The Wyndham Legacy (31 page)

“She'll be all right.”

But Marcus doubted that very much.

 

Doctor Raven was pleased he was alone with her. It was the first time her husband had left her, and now she was awake.

He merely smiled at her, waited a moment until recognition came into her very lovely blue eyes, then he leaned over her and gently laid his hand to her chest.

“Your heart is steady and slow. Is there any pain in your belly?”

She shook her head.

“I'm sorry about the babe, but there will be others, my lady. There is nothing wrong with you. It was the fall, the trauma to your body. I told his lordship that you're young and healthy. Yes, there will be an army of babes if you want them, once you've mended.”

She shook her head again. “No, there won't be more babes. This was the only one and he wasn't meant to be alive.”

Doctor Raven didn't understand her. He gently lifted her hand and closed his eyes as he felt the flutter of her pulse. “Please, try to relax.” She lay quietly then, her pulse slow, and he saw the tears seeping beneath her closed lashes. She didn't make a single sound.

He heard the firm footsteps and automatically stepped away. Marcus gently dabbed the tears from her cheeks. “Shush, love. It's all right now.”

“No, nothing's all right. Well, for you I guess it is. Everything is now the way you wanted it.”

“Duchess—”

“I want to kill the man who shot us.”

He drew back in surprise, then felt intense relief flow through him. “But I want to kill him too. How will we resolve this?”

She didn't answer him. She was asleep again.

“My lord.”

“Yes,” Marcus said as he turned to see Spears in the open doorway.

“I have a message from Badger.”

 

Marcus faced his mother from across the morning-room table. “I didn't know she was pregnant, Marcus. Dear God, this is all incredible and here I was jesting about it and loving mysteries. I'm a fool. I'm very sorry.”

He said nothing, merely played with the doubtless delicious casserole of whitefish made with white wine and tomatoes that Badger had prepared before he'd left for London.

“You impregnated her very quickly.”

“Yes, probably on our wedding night.”

“I don't like this violence, my dear, this wretched continued violence, all directed toward the Duchess, except for this last time. Who was that horrible man trying to kill? You or the Duchess?”

“With so many shots, I've come to the conclusion that he was shooting at both of us. Of course, the Duchess has been attacked twice already. God knows.”

“Spears told me you'd gotten a message from Badger.”

Marcus nodded. “He's on his way back soon. There's nothing more he can do there. All the Wyndhams are in London. Ursula was ill with a bad cold and so was that bloody dandified Trevor who looks like a centaur riding my stallion, so Lambkin tells me with a dollop of awe in his voice. As for Aunt Wilhelmina, evidently the old bat never went near her sick children for fear of catching something herself. As for James, he was staying with a young man he met their first day in London. He was out in Richmond. Badger rode there to make certain, spoke to one of the grooms and was told that Mr. Wyndham had indeed been there, though the young men had been ripping themselves up with brandy and card playing. So you see,
all of them appear to have been there, but Badger couldn't really swear to it. Even if he'd seen each and every one of them and had witnesses swear to have been with them, it still doesn't mean they're innocent.”

“It's that miserable old hag.”

“That would be nice. As I said, any of them could have hired someone to do it, even that miserable old hag.”

Aunt Gweneth came into the breakfast room, kissed her sister-in-law's offered cheek, smiled at Marcus, and said, “That Doctor Raven seems a pleasant young man.”

Marcus grunted. “He's young all right.”

“What does that mean, son?”

“It means I'm a fool. George is good, no matter his bloody young age.”

“He's older than you are, Marcus. I asked him. He's twenty-eight.”

“Yes, but I'm her husband and he isn't.”

His mother grinned at him. “So, you're a dog in the manger. How very odd, my dear, to see a jealous side to you. I always thought you so above such petty emotions. How refreshing to find you delightfully human.”

Marcus forked down a piece of bacon. “I know. I find it odd myself.” He gave his mother a lopsided grin to which she remarked, “That smile of yours always melted any female heart in the vicinity, even your mother's. Now, tell Gweneth then about what Badger discovered in London.”

As he spoke, Aunt Gweneth frowned, the muffin in her left hand still untouched. “It must be something to do with the Wyndham legacy.”

“I believed that when the Duchess was struck down in the library and that old book stolen, but now? With so many shots, Auntie, he must have been after both of us. The treasure? Neither the Duchess nor I have the foggiest notion where that wretched treasure is or if it even exists.”

“Actually,” Patricia Wyndham said, rising from her chair, “I believe I just might have an idea. I've been thinking about it a good deal, Marcus. Would you please fetch the
Duchess's drawings for me? I'd like to study them, then we'll see.” She beamed at her son and her sister-in-law, and left them motionless and speechless in the breakfast room.

 

Marcus stared at the pages stacked neatly in her small desk. He'd lifted out the drawings she'd made of the well and found other pages were beneath them. Sheet after sheet of music and the words written beneath the notes. The words on one sheet caught his eye and he read:

“ 'E ain't the man to shout ‘Please, my dear!'
'E's only a lout who shouts ‘Bring me a beer!'
'E's a bonny man wit' a bonny lass
Who troves 'im a tippler right on 'is ass.
And to hove and to trove we go, me boys,
We'll shout as we please till ship's ahoy!”

Then he softly began to sing it, a melody very familiar to him, one every lad in the navy sang over and over again, laughing and toasting one another. Still, he couldn't believe it. The Duchess was R.L. Coots? She'd written all these ditties? He leafed more slowly through them, recognizing nearly all of them. There were at least twenty of them. Beneath the sheets of music were correspondence and legal documents. He smiled. Lord, she'd made a hefty sum on the more recent ones.

She'd supported herself and Badger. She'd done it alone. She had guts, this wife of his. He felt a spurt of pride that made him go soft inside. Pride and something else, something that was already there, deep and endless, this something that was surely love and he had it bad, no, no escape for him nor did he want to. Perhaps he'd loved her from the time she was nine years old and he'd called her the Duchess for the first time. God, he didn't know, but it was there now, this well of love for her with its unplumbed depths he knew would always be there for him.

Very carefully he returned all the sheets of paper back
into the original order. He shut the desk drawer.

She was sleeping soundly, on her side, her hair tumbled around her face and down her back. He saw the even rise of her breasts. He remembered his accusations when he'd gone to Pipwell Cottage. A man had to be keeping her, surely, for she was just a girl, naught more than that, and naturally helpless, as all females were, all of them needing a man to protect them, to support them, to care for them. She'd probably wanted to cosh him, ah, but then she'd been the Duchess, the original Duchess who, to protect herself, had simply drawn away into herself and said nothing, just became still and aloof, and terribly and completely alone. That Duchess would never have thrown a saddle at him, struck him with a riding crop, or hit him with her riding boot. Ah, but she'd written all these songs, that Duchess who was now his, and different too, because if he riled her sufficiently now, she'd likely shoot him.

She'd done it all by herself.

She'd never told him.

As he walked back downstairs, he heard Spears singing in his mind, ditty after ditty in his rich melodious baritone. The sod knew. Badger had told him. Probably even Maggie and Sampson knew. Everyone knew except him.

Why hadn't she told him?

He handed his mother the two drawings then left the Green Cube Room, whistling a ditty that was surely too risqué for a lady to have penned.

He prayed both of them lived a very long time. He wanted every minute of it with her.

B
ADGER WAS NEARLY
frothing at the mouth as he said to Spears, Sampson, and Maggie, “Any of the bleeding bastards could have done it, any of them. Damnation, if they didn't have the guts for it themselves then they hired someone, aye, the miserable scoundrels. That old besom's behind it, you know she is.”

“Mr. Badger, calm yourself. Anger won't help us find the truth here. You said it appeared that they all had alibis. Perplexing, most upsetting actually that you couldn't find out anything definitive. It is unsettling for all of us.”

Maggie, who'd been studying her thumbnail, said, “Maybe we're looking in the wrong direction. Maybe it's someone right here. What was that man's name in the village? The man who owns that bookstore and is another Wyndham bastard?”

“I don't remember,” Badger said, looking at her thoughtfully. “But that's a good idea, Maggie. I'll ride over there this morning and have a very nice little chat with the man.”

“You be careful now, Mr. Badger. He might be a villain. We're abounding with villains.”

He didn't take her words at all lightly. “I will, my dear. Incidentally, that gown you're wearing is most becoming. That shade of pomona green complements your brilliant hair to perfection.”

“Thank you, Mr. Badger,” she said, giving him a teasing grin.

“I,” Spears said judiciously, “would prefer a soft yellow
on you. The green is too overbearing, too certain of itself, it overwhelms. Yes, softer colors would be more the thing on you, Miss Maggie.”

Sampson looked at her only briefly and said, “Who cares what color she's wearing?”

Maggie laughed, patted both her glorious hair and her beautiful gown, and took her leave. She said over her shoulder, “Sampson is right, you know. Now isn't the time for undue vanity. I'm going to the Duchess now. The poor lady's feeling restless and bored. Perhaps the earl will let me wash her hair this morning. He's been hovering over her, treating her like a half-wit, she complains to me, but he's worried and I like to see a man so smitten. It's about time, I say.”

“The earl,” Spears said, “has at last realized how very lucky he is. I too am heartened he has finally succumbed. However, he has also been acting strangely for the past three days. I don't understand it.”

Badger said, “You're looking for a mystery that isn't there, Mr. Spears. He's just very worried about the Duchess. Damn, why did she have to miscarry the babe?”

“Another score to settle with the person who shot them, Mr. Badger,” Spears said. “It deepens her depression. She blames herself, which is ridiculous, but true nonetheless.”

“She's also told his lordship that he now has his way. He'll never have to have a child by her body.”

“What has he said to that, Mr. Badger?”

“I don't know. Both of them have closed down tighter than castles under siege.”

Spears said, “True, Mr. Badger, but I think there's even more to it than that, although the miscarriage is more than enough.”

“I would say,” Sampson observed, “that the entire staff is dreadfully worried. The countess is very popular with them. As for the earl, his concern for her has brought them to viewing him as a just master and a husband who is on the mend, so to say. Indeed, I feel they're quite coming
to respect him in full-measure, no mean feat that.”

“He's still a bullheaded young man,” Maggie said. “If I'd had my way, the Duchess would have taken a horse whip to him, not just her boot or a bridle. I have told her I much approve the change in her. Yelling cleanses a woman's innards wonderfully. It readjusts her view of things. A man, as all women know, can't properly listen until his attention is fully engaged. A whip, I say, would do the trick.”

Wisely, none of the three gentlemen had a word to say to that.

Spears said finally, “I think I'll have a chat with Mrs. Wyndham. She's a dreadfully smart lady, that one.”

 

Spears found Patricia Wyndham lying on her back on the pale blue Aubusson carpet in the middle of the Green Cube Room, staring at the ceiling. She was utterly immobile, and for one horrible moment, Spears was certain she was dead.

“Madam!”

She slowly turned her head and smiled. “Hello, Spears. Come help me up. I do hope the carpet is clean, but certainly it is. Mrs. Emory is a household tyrant. There, thank you, Spears.” She dusted off her skirts, shook them out, then beamed up at him again.

“May I inquire what you were doing lying supine on the floor, madam?”

“You may, but I shan't tell you, at least not yet, Spears. Where is my son?”

“His lordship is probably giving orders to the Duchess, or to Maggie regarding the Duchess.”

“He's such a sweet lad,” she said.

That brought a choking sound from Spears's throat. “ ‘Sweet' isn't exactly an epithet I'd attach to his lordship. I, er, wished to ask you, madam, if you had any notion of who is responsible for all this misery we're having.”

“I can't know everything, Spears.”

“Do you know anything, madam?”

“Oh yes, I know quite a bit more than just anything. Indeed, perhaps soon now, I'll be able to clear at least some of this mystery up.”

“I see, madam. Perhaps you'd like to have a judicious ear to pour some of your opinions into?”

“Yours, to be exact?”

“Exactly so, madam.”

“Not yet, Spears. Forgive me, I'm not being coy, I'm just not quite ready. Untidy strings that don't weave themselves into the fabric, you understand? Now, I believe I'll see how my darling boy is doing with the Duchess. Poor girl, losing the babe has really pulled her down.”

Not to mention being shot,
Spears thought, but didn't say anything.

Her darling boy was yelling at the top of his lungs, his fond mother realized while she was still twenty feet from the Duchess's bedchamber. She opened the door to see the Duchess standing beside the bed, holding on to the cherub-carved bedpost and looking quite limp.

“Marcus,” the Duchess said, a goodly dollop of temper in her voice that pleased her mother-in-law, “stop your shouting. For heaven's sake, I'm all right.”

“You swore to me you'd stay in bed, damn you. Just look at you, white around the gills, sweating like a stoat, and out of breath and bed.”

“My dears,” Patricia Wyndham said, sweeping into the bedchamber, “this is surely not good for the Duchess's nerves. He's right, however, my dear, whatever made you get out of that very comfortable bed?”

“I knew you'd side with him.”

“True, but what's a mother to do?”

“She was relieving herself, Mother. She actually thought to get out of bed, walk all of fifteen feet to the screen, and use the chamber pot. I won't have it, do you hear me, Duchess? Now, you're getting back into that bed this minute.”

“Yes, Marcus, I know. I was on my way back to the
bed when you burst in here and started screeching like a crazed owl.”

“Crazed owl? Good God, even your mental works aren't functioning properly. You mean you've already used the chamber pot?”

“Yes, Marcus, and I even managed to walk back to the bed all by myself.”

Patricia Wyndham cleared her throat. “This is doubtless fascinating, children, but all this talk of the chamber pot can surely wait. Come, Duchess, I'll help you.”

“You just stay put, Mother.” He very carefully angled the Duchess so he wouldn't touch her side, lifted her some two inches off the floor, and carried her the remaining three feet to the bed.

Once he'd gotten her into bed again, on her back now for the pain in her side had lessened quite a bit during the past four days, he said, “There, now don't move or it will go badly for you.”

“That sounds quite intriguing. Just what will you do, Marcus?”

“Sounding a bit testy, are we? As to what I'll do, I don't know, but whatever it is, you will like it immensely, and so will I.”

“I hardly think that's a threat to convince me to obey you.”

“My dears, surely you don't wish to contemplate marital themes just now? No, certainly not. Such subjects aren't best fashioned for a mother's tender ears. You, my darling son, are still my little boy, thus, you are bathed in sunlight and purity. Yes, at last you're both quiet. Badger told me to inform you that he's sending up luncheon. Shall we all dine together and enjoy a comfortable prose?”

“Good God, Mama, a comfortable what?”

“Prose, my dear. Ladies of more advanced years speak in that fashion, you know. It's soothing.”

“Bosh,” Marcus said, and pulled out a delicate French chair from the last century for his mother. “You're about
as advanced as that hussy maid of the Duchess's.”

“Ah, Maggie. Isn't she an interesting sort?”

Spears said from the doorway, “Perhaps Madam will be so kind as to tell her son why she was lying on her back in the middle of the Aubusson carpet in the Green Cube Room?”

“I would have expected a minimal degree of discretion from you, Spears. You have gravely disappointed me. No, Marcus, my body positions don't concern any of you at the moment.”

“Bosh,” Marcus said again, looking harassed. “What the hell were you doing on your back? Some new meditation?”

“My dear boy, it's none of your business.”

The Duchess laughed. “Ah, thank you, ma'am. You've diverted his fire away from me.”

His blue eyes came again to rest on her pale face. He leaned down and kissed her mouth. “If you eat your luncheon, nap awhile, then I'll allow Maggie to wash your hair.”

“What about the rest of me?”

“I'll wash the rest of you.”

“No, Marcus, no, you can't, I—”

“Be quiet, Duchess.”

Patricia Wyndham rolled her eyes. “So much for my sunlight-pure boy.”

 

She knew he would be thorough. Marcus never did anything in half measures. As for the wound in her side, she knew he wouldn't hurt her, that he'd be gentle as a sliver of sunlight through the summer maple branches. But she couldn't help but be embarrassed because she was still bleeding and there were cloths between her thighs. Perhaps he would leave that part of her alone. He did begin well enough, treating her as he'd treat a stick of wood or a doorknob, but when he'd uncovered her breasts, all his good intentions began to unravel. His fists clenched, his mouth tightened, and his beautiful blue eyes darkened.

“I'd forgotten how utterly acceptable you are. That is, I've dressed and undressed you, looked at you and held you, wiped you down with icy water, but it's different now. You're better and you're looking at me while I'm looking at you. It's unnerving. Now, don't move, I'll try to keep my hands on the straight and narrow, wherever that could possibly be since your body is nothing but delight for me.”

He didn't manage to find any sort of straight and narrow, of course, but he did try, and when he was lightly washing her belly, carefully avoiding her bandaged side, he drew in his breath, closed his eyes, and went lower with the soapy washcloth.

“Please don't, Marcus. It's very embarrassing for me and I don't—”

He ignored her. “It doesn't bother me at all that you're bleeding. Thank God it's normal bleeding, and I don't have to worry that you'll die on me. No, just be quiet, Duchess, and trust me.”

He looked at her face as he spoke, saw the shifting expressions even as his fingers found her. He'd meant to wash her, nothing more, truly, he'd not thought about anything remotely sexual, surely, well, all things sexual he'd thought about were spiritual, or perhaps they were just sexual themes in the abstract, theories, nothing more, but his fingers were on her and his eyes were looking at her and his hand was shaking.

It had been a long time, too long a time. He became aware that her breathing had changed, had quickened. Her eyes were wide and questioning on his face, her cheeks flushed. He smiled at her and thought,
Why not?
His fingers gently molded themselves to her flesh, but still, at first, her soft flesh was unwilling, but he was patient and he loved her and wanted to give her pleasure. There'd been so much pain for her, too much damned pain, why not pleasure, just for this once?

Finally, when she tensed, her back arching, he came up
beside her and kissed her until she cried out her release into his mouth.

“Oh dear.”

“Hold still, Duchess. I still have your lovely legs and feet to wash.”

Once done with a bath the likes of which she'd never imagined in her life, he folded clean cloths and pressed them against her, then dressed her in a clean nightgown.

“Stop looking at me as if I were a brute. I'm your husband. Your body is mine and I'll thank you not to forget it. I wouldn't ever allow George Raven to touch you like this, to look at you with lust as I do. Just me and always just me. So don't be embarrassed. I forbid it.”