“He was indeed. We shall have cook find him an excellent bone.”
“We will at that,” she heard from behind her in Mrs. Prince’s gruff tones.
Georgie nodded, not taking her attention from her baby. “But I need to borrow him for a few minutes. Is that all right?”
Lully looked about her, as if sizing up the situation. Finally, she nodded and took Hattie’s hand. “We will have tea for you when you get there,” she told her mother and turned away.
The tableau held until Lully, hand clutched in Hattie’s, cleared the garden gate. Left behind, Murphy whined, but a hand on his head settled him. Then, pulling another calming breath, Georgie turned back to business.
“Can I be of some help?” the duke asked.
“Yes, please,” she said, attention still on Jem. “Come with me on my errand. Young Tom, I am not going to ask where you got yon blunderbuss. Is it loaded?”
“It is, ma’am.”
“Then please hand it to Peter Miller for the moment. Peter, I need you and one other person to sneak up on that carriage and hold it ‘til we can get there, please.”
Peter Miller, Jack’s buff, white-haired and broad-shouldered stableman, gathered the blunderbuss into his meaty hands. “My pleasure, ma’am.”
He pointed to another groom and off the two melted into the trees in the direction of the village lane. Georgie battled an overwhelming urge to clutch the duke’s hand for support, reassurance. The next question she must ask was the most difficult she thought she ever would.
“You were not to bring Lully back to Wyndham Abbey, Jem,” she said. “Were you?”
He began to weep again. “I’m that sorry, miss.”
“It’s all right. It is not your fault. Where were you to go?”
“I don’t know that, just that another coach was to be waiting somewhere on the North Road near Grantham.”
Wyndham Abbey was situated in Gloucestershire, nowhere near the North Road, certainly not as far north as Grantham. Georgie felt her knees all but give way. Before she could completely crumple, she felt Adam’s hand under her elbow, surreptitiously holding her up. He understood just as well as she what Jem’s words meant.
“Not to the continent, anyway,” he murmured.
“Of course not. They might need to recover her from whatever hell they’d planned for her if they need to wield her power. Oh, dear God...”
She could not collapse. Not until she handled this. She briefly closed her eyes, pulling her tattered poise around her. She would never be able to tell Adam what the support of his hand meant.
“Jem,” she said, “you cannot go back there. You know that. You would be welcome here if you like.”
Her staff immediately objected. She raised a hand. “His family was threatened. I will not have Jem punished for being put in an untenable position by his lord.”
That quickly the protest died. Each of her staff understood the inequities of power.
“Please take Jem in where Mrs. Prince can see to his leg. If you think it is needed, Mrs. Prince, please call for the surgeon. I would appreciate it if two grooms came with us, and the rest remained in the manor house at least until we return.” She briefly smiled at the nervous movement around her. “I am quite certain the maids will not mind a bit of mud on the floor. Now then, John Coachman, please ready the curricle. The duke and I have a small trip to take.”
“Village lane, I’m thinkin’?” the coachman posited with a gleam in his old eye.
“Village lane,” she agreed.
The preparations took mere minutes before two prime bays were hooked up to the curricle and Georgie and Adam seated behind John Coachman. One whistle brought Murphy up to set himself alongside the driver, head up, tongue out. John flicked the whip, and the team took off at a fast trot down the drive, followed by the grooms on Jack’s sturdiest hacks. Georgie hadn’t asked, but each also carried a shotgun.
Georgie jumped a bit when she felt a hand wrap around hers. The duke was smiling down at her. “Here I arrived believing you needed the strong arm of a duke to deal with the threat against Lully. You don’t, do you?”
She drew in a ragged breath. “Come see me in about thirty minutes.”
He gave her hand a companionable squeeze that felt to her like the greatest praise and then seemed to forget to let go. Georgie tried her very best not to contemplate exactly what her father’s actions meant. She much preferred to focus on the guilty pleasure that warm, strong hand afforded. It had been so long since she had had that kind of comfort. She could come to rely on it, she thought.
It took fifteen minutes to make their way back to the main lane into the local village. Georgie didn’t have to search for the carriage. It stood still in the middle of the road, not only Peter Miller and Tim the groom standing to one side, but more than a few villagers milling about in front of the placid horses.
