A footman hurried through the hallway as Sebastian stood in the marble-flagged space, stripping off his gloves. Following behind the harried-looking footman was his father’s valet, Daniels, a familiarly grim expression on his face. He met Sebastian’s eye, his silent frown saying everything Sebastian had already guessed.
“How bad is he?”
“I’ll clean him up, my lord, and get him back to bed.”
“Doctor needed?”
“Not this time, thank the Lord.”
The two servants continued towards the stairs, but Sebastian called, “Leave it. I’ll do it myself.”
“Sir…” The footman hesitated. “If you’re sure, sir…”
“Just send up the water.”
He bowed and hurried away to the kitchens. Daniels looked at Sebastian a little longer. This silent battle of wills was familiar too. Whose duty was the greatest? Common sense and society said one thing, Sebastian’s own personal god another.
With a sombre bow of his head, Daniels subsided and went after the footman. Sebastian slowly climbed the stairs, letting out a long breath.
Again. It had only been a week since the last time. It had only been twenty years since the first time…
He opened the door to his father’s bedchamber, hit by the familiar stench. The man was on the floor near his dressing table, from which all the objects had been swept to scatter across the floor. His thin white legs poked out from his vomit-spattered nightgown. The stains were dark. Port and claret, probably. It looked like blood. But there was also the acrid smell of stronger spirits too, as well as the acid smell of his stomach contents and the rank stench of piss.
Well.Herewas a lesson in control, was it not? To stand here, yet again, looking at his father covered in reeking filth and not grimace or heave or shout or bully or weep…but just…do what needed to be done.
Sebastian shrugged off his coat and waistcoat before he picked his father up as one picks up a sleeping child. He had been a tall man, but he was wasted to nothing. Bones and despair and self-destruction.
In the adjoining room, where men hurried to fill the copper tub with hot water, Sebastian stripped him then washed him. He dried him and dressed him in a fresh nightgown, and then he carried him back to his bed, grateful to find the sheets changed and the stained rug rolled up and removed.
His father had barely stirred, unconscious and oblivious. It was about the only mercy—that the earl didn’t know, didn’t remember.
But I remember everything…
Those were the widow’s words, weren’t they?
Sebastian tucked his father into bed, the earl restored to what little dignity he had left. Then he went to the window and opened it, letting fresh air chase out the foul.
One more glance at the bed, and then Sebastian left to clean himself and to change for dinner.
Eight
Madelaine’s aunt had enthusiasticallyarranged for her own carriage to take Madelaine to the picnic. She had even asked the coachman to give it a polish and repaint the wheels. But a note arrived on the Tuesday before from Lady Frances Elston.
It was written in that lady’s beautiful sloping hand, on thick, smooth paper, well-scented with something that might have been Lily of the Valley or Jasmine or something else entirely—beyond things like rose or lavender or lemon, Madelaine could never quite tell—and embossed with that lady’s own monogrammed coat of arms at the top in silver and blue.
Her aunt cooed over the letter, declaring it pretty enough to put in a frame. Madelaine smiled and told the nervous flutter in her breast to be still.
The content of the letter hardly helped. Lady Frances washonouredto have theprivilegeof collecting Madelaine from Lady Pemberthy’s house at eleven o’clock the next morning.Unforgivably early,she apologised,but necessary in thisinstance.Her landau, she promised,was the most comfortable in the worldand had been specially resprung to cope withthe pitfall horrors of the Kingston Road.
An hour’s journey, Madelaine estimated. Or perhaps closer to two. It was nine miles to Richmond. All that time, stuck in a carriage with the Lady Frances… Whatever would they talk about? How on earth could she pretend to be all the things Lord Cotereigh had planned for two whole hours, under the close, bored scrutiny of the marquess’s daughter?
But, no…Lady Frances was in on the wager—she was on Lord Cotereigh’s side, even if she wasn’t on Madelaine’s own. It shouldn’t be Lady Frances she feared but the thirty or so strangers she would meet at the other end.
Still. She did not look forward to the journey.
Wednesday dawned milky white but dry. The clouds might burn off, Madelaine mused, studying the sky from her bedroom window. Or they might turn black and thunder crack the sky. One never knew with April. It was a brave choice of month for a picnic.
Perhaps that was the point. Because Lady Frances’s hopes and fears for the weather formed much of their conversation as the gleaming landau clattered smartly away from Lady Pemberthy’s house. The covers were down, both front and back, all the better to display the occupants inside.
