Shall We Dance? (27 page)

Perry sat down beside her once more. This was why he'd had to tell her, even if telling her damned him forever in her eyes. She had to realize that she could be in danger. “And I can't blame you, pet. If you're the queen's daughter, her true daughter, some will want it proved, and some will want you…removed.”

She looked up at him, her eyes flat and cold. “And if I'm Sir Sydney Smith's daughter, or Perceval's, or any of the others who visited the queen in Blackheath? Then the queen is destroyed, once and forever. Forgive me, Perry, but I can't seem to forget why you came here in the first place.”

Perry slipped his arms around her shoulders, but she held herself stiff in his embrace. “I didn't come to your rooms last night to seduce you, Amelia, or to steal the queen's secrets. I came because I couldn't stay away.”

She nodded, stiffly. “Yes, of course. I must be fascinating, in my own rather unique way,” she said, turning her head away from him. “But now that your curiosity is satisfied, now that you know I am only a woman, you may leave me. Leave me alone.”

“I can't, Amelia. You have to understand, now, that you could be in danger.”

She shrugged his arms away and slid her bare feet to the floor, putting half the distance of the large chamber
between them. “Oh, yes, I'm in danger. Again. From this Rolin person who is your enemy, not mine. From your uncle and Lord Liverpool. From Nestor, of all people. All of them,
using
me. But none so badly as you used me last night, Perry.”

She drew herself up, looking more queenly than ever Caroline had been able to do, and said, “I asked you to leave, My Lord. I shall handle my life now, not you, not anyone else.”

Perry knew defeat when it stared him in the face. “At least let Clive stay. And Nestor, although I don't know what good that zealot will be.”

She nodded, biting her bottom lip between her teeth. Perry picked up his evening coat once more and left the chamber, for he had somewhere to go.

“Y
OU KNOW
, N
EVVIE
, you keep barging in here and one day I'm going to be shocked into an apoplexy, and it will be on your head,” Sir Willard said, pulling off his nightcap. The same young maid who'd been warming his bed the first time Perry had “visited” him in his chamber grabbed the nightcap and held it against her ample breasts as she ran for the dressing room.

Perry just stood there, staring at his uncle.

“And look at you. Been out all night, haven't you? Dressed in the dark, too. Hair all which way, and that's a morning beard or I miss my guess.” Sir Willard pointed at Perry's jacket. “That's ruined, you know. God, son, you're a disgrace to the name.”

“Oh, I doubt that, Willie. I think you bear off the palm
with that one,” Perry said, locating a decanter on a table in the corner and pouring himself three fingers of Burgundy. He downed the liquid, then returned to the bed to glare at his uncle. “How long were you going to wait before you told me?”

Sir Willard didn't bother to dissemble. “I warned you to stay away from her until this was over.”

“Oh yes, that you did, in your own inimitable way. I remember. Now tell me what you've got.”

“Get me a glass of Burgundy,” Sir Willard said, pulling up the covers. “It's not too early, as the sun isn't quite up yet. You didn't do anything stupid, did you, Nevvie? I'm not sure, but I think you could be shot if you've just come from doing what I think you've been doing, and if she is…she is…well, I won't say it.”

“No,” Perry said, all but throwing the requested wineglass at his uncle, “but I will. If she's really the Princess of Wales. Damn you, Willie, how many intrigues are you running?”

“Liverpool doesn't know,” Sir Willard said, then took a sip from his glass. “I'm not harebrained, Nevvie. Caroline detests the man and with good reason, as he often served as Prinney's conduit, delivering his nasty notes to her. A real stickler, Liverpool, and unwilling to see what's in front of his face, in front of all our faces. Our new king? What a complete waste! I doubt he'll live out the year if he doesn't stop insisting his leeches bleed him every time he hiccups. We could be on the brink of revolt if he dies, and a squalling infant is all we're left with. No, Nevvie, I may be Tory to the bone, but I'm
England to the marrow. Rather the Whigs to settle the populace for now, until clearer heads can take power once more.”

“Meaning you, of course,” Perry said, a sour taste in his mouth. “How were you going to manage that?”

“Through your pretty face, of course. A plain girl like that? I never thought for a moment that you'd fail to gain her affection. But damn it, boy, I never thought you stupid enough to ruin her. If word were to get out—if you've put a bastard in her belly—”

“She's not the king's daughter. She can't be.”

Sir Willard, who had been getting dangerously red in the face, shut his mouth, looked at his nephew. “You're sure? You've found proof of her birth? Found something in that damn tin box, did you? Well, good. Bring what you found to me, I'll burn it. We're not done yet, Nevvie.”

“I am,” Perry said, so disgusted he didn't know if he could remain in his uncle's presence another moment without disgracing himself completely by hitting an old man. “She told me to go away. I left Clive there, because you've put her in danger, you stupid bastard, but I've been banned from the household.”

“With the proof?”

Perry threw his wineglass at the fireplace. “No, blast it, without the proof. If there is proof. God's teeth! Amelia won't speak to me, the queen's household is crawling with intrigue, you're sitting here like some overfed spider weaving webs—and I've still got Jarrett Rolin to deal with, damn you.”

“He hasn't shown himself? It's been weeks,” Sir Willard said. “Maybe he's given up, gone home.”

“Would you?” Perry asked, staring at his uncle.

“Probably not. I've taken the time to learn more of what you and your friend Westham did to him. You were both very naughty, you know. It will be years before he can show his face in Society again, if ever. You're a very mean man, Nevvie, for all you act the fribble. Have you set out traps for him?”

“I haven't come here to discuss Jarrett Rolin. What made you think Amelia may be the heir? And don't lie to me, Uncle, because I'm not in the mood for lies.”

Sir Willard snapped his mouth shut tight and returned Perry's stare. Then shrugged. “Oh, very well. Liverpool put it to me to find the most damning piece of evidence against the queen that I could. Ordered me, damn him.”

“His mistake,” Perry said, summoning a weak smile. “Go on.”

“I'm going, I'm going. I hired a few men to ferret out what I could, which was very little that wasn't already known.” He drained his wineglass. “And then I realized that if anyone knew anything damning about Caroline it would be Henry Brougham, her advocate, although he's as power mad as Liverpool in his own way. I spent several mornings in my town coach, sitting outside Brougham's residence, until I noticed one particular fellow who scurried there early every morning and did not leave again until late at night. So I set a man to watching him for another week, and was informed that
the minion often carried papers with him when he left—and didn't always bring them back the next morning.”

Perry was fairly certain he could follow the tale from there, but allowed his uncle to finish.

“Had one of my men make a visit to this fellow's rooms one afternoon when I was sure he'd be gone. He brought back some interesting notes that I read, then had returned to the rooms. Quite an astonishing theory the man was pursuing. Quite astonishing.”

“Yes, I've met the man. Bernard Nestor, correct?”

Sir Willard's face turned red once more. “Damn you, Perry, how do you know that?”

“You don't know, Uncle?” Perry asked, at last smiling in real amusement. “Bernard Nestor is currently serving, not well, I'll admit, as butler to Her Majesty. Oh, and Clive and Mrs. Fitzhugh have resigned from your employ and are now working for me. I suppose all you have left is Mrs. Pidgeon.”

“Who?” Sir Willard asked, frowning.

“Yes, yes, of course. You don't know her. I've had the Italian servants sent home, as you wanted—everything is falling into place so neatly, isn't it, Uncle? You couldn't chance their testimony, not until and unless you knew Amelia is the heir. I don't know how many more servants you've insinuated into the queen's household, probably a dozen, but Mrs. Pidgeon is most assuredly yours, so don't bother to deny it again. She doesn't have the vocabulary of a servant. Now, tell me why you're still snooping and peeking and not acting. Does all your dependence lie on the hopeful contents of the queen's tin box?”

“I told you. Yes, damn it, it does. And why I thought to trust you with my last hope is a mystery that will probably haunt me to my grave.”

Perry approached the bed. “There is more than one way to approach the question of Amelia's parentage, Uncle.”

Sir Willard pushed himself up against the pillows. “What do you have in mind?”

Perry had debated with himself all the way from Hammersmith, but he knew that the easiest way for him to proceed was to feel out his uncle—although he was already fairly thoroughly convinced of his uncle's loyalty, which was to himself—and then keep him as close, as involved and as possibly damned as possible.

“There's birth, Uncle, and there's conception,” Perry said quietly.

“Con-conception? My God, of course!”

“We need a historian, Uncle. Someone who has spent his life cataloging every bit of minutia about our illustrious new king. What he eats, what he wears, where he goes, his every engagement. His every move, most especially in the early months of 1801. Is there such a man?”

Sir Willard levered himself out of bed as Perry turned his back, the better not to see the man's bare bottom as his nightshirt bunched around his belly. “I can think of two,” he said, striding to his desk in front of the windows. “One is dead, but the other? The other retired some years ago, to Bath. Royal archivist, or some such thing.”

He selected a bit of stationery and picked up a small
knife, using it to sharpen the pen he then dipped into the inkwell. “Give me that date again. When was the gel breeched?”

“William Austin was adopted by the queen in November of 1802, at about six months of age. Amelia was born in December of the previous year. If the queen adopted Austin when the rumors began, in order to divert attention from another orphan infant already in her care, the two births too close together to have been to the same mother? It's a brilliant plan, if that's what happened.”

“Yes, yes, the date. What dates shall I ask him to report on, Perry?”

Perry counted backward in his head. “Late February? March? The queen resided in Blackheath at that time, so that Princess Charlotte could visit with her once a week. It's entirely possible her father went along a time or two, on orders from his father. We should probably also attempt to determine if Prinney's allowance was raised at that same time. When do you think you'll have an answer?”

“If old Symons hasn't stuck his spoon in the wall, you mean? A fortnight, I suppose.” Sir Willard put down the pen, sanded the sheet. “What will you do in the meantime, Nevvie?”

Perry pulled at a loose thread in the rip in his sleeve. “Put Sir Nathaniel out as guard dog along with Clive at the queen's residence, and go hunting. What else have you left me, Uncle?”

“Good,” Sir Willard said, oblivious to Perry's anger as he folded the sheet and began heating a wax stick, to
seal it. “You can always charm her again if she's not the king's heir, or prepare yourself to flee to the continent, if she is, and your foolishness bears fruit. Now go on, go hunting, while I pretend not to know what that means.”

 

“I
STILL DON'T SEE
why we don't go back to where we knew he was, now that we know he's not in Wimbledon anymore,” Nate said, doing his best to imitate Perry's long, easy stride as the two of them headed toward yet another watering hole his father had warned him never to frequent—which helped to make this afternoon's excursion doubly enjoyable. “Oh, not that he probably went back there to get those boots. I wouldn't, would you? But we're coming up empty this way, and I've got to take myself off to Hammersmith in an hour, to drag the ladies around the Park.”

Perry stopped in his tracks in front of a coffee house he'd already told Nate he hadn't frequented since his first years in London. “The queen, as well? The queen's going to drive in the Promenade?”

Nate was grateful to be able to catch his breath. They'd been running about London for ten days, as long as Perry had been banished from Hammersmith, and Nate wasn't sure if His Lordship was running toward Jarrett Rolin, or away from himself (a thought Nate congratulated himself as being very deep indeed for a man of his tender years).

Still, he could only consider it a bleeding shame that the Runners who'd been watching Rolin in Wimbledon
had lost him on the way back to London. Then again, was it any better to be talking about Amelia, when it always seemed to make the scar on Perry's cheek go all white and cold?

“Yes, Her Majesty is going. It was her idea, actually, after Henry Brougham put it to her,” Nate said. “And she's taking up Georgie and Amelia, and even Mrs. Bateman. That's Georgie's mama. Going to be a crush, even in that fancy landau that Brougham arranged, since the queen wanted nothing to do with a closed carriage. Old as dirt, but the tits in the traces are fine enough, four good-looking blacks. Still, a squeeze. Why? Don't you think Amelia should be in the Park?”

“No, I imagine she'll be fine. After all, you'll be there, guarding her. Jarrett Rolin is the sort that avoids crowds when he's up to his schemes.”

“A coward at the heart of it, I remember. And Clive will be riding up on the bench with the driver,” Nate added, hoping that piece of information might remove the frown from Perry's face. The fellow had been deep in the doldrums long enough. Too bad Perry couldn't find Rolin and shoot him or something; a little murder would probably do the man a world of good. “Aren't we going in there?”

Perry turned about and headed back the way they had come, signaling with his cane for his coachman. “We've been hunting mare's nests, Nate, but I wanted to keep busy. The last thing I wanted was for Amelia to go out in public until Rolin was taken from the field, but if there's no other way, I suppose I should take advantage of the opportunity.”

“But you already said Rolin wouldn't do anything right there, in the Park, with everyone to see. Would he?”

“I doubt it, no. But as I've given him every opportunity to confront me, I can only conclude that he'd still much rather attack through Amelia. Or Georgiana. Or even you. That's who he's watching, even if we have yet to catch him at it. Perhaps today will be our lucky day. Now, come along. I want the queen's equipage to be in the Park no later than five.”

“If I spy you out behind a tree, I suppose I shouldn't wave and point you out to Georgie?”

Perry grinned, and Nate swung the gold-tipped cane he'd taken to carrying, feeling that he had accomplished something very good.

 

A
MELIA HAD OFFERED UP
three very creditable excuses to the queen, who had pooh-poohed each and every one of them, so that now they were stuffed like sausages in the ancient landau and heading into the crush of traffic all aimed toward the Park.

And if Mrs. Bateman didn't stop all but standing up in the landau to cry “Yoo-hoo!” and wave to everyone, Amelia might just give her a push and tip her out onto the street.

Poor Georgiana. How could such a sweet, wonderful girl be the product of such a crass, social-climbing mama? Her husband's Tory leanings be damned. The gossips be damned. From the moment Mrs. Bateman had heard of the queen's kind offer to host a small engagement party for her daughter and Nate, Mrs. Bate
man had spent her days making a complete cake of herself.