Page 13 of A Secret Consequence for the Viscount
‘Bowles was there? At the club?’
‘He was.’ Fred had sobered now at mention of that name, the good humour of a second ago fading markedly.
‘One of the last things I remember is warning him to never darken its door again, but he obviously returned.’
‘My wife sees him as perverted and cruel.’
‘And I would agree with her.’
‘Well, the one thing I do thank him for is his threats to unmask her completely. It was only because she thought she might be shunned as a pariah when thetongot wind of her improper plan that she agreed to marry me.’
‘A wise choice.’ Nick lifted his glass and finished the brandy before placing it down on the table beside him and refusing Frederick’s offer of another. ‘The world you all live in has changed a lot since I have been gone.’
‘And you have changed in appearance since last night. Jacob’s barber is a magician, by the way.’
‘The bath helped, too. The Westmoor physician also came this morning to see to my hand. He says he expects it to heal completely if I am careful.’
‘Knife wounds can be difficult things.’
‘The blade hit the bone at the back of the wrist, but at least it did not break.’
‘Which explains the sling. If you don’t want to be thrown into society so quickly by coming tonight, Nick, I will understand. After the army it was hard for me to fit straight back in.’
‘Because you felt different? Out of place?’
‘Yes, and because I had seen things that no one else could even imagine.’
Frederick was quiet then and Nicholas was glad of it.
‘I had thought to go to ground, but if I don’t come tonight it will only get harder. Better to get it over and done with. I saw Lady Eleanor yesterday, too, by the way.’ He tried to keep interest out of his words though he was not certain he had succeeded as Frederick looked up. ‘What is her story?’
‘Jake is very tight lipped about his sister, but from what I can gather the man she married was from a well-thought-of family in Edinburgh. The Robertsons.’
‘Was it the family of the Robertson boy we knew at school, then?’
‘No, by all accounts he was not related to them. Douglas Robertson, Eleanor’s husband, was killed falling off a horse, apparently in some hunting accident, and when Eleanor found out she was pregnant she came home to Millbrook to have her baby daughter, Lucy. And to grieve.’
Lucy. Nick stored the name inside him and thought how hard a path that must have been for a sheltered duke’s daughter with all the promise in the world.
A bit like him, perhaps, although his promise had been dimming even before his absence from England. His uncle had encouraged him into the profligate and debauched underworld of thetonand he had gone in to welcome the inherent risks with his eyes wide open.
‘Do you ever think, Fred, that maybe we were fools back then, playing so hard and fast?’
‘I think you and Oliver were the ones who were the worst of us although you held the biggest share in Vitium et Virtus and gambled away the most money.’
‘It was fun until it wasn’t,’ he returned and stood to look out of the window. ‘I will go up to Bromworth House tomorrow and see my uncle.’
‘Take my carriage.’
‘Oliver offered me the use of his yesterday.’
‘Will you live there this time, do you think? Put down roots and stay?’
Nicholas shrugged his shoulders because he truly did not know.
‘My advice would be to find a wife like mine, Nick. A woman who can be the better half of you, for without Georgiana at my side I’d still be lost.’
As I am, Nicholas thought, and felt the shiver of ghosts walk down his spine.
