The Secret Duke (21 page)

When Christian had foisted the creatures on him, the kittens were nameless, so Thorn had named them. The normal, bold one was black, so he’d named him Sable. The gray Manx kitten was plump and warier, so he’d irreverently called him after the king—Georgie.

Tabitha retrieved Sable again and yawned.

“Exhaustion or boredom, my lady? Shall I import mice? Or rabbits?”

An appropriate response to a private joke.

“My apologies, of course not. But give me your wisdom. Has Miss Barstowe learned that Captain Rose is sometimes the Duke of Ithorne and set out to demand marriage because of our adventure four years before?”

The noise the cat made sounded amusingly like a snort.

“Why else would she suddenly remember me? I am perplexed.”

“Ah, of course. Thank you.” Thorn rang the bell on his desk, struggling again with the idea that the cat might actually understand language. That sequence of sounds came only when summoning his long-suffering secretary would be wise. Perhaps he should devise some experiments.

A footman came in. “Overstone, if you please.”

When the rotund young man entered, Thorn said, “Barstowe. A lady of between twenty and twenty-three.”

“I can make inquiries, sir.”

Sable escaped again. Tabitha picked the kitten up and carried it to Thorn’s desk. She leapt up, her large hindquarters making it exceptionally easy, and put the kitten down. Then she leapt off again and went for a stroll.

“Child minder?” Thorn asked in disbelief. His secretary made a peculiar noise that might be choked laughter. “You exceed yourself, madam.” But Thorn rescued the tiny adventurer from danger of ink, or the inkwell from danger of kitten.

Needle claws pricked as Sable explored his hand. Thorn realized he was smiling. “Very well, I like your spirit, mite.”

He waved Overstone off to his research and conducted a language experiment. Georgie, as usual, was peering over the edge of the basket, mewling, but scared to venture away.

Thorn said, “Why not bring your other babe up here?”

Tabitha made a sound that was completely indecipherable, but didn’t do as she was asked.

“And that tells me nothing,” Thorn noted as Sable began a fearless progress up his sleeve.

Suddenly sorry for the timid kitten, he went and picked it up. Georgie wailed. Tabitha turned, but she merely watched, slit eyed.

“Your mother also thinks you should be more venturesome,” he said, returning to his desk and putting the kitten down there.

Tabitha leapt up again to hover.

“I wonder if human infants are as complicated,” Thorn asked. “But your two remind me a little of Christian and myself. I wasn’t timid, precisely, but I was more . . . careful before he came. You really should mellow toward him, you know. He’s a good man. Better than I, for he’s straightforward.”

He put a quill pen in front of Georgie, who batted at it tentatively. Sable raced down Thorn’s arm to leap on the pen in predatory fashion. But Georgie held his ground.

“Admirable,” Thorn told him. “Don’t let the jackanapes run all over you.” As the kittens were now a tangled ball, either in affection or competition, his advice came too late.

With what sounded like a sigh, Tabitha plucked one from the melee and went off to deposit it in the basket. It was Sable.

“Won’t work. He’ll be out of there in a trice.” But Tabitha turned back and hissed at the escaping kitten, and Sable slid back into the basket.

“Discipline. Excellent. I believe I’ll install you as nursery governess if I ever find a suitable wife. Now, what would Christian do about Bella Barstowe?”

Tabitha had her mouth full of Georgie, but she shot Thorn a look.

“True. He would race off to discover all. It’s what he did. But look at the chaos that resulted.”

Tabitha was putting Georgie in the basket, but Thorn didn’t need her wisdom. “In the end, it won him the woman he loves.”

“Of course not. Bella Barstowe? But I have to know the end of that story.”

“Very well, I’m desperate to escape for a few days. No harm to it. There’s nothing of importance at hand, and even if I’ve forbidden myself the
Black Swan
, this gives me an excuse to be Captain Rose.”

Thorn summoned Joseph and set him to packing for the captain, then checked his more personal commitments to be sure nothing would be neglected. He wrote quick letters to Christian in Devon and Robin in Huntingdonshire. Robin had made him promise that he’d always let him know when he was becoming his alter ego.

When Thorn had asked why, Robin said, “So that I can worry about you.”

“Wouldn’t it be better not to know?”

“Then I’d have to worry all the time.”

So many people worried about him, and he wished they wouldn’t.

Overstone returned with a sheet of notes. “There are a number of Barstowe families, sir, with and without an E. Oxfordshire, Shropshire, Hampshire, Lincolnshire. I will require a little more time.”

“Don’t look so pained. I don’t expect Rothgar- like omniscience.”

The secretary said, “Thank you, sir,” but he looked as if Thorn had insulted him with low expectations. He’d look more pained in a moment.

“I’m going to Ithorne. Order my traveling chariot to be ready in an hour, and send a groom immediately with this for the Black Swan Inn at Stowting.”

His secretary did look as if he’d suddenly felt a boil in a very tender spot. He knew a message to Stowting probably meant Thorn was about to become Captain Rose. It seemed Tabitha might too. She hissed.

Thorn wrote quickly. By the time he folded the letter, Overstone was ready to drip hot wax so Thorn could impress his seal. Not his ducal crest, but the image of a black swan.

“Sir . . .”

“If there’s any matter needing my attention over the next few days, you have an hour to present it.”

“Very well, sir.”

After a struggle, Thorn added, “I won’t be going to sea.”

Overstone didn’t say,
Thank God
, but the sentiment clearly showed on his face. He couldn’t understand Thorn’s need for another life, especially one that involved rough living and occasional danger.

Thorn, on the other hand, felt excitement dancing through his veins. He wouldn’t want to be Captain Rose all the time, but his adventures in that persona were precious flights of freedom.

“God bless Miss Barstowe,” he said to Tabitha, “husband hunter or not.”

He dealt with a few papers, but then all was ready for his departure. Feeling slightly foolish, he said farewell to the cats. Tabitha glared and closed the lid of her basket.

“I’ve left orders for your tenderest care,” Thorn protested.

Now that sounded alarmingly like a dismal prognostication followed by a curse.

 

 

 

 

B
ella woke the next morning feeling slightly unwell. Even if she did decide to return to London, she couldn’t face it today. She soon convinced herself that Captain Rose had proved not to be truly dreadful, and it would be only sensible to stay and talk to the man when he wasn’t in his cups.

That talk, however, would take place in a safer spot than a bedchamber. In the parlor downstairs. Yes, that would be safe.

With this plan in mind, however, she definitely needed to learn more about him, so she asked Louise to help her wash her hair. It was impossible to have a conversation while washing her hair over a basin, but when the maid began to work a comb through the tangles, Bella started on her subject.

“I encountered Captain Rose in the corridor last night. A very handsome man.”

“That he is, ma’am.” In the mirror, Bella could see the twitch of a wicked grin on the maid’s face.

Bella sighed. “But a bad man, I fear.”

“That he is too, ma’am.” But then the maid said, “No, not bad. But bold, and with wicked ways.”

“Does he live here in Dover when not on his ship?”

“A few miles inland, miss.”

“Is he married?”

“Not him!”

“Do many sea captains marry?”

“A fair number, miss.”

“It must be strange, being married to a man who’s often away.”

“Be a blessing with some of ’em, I reckon, ma’am. There, why don’t you sit afore the fire to dry it faster.”

Bella moved, silently agreeing with the maid’s words about husbands. Lady Fowler would definitely have preferred to have her husband away most of the time.

“I suppose Captain Rose has been going to sea since he was a lad,” she said, as she raised her hair to let the heat get underneath.

“Such a pretty color, your hair, miss. Catches the fire so lovely, it does.”

Bella chuckled. “I hope it doesn’t catch fire.”

“No risk of that, ma’am.” Louise set to tidying things away, and Bella was trying to think how to rephrase her question, but the maid answered.

“Captain Rose only came here about eight years ago, miss, though he’s Kentish-born. Raised in America, he was, see, but returned to his mother’s village and not long after he became master of the Duke of Ithorne’s ship.”

Bella started so sharply that the maid hurried over. “Did you burn yourself, ma’am?”

“No, no. I just . . . A duke. How amazing. How did that happen?”

And what did it mean for her plans? The link between this adventure and her London life seemed ominous.

She saw Louise wrinkle her brow as if uncertain how much to share.

“Do tell me,” Bella urged.

“I suppose it’s no secret around here, but I hope you won’t be shocked, miss. You see, Captain Rose is the duke’s illegitimate brother. They’re so alike there’s no denying it, which is apparently why the lad and his mother were sent away when he was young. Then some friend of the duke’s met Caleb—that’s his name— and was so shocked by the resemblance he arranged a meeting.”

“It’s like a play,” Bella marveled. “What happened?”

“The duke could have been harsh about such an obvious scandal, but he wasn’t. When Captain Rose—well, he wasn’t a captain then—said he wanted to return to his mother’s village, His Grace made no objection. And when the duke learned he was a sailor and had risen to bosun on a trading ship, he trained him to be master of the
Black Swan
.”

“How generous.”

“Indeed it was, miss, but then the duke’s an orphan, or as good as. Perhaps he was glad to find a brother, even one from the wrong side of the blanket.” She gathered up the wet towel and the slop bucket. “I should go and see if I’m needed elsewhere, miss.”

“Yes, of course. Thank you.”

Bella hardly noticed her leave, she was so absorbed in the extraordinary information. Captain Rose—the Duke of Ithorne’s illegitimate brother, and supposedly almost identical!

She’d seen the duke only from a distance. He certainly had the same dark hair and a similar tall build, but beyond that they seemed completely different. One was elegant and haughty, almost sleek. The other was handsome but rough-hewn. Earthy.

What did this mean, however, this absurd coincidence? Did it put her in danger?

As she combed out her hair she decided it wasn’t quite such a coincidence after all.

The duke’s seat was in Kent, and only about ten miles from here. If his father had sired a bastard, why not on a local woman? Apart from the early displacement across the Atlantic—and that made sense—why shouldn’t the bastard son end up here, and why shouldn’t the duke employ him on his ship? Was it odd that a duke owned a ship? She had no idea.

The coincidence was that she’d encountered Captain Rose here in 1760 and in 1764 slipped into the duke’s London house because of her work with Lady Fowler. Those were two separate events that happened to have a link, as when one met a stranger and in talking discovered a person both knew.

Should this affect her plans?

No. She rose from the fire and went to sit before the mirror. Even if Captain Rose regularly reported all his doings to his august patron, the name Miss Barstowe would mean nothing to the duke.

 

The next two days crept by and gave Bella too much time to dither. At one moment she was determined to stay and speak to Captain Rose. At the next she was ready to take a coach for London and forget about him. She still wanted her revenge on Augustus, however, and had no other notion how to achieve it.

Coarse though Captain Rose was, she felt sure he’d relish exposing a worm like Augustus, and would do it with gusto.

She purchased more material and thread and desperately sewed more handkerchiefs.

She was in her room, considering another day’s wait without enthusiasm, when Louise came to say that Captain Rose was below and asking to speak to her. The maid was clearly full of questions, and Bella feared she blushed. She had no acceptable explanation, so she didn’t attempt one.

“I’ll be down in a moment, Louise,” she said. As soon as the maid left, she hurried to the mirror to check her appearance. For this encounter, she must be neat, clean, and sober.

A matter of business, that was all.

She took a few steadying breaths and then left her room and went downstairs. At the bend in the stairs she saw him, and something made her pause. Surprise, perhaps, though why, she didn’t know.

He was standing with his back to her, fully dressed in his old- fashioned style, but with tall riding boots. She much preferred the modern coat with the skirts cut close to the body, but on him the fuller style looked almost elegant.

Elegant?

Not a word she’d have attached to the man she’d spoken with the other night. Of course, he’d been scantily dressed and drunk.

He turned and looked up.