Lord Somerton's Heir (37 page)

‘It’s always nice to know I am not a rapist,’ Sebastian observed drily. He glanced out to sea. ‘I’m anxious to get back to Brantstone. Both Lady Somerton and I could do with a hot bath and some clean clothes.’

‘You do look rather disreputable,’ Matt said with a cheeky grin. ‘Did you sleep well?’

‘Very,’ Sebastian replied with a smile. ‘Now, has anyone got any money I can leave with old Mother Shipton for our board?’

Sebastian stood at the end of the bed and looked down at the miserable young woman, who sniffled into her handkerchief. He tried to dredge up some shred of pity for Fanny Lynch but the memory of how close he had come to being forced to marry the wretch made him push his stepfather’s spirit behind him. He may be able to find it in his heart to forgive her, but he would never forget.

Fanny looked up at him with red-rimmed eyes. ‘Have you,’ she began in a tremulous voice, ‘come to take me home?’

Sebastian stared at her. ‘Home?’

‘To Brantstone?’

‘I don’t know where your home is, Fanny, but it’s not and never has been Brantstone. Your presence there was based entirely on lies and deception.’

Her lip wobbled. ‘I didn’t know!’ she wailed. ‘Freddy only told me that Lord Somerton had offered us his home and would look after us.’

Sebastian may have felt inclined to believe the woman’s credulity, had he not remembered the very active part Fanny had played in Freddy’s deceptions, from the cheating at cards through to that ghastly night in the library.

‘As it is, I am considering turning you over to the constable. You will be lucky not to hang for the amount of silver you have stolen from me.’

‘You wouldn’t do that.’ Fanny stared at him with large, water filled eyes. ‘I will be transported to New South Wales and never see Freddy again.’

Sebastian hesitated. Much as he disliked Fanny, he hated to be the bearer of bad news.

‘Freddy is dead. His body was washed up on a beach two days ago.’

Genuine tears welled anew in the large blue eyes and spilled down her pale cheek. ‘Dead? Not Freddy, not my brother… You have to help me.’ She clutched at his sleeve but he stepped back out of her reach. ‘Don’t turn me over to the constable. Please, Lord Somerton. I’ve said I’m sorry for what we did. Freddy’s always looked after me. I don’t know what to do.’

Sebastian refrained from the angry words that sprang to mind. Fanny did not need to be reminded that her brother was a murderer who would have — should have — died at the end of a hangman’s noose.

‘I won’t hand you over to the constable. You will be looked after here and, when you are well enough to travel, you will be given the sum of fifty pounds and an introduction to a respectable lady in London who can find a position for you as a lady’s companion, but it is entirely up to you what path you choose to take.’

‘But, Sebastian —’

He hardened his heart. ‘I’m sorry. I will do no more for you.’

‘And very generous, his lordship is. You should thank the lord for your good fortune.’ The woman who was caring for Fanny, and evidently knew the better part of the story, interceded.

Fanny cast her an uncertain glance. She looked down at the sodden piece of cloth in her hand. ‘Yes. It is more than I deserve. Thank you, Lord Somerton.’

For the first time, Sebastian caught a glance of the potential the young woman could have in the right circumstances but he could not, and would not, dictate her future. That was entirely up to Fanny.

She looked up at him and, for the first time, a smile caught at the corners of her mouth. ‘When is the wedding?’

He raised an eyebrow. ‘In the new year. How did you…?’

‘I guessed. I always thought you and Lady Somerton were meant for each other. I really rather liked Colonel Dempster,’ the corners of her mouth drooped. ‘Do you suppose…?’

Sebastian glared at her.

He put on his hat and, inclining his head to acknowledge Fanny’s nurse, left the room and the last of his responsibility to Fanny Lynch behind him.

Chapter 30

Bennet took a long draught of his pipe and closed his eyes, feeling the warmth of the late autumn sun on his face. He had found a sunny corner of the kitchen garden to take his ease and he considered that life had definitely taken a turn for the better.

‘Mr Bennet.’

He opened his eyes. Peter Thompson stood in front him, holding a battered tin box out before him.

‘What’cha got there boy?’

Peter swallowed. ‘The men who was tearing down the stables found it hidden behind a loose brick in a wall,’ he said. ‘I think it was Amy’s. I used to see her with it when she thought no one was looking.’

Bennet considered the object, a sad remnant of the girl’s life.

‘Nice it was found,’ he said.

Peter held it out. ‘I want you to take it to his lordship,’ he said. ‘There’s things in there. I don’t know what they are, but he will.’

‘What sort of things?’

Peter just shook his head and shoved it at Bennet before turning on his heels and running away.

Bennet looked at the object on his lap and opened the lid. It wasn’t locked. The contents looked like the sort of detritus he would expect of a young girl’s life: ribbons, dried flowers, the sort of cheap trinkets pedlars at a fair would sell and, hidden in a corner, a small, apparently insignificant object. Bennet fished it out and held it up.

He let out a low whistle.

Sebastian poured two glasses of French brandy and handed one to Harry. Harry swirled the liquid and took an appreciative sniff of the fumes that rose from the glass.

‘When’s the wedding?’ he enquired.

‘March,’ Sebastian said.

Harry cocked an eyebrow. ‘Have to say, old chap, I’m a bit hurt you haven’t asked me to stand by you.’

Sebastian set his glass down. ‘I have something to show you,’ he said.

He opened the cigar box that stood on the table and produced a small, silver object: a button.

‘What’s that?’ Harry picked it up and squinted at it. ‘Collecting buttons from the old regiment, Alder?’

‘So you recognise it, Harry?’

‘Of course I do. It’s an officer’s button from the Twenty-Second. Careless of you, Alder.’

‘It’s not mine. It was found in a box, hidden behind a brick in the old stables.’

Harry stiffened and set the button back on the table, recoiling from it.

He forced a smile. ‘How extraordinary. Could have been there for years.’

‘No. The box belonged a housemaid here at Brantstone, Amy Thompson. Did you know her, Dempster?’

The faintest hesitation gave lie to the words that followed. ‘How the hell would I know a housemaid from Brantstone?’

‘Perhaps you can tell me? Did she accompany her father over to Fairchild Hall? Did you see her in the village? Did you meet her at Brantstone?’

Harry picked up the button, turning it by its shank. ‘I saw her at the church one Sunday when I was staying with Georgie. She was lovely, Alder. Really lovely.’ He let the button, with its betraying insignia of an acorn, drop back on to the table.

Sebastian sighed and retrieved the small but significant object. Only one officer, other than himself, would have worn the insignia of the Twenty-Second Regiment of Foot in this neighbourhood. He knew as soon as Bennet showed it to him that he had found Amy Thompson’s secret lover. Had he also found her killer?

He looked down at the button in his hand. It carried such a weight. A man’s life, but it had already cost a life — two lives.

‘You have the death of two on your conscience, Harry. Amy carried your child.’

Harry flung himself out of his chair and walked across to the window, running his hands through his hair.

‘It was an accident, Alder.’ He turned to face Sebastian, his face crumpled in distress. ‘There’s not a day goes by when I don’t think about it…what I did…’

‘What did you do?’

‘We used to meet in the pavilion up behind the lake. When I was staying with Georgie I’d send the girl a ribbon. That was our secret signal. Different colour for different days. The last time…’ Harry went down on his haunches covering his face with his hands. ‘She told me she was with child. She started making all sorts of demands. I couldn’t think straight.’

Sebastian regarded his friend without sympathy. ‘Plenty of men find themselves in your situation, Dempster. They don’t resort to murder.’

Harry rose to his feet and stared at Sebastian. ‘Murder? It wasn’t murder. I admit I lost my temper. I panicked. She took a step backwards and slipped. I couldn’t stop her. She fell backwards and hit her head on the corner of the bench.’ His breath came in short bursts as if he had been running. ‘I can still hear the crack. I didn’t know what to do.’

‘Was she still alive?’

Harry shook his head. ‘No.’ He took a great shuddering breath. ‘I waited for hours until it was dark and she didn’t stir. No pulse. She just lay there, cold and dead with her eyes wide open. I carried her body down to the lake and I put her in. There wasn’t even any blood, Alder. No trace that it had ever happened.’

‘And you went on with your life,’ Sebastian said without disguising the disgust in his voice, ‘leaving her family to mourn; her mother to suffer an apoplexy, her body to be buried in unconsecrated ground.’

‘She was only a housemaid!’ Harry all but screamed.

Sebastian didn’t answer. He held out his hand, palm open with the incriminating silver button. ‘When did you lose this?’

‘After one of our trysts,’ he said. ‘I was wearing uniform on my way to a party. It was annoying to find it missing but I just thought a thread had come loose.’ He scowled. ‘If I had known the chit had purloined it…’

‘She loved you. She was carrying your child and you threw her away like a piece of refuse, Harry.’ Sebastian could not keep the disgust from his voice.

Harry finally met his eyes. ‘What are you going to do?’

Sebastian shook his head. ‘What are you going to do, Dempster? You have twenty-four hours before I report this to the Chief Constable. If what you say is true then you won’t hang…or you can be the coward I think you are and run. The choice is yours.’

Harry stared at his friend. ‘That’s it? You would turn me in? After Spain, after Inez…after everything? God damn it, you’re no saint. You’ve killed!’

Sebastian’s gaze did not waver. ‘When I have killed it has been in battle, Dempster. I don’t have the death of an innocent woman and her unborn child on my conscience, but I counted you my friend. I owe you the chance to do the honourable thing.’

Harry gave a snort of laughter. ‘Honour? God, Alder, I lost my honour years ago. Did you know I was all but cashiered from the Army? It was all done quietly, my reputation intact.’

‘What did you do?’

‘Gambling debts. Not just a few guineas here and there. Debts I could never hope to repay, even if my father dropped dead tomorrow.’

Sebastian narrowed his eyes.

Harry sighed heavily. ‘You may as well know the whole story. I founded a company: The Golden Adventurers Club. Forged some convincing reports of gold mines in Guinea and promised a fortune to be made. It was so easy to gull the investors. I soon made my fortune back, paid off my creditors.’

‘And the investors?’

Harry’s smile made Sebastian’s flesh crawl. ‘Oh dear, the mines were a failure. As far as they knew, a legitimate investment had been badly made. They didn’t make a fuss, didn’t dare risk their own reputations.’

‘And Anthony was one of them. He put everything he owned into that investment in one last gamble to rid himself of Freddy. Did he know it was you?’

‘No. I covered my tracks well. Even pretended to be one of the fools caught by the collapse.’

‘Anthony lost everything, including Isabel’s jointure in that venture.’

‘Well more fool him,’ Harry said, his swagger and confidence returning.

Sebastian rose to his feet. ‘Get out of my house, Dempster. You have twenty-four hours to examine your conscience.’

Harry straightened his shoulders and, without looking at Sebastian, walked over to the door.

As he put his hand to the doorknob, he said, ‘Your problem is you are too trusting, Alder. You see good in people where there isn’t any to be found.’

‘Get out before I change my mind.’ Sebastian turned his back on the man he had called his closest friend.

He heard the click of the door and waited a long moment before he let out his breath. He knew the decision Harry would make. He would run, like the coward he had shown himself to be.

Tomorrow he would exercise his powers as magistrate and give an order for the body of Amy Thompson to be buried within the churchyard with a proper Christian funeral. He had already housed the Thompson family in a grace and favour cottage on the estate and found a proper nurse for Mrs Thompson. He could not bring Amy back to life, but he could give her some peace.

Isabel looked at the card on the silver tray, her fingers playing with the sharp edges for a minute. Her maid shifted uneasily, anticipating the response, but Isabel nodded.

‘Show her in.’

She rose to her feet as Lady Kendall entered the room in a waft of her exotic perfume, wearing a soft, green-sprigged dress and green pelisse.

Isabel extended her hand. Lady Kendall’s green eyes flashed in surprise and she took the hand in her own green, gloved fingers.

‘Thank you for seeing me,’ she said.

‘Please take a seat.’ Isabel indicated the chair across from her. ‘Roberts, some tea for my guest.’

‘I came to offer my felicitations on your betrothal to Lord Somerton. He is a fine man,’ Lady Kendall said as the maid closed the door behind her.

Isabel allowed herself a gentle smile as she thought about Sebastian. ‘He is. I am fortunate to have found such a good man,’ she agreed.

Lady Kendall fidgeted. To see Georgiana Kendall discomfited was a novel experience for Isabel. She looked at the woman curiously.

‘What can I do for you?’

‘I have come to make my peace with you, Lady Somerton. Anthony is dead, so it falls to me. The knowledge that your first husband may not have been what you thought him to be has plagued me,’ Lady Kendall began delicately.