Dangerous Weakness

by Warfield, Caroline

  “Show me again the numbers for the Northumbrian holdings,” he said to distract his father.

  An hour later the two men made their way through the cavernous Sudbury House toward dinner set up in the blue salon, and Richard tried to see the logic of the thing. He began to catalog the advantages of marriage to Lady Sarah when they left the estate office.

  Beautiful face—if you like marble. Lily bloomed with life. He shook his head and followed his father down a hallway lit with dozens of beeswax candles.

  Impeccable bloodlines—that run a bit close to aristocratic inbreeding. He looked at the back of his father’s balding head. Lily’s heritage would add intelligence, courage, and strength to any alliance. Pedigree isn’t everything. That idea went against everything he had been raised to believe and took him off guard.

  The duke winced a bit while he climbed the ornate marble stairs to the second story. Richard noted the signs of age coldly. He knew his father wouldn’t welcome any mention of weakness.

  The Whartons are wealthy—there is no arguing that. Perhaps she will do. Richard considered the impact of one more minor land holding and found it negligible. They turned at the landing.

  Poised and confident in social and diplomatic circles. He could be certain Lady Sarah would decorate his arm and not embarrass him in public.

  What about in private? Can you picture bantering ideas about the affairs of state with her. In his mind, Lily Thornton laughed at him. What about in the bedroom? No matter how hard he tried to squelch it, all he could see was Lily, passion raw in her eyes.

  She won’t have me! he reminded himself ruthlessly and clamped his jaw so tightly it hurt.

  They reached the withdrawing room where the family gathered before dinner.

  The Wharton chit is well schooled in the duties of a duchess—

  The haughty face of Her Grace, his mother, glared back at him. “You’re late,” she snapped. “We do not tolerate such behavior in this house.”

  Richard trooped in to dinner with his parents and youngest sister. They walked sedately in strict order of precedence. They sat in their usual places in the same order, just as they had from the time Richard reached adulthood and was permitted at table. Her Grace nodded, and serving began, formally and in silence. He stared at his soup.

  “I spoke with Lady Sarah Wharton, this afternoon. We discussed preferred living arrangements. The girl has perfect taste,” his mother pronounced. “You will turn over all decisions about such matters to her.”

  “We are not betrothed,” Richard said, as blandly as he could.

  Her Grace ignored him. She ignored all truths that did not meet her desires. “The matter of neighborhoods can be easily resolved. The wedding, of course, will be at Saint George, Hanover Square.”

  “We have not yet—”

  “Yes, yes.” His mother waved an impatient hand. “Don’t keep Lisle waiting tomorrow.”

  He put down his spoon and stared at the table without actually seeing it. She will not do. He knew it in his marrow.

  Well-schooled in the duties of a duchess— Realization filled him. He didn’t want a duchess. “I’m not going to marry Lady Sarah Wharton.”

  “Don’t talk nonsense,” Her Grace spat. “Restrain your tendency to low standards, Glenaire. “Lady Sarah told me you forced her to greet that schoolmaster’s son and his wife at the theatre. We do not receive them.”

  His wife—your daughter. Her Grace chose to ignore that fact also. She couldn’t bend Georgiana to her will and, therefore, decided she did not exist.

  “She will not suit,” Richard said.

  “The Mallet woman?”

  “Lady Sarah Wharton. She will not suit.”

  “She suits us perfectly,” his mother sputtered.

  Richard rose to his feet. “You don’t have to marry her.” He put down his serviette. “I’ll take my leave. I will send notice to Lisle. They can accept her earl.”

  Silence followed him to the door. I’ve bungled the thing from the beginning. There must be some way to change Lily’s mind. I’ll find her; I’ll do better. If not, I’ll find another woman I can stand to live with, but it won’t be Sarah Wharton.

  He didn’t want a duchess. He wanted a wife.

  Chapter 19

  Walter Stewart accompanied Richard to a modest cottage on the outskirts of Greenwich four days later. Richard loathed the errand.

  If it distracted me from Lily, this damned trip might have value, but it doesn’t. At least it frees me from seeing all the messages from Sudbury House about my “ludicrous behavior.”

  A groom engaged in removing the knocker from the door and hanging a black mourning wreath tried to deny them entrance.

  “Tell Mrs. Clarke the Marquess of Glenaire wishes to pay his respects.” The man pulled his forelock and went inside to comply.

  “She may deny us, my lord,” Stewart mused.

  A woman whose husband died with his throat cut in an alley while doing England’s bidding might well choose not to see the man who sent him there. Damn Volkov.

  “She has the right,” Richard answered. I hope she refuses us. These things are always messy. Still, to avoid the call would be cowardly.

  “Volkov killed him on my watch. It is for me to see to his widow,” he went on.

  “Are we certain it was Volkov?” Stewart asked.

  “Clarke had him in sight. We know he followed him after he sent notice to us from the tavern.”

  Stewart nodded glumly. “About the widow, my lord, won’t the service arrange a pension?” The young man shifted uncomfortably.

  “Of course,” Richard answered. But an inadequate one. He couldn’t count the number of pensions he supplemented from his own pocket.

  To Richard’s disappointment, the widow didn’t deny them. She served them tea and burdened them with John Clarke’s dedication to England, pride in the Foreign Service, and personal devotion to the Marquess of Glenaire.

  “John worshipped you, my lord. He would be proud to know you sit here with me.”

  Richard forced a smile he hoped hid his consternation. “We regret the cause of this visit, ma’am.” He cleared his throat and withdrew a packet of paper, anxious to cut the visit short.

  The arrangements required little explanation. Mrs. Clarke clutched the papers to herself.

  “I knew what he did put him in danger,” she breathed. “Though he made light of it. He always said if anything happened to him the marquess would see to me.” She began to weep silently. “You didn’t fail him.”

  I failed him when he went after Volkov alone. He needed air suddenly—badly. He rose to leave.

  “I know you must leave,” the widow said with a loud sniff to hold back tears, “but I must know. Please tell me.”

  “Ma’am?”

  “How did my John die? Did he suffer?”

  “He died of a single knife blow, swift and easy, Mrs. Clark. He didn’t suffer.” The lie slipped off his tongue with practiced ease; the truth stuck rock hard in his chest all the same.

  “It is well you didn’t tell her,” Stewart said when they were safely gone. “No woman should know about such things.”

  The doctor’s report had gruesome detail on every line. The man’s throat had been cut, his belly breached, his body mutilated. Either Volkov lost himself in rage over being thwarted or he wished to send them a message.

  “Volkov is an animal. We will find him,” Richard said. He had ordered the casket sealed before being sent to the widow for burial.

  The two of them walked downhill in sunshine so bright it glinted off the Royal Observatory like a beacon, shone off the trees in beams of green, and shimmered on the Thames where it lapped restlessly in its banks.

  “About that, sir. I came here this morning to tell you.
A man matching his description sailed for Alexandria yesterday. Our man in Falmouth is certain it is him.”

  “Alexandria?” Or any port in the Mediterranean. If they stop in Gibraltar or Lisbon, he can change ships to anywhere in the world.

  “Yes, my lord. And sir, there is something else.”

  The marquess turned his head to raise an impatient eyebrow but kept walking.

  “Lily Thornton,” Stewart said.

  Richard could feel his cheeks stiffen from the force of his clenched teeth.

  “You didn’t forbid me to follow up, so I thought—”

  “What did you find, Stewart?”

  “In London, nothing. We’ve kept watch, and she never came back. I thought that since we’re scouring the ports for Volkov—” he gave a dramatic shrug.

  Volkov and Lily.

  “She left with him.” Richard’s heart stuttered, and he skipped a step.

  “No, no! At least I don’t think so,” the man walking beside him went on. “We’re fairly certain Volkov left on the Oceana for Alexandria. But I had people scour recent passenger lists. A woman about Miss Thornton’s description left five days ago for Malta on the Captain James.”

  “Her description?”

  “Single woman traveling alone with just the one servant. I took the liberty of interviewing some laborers at the dock. They remembered because she came all swathed in shawls. Tiny thing, like Miss Thornton, and the servant was big. Memorably tall.”

  “‘Just the one servant,’” Richard mused. “Too tall to be Volkov?”

  “That’s the thing, my lord. The laborers thought he was a Muslim, or some exotic from the East.”

  Richard stopped short. “Are you sure?”

  Walter Stewart looked back at him without answering.

  “Of course you are or you wouldn’t have told me.” They resumed their walk.

  “Can’t be one of Sahin Pasha’s people,” Stewart said. “The lot of them embarked from the navy docks in Portsmouth for Constantinople the same day.”

  Volkov had contacts in the East. He could hire a thug to—what? Guard? Kidnap? Imprison?

  “Sorry I couldn’t find more, my lord.”

  She wouldn’t go with Volkov voluntarily. I saw her face at Chadbourn Park. The man terrifies her.

  “She might have gone off on her own, you know, my lord,” Stewart continued.

  “Yes. She would do that,” Richard answered. Why can’t she just stay put where she belongs? Where I can see to her protection?

  They reached the quay. Richard put one foot on the steps to a waiting river taxi and turned to Stewart who waited expectantly above him.

  “I’m going back to London,” Richard said. “There’s nothing left to uncover here. Return to Falmouth and see if you can find someone who can place Volkov on the Oceana for certain.” He stepped into the small boat.

  “And Lily Thornton, my lord?”

  “Unless you discover she went with Volkov, she isn’t the Foreign Office’s concern.” Mine perhaps, but not yours.

  The oarsman pulled out into the stream, and the slap of the oars pulled him back toward London, back to the affairs of state. Where are you, Lily? What have you done?

  If he couldn’t reach her, he couldn’t change her mind. He leaned back and squinted up where stars that ought to shine lay hidden behind city smoke and foul miasma. Lily wanted to manage her own life. He ought to leave her to it.

  Let her try it anyway.

  Three days at sea and Lily’s uncharacteristic mal de mer continued unabated. Pregnancy had stolen her sea legs as well.

  Ahmet looked down his substantial nose at her, his now familiar sympathy shining in his eyes. “You wish to rest?”

  She shook her head. “Could we try something sitting still for a while?” She refused self-pity. You brought this on yourself. You got what you asked for.

  The delegation assigned Lily a tiny cabin apart from Sahin and the rest of his entourage, one just large enough for lessons in court protocol. Ahmet had been assigned to teach Lily what she needed to know to impress the Valide Sultan.

  He had demonstrated how to bow out of a room for the past half hour. Lily thought she might have it; she knew for certain the bowing contributed to dizziness. The ways of the Ottoman court remained strange, but Lily persisted. The more I learn, the better I will be able to get along.

  “I assume we should also skip the protocols for the serving of food?” Ahmet asked rhetorically. Amusement lurked in his eyes.

  Lily felt herself pale. “Please,” she managed, swallowing hard.

  “Let’s review the hierarchies inside the women’s quarters then.” He began to drone on, listing the hierarchy beginning with the lowliest servant girl or Kalfa.

  When he began expanding on the rights and privileges of the various ranks of imperial wives from the Iqbal, who may be favored with the sultan’s attention but have no children, to Haseki, who would be awarded her own quarters and servants once she had given birth, Lily’s head began to spin. Higher still was the Kadin, who had given the sultan a son. The concept of such a marriage and the structure of privilege felt as strange to Lily as the words themselves. Where will I fit? As Kalfa, no doubt, or worse. Surely not wife.

  “Repeat the words for me, please Ahmet.”

  “You learn quickly, Lady.”

  She smiled wanly. “Languages come to me.” Language, she knew, held the key. She could carve out a place for herself as a teacher only with perfectly fluent Turkish.

  Kalfa, Iqbal, Haseki, Kadin, Kafir. Kafir—infidel.

  “Kafir? That is me. Do you object to teaching a kafir, Ahmet, and a woman at that?”

  “I live to serve women,” the man said with a smile. “As to the rest,” he shrugged, “You learn quickly. It is my privilege to teach.”

  She smiled back. “So shall I. It is my wish to teach.”

  “Then we both serve the women of the sultan’s household, no? Shall we continue?”

  Ideas felt less strange with repetition. The rigid order of precedence reminded Lily of the house party at Chadbourn Park. Chadbourn’s guests had gathered before dinner and promenaded in rank order to their seats. The seats had been laid out according to the rules of etiquette and rank. The two worlds had more in common than someone might suppose.

  The Seraglio need not be strange. One need only learn the rules to get along. Lily would do it. She had no other choice. She had burned her bridges behind her. If Richard found her background lacking, he would find the scandal of life in the Seraglio insupportable. He would never have her after this.

  Chapter 20

  A nervous clerk greeted Richard at Horse Guards.

  “Fair put out he sounded.”

  “Castlereagh always sounds fair put out. What exactly did he say?” Richard demanded.

  “You are to call on him immediately. And you—beg pardon, my lord, but these are his words—‘damn well better have your analysis of Malta in your hand.’”

  The agitated clerk blinked up at him, anxiety giving him the fidgets. Richard dismissed him with an abrupt gesture. Malta. Did she sail to Malta? How unsafe are those waters? He looked at his unfinished report. If you concentrated on your damned work, you would know.

  Messages lay on his desk, more complaints from his parents and what was sure to be an ugly message from Lisle. He went to answer the summons from the foreign secretary and returned with Castlereagh’s anger burning in his ears, irritated with himself over his failure to complete his analysis. He had accumulated notes in fits and starts by collating observations of sea captains with agents on the ground, but allowed interruptions—and Lily Thornton—to disrupt the work. It remained to pull it together for Castlereagh, the prime minister, the cabinet, and, ultimately, the prince regent into a report that c
ould enhance his reputation. He began to write the final report.

  While American efforts have subdued the worst of the Mediterranean pirates, waters of the sea between Sicily and the coast of Africa remain unsettled. Unrest in Naples exacerbates the situation so that our forces on Malta—

  Malta. The woman Stewart described embarked to Malta.

  Lily of all women should know how perilous the Mediterranean has become. Did she go willingly? He doubted it. Either someone coerced her or something horrific drove her to take off on her own. Either way, Volkov is behind it. He picked up his pen.

  —our forces on Malta could feel the impact of shipping disruption.

  He began to list actions to be taken, numbers of marines to add to Royal Navy vessels, escalated improvements to the port fortifications, and beefed-up frequency for the Gibraltar packet.

  The Gibraltar packet. They are the fastest ships we have. I could leave from Portsmouth on tomorrow’s tide. If he left immediately, he could get home to pack a few items and just make it on a good mount. From Gibraltar, passage to Malta would be easy.

  Nonsense. One does not just hare off without planning. Besides, she has at least a week on me—closer to two.

  Richard shook the very thought from his head. He owed Castlereagh this report and his father the courtesy of a reply.

  Words flowed onto paper rapidly, if not coherently. They skimmed along the surface of the topic. They never plunged to Richard’s customary depths. They flew toward a conclusion.