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Please care for him, and tell Him his mother Loves him

Madeleine felt tears gather behind her eyelids. To love a child so much and have to give him up; she was overwhelmed with the cruelty of the world when you were poor and your choices so limited.

While she had been reading the letter, Billy had crawled across to Mr Shilton and hauled himself to his feet, using Mr Shilton’s knee as a prop. He stood unsteadily beside him, grinning in triumph, his chubby hand creasing Mr Shilton’s immaculate pale pantaloons, and Madeleine was struck forcibly with the thought that had so disconcerted Maltby, Mr Shilton’s butler. The child looked exactly like the man. She had to ask the obvious question. ‘You and baby Billy look so similar, Mr Shilton, could you be related?’

Both she and Mr Shilton coloured.

‘Really, Miss Rose. I don’t know that we should be discussing such a thing.’

She held her head high and met his eyes. ‘I know. It’s shockingly impertinent of me, but you do look so alike. And it would be material to what you do next, would it not?’

Billy had set off to explore the room, crawling very fast and efficiently from Mr Shilton’s chair to a pile of books, and Dot had decided to intervene in his progress and lead him over to the window.

Mr Shilton regained some of his equilibrium. ‘It is a question everyone will be asking. I’m not a fool. The gossips will love this. My problem is, I don’t know what I was doing some…’ he paused as he calculated, ‘I suppose the child is about nine months old, so some eighteen months ago.’ He looked away and could no longer meet Madeleine’s large all-seeing eyes, so aware was he of the delicacy of this conversation with a young lady. He was upset and nonplussed. ‘But you’re right, his parentage has significant bearing on the matter. I have no idea who his mother may be.’

Then a dim memory surfaced of a cold and hazardous journey south by chaise to join a friend’s yacht at Brighton on one of his periodic trips to Paris to see Max Flambard. He had stopped for the night at a small posting inn near Crawley. Travel-weary, he was shown to his room by a winsome maid with rosy cheeks and flaxen hair, who stayed to warm his bed. It was an uncomfortable thought for Ferdy that he could not recall her name – was it Edith? – but he did remember that her blithe, generous nature matched her bonny looks. He gave a small shudder. He turned anxious eyes to Madeleine. ‘Did you see anyone when you found him?’

‘No. But then seeing a child on your doorstep was such an unexpected sight, it is all that held my attention.’

In the background, Billy was standing on the window seat alongside Dot and they could hear him babbling excitedly at the passing show of horses and carriages. Ferdinand Shilton said almost to himself, ‘The timing could not be worse. I’m meant to be marrying Miss Payton.’ Then he met Madeleine’s sympathetic gaze. ‘She’s a very good woman. Very punctilious and principled, and I admire her for that, especially coming from a family tainted by scandal. But she won’t like it at all and I can hardly blame her.’

‘I suppose the fact he looks like you just compounds the problem?’

‘It certainly does. And I’m afraid, until I have met his mother and spoken with her, I cannot say categorically he is not my son.’

Mr Shilton looked so downcast, Madeleine said in her spontaneous way, ‘I would look after Billy. Dot and I would manage, but I am beholden to my cousins’ generosity and they would not countenance it either.’

Ferdinand Shilton leapt to his feet. ‘No!’ He was so emphatic, Billy turned his head in astonishment and was silent. ‘There is no way I could allow you to compromise your own reputation by taking on responsibility for a baby who has been left at my door, literally and metaphorically.’ A wintry smile broke over his features. ‘I shall speak to Miss Payton.’

Madeleine stood, ready to go. ‘You won’t send him to the Foundling?’ She looked up into his face anxiously.

‘Not if I can help it. But I don’t know what I should do for the best.’

‘You have staff here who can care for him?’

Ferdinand Shilton laughed ruefully. ‘Oh, my staff will be delighted to have a baby in the house, I’m sure.’

Madeleine had walked over to where Dot waited with Billy in her arms, looking out of the window. When the child turned to gaze at them, the sight of his sweet angelic face made both she and Mr Shilton hold their breaths simultaneously. ‘Oh Mr Shilton!’ Madeleine could not help herself exclaiming at the child’s beauty and sunniness.

‘He is indeed a charming child, yet he brings so many problems to my door.’ Mr Shilton took Billy’s outstretched hand. They walked into the hall with Dot, who had Billy in her arms.

Madeleine met Ferdinand Shilton’s troubled blue eyes. ‘I would very much like to know what you decide to do. And can I come and see Billy again?’

‘Of course. You found him after all. Now, I’d better take him and look among my staff for a young woman to be his nursemaid, for the time being.’

Dot put Billy into Mr Shilton’s arms and he held him a little away from his beautiful tailoring. Madeleine noticed the baby’s flannel pilcher looked a bit damp, and wondered how the household would cope with feeding and clothing such a new and demanding addition. But she knew Mr Shilton’s servants were numerous and skilled. The grand Maltby, however, still looked disapproving; he did not appreciate any irregularity in the household or any breath of scandal involving his master. This baby seemed to be an inevitable harbinger of both.

Madeleine stood on tiptoe to kiss the baby’s cheek and he reached out a hand to her, a gesture which turned her heart over. Then the child chuckled and she joined in with her own charming laugh whose lilting sweetness embraced Mr Shilton and lifted his heart. She and Dot picked up the pineapple and left to continue their walk to old Lady Lockhart.

* * *

Cornelia Lockhart was a relic of the eighteenth century. She had been a girl in the heyday of Georgian excess. The Duke of Richmond’s Goodwood House was where she had been happiest, attending numerous soirées and balls, and when she married and had her own home, she replicated the jewel colours that distinguished that mansion.

Madeleine and Dot entered the magenta hallway, dense with gilded family portraits, and while Dot headed towards the kitchen, Madeleine was led up the stairs to Lady Lockhart’s bedchamber on the first floor. This room was faded, but the walls were still a surprising Chinese yellow, with yellow silk bed hangings frayed with age.

In the middle of a mound of white pillows edged with lace lay a small pale face with white hair under a fine lawn cap, her tiny figure barely distinguishable from the bed linen, except for brilliant grey eyes, full of character and humour.

‘Come in, come in! I’ve been waiting for you, Madeleine. What has kept you, child?’