Page 124 of The Duke Undone

“I didn’t know what your father had done. When she stopped answering my letters, I felt that something was wrong, but I waited too long to act on my intuition. The company was changing then, from sail to steam, and the prize of our fleet, a steamship built to order, had sunk earlier that spring in the Black Sea. Peter and his father had gone to Odessa to negotiate with the insurers, a trip that lasted months. I had my hands full running the household, organizing company correspondence, keeping up a family presence at the docks, acting as Peter’s eyes and ears.”

She sat very straight, shoulders thrown back, exposing herself for their castigation.

“When she missed Maria’s birthday, I couldn’t ignore it any longer. I went to Weston Hall, and your father received me.”

Anthony sensed Lucy’s eyes upon him and straightened his own shoulders.

“He told me that your mother had become unmanageable. That her wanton behavior, her flirting and singing, had precipitated a crisis. He described an increased fondness for drink, the application of heavy perfumes, general derangement and immodesty, called her a strumpet, an embarrassment. It struck me as a cruel misinterpretation of my sister’s loving spirit and vivacity and I said so. That’s when he told me she was having an affair . . . with my husband, with Peter.”

Anthony started, and Lucy’s hand turned, gripping his.

“He showed me a fragment of a love letter written in her hand.” Bleakness moved across Aunt Helen’s face, stripping the color from her lips.

“No names. But he said it had been found the month before, in Peter’s office at the docks, in the fireplace. Peter had been careless burning the evidence. I walked out. I walked out blindly. I didn’t ask where Thalia had gone. I learned of it in the paper, like everyone else, when it was too late. I regret every day that I didn’t fight for her.”

“But she . . . and Uncle Peter . . .” Effie yanked at her braid, trying to contain her emotion.

“Nothing passed between them,” said Aunt Helen firmly. “The more I reflected, the more certain I became. The timing showed too much calculation. Why make the accusation then, when Peter was thousands of miles away? Besides, if Peter and Thalia were lovers, they would have corresponded in Greek.”

A rather cold defense to be mounted by a woman whose husband had been accused of adultery with her sister. But Helen was logical above all else.

“And, of course, when Peter arrived back to England, we had it out. Nothing passed between them but the love of brother for sister, sister for brother. I suspect the letter was a forgery.” Aunt Helen’s gaze flickered. “Your father had decided on his course of action and wanted more evidence of her supposed hysteria, while at the same time forcing our families apart.”

The warmth was gone. Numbness replaced it. Anthony hunched, slid his hand from Lucy’s, and thrust it into his pocket, where he twisted his watch chain savagely.

It had the hallmark of one of his father’s schemes. The tactical efficiency would have appealed to him. And yet . . . his father would never have falsified a document that humiliated his pride. Nor would he have needed to do so, with the right doctor in his pay.

Effie heaved a noisy breath, eyes fixed on the plate in her lap. For her, their father’s death was fresh, and their mother’s suffering had a vivid corollary in her own experience.

No more of this discussion.

Aunt Helen seemed to agree. She glanced at Anthony, took in his slouch, the hand in his pocket, and changed the subject.

“I almost forgot,” she said, her tone lighter. “I have a present for you, a bit late for your birthday, but . . .”

She put aside her cup and went to a cabinet.

“Papou’s worry beads,” she said, smiling down at him. “You played with them once upon a time.”

“I remember,” he said hoarsely, although he hadn’t until this moment, looking down at the amber beads strung alongside gold, the rich silk tassel. He let the beads drop through his fingers, twirled them so they dropped again. The movement, the rhythm, aligned him. He felt a tiny burst of wonder as he made the gesture his grandfather had made, and his grandfather’s father, and his. Restlessness, harnessed in this way, could produce a kind of peace.

He rose and kissed his Aunt Helen’s cheek. Lucy rose too. Her aunt had to be worried sick.

“Thank you for the tea and cookies,” she murmured as Aunt Helen turned to her. “I should be getting home.”

“You’ll come back soon, though,” said Effie. She seemed to shake off her pall, rising to wrap Lucy in a fierce embrace.

“Of course.” Lucy’s response was a bit breathless, perhaps due to the rib-cracking pressure. Her eyes brushed Anthony’s as she came away from Effie, their glow unreadable.

“I’ll call the coach,” he said.

Chapter Twenty

The first street passed, and the second, and they said nothing. Darkness had fallen and intermittent light from the swinging side lamp caught the green of his eyes, gave her the color and contour of his face, again and again. In the moments between, the shadows devoured everything. It was hypnotizing, his beauty revealed with startling clarity, then swept away.

Clouds of chloroform vapor still scudded in her brain, periodically blanking her thoughts. Lucy could dimly remember the seemingly interminable cycles of stupor and sudden shocked clarity, how she’d fought to hold her breath when the damp sponge descended until something hard and hot detonated in her lungs, and she inhaled and was lost.

“Thank you,” he said at last, his heated voice emerging like a caress. “I cannot tell you how much.” He shook his head, studying her face, which doubtless flickered as his did. Shadow swallowed his expression.