“No, you have already paid the price,” Mina said.
“But we could use your help,” Lowell added, “to find the rest of the children Lady Sparrowdale seeks, especially the youngest two. Did you make any deliveries for the earl for two infants?”
Perry studied the tops of his shoes. Fancy ones, they were, that one of Belle’s callers had left behind once. They only pinched a little. “That’s just what he told me not to tell you.”
“Who told you, Harry the Hammer?”
“That’s him. A regular giant, with fists as big as anvils, and twice as hard.”
“He won’t bother you again. In fact, he won’t be bothering anyone, from Botany Bay. But you can tell us about the children later. We need to leave soon to reach London by nightfall.”
“I’d better tell Belle. She took me in and all.” He glanced up at the stairs again. “But she’s busy right now.”
“We’ll go help the others pack up and return in half an hour, all right?”
Perry grinned. “It’s Belle. Better make it an hour.”
The day was growing overcast when they went back to wait outside Lord Penworth’s cottage. Lowell spread the lap robe around Mina’s legs. “I thought you would be happier once we found Perry, so he could lead us to the others, but you seem disappointed.”
“I am disappointed. I wanted to see La Paloma, to see if she could possibly be as beautiful as her brother painted her to be.”
“She is,” Lowell said, making the day darker, drearier, and colder still. Then he added, “But you are far more beautiful.”
And the sun came out.
Chapter Twenty-six
He did not look much like an earl. He did not look like much of a boy, either, the W.S. on the bottom of the list. Perry led them right to Wendell Sparr, though, a tiny three-year-old, the youngest of Sparrowdale’s side-slips.
He was a little scrap of a thing, with huge brown eyes and a nose that was bigger than his fist. The two were easy to compare, for Wren, as he was called, constantly held his hand to his mouth, sucking on his thumb. He would grow out of the habit, Mina told herself, and into his nose. And he would talk, eventually. For now, he did not smile or laugh or chatter or run around. He just sat, staring and sucking.
For all that he looked like the runt of an unfortunate litter, Wendell might very well be the heir to the earldom, if Mina’s first marriage proved binding, negating her second one, to Sparrowdale. She had not heard from the man sent to find Ninian Rourke, tracing him through his family and friends. Nor had Lowell heard from the investigator he’d sent to Scotland, to look for witnesses to her marriage or records of an annulment. But Perry swore Wren’s mother had been rightfully married to Sparrowdale—his grandmother had the papers hidden away somewhere safe—and so did Wren’s aunt Mary, who’d had the raising of the little boy since his mother took her own life.
Mary Tilbey was a thin, tired woman, whose eyes were as faded as the gray gown she wore, except for the purplish bruise under one of them. She had nine children of her own to feed and a loutish husband who drank. He used to be a coachman, one of the elite mail drivers, handy with his whip and his fists, until Sparrowdale came into the shop where Wren’s mother was working. Then Tilbey decided he did not have to work anymore. Now the money was all gone, and the quarterly support, and no one would hire Fred Tilbey to drive an oxcart. The house was dilapidated, damp and dank from the wash Mary took in to make ends meet. Sheets hung everywhere, but those ends never quite connected.
Tilbey blamed Mina. “If it wasn’t for you, our Eve would be alive, married all right and tight, instead of getting passed over by a blasted bigamist. I could of had my own posting inn.”
“But . . . but could you not see what Sparrowdale was like? He was already sickly three years ago. How could you let your sister-in-law wed him?”
Tilbey waved a hand around the pawky room, the crying infants, the squabbling children. “We had Evie living here too, lady, and two other sisters. Can you see what this was like? She married the old crimp in order to make a better life for herself, and for all of us. How was we to know he was a blooming earl with an heir and a new young wife? We thought he was just an old codger who wanted a pretty young thing to look after him in his dotage—and that he’d leave her better off after a few years. The fewer the better. We didn’t figure he could get a babe on her.” He made a rude noise. “ ’Stead, she killed herself out of shame, and the dastard wouldn’t even pay for her burial. We made sure his name went on the stone anyways, and on the brat, ’cause she married him in good faith.”
“Why the devil did you not take him to court?” Lowell asked. “Bigamy is illegal, for heaven’s sake.”
Tilbey cast a cold look at his lordship, in his shiny boots and his expensive buckskin breeches. “Lawyers cost money, that’s why. And who’s going to take the word of a poor man ’stead of an earl? He paid us to forget there ever was a wedding, then he forgot all about Evie. If old Granny Radway hadn’t got wind of it, Sparrowdale wouldn’t of given us a shilling for the boy’s keep.”
“My sister was a good girl, ma’am,” Mary told Mina. “A seamstress, she was, and she gave us all her pay. She wouldn’t of married your man if she knew he was wed. She wouldn’t of married such an old stick anyway, but he offered to pay our mortgage. Now Fred’s saying our oldest has to go north to the factories, and young Wren has to go on the parish.” She patted her stomach. “Lud knows where we’ll get the money to feed this new ’un.”
Mina already had Perry and one of the girls out buying foodstuffs. She would arrange for credit at the markets, she decided, and decent apprenticeships for the children as they grew older. What she would not do was give Fred Tilbey a farthing. The sot was lucky she did not have him castrated.
Lowell was going to ask his own half brother the barrister to pay a visit to Granny Radway in Bath, to look at the papers she had stashed away. Then he was going to explain to Fred Tilbey how French letters worked. Something in this house ought to.
When they took the boy away, he did not have one belonging to pack, not one shirt or gown. Mary did not even kiss him good-bye. The other children were too busy fighting over the bread and cheese to notice. Fred Tilbey spit on the half-dead bush outside his front door. “And good riddance,” he said, which was more than the little boy said.
They took him back to the duchess’s house, the silent, skinny, potential peer. If Mina’s first marriage would hold up in court, and if Wren’s mother’s would too, then Wendell Sparr was the new earl—if Roderick did not kill him first. Mina could only pray that Roderick knew less than they did and that Lowell could keep Wren safe.
The Mersford Square town house was like a fortress. Guards patrolled the grounds day and night, and armed footmen were stationed outside the nursery. Andrew moved back from the barracks with a few of his fellow officers. Ochs was dismayed, but the other boys were in alt. Now Martin had heroes to tell him tales, Homer had warriors to discuss the general’s tactics, Perry had young men to slip him a sip of brandy, and George had real soldiers to help deploy the lead ones he found in the nursery while searching for more valuable items.
Everyone fought over Wren—except Ochs, of course. They carried him around, tossed him in the air, sang him lullabies and drinking songs. Even blind Martin liked to have the baby sit in his lap when someone read to them, once he was tidied up. The dog took care of face-washing after all the treats the officers brought.
Homer took it as a personal affront that his baby brother was lagging far behind his age in speaking and was positive that the child’s understanding was not at fault. He was likely cuffed for speaking out in Fred Tilbey’s household, Homer reasoned, and had learned to be still. The young scholar was determined that his half brother would speak—if not spell his name—before the end of the summer, and spent hours coaxing Wren to talk.
Mina had to act like a countess, just to get to hold her newest ward. She tried not to feel jealous, for the boys were thriving, and revelin
g in being a family. When Jack rejoined them they would be complete except for the oldest child.
And her own son. Perry had no idea where another tot might be. As soon as the messengers returned, she intended to take her family—how sweet that sounded—to the Portsmouth property to go through her father’s papers. Somewhere there had to be a record, more than a pair of initials on a list. There simply had to be.
She would have an excuse to invite Lowell along, too, to help her go through Malachy Caldwell’s effects. Lord Lowell’s reinstatement as her detective might be unspoken, but she knew he would help her pursue any avenue of search. He was already going far beyond the capacity of hired investigator, finding nursemaids and ponies and toys. Once the search was over, though, for good or for ill, he would return to his fashionable London life. Mina decided she would stay on in Portsmouth.
The countryside was healthier for the children, and safer from Roderick’s venom. Her fortune would guarantee that the boys were readily accepted as her wards, distant connections of her late husband’s, without as much societal prejudice as they would find here in London. And Mina would not have to worry about meeting Lowell on the street there, or have to pretend he was just another acquaintance. She told Harkness to stop looking at London properties. Harkness already had.
Dismal thoughts for a dreary day, Mina told herself, climbing the grand staircase of Merrison House up to the nursery floor that rainy afternoon while the older boys were visiting the army barracks with Andrew and his friends. Today she should rejoice in what she had, not regret what she had not. How better to celebrate than to look on the face of a sleeping child?
Nanny Vann was napping. Wren was not. He was sitting in Lord Lowell’s lap, staring up at the top-of-the-trees gentleman, sucking on his thumb and drooling on Lowell’s satin-striped waistcoat.
Mina stayed in the doorway, unseen and unheard, admiring the picture they made, ignoring the wrench on her heartstrings.
“Come now, my lad,” Lowell was saying. “We know you can speak if you wish. If you do, you can have anything you want, I swear. Just name it and it is yours. A pony? Can you say pony, Wren? A biscuit? The moon? No?” He gave a great sigh, but the child simply stared, and sucked.
“I know,” Lowell said. “I am not a detective for nothing.” He shifted the boy’s slight weight and removed his watch from his fob pocket, dangling it on the chain. Wren reached for the timepiece. “No, no, my friend. You cannot put it in your mouth. Here, let me show you.” He held it to Wren’s ear, then turned the stem to make the hands go around. Wren took it from him to study, with his free hand.
“Well, that’s a start,” Lowell told him, reaching into his other pocket to see what he could find to amuse the boy. A key, a pencil, no—a coin. Wren took his fist away from his mouth to reach for the golden guinea.
“Ah, I can see you are Hawk’s brother, anyway. But now, my boy, with both hands full, you can use your mouth for something else. Can you say my name, bantling? I am called Lord Lowell, you know, but my special friends call me Lolly. Would you like to try? Lolly, Wren. Just say Lolly. La, as if you were singing. La-la-la.”
Mina had to put her hands over her mouth to keep from laughing aloud. She doubted Lowell would appreciate her overhearing this conversation. But then she gasped when his nonsense worked. Wren spoke! He did not say “La,” not “Lolly,” not even “Lowell.” He said, “Papa.”
Lowell looked up and blushed like a schoolboy when he noted it was Minerva in the doorway. “At least he did not call me Fred,” he said.
Mina beamed at him, tears in her eyes. “I do not care what he calls you. You got him to speak. What else can you say, my precious boy? Can you say Wendell? Mina? Lady Sparrowdale?” She knelt beside their chair and patted her own chest, hoping for “mama,” but getting “clock,” and “pretty,” instead.
“Yes, she is,” Lowell quickly agreed, lest Wren meant the guinea. “Very pretty.”
Now Mina blushed. “Gammon. Don’t go teaching him Spanish coin his first words out. Come, Wren,” she said, taking him from Lowell’s arms, “let us go find Mr. Harkness and show him what a smart boy you are.”
Wren called the butler papa too. But not Ochs.
That afternoon and evening Wren spoke himself hoarse for his brothers and the dowager, until George told him to put a sock in it. Later, when the children were all snug in their chambers with Nanny and the nursemaid and a footman and Merlin keeping watch, Mina found herself alone in the library with Lowell. They had both come to find a book to read, to make sleep come easier.
She tried to thank him again for what he had done, but Lowell was having none of it.
“It was you, taking Wren from that house and showing him your love, that let him talk. He would have spoken to the next one to pay him attention, even if it were the dog. He was ready.”
“Is understanding children part of your investigative skill? Or do you simply like them?”
“I never realized how much I miss my brother’s pair, although they are usually just trotted past me in their lace gowns and blankets. But, yes, I do like children, more than I thought. I never knew they could be so much fun.”
“Most men never discover that, leaving their progeny to the womenfolk to raise. Thank you for spending time with my wards. I am glad they have a man’s influence.”
Lowell set aside the book he’d been skimming and smiled. “They have a score of men here playing at soldiers with them, and menservants everywhere you look.”
“No, I mean a real man.” She could not explain it better, but Lowell seemed to understand and take it for the great compliment it was.
“Why, thank you. And you are a magnificent example of what a lady should be, except you really had not ought to let George see where you keep your diamonds.”
The library was quiet around them, cushioning them in candleglow and the scent of old leather books. Mina had the courage to ask, “Have you never wanted children of your own?”
Lowell poured them each a glass of sherry from the decanter on the desk. He handed one to her, admiring the way gold flecks danced in her soft brown eyes. “I never thought a family was in my reach,” he said, sipping at his wine. “I merely have a small competence, you know, and the investigation business has not proved lucrative.”
Mina looked at him over her glass’s rim, noting how a lock of pale hair had fallen to his forehead. “I think any woman, rich or poor, would be proud to call you father to her children. Or papa.”
“Any woman?”
When Mina simply stared at her toes, rosy color in her cheeks, he set his empty glass back down, and took Mina’s from her. “You know, I do not go around kissing just any pretty young woman who chances into my library.”
She replied, “If I thought you did, I would not have come here now.”
No amount of books, not even a library full, was going to make sleep come easier that night.
Chapter Twenty-seven
Some questions had answers. Some did not. Some answers were too uncertain or too dreadful, so the questions were left unasked, and some questions had to wait until other riddles were solved.
Mina finally had one issue decided. Twice.
The man Lowell had posted to Scotland sent his findings back by special messenger. That same day Ninian Rourke showed up on the duchess’s doorstop.
Throwing convention to the wind, Mina met him, alone, in the library. There was too much between them for politeness or public view. If Lowell’s feelings were hurt to be left out of the conversation, Mina regretted it, but Ninian was her past and her problem. She had to know more than the facts in the matter of her marriage; she had to understand her feelings, too, to see if there was the slightest ember of affection.
There was not. She barely recognized the gone-to-fat man with the florid complexion. He looked as out of place in this room of learning and refinement as scruffy Merlin would look at a fox hunt. Ninian looked more like a farmer than a shipyard foreman. Well, he was a farmer, it see
med. The smell of manure was still in his clothes, despite days of travel. His hands were rough, his language coarse, his manners rude. The thought that she had ever lain with this man mortified her, and the very idea of ever doing so again made her wish for one of Cousin Dorcas’s restoratives. Could she truly have been so young, so innocent, so utterly stupid? Yes, unfortunately.
Ninian, however, did not want to claim her and her fortune as his wife, as Mina had feared when Ochs announced the caller, with a supercilious sniff. Ninian did not want to claim their son, either. He still did not know about the boy, and Mina, still not knowing Robin’s whereabouts, had no intention of telling Ninian of the boy’s parentage. He had turned his back on them once.
He was intending to do so again. What Ninian wanted, the reason he had taken the journey to London, was to protect his own three sons. If Minerva kept sending men with questions, Ninian’s wife and father-in-law would start asking a few of their own. He and his boys would inherit a profitable farm when the old squeezecrab finally stuck his spoon in the wall, Ninian angrily told her—unless her blasted investigation had the boys declared bastards. If that happened, the moralistic old fool and his puritanical daughter would toss all of them out on their collective ears.
“The deuced elopement was supposed to be annulled, Minerva,” he said, stamping his big feet in worn boots, sending up clouds of sheep dung, for all she knew.
“It seems it was not, not that anyone could find.”
He cursed. “Your damned father told me that’s what you wanted.”
“I? You took his money and left! How was I supposed to stay married to a bridegroom who abandoned me?”
“Bloody hell, what was I supposed to do, with Sparrowdale and his son there too? They would of killed me unless I agreed to go.”
“Greed it was, not agreed. You took that purse so fast the coins did not have time to jingle. You could have come back for me, before they made me marry that horrible old man. I was a mere girl, with nowhere to turn except you. And you left.”
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