish.

Hugh stared at him.
“Goat’s
milk?” he repeated with a shudder. “Are you sure of that?”

“Oh, yes, I’d know it anywhere.”

Hugh felt ill.

Sir Thomas licked his fingers, and then looked at him. “Is there anything else, or can I toddle off to find that damned landlord?”

Hugh pushed the plate of cheese away. “I haven’t quite told you everything. As far as the landlord is concerned, Kitty and I are Mr. and Miss Oadby, a brother and sister.”

“So
Kitty
has the principal room?” Sir Thomas’s brows drew together. “Why in God’s name didn’t you simply pretend to be Mr. and
Mrs.
Oadby?” he asked.

“Because we quarreled during the journey, and she decided it would teach me a lesson if we were in separate rooms.”

“Rations, eh?” Sir Thomas was pleased to think that Hugh wasn’t getting full helpings of the dish he himself still craved.

“Look, Fanhope, you and I have got to handle this situation with care. It would be most awkward for Kitty if our little deception were to become known. She doesn’t want
any
slight upon her reputation, now she’s set to become titled and respectable, and I’m sure you wouldn’t wish to be the cause of her unhappiness. Besides, if your wife should learn about your past with an actress, it would be the doghouse for you, so I think it sensible all around if we keep each other’s little secrets, don’t you?”

Sir Thomas’s smile had faded. “Are you threatening me?”

“I’m only pointing out the disadvantages to us both. Your wife is a most, er, chaste lady, or so I understand, and her father does still control the purse strings, does he not?”

Sir Thomas’s eyes narrowed. “I never did like you, Mowbray.”

“The feeling’s mutual, but in this we’re forced to be allies, don’t you agree?”

After a moment Sir Thomas nodded. “Yes, I suppose we are.”

“We will all be strangers at the breakfast table, agreed?”

“Agreed. Is there anything else?”

“Just one thing. If we are strangers, you still cannot know about Gervase’s death, so don’t go back now and tell your wife all about it.”

“Eh? Oh, yes, I take your point.”

The other was about to go out when Hugh spoke again. “By the way, I was at the window when you arrived. What the hell is in that padlocked chest?”

Sir Thomas shrugged. “I haven’t the faintest notion.”

Hugh stared. “But you must have!”

“My dear wife’s lips are firmly sealed, and if I so much as mention it, she threatens to tell Papa I’ve been mistreating her. It’s not a threat to take lightly, because, as you so kindly reminded me, he controls the purse.”

“Upon which I’ve heard the duns are closing in.”

“If they are, I’ve seen no evidence.”

With that Sir Thomas went out, and as the door closed behind him, Hugh leaned his hands on a table and bowed his head with relief. All that had to be done now was warn Kitty. Taking a huge breath, he went again to try to wake her. He tapped constantly on her door until at last she admitted him.

Chapter Twenty-four

Anne’s birthday dawned fine and clear, and when she left her room, wearing a yellow-and-white striped muslin gown, with her willful hair painstakingly pinned and ribboned, she was determined to banish Charles Danby entirely from her thoughts. Today she had to devote herself to thoughts of Hugh Mowbray.

Mrs. Jenkins had already told her that Penelope was back in her rightful place, but Anne still wanted to see for herself, and so she went to the drawing room before going downstairs. The lamp holder was complete again, and in the cold light of day the only sensible explanation—admittedly a weak one— was that she and the housekeeper had both been more upset the night before than they’d realized and had somehow allowed themselves to be carried away. What else could it have been?

Everyone was in the kitchens, even Mog and Jack, who tolerated each other when it suited them. The cat reposed on Mrs. Jenkins’s sunlit chair by the fire and looked so sedate and relaxed it was impossible to imagine her being hysterical enough to do the damage she had in the drawing room, and maybe here in the kitchens as well. Jack—ever hopeful—was eyeing the table, where stood the birthday cake Mrs. Jenkins had baked, but the housekeeper had determined that not a single crumb would pass his thieving canine lips.