“Button fakes?” the duke’s young associate asked, wrinkling his nose.
“Counterfeit coin,” Mallet spat. “I assume they meant to channel the fakes into seamen’s pay.”
“Who arranged the forgery?” the duke asked.
“I dunno. Blair’s job is making sure folks cooperate. That’s all I know.”
“And he was speaking with Colonel Fairweather?” the earl asked, catching Sudbury’s eye.
“Yes, m’lord,” Pratt replied.
“Forgery be damned,” Rand said. “That animal was going to sell his son.”
Pratt nodded mournfully. “To the press gangs, if he were lucky.”
The meaning hit Rand like a stone to the head. Brothel or worse more likely.
“I had to bring him here. No choice.” His voice had a begging tone to it.
“Punishment for desertion is dire,” Mallet said. He glanced at Sudbury.
“It don’t matter, sir,” Pratt said mournfully. “Blair’ll see me dead if he gets me. I’m at my lords’ mercy here.”
“Where are Meggy and Lena staying? With the other camp followers?” Rand demanded, ignoring other issues and the expressions on the older men’s faces.
“No, sir,” said Pratt. “Blair keeps ‘em off by themselves. Has a place down by the wharfs.”
“Can you show it to me?” Rand asked. Pratt’s face lost all color at the thought.
“Easy, Rand,” Will soothed. “There are many things to consider here.”
“What? If he’ll sell his son, what will he do with a daughter? We need to get her away.”
“For starters, you never told me about those charming bruises you arrived with. Did you already barge in?” the earl asked, his eyes on the duke.
Rand shook his head. “It happened in Bristol. Friends of Blair’s, I think.” He described his capture and the conversation.
“It isn’t hard to guess what ‘business’ your acquaintances were hiding,” Sudbury said. “Bristol must be manufacturing, and Portsmouth must be used for distribution. We suspected something involving the ports, but this is more information than we had before.” Rand tapped an impatient finger on the arm of his chair, lost in thought.
“You can do what you will about the counterfeiters, but I need to get Meggy and Lena out of there with or without help.” Rand glared defiantly at his brother-in-law. Will had failed him once before. “If you don’t believe—”
“There’s no question the situation is dire,” Will replied. “You’ll have our help, but there is much to consider before we formulate a plan.”
Rand didn’t answer. Neither did he soften his belligerent stance.
“There’s Private Pratt, for one. He is best kept as a guest here until someone can sort out his status.”
Rand’s shoulders sagged. He nodded, and the earl continued. “There’s your role in all this.”
“What do you mean?”
“Is the lady legally married?”
Rand’s nod was choppy. “So she told me.”
“Pity. That complicates things,” the earl said. “What exactly is your relationship?” He raised a questioning brow.
“Friend.”
The earl looked skeptical. The two men held eyes for a long moment. Rand broke it at last. “She won’t have any other,” he admitted.
The earl relaxed slightly. “Can Blair prove otherwise?”
“Prove? No. He can spread slander though.” Rand felt his face flush. “She and the children lived in my house for two months while—that is, while she evaluated her choices.”
“And she chose to go back to her husband.”
“It’s my own damn fault. I forced her to see the folly of running to her grandmother. The old woman is Ojibwa. They’d have found her and— Well, they’d have found her. Blair threatened to have me arrested for taking his children. I think she went with him to keep me out of it.”
“If that’s so, she failed miserably,” Will said sympathetically. “You seem to have jumped in with both feet, but you can’t just march in and take a man’s wife and child, Rand. Even a vile husband has legal rights.”
“More’s the pity,” Mallet spat. “Some men shouldn’t be allowed to reproduce.”
“It’s the reality,” the duke said. He held up a hand when Rand started to protest. “That doesn’t mean we won’t help. It just means our plans must be carried out delicately.”
“Delicately?” Rand demanded.
“We need to get the husband out of the way,” the duke suggested. “Perhaps the Under-Secretary for War and the Colonies will have ideas.”
“The one who decides where troops are sent?” Pratt asked.
“The very one,” the duke said with a sardonic smile.
“Did I hear that I am needed?” A picture of aristocratic perfection stood in the doorway, his black frock coat, silver-threaded waistcoat, and snowy cravat the epitome of good taste. He smiled at the older men, but when he looked at Rand, his guarded expression gave away nothing. “Hello, Randy—or am I meant to call you Rand now? I’m sorry I’m late.”
Rand rose to his feet, both hands fisted at his side, and glared back at his cousin, his childhood friend, and the last man he ever wanted to see again: Charles Wheatly, the Duke of Murnane.
“No!” he shouted. “I don’t care if he is the Under-, the Assistant, or even the damn Secretary of State for War. I don’t want his help. Not now. Not ever.”
Meggy put her body between her husband and her daughter.
“Did he run to Wheatly? Tell me, or I’ll beat it out of you.”
“How could he run back to Canada? I told you before I don’t know where Drew is. He never came home five days ago. I don’t know whether he stowed away or hired out or—” Dear God, he could have been taken or hurt or worse. She wished her panic didn’t show, but she knew it did.
Cunning replaced the rage on Fergus’s face, and it frightened her. Rage felt familiar and predictable; she knew how to cope with rage. Cunning terrified her. When Fergus turned sly, she never knew where the blows might fall.
“You don’t know, do you?”
Meggy froze. What don’t I know?
“He’s here. Followed us to England. Already poking his aristocratic snout in my business.”
Rand? Where? Why?
“Had word from Bristol, and if I did, maybe your sneaky little weasel of a son did too. Ran to him, I’ll bet.”
A surge of hope filled Meggy. She knew immediately that Blair had seen it in her face.
“Like that, don’t you? Did he bang you good? Hoping for more?” He glanced behind her at Lena. “Told you what will happen if he comes calling. Been warned, just like I warned that son of yours. I owe you one, but I’m going to save it for later.”
“What do you want, Fergus?”
“Your brat and that scum Pratt scampered. It’s my life if I don’t find them, and if I go down, you go down too. Tell me what you know.”
“Private Pratt is gone?”
“Told him to lock your precious sneak away, dint I? And where are they?”
“You told Pratt to lock up Drew? Why would you do that to your own son?”
“Brat don’t know his place. Snuck around where he don’t belong. The colonel wants him gone some way or another. Best we make a little coin on it.”
Meggy’s knees gave way. When she sank to the filthy floor, Lena’s arms came around her neck from her place behind her mother’s back. Fergus planned to make money from getting rid of Drew? To sell him? She knew him to be a bully of the worst sort, but she couldn’t have imagined such a thing.
“I see you understand,” he said, watching Lena with deliberate care. “Tell me what you know.”
“I know nothing. I had no idea
about Pratt and—”
Her husband put his massive fist under her chin and forced her head back. “Tell me what you know about Wheatly’s connections.”
Meggy racked her brain. She knew little enough. His sister paints birds, for goodness’ sake. What was her name?
“His sister’s name is Catherine.”
He shoved her head to the side sharply and pulled his hand back. “Give me more than that, woman.”
“He’s never been in the army. I doubt if he has army contacts.”
“Good. Names please.”
“He called his sister’s husband Will. They have money. Pots of it, I think.”
Fergus nodded. “Might pay to keep word of their philandering crim con boy out of the scandal rags. Will? Would be William. Like their fancy names, do the upper classes. I need a last name. Same as his?”
“I don’t know. Perhaps.”
He shoved her in disgust, sending her on top of Lena who tried to wriggle free. “Colonel’s checking on ‘Wheatly,’ to see what he can figure.” Cunning returned. He stared down at her with an assessing gleam in his eyes.
“He’ll come here. I’ll bet my last coin on it. When he does, you be ready. You look like a hag. Pretty up. He’ll come. We’ll get ‘im then, and the brat too.” He stalked out.
Meggy rolled to a seated position and pulled a sobbing Lena into her arms. She lay her head on the little girl’s and let loose her own tears. She had failed. She couldn’t protect any of the people she loved.
Fergus plans to use me to harm Rand, and I will have no choice. If I don’t cooperate, he’ll harm Lena. A man who would sell his own son will do anything.
Chapter 22
“Is the woman in imminent danger?” Charles directed his question to the room at large. Rand seethed in the corner, his brother-in-law’s dictum to “Sit and don’t be a bigger fool than you have to be” ringing in his ears.
“Yes, Y’r Grace,” Pratt answered, coloring at his own boldness in being the one to speak up. “Sergeant Blair told Drew he would see that his ma and sister paid. And that was afore we scampered.”
“Then we have to extract them.”
Rand sat up straight and met his cousin full in the face for the first time since he sat down. I may hate the faithless bastard, but I’ll take any ally I can get. “That’s what I’ve been trying to tell them,” he said. “Give me some protection, and I’ll see to it she’s safe and Blair pays.”
“And then what?” Charles asked. “Are you prepared to run? Kill Blair, and you stand for murder.”
“If you don’t kill the worm, he’d have all the power on his side in court,” Mallet pointed out. The room erupted with ideas.
“But he’s a criminal! Can’t we just bring him up on charges? What is the punishment for counterfeiting coin?” Rand demanded.
“Hanging.”
“Well then, why can’t we—”
“For one thing, we don’t know he’s a forger. We only know he’s a bully-boy,” Will pointed out.
“For another, he is not just a criminal, he’s part of a criminal gang. We need to take down the entire enterprise,” Sudbury added.
“I don’t care about your investigation. I just want Meggy and Lena safe, even if I have to go myself,” Rand shouted over the din.
“Gentlemen, gentlemen,” Charles admonished. “I prefer subtler methods. They are more effective and much more satisfying in the end. My cousin is quite right that the woman needs protection, but the extraction must be done carefully, with as little bluster as possible.”
“What do you propose?” Sudbury asked, somewhat bemused.
“You can’t play games with Meggy’s life,” Rand insisted, glaring at Charles. Every muscle in his body tensed. He wanted to leap up and run out. No. I want to punch someone. Probably Charles.
His cousin acted as if he were unaware of Rand’s agitation. “It is vital that we get the woman out and do it in such a way that there is no evidence anyone in this room is the perpetrator. Once we do, we’ll have a free hand to go after the counterfeiters. The best way to protect her long term is to get the miscreant imprisoned.”
“Or hanged,” the earl said.
“Quite. I propose we reconnoiter. It would not be at all unusual if I were to make a visit to Portsmouth, in an official capacity. As is always the case, senior officers will entertain me, feed me their usual platitudes, and send me on my way. While they are busy attempting to bamboozle me, my cousin will be escorted about town, touring the sights, so to speak.”
Rand eyed him suspiciously. Where is he going with this?
“That might work. I assume when you leave the woman and the girl will be stowed in your baggage train?” Will asked.
“Yes, if we can remove them without being seen. We might be forced to withdraw far enough that we are assumed to be gone and then return to take them. My plan has several advantages. Number one, they won’t dare attack Rand if he’s in the party of the Under-Secretary of State. It will enable him to march straight into Portsmouth and survey the situation. Number two, it will give Rand the intelligence he needs to actually succeed in the rescue. Number three, it will enable me to assess the various officers who may or may not be involved.”
“Tidy, that,” Mallet said. “Your cousin makes sense, Rand.”
Rand studied his cousin, searched for hidden traps, and hoped for another option. The last time the two of them met, Rand drew his cork, and Charles left with a blackened eye. The boor refused to fight, he remembered in disgust. There had been a woman involved then, too.
“What are the disadvantages,” he demanded.
“If caught, we might have to use force to rescue the woman,” his cousin replied.
Good. I need a fight.
“We might risk their safety,” Charles continued as he watched Rand. “I assume you would prefer to avoid that.”
Rand didn’t honor that with a reply.
Charles sighed. He didn’t take his eyes from Rand’s. “In which case, we’ll have to rush our fences and move in on the counterfeiters without a firm grip on the full extent of the conspiracy.”
The two men watched each other, neither willing to be the first to look away. Rand finally broke eye contact.
“It might work,” he allowed, staring up at his sister’s ornate ceiling. He brought his gaze back down to pin his cousin. “But Meggy’s safety comes first.”
Catherine captured Rand as soon as the doors opened and the gentlemen prepared to leave. She clamped onto his arm while she bid their friends adieu and beamed at Charles, to Rand’s disgust. Why should she not? What lies between you didn’t impact the rest of them. He’s still Will’s nephew and Catherine’s half-brother. Old feelings about sharing his sister simmered in the stew of his resentment.
“Can you stay for supper, Charles?” Catherine asked. Her cheer sounded forced.
The duke glanced at Rand. “I think not. I am engaged for the evening. It was good to see you, Catherine.”
“Can you at least pop up to the nursery with us? Tobias and Mary will be sorry to have missed you.”
Rand stiffened at the sound of “us.” He watched Charles warily.
“Alas no, Cath. Give them my regrets and tell them I’ll take them to Gunther’s for ices with Jonny when I can.”
Jonny. His son. Julia’s son. Rand dropped his gaze to the magnificent parquet floor that covered the Chadbourn House foyer, but he didn’t see it.
The duke possessed better manners. “Good day, Catherine,” he said and then gave a slight nod of acknowledgment, saying only “Rand.” He turned and left without waiting for a reply.
A moment of awkward silence passed between Rand and his sister before he choked out, “I should like to see Tobias and Mary. I suppose they are no longer infants.”
“Is Drew upstairs also?”
She nodded and let him lead her, still holding his arm, toward the stairs.
“He and Tobias must be of an age,” he said to fill the silence between them.
“If I understood Drew correctly, he is seven. Tobias is two years older. He is Mary’s age.”
“Mary can’t be seven. She is just a baby!” Drew’s age? How can my niece have grown so quickly?
“You stayed away much too long,” Cath said in a voice he remembered well. It forewarned of a lecture. She paused on the second floor landing, trapping him there.
“Fred has been gone longer,” he said, attempting to deflect her disapproval to his brother after an uncomfortable pause.
“Yes, as we might have expected even if he weren’t a cavalry officer. But you, Randy? You’re the responsible one. We’ve needed you.”
He doubted that but could think of nothing further to say. He hoped she could read the plea in his eyes. No, I won’t talk about the past.
A sad smile transformed his sister’s expression, and she reached a hand to touch his bruised cheek then turned and continued climbing the stairs to the nursery.
“You haven’t even asked about Artie or Emma,” she said, deftly changing the mood of the conversation.
“If Mary has grown up, Artie must be married,” he said, attempting humor and falling short.
“Your nephew Arthur is sixteen and at Westminster School.”
It was Rand’s turn to pause. “Westminster?” he asked.
She sighed. “We learned. No son of ours will go to Harrow after— Well, after what happened. Will saw to it Matthews was ruined. Did he ever tell you that? They left him with no profession, no references, and no future.”
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