Page 103 of Charming Artemis

“Yes, it is.”

“Your father would be proud of you, Charlie. I hope you realize that.”

Charlie slouched a bit in his chair, but not in frustration or defeat, as he had so often in the past. “You knew him better than I did. If my calculations are correct, and I’m certain they are, even Wilson knew my father longer than I did.”

Mr. Layton nodded. “Wilson has known all the Gents for thirty years. He was younger than you when we first met him.”

“I think I would have enjoyed knowing Wilson as a young man.”

Mr. Layton laughed. “The Gents had some grand adventures together, though we were as different from one another as night and day.”

“Why is it none of you have been part of our lives until now?” Charlie asked. “It seems so odd that you’ve been playing least in sight for so long.”

“Your father asked it of us in his will,” Mr. Layton said. “He knew our tendency to swoop in and fix things, whether or not they need fixing. He wanted to guarantee that your mother was able to raise you boys as she saw fit, to have the influence and importance in your lives that she needed and wanted to have and that he knew you brothers would benefit from. The best way to assure that was to ask us to tread lightly until you were all grown.”

“Then you haven’t seen Mother in thirteen years?”

Mr. Layton clicked his tongue. “Of course we have. We have visited during times when you boys were away at school. We have written to her and she us. Those who were in London anytime she was never failed to call on her. I assure you, we have not neglected her, but neither have we cast aside your father’s instructions.”

“And were you not at least curious how my brothers and I were getting on?”

Mr. Layton studied him a moment. “I suspect, Charlie, your brothers have not always been good about including you in their discussions.”

That was an understatement. “I’m the baby. Babies don’t take part in discussions.”

“Well, I’m including you in this one because I think you need to know you were never abandoned.” Mr. Layton leaned his elbow on the arm of his chair, as if settling in for a drawn-out topic. “Niles—Mr. Greenberry—has a son who served in the army alongside your brother Stanley. That was no coincidence. When the Duke of Hartley found himself searching out a vicar to offer three of the livings at his disposal, his uncle, Lord Aldric, suggested Harold. When Jason was contemplating asking a chance-met Frenchman to accompany him to the Continent and, later, to act as tutor to his wife’s brother, he talked to Henri, since he has vast connections amongst the French émigrés.”

Lud, that was a lot of connections.

“When Philip and Sorrel needed a doctor who created braces and other such devices, they spoke with Kes—Mr. Barrington—as he has vast experience in that arena. I have an estate not terribly far from Fallowgill and sent detailed reports of its situation to Philip when it was struggling, which also put me in a position to offer help to Stanley and Marjie when they first took up residence there. Niles has experience with horse breeding and provided assistance to Corbin when he first began his efforts at Havenworth. Kes’s brother-in-law is a barrister, attached to Lincoln’s Inn, and he assisted Jason in beginning his studies there. When the love of Corbin’s life found herself in horrible danger, Lord Aldric summoned his many connections to discover chinks in the armor of her tormentor, utilizing his nephew’s high standing to add intensity to the counterattack. And each of us met often with Philip, Layton, and Crispin when they assumed the reins of their estates.”

“You did all of that?”

“Your father would have guided each of you in your pursuits and concerns and decisions,” Mr. Layton said. “He would have fought your battles with you. To do so on his behalf was our very real honor.”

“All of my brothers seem to have known you other than me.” Charlie still couldn’t reconcile that. How could they have been such strangers to him when the rest of the family was so deeply acquainted with them?

“Harold doesn’t know us as well as the others do,” Mr. Layton said. “We ought to have introduced ourselves to you sooner. It feels a bit as if we blinked and you were suddenly grown.”

“May I ask another question?” Charlie had a million of them.

“Certainly.”

“Was my brother Layton named for you?”

“He was,” Mr. Layton said. “Many of the Gents named children after each other. We have always been like brothers, family in a way that goes beyond blood and birth. We would do anything for each other.”

“That is a legacy my father passed on,” Charlie said. “His sons, I’m discovering, would do anything for each other. Crispin is one of us, of course, and now Linus. I suspect even His Grace would join our cause if asked.”

Mr. Layton motioned to the other gentlemen in the room. “As would Mr. Windover and Lord Techney, I would wager.”

Charlie didn’t doubt it for a moment. “Imagine if they’d been here when we paid our not-entirely-friendly visit to Finley.”

“Finley?” The name seemed to strike Mr. Layton. “Why were you calling on him?”

“He was harassing Catherine—again—and treated Marjie poorly. And he”—Charlie swallowed down the anger that rose up in his throat—“made an insulting and indecent proposal to Artemis, heavily insinuating that she was the sort who would welcome it.”

Mr. Layton’s jaw tightened. “The weasel.”

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