Not that Stephen meant to concern Sybil with the troubling epistle he’d picked up from the silver salver the footman had offered him a little more than an hour before.
“Ah, just what I need,” he murmured, sinking onto a footstool and resting his cheek against her hand as she gently eased the tension from his shoulders.
“You have something on your mind, Stephen. Is it Humphrey?”
He was glad she’d asked the question in such direct terms, enabling him to dispute this—in fact, dispute that there was a problem at all. Darling Sybil, so pure and trusting, had endured so much unhappiness at the hands of her cold and unloving husband, Stephen was not about to weigh her down with problems that would terrify her, but about which she could do nothing.
Nor had Stephen any idea yet as to how he would go about responding to the demand for payment if he didn’t want to see the reputation besmirched of a certain lady with whom he’d been on intimate terms.
The certain lady must refer to Sybil, of course, and the letter hinted at revealing the scandal of her apparent faithlessness with Stephen. Little matter that Lord Partington had sanctioned their union. Little matter that Lord Partington had been the first to stray, literally the day after their wedding night, abandoning his hapless betrothed, Miss Hazlett, at the altar to wed Sybil, only to return to his apparent true love, Miss Hazlett, before the ink had dried on his wedding vows.
No, Humphrey, Lord Partington, would be unaffected by the scandal, as would Stephen, for as men, they were permitted to stray. The only person whose reputation would suffer was Sybil. Though perhaps that would be the impetus needed for her to run away with Stephen to the Continent, where they would be free to love each other as they were only permitted to do, here, in secret. Of course, she’d never do that to her children. Hetty and Araminta were safely married, but Celia was only a baby.
A terrible thought struck him as Sybil gently nuzzled his ear. What if the blackmailer went further than to reveal Stephen’s affair with Sybil.
As matters stood, Humphrey acknowledged their daughter, Celia, as his. But what if the writer of this extortion demand—for that was what it was—had knowledge of Celia’s true parentage? What if the scandal revealed the fact that Stephen, not Humphrey, was Celia’s real father?
Celia was the principal reason Sybil refused to run away with him. She knew that to do so would be ruinous to the infant’s future. At least with Hetty and Araminta respectably married, there could be no harm to them.
As much as Stephen adored Sybil, he knew she was right. He couldn’t succumb to his feelings if it made baby Celia ineligible for a portion of her father’s estate and, with her illegitimacy recognized, unable to contract any decent marriage.
“Why, Stephen dearest, your cheek is awfully cold. How long have you been alone in this draughty room? Let me warm you.”
Feeling her softly rounded body enfolding him in her loving embrace was cathartic. Sybil had been the first and only woman who’d shown him true love. His beautiful, feckless mother had gambled away the fortune she’d inherited from her father, and then that of her husband, leaving virtually nothing for Stephen.
He gazed up at the mud-spattered window, half-c
overed with tentacles of ivy. The horrors of the Peninsula Campaign were like a long-distant memory of hunger, pain, cold, and privation. They had, however, fostered in Stephen a self-reliance which had stood him in good stead when he’d returned to England with little more than the clothes on his back.
He’d hardly been able to believe his luck when Lord Partington had solicited him as his heir. Now he was a young man with expectations. He would inherit a grand estate, and for nearly two years had spent a great deal of time at The Grange. To all appearances, he and his benefactor enjoyed a convivial relationship, but the truth was that while they rubbed along well enough, Lord Partington was happy enough to leave Stephen to his own devices—or rather, his wife—while he indulged himself with his mistress of more than twenty years, Miss Hazlett.
Far in the distance came the sound of thunder.
“Is it Celia? You know her grizzling mood is brought on only by the fact she’s cutting teeth.” He heard the smile in Sybil’s voice. “You mustn’t worry that it’s an indication of her temperament.”
“Lord preserve us that she should inherit Araminta’s temperament,” Stephen murmured, smiling as he held Sybil closer. “To think that I might have been leg-shackled to her.”
“No, instead of my lovely young daughter, you chose her aging mother. Oh Stephen, and you still haven’t rued the day?”
Stephen wished Sybil wouldn’t speak like this, even in jest. For him, it was Sybil’s warmth and loving heart that mattered most. He also thought her the most serene looking of any woman he’d ever come across. Indeed, in the two years since they’d been lovers, he believed time and age had only imbued her with greater loveliness. It was as if a light glowed from within her.
“I’ll never rue the day, my love. Even when you are ninety years old, and I’m a spring chicken of seventy-five, my heart will forever be yours. But talking of Araminta, she seemed agitated when I last saw her. No longer smelling of April and May, it would seem?”
“When was Araminta ever smelling of April and May? Certainly not with Debenham.” Sybil sighed. “Araminta brings her own problems upon her shoulders, but I’m sorry that this marriage is such a difficult one for her. The only blessing I can see is that she’s provided Debenham with an heir in such a timely fashion. If he finds fault with her in other ways, at least she’s done him proud in this one respect.”
“Indeed, she has,” Stephen agreed.
Back in London, there was no Sybil to rub his weary shoulders to soothe away his troubles. The Home Office was not a place to put his cares aside, but he could not remain at The Grange. He and Sybil had been discreet about their affair for two years and to the best of Stephen’s knowledge, no one, not even the servants—suspected.
His fears multiplied, of course, as he went about his work. A suspected move to blacken Princess Caroline’s name was afoot. Personally, Stephen thought she was doing a fine enough job on her own, though he had found her surprisingly fetching when he’d met her briefly the year before. Certainly, she was blunt, if not at times coarse in her language—as he’d been warned—and untidy about her person, but he’d found her frankness and directness refreshing. The great surprise was that she should ever have become consort to the fastidious Prince Regent, though, of course, the inducement of 160,000 pounds by his father to cover his debts could explain anything, he supposed.
And there was the matter of how to explain Debenham’s involvement in the Spencean uprising several years before, and the attempt on Lord Castlereagh’s life. So far, there was no evidence beyond the damaging letter. Damaging, simply not incriminating enough on its own though it hinted at much broader involvement on Debenham’s part. Perhaps Debenham had tucked his head in since then, and if that were the case, did Stephen really want to push ahead to uncover more dirt on his Cousin Araminta’s husband? No one had been killed or maimed in the conspiracy. Perhaps the time had come to simply leave Debenham out of their investigations and concentrate on another line of inquiry.
Like who was behind the blackmail letter Stephen had received. He’d said nothing to anyone while he gathered his resources to make the necessary payment by Thursday next. What else could he do? Allow the Pandora’s Box to be split open and the world to know that he and Sybil were lovers, thus casting doubt on Celia’s paternity?
Stephen could not bear such shame to taint either Sybil or Celia. He was a man, and his lack of dependency made him far better placed to withstand the opprobrium to follow.
But Sybil? And Celia? No, he simply could not risk irreparable damage to the two females in his life he loved more than his own.