The Saint (29 page)

“My income is hardly the least of it, although it surely comes after a few other things. The Manchester mill, for example. I know about the offer from Mr. Johnston and Mr. Kennedy. A very large sum of money just for your small share. With my forty-five percent under your control, not only could you sell them a majority ownership, but you could become very wealthy in the process. My yearly income is insignificant in comparison.”

Nigel's expression darkened. Down below, the sea roared against the shore. Gulls glided overhead, and the snapping wind bore the scent of ocean salt.

“I will not deny that it would be convenient for me to sell my share of the mill, Bianca. I have some debts. Great-uncle chose to leave me virtually nothing besides the estate, and barely enough income to maintain it. I had expected more.”

“You had expected everything, and lived in Paris as if it were already yours.”

“I certainly did not expect him to renew a connection severed long ago and give so much to the daughter of—”

“Of his only son and the woman whom he loved,” she interrupted. “That is not how you planned to say it, of course. You almost betrayed your true intentions for me, as well as your prejudices. That is the reason I will not marry you, aside from the fact that I can feel no love toward a man who is a blackmailer. You would never allow your wife to perform. If I were willing to be some man's caged bird, as you so aptly phrased it in London, I would have gladly chosen Laclere.”

He faced her squarely, blocking her progress along the cliff path. “Your feelings for him are those of a child infatuated for the first time. They will pass. You will be happier with me. We have much more in common.”

“How would you know what I have in common with him? Do you think that you know either one of us?”

“I must insist on the wedding, Bianca. It is not open for negotiation. If you doubt my affection or find none of your own for me, we need not share a bed, but we will marry.”

“You cannot insist on a wedding, Nigel. Even in France the woman must agree to it.”

“You agreed to it by coming with me.”

“I only came with you to get you out of England.”

“Do you think it makes a difference where I am? I said that I would ruin him if you did not cooperate and I can do so from Paris as surely as in London.”

“I do not think that you can. I think that his reputation will take more than one letter to an acquaintance to destroy. He is not his brother. He will not break so easily. You need to be there, stirring the pot, spreading the word.”

“If so, I will return and spread it during high season. Do not play games with me, Bianca. I am not a man to cross.”

Her resistance brought out the sullen aspects of his temperament. His expression had grown saturnine and his tone prickled with resentment and menace.

“I do not think that you will spread stories, Nigel. You see, I am prepared to pay you two thousand pounds a year to keep silent about what you know.”

“As your husband, I would have much more.”

“You will never be my husband, and if you ruin him, you will have nothing. If you demand one shilling more, I will give you nothing and let you do your worst.”

He paced away in annoyance and cast her a hooded, inspecting sneer. “Who would have thought such a sweet face hid such a cunning mind, cousin? Mrs. Gaston said not to underestimate you, that you could not be all childish innocence if Laclere was interested in you, but I only saw those big blue eyes.” He strode back and peered at her dangerously. She stood her ground. After all, when it came to hovering, Nigel could not begin to compete with Vergil.

“It should all be mine,” he snarled. “Your father was dead to him, and I was all he had. If Milton had not stolen his affection he would have been kinder to me, but instead, all I heard about was that high-blooded Duclairc until I couldn't bear to visit the old man anymore. Then, with his death, he shackles me with Woodleigh, but makes sure that I don't have the money to enjoy it.”

“Perhaps he challenged you with his bequest, to make something of the estate and thus of yourself. You could hire a good manager and learn. Laclere would help you.”

“I do not want Laclere's help!”

“Then take the two thousand that I offer or be damned!”

He paced away and back again. Winter fields spread beside him on one side, and the cliff dropped to the sea on the other. This time he strode up so close to her that they almost touched.

She looked into his hard countenance and a tremor chilled her spine.

He had passed from annoyance to cold fury, and from resentment to bitterness. She glanced askance at her position on the cliff path. Very casually she tried to step away from him and into the field.

His arm swung up and blocked her. He swaddled her in the embrace of his great coat and studied her face as if he weighed a great judgment. Ten feet away, the ground disappeared where the cliff dropped to the sea.

“Unfortunately, Bianca, two thousand a year does not begin to solve my financial needs.”

His apologetic tone made panic clutch her heart. The sea and ground appeared to swirl around her. His embrace tightened.

She clawed on his arm. “Stop this now. I am not worth murder, Nigel. The mill is gone.”

He entwined one hand furiously in her hair. “What do you mean, the mill is gone?”

“I sold my share to Vergil before I left. For one hundred pounds. The papers were waiting for his signature at my solicitor's.”

“You sold a partnership worth almost a quarter of a million pounds for one hundred? Are you a complete fool?” He yelled so furiously that her ears rang.

“Not a complete fool,” she said. “Not
your
fool, for one thing. If you forced me into marriage, I had no intention of letting you sell that mill out from under Vergil. Nor would you enjoy the fruits of its sale. And if you chose to expose him out of spite, I made sure that he would at least be wealthy in his social oblivion.”

“It is not legal. It cannot be.”

“Why not? My trustee and guardian approved, I am sure. And if it is not, I am told that your courts work very slowly on such matters. We will all be dead before it is resolved.”

“That is a very real possibility, sweet girl,” Nigel snarled. “I was rather counting on selling that mill, you see. You have placed me in an impossible situation.”

Her feet left the ground as he began carrying her. Frantic, she kicked and pummeled and bit. Grappling like a madman, he tried to haul her to the cliff.

Suddenly the fight left him. He set her down again and stared at her in shock. His gaze appeared inward, as if what stunned him was in his own soul.

“God, Bianca, I don't know what came over me. I would never—”

Something distracted him. His head turned, and a frown broke over his squinting eyes.

She caught her breath. Heart pounding, she followed his gaze down to the house.

A coach was stopping there. Mrs. Gaston had returned.

Bianca extricated herself from Nigel's hold and ran down the hill. She staggered out of the orchard just as Mrs. Gaston was handed out of the carriage.

The man who offered his help was not the coachman.

Bianca stopped a hundred yards from the house and tried to make sense of the sudden appearance of this visitor.

Nigel caught up. He came up beside her and his expression showed that he had not expected this development, either.

“What the hell is Witherby doing here?” he muttered.

chapter
21

V
ergil's hired mount was tiring, but he urged him on. His impatience would not permit rest now. Too much time had been lost in Calais. It had taken him two days to track down the inn where Nigel and Bianca had stayed, and find the servant who had overheard their plans.

The discovery that Nigel and Bianca had not gone on to Paris, but instead had removed to an isolated cottage on the Normandy bluffs, only deepened his misgivings.

Two women were traveling with the man, the servant had said. The news hardly reassured him. The other woman was most likely Mrs. Gaston.

They were playing their old game, but the prize was very high this time. Too high. The value of Bianca's inheritance, hell, the value of the mill alone, exceeded anything they had gotten with their blackmail. If Bianca resisted once in France …

For all intents and purposes, they had killed before.

It had not been hard to follow them. Nigel had hired a superb coach for their journey, and such things were noted in villages. In the last one, some farmers had directed him to the cottage by the sea, which had been leased by the blond Englishman.

He angled toward the timbered and plastered farmhouse hugging the rugged rise. A sparsely planted garden cringed inside low stone walls. A screen of bare orchard blocked his view of the coast, but the roar of the sea droned louder as he approached.

No one emerged with his call. He dismounted and entered.

Three people sitting in the cottage expressed no surprise with his arrival. Bianca looked at him fearfully, Nigel only scowled, and Mrs. Gaston smiled with contentment.

Another person waited in the cottage too. Someone Vergil had not expected, and who grinned at the way Vergil reacted to the shock of seeing him.

“It took you long enough, Laclere,” Cornell Witherby said.

Bianca jumped up and ran into Vergil's arms. “You should not have come,” she said as she kissed him.

“He had to, Miss Kenwood,” Witherby said. “Didn't you, Laclere? There was no way you would allow her to leave like that.” He turned to Mrs. Gaston. “I told you that he would come.”

Nigel rose and distanced himself from the other two. “I want you to know that I had no role in this, Laclere. I did not realize they sought to lure you here. I did not even know Witherby was this whore's cohort.”

“To say you had no role is an exaggeration,” Vergil said. “You may have been duped by Mrs. Gaston, and this may not be unfolding as you expected, but you did what was needed to get Bianca to accompany you.”

“He said that he knew about us, and about you and the mill,” Bianca said. “He threatened to ruin you.”

He took her face in his hands and ignored the others for a precious moment. “You should have told him to do his worst, darling. If it meant having you with me, I would have gladly been ruined.” He embraced her closely and looked at Witherby. “I know how Mrs. Gaston procured my brother's letters, but learning about the Earl of Glasbury— You are the worst scoundrel, Witherby. You befriended my sister and then betrayed her confidences. Only she could have told you about the earl.”

“I really wish you had left it all alone, Laclere.”

“You killed my brother. I could not leave that alone.”

“I killed no one.”

“You may as well have pulled the trigger.”

“No one was supposed to die,” Mrs. Gaston said. “We asked for a little money, that was all. Not even very much. A few thousand. Why the viscount and others felt the need to go and kill themselves—well, that isn't our fault they reacted so rashly.”

She appeared annoyed by the bad behavior these men had shown, and the trouble it had caused.

“First Milton and Dante, then Pen. Finally me. You two have used the Duclairc family again and again in this crime of yours.”

Witherby got up and strolled over to the mantel of the hearth. A pistol rested on it. “Your family has been limping along for generations. The weakness begged to be exploited.”

“It was not weakness that you took advantage of, but trust and affection. Why didn't you make it complete? You knew about Bianca and me, Witherby. Why didn't I get a blackmail note too? Why this elaborate game to bring me here?”

“It would have been just like you to take the fall, Laclere. Or worse, use it to find us out. I have known for months that you were looking for us. Your sister told me. Oh, she does not know the meaning of your absences, but I saw what you were up to when she described your frequent journeys and your deep interest in Milton's life. I knew it was just a matter of time. And that drama with the earl and Hampton—eventually you would remember that one other person knew Glasbury's secret. Your sister.” He lifted the pistol off the mantel. “You really should have left it alone.”

Vergil watched those fingers close on the weapon. “The accidents at Laclere Park. It was not Nigel trying to kill Bianca, but the two of you trying to kill me, wasn't it?”

Bianca's head snapped around. She looked at Witherby and Mrs. Gaston with shock. Vergil felt the chill of fear shake her.

Nigel's eyes widened. “You thought I was trying to kill my cousin?”

“Do not pretend that you do not have it in you,” Bianca said softly.

For some reason, that checked Nigel's indignation. His face flushed and he averted his gaze from her.

“It entered my mind,” Vergil said. “However, if Mrs. Gaston was visiting that day that Bianca and I went to see your uncle's effects, I think it is safe to say that the shots that missed us came from her.”

Nigel turned in horror to Mrs. Gaston. “You said that you were in the park when I found you gone on my return. That you had slipped out so they wouldn't find you in the house.”

“Laclere is guessing, Nigel. He is making accusations without basis.”

“The rock fall, that was you, Witherby,” Vergil said. “You had just arrived that morning. You saw me following Bianca, and followed me yourself.”

“You were getting too close, Laclere. We learned that you had taken Milton's place in Manchester. Eventually you would learn about the visit to Mr. Thomas. I did not make the choice easily.” He gestured with the pistol. “Nor do I make this choice easily, either. However, I see no alternative. I think we will all take a walk now. The sea is beautiful this time of day.”

Bianca subtly cringed. Nigel went white. Vergil gazed at that pistol, and at the tight resolve on the face of a man he had trusted as a friend.

“Witherby, I did not come to France alone.”

“You came
here
alone.”

“I am ahead of the others by a half hour, no more. The carriage must stay on the roads, while I rode cross-country. In minutes the others will be here. Even if they are delayed and you succeed in forcing us off that cliff and getting away, they know about Mrs. Gaston already, and will soon learn about you.”

“You are bluffing. You would never risk having anyone else learn about your brother, or about you and your ward.”

“I can trust the men I told.”

Witherby gestured more distinctly toward the door with the pistol. “If what you say is true, I have nothing to lose. I will take my chances. Let us go. You, too, Nigel.”

Mrs. Gaston began to rise.

“No,” Witherby said. “You stay here.”

Turning Bianca under his arm, Vergil followed Nigel out of the cottage. Witherby and the pistol hovered at their side.

“It was her idea, wasn't it?” Vergil asked, glancing back to where Mrs. Gaston sat on her chair.

“Not really. It was a game at first. When it worked with the first one, when this money just appeared so easily—it wasn't hard at all. The wonder is that it doesn't happen all the time. All those secrets that half the world already suspects but pretends they don't—hell, Lord Fairhall wasn't even very discreet about his taste for little girls.”

“Are you her lover, along with Nigel?”

Witherby shook his head. “My interest in your sister was not a feint, Laclere. Mrs. Gaston and I are only friends, and business associates.”

They approached the barren orchard. The tree branches made a web of snarled lines against the sky. Vergil looked at Bianca's face. She was being brave, but her eyes glistened with worry and fear.

He tightened his hold in reassurance, and stretched his hearing for the sounds of a carriage.

He heard nothing but the close roar of the surf.

“How did you know about my brother, Witherby?”

“His reclusiveness. His lack of marriage, despite being a viscount. It is a common pattern. No doubt many others suspected. As for Manchester, and Mr. Clark, that was an accident. I saw him entering a bookseller almost two years ago, and then leaving with a letter. I merely asked in the shop for the name of the man who had just left, and learned it was Mr. Clark. A pound procured the information that his letters came from Manchester. Well, it was a delicious mystery, and I had to look into it. Imagine my shock at learning how he had debased your family with that mill and that lover.”

“And your friendship with me counted for nothing as you exploited that.”

Witherby's face flushed. “I did you a favor. You got the title, after all.”

“I did not want the title, least of all at such a cost.”

Nigel, pacing ahead of them, suddenly halted in his steps and looked east.

“Thank God,” he muttered.

Vergil and Bianca turned. The speck of a carriage rolled along the road, growing larger by the instant.

Witherby tensed beside them. For an instant his eyes went wild with panic. Then he sighed deeply and composed himself. The pistol fell, to hang limply from his arm by his side.

“Who is it?” he asked quietly in the voice of a man needing to know what he faced. It was the request of one friend to another, so that preparations could be made.

“Hampton and Burchard. St. John made one of his ships available to bring us over, so he may be with them.” Vergil glanced to the cottage, where Mrs. Gaston remained. “I expect that my brother also insisted on riding along, although I suggested he remain in Calais.”

“Almost the entire Dueling Society, then.”

Not only the Dueling Society. As the carriage rolled up beside the cottage, it was clear that Dante sat up with the coachman because the carriage was full. After Hampton and Burchard and St. John stepped out, a man remained inside, his hook-nosed profile backlit by the far-open window.

The Dueling Society did not react much to seeing Witherby. Vergil could read them reaching the necessary conclusions, however, and saw the dismay in their eyes.

Adrian walked over and removed the pistol from Witherby's hand. “You will not be needing this just yet. If you choose pistols, you can have it back then.”

Bianca stiffened under Vergil's embrace. She looked up into his eyes with a worried expression that made his heart clench.

Witherby shook his head. “I will only do it that way if you allow Mrs. Gaston to leave first. Otherwise there will be a trial and all of it will come out, Laclere. Your brother, the earl—all of it, I swear.”

Dante overheard. He strode forward with flaming eyes. “She does not go free, Vergil.”

Vergil released Bianca and took him aside. “If she goes back to England, if we swear the evidence we have against them—not only our brother's name will be ruined, but those of other men. Your name will come up too. I can't allow it, and if her freedom is the price of silence, I will pay it.”

“What about what I am willing to pay? I don't see this as only your decision.”

“If you think about it, it will be your decision as well.”

Dante's expression turned hard. “Then let me stand to him. It is my place to do so.”

“It is not yours any more than it is Pen's.”

“I'll be damned if it isn't.”

“Dante, you are not a good shot, and if he chooses sabres you will have no chance at all. He will kill you.”

“He may kill
you.
”

Vergil looked back at Witherby, whose face had gone impassive. “No, I don't think so.”

Vergil nodded to Adrian, who entered the cottage. It took him a while to explain things to Mrs. Gaston, and Vergil wondered just what Burchard was saying to her. When they emerged, her face was flushed and Adrian's dark eyes glowed.

Wellington climbed out of the coach, and subjected Mrs. Gaston to a scornful examination. “I trust that I will not see you again in England, madame.”

She turned even more red.

The Iron Duke gestured to the road. “I recommend that you head west. If I catch up with you on the road later, I cannot promise to behave as a gentleman.”

Composing herself and assuming a disdainful expression, Mrs. Gaston walked toward the stable where Nigel's hired coach waited. She did not look back.

Wellington turned his attention on Witherby and became the image of barely contained rage. “Tell him to choose his weapons.”