Heartless

by Mary Balogh

  “But he was very well-liked,” Charlotte explained. “We all admired him a great deal, except Emily, perhaps. But Emily has always been a little strange. She cannot help it, poor dear. ’Tis her affliction. She used to run away when Sir Lovatt called.”

  Luke felt convinced that Emily, if only she could talk, would be able to tell him a great deal more than the others had noticed. He felt frustrated in his efforts to piece together a story.

  “Blaydon appeared here soon after your mother’s death?” he asked. “Did he ever explain why he came here? And why he came at that particular time?”

  “He was looking for a place in the country,” Charlotte said with a shrug. “And that particular house was for lease. I suppose he might have chosen any of a dozen different places.”

  Luke did not believe so somehow. He frowned. What was it he was not seeing or not understanding? What was the missing clue? Had Anna met Blaydon somewhere even before that? Had he followed her to Elm Court then as he had followed her to Bowden now?

  “Did Anna go away to school?” he asked. “Was she ever from home for any length of time before your mother’s death?”

  Charlotte thought, but she shook her head. “Mama was ill for several years,” she said. “Anna was like a mother to us. She was always at home.”

  It seemed, Luke thought, that he would have to take his interpretation of what had happened back to Anna and hope that she would finally confide the truth to him when confronted with what he already knew.

  “’Twas a pity,” Charlotte said, “that Sir Lovatt did not arrive a little sooner than he did. He just missed the chance to become reacquainted with Mama.”

  Luke regarded her from hooded eyes.

  She looked a little disconcerted for a moment. “His family had an acquaintance with Mama’s,” Charlotte explained. “He and Mama knew each other as children.”

  It was strange, Luke thought, how sometimes the most pertinent information on a subject could come out quite by accident. Charlotte had let out this particular piece of information as an aside, as something that had no particular relevance to the matter at hand. And yet to Luke it had enormous significance, suggesting as it did that the arrival of Sir Lovatt Blaydon at Elm Court had been no more accidental than his appearance at Bowden.

  But how could he find out what the significance of that particular piece of information was? Had there been some sort of family feud that he was continuing? Had Anna’s mother at one time done him some harm that he wished to avenge? Had he been in love with Anna’s mother?

  How could he find out? Who would know?

  The answer came to him almost as soon as he had asked himself the question.

  “Lady Sterne,” he said to Charlotte. “She was your mother’s friend?”

  “Oh, yes,” she said, blinking at the abrupt change of topic. “She is Anna’s godmother, you know. We all call her Aunt Marjorie though she is not really our aunt.”

  “How long were they friends?” Luke asked. “All their lives?”

  “They met in London as girls,” Charlotte said, “when they were both presented to the queen. Mama often told us about it. They remained friends ever after though Mama would not allow Aunt Marjorie to come visiting after she became so sick. She did not want to be seen pale and thin and ugly, she used to say. Poor Mama.”

  There was a chance. Just a chance that Lady Sterne would have known Blaydon or at least that Lady Royce had talked of him. It would mean going to London, of course, and delaying his return home by another day at least. He was becoming more uneasy about being away from Anna. But he needed to learn the truth, or as much of it as he could possibly piece together. More and more he was beginning to feel—partly with elation and partly with fear—that whatever it was between Anna and Blaydon, it was not love.

  He left Elm Court for London early the following morning, one day after his arrival there.

  • • •

  Anna was careful to tell a number of people where she was going. It might not seem very proper that she was going alone, with only a maid for company, but she was not concerned with appearances. She just wanted some people to know. She told Mr. Fox and Cotes and Mrs. Wynn, and she took with her a coachman, a footman, and her maid.

  She was paying a morning call on Sir Lovatt Blaydon.

  At the time when his man would be waiting among the trees to watch her set the money and jewelry beneath the stone outside the gamekeeper’s cottage so that he could retrieve them without delay, she was being driven through the gates of Bowden and along the road to Wycherly. She was paying a morning call because it was unlikely she would encounter any other visitors at that time.

  “Wait here for me,” she told the coachman and footman when the latter handed her down outside the doors of Wycherly. They looked disappointed that they would not have the anticipated visit and ale in the kitchen, but both bowed their acquiescence.

  “Wait here for me,” she told her maid when Sir Lovatt’s butler offered to escort her to a visitors’ salon leading off the hall, and Penny nodded and bobbed a curtsy though she looked as disappointed as the men had looked.

  Anna stood inside the salon for ten minutes, gazing out the window, drawing some strength from the sight of her own carriage and servants before the doorway. She slipped a hand beneath the robings of her open gown and through the slit at the side of her petticoat to the pockets taped about her waist beneath her hoops. Her fingers touched cold steel and suddenly felt as cold as the metal. And for a few moments she was breathless and the darkness threatened the edges of her vision again.

  But she was not going to faint today, she decided. Never again. She was not going to be a victim ever again. She should never have allowed him to gain such power over her. When he had talked of witnesses to various crimes, she should have invited him to use them. She should have gambled on pitting her honesty against their lies. Except that there had been so much to lose then, both for herself and, more importantly, for her family.

  No, she thought now, she must not blame herself for the weakness of the past. In the past it had been necessary. But no longer. Now, giving in to the endless demands protected only herself, making her into an abject, cringing creature.

  She would not do it any longer.

  The door opened behind her. She did not turn immediately.

  “Anna.” He sounded genuinely pleased. “What a very pleasant surprise. You have brought your bundle in person instead of leaving it beneath the stone? I would have asked it, my dear, if I had realized you had the courage to come here alone and risk your reputation. Do take a seat. I shall have refreshments brought.”

  She turned at last to look at him. He was wearing a morning gown of gray silk over his shirt and breeches. Without the padding of waistcoat and skirted coat, he looked thin rather than slim. His wig had not been freshly powdered. She guessed it was yesterday’s powder. He looked older than usual.

  “I want neither a chair nor refreshments,” she said. “And as you see, I carry no bundle.” She spread her empty hands to the sides. “There is no bundle beneath the stone outside the cottage.”

  He looked sympathetic rather than angry. “He has hidden away the valuables and the keys, my Anna?” he asked. “What sort of a husband is that, I ask you? Not one who loves you as you deserve to be loved, my dear.”

  I love you. She had a vivid image of Luke’s face above hers on her bed, the tender light of love in his eyes to prove the truth of the words he spoke. She thrust the memory back whence it came.

  “I will not pay any more of my father’s debts,” she said, “until they have been presented in full to either my husband or my brother. And I will not allow you to make any more threats to me. If you wish to bring any charges against me, you may speak to the appropriate authorities. My husband will be home soon. When he returns, I shall tell him everything. Every single sordid little detail. Perhaps you can make lif
e difficult financially for my brother, sir, and perhaps you can destroy me. Perhaps you can even put a rope about my neck. But I will not allow you to harass and intimidate me ever again. Your power over me is ended as of this moment.”

  He looked at her silently for a few moments, his hands clasped at his back. And then he smiled slowly. “Anna, my dear,” he said at last, “you are magnificent. You are finally becoming the woman I always knew you could be.”

  “I will be returning home now,” she said. “I have three servants with me, sir, and several more at home know where I have come this morning and what time I expect to be home. If you try to detain me, there will be trouble.”

  He laughed. “You are wonderful, my dear,” he said. “I kiss my hand to you.” He proceeded to do so. “You are free to leave whenever you wish.”

  She stood looking steadily at him for a while, trying to make sense of his reaction. Was it possible that he would let her go so easily? Had it been as simple as this all along, if she had only had the courage to stand up against him?

  She did not believe it for a moment.

  She walked past him to the door and was relieved when he stepped well to one side of her path.

  “Anna,” he said softly as she passed. “My dearest Anna.”

  Her back prickled as she stepped into the hallway and summoned Penny. It bristled as she stepped outside and allowed her footman to hand her into the carriage. It crawled during the seemingly interminable time it took him to climb to his place beside the coachman.

  And then the carriage lurched into motion. After a few minutes they were off Wycherly land and on the road back to Bowden.

  She was free. It was all over. At last. She was free.

  But she did not believe that, either, for a single moment.

  • • •

  Doris was delighted to see Luke. She hugged him when he arrived at Harndon House and looked beyond him for Anna. He had come on business for a day or two and had left her at home with Joy, he explained. Doris was enjoying the entertainments of the spring Season in town and had an even larger court than she had had the year before.

  “But if you do not mind being burdened with me for a while longer, I do not believe I will choose a husband from among them,” she explained to him. “There is no one for whom I feel a particular fondness.”

  Last year, Luke thought, that argument would probably have meant nothing to him. This year it did. He smiled at her.

  “Then you must wait until there is, Dor,” he said.

  He arranged matters so that he could have a few words alone with his mother.

  “I have learned the truth, you know,” he told her. “About George’s death, that is. You should have told me, Mother. ’Twas something I needed to know.”

  “No,” she said, her face stiff and pale. “You did not need to know anything so shameful. You thought badly enough of him as it was.”

  “I have learned the full truth,” he said. “I have been to his grave, Mother, and wept there. He continued to love me even though he thought I had tried to kill him. I was angry enough to challenge him, to make a point, but I loved him too dearly to kill him. I aimed well to one side of him, but I hit him.”

  “He knew it,” she said. “He always argued with your father that ’twas so.”

  Luke went down on his haunches suddenly before her and took both her hands in his. “Mother,” he said, “Papa and George are dead, more is the pity. I will grieve for them for the rest of my life. But there are still you and Ashley and Doris and me. Let us love one another while we are alive and have the chance. I was without my family for ten years and convinced myself that ’twas better so. But I have learned in the past year that family and love are the most precious possessions anyone can own.”

  His mother sat staring woodenly at the floor. “So many decisions,” she said, her tone flat, “have to be made without time to reflect and without knowledge of what the consequences will be. I had to decide, Lucas, between you on the one side and your father and George on the other. Duty led me to choose them. I have always put duty first since my marriage. I have always put duty before love. What is love, after all, but an emotion to cause us pain and bring us loss? I always loved you best, shameful as the admission is. But I put duty before love.”

  “Mother.” He warmed her stiff, icy hands with his own. “Mother.” He raised her hands one at a time to his lips.

  “I love all of you,” she said. “I worry about all of you. With my lips I try to persuade all of you to be dutiful. With my heart I am afraid that you will all love and be hurt by love.”

  “Mother.” He kissed the palm of the hand he held to his lips. “Mama.”

  She looked up at him. “I cannot change, Lucas,” she said. “But know that I love you and wish for your happiness. You made a wise choice in Anna.”

  “Yes.” He squeezed her hands once more and released them as he got to his feet. “I have to call on Lady Sterne with a message from Anna. And then I must hurry home to her. All is well with Doris?”

  “All is well,” his mother said. “She is a year older in age than she was last year and five years older in experience, I vow.”

  • • •

  Luke called on Lady Sterne without delay and was fortunate to find her at home—with his uncle. They were seated quite respectably in her drawing room. Luke knew that they were lovers. He knew too that they were ever discreet and would not have dreamed of making love to each other in the home of either.

  “Mercy on me,” Lady Sterne said, coming across the room to Luke, both hands extended. “As handsome as ever, Harndon. But you left Anna and the child at Bowden? For shame.”

  “Hark ye, lad,” Lord Quinn said sternly, on his feet too, “I’ll not have the two of you drifting apart merely because the first year of marriage is past. Pox on it, but marriage is the damnedest thing.”

  “Oh, pshaw!” Lady Sterne said. “Pay him no heed, Harndon.”

  “I need some information that I hope you can supply, madam,” Luke said, taking the offered chair.

  Lady Sterne raised her eyebrows in enquiry.

  “The late Lady Royce, your friend,” he said, “grew up knowing a family by the name of Blaydon. In particular a boy of about her age named Lovatt. The father would have been a baronet, I believe. Did she ever mention this man or this family to you?”

  “Egad, Luke,” his uncle said, “you ask some strange questions.”

  “The man took up residence at Elm Court immediately following Lady Royce’s death,” Luke said, “and he has leased Wycherly Park from Severidge under an assumed name. Anna pretends not to know him, but Emily does know him and she does not like him. I have just come from Elm Court, where I spoke to Royce and to Charlotte.”

  “Lud,” Lady Sterne said almost in a whisper, “Anna is harboring a secret?”

  “Lookee, Luke,” Lord Quinn said, “you may bring naught but grief on yourself by prying into your wife’s secrets.”

  “Anna is not happy,” Luke said. “And I love her, Theo. Oh, yes, the two of you can congratulate each other on the total success of your schemes. I love her. Therefore, I must find out the truth.”

  “But as I live, I have never heard the name,” Lady Sterne said. “Blaydon.” She frowned in thought. “You are quite sure it is not Blakely? Lowell Blakely?”

  Luke stared at her. “Perhaps,” he said. “What do you know of him, madam?”

  “He was a handsome lad,” Lady Sterne said, “tall and slender and dark. Or so Lucy said. I never saw him myself. He was quite in love with her and she had been infatuated with him when she was very young. She had promised—when she was just a young girl—to marry him. But even before her papa brought her to London she had grown tired of his persistence and his ardor and his jealousy. He used to smuggle letters to her quite shamelessly after she came here. She used to complain of them to me. Sh
e started to return them unopened. And then she met Royce and no man ever existed for her after that.”

  “And she never heard from Blaydon—from Blakely—again?” Luke asked.

  “Only once, as far as I know,” Lady Sterne said. “She was married in London. I remember her telling me afterward that he was standing outside the church, silently watching, when she came out on Royce’s arm. Lud, it quite gave me the shudders when she told me that.”

  Luke felt it now himself—a deep inward shudder. “The man who now calls himself Colonel Henry Lomax,” he said, “was standing outside the church when I brought Anna out after wedding her.”

  “Mercy on us!” Lady Sterne said.

  “Zounds!” Lord Quinn said.

  “I believe,” Luke said, getting to his feet, “I had better return to Bowden as quickly as I can.” He bowed. “You will excuse me, madam?”

  “Egad.” Lord Quinn jumped up too. “I’ll come with you, lad. I can still shoot a pistol and hit my target, I warrant you. If this Blakely-Blaydon-Lomer or whoever he is thinks to lay one finger on that gel, he will find himself staring down the barrel of a gun with my itchy finger on the trigger. Devil a bit! I’ll not be able to escort you to the Minden soirée tonight, Marj, m’dear.”

  “Oh, do go with Harndon, Theo,” she said, her hands pressed to her mouth. “Oh, Anna. My dear little Anna.”

  Luke did not argue. For almost ten years in France his sword and his pistol had been the only friends and the only defense he had felt need of and both had been quite adequate in protecting him. But for those ten years he had not had love to protect. Or Anna. He felt sick with worry.

  Why in heaven’s name had he left her there alone? He had seen only unhappiness. He had not dreamed of danger.

  26

  ANNA returned to Bowden Abbey late in the morning the day after her visit to Sir Lovatt Blaydon. She had been visiting the wife of one of her husband’s laborers, a woman who had just given birth to her eighth child.