An enchanted prince who was unquestionably the new Viscount Hillbrook. The letter confirming the identity of the clergyman officiating at his parents’ wedding had arrived while she was at Castle Craven.
Outside the church, sunlight dazzled Sidonie. As her vision cleared, she noted a strange hush in the crowd, different from the respectful silence appropriate to a funeral. Puzzled, she saw a commanding man in black marching with unhesitating purpose toward Roberta. She had no idea who he was but immediately recognized his aura of power. It was a quality Jonas shared. With a sudden lurch of fear, she ushered the boys toward Barstowe Hall’s housekeeper.
“Lady Hillbrook?” The stranger performed a cursory bow. “I am Sir Pelham George from London. May I have a private word? I apologize for intruding upon this sad day, but my time in Wiltshire is limited.”
Perhaps he was a creditor. Sidonie was surprised William’s debtors hadn’t already descended like vultures. This man didn’t look like a creditor. He looked like someone who ruled a small kingdom by personal edict.
“I’m not myself, Sir Pelham,” Roberta said in the breathy tone she’d adopted since William’s death. Raising her veils, she fixed her tragic blue gaze upon the gentleman. “I beg your indulgence. Please call at Barstowe Hall tomorrow when I may feel stronger.”
Sidonie shouldn’t resent her sister’s dramatics. After all, she’d convinced everyone that she genuinely mourned her husband, making her an unlikely murderer. Sidonie waited for this stranger to fall victim to Roberta’s blond beauty. Instead his expression remained stern as he extended his arm. “My lady?”
The crowd’s avid curiosity buzzed around them. Dread coiled inside Sidonie. Dear God, was Sir Pelham here to arrest Roberta? But his manner was solicitous rather than threatening—and nobody but Roberta, Sidonie, and Jonas knew the truth behind William’s death.
“If you insist.” Sulkiness pierced Roberta’s pretense at the pliable, pitiable widow. Her lips thinned as she accepted his escort. “My sister will accompany us.”
Without speaking, Sir Pelham bowed to Sidonie. He drew Roberta aside while Sidonie followed. “My lady, this news may prove distressing.”
Cold sweat prickled across Sidonie’s skin as she frantically wondered what she’d do if this stranger took Roberta into custody. Roberta’s eyes widened with immediate panic and her delicate throat moved as she swallowed. “Sir, I cannot imagine what more could distress me, given I’ve just lost my husband.”
The man’s expression became impossibly severe. Something in Sidonie guessed what he planned to say before he spoke. Heaven lend her strength, she’d feared for the wrong person. Roberta wasn’t under threat.
Across a long distance, she heard the deep rumble of Sir Pelham George’s voice, every word clear as a bell. “After evidence laid with the local magistrate, Jonas Merrick has been arrested for the murder of his cousin, Viscount Hillbrook.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
Sidonie clutched her shabby brown cloak around her and shifted on the wooden chair to relieve her numb backside. The fear that beat like a drum beneath every breath almost distracted her from her discomfort. Around her, austere Roman faces glowered down as if to insist that she had no right to be here, in the foyer of Rothermere House, the Duke of Sedgemoor’s extravagant London mansion.
The statues looked sterner by the minute. But even supercilious marble patricians couldn’t match the disapproval expressed by the duke’s butler when opening the door to such a badly dressed woman. A woman purporting to be sister-in-law to the insolvent, now deceased Lord Hillbrook. A woman claiming no acquaintance with His Grace but who insisted upon seeing him on behalf of a man awaiting trial for murder.
The butler had several times indicated that His Grace wasn’t at home. Sidonie had several times indicated with all the frosty hauteur she could muster that she’d wait. For Jonas’s sake, Sidonie endured the servant’s rudeness, just as she endured this long delay. Grim determination had got her from Barstowe Hall to London after the funeral two days ago and to Newgate Prison yesterday. Grim determination had kept her at Rothermere House all day. Tonight she’d sleep at Merrick House, William’s London property, under the careless eye of its scant staff. Tomorrow grim determination would spur her to pursue her quest to clear Jonas’s name.
Knowing it was pointless expecting a nobleman to receive her earlier, she’d arrived at the duke’s house midmorning. Now long beams of light through the fanlight above the door showed afternoon advanced toward evening.
She still hadn’t advanced beyond the entrance hall.
Other people had come and gone, she assumed to see His Grace. She was familiar enough with aristocratic ways to know that “not at home” meant not at home to petitioners who arrived without appointment and with a barely concealed air of desperation. The parade of approved callers had ended about an hour ago. Bleakly Sidonie was aware that the butler would soon throw her out. She was tired, she was disheartened, she was stiff with sitting so long, and she was so thirsty she could drink the Thames dry. Unwelcome petitioners didn’t rate tea or even a glass of water.
Her belly cramped with hunger but she disregarded it. She hadn’t eaten since last night, when she’d choked down some bread and cheese after a fruitless day fighting to convince Jonas’s jailers to allow her to see him. Naïvely she’d imagined she merely needed to request an interview with a prisoner and it would be granted. But no amount of pleading had got her beyond the gates.
When she’d first glimpsed the prison’s dark, sinister bulk, she’d felt sick with fear and outrage. The very stones of Newgate seeped misery. Jonas didn’t belong there. Jonas belonged with her. She’d save him from hanging if it killed her.
Biting her lip, she curled her fingers into her white muslin skirts. How Jonas would despise seeing her dressed this way. Clearly an opinion the churlish butler shared. She’d thought to borrow one of Roberta’s dresses, but her sister’s fashionable figure meant everything Sidonie tried strained across overflowing curves. Sidonie had hoped it wouldn’t matter what she wore. She’d mention Jonas’s name and the duke would see her. After all, hadn’t Camden Rothermere saved Jonas at Eton? Hadn’t he come to Castle Craven to warn Jonas of William’s erratic behavior? Her experience in the increasingly chilly hall indicated that Jonas’s churlishness to the duke in Devon had snapped any boyhood bonds between the men.
Where did that leave her?
Her hands clenched so hard in her meager skirts that the knuckles shone bloodless. Fierce demons of despair had snapped at her heels since she’d learned of Jonas’s arrest. She hadn’t even waited to learn what evidence had been laid against him before she’d set off for London. Anyway, she could guess. The feud was common knowledge and the duke had said at Castle Craven that William sought legal redress for the failed emerald sche
me. It would take little for suspicions to focus on William’s cousin if the authorities decided to treat Lord Hillbrook’s death as other than accidental.
She was going to save Jonas. She wouldn’t fail. She was his only hope.
Perhaps she should try Jonas’s other Eton friend, Richard Harmsworth. She’d assumed a duke would make an ideal champion, but today’s ordeal indicated the duke might remain beyond reach unless she waylaid him away from his watchdogs. Except her knowledge of the habits of London gentlemen was close to nonexistent. The butler was right to treat her as a country mouse. She didn’t know enough of this sophisticated world to plan an effective campaign.
Well, you can learn.
Perhaps she should leave and smarten her appearance. The problem was she was woefully short of money. And time. She needed to get Jonas out of Newgate, where they kept him pending his trial. She didn’t have the luxury to wait for a modiste to fashion a stylish gown. Even if she could afford such a thing. Sidonie only had what little she’d saved from Barstowe Hall’s miserly housekeeping. And the proceeds of selling her hairpins.
The diamond pins had been a precious memento. She’d expected to mourn their loss. But what were pretty chips of polished stone compared to this threat to the man she loved? She’d relinquished them with no twinge of regret. What she’d regretted was how little she’d received in exchange.