Page 76 of Miss Desirable
Ash Dorning, the quietest of the siblings, spoke. “See that you don’t either.”
Fournier rose and bowed. “We understand one another. I am for the docks, and you have a precious sister to guard.”
The Frenchman strode out, leaving his drink unfinished.
“Man knows how to make an exit,” Sycamore said, downing the brandy. “I suppose we relay these developments to the ladies?”
Kettering rose. “I don’t like the whole situation, but I do like him. He’s…”
“Smitten,” Ash said, “and if Catherine has fallen in with this plan, that is all we need to know. I’m off to brush up on my bonhomie. Gentlemen, good night.”
Sycamore departed soon after—he had a club to supervise, or so he claimed—leaving Kettering in Casriel’s company.
“What?” Kettering asked, tidying up the table. “You have something to say.”
“We failed Catherine before. We cannot fail her again.”
Kettering circled his hand. “And?”
“We will owe Fournier when this is over, regardless of the success of the plan.”
Kettering began blowing out candles. “I think it rather the case that we already owe Fournier. The question becomes what to do about it.”
Casriel rose. “You heard him. Gossip, guile, and good manners. As it happens, I excel at the latter, my brothers have the guile, and you are a noteworthy gossip.”
“I am no such thing.”
Casriel yawned, picked up a carrying candle, and—only because Kettering was anxious to discuss the situation with his darling wife—was permitted to have the last word.
* * *
The fellow traveled under thenom de guerreArmand Ablesdorf and spoke with a convincing French accent. His watchful dark gaze and exorbitant price pronounced him to be a citizen of the great state of unprincipled ambition, though if Ablesdorf was competent, Armbruster would meet his terms.
“This is a letter,” Armbruster said, passing a folded document across the scarred table, “dated years ago and acknowledging the child as mine. I state my fervent intention to be a father to my offspring in every regard, supporting and loving same et cetera and so forth.”
Ablesdorf’s swooping dark brows drew down. “The letter has been very well preserved, my lord.”
Because it had been written yesterday, of course. “I assure you the signature is genuine. I can replicate that signature if you like.”
Ablesdorf sat in the snug of the lowly Prince and Pony Inn and read the damned letter, while somebody started an argument in the kitchen about dogs, and a pair of old women cleaned their pipes by the fire. The Frenchman fit in here—above medium height, but not too tall. Medium build, regular features that somehow weren’t quite handsome, and clothing that suggested a comfortable but unpresuming existence.
A forgettable man, at least when he chose to be. Ablesdorf folded the letter and tucked it into a coat pocket. “You do not mention the gender or name of this offspring to whom you are so devoted.”
“I’m being discreet. The point is, the letter is clearly addressed to the child’s mother and acknowledges the child as mine. That gives me rights.” Not quite how the solicitors had put it, but close enough.
Ablesdorf examined the direction on the missive, as best Armbruster had been able to recall it from his days in Rome.
“This is a copy of a letter, my lord. Anybody can see that it has not been through the post.”
“A gentleman employs a clerk whose job consists entirely of making fair copies of all outgoing correspondence. One doesn’t want to send the same tattle to the same party twice.”
Ablesdorf sipped his ale, not as an Englishman, Swede, or a German would partake, but as a Frenchman condescended to risk putting his lips to inferior potation.
“You expect this copy of a letter to convince French authorities that I retrieve the child on your behalf?”
“Not entirely.” Armbruster passed over another missive. “This is my sworn explanation to anybody in an official capacity. You will note the watermark—my titled father’s coat of arms—and the seal replicating the family crest. If that doesn’t win you free of official complications, this should.”
Having a purloined stash of Papa’s official stationery had proved invaluable at public school, and Armbruster still kept some on hand for exigent circumstances.
