The Wisdom of Madness: The Ministry of Curiosities, Book #10

by C. J. Archer

  The Wisdom of Madness

  The Ministry of Curiosities, Book #10

  C.J. Archer

  C.J. Archer

  Copyright 2018 C.J. Archer

  Visit C.J. at http://cjarcher.com

  Contents

  About THE WISDOM OF MADNESS

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  The Medium: An excerpt

  A Message From The Author

  Get a FREE Short Story

  Also by C.J. Archer

  About the Author

  Thank you to reader Krysta Rangel for naming the puppy mentioned in this book. I hope you all agree with me when I say it’s the perfect name.

  About THE WISDOM OF MADNESS

  With Alice determined to discover the truth about her past, and Seth determined to help her, the couple find themselves sucked into a world where nothing is as it seems and no one can be trusted. On the run to escape a mad queen's wrath, and with an entire realm looking for them, tensions fray and friendships are tested.

  Even worse for Seth, shocking secrets he'd rather leave buried are brought to the surface.

  Joined on their adventure by an irritable Gus and a mysterious Eva, the four friends must learn the truth of Alice's past so she can forge her future.

  But a future with whom? And where?

  Chapter 1

  Seth

  Watching Charlie and Lincoln talking quietly together, it was difficult for Seth to remember that he'd once been half in love with her.

  Perhaps not love. Not really. At least not the depth of love a husband has for his wife—or ought to—and clearly not the depth of love Lincoln and Charlie had for each another. They thought alike, finished one another's sentences, and knew each other better than they knew themselves.

  It was a marvel that anyone could love a cold, calculating man like Lincoln. Even more miraculous was that Lincoln loved her back. They'd all thought him incapable of emotion. Before Charlie came to live with them at Lichfield Towers, Seth, Cook and Gus joked that Lincoln had been created in a mad scientist's laboratory.

  How wrong they'd been.

  No, Seth had never really been in love with Charlie, but he did adore her. She'd once said their relationship was like a brother and sister, but in his experience, brothers and sisters bickered. He and Charlie rarely argued. Favorite cousins? No, that wasn't right, either. He loved Charlie like a…like a man who'd be there to pick up the pieces when her husband died. Like a man who knew she wasn't the grand love of his life, his soul mate, but didn't want to see her suffer, either. There. That described them perfectly, and quite poetically too, if he did say so himself.

  He propped his booted feet on a footstool, clasped his hands over his stomach, and watched his two good friends share a secret smile. A pang twisted his gut. No one had ever looked at him that way, and sometimes he wondered if anyone ever would.

  Thoughts of Alice threatened to rise but he quashed them. There was no point thinking about her. She simply wasn't interested in him, and that was the end of it. If only they didn't keep bumping into each other, Seth was quite sure he'd lose interest. If only she weren’t always around. He was a fickle lover, after all; he rarely kept his paramours for more than a few months. Just as soon as Alice moved out of Lichfield, all would be well again. He could find himself a lonely widow or bored governess, someone older but not too old. Someone who appreciated the attentions of a younger man. Not someone like Alice with a biting wit, fierce intelligence and formidable elegance.

  Not someone who'd be shocked by his past.

  Seth's mother swanned into the drawing room as if she were mistress of the house. It was a testament to Charlie's good nature that she put up with the indomitable Lady Vickers. Seth's mother could be trying, to put it mildly.

  She clicked her tongue and shooed his feet off the stool so she could pass.

  "You could have gone around, Mother," he said.

  "Your boots are filthy. Charlie doesn't want dirt on her velvet stool." She lowered herself onto the sofa and regarded him levelly.

  "That's for Charlie to decide, not you."

  She sighed. "Seth, why are you being so disagreeable of late?"

  "I am not."

  "You are. You don't like anything I say or do, not to mention you mope about the house like a listless schoolboy. Indeed, you're worse than when you were a schoolboy home for the holidays. At least then you'd spend all day in the stables or out riding."

  "I'd gladly spend all day in the stables now, but apparently it's not a suitable occupation for a gentleman."

  "Not the manual labor part, no," she admitted. "However, you can still go riding." She glanced at the clock on the mantel. "You have a few hours before you must dress for dinner. You haven't forgotten you're dining with me at the Beecrofts' tonight, have you?"

  He planted his elbows on his knees and buried his fingers in his hair. "Must I go?"

  "Yes! Lizzie Beecroft is desperate to see you again, so her mother tells me."

  "Lizzie Beecroft can't even look me in the eye. And when she does talk, it's about horses. Nothing but horses."

  "You like horses," Charlie piped up from the other side of the room.

  "Not as much as Lizzie Beecroft, apparently."

  "She knows you like them, Seth dear," his mother said. "She's trying to attract your attention by talking about your interests. Honestly, I thought you understood women."

  "Some women," he muttered, once again pushing thoughts of Alice away. He frowned. "And what makes you think I understand women?" As far as he could remember, he'd rarely mentioned his previous lovers to his mother. She knew about Julia, of course, and a handful of others, but not all. Not nearly all.

  His mother avoided his gaze. "I hear things."

  What had she heard? How much did she know? Did he want to hear the answers?

  "You should go, Seth," Charlie said quickly, no doubt thinking he needed rescuing. Bless her. "You've been cooped up at Lichfield ever since the wedding and deserve an enjoyable evening out."

  That was the problem—it wouldn't be enjoyable. Once upon a time, he would have been delighted to dine with the Beecrofts—or anyone, for that matter—but now he found it a chore. Now he found the girls to be silly or dull, and he simply couldn't be bothered flirting with them. What had happened to him? Why couldn't he do as he used to and enjoy an evening with pretty girls, teasing the ones who were too shy to meet his gaze and flirting with the bolder ones?

  Ever since the wedding, a week ago, something in Seth felt different. Perhaps it was seeing Charlie and Lincoln happily settled. Or perhaps it was the quiet lull following the chaos leading up to that day, with Lincoln being arrested, Swinburn trying to destroy the ministry, and the Queen of Hearts's army coming for Alice. While he was glad it was all over, he had to admit that the days since had been slow. Visiting Gus's great aunt and the orphans just wasn't enough. He needed something more, yet he didn't know what. He did know that dining with the Beecrofts wasn't the answer.

  He appealed to his mother. "We had dinner with the Beecrofts three nights ago. Must I go again?"

  "Yes."

  "Why, since I won't be marrying Lizzie Beecroft?"

  "You might, if you put some effort into getting to know her. She's quite fetchi
ng when she looks up from her lap."

  "I require more than a fetching woman for my wife." Even in his lovers, too. Beautiful but dull had never interested him.

  His mother wasn't ready to give up the very tasty morsel of a Beecroft bride, however. They weren't a wealthy family but they were established and respectable, something his mother craved and, to be perfectly honest, the Vickers name needed. Seth's father had pushed the boulder down the hill of their disgrace, and Seth only managed to stop it by employing somewhat dubious methods, but pushing it uphill again was proving a task beyond both him and his mother. They needed to attach themselves to a family like the Beecrofts to haul up the final climb. The problem was, he didn't particularly care.

  "Lizzie is demure, sensible, and well behaved," Lady Vickers went on.

  He couldn't help his smile. "Lucky you never had to marry off a daughter. You're not very good at touting a girl's qualities to a fellow."

  "Lizzie would make the perfect wife."

  "Not for someone like me. I require someone more like Charlie."

  "Is that so?" Lincoln countered, sounding like he wanted to smash Seth's nose.

  "Not like Charlie," Seth said before he turned to ice from Lincoln's glare. "Definitely not like her. At all."

  "Someone like Alice," Charlie added, her eyes twinkling with mischief. She plucked the sleepy beagle off the carpet near her feet and settled him on her lap. Lincoln's gaze defrosted as he followed her every move.

  "Alice is a dear girl," Lady Vickers said, "but she's not for Seth, and he knows it."

  "You do recall that she's a princess," Charlie said.

  His mother plucked off one of her black gloves. "Not here."

  "Would it be different if she weren't exiled?"

  "And lose my Seth to another world entirely? I missed him terribly when I went to America. Imagine if we were separated by…" She flapped the glove. "By more than an ocean? It would upset me too much."

  Seth opened his mouth to protest but found he didn't have the heart for it. He had no idea what to think regarding Alice anymore. Perhaps his mother was right. Or perhaps she was very wrong. He sighed. Why couldn't he be more like his old self? Enjoying life and the world around him, happy to give and receive affection, and grateful for somewhere comfortable to land when he'd had his fill? Rather like Gordon, the puppy.

  Christ, had he really been that immature mere months ago?

  "Besides," his mother went on, "the Beecrofts know very little about…events from your past."

  Seth felt the heat rise up his neck. It would seem his mother knew more than Seth realized. Alice didn't, thank God.

  "The Beecrofts rarely come to London," Lady Vickers said. "Lady Beecroft brought her daughter down only last week after more than two years absence and hasn't yet had time to hear all the gossip. You would be smart to secure the girl before she does hear it."

  Seth followed the thought that flittered through his head of his future, faceless wife learning of his past and all the dissolute things he'd done to make ends meet, quite willingly at the time. It wasn't that he regretted the choices he'd made, it was just that he preferred certain people didn't learn about them. Chief among them being the woman who was supposed to admire and respect him, whoever she may be.

  He groaned. "Help me out, Charlie."

  Charlie's fingers stroked Gordon's long ears. "Leave me out of this."

  Seth looked to Lincoln. Lincoln's eyes tightened at the corners. Seth wouldn't get help from that quarter either.

  Charlie placed the puppy in Lincoln's lap and offered a hand to Lady Vickers. "Why don't we see to the week's menu together? I could do with your advice."

  "You don't need it," Lady Vickers said. "You're perfectly capable of speaking to Cook without me, although I do want to see him about another matter."

  Another matter? Oh God, what was she up to? First the footman—second footman—and now the cook. Seth's friend, no less. Did she have to flaunt their…whatever it was…in front of her own son?

  "I know what you're trying to do, Charlie," his mother said, "but it won't work. I will not be distracted from my task. Seth, promise me you'll come to dinner tonight."

  If he made a promise and then broke it, would he go to hell? Surely God would see that it was necessary.

  "I have to go out," Seth said, rising. "I remember something important I'm supposed to be doing."

  He was rescued from the sharp point of his mother's glare by the entry of Doyle, the butler. "Miss Eva Cornell and David Cornell," he announced.

  Seth sat again. This he would stay for. It was always fun watching Lincoln struggle in the presence of his half-brother and sister.

  Charlie, ever the gracious hostess and sister-in-law, greeted them with smiles and kisses. Even the stern David returned her smile with a genuine one of his own. It faded upon seeing his older half-brother stand to greet them. Not even the puppy in Lincoln's arms could soften David's features.

  "Fitzroy," David said.

  "Cornell," Lincoln said.

  Seth made a point of shaking David's hand and kissing Eva's cheek. He'd stepped in for the kiss and, because of their closeness, he could feel her tense. It was the same reaction she always had upon first seeing him, but he was grateful that it rarely lasted. She just seemed to need a moment to get used to his presence. It was a reaction he often noticed timid people have. Except Eva wasn't timid.

  "To what do we owe this pleasure?" he asked, deliberately taking a step back to give her space.

  David glanced around the room. "Our mother isn't here?"

  "No," Lincoln said.

  "We haven't seen Leisl since the wedding," Charlie added. "Why did you think she'd be here?"

  "She left us a note telling us to come."

  "Me, not us," Eva said to her brother. "She addressed the note to me. You're supposed to be working." She asked Lincoln if she could hold the puppy and he handed the beagle over. She clutched him to her chest and snuggled him. Seth had to hand it to the puppy—he was better at getting Eva to relax than he was. "What did you name him?"

  "Gordon," Charlie said. "After Gordon Thackeray, a friend who helped us on occasion. He's gone now but not forgotten."

  "How lovely." Eva laughed as Gordon licked her chin.

  Seth couldn't help smiling at her. Not only did she have a lustrous laugh but he still marveled at how much she looked like Lincoln, with her strong cheekbones, dark hair and eyes. Lincoln never laughed like that, though. Not in Seth's presence.

  "If our mother's not here then where is she?" David asked, unmoved by the puppy's floppy ears and big brown eyes.

  "Perhaps she decided to do some shopping first," Lady Vickers said.

  "She doesn't like to shop."

  "Perhaps today is different."

  David looked as if he would protest, but Eva got in first. "She has certainly been acting oddly in the last few weeks."

  "She has tried to get you to come here several times in recent days," David added. "Do you know why?"

  Eva scratched Gordon behind his ears and stroked her cheek against his head. "No."

  "Now that you're here, stay for tea." Charlie signaled to Doyle. "Please bring refreshments. Oh, and ask Gus and Alice to join us."

  David perched stiffly on the edge of an armchair and Eva sank down beside Lady Vickers on the sofa, still holding Gordon. The wriggling puppy nipped at her fingers and she laughed again. She might seem prim, with her hair tightly pinned back and her high collar buttoned up, but when she laughed, her gypsy heritage shone through. He'd wager she was more carefree than she let on. Seth resolved to always have Gordon around when Eva came to visit; that way her stiffness upon greeting him wouldn't last more than a moment.

  "We should get a puppy, David," she said.

  "Absolutely not!" David turned to Lincoln. "A search party should be sent out for our mother."

  "Where would you like the search to start?" Lincoln's sarcastic edge was a slender thing but sharp. Charlie winced.

&nb
sp; "You're the expert at investigation. Start the search where you think it should be started."

  "Or we could have tea first and see if she turns up." Eva pressed the puppy into her brother's hands. "Good boy." Seth wasn't entirely sure if it was directed at Gordon or David.

  David set Gordon down and the puppy gamboled over to Charlie, where he gave her shoes a thorough sniff before plopping down on the floor near her feet.

  Alice entered with Gus. She greeted Eva and David cordially but it lacked the vivacity Seth so admired in her. She hadn't been herself ever since the wedding. Or, rather, since the Queen of Hearts's army had tried to take her back to the Wonderland realm to face charges of treason. Alice had been badly shaken that day—they all had—and she hadn't fully recovered. Knowing that an entire army could reappear to capture her at any moment must weigh on her mind. Seth just wished she'd allow him to shoulder some of the burden of that worry by talking to him. She didn't even confide in Charlie. Seth assumed it was because Alice didn't want to trouble her in what was supposed to be her happiest days, but he also knew Alice's predicament was the reason Lincoln and Charlie hadn't yet gone on their honeymoon.

  The mood in the drawing room suddenly changed. It was so subtle that it took Seth a moment to realize it had happened at all and several more moments of polite conversation to understand where it came from. It certainly wasn't Gus, who'd brought a sense of heightened anticipation with him. The big idiot was…well, a big idiot. He wouldn't know how to spell heightened or anticipation, let alone have the depth of character to be the cause of an intrigue. It was what made him so loveable—not that Seth would ever tell him that.