Grace had seen little of the dowager countess in recent memory, but she had seen the girl more than a handful of times. She wasn’t yet out in society, but she was a pleasant enough child, always ready with a polite wave or a nod—even though Grace was certain that Eliza’s brother would not have approved, since Grace’s family was not consideredgood Ton, and thus not the sort of people with whom Eliza ought to encourage any degree of familiarity.
She had also seen Eliza sneaking choice bits of meat to Tansyin the garden on occasion, and that alone made this unusual, utterly inappropriate request worthy of her consideration. “Suppose you tell me this secret,” she said, “and I’ll judge for myself whether it’s one worth keeping.” Unless she missed her guess, he had no other choice. Whether she spilled it herself or not, itwouldget out, eventually—if she elected to refuse him her assistance.
His well-formed lips firmed, thinned. A long beat of silence passed between them. And at last, as his jaw flexed, he said, “Your mother was a bigamist by your own admission. Which would make you a bastard, if I’m not mistaken. Is that not so?”
Grace had heard the word too many times for it to sting, and she’d long since stopped considering the circumstances of her birth any of her own responsibility, besides. “Yes,” she said, simply.
At last he met her gaze, that piercing blue so severe, so weighty that it pinned her in place. And he said, “So am I.”
Chapter Five
He’d surprised her. Henry could see it in the part of her cupid’s bow lips, the arch of her gold brows, the widening of those incredible grassy-green eyes.
She blinked once—twice. Said, in a dazed tone, “I beg your pardon? Surely you’re not implying you are not your father’s son. I recall having seen you together a time or two, before”—here, her lips pursed just briefly, as though she feared touching upon an uncomfortable subject—“before he passed,” she concluded. “You’re the very image of him. No one could possibly say otherwise.”
Oddly, he appreciated the delicacy. It had been only a year since his father’s death, and still it was difficult to believe he was gone. “It’s not my parentage which is in question,” he said. “In fact, that might sting the worst of all, as it wouldn’t matter, legally speaking, even if it was. A child born to parents who are wed is presumed to be the husband’s child, even if he or she is obviously not.”
That little furrow between her brows. “I’m sorry,” she said. “Youareyour father’s child, then? His eldest son?”
“His only son.” Another complicating factor.
“What, then, is in question?”
“The date of my birth as it relates to the date of my parents’ marriage.” Henry blew out a rough sigh, gave another vicious yank of his hand through his hair, and wrenched free the tangles that had formed in the light breeze. “Will you sit, Miss Seymour?” he asked, with a gesture toward the small table he’d had placed near the side of the house, well away from any windows—or prying eyes or ears.
“I suppose I had better.” She sank into the chair he offered to her with an effortless elegance, folding her hands in her lap. “I confess, my lord, I’ve been out in society for five years now, and I still find the ways of the aristocracy rather odd. I don’t suppose you could be…a bit more elucidating?”
He’d have to be, it seemed. “It’s old gossip now,” he said, “though there are certainly still some who hold it against my family. But before my parents married, my mother was my father’s mistress.”
Those gold brows shot up again. “Oh,” she said. “I’d never have suspected.”
“It was thirty years ago. It’s not bandied about as it once was. But some people have long memories, and even after their marriage, there were many years in which my mother found most doors in London firmly closed against her.” Even if the censure had faded over the years, Mother had never been particularly strong-willed. Without the reassurance of Father’s presence at her side, she had withered, wilted. Shut herself away from society. “When my mother found herself in a delicate condition—”
“Pregnant, you mean to say.”
Henry tapped his fingertips upon the surface of the table in agitation. “I did, but I prefer to use a modicum more tact.”
“Why? There’s no sense in mincing words in such a situation as yours.”
Goddamn it all, she had a point. “When my realized she waspregnant,” he corrected, “my father was traveling. Letters were slow to reach him, if they arrived at all. I don’t believe Mother expected that he would marry her—but as soon as he learned of my impending birth, he came back at once.”
“Good of him,” Grace allowed.
“He loved her,” he said. “And she loved him. She hadn’t expected him to save her from her predicament, but he defied his family’s wishes and married her as soon as he’d arrived.”
“I’m sensing abut.”
Ofcoursethere was a damnedbut. They would not now be having this conversation had there not been a damnedbut. “He arrived too late,” he said. “By a matter of days.”
“Oh,” she said. And then, “Oh. So you’re—”
“Illegitimate,” he said. “By way of a damned technicality. Iammy father’s son—his only son. But being born outside of wedlock makes me a bastard.” Not the earl at all. “My birth was a scandal anyway. Plenty of couples advance their vows. I can name a dozen or more lords who arrived less than nine months after their parents’ marriages.”
“Early babies,” Grace said. “That’s what they say, isn’t it? That the first babe can come at any time. To save face, I assume, and most just pretend that it is so.”
“For some, I suppose, it must be true. But it would be a damned miracle for a child to arrive so early as I did, and everyone knew my mother had been my father’s mistress, besides. What they managed to hush up—or so they thought—was the fact that my birth had preceded my parents’ marriage.”
“How did they do it?” Grace asked, and to her credit her expression was interested, not horrified.
