Page 11 of A Delicate Deception
Letting the house quite literally rot had never been his intention. In the immediate aftermath of grief he hadn’t had the wherewithal to do anything with it, and then he had been busy doing the work of two men. But allowing an entire house to sink into the earth was nothing if not a waste, and Sydney hadn’t been raised to waste so much as a crust of bread, let alone an entire house. He could sell the place, if that didn’t feel like a grossly presumptuous thing for him to do, considering his manner of inheriting it. He could let it, he supposed, and take the money and... add it to all the other money he couldn’t bring himself to touch, the rest of that sum that had passed from Penny to Andrew to him. He could hand the whole thing over to Lex, who had at least a greater emotional claim to the place than Sydney did. Maybe that was what Lex had summoned him for—a plan to take the house off Sydney’s hands. If Lex ever arrived, he would be sure to ask.
The next evening as Sydney returned to Pelham Hall after having supper at the inn, he passed a chaise and four heading in the opposite direction. He could think of only one reason for this, so he doubled his pace. When he reached the front door he all but threw it open.
There, seated on an overturned barrel in what had once been the manor’s great hall, sat the Duke of Hereford. For one instant Sydney felt nothing but the purest relief that his friend was alive and well. But soon enough that passed and he recalled how long he had been waiting.
“Fifty miles, Lex. I traveled fifty miles to wait in a pile of rubble for over a week. I didn’t know if you were alive or dead or hoaxing me.”
“You make it sound as if you walked the distance in your bare feet.” Lex took a puff from a cigarillo, letting the ashes fall to the bare flagstone floor. “You probably took the stagecoach, because we both know you’re too stingy to pay for a post chaise.”
“Lex.” Sydney tried again, summoning whatever scraps of patience he had left. “I need to return to my post. Not everyone can be as indolent as you.”
Lex made a moue of distaste. “Surely they finished with that canal by now.”
“One, it was a railway. Two, when it was finished, I started work on another railway. That is how employment works. One keeps working and earning one’s living.”
“So tedious.” Lex crossed his legs and bounced one foot over the other. There was neither fire nor lamplight, and the windows were covered in ivy, so Lex’s face was obscured by shadows. Still, Sydney could see streaks of silver in Lex’s formerly dark hair. Sydney hadn’t been the only one to lose a sibling that night: Sydney had lost Andrew, but Lex had lost his only sister. And since Sydney had last seen him, Lex’s father and his only surviving brother had died, making Lex the duke, but also an orphan.
Sydney paced the length of the room. “Tell me why you sent for me. I’ve imagined every distressing scenario, so please put me out of my misery.”
“I’m trying to make this interesting for you,” Lex said peevishly. “Don’t make me hurry my tale.”
“Tell me this isn’t some misbegotten attempt to get me back into your bed,” Sydney said, more to provoke Lex than out of any concern that this might be true.
“Don’t flatter yourself,” Lex said. “If I needed someone in my bed that badly, I could find a willing volunteer nearer than Liverpool.”
“Manchester,” Sydney said.
“As you say,” Lex said with a shrug, plainly not caring much for a geography lesson. Or for accuracy. Or for Sydney’s patience. “In any event, I had to bend the truth a bit to ensure that you came. And I couldn’t exactly write down the facts of the matter, in case the letter got intercepted.”
“Are we spies now? How thrilling.”
“Oh, my dear boy, I wish it were as easy as that. What we are is parents. Leontine, darling,” he called. “Come here.”
A child of about five years walked into the room, fixing Sydney with a bright smile. She had golden hair and a ruffled dress and a profile he would know anywhere. It was too dark to see much of the child’s face, but when she stepped into the solitary beam of sunlight that made its way through a crack in the dirty windowpane, Sydney had all the proof he needed.
“How?” he managed, his voice hoarse and his eyes swimming with unshed tears.
“This charming parcel was delivered to Hereford House with a note explaining that she’s Andrew’s natural child,” Lex said, dry as dust.
“Her mother?” He could not think of where they had been—he looked at the child, trying to calculate her age—five or six years ago. London, for a few months, then Durham. “When is your birthday?” he asked the child, kneeling in front of her.
“She doesn’t speak English. Or if she does, she’s being dashed stubborn about it. Try French.”
“Commentvousappelez-vous?”he asked, certain he had bungled his pronunciation. The child tilted her head uncomprehendingly. He had probably said something unforgivably insulting. Andrew had always done the talking when they had been overseas. He had done the talking everywhere they went, for that matter; he had been the one who knew how to make himself liked and understood. Looking at this child, Andrew’s daughter, Sydney felt a fresh surge of grief.
“It’s Leontine,” Lex said.
“Bonjour, Leontine.Bienvenue.”That much he could remember. The child smiled at him when she heard her name. He looked around the room for something to occupy her. He had not had anything to do with small children since Andrew had been this age and he had only been two years older. Sydney was grateful that he had, at least, swept the room clear of anything sharp or dangerous, except for a couple of workmen’s tools in the corner. But he had also removed anything that could reasonably be played with. He took his watch from his pocket, dimly aware that babies were apparently amused by the ticking sound. She was not a baby, but perhaps the principle would hold. She took the object eagerly.
“A French mother,” he said aloud. That, unfortunately, did not narrow down the field. He remembered the months they had spent in Flanders working on a bridge. “Who brought her to you?”
“She was left on my doorstep like a jug of milk. The note said her name was Leontine, her father was Andrew Goddard, and her mother and aunts died of typhus. I assume mothers and aunts are euphemisms for residents of the bawdy house where the child undoubtedly was conceived.”
Knowing Andrew’s proclivities, that was entirely likely. For all his talk of sex not being a sin if it was mutually respectful, he had found a vast quantity of women to mutually respect. “Why did they bring her to you? You don’t just sail across bodies of water and deliver children to the nearest duke.”
“How the devil do you expect me to know what goes through the minds of French brothel keepers? I expect they were looking for Andrew, found he was dead, and decided his brother-in-law would do just as well.”
“Good God.” Sydney could only imagine how distressing it must have been for Lex to be reminded of his loss and burdened with a child all at once.
