Mary Balogh: At Last Comes Love

He packaged up the money before going to bed and dispatched it the next morning to Harrogate. By now Toby was bound to have put his heel through a stocking or his knee through his breeches or his toe through his shoes or… Well, the possibilities were endless. Bringing up a child was a decidedly expensive undertaking.

On the second day the ticklish decision of how best to approach his grandfather was taken out of his hands. There was a note beside his plate at the breakfast table, written in the all-too-familiar hand of the secretary. It was a summons to appear before the Marquess of Claverbrook at one o'clock precisely. The old gentleman did not go out much these days, according to Duncan's mother, but obviously he did not miss much of what went on beyond his doors. He had heard that his grandson was back in town. He had even known where to find him.

And it was definitely a summons rather than an invitation – /at one o'clock precisely/.

Duncan dressed with care in a coat of blue superfine that was neat and elegant but not in the first stare of fashion. He had his valet tie his neckcloth in a smart yet simple knot. He wore a plain fob at his waist and pulled on well-polished Hessian boots over his gray pantaloons, but plain black ones rather than anything more flamboyant. He certainly did not want to give the impression that he lived extravagantly – which he did not. "You do understand, Smith," he said to his man, "that I will be unable to pay you this week and perhaps will not be able to next week either – or the week after. You may wish to look about for other employment, and London is by far the best place to do it." Smith, who had remained with him through thick and thin for eleven years – though never before in utter poverty – sniffed. "I understand a great deal, m'lord," he said, "not having been born an imbecile. I will leave when I am good and ready to leave." Which would not be immediately, Duncan gathered – a loyalty for which he was silently grateful.

He frowned at his image before leaving the room. He did not want to appear obsequious before his grandfather any more than he wished to look expensive, though of course he /was/ desperate. He sighed inwardly, took his hat and cane from Smith's hands, and left the room and the house.

Forbes took Duncan's things when he arrived at Claverbrook House, scarcely sparing him a glance as he did so, and invited his lordship to follow him. Duncan followed, raising his eyebrows and pursing his lips at the butler's stiff back. It was probably a good thing he had not come yesterday, uninvited. He doubted he would have got past Forbes unless he had been prepared to wrestle him to the ground.

The Marquess of Claverbrook was in the drawing room, seated in a high-backed chair he had possessed forever, close to a roaring fire despite the fact that it was a warmish spring day. Heavy velvet curtains were half drawn across the windows to block most of the sunlight. The air was heavy with the smell of the ointment he used for his rheumatism.

Duncan made his bow. "Sir," he said, "how do you do? I hope I find you well." His grandfather, who had never been one to indulge in unnecessary chitchat, did not deign to deliver a health report. Neither did he greet his grandson or express any pleasure at seeing him again after so long.

Nor did he demand to know why he was back in London when he had fled from it five years ago under the blackest cloud of scandal and disgrace.

He /knew/ why, of course, as his opening words revealed. "Give me one good reason," he said, his bushy white eyebrows almost meeting over the bridge of his nose, a sharply defined frown line between his brows the only feature that revealed where one ended and the other began, "just /one/, Sheringford, why I should continue to fund your excesses and debaucheries." He held a silver-headed wooden cane in both gnarled hands and thumped it on the floor between his feet to give emphasis to his displeasure.

There was one perfectly good reason – even apart from the fact that really there had not been a great many of either excesses or debaucheries. But his grandfather knew nothing about Toby and never would, if Duncan had any say in the matter. Nor would anyone else. "Because I am your only grandson, sir?" Duncan suggested. And lest that not be sufficient reason, as doubtless it was not, "And because I plan to live respectably for the rest of my life now that Laura is dead?" She had been dead for four months. She had taken a winter chill and just faded away – because, in Duncan's opinion, she had lost the will to live.

His grandfather's frown deepened, if that were possible, and he thumped the cane again. "You dare mention /that name/ in my hearing?" he asked rhetorically. "Mrs. Turner was dead to the world five years ago, Sheringford, when she chose to commit the unspeakable atrocity of running off with you, leaving her lawful husband behind." It had happened on Duncan's twenty-fifth birthday – and, more to the point, on his wedding day. He had abandoned his bride, virtually at the altar, and run away with her sister-in-law, her brother's wife. Laura.

The whole thing had been one of the most spectacular scandals London had seen in years, perhaps ever. At least, he assumed it had. He had not been here to experience it in person.

He said nothing since this was hardly the time or the place for a discussion on the meaning of the word /atrocity/. "I ought to have turned you out then without a penny," his grandfather told him. He had not been invited to sit down, Duncan noticed. "But I allowed you to continue drawing on the rents and income of Woodbine Park so that you would have the wherewithal to stay far away out of my sight – and out of the sight of all decent, respectable people. But now the woman is gone, unmourned, and you may go to the devil for all I care. You promised solemnly on my seventieth birthday that you would marry by your thirtieth and have a son in your nursery before your thirty-first. You abandoned Miss Turner at the altar five years ago, and you turned thirty six weeks ago." /Had/ he promised something so rash? Of course, he would have been a mere puppy at the time. Was /this/ the explanation for the sudden cutting off of his funds? That his thirtieth birthday had come and gone and he was still a single man? He had been with Laura until four months ago, for the love of God. But not married to her, of course. Turner had steadfastly refused to divorce her. His grandfather had expected him to find a bride within the past four months, then, and marry her just to honor a promise made many years ago – by a boy who knew nothing of life? "There is still time to produce an heir before my thirty-first birthday," he pointed out – a rather asinine thing to say, as his grandfather's reaction demonstrated. He snorted. It was not a pleasant sound. "Besides," Duncan continued, "I believe you must have misremembered the promise I made, sir. I seem to recall promising that I would marry before your eightieth birthday." Which was… when? Next year? The year after? "Which happens to be sixteen days from now," his grandfather said with brows of thunder again. "Where is your bride, Sheringford?" /Sixteen days/? Damn it all!

Duncan strode across the room to the window in order to delay his answer, and stood looking down on the square, his hands clasped at his back. Could he pretend now that it was the eighty-/fifth/ birthday he had named? He could not even remember the promise, for God's sake. And his grandfather might be making all this up just to discomfit him, just to give himself a valid excuse for cutting off his grandson from all funds. Woodbine Park, though a property belonging to the Marquess of Claverbrook, was traditionally granted to the heir as his home and main source of income. Duncan had always considered it his, by right of the fact that he was the heir after his father's death, even though he had not lived there for years. He had never taken Laura there. "No answer," the marquess said after a lengthy silence, a nasty sneer in his voice. "I produced one son, who died at the age of forty-four when he had no more sense than to engage in a curricle race and try to overtake his opponent on a sharp bend in the road. And that one son produced one son of his own. /You."/ It did not sound like a compliment. "He did, sir," Duncan agreed. What else /was/ there to say? "Where did I go wrong?" his grandfather asked irritably and rhetorically. "My brother produced five lusty sons before he produced any of his daughters, and those five in their turn produced eleven lusty sons of their own, at least two each. And some of /them/ have produced sons." "And so, sir," Duncan said, seeing where this was leading, "there is no danger of the title falling into abeyance anytime soon, is there? There is no urgent hurry for me to get a son." It was the wrong thing to say – though there probably /was/ no right thing.