“So he said.” He stooped to plant a kiss on his aunt’s cheek. “I want to know what you can tell me about the Countess of Portland.”
His aunt sat up straighter. “Claire Portland? Good heavens, whatever for?”
Sebastian simply ignored the question. “What do you think of her?”
Aunt Henrietta gave a genteel sniff. “A pretty little thing, obviously. But all bubble and froth if you ask me.”
“She certainly gives that impression. But appearances can be deceiving.”
“Sometimes. But not in this case, I’m afraid.” His aunt fixed him with a fierce stare. “And now, not another word until you tell me your interest in the lady.”
“It appears that at one time, Lady Anglessey thought to marry Claire Portland’s brother, the Chevalier de Varden.”
“Hmmm. Yes, I can see that. Dashingly handsome man, the Chevalier. And nothing piques a girl’s fancy more than a tragic, romantic past.”
“Dear Aunt. One might almost suspect you of nourishing a tendre for the fellow yourself.”
She made a deep rumbling sound that shook her impressive bosom. “I’ve no patience with romantic, handsome young men, and well you know it.”
Sebastian smiled. “Lady Portland. Tell me about her.”
Aunt Henrietta settled herself more comfortably. “Not much to tell, I’m afraid. Her father, the late Lord Audley, left her well dowered. She had a successful season and married the Earl of Portland at the end of it.”
“What about Portland himself?”
Again, that genteel sniff. “I’ve heard him referred to as a handsome man, although personally I’ve no use for redheads. But there’s no denying the old Earl, his father, cut up quite warm. And Portland himself’s not one for wasting the ready at the gaming table. Claire did quite well for herself. I wouldn’t say Portland’s one to sit in his wife’s pocket, but then he hasn’t set up a mistress, either, that anyone knows of. He seems to spend most of his time at Whitehall.”
“And the lady Portland? Has she established herself as something of a political hostess?”
“I doubt she has either the inclination or the intelligence to carry it off.”
Sebastian came to take the chair opposite her. “She seems surprisingly close to Morgana Quinlan.”
“Well, that’s to be expected, isn’t it, given the close proximity of their fathers’ estates?”
“I would have said the two women were of starkly different temperaments.”
“Yes. But sometimes friendships are like marriages: the best couplings are between opposites.”
Sebastian was silent for a moment, his thoughts on his own parents’ marriage. That was one instance when a coupling of opposite temperaments had definitely not prospered. But all he said was “Lady Quinlan seems to nourish a particularly bitter animosity toward her sister. Do you know why?”
“Hmm. I suspect she had her nose put out of joint when her younger sister succeeded so much better than she in the Marriage Mart. Frankly, I was surprised Lady Morgana went off at all. The woman’s not only a shameless bluestocking, but a dead bore to boot, which is far worse. I once made the mistake of attending one of her scientific evenings. Some gentleman lectured us interminably on Leyden jars and copper wires. Then he killed a frog and reanimated it with electric shocks. It was quite revolting.”
Sebastian leaned forward. “How did he kill the frog?”
Aunt Henrietta drained her chocolate cup and set it aside. “Poison, I believe.”
THE HOME SECRETARY, the Earl of Portland, was sitting in a coffeehouse just off the Mall, a steaming cup on the table before him, when Sebastian slid into the opposite seat.
“I don’t recall inviting you to sit,” said Portland, regarding Sebastian through narrowed eyes.
“You didn’t,” said Sebastian cheerfully.
The air filled with the steady beat of a drum and the tramp of feet as a troop of soldiers marched past. Fresh cannon fodder, thought Sebastian, on their way to Portsmouth and the war on the other side of the Channel. No one in the coffee shop even looked up.
Portland leaned back in his seat, a faint smile touching his lips. “My wife tells me she met you in Lady Quinlan’s drawing room yesterday.”
“You didn’t tell me you were brother-in-law to the dead lady’s lover.”
“You mean Varden?” Portland raised his cup to his lips and took a thoughtful sip. “I know there was an attachment of long standing between them, but I wouldn’t care to hazard on its present nature.”
“Tell me about him.”
Portland shrugged. “A likable enough lad, I suppose, if a bit too hotheaded and impulsive for my taste. But then he’s half-French, so I suppose that’s to be expected.”
“What can you tell me about his politics?”
Portland gave a sharp laugh and took another sip. “The pup is twenty-one years old. He’s interested in wine, women, and song. Not the composition of the Prince’s cabinet.”
“How about dynastic disputes? Might they interest him?”
Portland lowered his cup, his face suddenly drawn and serious. “What are you talking about?”
Sebastian let the question slide past him. “The lady who asked you to convey the note to the Prince, what can you tell me about her?”
Portland glanced down at his cup, his sandy red eyebrows drawing together in a thoughtful frown. “She was young, I would say. At least that’s the impression I had. If I could see the color of her hair, I don’t recall it.”
“Definitely a lady?”
“I would have said so, yes.” He hesitated. “I think she was tall, but I can’t be certain. Perhaps I simply imagined that afterward, when I assumed it was Lady Anglessey who had handed me the billet-doux.”
Sebastian leaned back in his seat, his gaze on the other man’s face. It struck him as too much of a coincidence that the note used to lure the Prince to the Yellow Cabinet had been given to the Home Secretary, rather than to one of the sycophants with which the Prince typically surrounded himself. Then again, it was always possible that the woman in green had singled out Portland deliberately.
Aloud, Sebastian said, “Do you remember the dagger that was in Lady Anglessey’s back?”
Portland turned his head to stare out the shop’s bay window to the street beyond, empty now in the bright sun. His throat worked as if he had to fight to swallow, and his voice, when he spoke, was strained. “It’s not something I’m likely to forget, now, is it? The way it stuck out of her like a—”
“Had you ever seen it before?”
“The dagger?” He looked around again, his eyes opening wide as if in surprise. “Of course. It’s part of the collection of Stuart memorabilia that was in the possession of Henry Stuart when he died. I believe it belonged to his grandfather, James the Second.”
The bell on the shop’s door jangled as two soldiers came in, bringing with them the smell of morning air and sun-warmed brick and a whiff of fresh manure. Sebastian kept his gaze on the Scotsman’s freckled face. “What happened to it?”
“You mean after Henry’s death? Don’t you know? He willed the entire collection to the Prince of Wales—the Regent.”
Chapter 38
Kat spent a restless night. Her dreams were troubled by marching rows of dead soldiers and a bloodstained guillotine that creaked ominously in the wind.
Rising early, she went to stand at the window overlooking the street below. In the clear dawn light she could see the milkmaids making their rounds, the buckets of fresh milk dangling from the yokes across their shoulders.
She had no regrets for the things she had done. The tyranny the French soldiers had brought to the continent of Europe was nothing compared to the horrors Ireland had suffered under the English for hundreds of years now. She would still do whatever she could to hasten the day of Ireland’s liberation. But she could not, in all honesty, accept Sebastian’s love and continue to give aid to the enemy he had risked his life to fight.