by Sheila Walsh
There followed a long silence. Then:
‘What do you mean to do with me?’ Aubrey’s voice was subdued.
Benedict sat back again, crossed one leg over the other, and regarded his gleaming toecap thoughtfully. ‘That rather depends on you. The doctor tells me that you will be fit enough to be moved in a day or two’ ‒ he saw alarm flicker in the boy’s eyes ‒ ‘in which case I mean to take you down to Shallowford to recuperate. But before that,’ he continued as relief flooded Aubrey’s face, ‘you will write to your so-called friends, informing them that if all that was stolen is not immediately returned, I shall be obliged to inform on the lot of you.’
‘But you don’t know who the others were!’ Aubrey cried in some agitation.
‘Don’t count on’t, my boy,’ said Benedict softly. ‘I am confident that I can name them without the least trouble.’
There was sufficient conviction in his voice to stem any further argument. Beads of perspiration stood out on Aubrey’s forehead, and Benedict knew that he could press the matter no more for the present.
Without hurry, he rose and went across to a near-by table to wring out a cloth in cool water. He sponged Aubrey’s face with surprising gentleness.
‘There ‒ I’ll tease you no more for now.’ He poured a measure of the composer prescribed by Sir James and obliged Aubrey to drink it. ‘Later, when you feel more the thing, I have a suggestion you may care to consider ‒ concerning your future.’ He removed one of the pillows and laid the boy carefully back. ‘That should be more comfortable.’
Aubrey’s eyes were already clouding. ‘I was wrong about you. You’re a … great gun!’
‘How very discerning of you!’ drawled his host.
The boy chuckled drowsily and closed his eyes.
Theo practically threw herself upon Benedict when he arrived in Grosvenor Square. She was in her room trying to read Mr Scott’s Marmion, and not taking in a word, when Bracegirdle came to tell her that Mr Benedict Radlett was below in the gold drawing room.
‘Oh, if you only knew how I have longed for news!’ she cried, holding out her hands to him. ‘It has taken every ounce of my resolution not to rush to your rooms.’
‘Which would have been most improper,’ he said in mock reproof while taking hold of her hands.
‘I suppose so, though I doubt that would have been a consideration, only I suddenly realised that I didn’t properly know your direction ‒ and could hardly discover it without occasioning comment.’
‘You don’t change at all, I see.’ But he laughed and led her to a sofa near the window where the setting sun cast an aura of flame about her head. ‘I wasn’t sure when best to call. You are so seldom at home.’
‘No, but Lady Bellingham was having one of her boring musical evenings ‒ and I felt quite unable to sit through it.’ She looked at him eagerly. ‘How is Aubrey?’
‘Better than he deserves. Still weak, of course, but making excellent progress. Sir James is very pleased with him.’
‘Sir James?’ Theo’s eyes grew round. ‘Benedict ‒ you didn’t approach Sir James to remove the bullet from Aubrey’s shoulder?’
His smile mocked her. ‘Why should I not? He’s a sawbones, and a good one ‒ and I’m not exactly au fait with the present standard of London doctoring.’
‘But ‒ well, he’s a terribly high stickler! However did he react?’
The smile became a grin. ‘Devilish sticky at first! Gave me that thin-nosed stare. But I talked him round. Followed your example ‒ poured the butter-boat over him!’
Theo burst out laughing. ‘That I don’t believe! He would never succumb to flattery. But I don’t care how you did it so long as Aubrey is the better for it!’
‘Unscrupulous wench!’ he said. ‘Would you dare as much for me, I wonder?’
Theo blushed and looked quickly away ‒ down at his hand, which still enclosed hers. ‘Perhaps. But you are not so young and … and vulnerable as Aubrey, and do not need to be rescued from your folly.’
He lifted her hand to his lips. ‘Oh, sweet coz ‒ you know nothing of my needs!’ he said softly.
It would be so easy to respond in kind, she thought as her pulse began to quicken, but no ‒ he should not so easily play havoc with her emotions again. Determinedly she drew her hand away.
‘We are discussing Aubrey,’ she said firmly, praying that no trace of a tremor was discernible in her voice. ‘Does Selina know yet what has happened?’
He shrugged, accepting her rebuff with equanimity. ‘Not to my knowledge.’
‘I doubt she has even missed him,’ said Theo, unable to keep a note of waspishness out of her voice. He raised an eyebrow.
‘You could well be right. But she will have to be told something. I have it in mind to take the boy down to Shallowford at the weekend. He should be strong enough to manage the journey by then.’ Benedict sipped a glass of Madeira thoughtfully provided by Bracegirdle.
‘Oh, yes. That will be just the thing for him!’ Theo sighed. ‘I only wish that I might come with you!’
His look was uncomfortably searching. ‘Tired of the beau monde already?’
‘Does it make me sound too ungrateful if I say yes?’ She grimaced. ‘I don’t wish to be. It’s simply that an unremitting round of pleasure seems such a totally meaningless exercise ‒ for me at any rate. There are so many ways in which I can be useful at Shallowford.’ She sighed even more heavily. ‘But I can’t come. The Duchess’s ball is next week, and as she is giving it for my benefit I can hardly leave her to complete the arrangements alone, even though she is much better at it than I am.’
‘A pity.’ Benedict stood, and set down his glass.
‘Will you stay in the country?’ she asked, hoping very much that he would not.
‘That rather depends,’ he said. ‘On Aubrey’s condition, among other things.’
She gave him a considering smile. ‘I believe you care rather more for Aubrey than you would have one think.’
‘ “Care” is coming it a shade strong,’ he drawled. ‘But I’ll allow the young rip don’t want for pluck. He’s been in considerable pain these past few days and has borne it like a good ’un. He has time enough to put all this behind him and make something of himself.’
The tone of his voice made her look up at him more closely. ‘Did you have a particular something in mind?’
‘I might ‒ if he has the wit to seize his opportunities. It did me no harm.’
Theo stood up, too ‒ taken aback. ‘You mean India? Oh, Benedict, he is very young to go so far away?’
‘Nonsense.’ There was faint exasperation behind his eyes. ‘True, I was a trifle older ‒ but you said the lad was hot to join a cavalry regiment, and the East India Company can offer him excellent opportunities for advancement. I will engage to purchase a commission for him, and have friends enough out there to keep him under their eye ‒ see he doesn’t come to harm.’
‘You appear to have it all worked out,’ Theo said, still not entirely convinced. ‘Have you put the proposition to Aubrey?’
‘No. I’ll wait until he’s more fully recovered.’
‘And Selina? She won’t care for it.’
Benedict’s lip curled. ‘Do you think not?’ he drawled. ‘It’s my belief she’d dab her eyes a few times, sigh a little, and wave him farewell with no more than a slight pang!’ On reflection Theo thought that this was probably true, and it made her feel a little sad for Aubrey’s sake. She thought again of Shallowford.
‘I do hope Aubrey’s presence won’t upset Grandpa,’ she said. ‘I had a letter from him today and he sounded decidedly fractious.’
She told Benedict what Lord Radlett had said about Beau, but carefully omitted the rest.
‘Is Beau really so badly in debt? I confess it isn’t the first time the idea has been put into my mind.’
‘My dear child, Beau has been in debt for most of his life, to some degree or other, but if you mean is he more than usually squeezed at pres
ent, then I would hazard that he is.’ Benedict’s tone grew sarcastic. ‘Gambling over the odds on his expectations, no doubt!’
‘But that’s awful!’ Theo exclaimed. ‘He’s going to feel utterly betrayed if he discovers what Grandpa is contemplating! Will he have told him, do you suppose?’
‘Not unless his temper got the better of him. I fancy your grandparent’s warped sense of humour would derive more satisfaction from the thought of allowing Beau to hope, and then dashing his expectations when they are beyond recall.’
Theo was shocked and disappointed. She had accepted that her grandfather was difficult, crabby, even wildly unreasonable; but that he could be so vindictive hurt her more than she could express, for she had in a curious way grown to love him and found it hard to believe that she could not, if she really tried, reverse his attitude before it was too late.
But she was to be denied that opportunity.
Two mornings later, when Theo and the Duchess were about to set out on a shopping expedition, Benedict arrived ‒ striding into the room with a lack of ceremony that betrayed a degree of urgency above the usual, his face set in lines of such grimness that Theo’s mind immediately flew to Aubrey ‒ he had taken a turn for the worse. But before she could frame the question, Benedict had come forward to take her hands.
‘I’m very sorry, my dear,’ he said, and she saw in a detached way that his eyes were bright with compassion. ‘It is your grandfather. He died quite suddenly, late last night.’
Chapter Fourteen
‘My dear child, such a sad homecoming!’ Great-aunt Minta folded Theo in her arms as soon as she entered the library, and then led her to the sofa near the fire, looking, Theo observed, more frail than she remembered. ‘It came as such a surprise in the end, you know. All was much as usual last evening, except that Edmund was more crotchety than ever! I rebuked him, I remember, for drinking too much port ‒ “It ever made you blue-devilled!” I told him roundly …’ Her voice trembled.
Theo begged her not to upset herself, but it seemed as if she wished to talk, and thinking that perhaps she needed to do so, the girl let her continue.
‘And then, this morning quite early, Gorton found him … just as if he had gone to sleep and slipped away. Well, you will see for yourself how peaceful he looks, only … well, I know it is fanciful of me, but already the house seems quite empty without his presence!’ She cleared her throat and sat up very straight. ‘You know that Beau has arrived already? Hardly seems five minutes since he was here before! So much upheaval as there will be!’
Theo wondered with a sinking heart whether Aunt Minta had the least idea how much of an upheaval was likely.
Already it seemed much longer than a few hours since she had first heard the news from Benedict. While the Duchess had exclaimed and commiserated and shed a few tears, she had stood quite still in her grief, white-faced and silent, only the tightness of the skin stretched across her knuckles as she gripped a chair-back betraying the extent of her distress.
She had been ready to leave on the instant. The Duchess had put her coach at their disposal, and, drying her tears, had begged Theo not to be considering any inconvenience her going might cause, but to recruit all her strength for the ordeal ahead.
But there were other matters to be considered. Benedict had seen the lawyer and informed Beau, but the question of Aubrey remained. He must risk removal to his mother’s house in Upper Wimpole Street, or make the journey to Shallowford a little sooner than had been expected.
By then, of course, Selina knew of Aubrey’s folly and its unhappy outcome. She had been by turns angry and tearful, the distraught mother wounded by an ungrateful offspring, for all the world, Theo complained indignantly to Benedict, as though much of it had not been due to her own lack of guidance.
Now that he was in trouble, her concern seemed to centre as much upon how people would react towards her if the truth should come out as upon the possible fate of her son. Lord Shadley was still breathing fire, and in spite of the mysterious return of both his wife’s and the Duchess’s jewels, Bow Street was known to be pursuing the most diligent investigations, encouraged by the discovery of a coat with a bullet-hole in it thrown in the bushes some way from the scene of the crime, which seemed to confirm that one of the felons had been hurt.
‘Why the devil could you not have picked on someone other than Lord Shadley to rob?’ Benedict had berated his young charge in some exasperation when the affair did not die down. ‘Not only a magistrate, but one committed to stamping out this particular kind of offence!’
Selina had already acquiesced eagerly to Benedict’s suggestion of moving Aubrey to Shallowford the moment he could travel, but the Viscount’s death had now precipitated matters, and her alarm lest she should be obliged to have Aubrey at home, with all the attendant possibilities of questions being asked, was so apparent that a hasty consultation with Sir James had ensued, and he had given his consent for the boy to make the journey.
Theo realised that her great-aunt was still talking, and she hadn’t heard a word. As if the old lady could read her thoughts, she said suddenly, ‘But there ‒ I daresay you won’t want to be listening to me prosing on just now … such a journey as you must have had!’
Theo assured her that they had been very comfortable in the Duchess’s coach and that although Aubrey was looking a little frail, Benedict had taken him straight up to his room, and was hopeful that he had taken no lasting harm. From the blank look in Great-aunt Minta’s eyes, it was evident that some kind of explanation was required.
‘The poor boy is recovering from a rather nasty accident,’ she said simply. ‘Benedict had intended to bring him down here later in the week, but in the circumstances … well, it seemed rather silly to make two journeys, and the doctor pronounced him well enough to travel.’
To her relief the old lady accepted the explanation as it stood, saying merely, ‘Quite so. Very sensible. Is his mama come also?’ And she seemed to accept without surprise that she was not.
‘But I can’t possibly just drop everything at a moment’s notice!’ Selina had cried plaintively. ‘And really I cannot see any reason why I should. There will be nothing at all for me to do. You and Benedict between you can minister to Aubrey’s needs far better than his poor mama!’ A slight note of waspishness here. ‘I suppose I must come for Lord Radlett’s funeral, though God knows I have little enough cause to mourn that man’s passing … and whatever else I may be, I am not a hypocrite!’
While she could not admire Selina’s sentiments and found her frankness harmful, Theo acknowledged that there was an element of truth in what she said, enough perhaps to enable her to accept if not condone the older woman’s behaviour.
Feeling a sudden need to wash and change, Theo hugged the old lady and stood up. ‘You know, I believe I will go to my room, just for a little while.’
Upstairs she met Benedict coming away from Aubrey’s room. The boy was already asleep, he told her, and with any luck would be none the worse for his experience.
‘You look tired,’ he said abruptly. ‘I hope you mean to rest?’
‘A little. I am more travel-weary than anything else.’ She hesitated. ‘I thought perhaps I might freshen up and then go along to my grandfather’s room.’ She heard him draw in an exasperated breath. ‘Well, you know I like to get things over with … and Aunt Minta says that Gorton is very cut up. I wouldn’t want to add to the poor man’s distress by appearing to neglect to pay my last respects. Gorton, you know, sets great store by such things.’
‘The devil with Gorton!’ said Benedict softly. ‘I am more concerned with your distress!’
‘I don’t mind,’ she insisted. ‘Oh, did Purley tell you that Beau is already here? Now, the thought of facing him does bother me!’
He touched her cheek briefly. ‘You needn’t let it trouble you, my dear. I will handle Beau.’
He was called upon to do so almost immediately. He had hardly left Theo when Purley came hurrying along the
corridor to meet him. The old butler was badly out of breath and showing his years.
‘Oh, sir ‒ would you be so good as to come? Only it’s Mr Beau … oh, dear … I suppose I must learn to call him his lordship …’ His mouth quivered uncontrollably, and it was some moments before he could continue: ‘In his … in the late master’s sitting room, he is … and driving Gorton into a fit of the shakes, demanding the keys to all the cupboards.’
Benedict swore and, without waiting to hear more, strode away in the direction of Lord Radlett’s apartments. He heard Beau’s voice before he reached the open door, its languid tones clipped with fury.
‘Perhaps I have not made myself clear, dolt! Or else grief has addled your wits. But I will tell you one more time. My uncle is dead and you now take your orders from me ‒ and I am ordering you to surrender to me all the keys my uncle possessed ‒ for this room, the bedchamber, or any other room where there may be locked drawers or cupboards, and don’t tell me you have no knowledge of their whereabouts, or I shall lose all patience!’
Benedict pushed the door wider and stepped in, unnoticed.
‘But then patience never was noticeably one of your virtues, was it, Beau? I fear it is something you may now be obliged to cultivate.’
The dandy swung round at the sound of the familiar sneering drawl, something very like a snarl on his lips. ‘You!’
Benedict acknowledged the greeting with a sardonic bow, only his eyes betraying a cold anger. It was not apparent, however, as he turned to the pale, shaking valet.
‘I’m sorry I was not here sooner, Gorton. I fear you have been obliged to suffer more than you should.’ He heard Purley come panting up behind him, and said with a brief glance in his direction, ‘Perhaps a restorative might be in order?’
The butler nodded, averting his gaze from the new Lord Radlett, whose raddled face was red as a fighting-cock with suppressed rage.
‘You come along of me now, Mr Gorton,’ he said, made bold by Benedict’s presence. ‘We’ll take a glass of something together in my sitting room as’ll maybe put a bit of a spring back in your step.’