“You don’t.”
“I haven’t lost a dear one recently,” he replied softly.
She pressed her lips together for a moment, then rose and took the plate from her brother. Silence crossed to the hearth and filled the plate with porridge from a pot hanging there. She brought the plate back to the table and set it in front of him.
“Let me take Mary. She’ll have the porridge all over your coat in no time.”
“Thank you,” Winter said. He spooned up a mouthful of the thick porridge and murmured in contentment as he ate it. “That’s very good.”
“Nell made it,” Silence said drily. Her own cooking left much to be desired.
“Ah.” Winter swallowed and gestured to the wooden box. “I found that on the front step.”
“Did you?” Silence felt a spark of curiosity and looked at the box with more animation than she’d had in days. “Do you think it’s Mary Darling’s admirer?”
Winter smiled gently. “I could venture a guess, but it seems more logical to simply open it and find out.”
Silence stuck out her tongue at her brother. She turned the box over in her fingers. It was no bigger than the size of her palm. As she examined the box, she realized that although it was very plain, without marking or paint, the box was finely worked. It shone with beeswax. She frowned uneasily. The box was much dearer than Mary’s other gifts.
Mary Darling grabbed for the box, held so temptingly in front of her.
“Not yet, sweetie,” Silence said. “We need to see what’s inside first.”
She laid the box on the table, opened the lid, and gasped.
“What is it?” Winter half rose to look.
Silence turned the box so that he could see the strand of pearls coiled inside.
He was quiet a moment; then he lifted the necklace with his long, elegant fingers. He held the pearls up, watching as they gleamed in the light. “This is a very expensive present for a child.”
“It’s not for Mary Darling,” Silence whispered. She held up the scrap of paper that had lain under the pearls. Two words were written upon it.
Silence Hollingbrook.
WHEN HERO WOKE, she knew even before she opened her eyes that Griffin was no longer with her. She lay, unmoving, eyes shut, as if to put off the inevitable realization that he was gone. The bed was cold. He’d been gone a long time.
She curled her fingers into fists and was startled to feel something in her right hand. She opened her eyes to see and brought her hand closer to her face. It was late morning, the light shining from her window bright and strong.
The thing in her hand was her diamond earring. Hero traced the bobble with one fingertip. The diamond earring Griffin had picked up after she’d thrown it at him so long ago now. She looked at it, and tears filled her eyes as she understood the message.
He wasn’t coming back.
IT WAS LATE morning by the time Griffin climbed the steps to his town house. His legs felt leaden, his chest heavy and clogged.
“Where have you been?”
He raised his head at the familiar voice. Mater stood on his step, wrapped in a velvet cape.
He stopped and said stupidly, “What are doing here? Has something happened?”
“Has something happened?” she repeated incredulously. “Yes, something happened—you beat Thomas, say you’ve seduced his fiancée, and then you both virtually disappear! I want to know what is going on and how you’ll resolve this horrible difference between you two. It’s worse now than before you came back to London. What has happened to our family?”
He stared at her, this strong little woman, and saw her shoulders sag. She’d withstood Pater’s death, withstood debt and scandal, and now she was near defeat because of him. His mouth tasted of ashes.
Add his mother’s disillusionment to his sins.
He glanced around and realized they were in a public place. One of his neighbors was peering at them avidly from behind her curtains.
Griffin took Mater’s arm. “Come inside, dearest.”
She looked up at him uncertainly, and in the morning sunshine, the lines about her eyes were clear. “Griffin?”
“Come inside,” he repeated.
He led her into his library and realized his mistake immediately when he glanced to the spot beside the settee where he’d made love to Hero. He swore under his breath, but where else was he to put her? Half the rooms were in sheets because he didn’t bother using them.
“What is it?” she asked, touching his arm worriedly.
“It’s nothing,” he said, and strode to the door to bellow for a servant. A full minute elapsed before a blowsy maid scurried into view. “Bring some hot tea and cakes.”
She curtsied. “ ’Aven’t any cakes, m’lord.”
Griffin grimaced. “Bread, then, or whatever else Cook can find.”
He closed the door and turned back to the room, running his hands over his head. He wasn’t wearing a wig, hadn’t shaved in days, and his house and staff were wretched. Well, the last hardly mattered anymore. Once he’d dealt with the Vicar, he’d let the lease lapse and remove himself and Deedle to the north. Deedle hated it there, but Griffin would be damned if he’d stay in the same city as Thomas and Hero.
“Griffin?” Mater said softly.
Damn it. Mater had never cared to rusticate. He’d be leaving her behind as well. Unless she decided to take up residence in a city nearer the Mandeville estate. But that still wasn’t London.
Nothing was the same as London.
“Griffin!” His mother crossed the room and took his hands. “You must tell me what you’re thinking.”
He smiled wearily. “It’s not so very dramatic as all that, Mater. I’m making plans to leave London.”
“But why?”
He closed his eyes. “I can’t live here with Thomas and her.”
“Lady Hero, you mean.” She half laughed, and he opened his eyes to see her staring at him in exasperation. “Are we not to speak her name now?”
“That would be rather hard for Thomas,” he said wryly.
She blinked. “He’s not…”
He nodded. “They will be married Sunday.”
He dropped her hands and crossed to pour himself a healthy glassful of brandy.
“But I thought…”
“That I’d marry her?” he asked, his back still turned to her. “Apparently not.”
“Why not?”
He shrugged. “Does it matter? Anyway, Thomas will have his revenge for my seduction of Anne.”
“Don’t be silly.” She made a dismissive sound. “I never believed you’d seduced Anne.”
He turned, vaguely surprised—and rather grateful. “No? Everyone else did.”
“I’m your mother, Griffin.” She placed her hands on her hips and looked at him with exasperation. “Do give me some credit.”
“Oh, Mater, I love you so.” He smiled wryly and drank some brandy, wincing slightly as it burned his gullet.
“No one believes that old gossip anymore.”
“Thomas does.”
She stared. “What?”
He nodded and drank some more brandy. The second sip was smoother. Perhaps he’d become a sot.
“But that can’t be!”
“Said so himself,” he assured her. “Got it from Anne’s own lips as she lay dying.”
“That girl always was a ninny, God rest her soul,” Mater muttered. “Did you tell him point-blank that you didn’t do it?”
“Yes, and he point-blank did not believe me, perhaps because of my recent actions with Lady Hero.”
“That’s an entirely different matter,” Mater said.
“Is it?” he asked. “To Thomas I doubt it is.”
“Anne was his wife. Lady Hero is only affianced to him. Besides…” She trailed off, biting her lip.
Griffin narrowed his eyes at her suspiciously. “Besides what?”
She waved an irritable hand. “It’s not my secret to divulge.”
/> “Mater.”
“Don’t growl at me.” She locked gazes with him for a moment, then looked away. “He can be so foolish sometimes.”
“Tell me.”
“It’s none of your business, Griffin.”
“If it involves Hero, it is. I love her.”
Her face softened immediately. “Oh, do you?”
“Yes, unfortunately,” he said. “Now tell me.”
“It’s just that Thomas took up with a rather risqué lady last season, a Mrs. Tate. He tried to hide it from me, of course, but I saw nonetheless. He couldn’t keep his eyes off her when he’d see her at a ball or some other such place.”
“Thomas has a mistress? Damn it, I knew it! He was following her at Harte’s Folly.”
“Rather more than a mistress I think, although perhaps he doesn’t know it himself,” she said somewhat obscurely.
Griffin’s anger was building. How dare Thomas marry Hero already encumbered by a mistress? “Has he broken it off?”
“That’s just it,” Mater replied. “I thought he had when he proposed to Lady Hero, but now I think he’s seeing Mrs. Tate again.”
“To punish Hero,” Griffin growled.
“No, I don’t think so. I think he’s formed a tendre for the woman.” Mater shook her head sadly. “I love Thomas dearly—he is my firstborn son—but he can be so very boneheaded. He should let Lady Hero go.”
“Ah.” Griffin tossed back the rest of the brandy. “But I’m afraid that doesn’t matter to me in any case.”
“What do you mean?”
“She doesn’t love me.” He tried to smile and failed. “She won’t marry me.”
“Humph.” Mater frowned ferociously. “She might say she doesn’t want to marry you, but I don’t for a moment believe she doesn’t love you. A woman like Lady Hero does not let a man into her bed out of the bonds of wedlock unless she’s fallen head over heels for him.”
He looked down at his glass, unable to meet her gaze. He suddenly found it hard to speak. “She’s hiding it well if she does love me.”
“If only we had more time,” his mother burst out. “I’m sure she’d come to her senses if Thomas would just wait to marry her.”
“It’s Wakefield who is pushing the marriage.” Griffin shook his head. “And in any case, I truly don’t think she’ll be changing her mind. I have business to finish here, and then I’ll be leaving for Lancashire.”
“But you can’t leave!” Mater cried. “Don’t you see? If you just give her time—”
“I can’t stay and watch her marry Thomas!” he hissed, the pain surfacing despite his efforts to keep it submerged. He glanced at her and then away again at the pity in her eyes. “I simply can’t.”
“Griffin—”
“No.” He cut the air with the blade of his hand. “Just listen. I’ll finish my business, and then I’m moving north permanently. I’ll either transfer my business north somehow or have my agents act for me in London. I’m not coming back.”
She watched him silently, but tears swam in her eyes. He could see them clearly.
It was more than he could bear.
“She doesn’t love me. I have to accept that fact and go on.” He picked up the decanter and a glass and strode to the door. He paused there, his back to her.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
And then he fled to his rooms. If he was lucky, he’d be insensibly drunk in an hour.
Chapter Seventeen
The queen returned to her rooms that night with a heavy heart. Her suitors were right: She must make a decision and choose the perfect man to wed, but the thought filled her with sorrow. She went to her balcony and saw that the little brown bird was already perched there.
Queen Ravenhair picked up the bird and found about his neck a string with a tiny mirror tied to the end. She untangled the mirror and held it up—and of course saw herself reflected in its surface. And then she knew the message: She was the heart of her kingdom….
—from Queen Ravenhair
Hero absently turned the diamond earring over in her fingers late that afternoon. She had retired to the sitting room with a pot of tea, now cooling on the low table in front of her. The room smelled of roses, because a giant vase of the flowers sat on the corner table. They were pale pink—her favorite—but she glanced away from the sight of them.
Cousin Bathilda had had hysterics over Maximus’s demand that Hero marry on Sunday. She’d gone off to try and reason with Maximus, but Hero had very little hope that even Cousin Bathilda would persuade Maximus to put off the wedding. Once Maximus set his mind to something, he was like a granite boulder: hard and immovable.
Not that it mattered, really.
If she were to marry Thomas, this Sunday or a Sunday months from now it made no difference. She didn’t even care about the inevitable scandal. She knew she should. A small part of her mind was wailing that she should be panicked, should be pacing or throwing hysterics herself. And yet she couldn’t bring herself to care.
She was making a mistake.
Hero sighed and dropped the earring next to her tea-cup. She couldn’t shake the feeling that she was making a terrible, irredeemable mistake.
“There you are,” Phoebe called from the doorway as she entered. “Wherever has Cousin Bathilda gone? I can’t seem to find her.”
“I’m sorry, love,” Hero said, feeling guilty. “She’s gone off in a frenzy to speak to Maximus.”
“Oh,” Phoebe said, sitting down on a chair at right angles to Hero’s settee.
Phoebe’s little shoulders drooped. Hero bit her lip. “Did Maximus talk to you?”
Phoebe nodded, looking down.
“I’m so sorry.”
“It’s all right.” Phoebe straightened a bit. “All those balls and such. It would have been wearying, I expect, don’t you?”
“Yes, it is rather tiring,” Hero said gently.
“It’s just…” Phoebe wrinkled her nose. “I would’ve liked to have danced with a gentleman not related to me once. Just once.”
Hero felt tears prick her eyes.
“It’s for the best. I do understand that.” Phoebe inhaled and looked up. “Did Cousin Bathilda go to talk to Maximus about your marriage?”
Her voice was diffident and Hero felt worse. They’d not told Phoebe anything, but she must’ve been aware of the household turmoil the last couple of days.
“You know Maximus said I had to marry this Sunday?” Hero asked.
“One of the servants overheard something and told me.” Phoebe’s eyes dropped. “I thought you didn’t like him anymore?”
“It’s rather complicated.”
“But he hit you, didn’t he?” Phoebe looked at her worriedly. “That’s where you got that bruise on your cheek, isn’t it?”
“Yes.” Hero winced as she touched her cheek. It was turning a rather vivid purple. “But he has sent his apologies.” She gestured to the vase of roses.
Phoebe examined them. “So that’s who they’re from?”
“Yes.”
“They’re quite extravagant. He must be feeling guilty. But then he should feel guilty. I don’t think you ought to marry him,” Phoebe said earnestly. “Not if he’s hurt you. What is Maximus thinking?”
“It’s not quite that simple.” Hero sighed and picked up the diamond earring, twisting it between her fingers. “Maximus is doing what he thinks is best for me.”
“I don’t see how.”
“Mandeville acted out of anger—I did something to anger him terribly. He’s a very trustworthy man usually. Maximus knows this and knows he will make a responsible, solid husband for me.”
Phoebe wrinkled her nose. “Responsible. Solid.”
When repeated flatly like that, Thomas’s attributes sounded less sterling. Nevertheless, Hero nodded. “Yes.”
“It seems rather boring reasons for marrying someone.”
Hero bit her lip. “Marriage is supposed to be boring.”
“Why?” Phoeb
e asked. “Why can’t it be exciting and… and an adventure? I’m sure if you looked a bit more, you could find a man who made your heart thrill when you saw him.”
Made her heart thrill. That was what she felt like when she saw Griffin. But he was wholly inappropriate, wasn’t he? Phoebe was simply too young to understand.
Hero shook her head, staring at the earring in her hand.
Phoebe leaned forward to peer at her hand. “Isn’t that the earbob you lost at your engagement ball?”
“Yes.” Hero folded her fingers protectively around the little piece.
“But how wonderful that you’ve found it again,” Phoebe said. “It’s almost like having an entirely new set when one finds a lost earring, I always think.”
Hero raised her eyebrows in faint amusement. “How often do you lose earrings?”
“Quite often, I’m afraid,” Phoebe said. “They just seem to—”
“Your brother is as stubborn as a mule!” Cousin Bathilda cried as she entered the sitting room. Mignon barked as if to emphasize the pronouncement.
“He wouldn’t move the date?” Hero asked.
“Not only would he not move the date, but he also wouldn’t even discuss the matter.” Cousin Bathilda plopped onto the settee beside Hero, earning a growly grumble from Mignon. “Then he had the temerity to tell me that he had business to conduct and that our interview was over! Can you imagine? Where that man became so rude, I haven’t the faintest. Your mother was the height of civility, my dears, a true lady, even without the title, and I certainly never led him to believe that such conduct to his elders was a matter of course.”
Cousin Bathilda was busy twitching her skirts in her agitation, and the constant movement was apparently too much for Mignon. The little spaniel got up from her lap and delicately stepped onto Hero’s lap, where she settled with a long-suffering sigh.
Hero stroked Mignon’s silky ears. “Would you like some tea, Cousin?”
“Tea would be quite the thing,” Cousin Bathilda said. “But this pot has gone cold no doubt. Phoebe, will you be a dear and call for another?”
“Yes, Cousin Bathilda.” Phoebe obediently rose.