The Wyndham Legacy (Legacy 1)

“That is quite the oddest thing I’ve ever heard. She doesn’t sound appropriate as your personal maid.”

“I think, Spears, that Maggie will change your mind. I like her. She’s different, somehow whole and unsullied, despite her rather colorful background. There is kindness in her and the sweetest devilment imaginable.”

Spears divested himself of his own outer garments. His attitude was stiff. It wasn’t her duty to see to him. If she were lax in matters of propriety, he most certainly wasn’t. He would speak both to Mr. Badger and to this Maggie, who was a sweet devil.

“Do come into the parlor or salon, as the French say. I want to hear everything. First, why didn’t you write me? I had to find out from Mr. Wicks that Marcus was here in Paris. Then it took Badger nearly three days to find him.”

“I know,” Spears said gently. “I will tell you everything.”

“His arm, Spears, is he all right? Why didn’t you tell me he’d been wounded? Why didn’t you write to me or send a messenger?”

Spears was silent a moment, then shook his head slowly. “I had no wish to worry you.” He sighed deeply. “I fear it still gives his lordship a lot of pain. The bullet fragments are still embedded, you see, in his upper arm. Many times he can’t sleep with the pain. Naturally he refuses to be quacked. He won’t even allow a tincture of laudanum in a cup of tea. I have, of course, many times ignored his wishes to do what is best for him.”

Her face was perfectly white and Spears quickly added, his voice smooth and persuasive as a vicar’s, “But for the most part, it continues to heal. A physician could do nothing really. The fragments are very, very small and they eventually make their way out of the arm, which sounds rather disgusting, but it happens and it’s a good thing it does happen. It’s just a matter of time until he is perfectly fit again, Duchess.”

“Time grows short.”

“Actually,” Badger said from the drawing room doorway, a huge wooden ladle in his hand, “time runs out in exactly two and one half weeks. I, for one, hate to leave things to the last minute. Last minute endeavors never succeed.”

“Mr. Badger has told me of your plan, Duchess. It will work. We will contrive.” She believed him. He would make a splendid Foreign Minister, she thought, and took his arm as they walked into the dining room. There was no one to remark that the very rich young English lady, who had no chaperon and whose personal maid was upstairs arranging her glorious red hair in preparation to drive a young Russian cossack mad, was eating in the splendidly decorated dining room with her cook and an earl’s valet.

The Duchess didn’t hear a thing from Spears until the following evening.

“His lordship,” Spears said with admirable control, and with two bright spots of color on his lean cheeks, “got into a fisticuffs last night. He is in bed with two cracked ribs, a black eye, and nearly an entire set of bruised knuckles. All his teeth, however, and thank the good Lord, are unharmed, still white and even and whole. He was also grinning like a sinner.”

“How could he fight with his arm still hurt?”

Badger laughed. “Mr. Spears, did he tell you how his opponents fared?”

“Yes. Evidently one of the English officers called him the Dispossessed Earl, and his lordship beat the, er . . . he gave better than he got. He was hurt because this opponent had friends. It was one-sided, you see. His arm wasn’t harmed Duchess. It was unfortunate that Lord Chilton was occupied elsewhere, or his ribs just might have survived.”

“I see,” the Duchess said, her voice faint. “However does anyone know about the stipulations of my father’s will?”

“These things have a way of spreading,” Badger said. “Like the plague.”

“That is an excellent analogy, Mr. Badger. Very apt. Any news that titillates precludes secrets. His lordship’s, er, mistress is with him, at his request. She very prettily asked me to provide her with the appropriate nostrums. I left her gently daubing his lordship’s brow with a soft cloth dipped in rosewater, and humming one of those new ditties to him, by that English fellow.”

“His mistress with him?” she said, her voice thin and high. “Soothing his fevered brow?”

“I do not believe his brow is fevered. Despite his injuries, his lordship was giving her many, er, interested looks, which bodes well for his general feeling of well-being. However, despite his lordship’s wishes as regards her, I will nonetheless contrive to send her back to her own dwelling this evening. It may be very late, but it will be done.” He gently flicked a piece of lint from his dark blue jacket sleeve. “You will be relieved to know she isn’t a harpy, Duchess, nor is she always pestering his lordship for baubles and jewels and the like. Indeed, I believe she cares as much for his lordship as a creature of her stamp can care for anyone.”

Like my mother, she thought, but said aloud, “I am delighted to hear it. Actually, relief is an emotion I’m not feeling at the moment, Spears. Perhaps I should invite her to tea to thank her for her restraint.”

Spears turned away, hiding his very small grin, saying over his shoulder, “Perhaps it isn’t such a good idea. She would expire with shock.”

“That would be a good start,” the Duchess said.

Rancor, Spears thought. It was indeed rancor, a goodly dose of it.

He said, “Her name is Lisette DuPlessis.”

The Duchess said nothing to that.

“His lordship likes her name. He thinks it sweet.”

“I don’t trust Marcus,” the Duchess said finally, looking over Spears’s right shoulder. “I don’t want to chance leaving this business until the last minute. I agree with Badger. I want to complete the matter tonight.”

“If his lordship will allow me to remove his mistress from his bedchamber.”