Debt of Honor (27 page)

The tears poured, no matter how hard she tried to keep them at bay.

“You see”—the last word had an unnaturally high pitch while she started crying in earnest—“Percy married me to get Wycombe Oaks back. Your husband sold it to my father after you died. This is why you are here now. Although I wish you were at Bromsholme, because you really belong with your son, even if my father was your cousin. Percy has another portrait of you in the Bromsholme library, but he should have this one too. If I were Sir George, I would never let anyone take your portrait away from me. Did he love you? My father never loved my mother.”

Lady Hanbury smiled at her with equal parts of happiness and enigmatic indifference. It would be silly to expect any reaction from a portrait, of course.

She sighed and studied in silence the woman whose face had become so familiar through another portrait, the one over the mantel in the Bromsholme library.

“You should be in Bromsholme with your son,” she repeated. “I wish I could at least make a copy for Percy, but”—she sighed and her face crumpled—“I shall not be going back to him. He plans to divorce me…”

The tears returned with full force. She touched her stomach, but it was as flat as ever, just, perhaps, a little harder under her fingers.

“I am so sorry,” she whispered. “You must believe me that I really have not done anything to earn Percy’s wrath. Please believe me. I shall go mad if no one does. My father, of course, never would, but I shall not tell him anything. He hates me for not being a son. And Percy…I cannot stay with him when his heart and mind are against me.”

That was really the crux of the matter. His lack of trust in her integrity.

“Well”—she let out a deep breath—“most people would think me mad, talking to a painting. But you are not just any painting. You are the picture of my mother-in-law. And you seem happy. I hope you were.”

Letitia dug into her robe pocket for a handkerchief and blew her nose. Her head fell back against the armchair’s soft support. Her eyes, puffy from crying, were too swollen to keep them open, so Letitia let her heavy eyelids fall closed, just for a moment. Her head swirled, exhaustion weighing her down like a heavy blanket. The room, with its flickering candles, drifted away…

Next, she was somehow in front of her mother-in-law, who stood relaxed under an old oak, smiling at her and leaning against the trunk with one elbow atop a gnarly bulge where once a side branch must have grown. Her other hand rested on the head of an enormous Irish wolfhound sitting quietly by her side, his muzzle turned upward and his attention on his mistress. Mrs. Perkins had said his name was Duke.

The dog turned his head toward Letitia and blinked under his shaggy eyebrows. His tail thumped on the ground. Then he turned around, alarmed. Two young people were walking across the rolling lawn in the background—a tall, young woman with straight, black hair let loose down her back and a man whose face Letitia could not see because he was angled toward the woman. They were holding hands and laughing.

Lady Hanbury followed the dog’s gaze and frowned. She and Duke moved in pursuit of the pair, leaving Letitia behind. Then Percy, decked in his highwayman’s coat, came galloping after them all. But even though he was on horseback and the two young people on foot, he could not draw close to them. They kept eluding him and disappearing as soon as he seemed to get near.

They all were now inside a house, and she realized it was Wycombe Oaks. Percy was no longer mounted. He followed the laughing couple in and out of the rooms, but they always got ahead of him, laughing with glee whenever they saw him.

And there was her father too, standing at the end of the long gallery, in front of her mother-in-law’s portrait, dangling a piece of paper in his hand menacingly.

Percy abandoned his pursuit of the merry couple and ran toward her father. To her surprise, Letitia realized she must have been following him somehow, because she was just behind his back.

But it was not Percy, she realized. It was Sir George. Her father was shouting something louder and louder…then, somehow, he grabbed her and was shaking her, his furious face looming inches above hers.

“Let me go,” she screamed. “Let…”

Chapter Thirty-Two

Words died in Letitia’s throat when a hand cupped her cheek. She thrashed her head, but the hand did not go away. With the greatest effort, she forced her heavy eyelids to open.

Josepha’s face, not her father’s, loomed above hers.

“Wake up, my dove.” Josie’s voice cut through all the noise of the dream vanishing from her head. “It will do you no good to sit here instead of resting in your bed. You gave me such a fright when I found your room empty. Did you have a bad dream?”

Letitia tried to shake her head and winced at the discomfort in her neck.

“No, Josie. Not bad, just strange.”

She glanced at the wall. Lady Hanbury regarded her with her frozen smile again while Duke sat quietly by her side, as before.

“Do you know that this is Sir Percival’s mother, Josie?” she asked, pointing to the portrait. “She was my father’s distant cousin. He brought this painting here after the purchase of Wycombe Oaks. Does it not seem strange to you that Sir George would sell the portrait of his wife together with the house? Well, maybe not.” She shrugged. “After all, he sold all other family portr—”

Loud shouts, eerily reminiscent of her dream, broke into the room from the street. Someone called her father’s name. The intruder shouted loud enough to be heard not only through the closed windows, but probably all the way across Park Lane to the Serpentine.

“Stanville, you cheat and liar! Reveal yourself!”

Wide awake now, Letitia sprang up from the armchair.

“Do not go near the window,” Josepha said hurriedly. “Someone may mean his lordship harm and throw a stone at it.”

But Letitia had already moved the curtain enough to peek out. The darkness outside yielded only the shadow of a male silhouette hovering at the foot of the front stairs.

“Stanville, you bastard!” he bellowed. “Do not think you can hide from me and from justice. I see the light in your room. Come out, you coward, or every paper in town shall have a story to put on the front page tomorrow!”

Letitia gasped and pressed a hand to her mouth, letting the curtain go. The man in the street was certainly in his cups. There was a hint of slur in his speech and unsteadiness in his stance. Oh, where was the night watch to arrest him for his drunken behavior? Thank God, many houses were still empty after their owners’ exodus to the country for the summer. Maybe the drunkard would go away.

But he immediately dashed her hopes.

“Stanville, stop hiding like a woman! You conniving cheat, come out and face the truth after twenty-five years. Your life in hell is not enough to pay for what you did!”

Twenty-five years? Was this a coincidence? Somehow the reference to the long-gone past struck a note of premonition in Letitia’s mind. Her heart slammed. Twenty-five years. She had to find out what the stranger was talking about.

She grabbed the candleholder she had come with to the study and dashed out of the room. Josepha, hissing like a frightened cat, followed close behind. But the pull of the stranger’s words was stronger than fear.

When Letitia reached the foyer, Jasper, together with another footman, was unlocking the door. No doubt they meant to deal with the drunkard. The last latch clicked open to the accompaniment of another challenge coming from outside.

“Let him in,” she commanded.

Both men jumped, startled. Obviously, no one expected her to come downstairs.

“Her ladyship should stay away,” Jasper suggested. “This man may be dangerous. He’s been here twice already and left his card for his lordship. I told him not to come back for a fortnight, and yet he’s back only a week later.”

“Let him in, please,” Letitia repeated. “He will not fight both of you in the house.”

“My lady, the—”

“Come on, Stanville! Show your face at last!” came another shout from the street. “Or perhaps you have no face to show after what you did to Hanbury?”

Hanbury?
His words had the effect of the experiments with electrical current Letitia had read about. They jolted her with nearly supernatural force from the bottom of the staircase toward the door. She covered the short distance in seconds and, before either footman had a chance to intervene, pulled the door wide open.

The man in the street swayed in unison with the swinging motion of his arms, while he tried to articulate another challenge wrapped in insults. He froze halfway through the movement.

For a few seconds, they watched each other. The stranger dropped his arms at last and stood still while the latest mumble died in his throat. In her white robe, a shawl over her shoulders and a single candle in her hand, she probably made him think she was a ghost, not a real person.

He soon confirmed her supposition.

“Who are you?” he asked as loudly as before, but she did not miss the slight shakiness lining his words.

“I believe you should introduce yourself first, sir,” she replied, infusing her tone with hauteur. “But perhaps you are afraid to do so, given your despicable manners. I will answer your question then—I am Lord Stanville’s daughter. Come in.”

He gaped at her uncertainly for a moment, then bowed in a rather wobbly manner.

“I beg your pardon, Miss Parker,” he muttered. “Why does not Stanville answer the door himself?”

“My father is not here.”

The stranger straightened. She had become accustomed to the darkness by now and did not miss the expensive cut of his clothes. Her sudden appearance must have sobered him better than anything else might; he seemed to be losing his foxed attitude, although his stance still betrayed a serious camaraderie with a bottle earlier in the evening.

“I beg your pardon, Miss Parker,” he repeated, the slur retreating from his speech. “Perhaps I ought to come back in a more acceptable fashion when your father is back in town.”

“Perhaps,” Letitia rejoined. “However, since you have already intruded upon my sleep, you will oblige me, sir, and come in and talk to me tonight.”

It was not an invitation. It was an order.

The stranger still hesitated.

“The business I have is between me and your father. I cannot see how I should involve you in what is a rather ancient history.”

“And yet you seem to be willing to involve all the newspapers in town. I believe I have the right to expect from you an explanation, sir.”

He shuffled his feet without moving forward.

“It is not appropriate for a young lady to be involved in such sor…I mean, in this particular business.”

By now, Letitia’s curiosity was stretched past the point of endurance. She would ask the footmen to bring him in if he continued in his refusal.

“It is rather too late for your concern, is it not?” she pointed out. “Besides, I am a married woman. You may calm your trepidation about my maidenly sensibilities. And you shall tell me the reason for your breach of peace. Or are
you
a coward instead of my father?”

He finally moved and slowly walked up the stairs, though his movements betrayed apprehension. The sight of two footmen behind her back must have shouted warnings in the dark.

His wariness became even more pronounced once he crossed the threshold and the heavy door closed behind him.

Letitia could not help feeling some satisfaction. Intimidation seemed to do wonders on occasions.

“Come along,” she said in a clipped tone, not even trying to sound friendly. “You too, Josie,” she added and glanced at the footmen. “We shall not be long. Please wait.”

They bowed in response. She turned and began marching towards the staircase. The stranger, now meek and silent, breathed laboriously behind her back with each step up.

When they entered her father’s study, her initial observation was confirmed. His clothes bespoke wealth and fashion. He was about her father’s age, or so she supposed, but he looked better than her father, his figure still lean, his dark hair lightened by an occasional sun-bleached streak and a suggestion of grey around the temples.

She put the candlestick down on the desk and stood silently, watching him.

He took the hint.

“I beg your pardon, ma’am,” he said and inclined his head. “I am Sir Philip Ashton, once Lord Stanville’s close acquaintance. Please accept my deepest apology for the ungentlemanly behavior you have been forced to witness. Had I known you were the only resident here, I would have stayed away, along with my grudges. I do beg your forgiveness. I hope you will believe me, ma’am, when I assure you that this is not the usual way in which I confront others. I was certain I saw his carriage pulling in earlier this evening, just as I was leaving Hyde Park, but now I realize it might have been yours.”

Letitia would not let him off the hook so easily. “You inquired earlier about my father’s whereabouts, I’m told. You knew he was not due in town for another while. Why not approach him in one of his clubs once he returned? Why the haste of hauling him out of bed in the middle of the night when you had so many other possibilities? At the least, you could have sent him a letter.”

“This is all very true,” he replied, “and upon some reflection I should have done exactly that. All I have for my defense is that I returned to England after twenty-five years in India only ten days ago. And only a few hours ago, I discovered that an old business involving your father has been left unfinished. Or, more precisely, it was not finished the way we were promised it would be.”

“The business that involved Sir George Hanbury,” she said. “You are, no doubt, referring to the sale of Wycombe Oaks all those years ago.”

Her words clearly surprised him. “Sale?” He creased his brow. “Is this what happened? And you know about it? Perhaps I am mistaken, then. Perhaps Stanville repented and then persuaded Hanbury to sell the estate to him. Perhaps he did nothing to earn my scorn. But he had to have done so after I left the country, or I would have known. This is not how he obtained Hanbury’s pile in the first place and how I remember the events of that night twenty-five years ago.”

His words suddenly frightened her. What happened before her father bought Wycombe Oaks? Lord, what was Sir Philip talking about? Her father’s treatment of the estate, his evident dislike of Percy, his unexpected visit to Bromsholme after her letter—all indicated that there was much more to it than a simple business transaction. She had always sensed that.

Letitia glanced at Sir Philip, who regarded her with some curiosity. She burned with the need to know what sort of unfinished business between Sir George Hanbury and her father had been festering for twenty-five years. Or why it compelled a member of society to abandon all rules of decorum and create a scene in the street in the middle of the night.

“Do you know, sir, who this lady is?” She pointed to the portrait on the wall.

“Lady Stanville, I suppose.” He appraised the figure in the painting and then her, as if comparing the faces. “You favor your father, ma’am.”

“This is not my mother,” she replied. “The sitter is Sir George Hanbury’s wife.”

Sir Philip turned rapidly, focusing on the painting again.

“God Almighty,” he muttered. “So it must be true. George would never part with his wife’s portrait willingly. Stanville never kept his word, then.”