Page 48 of The Sprinter
And who better to supply information than a servant? There was always a servant or two who would do just about anything for the right price. The senior footman on his father’s estate had always procured him anything he liked for a price—he’d been drinking brandy since he was eleven. On the rare occasion a bottle was noticed missing, a low-ranking servant was blamed and dismissed. Certainly, there was a person of that ilk working in Lady Heathway’s house.
Jacobs smiled. He had one very important advantage in that sort of effort. He was very rich and he could pay very well.
*
Grace had takenLady Heathway’s advice and stayed abed until late morning. Betsy had brought her a tray so that she might breakfast in her room.
While she did so, Betsy regaled her what had gone on in the house the night before.
“It all started out regular as anything,” Betsy said. “Regular forthishouse anyway. We all had our wood clubs by our side in case of a break-in, and Mr. Ranston was prowling the house. Then, he starts taking nips of brandy here and there. And by the way, I think Jenny was doing it too, she really is a daring sort of kitchen maid. Then, as will be no surprise to anybody, the brandy made Mr. Ranston feel very heroic and he told us all sorts of stories of his derring-do in the war and how he even dragged one soldier out of a linen closet in a seminary and gave him a good talking to so as to restore the man’s spirits and get him out into the fight.”
“Oh, dear, the poor man was so terrified that he was hiding in a linen closet?” Grace asked.
“’Parently so, though Mr. Ranston fixed him up by explaining his patriotic duty and how the king was counting on him. Then,” Betsy went on, “he sang us a few songs and that’s when I really started to wonder if he hadn’t drunk enough of Lord Heathway’s brandy. Then he ran out of the room crying and so I thought I better see where he was going as I still remember him shooting at you.”
Grace certainly did remember that too and was not likely to ever forget it.
“So I follows him to the main hall, and Gregory and Benny came too. Mr. Ranston walks right into the drawing room and sits himself down as if he owns the place and then starts crying about the fellow in the linen closet which just an hour before he’d been so cheerful about. Then he stands up and shouts something about not hiding from danger and falls over like a pile of bricks on the carpet.”
“Lady Heathway says he’s not to be dismissed, which I thought rather kind,” Grace said.
“Or loony, if you ask me,” Betsy said. “He’s stayin’ abed today and Mrs. Redwiggin is feeding him tea and toast, on Lady Heathway’s orders. The lady has also moved the brandy to a locked cabinet and gave Lord Heathway the key, so don’t ask me how Mr. Ranston will fortify himself the next time he’s guarding the house.”
Grace was rather bemused by what had gone on in the house, and sympathetic to how Betsy viewed it. When she attempted to imagine Manfred getting drunk and falling over in one of the drawing rooms of Barlow Hall, she really could not picture it. Or imagine what would have been the aftermath. Though, she was fairly certain a day of rest with tea and toast would not have been on the list of possibilities.
Betsy left her to her own tea and toast and Grace leaned back and allowed all the memories of last evening to flood over her. Mr. Ranston lying unconscious on the drawing room floor had really been the least of it.
How far would Lord Gresham take this spiteful little game he played? Must she always be looking over her shoulder to determine what he would do next?
It was upsetting enough to have encountered Mr. Jacobs and seen how angry he really was over being excluded. But now it seemed she had a second enemy.
But it made no sense! He was Lady Heathway’s nephew, and she was being shielded by Lady Heathway. Why should he wish to cause more trouble?
Was she in some way misreading the situation?
She did not see how she could be.
Grace wiped away a tear that had somehow had the audacity to present itself. It was so unfair that she should be drawn to him and also punished by him. She should find it easy to thoroughly dislike him. And she did. But then she didn’t.
Her mind disliked him because her mind was a very sensible creature. Her heart, though, was unruly and nonsensical.
She did not know what she was to do about it, other than be rational. Everything she did from now on must be rational.
Mr. Vance seemed to have some small interest in her. Was there something there?
There was not something romantic there, of that she was sure. But had not couples got on very well, simply as friends? He would be a rather marvelous friend, she was certain.
She would have time to think it over, as the next two days would be very quiet. She and Lady Heathway would make some calls, of course. But the evening entertainments would only be tomorrow evening when the duchess and her duke would come for whist with Lord and Lady Heathway. It was a longstanding engagement between the couples during the season—once a fortnight they would play one another and then have a buffet supper. Grace’s only duty was to spend some time softly playing at the pianoforte while they played their games. She was at once hopeful that it would be a peaceful evening, and fearful that it might not. Lady Heathway and the duchess were so competitive with one another that Grace could only imagine the less than cheerful spirits of the lady who lost.
After that evening, they would attend Lady Tredwell’s masque ball. Lady Heathway had met with Madame LeGrange to have something made for Grace to wear to it, though she did not yet know what it was. All she did know was that it would throw Miss Wilcox’s dress of last year into shadow and that dress had been a ridiculous collection of petals meant to appear as a rose. So, Grace supposed she would not turn up as a rose of any sort.
The masque would be her next venture out into the wider world and Grace was determined to make some decisions. Did anybody prefer her to other ladies? Did she prefer anyone, excepting the diabolical Lord Gresham, of course? And if she did not prefer someone who seemed to prefer her, what could she live with? Might it be Lord Ryland and his odd interest in murder? Or Mr. Vance, who was always so jolly but for whom there was not a spark at all? Or even Lord Bertridge, though he was rather straitlaced. Or maybe Lord Blackwood? After all, Lord Blackwood had just got a rather charming puppy—might that not be pleasant?
If any of those gentlemen asked, she would accept. She would say yes. Because Grace Yardley was not an idiot who would end a spinster on account of her ungovernable heart.
The two dayshad passed by peacefully, just as Grace had supposed they would. Reading and sewing and occasionally playing the pianoforte had been good for her. Especially reading, as it could take her mind well away from her own thoughts and plunk them into another world. In that world, a heroine might face all sorts of danger, but Grace could close the book and be satisfied that it was not herself chased by a ghost or finding oneself in the clutches of greedy and dangerous relations or looking everywhere for a missing fiancé. Though, she supposed after all shewaslooking everywhere for the missing fiancé.
Mr. Ranston had recovered from his adventure with Lord Heathway’s brandy, though whenever he entered the drawing room he glanced at where the decanter had once stood as if it were a constant scold against him.
