Page 115 of Marry in Secret
It frightenedhim? The sympathetic feelings Ambrose’s explanations had aroused in him drained away.
“I suppose it was you who sent us poisoned marzipan.”
“Yes, though I gather it didn’t work.” He sounded irritated, rather than regretful.
“It worked all right,” Thomas said grimly, remembering the sight of young Peter sprawled on the cobblestones in his own vomit. “It almost killed a young worker in our house.” And it could so easily have been him or Rose.
“But you didn’t eat any!” It sounded like an accusation.
“No, I don’t like marzipan.”
“You used to love it. I remember you scoffing it down as a boy.” He sounded aggrieved.
Thomas’s voice was hard. “You’re missing the point, Ambrose. What if my wife had eaten it?”
“Oh, I would have been very sorry about that,” Ambrose assured him. “She’s a lovely girl, Rose. No, no, it was you I intended it for.”
Thomas stared at him incredulously. Did the man not care that he’d endangered others? Apparently not. “But why try to kill me in the first place? I never did you any harm in my life.”
“Thomas, don’t you understand? It wasn’t about you, it was about me—it’s always been about me.”
He gestured with the pistol. “I was the eldest son, and I got nothing. Nothing. The old man forced my mother—did you know that?Forced.It wasn’t her choice to have a babe out of wedlock—she was a decent girl, a virgin before your uncle had his way with her—but she had to live with the shame of it every day of her life.
“And washeashamed of what he’d done? Not a bit—he thought himself a devil of a fine fellow, siring two strong sons six months apart. And oh, didn’t he pride himself on his generosity in taking me in, his base-born brat, and raising me to be useful in the service of the family? Yes,useful. I did everything. And my reward? Oh, I got a house to live in, and was fed and clothed and shod—but none of it was mine. Payment?” He snorted. “I was paid a pittance,because what did I need money for? Everything I needed was provided—as long as I stayed in my place, doing my job, like a good little well-trained bastard.”
His story struck a chord deep in Thomas. He’d known some parts of it as a child, and had accepted it then with a child’s understanding. Now, as an adult, a man who’d suffered his own injustices, he gained a new perspective on Ambrose’s situation. Some of his anger began to drain away.
“I had no idea...”
Ambrose’s voice was bitter. “No, once you grew up, you never thought of me as a man, did you, with my own dreams and desires. I was just a boy you used to know, your uncle’s steward. And then Cornelius’s. And then I was yours—handed down like a piece of property.”
Thomas swallowed. It was true. A thought occurred to him. “Did you kill my uncle? And Gerald?”
“No, Gerald really did die of cholera in Italy. And the earl broke his neck of his own accord—though admittedly he’d been drinking and was more reckless than usual. It was losing Gerald, and then you, that finally got to him. He kept saying, over and over, that he’d lost everyone, his whole family. As if I weren’t standing right there in front of him, his own flesh and blood.”
He considered that for a moment, his pistol drooping, forgotten. “If I’d known back then that you were still alive, none of this would have happened. You were always more reasonable—you would have listened, I’m sure. But when Cornelius inherited I realized I would be trapped forever. You know, I asked him to increase my pay and he refused.”
“Cornelius is a fool.”
“Yes, he is a fool and lazy with it, and that’s when I realized that he was never going to check the books, never going to take an active part in managing the estate.”
“And so you started helping yourself.”
“Yes, at first it was just helping myself to your allowance—I never stopped it. Cornelius didn’t know about it. It was so easy.”
“You forged my signature.”
Ambrose shrugged. “You know I was always good at drawing—better than Gerald if you want to know the truth. And I had some of your old letters and a couple of old documents. It was easy to copy your signature.”
“You wrote those letters refusing my ransom, too.”
Ambrose nodded. “That was easy. The earl often got me to sign unimportant documents on his behalf. And I had some of Gerald’s old letters—not that anyone on the Barbary Coast would know whether a signature was genuine or not. But by then I had the house seal. For some reason foreigners set great store in an impressive seal.”
He seemed quite proud of his cleverness, Thomas thought savagely. Had he forgotten who he was talking to? What he was boasting about? The “cleverness” by which he’d sentenced Thomas to a life of slavery.
Thomas’s fists knotted. He shoved them into his pockets. Much as he itched to thrash the smugness off his cousin’s face, this was not the time to lose his temper.
“When I realized what a lazy sod Cornelius was, I came up with my plan—to amass enough money to enable me to buy land and make a start elsewhere. And by the time that letter arrived, saying you were alive and demanding ransom, I was too deep in to stop. I’d had a taste of freedom, and started to amass enough money to start a new life.”
