A Secret Consequence for the Viscount

by Sophia James

‘My brother said you went to Essex to the Bromworth estate?’

  He nodded. ‘Oliver leant me his carriage and driver. With such horses it was a quick run both there and back.’

  ‘I hope it all went well.’

  At that he laughed. ‘Well for me and poorly for my uncle, but I am finally shot of Mr Aaron Bartlett and his plotting so at least now I will be able to afford my own boots.’ He added this in a wry tone as he stretched his legs out before him.

  ‘I heard that you had won a substantial sum at the card tables last night?’

  He frowned. ‘A dubious talent in the eyes of the ton. Once it was losing I was better at, failure more acceptable to the doyens of good taste here.’

  She smiled because what he said was the truth. She had heard the rumblings of gossip before she had left Frederick’s and the strong opinion on the Viscount’s new ability to fleece any other man at the table was not flattering.

  ‘Perhaps you should pretend sometimes to be a lesser player?’

  He sat up at that and looked at her directly. ‘Dromorne threatened to foreclose on his IOUs if I did not fully reimburse him last night.’

  The truth of this made Eleanor place down her flowery craftwork. ‘There was no choice for you, then?’

  ‘None. Tonight, however, I have my title and my estate returned into my care. Undoubtedly there will be others who will come forward demanding payments of past debts that I have long since forgotten, but now I can manage.’

  ‘You will open your town house again?’

  ‘I have a man hiring staff as we speak.’

  ‘And your memory? Has it been jogged at all with the sojourn back to Bromworth Manor?’

  ‘No. I had thought perhaps...’ He let this tail off and shook his head. ‘But, no.’

  Standing, she walked across to the hearth, using the mantel for support. ‘Then I want to offer you a proposition, Lord Bromley.’

  She stressed his title. Better to make the suggestion formally and holding no whisper of emotion.

  He looked up at that, his eyes darker than they normally appeared. ‘A proposition, Lady Eleanor?’

  ‘I want to help you retrieve your memory.’

  After these words he said nothing, but merely waited.

  ‘I was with you for many of the days that you have forgotten. The days before your attack,’ she qualified.

  ‘With me?’

  She was not brave enough yet to give him all the truth. ‘As a friend. You were at a loose end and so I accompanied you on day trips.’

  The candles against the darkness, the smell of scented wax, his skin under moonlight, her unbound hair draped across the tanned folds of his shadowed arm.

  She did not speak of this.

  ‘Where did we go?’

  ‘The Vauxhall Gardens. Hyde Park. Bullock’s Museum. Fortnum and Mason. Gunter’s Tea Shop.’

  ‘Quite the potpourri of establishments.’

  ‘There were others as well.’

  ‘All in less than a week? Not a little acquaintance, then?’

  She smiled and spoke with more trepidation than she meant to. ‘The thing is, Lord Bromley, I might be able to help you to remember by going back.’

  ‘Recall by association, you mean?’

  ‘Memory aided by events that are familiar. I have been reading about amnesia. Hypnosis is one treatment, but so is the quieter option of passing again across what your soul would know and hence allowing a passage for the brain to reconnect.’

  She recognised in her words the text she had studied all afternoon at Lackington’s.

  ‘Why would you do this? For me?’

  ‘You are my brother’s best friend and Jacob would be more than pleased to see your memory restored.’

  * * *

  He could not understand her motives. One thing was for certain—they were not quite as she had admitted them, for she had blushed bright red at his question and looked away.

  What was it she was saying underneath her words?

  ‘I truly went to Gunter’s Tea Shop with you?’

  That brought a smile into eyes that were anxious.

  ‘Happily, my lord. You particularly enjoyed the chocolate sorbet in a pewter mould shaped as a pineapple. But then Gunter’s frozen indulgences are all particularly alluring.’

  He could not ever remember laughing with a woman as he did with Eleanor Huntingdon.

  ‘I can see why that memory has been expunged from my recall, Lady Eleanor.’

  ‘You brought a box of the extravagant pastries home. The almond croissant was your favourite.’

  ‘To the Bromley town house?’ Had she gone there with him, too? The tea shop was a place she might have accompanied him without being exposed to scandal, but to visit him at home?

  As if she had said too much, she retreated into silence.

  ‘Very well.’ He gave this quietly as she looked across at him. ‘Our first destination is the tea shop on Berkeley Square. I’ll pick you up at two o’clock tomorrow and we shall go and have ice cream.’

  ‘You are not staying here this evening?’

  ‘My town house is being readied for me and it will be good to put my head down in a bed that I know.’

  The sharp flash of anger that crossed into Eleanor Huntingdon’s face as he said these words were another puzzlement.

  ‘Then I look forward to tomorrow, Lord Bromley. On the last occasion you wore a dark blue jacket and beige trousers.’

  ‘You think the details important?’

  ‘I do.’

  ‘What was it you had on?’

  She frowned at that as though she could not exactly remember. ‘It was warm so no doubt I had on one of my summer silks.’

  ‘In gold?’

  ‘Pardon?’

  ‘I liked you in gold at Frederick’s.’

  ‘I am not certain I have...’

  ‘Anything, Eleanor. Wear anything you feel comfortable in. I was teasing.’

  A further blush at the informality of his using her Christian name. Jacob’s sister was beginning to confound him completely and the thought crossed his mind that he would sit anywhere opposite her just to see her blue eyes smile. Even in Gunter’s Tea Shop in Berkeley Square.

  Had it been the same back then?

  He could not ask her. He couldn’t ask Jacob either. He swore under his breath because the loss of his memory was causing havoc in every sort of way possible and Eleanor’s offer was the one avenue to help him get closer to finding out the truth.

  He just hoped like hell that he had not hurt her.

  * * *

  She watched him leave and for just a second was transported back to the night before his disappearance. They had made love and it was late, but the magic between them seemed doused and awkward as he had escorted her to the front door of the Bromley town house and to the carriage that awaited outside.

  He had not kissed her. She remembered that vividly. When she had reached up that last time he had pulled away, calling to his footman to escort her home, anger and distance in his voice. He had not even stayed to wave her goodbye either, the door shut firmly so that all light was gone. She had stumbled on the steps in the darkness and almost fallen.

  Falling. It felt like that again now as uncertainty clawed at truth. She did not know him any more. The man she had imagined was different from the one he had become, but she was different, too, with the responsibility of Lucy. She was also scared of allowing him in once more and being hurt because of it.

  The dry ache in her throat made her breath shallow.

  Chapter Six

  Nicholas spent the next morning in one of the more squalid parts of the Ratcliffe Highway, asking questions that might lead to answers about his uncle’s invol
vement in his lost years.

  Once he might have felt out of place in such a location but the forces that had shaped him in the Americas were the same as those he now trawled through in the pestilent dark alleys of Stepney. Destitution, filth, poverty and overcrowding abounded here and criminal activity was a direct result of that.

  The smell of the river was everywhere and the toil of those who lived by it easily seen, the scavengers and mudlarks who survived on what they could find on the bottom of the Thames when the low tide washed in various pieces of coal, rope, bones or copper nails if you were lucky. Nicholas knew this because the James River had held the same desperation and there were times, especially in the early months there, when he had wondered about crawling into the sludge himself.

  Those who held the run of the docklands were steeped in beggary and with no other means available to them were unlikely to overlook opportunities that might keep them from the workhouses.

  Opportunities such as the kidnap of a viscount and his subsequent disposal. He’d had the name of a man who might have some information about such things, given to him quietly, of course, and taking the last of his gambling winnings from Frederick’s soirée to obtain.

  He’d dressed accordingly, but there must have been something in the lines of his face that spoke of menace and experience because walking through the mean streets of the place he had been completely unchallenged. Perhaps the scar did him a service here.

  Mess with me and I will deal with you, as others have dealt with me.

  The White Horse Tavern stood on the corner of East Smithfield and a smaller unnamed street, the river visible from its front portal. Those who watched him enter were miserably clad with barely a boot between them and the stench of the streets followed him inside to the bar where he recognised the look of some of the cheaper liquor he’d dispatched himself in Richmond.

  A stranger approached then, a man in his forties with an eye that was patently false in its deformed socket, as well as being poorly fashioned.

  ‘You’d be the one who has been asking about the details of a snatch in Jermyn Street some years ago?’

  ‘I am.’ Words were not things to be bandied by the starving in the same way as the ton was wont to. The less said the better.

  ‘Join me over there.’

  The very position of the man’s seat told Nicholas two things. He liked his back to the wall and he felt safer near a further exit. A small door was visible beside the table, three steps running down to it.

  The newcomer held his hand above his belt as he sat and Nick knew there would be a knife there. There was probably another one on the outside of his right boot given that was the side he favoured as he gestured to Nick to also sit.

  ‘Did you bring money?’

  ‘I did, but the amount depends on what you might tell me.’

  Neither of them used names. The parish constables and the Night Watch were noticeable by their absence in these parts of London, but there were other means of maintaining order. Should the need arise for violence Nick knew the man would not hesitate and there were those close undoubtedly involved in the same scam. The lad in the corner tending to the fire, the bearded fellow behind the bar, the two older patrons to one side who were stiff with focus.

  He turned back and waited, his breath quiet and even, but nevertheless relieved when the contact fumbled in his pocket to bring forth a small book.

  Turning over the pages to find the right entry, the glass-eyed man read quickly.

  22nd August 1812

  Jermyn Street, Mayfair

  Viscount Bromley

  Twenty pounds

  Paid

  The shock of the words made Nicholas’s breath come shallowly. ‘Who paid?’

  ‘An older fellow named Bartlett and an arrogant toff he was, too. The mark was put into a hackney coach and thrown into the river as per instructions and then left for the tide to take.’

  Or to crawl out? To be picked up? To find a ship to faraway shores?

  ‘Did Bartlett pay again later when it was discovered that the man was still alive? Did he have someone follow Viscount Bromley abroad?’

  ‘No. That was the end of it. A simple drowning. No amount of gold would be enough to entice those I hire out to cross the seas to hunt further.’

  ‘But others might?’

  ‘I have never heard even a whisper of it, but I suppose with enough gold offered it could be possible.’

  Nick believed what was said and the hope of a quick resolution wilted. His uncle might have ordered his demise in the first place at the river, but when that did not eventuate another had tried to finish him off.

  He put a small bag of gold on the table, the clink of it satisfying. ‘If you hear anything at all about this matter I would be well pleased to learn of it. Leave word at the address inside and mark it “Stepney”.’

  As a duke, Jacob was often receiving missives. No one would take notice of a further messenger.

  A quick nod of his head and the man stood, using the small door to disappear. There was mud on his boots from the river and his cloak was torn at the hem.

  As Nick rose himself the tavern owner came forward and slugged him hard on the side of his good cheek.

  ‘In warning not to say nothing of this to anyone.’ He could feel the eyes of all the others upon him as he left.

  * * *

  She had worn the sprigged muslin to Gunter’s six years ago, Eleanor thought as she rifled through the clothes she’d brought down to London from Millbrook House. But there was nothing here remotely similar to that which her eighteen-year-old flighty self would have once favoured. Certainly apart from the one very formal gown she had worn to Frederick’s, there was nothing in gold.

  Hauling out a deep blue velvet, she held it up against her. The colour made her eyes bluer and she had always liked the cut.

  Sighing, she stroked her fingers across the pile. Was she doing the right thing? She missed Lucy and every day she promised to help Nicholas was one less she did not have with her daughter. She wondered if she should put more of a guard up, for her protection and for Lucy’s. But she wished his memories back as desperately as he himself did because only then she would know whether she could trust him to be the sort of father her daughter needed.

  The demons still sat upon his shoulders and the menace that had become such a part of him now was worrying. Still, yesterday at Bromworth Manor he had discovered his uncle’s part in his mysterious disappearance so that was one less concern. The debts he owed should right themselves with his newly come inheritance and things would return to normal.

  Normal?

  He would never be the rakish pleasure-seeking smiling Viscount she had once fallen in love with, but her older self found this dangerous, larger and quieter version even more attractive.

  He was steel now, honed in fire, the pieces that had been light and reckless burned away to the bone. She could not even imagine how this Nicholas might enjoy ice cream with her at Gunter’s.

  Despite everything she looked forward to their next meeting. It had been the middle of August last time they were there—now hot chocolate might be more the order of the day on a cold December afternoon. All she could feel was excitement.

  * * *

  His carriage arrived on the dot of two and Jacob called to her as she came downstairs hoping to leave before anyone saw exactly who she had gone with.

  ‘Tell Nick to stop in for a drink here with me afterwards.’

  Eleanor smiled because there was very little her brother ever missed when it concerned his family. ‘I will.’

  ‘And make sure he takes take good care of my baby sister.’

  ‘Hardly that. I am almost twenty-five. A matron.’

  He shook his head and stood. ‘Experience does not always come with the years
one lives, Ellie. I don’t want you hurt.’

  ‘You think I might be?’

  ‘After all that Rose and I endured, I am now of the opinion that no one knows better what is right for your life than you do. But a word of warning. If you are hurt, let it be your making and not that of others. He is a good person, Nick, but in a difficult situation.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘And you are a bit the same, I think.’

  She made no answer to this as she turned to go, but sometimes she got the distinct impression that her brother could read her more easily than she gave him credit for.

  Nicholas was just walking towards the town house after speaking with his driver and he looked up when he saw her.

  ‘The while we keep a man waiting he reflects on his shortcomings.’

  She frowned at his words.

  ‘It’s an old French proverb, though I have changed the pronoun.’

  His explanation made her frown. ‘What are your shortcomings then, my lord?’

  ‘I have so many I cannot remember half of them.’

  When he smiled she saw a dark bruise on his left cheek, newly gathered.

  ‘I hope no one else has decided to try to do away with you since yesterday, Lord Bromley.’

  All humour evaporated and when he didn’t answer Eleanor felt a growing bud of alarm.

  He was dressed in his own clothes this morning. A black jacket over lighter trousers, his white shirt and cravat enhancing the tan of his skin. His hair was back in a looser queue today, allowing wisps of dark brown to frame his face in a fashion that was unusual nowadays, but one that suited him completely.

  Beautiful. She had always thought him that even in the very worst of times.

  But this afternoon, as he helped her into the carriage, he felt less safe than he had yesterday. She could almost imagine he might scrap the plans for the tea-shop visit and head instead to find some frightening shadow-filled tavern in which to imbibe uncut liquor in great quantities.

  For years she had lived so carefully, with circumspection and quietness. She had blended into Millbrook House without incident, making sojourns to London only occasionally and always being on her very best behaviour.