The Foundling (Rags to Richmonds #3)

Chapter 23

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

T he room stilled as Frederica, Scarlett, Adelaide, and Kem all stared at Lord Tipton, aghast. He stared back, his eyes wide like a frightened animal.

“Dear God,” Kem murmured.

His lordship made an odd noise and closed his eyes; Scarlett hastened to his side. “Pray, sit down, Uncle. You have had a terrible shock.”

It seemed somehow ominous that he submitted to being ushered into a chair. Kem went to the sideboard and poured a glass of something amber-coloured. “How the devil did he know about the solicitor?” he asked as he handed it over.

Lord Tipton knocked the drink back in one gulp and sucked in a breath through his teeth. His gaze flicked to Frederica and away again quickly. “It seems he got what he needed while he was at Taverstock after all. He found out where Robert used to live.”

Frederica’s blood ran cold. ‘I am a Richmond. My parents were Robert and Susan Richmond. I was born and orphaned in Wykham.’ A whimper of despair escaped her as she realised what she had done. “I told him! I am so sorry, I forgot. He…he was hurting me, and I?—”

“It is not your fault,” Adelaide said firmly.

“Indeed, it is not,” Lord Tipton echoed. “Frederica, you are not to blame for any of this. There was always a risk the deception would be discovered. I want you to know—all of you—that your aunt and I did not take the risk lightly. But Damian ought not to be master of a hazard den, let alone an estate.” He stopped speaking and rubbed his forehead.

Frederica pitied him but did not feel at all familiar enough to condole with him—he was still much more an earl than an uncle to her, not to mention being thirty years her senior. Even her sisters seemed unsure how to act.

“What can be done?” Kem asked grimly.

“He wishes me to meet him,” Lord Tipton said.

“To what end?”

“Money,” his lordship said bitterly. “Apologies, ladies, but I think we are beyond delicacies at this point. My brother means to blackmail me. If I do not accede to his demands, he will send a copy of Robert’s will to The Times and ruin us all.”

“But if he has my father’s will, he could simply declare himself the rightful heir,” Adelaide said. “He does not need to blackmail you.”

Lord Tipton scoffed quietly—defeatedly. “Waiting for me to die is not an appealing option to him. He wants money now. And I daresay, he wants revenge for the lie I have told.”

“Pray do not give the man a farthing,” Kem spat. “He would take everything you gave him and still reveal the truth when it suited him.”

Lord Tipton met his nephew’s eyes. “What choice do I have?”

Kem began to speak several times and seemed to grow angrier with every utterance he bit off before it passed his lips. At length, he said darkly, “How much damage will you allow him to cause? Enough is enough. He must be stopped.”

“Something must be done, on that we agree,” Lord Tipton said. “You will come with me?”

“Go with you?” Adelaide said, looking between her husband and her uncle. “Go with you where? You cannot mean to actually meet him? You said not an hour ago that Oakley might be in danger from him— physical danger. Uncle, tell me you do not mean to go!”

But it seemed that he did—and, no matter how Adelaide begged him not to, Kem was resolved on accompanying him. What was more, his lordship categorically forbade any of them from rousing Lady Tipton from her repose until after they had left, knowing she would resist his going. Frederica watched with a sense of complete helplessness as the same scene from the previous day repeated itself, only this time it was Adelaide who wrung her hands in worry, and for her husband’s safety, rather than her friend’s.

“What would you have me do, my love?” Kem said tightly upon her eighth or ninth plea for him to remain. “I cannot allow him to go alone—he can barely walk—and he is determined to go with or without me. I frankly do not blame him. This situation needs resolving, for Oakley’s sake as much as anyone’s. Nothing bad will happen, I give you my word. At least, not to either of us.”

Frederica saw him place a hand on the gentle swell of Adelaide’s stomach and say something else that she could not hear; and she saw a tear roll down Adelaide’s cheek. She prayed his word would be enough, for it felt far from sufficient in that moment.

“Damian is lodging at the Red Lion in Wykham,” Lord Tipton informed them as he prepared to board the carriage less than an hour later. “I have sent an express to Oakley and Worthe telling them to go straight there, but if it misses them for some reason and they come here instead, I trust you to direct them there. Kemerton and I shall travel to Avonwyke today and Wykham tomorrow, hopefully to meet them there.”

“What are we to say to Aunt Louisa when she wakes up?” Scarlett fretted.

“The truth,” her uncle replied. “That I demanded your compliance. She will not blame you, my dear. She will be furious with me, and I suggest you allow her to be. It will spare you any of her displeasure. Regardless, being vexed with me is far superior to being carried away by her fears for the future.”

He gave them all a rather stiff bow and turned to heave himself into the carriage. Frederica winced to watch him: holding on to the door frame with both hands, it still took him three bounces on his heel to gain enough height on the step to swing his other leg off the ground, and then he fairly stumbled into his seat. It looked undignified and painful, and she understood better why he had previously been unable to travel to Avonwyke. If this was him recovering, she could only imagine how he must have been suffering before.

After a final, private word with Adelaide, Kem climbed up behind Lord Tipton, and a footman closed the door. They were travelling light; only Kem’s manservant would accompany them, and once he had climbed up to sit with the coachman, they were away.

Adelaide took a shaky breath and then, to Frederica’s surprise, quietly swore.

“Try not to worry,” Scarlett said to her. “They are both too sensible to do anything foolish.”

Adelaide rubbed a hand over her belly and shook her head. “I would usually agree with you, but not in this instance. I have a very bad feeling about this.”

As it turned out, so did their aunt. Her ladyship summoned them to her private sitting room an hour later, vastly perturbed to have woken to a report from her maid that the gentlemen had departed. They entered to find her standing in the middle of the little parlour with her hands clasped in front of her, awaiting an explanation.

“Well, girls?”

Her ladyship turned white upon learning what had happened and where her husband and nephew had gone. Frederica had expected her to be angry—largely because that is what Lord Tipton had told her to expect—but there was no anger in her aunt’s pallid complexion or shaking hands. It crossed her mind to apologise again for revealing her birthplace, but the word was becoming meaningless in its overuse—and Lady Tipton seemed to have much more immediate concerns than how the secret was discovered.

“What was he thinking?” She staggered backwards until her calves touched the chaise-longue and then dropped heavily onto it. “He has been bedridden for most of this year. He has only been on his feet for a matter of weeks. He will cause himself an injury.”

Having seen him attempting to climb into the carriage earlier, Frederica could not but share her aunt’s concern. She and her sisters all seated themselves around the little parlour—Adelaide on a chair next to Lady Tipton, to whom she said, “I tried to stop them. I tried every which way.”

“I am sure you did, my dear,” her ladyship replied. “And I wish you had succeeded. You know I love your husband, but he is not best placed to keep your uncle calm in this situation.”

“On the contrary,” Scarlett said soothingly. “Kem is one of the most even-tempered people I know.”

“Not in this case,” Adelaide said. “He absolutely detests Damian. I do not know that he will be reasonable.”

“Detests him?” Scarlett said. “What has Damian done so bad that Kem would hate him for it?”

Adelaide winced and pressed a hand to her side in obvious discomfort, thus Lady Tipton put a reassuring hand on her arm and took up the explanation.

“Your uncle and I were great friends with Kemerton’s late mother and father. Indeed, they were two of very few people whom we ever told about your brother’s true parentage. When the boys were younger, about thirteen I believe, our family summered at Avonwyke. Damian joined us, for he was on leave from the army at the time.”

“Kem has met him? I did not realise,” Scarlett said.

“Yes, he has met him several times—though that was the last,” her ladyship said uneasily. “We discovered later that during our stay, Damian had got a child on one of the servants. When her disgrace was discovered, she attempted to bring about the end of the pregnancy herself so that she would not lose her position. I know not by what means, except that it caused her to bleed to death.”

Scarlett gasped, and Frederica grimaced, both shocked—but there was worse to come.

“It was Kem who found her,” Adelaide said quietly. “He tried to help her, but she died in his arms.”

“How awful!” Scarlett cried.

Frederica closed her eyes, remembering with revulsion the smugness with which Damian Richmond had avowed to having heard whispers that the Kemertons were an ‘excessively proud’ family. They had disliked him because of this , she comprehended now—and he had considered their ill opinion unjustified. And poor Kem! She had seen some shocking events herself at Taverstock—some of them very recently—but to witness such a grisly tragedy at such a young age must have been horrific.

“No wonder he thinks so ill of Mr Richmond,” she said. “Who that knows this could feel any other way?”

“Quite,” Lady Tipton said heatedly. “And imagine, if you will, that if Lord Kemerton has endured one such appalling incident at Damian’s expense, how many my husband has endured in a lifetime of being brother to him. And now with a threat to ruin your brother—to ruin all of us…I greatly fear he will not be reasonable either.”

Adelaide shifted about uneasily in her chair, one arm now wrapped tightly around her midsection. “What do you think will happen?”

Lady Tipton shrugged slightly. “I suppose it depends how unreasonable Damian’s demands are.”

“Will my uncle refuse if they are unreasonable?” Scarlett asked.

“Is Damian liable to hurt them if they refuse?” Adelaide asked. Distress was making her breathless. “He is clearly not above hurting people.”

“Let us hope your uncle took his pistols, just in case.”

Frederica could see that her aunt had spoken without thinking—she was perched on the very edge of her seat, wringing her hands together with worry—but it was evidently too frightening a prospect for Adelaide.

“Oh God!” she cried. “You think they will duel?” She was panting with alarm.

Realising her niece’s distress, her ladyship said emphatically, “No, dear! No! I meant only for protection. But I am sure he did not take them. ”

“But you do think they will need them?”

Lady Tipton floundered over her answer, her expression far more a ‘yes’ than the ‘no’ that was forming on her lips.

“It does not matter if he did not take them,” Adelaide cried, “for Kem has pistols at Avonwyke. He is going to get himself killed, is he not? I cannot—Oh!” She let out a sharp cry and abruptly bent forwards, clutching at her stomach with both hands.

Lady Tipton grabbed for her, as did Scarlett. Frederica was for a moment frozen in horror. Adelaide’s baby was not due for months; pain at this stage presaged nothing good, and as she looked at her sister gasping in agony, she could think only of the nameless woman who had died in Kem’s arms, miscarrying a child. That, and Damian Richmond, leaning over her, snarling that she did not know who her family was.

He had been wrong then, and he was no less wrong now. I am a Richmond! she thought defiantly. And I shall do whatever I must to help my family.

In the first instance, that meant running to pull the cord for her ladyship’s maid to come. A short while later, once Adelaide had been settled in her bed and the physician sent for, it meant sitting down to pen the most difficult letter she had ever written in her life.

Dear Duke of Penrith,

I hardly know where to begin, but I believe it must be with an apology. Indeed, I have so many apologies to make that I may not have ink enough to write them all, but most importantly, I must apologise for what I am about to ask of you.

You once told me that assisting me in any capacity would be an honour. If my actions this past week have not completely destroyed every feeling of warmth you ever had towards me, I beg you would consider providing that assistance now. My family is in grievous difficulty, and to my shame, it is the result of my foolishness—my credulity. I should never forgive myself if I did not therefore do everything in my power to find a solution. No other justification could induce me to risk making you think worse of me than you already must by petitioning you in this manner.

It has been discovered that the new schoolmaster at Taverstock was not ‘Mr Milliard’, as he claimed, but Mr Damian Richmond, Lord Tipton’s brother. It shames me deeply to admit that I was thoroughly taken in by him. Unknowingly, I provided him with information, the disclosure of which has the potential to ruin my whole family. He has avowed his intention to extort money from my uncle in exchange for his silence—but that is not the worst of it.

Their lordships Tipton and Kemerton have, this very hour, left Chiltern Court to go to the Red Lion in Wykham where Mr Richmond awaits them. Their purpose is not clear, except that they mean to prevent him from injuring the family. I cannot overstate my aunt and sister’s concern for their safety. The prospect of ruination notwithstanding, both gentlemen have valid cause to revile Mr Richmond, who is by all accounts— mine included, as of my last encounter with him—an unprincipled brute. It is my sister’s very real concern that her husband will demand satisfaction from him, with no guarantee of being the victor. It is my aunt’s equal dread that Lord Tipton’s health will not withstand any violent encounter. Lord Oakley and Lord Worthe have been summoned from Hertfordshire to attend the meeting, which I cannot believe will result in anything but an exacerbation of tempers and peril. My sister, Lady Kemerton, has been taken ill with worry, and there are grave concerns for her unborn child. The situation is dire, and I beg you would help me prevent a tragedy.

I recall you saying that you had some influence amongst the judiciary. It occurs to me that, if my uncle and brothers were not able to meet Mr Richmond—if, for example, he were to be in gaol when they arrived to meet him—then nobody would be able to seek satisfaction, and everybody would remain safe and well. I know not what charges might be levelled against him, but I cannot believe it will be difficult to uncover some evil or other, for he is wholly unscrupulous.

That I should even entertain the notion of soliciting your help is an egregious presumption, I know. It would be, even in ordinary circumstances, but after my behaviour towards you last week, it must seem brazen. I am sorrier than you can know for giving you such pain. I have managed to hurt almost everybody I care about of late, but the injury to you has been the hardest to bear, for of all of them, you are dearest to me .

Frederica did not realise she had paused until a droplet of ink fell from her pen to spatter on the page. She stared at the last line she had written for a moment longer, then with an unsteady hand and a racing heart, replenished the ink and continued.

I did not set out to write of my feelings in this letter. It seems wildly inappropriate to ask for your help in the same breath as expressing my esteem, but I find I cannot help it. I am under no illusion that it will alter anything, but if this is to be my last opportunity of telling you what is in my heart, then I must take it.

I miss you. I thought I knew what I was about when I forbade you from saying what you came to Taverstock to say, but I could not have been more wrong. I had suffered a horrible shock and was plagued with guilt. I thought it would be wicked to choose happiness in the face of so much misery. But the truth is that I was ready to leave. It would have made me happy—blissfully so. I regretted turning you away almost the moment you had gone.

When Oakley came the next day, I was in a more reasonable frame of mind—I had remembered my resolution to go. He brought me to Chiltern Court, but my resolve has not lasted. I do not feel the same contentment with my decision to leave that I felt before. I recognise that it has been but a short time, but Chiltern Court does not feel like home in the way I expected it to, no matter how dear my family are to me. And I comprehend now that I had not merely reconciled myself to leaving Taverstock—I was only reconciled to leaving it to be with you.

I have led a narrow existence. Not sheltered from hardship, perhaps, but not varied, not worldly. Life outside of Taverstock is terrifying to me—and I am lost in it without you. You have been an anchor while I have been adrift without direction. I upbraid myself daily, hourly, for turning you away. But most of all, I berate myself for using you so ill when you have surely suffered more than your share of pain already in this life. I am heartsore with regret.

I pray that you will find somebody who can love you and your beautiful children the way you deserve. If she loves you half as much as I do, you cannot remain unhappy for long.

Yours with the greatest affection,

Miss F Richmond

Frederica asked Scarlett to help her send the letter. Lady Tipton would not approve of her writing to the duke, and Adelaide was too unwell to be troubled. Scarlett appealed to the butler to arrange for an express rider and used her own pin money to pay him.

“Are you sure this is wise?” she asked at the last moment. “We have scandals enough to contend with. We cannot inflict another on our poor aunt and uncle.”

Frederica hesitated. She could rewrite the letter with all her confessions omitted. She did not need to humble herself to the duke in this way. But I do need him to know that I love him , she thought helplessly. Besides, that was not Scarlett’s concern. Her sister did not know she had written anything but a plea for help. She nodded firmly. “There are few people in the world I trust as much as Penrith. If he cannot help us, then he will at least not worsen our plight by revealing it.”

Scarlett took her at her word and gestured for the rider to depart. Frederica inhaled sharply at the sudden burst of movement from the horse and held her breath as it galloped away along the drive, carrying all her hopes and dreams with it.