She pushed a sandwich around on her plate. “Edmund—my Edmund, the fifth earl—fought in the colonies.” She gave a dismissive wave with one hand. “He was not the earl yet. Second son. Expected to always...” Her silence lingered a moment, then she took a deep breath. “He changed... he said it changedhim. He couldn’t sleep. Nightmares. I always wondered what he had been like bef—whether it was the Americas that changed him, or the fighting.”
“It was the war.” Mark’s voice caught in his throat, sounding like a rusty wheel. He cleared it as he stared at the wall behind the table. “It changes men.”
“Did it change you?”
He looked back at her, fear lingering in the back of his mind. How far would her questions take him? “Yes.”
“Is it why you have only had one mistress since your return?”
Chapter Twelve
Monday, 25 July 1814
Le salon de thé d’Adélaïde, Whitehall
Four in the afternoon
Judith watched aseverything about Mark Rydell grew still. His usually expressive face, his often-fidgety fingers, the leg that had been bouncing under the table for the past half hour. His pupils dilated, making his eyes dark and a bit menacing.
But she did not withdraw the question. Instead, as his silence continued, she decided to up the ante. “Because one hears rumors of many kinds. You, too, returned from war a changed man. You roam at night. You acquired a single mistress, an actress, instead of a string of noble lovers as you did before you served. And now that your mistress has died, you are making plans to move into the house you purchased for her. Alone. With only a few servants.”
Rydell pushed his chair away from the table. “Am I to presume that our business concerning your son has reached its conclusion?” He pushed down on the cane, as if to stand.
Judith took a deep breath, watching his face as she grasped his arm. The tension of his muscles beneath her palm told her exactly how far she had stepped over the line. “No. Please stay. I will press no more about anything that does not concern Edmund. But I hope you will listen to my reasons for asking. I will require no answers, if you will only listen.”
After a moment, Rydell scooted his chair back under the table. “I will listen.”
She released his arm, then hesitated as Adelaide poked her head around the door. “Do you need anything, my friends?”
Judith shook her head, and the hostess vanished. She gazed over the display of food, most of which remained untouched. “I am afraid we are wasting this delicious array of treats.”
His face softened. “We have had other concerns.”
“We have indeed.” She pushed her teacup away and faced him. “After I found out about our loss of funds, I have not trusted Edmund to tell me the complete truth, a skepticism that has proven accurate time and again, including today. I do not understand why he cannot lay all the events out in the open, but he apparently believes I will think him less a fool if I do not realize the extent of his mistakes.” She sniffed. “Although why he should care about what I think, I do not know.”
“You are his mother.”
She chuckled. “If that is the case, then it is something he should have been concerned aboutpriorto diving into the deep end of his desires. However, since I did not trust him, I have spent my time talking to others. Blackwell. Servants. Guards at other gaming hells—”
Rydell’s mouth twitched. “That must have come as rather a surprise.”
She grinned. “More for them than for me, apparently.”
“No doubt.”
“I went with guineas in my pockets and questions on my lips.”
“And what did you learn?”
“That guineas open many a door and surprises loosen many a tongue.”
“But what did you learn?”
She peered closer at his face, waiting to see his response. “That I was not the only one asking questions about Edmund and his wagers.”
His eyes gleamed but he remained silent.
“I went asking questions about you as the holder of his debts but found you had been there before me, asking questions about Edmund and his debts other than those of your club. And me. I was told that the night Miss Ashley died, you took your grief about her betrayal with Shropshire to the boxing ring, only to discover information about Edmund that sent you into the Rookeries in search of a particular person. A search that”—she gestured up and down at his torso—“led you into a bit of trouble on your own.”
