by Joan Wolf
She called on Nanda one morning and that interview had done little to ameliorate her worry. Nanda was calm and polite, but there was a look of radiance about her that made Lady Crosby nervous. A woman who looked like that would be capable of anything – including eloping with Viscount Stanford, Lord Wellington’s protégé and heir to the Earl of Seaton.
In Lady Crosby’s memory the only person who had ever had any influence over Adam was his father. Reluctantly, Lady Crosby decided to write to her brother.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Adam was unaware of the stir his love affair was causing in the breasts of his apprehensive family as he met with Menteith in the library of the earl’s house in Hanover Square to plan the downfall of the Duc de Gacé. The two men sat on either side of Menteith’s beautifully polished desk, and Adam spoke first.
“I think I’ll let him steal a memorandum. As I said to you earlier, we need solid evidence, and a stolen memorandum containing secret information is certainly that.”
Menteith stared into Adam’s calm blue eyes. “Dash it all, Stanford. You aren’t proposing to give him real information?”
“We have no choice,” Adam pointed out. “We can hardly prosecute him for passing false information. And unless we give him something of value, Gacé might not risk sending it. I rather think our friend the Duc is having doubts about Boney’s future. I shouldn’t be at all surprised to discover he was looking for a way to change sides again.”
“What do you have in mind?” Menteith asked uneasily.
Adam picked up a jeweled paperknife from the desktop and began to turn it over in his fingers. With his eyes on his hands, he said slowly, “I’ll draw up a memorandum pertaining to the new supply route and leave it on my desk. The next time Gacé comes into my office, I’ll make an excuse to go out of the room. When I come back, I rather doubt the memorandum will still be there.”
“How will you be able to prove he was the one who took it?”
“I’ll watch the door while I’m gone so I’ll be able to swear that no one else was in my office.”
“Then you’ll be able to swear that the memorandum was there when you left the room, and gone when you returned. And the only person in the room will have been Gacé.”
“Precisely.”
Menteith still looked worried. “And then?”
Adam put the paperknife down and laced his fingers together. “Then, we keep my lord Duc under constant surveillance. I’m certain he’ll pass the memorandum on to Bellay. Of course, it’s imperative that Bellay is stopped and the memorandum recovered. Do you have men you can trust to do that?”
“I do.”
“Good. Tell them to seize Bellay and bring him to you. You then will promise the Duc a reasonable prison term instead of the gallows if he will sign a paper swearing that Gacé has been passing him secret information to the French for the last eight months.” Adam picked up the envelope he had placed on Menteith’s desk when he first came in and handed it to the military secretary. “Then we will both confront Gacé with Bellay’s signed document - and with these documents I had drawn up by my solicitor.”
Menteith took the two documents out of the envelope and read them. As Adam knew, the first paper contained a confession of espionage. The second paper was a statement in which Gacé agreed to Nanda’s divorcing him, and in which he relinquished to her the permanent guardianship of his children, Virginie and Marc.
Menteith looked grim after he had finished reading. “Divorce,” he said heavily. “It will be a scandal.”
“No one will expect Nanda to remain married to a traitor,” Adam said reasonably.
Menteith sighed. “All right, suppose Gacé signs these papers – we still can’t let him go. He will have read the memorandum. What do we do with him then?”
I know what I would like to do, Adam thought grimly. But looking at the kind, worried face of the Earl of Menteith, he knew he couldn’t say what he had in mind. The whole Doune family, he thought wryly, appeared to be burdened by strict consciences.
He said, “We certainly cannot let him go free. I suggest we place him under our personal detention somewhere, perhaps in Scotland. Once the opening maneuvers in the peninsula are over, we can release him and let him leave the country. In fact, we should give it out that he’s already left, when in fact he’ll be in Scotland. There’ll be some speculation, but nothing so damaging as a trial and a hanging. It is, I believe, the neatest solution under the circumstances.” Adam’s eyes were cold as winter. “I think Gacé will behave himself. We’ll be holding his signed confession.”
Lord Menteith had been following Adam’s words, a slight frown on his face. When Adam concluded, the earl gave a thoughtful nod. “It sounds all right. I can send him to my castle in Fife. He should be safe enough there. But, for God’s sake, Stanford, we must be sure to recover that memorandum!”
“We will,” Adam said. “Gacé has no suspicion he’s been detected. And he thinks I’m a fool. That’s his weak point. He is correct about his own cleverness, but he underestimates everyone else.”
“When do you want to do this?”
“As soon as possible. Gacé hasn’t been at the Horse Guards very often lately. He spends most of his time at Hartwell, trying to tune the king up sweet. I’ll prepare the memorandum and have it ready the next time he pays me a visit.”
“Very well,” Menteith said. “You’ll let me know as soon as Gacé makes his move?”
“I will let you know.”
# # #
The plan was put into effect exactly four days later. Adam was sitting before his neatly piled desk when the door opened and the Duc came in. “Gacé” said Adam, a note of surprise in his voice. “We haven’t seen you here for quite some time.”
“No, I have been in attendance upon his majesty a great deal lately. You appear to be as busy as ever, dear boy. Gacé gestured gracefully to the high piled desk.
“As you see,” Adam said ruefully. “In fact, I have another report to pick up from Menteith. He’s going out shortly and I don’t want to miss him. Do you mind waiting for just a moment?”
Something flickered in Gacé’s eyes. “Not at all,” he said.
Adam went out, but not to Menteith’s office. Instead he posted himself in a position where his eyes could always be on his office door. He waited eight minutes. No one else went in or went out. Then he extracted a piece of paper from his pocket and returned to his office.
Gacé was standing at the window looking out at rain-swept Whitehall. He turned as Adam came in. “I’ve never been able to adjust to your English weather.” He shook his head. “So much rain.”
“This is nothing,” Adam said. “You should have seen the rain at Burgos.”
“Ah yes,” Gacé responded with ready sympathy. “England must seem snug indeed after that.” He began to walk toward the door. “I won’t intrude on your time any longer, my dear Stanford. You are, as I mentioned, well occupied. My wife and I are dining at the Liverpool’s this evening. Shall we see you there?”
“No, your grace. I have not yet breached the Prime Minister’s circle.”
“Ah. Well I will leave you to your work, Stanford. Adieu.”
Adam waited three minutes before he looked at his desk. It looked untouched, but the memorandum was gone. He went to tell Menteith.
# # #
The following afternoon the Earl of Seaton reached London and went directly to the Grosvenor Square residence of his sister. Happily, she was home.
“Now, what is this all about, Frances?” he grumbled as he stumped around her smart drawing room stretching his travel-cramped legs.
“Do sit down, Richard,” Lady Crosby responded. “You make me nervous when you circle around like that.
He came to stand before the fire and propped his shoulders against the Wedgwood mantel. “I don’t want to sit down; I’ve been sitting for days in that damn chaise. Now, tell me, Frances – what is this concern you have about Adam?”
“I wro
te you about it, Richard. He has been staying at the Duc de Gacé’s house in Berkeley Square and I think he is having an affair with the Duchesse.”
“Women have been chasing Adam since he was sixteen,” the earl said. “And Adam never ran very fast.” He stopped pacing and stared at his sister. “Have you really dragged me all these miles to tell me Adam is having an affair?”
Lady Crosby frowned impatiently. “This is different. I tell you, Richard, this situation is dangerous. There is a recklessness about those two that disturbs me greatly.”
The earl’s eyes narrowed. “You think he’s serious?”
“I think he is deadly serious.”
“And she’s married.”
“Married – with two children.”
“Is there gossip?”
“Not yet. They are being discreet. But I’ve seen them together and I tell you, Richard, I wouldn’t be surprised if he eloped with her.”
“What!!!!” The earl’s face began to get red. “You can’t be serious.”
She didn’t answer, just looked at him.
The earl swore softly. “Damme, Frances, if he does that, the boy’s finished. He has a brilliant future – dash it, I wouldn’t be surprised if he ended up prime minister one day!”
“He won’t be prime minister if he elopes with the Duc de Gacé’s wife!” his sister retorted.
The earl paced nervously around the room again, finally halting in front of his sister’s chair to say soberly, “I can talk to him, Frances, but if things are as you say they are, I doubt he’ll listen.”
“Nonsense,” she said briskly. “Dear Adam has always been very fond of you.”
Suddenly the earl looked older. “Perhaps I didn’t phrase my thought correctly. Yes, Adam is fond of me, and of course he’ll listen to me; I don’t remember Adam ever refusing to do that. And if he feels it’s possible, he will go along with my request. But if his mind is made up, nothing I say will change it. It was like that when he wanted to go into the army and I wanted him to stay at home.” He sat on a curved leg sofa, stretched out his legs and sighed. “I don’t know anything about Gacé,” he said heavily. “Is his wife French too?”
“No, she is a Doune. Menteith’s her elder brother.
“A Doune! It’s hard to imagine one of that family doing anything so rash as eloping.”
“You haven’t seen her with Adam,” Lady Crosby said ominously.
The earl sighed. “I suppose I had better see Adam. I’ll write a note and you can send it round to Berkeley Square.” He sighed again. “It’s a thousand pities you weren’t in London when Adam arrived, Frances. Then he would have stayed with you and not this French Duc.” He heaved himself to his feet and walked to the door, where he turned toward his sister once more. “Ned is getting himself shackled. He’s engaged to marry the daughter of a Russian prince.”
Lady Crosby knew her brother’s second son was working for the English ambassador in Russia, but this news was a surprise. “A Russian prince!” she exclaimed.
“Yes.” Lord Seaton sighed. “I expect it’s those long Russian winters. Anyway, he sounds in raptures. The girl’s a goddess, according to him; fortunately she’s also an heiress. It could have been worse, I suppose.”
“Yes,” Lady Crosby said fervently. “At least she’s not married.”
# # #
Adam and Nanda were at the cottage in Hampstead when Lady Crosby’s servant arrived with the Earl of Seaton’s note. At the exact time that Nanda reached home, the Duc de Gacé was meeting a French agent in a bookshop in Piccadilly, observed by the two men Lord Menteith had handpicked for the job. Gacé calmly passed his book to Bellay, then proceeded home where invited his wife to go driving with him in the park.
Stanford arrived at Berkeley Square at six o’clock to be greeted by the message from his father. He left immediately for the Crosby’s house in Grosvenor Square.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Lady Crosby was tactfully absent when Adam arrived at her home to see his father. The earl was reading a book in one of the smaller salons, and he put it down when his son came in.
“Papa!” Adam said, warmth and surprise in his voice. “How nice to see you. What brings you all the way to London?” He crossed the room and bent to kiss his father’s cheek.
The earl gestured him to a matching tapestry covered wing chair that faced his own. “I’m glad to see you looking better than you did when you left home for London.”
“I’m feeling much better, thank you. I’m sure you noticed the limp, though”
“It’s not that noticeable,” the earl said gruffly.
Adam smiled. “The doctors tell me it’s here to stay, but there’s not much pain. And I can still ride, thank God. Things could be worse.”
“You won’t be able to return to the Peninsula, though.”
“No,” Adam said softly. “But I have a strong notion that Boney will be finished before the year is out.”
There was a brief silence while Lord Seaton regarded his son. The drawn, exhausted look Adam had worn when he left home was indeed gone. He was meeting his father’s eyes, his own densely blue and full of understanding. Lord Seaton suspected his son knew very well why he had come to London.
The earl reached for a delaying tactic. “Ned is engaged.”
Adam looked delighted. “Good for him. To his Russian beauty, I suppose?”
“You knew about her?”
Adam laughed. “Ned’s letters of late have mentioned a certain young lady with revealing regularity.” He looked at his father’s gloomy face and said with amusement, “I’m quite certain she’s civilized, Papa. She even speaks English.”
The earl looked up from under his heavy gray brows. “At least she’s not married.”
Silence. Then, “Are you referring to me, sir?” Adam said.
There was something in that pleasant voice that set the earl’s teeth on edge. “I am,” he replied.
“I see.” Adam’s voice maintained its deceptively pleasant note. “I gather my aunt Frances sent for you.”
“She did. To be perfectly blunt, Adam, Frances has taken the notion that you plan to elope with the Duchessee de Gacé.”
The astonishment on his son’s face was genuine. “You can’t be serious, Papa. She told you we were going to elope?”
Relief swept through Lord Seaton. He said in a conciliatory voice, “We all know that Frances is prone to exaggerate, but I thought I’d better come and see what she was getting herself into such a coil about. I see, however, that she was mistaken.”
“Yes,” Adam said briefly, and he no longer looked amused. “She was mistaken.”
Lord Seaton smiled. He had known the boy couldn’t be that foolish. “I thought she must be,” he was beginning to say when Adam cut him off.
“I am going to marry the Duchesse,” he said.
The earl stared at him in confusion. “You want to marry her?”
“Yes. And you may tell my Aunt Frances that, much as I might like to elope with Nanda, she would never consent to elope with me. She has remained in a deeply unhappy marriage for five years for the sake of two children, whom she loves. She would never abandon them. Nor will she marry me unless I can arrange it so that, upon her divorce from Gacé, she is named guardian of the children.” He stopped speaking abruptly. “I’ve already said too much, but that is the truth.”
The earl, who had heard only one word, was aghast. “Divorce! Adam, you are not to marry a divorced woman!”
Adam’s face wore its calmest look – the look his father knew always meant trouble. He said, “Would you prefer it if I never married at all, Papa? For if I don’t marry Nanda de Vaudobin, I can assure you I’ll never marry any other woman. You will have rely on Ned to provide you with an heir to the title.”
Lord Seaton thought of Ned’s Russian princess, and shuddered. He said sharply, “Nonsense. It is your duty to marry, and you never shirk your duty. You will marry, Adam, and to someone suitable to your name and posit
ion.” He stared at Adam’s implacable face, and added with genuine horror, “Not a divorced woman, Adam. Please God, not a divorced woman!”
“Disown me if you must, Papa. I will understand.”
“Of course I won’t disown you,” the earl snapped angrily. “Things won’t come to that.”
“They might,” his son said grimly.
There was no mercy on Adam’s face, and with a sinking heart his father realized, that if he did not accept this woman, his relationship with his brilliant eldest son would be over. Adam meant what he had said, and Adam didn’t change. “Does she mean so much to you?” the earl asked, his voice barely audible.
Adam’s eyes were brilliant. “Yes.”
Lord Seaton closed his eyes and fought to calm himself. Finally he opened them and said wearily, “Very well.” He felt as battered as if he had been in an actual fight. “But I don’t think I can bear a vulgar scandal.”
“There will be no scandal,” Adam said definitely.
The earl sat up straighter in his chair. “Well, if you can separate a man from his wife and children without a scandal you must be a miracle maker, Adam. Is Gacé agreeable to a divorce?”
“Gacé knows nothing about a divorce, Papa, and he must not know. At least, not yet.”
“Good God, Adam!” The earl pushed himself out of his chair and began to stump around the room, finally coming to a halt in front of his son. “You tell me you plan to marry this woman and next you say her husband has no intention of divorcing her?” His eyes narrowed. “If there is a suit, and you are named as correspondent, I will disown you.”
“I said there will be no scandal.” Adam’s voice was patient. “If things fall out as I plan, Gacé will grant Nanda a divorce and the guardianship of the children.”
“How many children are involved here?”