When he came awake from his last doze to find that the sun had already set again and Bristol was close at hand, relief coursed through him. He wanted to fetch Nat and be done with this, so he could go home to Abby.
His wife.
With that thought ever-present, he sought out his brother. Thankfully, Sir Horace’s estate was well known in town. More importantly, the innkeeper who gave Spencer its direction confirmed that a gentleman from London had already visited the Peabody estate twice. In fact, the innkeeper said, the man was there that very evening.
Elation gripped Spencer. It was almost over now.
Then a strange thing happened upon his arrival at the Peabody estate. The butler seemed unsurprised to see him, even going so far as to say that “the gentlemen” had been expecting him for dinner, which was sadly now long past. Though curious about how anyone could be expecting him for anything, Spencer held his tongue as he followed the servant to Sir Horace’s study, where the gentlemen were “having their port and cigars.”
But after Spencer was announced and had entered the room, two things rapidly became apparent. One, Nat was definitely the “gentleman from London.” And two, Sir Horace had indeed been expecting the Viscount Ravenswood.
“Capital! You made it after all,” said the genial Sir Horace, whom Spencer had never laid eyes on in his life.
Nat, however, looked as if he’d seen a ghost. “Spence? Why on earth are you—” The man caught himself. “Yes, it’s wonderful that you arrived in time.”
Something odd was going on, and Spencer had a funny feeling he wasn’t going to like it. “In time for what?”
“The signing of the papers, of course,” Sir Horace put in as he poured another glass of port, apparently for Spencer. “We waited until after dinner in hopes that you might arrive, even though your brother had shown me the documents giving him the authority to complete the purchase. He said he feared you wouldn’t make it here yourself to sign everything and receive the bill of sale, but I’m so pleased that you did.”
So, his devious sneak of a brother was at it again, was he? “I assure you, my pleasure far surpasses yours,” Spencer said dryly as his gaze bored into Nat. At least his brother had the good grace to look guilty. “Remind me again of exactly what it is I’m buying.”
When Sir Horace frowned, Nat gave a nervous laugh. “Don’t mind my brother. He enjoys a good jest from time to time.” He shot Spencer a pleading look. “The bottle works, Spence, don’t you remember?”
“Bottle works,” Spencer repeated. Nat had stolen Abby’s dowry for that? What the bloody hell did Nat want with a bottle works? And why buy it in Spencer’s name?
“Yes,” Nat went on hastily, “to produce Bristol blue bottles for the Mead. As a gift to your wife.”
Spencer’s eyes narrowed. “Of course. I forgot.” He flashed Sir Horace a smooth smile. “Unfortunately, I’ve changed my mind about the purchase. If you’d be so good as to return any funds my brother handed over—”
Sir Horace rose, his bulbous nose reddening. “He hasn’t handed anything over yet—we haven’t completed the transaction. But this is highly irregular, my lord. I demand to know why you would send your brother to purchase my bottle works and then withdraw for no apparent reason. Why, I spent half the day yesterday showing him around the factory. Then you snap your fingers and expect to undo everything?”
“It’s my money, isn’t it?” Spencer drawled. “And until I sign anything, it remains my prerogative to change my mind. Which I have.”
“Sir Horace, if you could just give me and my brother a moment to speak alone—” Nat began.
“No need for that.” Spencer reached over to grab Nat by the arm. “Come on, Nathaniel. You have an appointment in London for which you’re already two months late.”
“What?” Nat asked as Spencer dragged him toward the door.
“I say, old chap,” Sir Horace called out, “are you sure you don’t want to take a look at the property yourself before you change your mind? We could go round in the morning—”
“I’m sure.” Those were Spencer’s last words before he hauled his brother through the door and off down the hall toward the entrance.
“Let go of me, you bloody fool,” Nat hissed. “I can walk unassisted.”
“That’s precisely what worries me,” Spencer said, not even pausing in his march for the door. “I fear you’ll head unassisted in the wrong direction.”
The butler blinked as they swept through the entrance hall, but hastily leaped to open the door. Moments later, Spencer and Nat were in the carriage.
As soon as it set off, Nat exploded. “Do you have any idea how long it took me to set that up? How many bottle works I looked at before I settled on that one? And Peabody was giving it to me for a song, too, only forty-seven hundred pounds.”
“Of Abby’s money,” Spencer snapped.
“Not her money. Yours. The dowry belongs to the husband.”
He snorted. “Funny how the husband hasn’t seen a penny of it.”
Nat stiffened. Reaching inside his pocket, he pulled out a wad of bank notes and tossed it at Spencer. “Here. That’s what I was going to give Sir Horace.”
He counted them, surprised to find that they did indeed come to forty-seven hundred pounds, only three hundred pounds shy of the five thousand pounds in Abby’s dowry. Three hundred was scarcely enough to cover Nat’s expenses and Abby’s passage to England.
Nonetheless…“I thought her dowry was in gold coins.”
“I changed them in America before I left. I’m not idiot enough to travel to England with five thousand pounds worth of gold coins in my pockets. There are pirates who roam the seas, for God’s sake.”
Spencer could only gape at him. “So you really were buying that factory for me? Or rather Abby?”
Nat shrugged. “Actually, when I left America, I’d hoped her father would live a while longer. Then when she came here I’d have the factory bought and the beginnings of the business established here, all neatly tied up in property you or she might be reluctant to sell out of hand. So she’d stay to help me run the thing, and you’d be around her all the time, and there’d be the problem of the marriage…”
“And perhaps Abby and I would think it better just to let things lie.”
“Or you’d do something noble like insist on maintaining the marriage for her sake, and she would agree.” Nat gazed steadily at his brother. “That woman was half in love with you before she even left America. She spent nearly every day after your departure mooning over you. That’s why I knew my plan would work. She wanted you, and you wanted her. I knew you wouldn’t let her leave once she got here.”
Spencer shook his head in sheer amazement at his brother’s audacity. “The only reason I didn’t let her leave initially was because you were missing and I couldn’t risk a scandal. So your original plan would have failed miserably. If she’d arrived according to your plan, and you’d told me you’d spent her dowry on a bottle works, I would have sold the factory at a loss, paid her off, and cut your allowance to compensate.”
“And let her go back to America alone?” Nat snorted. “You would have had to take her back there, if only to dissolve the marriage. And you know how those long ship passages are…” Nat thrust his chin out defiantly. “You both liked each other, and I knew it. You just needed an excuse to be together long enough to realize it for yourselves.”
“An excuse which you provided by marrying me off without informing me.”
“If I’d informed you, you wouldn’t have married her. And you know you wanted to.” Nat scowled. “I certainly wanted you to. I wasn’t about to let you make me heir to all the blasted Ravenswood properties and the blasted Ravenswood title. A position for which I’m ill-suited, as you ought to realize by now.”
Spencer opened his mouth, then closed it. Yesterday he would have exploded into fury at his brother’s characteristic habit of seeing his actions only through his own distorted glass. Today was a different matter. “So yo
u took the bull by the horns, so to speak.”
His calm tone seemed to give Nat pause. The young man eyed him warily. “Somebody had to. You certainly weren’t going to.”
“And you knew exactly what was right for me, what I was capable of handling, and what I ought to do.”
Nat looked downright fearful now. “Well…I wouldn’t put it quite like that—”
“Why not? That’s how I always put it when I made choices for you.” He settled back against the seat, pinning Nat with a dark glance. “I’m proud to see you following so closely in my footsteps, really I am. But since I have more experience in trying to run people’s lives without consulting them, let me give you a little helpful advice. First of all, never try to run more than one person’s life at a time. It’s too complicated, and you risk their taking actions on their own that might destroy your carefully laid plans.”
Nat sank against the squabs, crossing his arms sullenly over his chest. “If you’re trying to tell me my scheme didn’t work, I won’t believe it. Evelina kept me very well informed about how the two of you are getting on.”
“Ah, Evelina, the first person who didn’t act according to your plan. Let’s talk about your fiancée and her letters. The last one was returned from Wales, since she didn’t have a new address to send it to.”
He flushed. “My letter’s on its way to her. I didn’t have time to post it in Wales. I was in too much of a hurry trying to outstrip some rogues shadowing me—I assume they were yours.” His eyes narrowed. “I thought I’d given them the slip. How did you know where to find me?”
“Oh, my runners found out all about your business contacts. And when Evelina came yesterday evening, desperate to reach you—”
“Desperate?” he asked with a frown. “Why? Has something happened?”
Spencer glowered at his brother. “Ask yourself what you were doing two months ago when you should have been keeping your prick in your trousers, and you’ll have the answer to that question.”
Nat blinked, then stared at him, stunned. “Evelina? She’s…she’s—”
“With child. Congratulations.”
“My God,” Nat said hoarsely, “I’m having a baby.”
For the first time in his life, those words didn’t strike envy into Spencer’s heart. “I believe she is the one having the baby.” He leveled a stern glance on his brother. “And she is the one who will suffer society’s disapprobation if you don’t marry her at once.”
Nat’s pleasure turned to alarm just that quick. “Is she all right?”
“She will be, once you’re there. But the only way to preserve her reputation is if the two of you elope immediately, making people think you simply couldn’t wait for a wedding. That way her mother—who’s not the brightest candle in the sconce and is liable to cause trouble if you tell her the truth—won’t be involved.”
“Yes, whatever you say,” Nat murmured, still looking dazed.
“Then you’ll have to take her to Essex once she’s close to her time and keep her there for a while so people won’t speculate about her exceedingly early baby.”
“Right.” Nat glanced up. “Essex. You mean the estate?”
Spencer eyed him askance. “Unless you own a house in Essex that I don’t know about.”
“You would…let me go back there even after—”
“It’s your home and you’re my brother,” he said evenly. “Of course I would let you go back there.”
“My God, Spence, I don’t know what to say.” Then his face hardened. “Oh, of course you would let us go there. Can’t risk a scandal.” He gave a bitter laugh. “That’s why my plan to keep you married to Abby worked. I can always count on you to fix my mistakes, not because you give a damn about me, but because you have to maintain a certain image. That’s why the lofty Ravenswood can’t tell his brother he’s sterile, except when he’s too drunk to know what he’s saying. Can’t have people thinking he’s weak, you know.”
A deep sadness settled into Spencer’s chest. He’d known that his relationship to Nat had deteriorated through the years, but he’d always blamed Nat for that. Or Dora and his father. Perhaps it was time he acknowledge his own part in it and try to make amends.
“I want you at the estate because Abby and I will be there once Parliament is no longer in session.” If Abby forgave him, that is. If she didn’t—No, he wouldn’t think about that. “If you truly wish to make a go of this business, you and Abby will have to develop a plan for it. She’s already selling the Mead in London as a perfume, so you might want to consider pursuing that avenue.”
Nat gaped at him as if he’d gone mad. “You would let me…and Abby—”
“Let you? Good God, man, you’re twenty-nine and an expectant father. If you’re not ready to choose your own path in life by now, you never will be.”
With a surge of excitement, Nat leaned forward to grab Spencer’s hands, squeezing them fiercely. “You won’t regret this, Spence, I swear. I’ll make the best of this chance. I’ll make you proud of me.”
“There will be conditions, of course,” Spencer said gruffly, unused to such effusive emotion from his brother.
Releasing Spencer’s hands, Nat settled back into his seat. “Whatever you want.”
Spencer stifled a smile at his brother’s enthusiasm. “Your firstborn child?”
Shock filled Nat’s face.
“I’m joking,” Spencer said hastily. “For God’s sake, I’m joking.”
Nat eyed him suspiciously. “You never joke.”
“Then it’s about time I start, don’t you think?”
A slow smile lit Nat’s face. “Yes.” He started nodding. “Yes, I suppose it is.”
They’d reached Bristol proper now, and a thought occurred to Spencer. “Do you need to stop at the inn to gather your belongings?”
“I can always send for them from London.” Nat flicked his gaze over Spencer. “But you look pretty haggard. Why don’t you take my room in the inn tonight, and let me go on in a mail coach?”
“I can’t. I promised Abby I’d be back in time for the Throckmortons’ May Day fête tomorrow night. I’m supposed to introduce her to the king, and I know she’s nervous. That’s why I posted through the night to get here, and why I intend to post through the night to get back.”
Nat stared at him. “Despite having such an important political engagement tomorrow, you came all the way to Bristol after me just because Evelina asked?”
Spencer sighed. “I know I’ve been something of an ass from time to time, Nat. But I have always wanted only the best for you.”
Nat ventured a smile. “You probably find this hard to believe, but I did the same for you.” He glanced down at his hands. “You are…I mean…Abby does make you happy, doesn’t she?”
A laugh swelled in Spencer’s throat that he barely managed to check. “You have just presented me with quite a dilemma. On the one hand, I don’t want to encourage this deplorable habit you’ve developed of behaving like your older brother.”
Nat’s head shot up, his eyes narrowing. “And on the other hand?”
“She makes me insanely happy.” As Nat broke into a grin, he added severely, “However, I have not made her terribly happy. And I’m not sure if she’ll be able to forgive me for that.” He added, his throat tight, “Before I left London, she said that she was leaving me as soon as I could take her back to America.”
“Why, for God’s sake? You must have done something, said something…Wait, please say you didn’t tell Abby you’re sterile.”
“Of course I told her. She had the right to know.”
“But you’re not even certain that you are.”
Spencer frowned. “I’m a bit hazy about what I said to you in America—but surely I mentioned that I’ve never used any methods to prevent children with my mistresses. And none of them have ever borne me a by-blow.”
“How do you know they didn’t use something? Light-skirts sometimes use methods a man can’t detect, like sp
onges or pessaries.”
“I suppose that’s possible. But there was Genevieve, who knew the truth, so she had no need to use anything. I told her that my mettle lacked mettle.”
Nat laughed. “And of course she took you at your word. Never mind that you were a spymaster and a lying dog. When you said she needn’t prevent children, she listened.”
Spencer could only stare at him.
“Didn’t think of that, did you?” Nat asked, eyes twinkling. “Of course not. The great Ravenswood expects it to be so, and it is. Well, not everybody heeds your pronouncements, dear brother. They simply don’t tell you they’re ignoring you.”
Spencer hardly knew what to think. Nat was right—it had never occurred to him that Genevieve might not believe him. Was it possible he might actually be able to—
He squelched the thought before he could hope. “No,” he said firmly. “Genevieve would never have hidden such a thing from me. And we were together for three years.”
“Suit yourself, you know the chit better than I do. But even if you’re right and you can’t sire children, you can always take in foundlings.”
“That’s what Abby said. That’s partly why she’s…leaving me. I told her I would never do it.”
“Why not?”
“It seems silly now, but at the time I was thinking of how Dora left us.”
“Dora? You let our stepmother and her disastrous marriage to Father stop you?”
Nat sounded so incredulous that Spencer got defensive. “Well, yes. She wanted children, and Father wouldn’t give them to her. And clearly we weren’t enough for her, so she ran off.”
“For a man who used to be a spymaster,” Nat said, shaking his head, “you can sometimes be damned oblivious.”
“What the hell does that mean?”
“Our not being ‘enough for her’ wasn’t why she left. Granted, I know she wanted children, but that wasn’t the main trouble. What made her grow to hate Father was his refusal to share her bed. For years, apparently.”
“What? How do you know?”
Nat crossed his arms smugly over his chest. “If you’ll recall, dear brother, I was at home for most of their marriage while you were at school. And I wasn’t averse to spying on the servants. I was rather sneaky about it—that way I heard the juiciest gossip. And they gossiped. A lot.”
Married to the Viscount Page 33