“I mean, is the Viscount of Beswick friendly with Charlotte? She mentioned a friendship with him.”
“My daughters suffer from the modern malady of gossip, both listening and sharing,” Aunt Judith waved away.
“Hardly gossip, Mama,” Jean protested, “they have been seen together. I have it on reliable authority.”
“And where is that?” Charlotte asked.
“Promenading at the races in York,” Jean said with a touch of pride.
“And at the assembly rooms,” Alice put in conspiratorially.
“In the past month?” Charlotte pressed, and Jean nodded subtly as if it were the greatest secret.
That would mean Amelia somehow found Luke but decided against arriving at Hamilton House. Why?
“Perhaps we should pay a visit to the Viscount Beswick, then?” Seth suggested. “Does he live nearby?”
“The priory is only a few miles away,” Emmeline said.
“He is not there,” Uncle Henry put in unexpectedly.
All eyes turned to him, and he blinked in surprise at the attention.
“I went over there stalking a particularly fine stag and was told by the agent that he had gone to Scotland.”
“Agent?” Aunt Judith demanded, turning her full and formidable attention onto her husband, “Whatever do you mean, Henry? What agent?”
“Well, I presume since his mother died, that young Beswick wanted a change of scenery—”
“Died?” Charlotte all but spluttered, directing the room of eyes her way this time, before reprimanding herself again for speaking out of turn. “I—I mean to say, how unfortunate.”
“Ah, yes,” Uncle Henry nodded slowly, “and he has decided to sell Beswick Priory. The agent was in the process of valuingthe place and arranging the sale. No shortage of buyers, I’m thinking.”
His mother died? Oh, how tragic for Luke… and I had not been there to console him in his time of need…
A terribly guilt-laden pit grew in Charlotte’s belly. She had not considered what the consequences of not beingherselffor a while might have been for those she cared for.
“How could you know something like this and not tell us, Papa?” Emmeline cried out.
“None of you were particularly friends with young Beswick, only Charlotte. It didn’t seem to be the kind of news you would find interesting,” Uncle Henry protested.
“A neighbor of ours decides to move, selling his ancestral home, and you do not think it is worthy of note,” Aunt Judith tutted with disgust, “honestly, Henry, I despair.”
“Did he say where in Scotland?” Charlotte asked, trying to keep the urgency from her voice.
“Oh, I don’t know. It went in one ear and out the other, so to speak.Stra— something.Strathperhaps? That’s a name the Scots use, isn’t it? I cannot recall in all honesty.”
Charlotte looked at Seth and saw her own despair in his eyes. Their only leads were now an old and derelict home in Carlisle and the entire country of Scotland.
If Amelia had indeed, by some miracle, gone with Luke to Scotland, they could be anywhere. What chance of finding them before the term of the marriage clause expired? That was just over a week away.
CHAPTER 27
They rode to Beswick Priory on two horses loaned by Henry Nightingale. Charlotte led the way along winding lanes between rolling hills and lush meadows. Dark woods stained the hillside, and beyond rose the brooding mass of the dales.
Seth was immune to the picturesque countryside. It should have been a refreshing contrast to the smoke, smells, and stone of London, particularly for a man born and raised in the capital. But Seth couldn’t help but brood on the seemingly insurmountable obstacles they were facing.
When the quest was simply to find Amelia and obtain her agreement to publicly reject me, that seemed achievable, even if she was at the other end of England. But Scotland might as well be India. We cannot reach it and find her in time.
