Royal Regard

by Mariana Gabrielle

  “Your Grace, Your Lordship, His Majesty sends his regards. He wishes me to remind you his staff is at your service.” Nick noted it was Prinny’s personal household placed at their service, not the House of Hanover. None of the king’s siblings had chosen to involve themselves.

  Nick waved the man to the second visitor’s chair before the desk while Firthley poured a drink.

  Mentally, Nick shook himself, concentrating on the General to keep from falling apart. “You may tell His Majesty I thank him for his assistance,” he intoned, picking up what remained of the brandy he had been planning not to drink.

  “I should have expressed my gratitude before now. And to your men. I will find a better way to convey my appreciation once we are through this muddle.” The brandy sloshed in the glass as he waved it toward the soldier.

  The General acknowledged Nick with a bob of his head as he was handed his glass, “No need for thanks, Your Grace. It is our pleasure to assist. His Majesty is quite concerned for Lady Huntleigh.”

  “Most appreciated, you may be sure,” Firthley acknowledged. “Might we get to business with no further delay? We would both prefer to be concentrating on other concerns.”

  “Of course.” It gave Nick pause when the man took a long, slow draught from his glass before he began. Whatever was about to be said, Firthley was right: Nick would rather be hiding in Bella’s bedchamber with the door locked than listen to another word about the crimes against her.

  “You know the identity of the woman identified as Michelle Delacroix, Your Grace?”

  “I have made the duke aware, yes.”

  Nick drummed his fingertips impatiently on the desk.

  “Before her marriage,” the General began, “Lemaître was lady’s maid to the duke’s sister, then his wife. Her mother had been a cook under the previous duke, but when Malbourne inherited the title, he replaced all of the servants, including her mother. She stayed until he bolted just ahead of the Revolution, and she married into the bourgeoisie. Presumably she was his light o’ love.”

  “Presumably.” Firthley’s lip curled. “Deplorable to make a mistress of a woman in one’s employ.”

  Nick nodded agreement, but kept his attention on the soldier.

  “There was some talk of a babe, but no child to speak of now,” he continued. “It may have been farmed out or may not have existed at all.” Nick and Firthley traded an ominous glance and the General’s solemn expression mirrored theirs. They all knew what a peer might do to cover up the existence of an unwanted child, and none of them wanted to voice it. “Once widowed, she worked as every kind of servant, but lady’s maid for one of Napoleon’s toadies for seven years before she reunited with Malbourne.”

  “This seems rather more detailed than I would expect,” Firthley noted, “even for a contingent as thorough as yours.”

  On reflection, Nick agreed. It wasn’t as though Bow Street Runners would have had time to go to France and report back by now, even had anyone been dispatched there.

  The General sat up, tugging at his coat, appearing inordinately pleased with himself. “We had a French agent placed in Boney’s service who has since removed to London—one Pierre Bouchard. A mercenary soldier for Malbourne and nobles like him, turned spy against the provocateurs, then for anyone working against Napoleon.”

  “And our government held the heftiest purse,” Firthley deduced.

  “Indeed. When made aware of the circumstance, he reported to the Foreign Office straight away.”

  “How extraordinarily fortunate.”

  “Quite, my lord. Malbourne had paid him a great deal of money to keep silent about past engagements at Château de Fouret, but since the duke is now dead, he no longer felt obligated to keep the man’s secrets.”

  “Lady Amelia Dewhurst?” Nick guessed.

  The General sat back, stunned. It took him a moment to restrain his lips, opening and closing in disbelief, but at the same moment he spoke, Firthley did, too.

  “How do you know that name?”

  “Who is Lady Amelia Dewhurst?”

  “The last Duchesse de Malbourne,” Nick answered, “an Englishwoman.”

  Steepling his fingers, Firthley sat back as Nick went on, “Huntleigh had been trying to find Bouchard. He knew Lady Amelia as a child and suspected Malbourne had done her ill. One of the château’s former servants suggested Bouchard might know something if he could be found.” Nick sat back and crossed his right ankle over his left knee, waving his hand and shrugging his shoulder. “I know nothing more. I haven’t the resources of the Foreign Office.”

  The General finished the brandy in his glass, so Firthley poured more. Once the soldier had taken a goodly mouthful, he filled in the blanks.

  “As you say, Your Grace, Lady Amelia Fouret, née Dewhurst, was the only child of a minor baron whose title is now extinct. From what we understand, Malbourne told his wife’s family she died in childbirth, but Bouchard said there was no evidence of that. He said…” The man almost retched up his brandy when he recounted, “Bouchard said she hadn’t enough unscarred flesh left on her bones to carry a babe. He was the one to bury her, you see.”

  All three men sat silently as they finished their glasses, remembering what had been found when they combed through the two small rooms Malbourne had rented in the East End. In the earliest hours of Bella’s return to London, when the doctor would still not allow anyone into the room, Nick had insisted on joining the Bow Street Runners and the Royal Guard in the search. Firthley had come along to ensure Nick’s safety, and that of everyone around him should the duke’s fury again explode.

  Nick hadn’t been able to hold back a roar at the sight of the bed frame. Presaging another murderous rage, he had taken in the shackles and straps and iron posts, all tools to facilitate the worst forms of torture anyone in the room could imagine and many they never wished to. Seeing the armoire filled with every kind of instrument of pain, birch rods to thumbscrews to branding irons, Nick had slammed his already-pulped fist into a wall. However, angry as he had been, as soon as he laid eyes on the devices meant to pierce and scar a woman’s intimate parts, he cast up his accounts and Firthley had taken him to the carriage, ashen and stumbling.

  Three hands reached for the decanter, but Firthley took the prerogative to refill each glass.

  Nick spoke first, “Huntleigh would be gratified to know Lady Amelia’s fate has been discovered and avenged, though it is unfortunately too late to bring anyone peace.”

  “What I know would not bring her family peace. And truth to tell, I am relieved not to have to make an accounting to her father.” The General’s face was disturbed in a way no military man’s ever should be—eyes as haunted as any man who seen his own woman and children killed before his eyes. As disturbed as Lady Amelia’s father might have been.

  Firthley took up his glass and gave a half-cynical, half-virtuous toast, “To the belated righting of wrongs, gentlemen.” All three men drank, all three faces grim.

  Before Nick could dwell further on what might have happened to Bella had they not found her in time—as though her current unresponsive state weren’t enough—the General said, “I do not wish to cause a disruption in Lady Huntleigh’s protection, but The Blues cannot spare a score of men indefinitely, as she can by no stretch be considered Royal Family.”

  “Oh,” Nick responded blankly, “of course.” Another thing he hadn’t considered. Prinny had sent the nearest available men when he heard the news, members of his own guard, but strictly speaking, they should never have been assigned the task.

  A tap on the door revealed Corbel, whose face was so still there must be a story behind it.

  “My lord, one of the gentleman of our military guard requests an audience. First Major John Smythe.”

  The General swore under his breath.

  Corbel coughed to clear the room of profanity, and continued, “He is rather more insistent than one might expect of an officer. He will not be moved, Sir.”

  Firthl
ey held out his hand to invite the General’s explanation for a military officer in the receiving room.

  The soldier’s lips stretched across his face in what might loosely be called a smile. “As I was saying, my lord, the Coldstreamers will take our place here in the morning, and we will keep them in your service as long as they are needed. Longer, if I have my say, and I frequently do.”

  “Our thanks, Sir,” Firthley acknowledged. Picking up the quill from the standish, he pointed the feather toward the soldier, prelude to the question he need not repeat.

  The General’s face might split at the jaw if he pulled his mouth unto a tighter smile. “We have had one stroke of luck. One of our ranking officers in that unit, Major Smythe, the young man trying to force his way into your study, appears to have a vested interest in the countess’s safety.”

  Firthley queried, the end of the goose feather trailing across the desktop, “Why is that?”

  “As he tells it, they have been estranged many years, but I am given to understand he is her brother.”

  Chapter 28

  Nick and Firthley stared at each other, dumbfounded, then at the General, who regarded them earnestly, no idea of the cannon blast he had just released in the marquess’s study. Charlotte had assured Nick the Smithson men were beyond his reach, burning in the flames of Hell, where they belonged. At best, this was an imposter.

  No, perhaps not best. It might be better if the man were her dear departed brother, so Nick could force restitution for every bruise Bella had experienced at his hands. Yes. On reflection, that would be an outstanding outcome.

  Before Nick could envision all the ways to make Major Smythe pay for the damage he had inflicted on his sister, Firthley recovered the powers of speech, but in a register almost too shrill for a man.

  “Her brother?”

  “Yes, Your Lordship.” The set of his jaw portended a lengthy chastisement of said brother. “Major Smythe was asked to remain in the receiving room. I wished to bring you up to date and secure your agreement before I invited him to join us.”

  “Quite right!” Firthley’s voice continued to rise in both pitch and volume.

  More to the point, Nick assumed without expressing his opinion, the general wished to take credit for his own regiment’s successes before allowing anyone else to supplant his men in the king’s esteem.

  Firthley stepped out from behind his desk, taking up the brandy decanter. He offered the dregs, which were declined, and used the near-empty carafe as a reason to cross the room. Placing it carefully on the sideboard, he looked over at Nick, brows turned in, forehead furrowed.

  “If you have nothing else, General,” he intoned, nobility rising, breaking the surface unease in the room like oil through water, “you had better send Smythe to me. You needn’t return, as I will interview the man myself.”

  Nick looked back and forth between Firthley and the soldier, but while the marquess had no problem looking him in the eye, the general finally appeared to grasp the tension, so kept his impassive expression studiously anywhere else. He stood, ineffectually dusting his uniform. Before Nick could speak, he said, “If you have no further inquiries, Your Lordship, Your Grace?”

  The General looked briefly at Firthley, who said, “You may go.”

  Once the man had left, the marquess summoned his butler, who appeared so quickly it was certain he had been waiting just outside the door.

  “Keep the gentleman in the receiving room under guard for the moment, and ask my wife to attend me here.”

  “Yes, my lord.”

  Firthley turned to remark to Nick, “If the man is her cousin, she’ll be able to confirm it. I’ve only met him twice, years ago.”

  Speaking once more to Corbel, he instructed, “Once you have spoken to Her Ladyship, please have two soldiers posted at the door to Lady Huntleigh’s room, and two more below her outside window, and only then show Major Smythe up.”

  Once Corbel had cleared the doorway, Firthley explained, “The family name is Smithson, not Smythe, and no matter who has vouched for him, I know nothing of this man.”

  Nick considered dozens of reasons a stranger might dissemble to gain entrance, and the dismay must have crossed his face, as Firthley said, “Quite.”

  Firthley slammed his hand down on the desk, the orrery bouncing and shaking at the impact.

  “Demme! Wretched timing. As though there weren’t enough turmoil.”

  Firthley crossed to a row of locked cupboards and found a new bottle of fine French brandy, emptying it into the decanter. He splashed well-water into both of their empty glasses, however, which spoke volumes about the clarity he thought required for this meeting. And he was right. Nick’s mind was more than muddled enough.

  He asked, “This is the brother who will be after her money?”

  “From what I understand,” Firthley said, returning the carafe to the shelf. “He wrote after his father’s death, asking that I buy him a commission, but Charlotte and her family were firmly against it.”

  Charlotte rushed in the door, removing the sullied apron as she flew across the room to her husband, Corbel picking it up and folding it across his arm as he trailed behind.

  “Am I hearing correctly? John Smithson is here? Now? My unspeakable cousin has reappeared after all this time?”

  Firthley put his arm around her tensed shoulders. “So it would appear, though the man gave the name Smythe. I can have him sent away, but I thought it prudent to confirm his identity and find out what he wants. Do you mind seeing him?”

  “I would just love to see him,” Charlotte growled, in a voice Nick had never heard and never wanted to hear again. She sounded like she might chew a man’s arm off if asked to trim a fingernail. “The deuced rat must have been waiting in the gutter for Myron to die.”

  “Lady Firthley!” Firthley barked at this shocking speech, but Charlotte was unmoved.

  “The moment he says closest male relative, I will throw him down the front stairs!”

  Firthley patted her gingerly on the arm as he stepped back just a bit, his eyes rounded. Apparently, he didn’t hear this voice often either.

  “That will not be necessary, my dear.” Firthley took a pistol out of his desk drawer, loaded it, and slipped it into his waistband, underneath his jacket, looking for all the world like a back-alley criminal in a gentleman’s clothes. “I’ll be with you the entire time.”

  Wondering if he were too exhausted or inebriated for pistols, Nick asked, “Do you really think you’ll need a firearm? He is her brother.”

  “You have no idea, Wellbridge,” Charlotte said, straightening her hair in the pier glass on the wall near Firthley’s desk. “My uncle and cousins were the very dregs. Make no mistake: he will have some awful plan, and on the heels of Malbourne… If we aren’t careful, Bella will be drugged again and on a ship to the Continent with another man trying to browbeat her into signing over her fortune… It would not in the least surprise me if they were in league.”

  Nick took the other gun Firthley offered and ensured it was loaded. “He will have to kill me first.”

  Firthley seated himself on the front of his desk, Charlotte standing right next to him, and Nick stayed near the door, to keep the man from escaping Firthley’s weapon if he tried.

  No more than five minutes later, during which time none of them moved or spoke, all preparing themselves for a meeting none could predict, a tall man entered, wearing a full-dress military uniform, minus the shako. Just below his craggy face and closely shorn, greying hair, a deep scar cut across his clean-shaven jaw. The resemblance to Bella was slight, visible only in the nose, the tilt of his head, and the bronze shimmer of the few hairs not yet silver.

  Even had the General not prepared them, Nick would have known he was a member of the elite Coldstream Guards. Nick marked the insignia of a First Major on his double-breasted scarlet jacket, faced with white. Two rows of buttons were shiny, boots spotless, as though he had jumped directly from a carriage to the marble fron
t foyer, and his white breeches and kid gloves were clean as a nun’s linen. The entire ensemble had been perfectly tailored, needing no padding to enhance his broad shoulders and trim, but not thin, middle-aged waist. His height, weight, and breadth were uncomfortably comparable to Nick’s, but his eyes spoke of much more experience killing.

  Nick wondered how long he had been watching, waiting for the right moment to strike.

  Charlotte and her husband spoke at the same time:

  “Mr. Smythe, I presume?”

  “Why are you here, John Smithson, and what have you done with your real name?”

  “Charlo—my apologies, Lady Firthley, Lord Firthley. It’s John Smythe now—Major John Smythe.” Smythe bowed sharply, then stood straight as a javelin, making no move toward a seat.

  Charlotte snapped, “You still look like a Smithson to me.”

  The Major looked chagrined at the charge, but left the bait dangling. He turned toward Nick, relying on the haughtiness and superiority of a British officer to maintain control. “And who, Sir, might you be?”

  Nick drew on the arrogance of generations of Northopes to quash any thought of superiority. “The ninth Duke of Wellbridge and Lady Huntleigh’s betrothed.”

  The soldier’s eyebrows rose. “Betrothed? I had understood Lord Huntleigh only recently—”

  “I am not the one required to explain himself, Sirrah.”

  “Of course.” After a lengthy, unrepentant stare, he inclined his head and said, “I beg your pardon, Your Grace.”

  Turned back to Charlotte and Firthley, Smythe offered, “I know it has been many years, Lady Firthley, and understand why you might be reticent to invite me into your home, but quite aside from the military posting, my sister is badly injured, and I wish to see her.”

  Charlotte’s eyes narrowed. “I’m sure you do wish to see her, and any inheritance from her husband, but you will not set a finger on a ha’penny. The three of you spent Bella’s dowry and sold her to Myron and a ship filled with sailors, and that is all you will ever get.”