A Woman's Estate (52 page)

“I had gone out to meet Griselda,” Bertram said. “I should
have told you, but—”

“It was my fault,” Griselda put in, leaning forward from her
chair on the other side of Bertram’s bed.

“If anyone else says anything is his or her fault, I shall
throw myself on the ground and drum with my heels,” Abigail announced firmly.

Bertram’s free hand moved in a characteristically graceful
gesture. “It is more elegant to have the vapors,” he fluted in his usual
affected tone of voice. Then he sobered. “I don’t want you to think me a
complete fool. I hadn’t said anything to Eustace about suspecting him, you
know. I was going to warn him after he pushed Victor into the river, but by the
time I got to the house, Griselda told me he was packing to go on a visit, and
I thought he had been scared off.”

“Yes, and we know why you didn’t say anything after the
incident at the mill,” Abigail told him. “I have only just remembered that
Eustace was in the stable when we made our plans to picnic there. But why in
the world did you agree to meet him at night at the ruins?”

“The triumph of hope over experience,” Bertram sighed. “That
was stupid, I suppose, but I had a pistol, and I had no idea he had any reason
to want to hurt me. He came to Stonar and told me he was deep in debt and had
to leave the country secretly. The road is less than half a mile from the
ruins, and he said he would have a carriage waiting for him there. He asked me
for money, suggesting that I draw on Arthur’s funds, but I didn’t have to do
that because I had been saving.” He turned his head and smiled at Griselda.

“Good God,” Arthur said, “that would have fooled me too. And
I wouldn’t have minded if you
had
drawn on me. It would have been cheap
at any price to be rid of him so easily.”

“I thought so,” Bertram agreed. “But I had a few thousand.
My expenses are low, and you pay me very generously. And when I handed over the
money, I was going to tell him that I had found the man in London who had been
watching Abigail for him, so that he wouldn’t be tempted to come back. But I
never had a chance to threaten him. He came up behind me and hit me without a
word. Why? Do you know?”

Arthur told him about the forged letter. “I suppose he
intended to cover your death by making us believe it was
you
who had
fled the country, having first stolen a substantial sum from me. But how could
he believe I would not recognize the forgery?”

“Perhaps he didn’t realize Bathurst would show you the
letter,” Bertram suggested. “And I don’t think he ever recognized that you had
political importance or realized that Bathurst would not want to make too much
trouble for the nephew of Liverpool’s friend. You were only Sir Arthur, and
Roger, a mere Mr. St. Eyre.”

“Yes, but also Eustace was like Mama,” Griselda sighed. “He
always believed what he wished to believe, and I am sure he
was
deep in
debt. Mama never gave him much. I think he had been forging bills in her name
as he did with Papa long ago. She had been complaining about her accounts to
Mr. Deedes. I wrote a letter only two weeks ago. Eustace must have been growing
more and more desperate.”

“I tried to save him,” Bertram said, disengaging his hand
from Abigail’s so he could take Griselda’s in both of his own. “I understood
that whatever he did, he was still your brother.”

Griselda looked appalled. “Oh, Bertram, have I brought all
this on us through being foolish? I didn’t realize you were trying to spare me
pain. I thought you wished to avoid a scandal.”

“Griselda!” Bertram protested. “I wasn’t too happy about
having an intended murderer in the family, but I wouldn’t have risked Victor’s
life for that. I thought you loved Eustace.”

Griselda shook her head sadly. “He wouldn’t let me love him.
I don’t know why he enjoyed tormenting me, but even when he was a little boy,
he did things on purpose so that I would be punished. He was…cruel.”

“Well, that makes no difference now,” Abigail said briskly.
It was time, she felt, to change the subject, and she intended to provide one
sufficiently attractive to divert everyone. “We must have the banns for your
wedding posted as soon after the funeral as is decent. Tomorrow I will speak to
the vicar. When you are married, you can live here at Rutupiae. Griselda can
continue to take care of the house, and it will be no trouble for Bertram to
walk over to Stonar every morning to his usual duties.” She laughed and raised
her brows. “After all, he has been walking in the other direction even more
often. And now there is only the question of Hilda. Do you want me to—?”

“Abigail!” Arthur exclaimed, his voice slightly choked with
laughter. “Haul in your team. You are riding roughshod over two people’s
lives.”

Bertram laughed aloud. “I have not the smallest objection,
since her plans, although admittedly precipitous, are exactly what Griselda and
I would like best.”

“And about Mama,” Griselda put in, “I wish to assure you
that she really did not know what Eustace was about, nor would she have
condoned it if she did. She has always accepted Victor’s right without
resentment.” She smiled sadly. “She worried because she felt Abigail was
spoiling him. She never understood that she had done anything wrong with
Eustace and me.”

“I never thought your mother was involved,” Abigail said
softly.

“No,” Griselda agreed. “You understood her very well.” She
shrugged. “I think she might not wish to stay at Rutupiae now, but if she does,
Bertram will be able to manage her, and she will behave differently to me
because I will be a married woman.”

Abigail had her doubts about that, but she said nothing.
There would be time enough in the future to deal with Hilda if necessary, and
right now Bertram was looking very tired. Arthur had seen that too.

“I think I had better take my wife away,” he said. “She has
done all the arranging possible here. I will have to point her in another
direction—perhaps at Vienna. The loose ends there should keep her busy for a
while.”

Actually, there were enough loose ends to keep both Arthur
and Abigail busy right where they were. Arthur had all the business that
Bertram had put aside for him while he was at Ghent, in addition to everything
that had piled up after Bertram had been injured. Abigail had similar duties in
Rutupiae. Then there were the funeral arrangements and wedding arrangements and
preparations for the family gathering at Christmas. On 23 December there were
three particularly welcome arrivals—Victor, Daphne, and a letter from Lord
Liverpool thanking Arthur for his efforts and announcing that a peace treaty
had been signed by the British government and sent to Ghent for the signatures
of the Americans.

In the joy and confusion of welcoming the children and
listening to the momentous events they had to recount immediately, the last
item was pushed into the background. Arthur did not get around to telling
Abigail about it until they were in bed. Her joy at the news reminded Arthur of
a flicker or two of doubt that had been aroused in him. When he thought back on
some of Abigail’s behavior, now that he was no longer blinded by fearing she
had some strong emotional involvement with Gallatin, Arthur began to suspect
that there might be some fire behind the smoke of Eustace’s accusation. Clearly
Eustace had picked the wrong evidence, but the basic assumption might not have
been so far out of line.

“I had something more important on my mind in Bathurst’s
office,” Arthur said when Abigail had finished expressing her joy over the
peace treaty, “and perhaps I felt it would not be safe or wise to ask before
this, but—are you a spy, my love?”

Abigail looked at him warily. She knew those drawling tones
and look of indolence could be a danger signal, but what she had done was the
one secret she had kept from Arthur, and she wanted the slate to be clean.

“If you are asking me whether I am in the pay of the
American government, the answer is no,” she said, “but I must admit that I have
transmitted information—” She paused and eyed her husband, then finished
aggressively. “And I will again too, if I think poor little America is being
bullied by—”

Arthur laughed aloud and muffled her mouth with his. “Hush,”
he whispered into her ear when he was certain she had been subdued. “You must
be careful what you say. Don’t you know that they can hang a husband for the
treason committed by his wife as well as vice versa?”

“No!” Abigail exclaimed, horrified. She knew Arthur was not
angry, but it was dreadful to think she might have made serious trouble for her
husband. “Oh, I never would have done it if I had known you could be blamed.”
She sat up in her indignation. “You see,” she said, “how pernicious the laws
are. You, who are totally innocent, might have been ruined just because the
stupid law insists on an impossibility—that two people can literally become
one.”

“Yes, my little firebrand,” Arthur agreed, drawing her down
into his arms and untying the first of the ribbon bows that held her nightdress
together. “Tomorrow we will begin a crusade to change the law, but tonight I
intend to try to fulfill its conditions.”

About the Author

Roberta Gellis was driven to start writing her own books
some forty years ago by the infuriating inaccuracies of the historical fiction
she read. Since then she has worked in varied genres—romance, mystery and
fantasy—but always, even in the fantasies, keeping the historical events as
near to what actually happened as possible. The dedication to historical time
settings is not only a matter of intellectual interest, it is also because she
is so out-of-date herself that accuracy in a contemporary novel would be
impossible.

In the forty-some years she has been writing, Gellis has
produced more than twenty-five straight historical romances. These have been
the recipients of many awards, including the Silver and Gold Medal Porgy for
historical novels from the West Coast Review of Books, the Golden Certificate
from Affaire de Coeur, the Romantic Times Award for Best Novel in the Medieval
Period (several times) and a Lifetime Achievement Award for Historical Fantasy.
Last but not least, Gellis was honored with the Romance Writers of America’s
Lifetime Achievement Award.

The author welcomes comments from readers. You can find her
website and e-mail address on her author bio page at www.ellorascave.com.

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Also by Roberta Gellis

Fortune’s Bride

The Cornish Heiress

The English Heiress

The Kent Heiress

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