Jane shrugged. “Talking about her hurt. All of it hurts.”
“Oh, Jane,” Esme whispered, and wrapped and arm around her. She hugged her gently. “Why don’t we go back to the others? It’s more likely that Finn, Sebastian and Marianne would recognize who this Hugo person might be than me. I lost track of all those fops when I left this life and I can hardly be bothered to figure them all out now. Poor Bentley has to give me a cheat sheet every time we can manage to get a few of them to lower themselves to come to our home.”
Jane’s cheeks burned at the idea, but she nodded as Esme got up and Jane followed her back down the hallway to the parlor. She’d long ago given up on the idea of humiliation and yet that was what burned in her chest as they returned to the others.
Ripley immediately made his way back to her and the relief she felt when he did was too powerful. She focused on him while Esme very kindly took the others aside and briefly explained what was going on so that Jane wouldn’t have to repeat the awful story all over again.
“They’ll think me a fool,” Jane said as she stared into his eyes and allowed their depths to calm her.
Ripley shrugged. “Then they can all go to hell.”
She smiled at his instant dismissal of people who mattered in the world and in his business. Because she needed to feel him, she took his hand, memorized the rough slide of his palm against hers. He squeezed gently and she drew a ragged breath.
“I’m so sorry, Jane,” Delacourt said as the others faced them at last. She searched his face for annoyance that she’d brought this mess to his house, but saw none. In fact, he crossed to her and touched her shoulder briefly. There was nothing but kindness in him as he said, “Please know that we’ll do all in our power to find your sister.”
“Thank you.”
“Esme told us about this man who was involved,” Ramsbury said, and he, too, looked nothing but supportive when he spoke to her. “But I’d like to hear all the details you have directly from you and Ripley.”
Jane drew a ragged breath and tried to organize the snippets of information that banged around in her head constantly. “The girl at my sister’s school said they were going to elope. And my mother’s letter to Nora called him Hugo and said his grandfather is titled. That’s all the information I have.”
She glanced at Ripley, and like he had read her mind, he withdrew it from the inside pocket of his jacket, smoothed it and handed it over.
Delacourt glanced at it, then surprised Jane by giving it to Marianne rather than Sebastian. Esme joined her sister-in-law and together the two women read over it, heads close together.
“So the grandson of a titled gentleman,” Marianne said, her gaze never leaving the letter, like she was trying to decipher some code it held.
“Yes,” Jane said. Her humiliation was fading at the kindness of those in the room. “Obviously he might have been lying to my sister about that fact. We’ve no idea.”
“It’s possible,” Esme said with a quick glance up at her. “But I think we start from the idea that every fact we have is true. We can adjust that belief if we find evidence to the contrary. Did the girl actually call him young?”
Jane nodded. “Yes. She said young man.”
“Then he’s probably around her age, or not much older,” Delacourt mused. “Because when you’re seventeen or eighteen, anyone at the top end of their twenties looks old and over thirty is ancient.”
“I resent that,” Ramsbury muttered, and the others chuckled. He glanced at Jane with a smile. “I just celebrated my thirtieth birthday.”
She smiled along with them, her tangled emotions soothed by their easiness. Jane had only known them all in passing, had never thought she’d bring something so emotional to the doorstep of an earl and his very important family. And yet she felt no judgment. No cruelty. No wonder Esme loved them all so fiercely.
“And his name is Hugo,” Marianne said, tapping a finger to her lip. “A somewhat uncommon name.”
“Hugo, Hugo,” Delacourt repeated, and looked at Ramsbury. “There’s Stopford.”
“Yes, but he’s a viscount,” Ramsbury said.
“And the grandson of a duke.”
“I don’t know.” Ramsbury shook his head. “If the young man, himself, was titled, why would Jane’s mother reference the grandfather and not the son, himself?”
“I think Ramsbury is correct,” Esme said. “There’s a specificity to the language.”
Jane nodded. “In my world, a viscount would be a fine catch all on his own. My mother would crow about a viscount, and if he would one day inherit a dukedom? She would have been telling my sister to land him at all costs.”
“So an untitled grandson,” Delacourt said. “Probably. With the first name of Hugo.”
“Hugo Fielding?” Ramsbury suggested.
“He’s hardly young,” Delacourt said. “He’s pushing fifty. Oh, what about Bernard Horne’s grandson? Isn’t he a Hugo?”
