Page 182

O ne of Sinjin’s favorite places to spend time at Perriton Grange was the apiary, the field where Old Jack tended the estate’s dozens of beehives.

As a boy he’d stand in the middle of the lines and lines of hives, close his eyes, and listen to the hum of the bees at work.

The child he was had found that sound comforting.

Now, standing in the ruins of his conservatory, he found no comfort at all in the hum of voices and activity around him.

All he wanted was for them to go and leave him alone with the broken glass, the trampled plants, the chopped down trees, and the sad refuse of ten years of his care and work.

Seamus’s precipitous interruption of the Duke and Duchess of Chelmsford’s dinner had resulted in a mad scramble to assemble carriages and transport everyone in attendance to the Perriton house on St. James Square.

Sinjin had not been able to utter a word nor do much at all save stand amidst the carnage and think that he really should do something.

The duchess and Cordelia had gone to the far end of the conservatory where Missus Beatty sat in a chair next to the fish pond.

The cook had a battered coal skuttle next to her feet and a large cookpot in her lap.

“They scooped the wee fish out and left them gasping on the floor,” she was saying. “Broke down the sides of the fountain to let out all the water.”

“She saved them, she did,” Betsy the kitchen maid said. “Scooped them up in the cookpot and had me fetch some water. Will they live, Mister Sinjin?” she called to him.

He turned slowly and took a few steps towards the pond.

Halfway there he heard and felt a loud crunch beneath his feet.

When he bent down, he picked up the remains of his new microscope.

The one Cordelia and Daedalus had gifted him.

His sister came to him and took the broken instrument from his hands.

“We’ll buy you a new one, dearest,” she said softly as she stroked his hair away from his face.

“We’ll set this to rights.” He nodded wordlessly, kissed her cheek, and walked the rest of the way to the fountain and pond to kneel down next to Missus Beatty.

“Are you all right, Beatty?”

She reached out and patted his head. “It’ll take more than three milksop lordlings to get the best of me, lad.

” Betsy took the pot from Beatty’s shaking hands and showed Sinjin the three large goldfish that had occupied his conservatory pond for the last ten years.

They were a bit crowded in the pot but swam about quite vigorously.

“They’ll live, won’t they, sir?” the girl asked. Where was Alice? She would know best how to console Betsy. He knew she was in the conservatory. Was it his body or his soul that sensed her presence? He needed her, but feared his reaction to her trying to apologize for…this.

“I should think so,” he said, his voice hoarse and burning his throat. “You and Missus Beatty have saved their lives.” He met the maid’s eyes and forced himself to smile. “Just make certain she doesn’t cook them up.”

“Oh no, sir. I’ll keep them safe.” She nodded solemnly.

“Perriton?” Carrington-Bowles peered around the broken limbs of a lemon tree back towards Sinjin’s work table.

Sinjin stood, patted Missus Beatty’s shoulder and strode to where Carrington-Bowles and a gentleman in the garb of a Bow Street Runner stood.

“This is Archer Colwyn, a friend,” Lady Camilla’s nephew said.

“We sent for him before we left Berkeley Square.” The Runner extended his hand and Sinjin shook it.

“Do you recognize him?” Mister Colwyn asked as he stepped aside and indicated a prone figure on the mosaic pathway that meandered through the conservatory.

“Weatherly.” Sinjin went hot all over. He reached for the man, but Carrington-Bowles and the Runner held him back.

“He attacked a defenseless woman. He destroyed my conservatory.” Now that he had started talking the fog in his mind and the hum of voices disappeared to be replaced by a blind, red fury.

“I’ll kill him.” He tried his best to wrest free of their hold.

“And you would be justified,” the Duke of Chelmsford said as he came from behind the tangle of broken wisteria and weeping begonias.

“However, as I have asked my wife to limit the number of bodies her men toss into the Thames these days, that would be inadvisable.” He clasped his hands behind his back.

“Alice has informed me that in addition to Weatherly here, the other two milksop lordlings involved in this diabolical act are the Earl of Stanton and Lord Octavius Earden.”

“No doubt,” Sinjin said between clenched teeth.

Alice. She was here. She’d traveled in the carriage with her aunt and uncle and Lady Camilla whilst he had traveled with Carrington-Bowles, Daedalus, and Cordelia.

He closed his eyes and tried to catch his breath.

Everything came rushing at him at once. The way she’d avoided his gaze at dinner immediately after Lady Camilla announced what had happened to Miss Rutherford and her friends.

Somehow his involvement in Alice’s revenge had gotten back to Earden and his friends by way of this last act, the one Sinjin had advised her against. The one she’d said she would let go.

He didn’t want to blame her for the smashed microscope, the torn down vines, the exotic trees turned to kindling, his roses uprooted from their urns.

The searing ache in his chest, the labored effort it took to draw breath, the very thought that Seamus or Missus Beatty or even Betsy might have been seriously hurt or killed. What had she been thinking?

“I can drag him off to Bow Street,” Mister Colwyn said quietly. “Have him brought up on charges and have the other two arrested as well. I understand this is your family’s home and that your elder brother is in charge, but I am certain once he sees all of this he will do as you wish.”

“Are we certain we wish to feed the news sheets and prints artists more fuel for their fires?” Lady Camilla asked as she and the Duchess of Chelmsford joined their little group.

Viscount Wheatly stirred once and subsided back onto the floor with a groan.

“Not to mention it appears your Missus Beatty gave as good as she got and better.” Lady Camilla gave Wheatly a little nudge with her slippered foot and smiled.

“What do you suggest, milady?” Sinjin asked. He glanced about casually which was a mistake. Not only was Alice nowhere in sight, everywhere he looked revealed new destruction which caused pangs in his body like physical blows.

“Chelmsford, you know Stanton’s father. Wheatly is the Marquess of Fordice’s heir, is he not?” Lady Camilla looked to the duke with a deceptively beatific expression on her elegant face.

“Indeed, and I am acquainted with Fordice as well. El, my love, will you accompany Lady Camilla to visit the Dowager Countess of Stanton? She serves on several charitable committees with you two, does she not?”

Lady Camilla patted the duke’s arm. “You have always been such a clever boy, Perseus Whitcombe. Her Grace and I will pay a call on Lady Stanton and inform her of her son’s activities this night. She still hasn’t forgiven him for moving her out of the family townhouse.”

“She’ll be in a more forgiving mood when I tell her that the earl’s membership at Goodrum’s along with those of his friends have been revoked.

” The Duchess of Chelmsford owned the most desirable pleasure club in London.

Memberships were exclusive and sought after by the highest-ranking peers in London.

Sinjin and Mister Carrington-Bowles exchanged a glance.

Mister Colwyn chuckled and shook his head.

“One would do well never to cross our Captain El,” he said, referring to the duchess.

“Colwyn, Carrington-Bowles, and I will fetch Wheatly to his father. Earden’s father will be at White’s this time of an evening.

We’ll stop there after we deal with Wheatly.

” The duke looked to Sinjin. “Will that satisfy, Mister Perriton? I know your brother, Frederick, is head of the family whilst your father is ill, but I daresay he will defer to you in this.”

Sinjin studied Wheatly for a moment and then gave his conservatory a careful perusal.

They were right. With everything that had happened, this was the best course.

There was no need for more scandal. Not to mention his taste for revenge had been irrevocably dampened.

Suddenly he was very tired. His body ached, and his mind was a maelstrom of thoughts and feelings.

Any other time in his life when things became too much, he would seek out Alice in person or in a letter. What was he going to do now?

In his slow perusal of the damage done by Stanton and his miscreant friends he caught sight of the chaise longue where he and Alice had finally given in to their passions.

He’d proposed tonight and he meant every word.

She’d broken his trust. She’d given him no answer.

She might be carrying his child. He’d chosen the wrong time to give up his hermit ways because all he wanted to do now was scream.

He knew what he was honor-bound to do no matter how he and Alice now felt about each other.

“You’re right,” he said and extended his hand to the duke. “This is the best course of action for everyone concerned. Thank you…thank you all for everything. I…” He shook his head.

“Very good,” Lady Camilla said and clapped her hands.

“I shall have Lord Daedalus and Lady Cordelia escort me home. Lionel, dear, you go with the duke and Archer to dispose of this.” She kicked Wheatly and he groaned.

“Lord Daedalus!” She made her way up the path toward Sinjin’s work table.

Carrington-Bowles and Archer Colwyn dragged Wheatly none to gently toward the back doors out of the conservatory.