“The prodigal son returns,” Edgar drawled. He seemed larger than in James’ memory, and yet he had only seen him the week before.
“I’d like to talk about wedding details,” Mrs. Sumner began. “It would be lovely if you could both be married in the sweet little church here in Brambridge—”
“Excuse me.” James marched to the garden door, to the orangery and beyond. In the knot garden, he sank onto the marble bench that surrounded an iron globe. The coldness of the marble seeped through his breeches and into his body.
Wedding details.
He stood and strode away from the house across the parkland, stumbling on the unkempt grass, vaulting the fences until he reached the cliffs. He sat gasping for breath as he reached the land’s edge. Far below him the waves rolled against the shore.
He threw his head back and laughed, sucking in the air in deep breaths. How awful and yet so fitting. His walk had taken him straight to the headland where Tommy had lit the fire two years before. From there he could see all the way out into the sea.
How could one ever convince another that what they had said before now meant nothing? That by being apart, he had been able to think more clearly? James picked up a pebble and tossed it off the cliff. It fell away without a sound.
All he had needed was time. Time to spend in the house that he had desperately wanted for two years, in order to find out that really he didn’t want it. The house was merely an empty shell that he had used to symbolize his father.
But that wasn’t the most terrifying thing. In that instant in the cave, he had chosen his father over Harriet, the darkness over the flaming light. The dark portraits of the gallery and their penetrating gazes came into his mind. Is that what happened to the Stantons? They each turned into their fathers, lying, cheating, manipulating until way beyond the grave? All that each of them needed was time and choice?
But she would never take him back. She was an impetuous romantic. Yes, he knew that she had always loved him. It hadn’t taken Melissa to tell him that. But he had seen the look that she had given him in the cave. The hurt and depth of cold in her eyes freezing the flames of red on her head. He’d killed the calf-love that she’d had for him in one instant. It wasn’t trust that he’d broken, it was the image of himself in her eyes.
You are like your father.
James swallowed. So be it. He was like his father. He didn’t have anything left to him. What would his father do?
James watched as a cold red sun set behind the waves. There was only one thing his father would do.
Returning to Brambridge Manor, he ran through the house into his room and packed his bag. He swept his telescope and the embroidery bandages off the side table and jammed them down in a side pocket. One of the last times he’d seen his father before he’d accused him of murder had been as a shadowy figure in his study, his arm upraised, closing the door on James. Running away from the son who had finally turned on him, who was finally old enough to defend himself.
James hurried through the house. At the gallery he paused, taking a last look at the sneering portraits. His lady still pointed upwards to the sky, but now she smiled again, all seeming sadness gone. James stepped lightly into the gallery with a frown. Putting a hand in his pocket, he fingered the raised stitching on the embroidery he kept there, close to his heart. He’d thought it before, that the trace of the five stars was strange. He should have seen that with the addition of two more stars, the constellation would have formed the plough. Time and dust must have obscured them. How had he not seen it before? His lady pointed to the stars, to the Plough itself, the constellation he had watched every night since he had left Brambridge.
As if she had given him her benediction, whistling under his breath, he strode to the stables. He called for Scorpius and saddled up the stallion with all his belongings, patting and stroking the great beast.
“You weren’t going to say goodbye?”
James looked up. Cecilia stood at the entrance to the stable, an oil lantern in her hand, a cloak billowing in the wind around her.
“So you are going after her.” Cecilia stepped into the stable and hung the lamp on a beam. She shook back her hood. “Thank God.”
“What do you mean?”
Cecilia stared at him. “Harriet. You are going after Harriet, aren’t you?”
“How can I? I don’t know where she’s gone. And now I’m engaged to Melissa.”
“As if I could avoid knowing,” Cecilia muttered. She sat on a hay bale. “Her mother has been crowing about it for days.”
“How did you know about Harriet?”
Cecilia frowned at him. “Edgar asked me about you and her. He said that he’d seen you together and asked what I knew. He seemed a little unquiet.” Cecilia fiddled with the straw in the bale. “You’ve seemed different lately. Less focused.”
James pulled the straps tighter around Scorpius’ flank. “Perhaps it was the laudanum.”
Cecilia shook her head. “When you first came back you would stare at the walls of the house as if you were expecting them to burn. Now it is as if you don’t even see that they are there.”
James patted Scorpius. “Were you ever taken into father’s study?” He picked up a brush and brought it down sharply on Scorpius’ flank. The horse stamped nervously. “Sorry,” he muttered.
Cecilia pulled at the straw. “No. But Mama was.” Cecilia stood and took hold of the lantern. She brought it close to her face. “I heard the screams,” she said quietly. “I was just better at hiding than everyone else.”
James bit his lip.
“Which is why you should go after her, James, and leave this place to rot.”
James looked up quickly. Cecilia’s face was ghostly in the flickering light of the burning oil. He sighed. “I don’t know where’s she’s gone. I’m not sure she’d even have me.”
Cecilia dropped the oil lamp to her side as her arm fell. “You mean you didn’t hear?”
“Hear what?”
“Mrs. Madely told Mama and Mrs. Sumner that Mr. Granger stopped a very funny gentleman on the road to Honiton. He had a cart full of packing cases and paintings. Apparently he called himself Master Chance.”
Master Chance. Harriet had come up against Granger and he hadn’t realized that she was a woman? “It still doesn’t tell me where she went.”
Cecilia turned to the door of the stables. “It’s no secret that the post coach to London leaves from Honiton, James.” She paused and swung round. “Nor that Agatha, Harriet’s aunt, arrived from London many years ago. Mrs. Madely wouldn’t keep quiet about her London quality housekeeper.”
James swung himself into Scorpius’ saddle. They’d gone to London. They had to have done. He had been going there anyway. Was there a chance that he could find Harriet again? Oh gods help him. He needed his army name more than ever.
As the horse passed through the stable doors, James gave out a loud “hah” and nudged Scorpius in the side. The great horse sprung forward. James hunkered down low. Yes, he knew he was running away. But he was also running towards something.
Something that might save him.
CHAPTER 25
Harriet put her spoon down and looked around herself with wide eyes. Several interested male gazes stared back at her. Adopting her best starched schoolmistress glare, she waited until they looked away and dropped her gaze back to her ice-cream. She had chosen a Bergamot Water Ice in the shape of a strawberry. Alas there was very little left of the strawberry, only the stalk remained.
Outside the window, the trees wilted. It was blisteringly hot. Despite the use of Lady Colchester’s carriage, Harriet’s feet ached. They had covered every art gallery that Lady Colchester knew, from Kensington to Cork Street. She shuffled her feet, trying to ease the tenderness from her toes.
Two weeks had passed since they had arrived at Upper Brook Street. In that time, Harriet and Agatha had been fitted for new dresses. They had dance lessons every day from the over-powdered Mr. Bertrand. Harriet
had not been able to hide her mirth. Mr. Bertrand was even more of a dandy than Master Chance, the painting salesman that she had tried to portray. Meeting Madame Dupont also had been a different experience. The seamstress had taken one look at Agatha and refused to do the fitting, despite Lady Colchester promising to pay her a handsome sum. In extremely clear words, she told all of them that it would be bad for her business.
Just what had Agatha done before leaving London that had made Madame Dupont act in such a rude way? And it wasn’t only her. At the few musicales Lady Colchester had taken them to, many of the audience had turned their back on them, and those that did acknowledge them had obviously only done so because they were with Lady Colchester.
“Ahem,” Agatha said quietly.
Harriet looked up to see the ice dripping off her spoon. Whilst she had daydreamed, her ice-cream had fallen into a puddle on the plate.
She sighed and laid the spoon down, the taste in her mouth now bitter. They had stopped in Gunthers as it was close to where they had been searching the galleries of Bond Street. Each owner had shaken their heads at the name Peter Beauregard; they professed to have no knowledge of an exhibition of his works. They had not even seemed interested in seeing the small painting that Harriet had brought with them to show just in case. Noting Lady Colchester’s attendance, they preferred instead to tempt the ladies into looking at the other paintings on offer in the gallery.
Lady Colchester had waved off the carriage and they had moved on further, down Regent Street to Cork Street where the more fashionable galleries stood. But each time they were greeted with a blank gaze and supercilious smirks.
“Perhaps it was all a lie,” Agatha said glumly. “I’m not sure where to go next. I never used to pay attention when Peter mentioned his art. He left for Oxford when I was very young. I didn’t see him much after that. And there wasn’t much opportunity to look at art in Brambridge.”
Art appreciation did seem to be a rich person’s hobby. Those proud gallery owners had fixated on Lady Colchester and ignored Harriet and Agatha. Harriet frowned. There had been another lady recently interested in visiting an exhibition, something at the Royal Academy of Art. Who was it—ah yes, Lady Guthrie. Who was she to merit mention in the circulars? Harriet straightened and pushed her plate away from her.
“Where’s the Royal Academy?”
“In the western apartments at New Somerset House on the Strand. They hold an exhibition every year.” Lady Colchester shook her head. “But surely he wouldn’t have gone there. That is for painters of the highest acclaim.”
“Why do you think he might have gone there, Harriet?” Agatha took a last mouthful of her own ice-cream and let her spoon fall to the plate with a clatter. “Sorry.”
“There was a lady in the papers—a Lady Guthrie—“
“Awful woman,” Lady Colchester said.
“She was going to a Turner exhibition that was going to be held at the Royal Academy. From what I read, Turner does very good seascapes. Papa did too.”
Agatha looked doubtful, Lady Colchester even more so. “Only the best artists exhibit at the Royal Academy, Harriet darling, and I’m not sure Peter was classed among their ranks.”
“It’s worth one last try.” Harriet pressed her foot back into her half-slippers and pushed her chair back. Agatha sighed and followed her out of the shop and into the waiting carriage.
Lady Colchester gave instructions to her coach to take them to the north side of Somerset House on the Strand. The other side led straight onto the river and was only accessible by boat.
Leaving the liveried coach on the Strand, Harriet marched the length of the courtyard to the new building that formed New Somerset House, with her painting under her arm, the aches in her feet forgotten. But her step faltered as she reached the large doors to the building. The oak doors stood closed, as if to show that only a part of society could pass beyond the hallowed entrance. She looked down at the parcel under her arm, and then back to Agatha and Lady Colchester behind. Despite Lady Colchester’s kindness, it was still evident that Harriet and Agatha were mere country misses, that their dresses were only serviceable at best. She didn’t want to think about what would happen if they could not find some of their own money.
It was almost certain that they would have to return to Brambridge and beg the forgiveness of Mrs. Madely.
And she would have to see James again.
Harriet swallowed and pushed on the oak doors. They swung open with surprising ease to reveal an enormous staircase that stopped at every floor with entrances on either side to more rooms.
A small reception was tucked to the left hand side of the doors. Harriet stepped into the shadowed lobby and put her hand on the counter. A small man sat on the other side, his head bowed to his work.
“I wish to see the Director of Painting.”
The man cocked his head and moved a paper from one side of the counter to the other. “Who?”
“What do you mean, who?”
The man sighed and looked up finally. “These apartments house the Royal Academy of Arts, my dear. They don’t have directors, they have associates and members.”
Harriet sucked in a breath. She had been too busy taking in the black and white tiled floor and the statues to prepare herself for what she was going to say.
“I, well, I don’t know.”
“Perhaps you could work it out quickly. I have other people to tend to.”
Harriet glanced behind her. A pair of well-dressed men leaned against the staircase banisters, eyeing her speculatively. Broad shouldered, they were dressed in Bath superfine and their breeches molded snugly to their thighs.
Harriet picked her painting off the counter and stood back. “I beg your pardon,” she murmured as the men stepped forward. She watched curiously as the clerk fawned over one of the men who had patches of white hair on his head and limped awkwardly.
“Lord Lassiter.” Lady Colchester’s breathless voice in her ear made her jump. “Reportedly back a few months ago from the war. Extremely rich. Had a funny name in the army as well I believe. Can’t remember what it was. Will need to see the scandal papers.” She nodded toward his friend. “He was on the Peninsular with him too.”
Lady Colchester smiled at Lord Lassiter and turned back to Agatha and Harriet.
“I say. Could not help hearing the young lady’s conversation with the clerk. Wondered if we could help, Victoria?” Lord Lassiter had approached quietly despite his limp and stood beside them.
“Why, Freddie.” Lady Colchester turned. “Might I introduce you to my dear friend, Agatha Beauregard and—” Here she glanced at Agatha and, receiving a nod, she continued, “Harriet Beauregard, her niece.”
“Charmed.” Freddie, Lord Lassiter, leant over Harriet’s hand and kissed it. He looked back up at her and caught her gaze. He reminded her of James. Unwillingly, Harriet held his look and smiled weakly. She didn’t need any more interaction with handsome, battle-weary men.
“As am I, Anthony Lovall at your service.” Anthony pushed Freddie out of the way and took Harriet’s hand in his.
“You can’t treat an injured man like that, old boy,” Freddie said, rapping Anthony on the ankles with a cane. “You know I get first look in on the good-looking ladies.”
“Oh shut up, Freddie. Can’t you see the lady needs help?”
“Of course.” The jesting look on Freddie’s face had gone. In an instant he had turned from the clown to a soldier. Seeing Harriet’s gaze, he pasted a smile on his face once more. “Why do you think I said ‘at your service’? Miss Beauregard, how can we help?”
Slowly Harriet unwrapped the small painting of Longman’s Cove she had carried all morning. “I want to find out which who here might look after this sort of painting,” she said directly. She propped the painting on the counter. “It was painted by my father, Peter Beauregard.”
Freddie patted at his waistcoat and brought a quizzing glass to his eye. He let it fall with a sharp motion. “I’m so
rry Miss Beauregard, that can’t have been painted by your father. Anthony, look at the way it is put together. Surely it is a Mompesson? I saw the paintings when I was here last week. There was one just like it.”
“I’m sorry, Lord Lassiter, but this was most definitely painted by my brother,” said Agatha. “Come on, Harriet. We’re wasting time. He must have gone elsewhere.”
“I want to see it,” Harriet said.
“See what?” said Lady Colchester puzzled.
“The painting that looks just like this one.”
“I’ll take you,” Mr. Lovall volunteered.
Freddie pulled out his quizzing glass and, putting it to his eye, surveyed the picture again. “We’ll all go,” he said, glancing over the top of the counter at the clerk who stood awkwardly behind.
The clerk grimaced and threw a handful of tokens onto the counter. Freddie swept them into his hand and handed them to Agatha, Harriet and Lady Colchester.
He put a hand on the painting, his eyes still on the clerk. “And I think I will take this with me too.”
Grasping the painting under one arm, Freddie started up the stairs. Harriet looked at the clerk, who was staring after the painting. With a quick jump, she trotted to keep up with Freddie.
At the first landing, Freddie turned left into a room filled with portraits in soft blue and pink hues. Each portrait was surrounded by a heavy gilt frame, and at least five foot wide.
“Reynolds,” Freddie said knowledgeably.
Harriet gasped. She had read about him in the papers. He had painted everyone. Soft gazes stared out of the pictures. It was utterly unlike the dark portraits in Brambridge Manor. Harriet had only glimpsed them once, but that was enough.
“This,” said Mr. Lovall as they reached a large light-filled atrium, “is the Mompesson Gallery, otherwise known as the Great Exhibition Room. I’m told that the paintings were left here after the annual exhibition of 1810.”
Slowly the little group spread out across the gallery. “I can’t believe it,” Agatha muttered again and again.
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