Page 24 of A Lady's Heart Deceived
Can love strike twice in a life? Or have I already had my one chance taken from me?
Piers raised an eyebrow. “I can imagine it would have been difficult for your parents if they had been in love while Lord Hugh was still at university. The various colleges have firm rules against students having wives.”
She hadn’t wanted to ask, but he’d just given her the perfect opportunity. Maggie bit the bullet. “And what about you, Piers? I understand you have a fiancée. Have the two of you set a date for your wedding?”
She was fishing, and if the odd expression which quickly flittered across his face was any indication, Piers was well aware of what she was doing.
He cleared his throat. “It’s complicated. And since the lady in question is owed a degree of discretion, I can’t discuss it. I’m sorry, Maggie; I don’t mean to be evasive with my answer. I just have to make sure that the feelings of others and their situations are protected.”
His words were polite, but they were clear. She should mind her own business and not pry into his affairs. If anyone could understand how difficult things could be for someone who should rightly be married by now, it was her. “I am the one who should be apologizing, Piers. I have no right to ask such personal questions. It was not my intention to cause offense,” she replied.
“You didn’t. I wish I could tell you, but Lady Dinah and I made a pact last summer. Neither of us would discuss the status of our betrothal with anyone else.”
He was being guarded with his words, but there was a definite undercurrent of relief in the way he spoke. Maggie guessed that the betrothal had come to an end, and while Piers was waiting for Lady Dinah to make that public, he clearly wasn’t disappointed that it was over. His behavior was understandable—a gentleman wouldn’t ever be so crass as to speak of the end of an engagement, especially before the lady involved let it be known in her private circle.
She searched for another, safer topic for discussion. “Your brother, Jonathan. Is he your only sibling?”
Piers smiled at her, and the air between them cleared. “No. He is my younger brother; there are also three girls in the family. I was baby number four, and to the utter relief of my parents, a boy. My older sisters are all married, as is Jonathan.”
Keen to move away from the subject of marriage, Maggie focused on their destination. “Whereabouts in Coventry, are we staying? I don’t know the city; it’s not somewhere that we have ever visited. My family tends to move around London, only leaving for Scotland when it is Christmas.” She had travelled the Great North Road so many times, Maggie was certain she could find her way to Strathmore Castle without a map.
“Jonathan and Elizabeth live in St. Mary’s Street, which is in central Coventry, not far from the churches of St. Michael's and Holy Trinity. It’s convenient for our purposes as we should be able to visit both them and other nearby churches in order to look for Robert’s baptism records. I will also have to check in with the barracks since I am visiting the city on army business. I could ask around there and see if anyone remembers Robert.”
A strange sensation touched Maggie. She didn’t want to hear Piers mention the name of her former fiancé. When it came to Robert, something had shifted in her heart.
The silence was deafening.
Chapter Sixteen
“Ican’t believe you arrived unannounced on my doorstep with the Bishop of London’s daughter in tow. Brother dearest, you have some explaining to do,” said Jonathan, closing the door of his study. His wife, Elizabeth, was busy showing Maggie upstairs to her room.
Piers rubbed his tired temple. Where was he to begin? “I am sorry. I should have written, but things happened all rather quickly. I was ordered to come north only a few days ago.”
He gratefully accepted the generous glass of brandy his brother handed him, then took a seat in an old leather chair. Jonathan sat opposite Piers on the other side of his desk.
Elizabeth’s stepfather was a major shareholder in the Coventry Canal Company, and Jonathan worked for them as a manager, liaising with the various mining companies which sent their coal down the canal to the English midlands and beyond.
Jonathan Denford had a good head for figures, and he had helped retrieve the fortunes of the company after the construction costs of the canal had threatened to send it bankrupt.
Silence hung in the room, only finally broken when Piers softly chuckled. “You are not going to give me an inch, are you?”
His brother shook his head. “No. Consider it punishment for not having been to visit for eleven months. We haven’t seen you since Christmas, and then all of a sudden, you are knocking on the front door asking to stay. Just be grateful that Elizabeth is a pragmatic woman. Now talk.”
Piers sipped at his brandy. It was a relief to finally be in Coventry and also to see a familiar face. Jonathan might well be giving him grief, but it was nothing compared to what Piers had endured almost every day in London.
Where to begin?
“Maggie Radley’s fiancé died at Waterloo. And while that was tragic enough, she has recently discovered that he may not have been all that he claimed to be,” he replied.
Jonathan’s eyes went wide. “You mean, he was a fraud?”
“I am beginning to suspect he might have been. I can’t find any record of him in the army files in London. He is not on the muster rolls. We came to Coventry because that is where he is supposed to have been born. I just want Maggie to get some answers. And perhaps be able to close that chapter of her life.”
It was a relief to finally give voice to that horrid thought. Speaking ill of the dead didn’t sit well with him, but from what he had discovered, or rather,notdiscovered about Robert Taylor, Piers was of the opinion that the captain had lied to Maggie.
Jonathan set his glass on the desk and clasped his hands together. “Speaking of answers, have you heard anything more regarding your own situation? I take it the British Army hasn’t moved to formally charge you with anything. But that doesn’t mean that they won’t at some juncture. You need that letter of support from the Prince of Orange. He might well be the heir to the throne of the Netherlands, and as such a very important member of a foreign royal family, but even he cannot just leave you hanging like this. You helped save his life.”
Piers sighed; he had been expecting this but had hoped his brother might at least have left it alone until he had finished his drink. “Yes, I know the prince is honor bound to support me, but I still haven’t heard back from him. I have written to the Dutch royal family several times over the past year. But nothing has come of it.”
