With only a nod, Lord Lancashire squeezed her hands and then stepped away, going to the carriage and speaking to those within. Susanna heard Ellen’s loud exclamation, and within a few seconds, her friend was beside her, shock written into her expression. Shock that Susanna could understand all too well.
“How can this be?” Ellen asked, as Susanna squeezed her eyes closed against the threatening tears. “How could Maude do such a thing?”
“I do not know,” Susanna whispered, unable to trust her voice, “but I must try to understand.” Her heart twisted sharply, and she snatched in some air, pushing away her tears as best she could. “My sister has tried to cause me great pain, but it has been done alongside another.”
“Then let us go and discover who this other is,” LordLancashire said, grimly as he took Susanna’s hand in his own. “Although I believe we may already know.”
“Lady Evelina,” Lord Kettering muttered as they all stepped inside, with Lady Kilthorn choosing to remain in the carriage, waiting for their return. Susanna, taking strength from Lord Lancashire’s hand in her own, held her head high as she walked back towards the parlor. Then, giving herself only a breath by which to gain her courage, she pushed the door open and stepped inside, followed by Lord Lancashire, then Ellen, then Lord Kettering.
Maude shot to her feet. “Whatever is the meaning of this?” Her eyes landed on Susanna, her face flushing red. “Susanna, I thought you were out on a drive with…” Trailing off, she looked at the others in turn, just as Susanna turned her attention to the other person present in the room. Lord Kettering had been quite correct, it seemed, for Lady Evelina sat there, her hands clasped in her lap, but her face beginning to pale as she looked from one face to the next.
“How could you do this to me, Maude?” Susanna did not begin by asking questions, did not start going through one thing at a time, but instead, brought the truth directly to her sister. “How could you try to injure me so?”
Maude’s face went from scarlet to puce and back again.
“I know that we have never been close, but I thought you cared about me, as your sister,” Susanna continued, her voice rasping. “And now, to discover that you have done all you can to prevent me from gaining happiness…. I can hardly take it in. I cannot understand it.”
Lord Lancashire, his hand still on hers, moved closer so that she could lean against him a little, needing his presence still. Her eyes welled with tears, but she forced them back, wanting to hear Maude’s explanation rather than let sorrowovertake her.
“You were overheard, Lady Maude,” he said, his voice flooding the room as Maude sucked in air, her eyes now going to Lady Evelina, who, despite the paleness in her cheeks, had her head lifted and her gaze fixed to the wall opposite her. “We have been seeking the truth for a long time, but never once did we think that it would come from Lady Susanna’s very own family.”
The pain that forced its way into Susanna’s heart was so great that she could not breathe. Turning, she put her head to Lord Lancashire’s shoulder, tears unwilling to be held back any longer as his arm wrapped around her waist.
“Thankfully,” she heard Ellen say, as Lord Lancashire murmured words of comfort into her ear, “you did not succeed. Lord Lancashire discovered that the letter was not truly from Lord Blackwood and has now returned to Susanna. They will be married, happy, and contented, and your scheme will have failed utterly.” The words were spat out, harshness and anger burning through each one. “How could you do such a thing, Maude? To your own sister?”
“I am to gain the happiness first!”
Susanna lifted her head as Maude’s fury was thrown out towards her, seeing her sister’s face change. Yes, it was still pale, but there was a hardness to it now that she had never seen before. Steel filled her eyes, her hands in fists, her jaw tightened – and Susanna did not recognize her own sister in that moment. It was as though a mask had been lifted away to reveal something that had always been there, hidden beneath the prettiness and the smiles and the easy charm that drew gentlemen to her side. This was the real Maude — jealous, grasping, and utterly without remorse. And in that terrible clarity, Susanna mourned the sister she had thought she had, the one who had braided her hair as a child and whispered secrets in the dark nursery. The betrayal wasdeeper than any letter or scheme; it was a betrayal of their shared past, of the very bond of sisterhood. A profound sadness settled over her, heavy and cold, for the loss of a relationship she had always, perhaps naively, believed was immutable. The anger that had flared within her was now overshadowed by a crushing sense of grief.
“Mother and father were focused upon me,” Maude continued, her eyes still flooded with rage. “You thought that you would supersede me, did you? That you would take the attention I had been garnering for myself?” She shook her head. “No, I could not have that.”
Susanna closed her eyes. “You saw Lord Lancashire and I last Season.”
“Yes.” Maude threw out the word as if it were something utterly distasteful. “I could not allow it. I wanted the attention to continue, the interest to continue, the happiness to continue.”
Ellen rolled her eyes. “You cared only about yourself, then,” she said, plainly. “This attention you speak of, that is why you have not yet accepted courtship, is it not? You seek the attention from gentlemen, you revel in their interest in you, but you do not want that to end. That is why you have not yet chosen a gentleman.”
Susanna’s eyes widened just as Maude’s narrowed. Ellen had evidently seen something that she herself had not, but now that it was spoken, Susanna could understand the reasoning behind it. Had not her own mother made a remark or two about how Maude really did need to settle on just one gentleman very soon? As yet, her sister had not done so – and now the reason for that became clear. Her pride was being fed by each smile, each laugh, each conversation, and each dance offered to her by the gentlemen of the ton. Rather than have her gaze fixed solelyon the future and what was to be for her, Maude was concentrating solely on what she could get now. And attention and interests were the foods on which she was living.
“Lady Susanna threatened that, if Lord Lancashire had declared himself, then the ton’s attention would have been on her instead of upon you,” Lord Kettering said, as Susanna turned her face into Lord Lancashire’s shoulder again, still fighting back tears. “So you determined to push Lord Lancashire away.”
Maude sniffed. “I did not do anything terrible. I did not say or do anything that would have had the ton in its entirety turn their back upon Susanna.”
“Only because you could not risk that,” Lord Lancashire rumbled. “Any hint of damage to your sister’s reputation would have hit upon you also, would it not? It was not out of kindness but of self-preservation.”
Susanna looked at her sister, seeing the glint still in Maude’s eyes, in the way her back straightened and her chin lifted. There was no real sorrow there, no genuine sadness over what she had done and how she had injured Susanna. To her mind, this was all entirely justified.
Her eyes closed.
“But you did not do this alone,” Lord Lancashire continued, as Susanna opened her eyes again and looked, instead, to Lady Evelina, just as Maude herself did. “With Lady Evelina’s help, you forged a letter from Lord Blackwood and sent it to me. You also sent a letter to Mr.Graves and threatened him in a most dreadful manner – and all to achieve your aim.” His eyes went to Susanna, his arm still around her waist. “To separate both myself and Susanna.”
He paused, and when he spoke again, his voice was quieter — the controlled, precise tone of a man laying out evidence. “There is one more thing. When my brother and Ivisited Mr.Stevenson’s offices, we found an entry in the visitor’s ledger. A ‘Mrs.Hartwell’ had called to enquire about the Duke of Somerset’s accounts.” He turned his gaze upon Lady Evelina, whose hands had gone very still in her lap. “There is no Mrs.Hartwell, is there?”
The silence that followed was answer enough. Lady Evelina’s composure, which had held through the worst of the confrontation, cracked at last — not dramatically, but in the way a fine piece of porcelain cracks: a single, barely visible line running through something that had appeared flawless. Her lips parted, but no denial came.
“It was to make sure,” Maude said flatly, as though the words meant nothing. “To confirm that Mr.Graves had done as he was told — that the false information had reached the right ears.” She shrugged one shoulder, the gesture so casual it was almost obscene. “A precaution, nothing more.”
Lancashire’s jaw tightened. A precaution. They had monitored their own deception with the methodical care of women checking the progress of needlework — ensuring each stitch was in place, each thread pulled tight. It was not a rash scheme born of momentary spite. It had been planned, maintained, and verified. And that, perhaps, was what cut deepest of all.
