Laura stood aside for the woman to pass through the doorway. “You must be pleased to see your son again.”
Mrs. Madge halted, one foot on a step. “He should never have lost his position here. The gossips brought it about, of that I’m fair sure. Vicious they were, saying he was mixed up in that business.”
“My husband would never act upon gossip, Mrs. Madge.” What business was the cook referring to? Did it concern just the smuggling, or had Nathaniel been jealous of how closely Mallory and Amanda had worked together?
“Not normally, no. He’s a good man, milady, but…”
Laura paused at the door. “What is it, Mrs. Madge?”
“I understand that his lordship was overcome by grief, milady. I fear it affected his judgment. He thought the worst of poor Theo, even though there was no evidence. And my son had to go off to find work elsewhere. A very talented gardener he is too, milady.”
Mrs. Madge put a hand to her scarlet cheek, apparently realizing the inappropriateness of her comment. “If I don’t get back, that green girl will do something silly, and there’ll be no dessert for luncheon. If you’re finished here, milady?”
“I am, thank you.”
“I’ll have that menu up to you in a trice, milady.” Back in her kitchen, Mrs. Madge regained her confidence with a brisk shrug of her shoulders. “I’ll consult Mrs. Beaton’s receipts for suitable dishes for your dinner. But I have some lovely ideas of my own.”
“I’m sure you do. Thank you, Mrs. Madge.”
Laura returned to the ground floor thinking there were two different Theo Mallorys: the one Laura had disliked on sight and the one Mrs. Madge thought she knew. But mothers always loved their sons no matter what they did. Laura knew she would be the same. She prayed every night for a baby. Her mother had commented on the lack of news in her last letter. She’d expected a healthy girl like Laura to fall pregnant quickly. Laura sighed. A child would help banish the sadness of Nathaniel’s past. It would be like a newbeginning.
Chapter Seventeen
Nathaniel rode with Hugh into the village. In The Sail and Anchor tavern, Mallory lay on his bed in his rented room, dressed in a richly patterned dressing gown decorated with yellow dragons. There was a paucity of furniture, just a wooden table and chair on bare boards. The rank smells of unwashed bodies, stale ale and smoke from the tavern below fouled the air. Mallory’s coat and a spare shirt hung neatly on the chair back. A basin, clothes brush, hairbrush and razor were lined up over the table along with an emptytankard.
A red mist passed over Nathaniel’s eyes at the sight of him, and his hands formed fists at his sides. He steadied himself. His aim was to get this man behind bars and see himhang.
Mallory rolled off the bed and stood. Running his hands through his hair, his bloodshot eyes flickered to Hugh’s face then back to Nathaniel’s. “Good of you to return my call, Lord Lanyon. I trust you’ve brought my money.”
“For what?”
His fingers wrestled with the top button on his shirt. “I was called away before I was paid my wages.”
The man had gall, he’d give him that. He also had grandiose ideas above his station. But would he have taken a chance and come back if he’d murdered Amanda? It was hard for Nathaniel to dispel his long-held belief that the man had pushed Amanda over the cliff. What else might have caused him to run? Had he been scared off by Amanda’s murderer, suspecting he was next? Or was it fear that one of the gang would give him up to the police? Mallory was certainly scared now. It was in his stiff shoulders and the way he refused to meet Nathaniel’s eyes. He’d gotten the gardening job because of Mrs. Madge, but Nathaniel had never liked the man. Thought the world owed him a living. And he no doubt saw Amanda as a means to betterhimself.
It might be two years ago, but recalling the chain of events leading up to Amanda’s death brought it back fresh and stark. After Nathaniel had returned from a trip to London, he suspected Amanda’s relationship with Mallory had progressed to an affair, although she’d denied it. The trauma he suffered as a child because of his parents’ breakup and his mother’s subsequent death, and then his taciturn father who’d ignored his existence, came rushing back. It almost brought him to his knees and left him hopelessly sad, hollow andempty.
Having wrestled his emotions into some semblance of order, he eyed Mallory coldly. Nathaniel was damned if he knew what Amanda had seen in him. Was it his blond looks? Surely not his oily charm. It surprised him that although he wished to serve bloody justice on this man, he did so without a twinge ofjealousy.
Nathaniel rested his booted foot on the chair and leaned his arms on his knee to distract himself from grabbing Mallory by the scruff of the neck. “Glad to see that you had the good sense to return to Wolfram. You can clear your name of the recent spate of smuggling, if, as you say, you are innocent.”
“You think that’s why I’m here?” Mallory smoothed back his hair. “I’ve never been involved in smuggling. Not back then and not now. My nose is clean.”
A man like Mallory would never pass up the opportunity to make money, through good means or bad. “Yet you ran off with your tail between your legs. The sign of a guilty man, wouldn’t you say?”
Mallory attempted a leer, but it failed to match his watchful eyes. “I didn’t run. I went after a lady I fancied. And now I need money to marry her. Money that you owe me, milord.” He spat it out with another unpleasant smile. “I doubt you’ll want me to spread it about that you don’t pay your staff. Not to those who already think ill of you.”
“Why you returned is of no interest to me. There are questions you must answer,” Nathanielsaid.
“You will tell the constable all you know or rot in jail until you do,” Hugh said in a rough voice, stepping closer as if about to thump the truth out ofhim.
Nathaniel cast Hugh a warning glance. The villagers were ignorant of Mallory’s sordid past. Any action they took against him themselves would only make matters worse. “I find it interesting that you’ve turned up at this particular time, however.”
Mallory shrugged into his coat. “And if I choose to tell the constable to go to the devil?”
“Then he will find a reason to lock you up until you agree,” Hugh interjected. “We’re close to rounding up the gang. And guilty or not, you’ll be tarred with the same brush. If you don’t come clean with what you know, it could go very badly for you.”
Mallory swallowed. “I didn’t have anything to do with it, I tell you. I’ve been miles away! But I keep my ear to the ground. If I tell you who’s behind it, will you give me my pay and let me go?”
