The clock ticked relentlessly in the quiet of the morning room. Althea stitched, Constance stared at a treatise on the symbolic use of light in oil portraits, and Stephen went mad.
“He’s gone by now,” Stephen said.
Over at the door, Ivor flinched.
“Joshua will bring us word,” Althea said.
Joshua would bring them Quinn’s body. Murderers were turned over to the doctors for anatomical studies. Stephen knew exactly what that meant, despite the general unwillingness of his siblings to tell him anything useful. A mere manslaughterer’s remains were returned to the family for a proper burial.
“Thus endeth the short and merry tale of Quinton Wentworth,” Stephen said. “From footman to felon, by way of Mayfair’s finest neighborhoods.”
Constance exchanged a look with Althea.
“That’s enough, Stephen,” Althea said, but without the usual whipcrack tone she used on him.
“Quinn is gone,” Stephen retorted. “We’re on our own now.” Stephen hated the idea that he was supposed to meekly sit in his wheeled Bath chair and grieve for a brother who’d been arrogant to a fault, for all Quinn had also been ferociously conscientious regarding the bank’s business.
“Quinn got above himself,” Constance said. “He made sure we didn’t commit the same error.”
The Wentworths lived quietly, but they lived quietly and well in London, a far cry from the quagmire of misery that had spawned them in York.
Stephen was seventeen and should have gone up to university. He would never go to university, for two reasons. First, he already knew more than most of the professors teaching at either Oxford or Cambridge about the subjects that mattered to him.
Second, the damned Bath chair.
But his wheeled chair offered lessons of its own, such as how closely madness hovered near the unsuspecting. Stephen had frequently considered taking his own life, before Quinn had brought Duncan down from York. With the implacable assurance of a man equally expert in Socrates, biology, and scripture, Duncan had insisted that a laboratory and greenhouse be added to the town house. To Stephen’s amazement, Quinn had listened, and life had changed.
Today, life was changing again.
“Quinn has himself to thank for this day’s work,” Stephen said.
Constance tossed her pamphlet onto the low table. “What would you have us do, Stephen? Post notices in shop windows that we’ll meet our brother’s killer in Green Park at dawn? Quinn told us not to interfere.”
Althea pulled a thread taut. “Quinn was forever telling us what to do. When did we listen?”
“We did sometimes,” Constance said. “When he was sensible, not simply blustering and being overprotective.”
Stephen wheeled himself to the window, where a sunny London morning was bustling to life. He’d spent much of his life looking out of windows, until Duncan had said that the mind needed fresh air to invite fresh ideas.
“Quinn was always overprotective,” Constance said, “and when it mattered, he had no one to protect him. I tried. I sent a hundred pounds to the warden, simply seeking an interview. He sent it back.”
“Two hundred,” Althea said, “and that was also returned.”
In the complicated economy of a prison, a returned bribe meant one of two things: Somebody else had paid a much larger bribe, or had made a more effective threat.
Stephen’s sisters didn’t need him to spell that out for them. He’d been eight years old when Jack Wentworth had died, old enough to know, as Duncan said, which from that. His sisters were both older than he and knew all manner of subjects not taught in any finishing school.
Constance took up one of the fine porcelain teacups that sat unused on the tray Ivor had brought in. She loathed tea and had a secret fondness for gin. Perhaps grief had deranged even her formidable mind, for she set the cup down and reached for the teapot instead.
This she hurled against the fireplace, resulting in a satisfyingly loud crash. Althea stared at the shattered porcelain and the tea splattered all over the bricks, then did the same with three teacups in succession.
The sisters would manage. Stephen signaled to Ivor, who opened the door. Stephen wheeled himself from the room amid the loud, messy destruction of a fortune in porcelain, and pretended not to notice that Ivor was crying.
* * *
Quinn’s first impression of the celestial realm was that it smelled a lot like prison. Dirty straw, dirty people, despair saturating the air. Somebody was in a taking worthy of Althea holding forth on the subject of women’s rights.
Women had no rights. Perhaps in heaven, that oversight had been addressed.
“He’s breathing,” a man said. “He’ll wake up in a moment.”
Quinn’s head was lifted and the white expanse of the great beyond—or of the executioner’s white hood—was replaced with the warden’s office at Newgate prison.
“I’ve been sent to hell after all.” Quinn’s throat ached, but he could speak intelligibly.
“Praise be,” said a dapper little man with a full head of white hair. “Thank the everlasting powers. Somebody fetch His Grace a glass of water.”
The company boasted a His Grace, more proof that Quinn had been weighed in the scales and found wanting, for this was surely not the afterlife. He struggled to a sitting position, his brain sluggish, his neck burning like the devil.
Perhaps not the devil.
“Here you go, Your Grace,” the dapper fellow said, passing Quinn a mug. “Soon you’ll be feeling just the thing.”
The water tasted metallic, but was cool and soothing to Quinn’s throat. In no version of hell he’d been threatened with were new arrivals offered water.
“Who are you?”
“Thaddeus E. Dodson. My card.” The fellow passed over a card printed on linen stock. The College of Arms. Perhaps this truly was eternal damnation, or the lingering effects of laudanum in an odd version of the hereafter.
The warden’s expression was carefully neutral. Two guards stood by the door impersonating well-trained footmen—erect posture, expressions blank.
Quinn took another sip of the holiest water he’d ever tasted. “Somebody had better start explaining.”
The warden cleared his throat. “You’ve been pardoned, Your Grace.”
“The king himself has seen fit to grant you clemency,” Mr. College of Arms said. “He has forgiven your error as an unfortunate tragedy mishandled by the courts. You are free to go.”
The warden was studying the truly awful portrait over the mantel, a well-fed beldame with a pug in her lap.
“What aren’t you telling me?” Quinn asked. “Fat George never does favors without expecting something in return. I’m a convicted felon. What could he want from me?” A convicted felon who had cheated death. The shock of that truth spread over Quinn like a summer sunrise. He could not trust his good fortune to last, if good fortune it was, but he was undeniably alive.
“You are a pardoned felon,” Dodson replied. “We need not speak of that when more good news is at hand. Did you know, sir, that you were heir to the Walden ducal title?”
The only people who called Quinn “sir” were people who wanted money from him or people who owed him money.
And the whores, Ned, and Davies. They had called him sir.
“I suppose you’ll have to hang me again,” Quinn said, pushing to his feet. “I’m not the duke of anything, and I hope to die in that fortunate state. Shall we get on with it?”
He was not bluffing. The only explanation he could concoct for this reprieve was that he’d now be expected to commit some fraud or deception for the Crown. His father had attempted any crime, any betrayal of decency for the sake of another bottle of gin. Quinn would not follow in those scapegrace footsteps, even to save his own neck.
“You’ll not be hanged,” the warden said. “The bugger has papers, royal seal and all. To hang you now would be both treason and murder.”
Quinn experienced the same dread that had come over him when he’d returned home after a day of looking for work and he’d heard Papa ranting from half a street away. Drunk and mean, drunk and maudlin, drunk and murderous. Those had been the choices when Papa was loud. All of Quinn’s options had stunk then, and they doubtless reeked now.
“Mr. Dodson, you will explain yourself.”
“The situation is simple, Your Grace. You are heir to the Walden dukedom, the seat of which lies in the north, not far from the place of your birth. Given your exalted station, the king has spared your life so that you might carry out the duties of your office, in gratitude to a benevolent sovereign.”
Gratitude, to the very Crown that tried to hang him? Had hanged him?
“Bloody bedamned to your pardon, Mr. College of Alms. If King George thinks I’ll hand over my fortune for his rotten title, ye can tell him to shove his seal up the royal bunghole—if he can find it.”
Quinn’s speech had reverted to the dialect of the York slums, and Mr. Dodson had retreated to the door. One of the guards snickered, then began coughing when Quinn turned a glower on him.
“Think of it as a commutation,” the warden said. “You were in a prison of one sort—ugly maids, bad food, poor company. With a title, you’ll be in a prison of another sort. Better food and comely maids, though I can’t vouch for the company you’ll find.”
That perspective had merit. Then too, Quinn had siblings and a business partner, and they needed the money his will provided. Then there was Jane, waiting for her five thousand pounds. Quinn marched over to Dodson and treated him to what Stephen called his damnation-and-doom glower.
“Tell the truth, or I’ll hunt you down and use a dull, dirty knife to relieve you of body parts your missus might once have been fond of. What happens to my money if I accept George’s pardon?”
Dodson blinked twice. “You keep your money.”
“And?”
“You inherit the debts that the Walden estate has amassed.”
“To the penny, man, or I swear I’ll find a way to have a fatal accident.”
Dodson named a sum that would have felled any mortal who hadn’t spent the last ten years assessing which lords were worth lending money to and which were hopelessly bankrupt.
“Income?” Quinn pressed.
“From five different estates. They have been more than self-sustaining in the past and include tenancies under lease.”
If the task was clawing a path out of debt, Quinn was better suited to that challenge than any other subject of the Crown, and King George likely grasped as much. What His Majesty could not know was how determined Quinn was to bring his enemy to justice.
The laws of the slum were few and simple. One directive stood foremost among them in Quinn’s mind: Show weakness to those who disrespect you, and you’ll be devoured like the prey you are. An eye for an eye meant wrongdoing was punished, and honor upheld. Any other course was as good as begging to be victimized again.
“Mr. Dodson and I are in want of privacy,” Quinn said, “and send my footman to me.”
The warden smiled faintly. “He means the prisoner Davies.”
Quinn ran a finger around the collar of his shirt. “I mean my footman, Davies. When I depart this cesspit of injustice, I’ll need the services of my tiger, Edward, as well as my chambermaids, Penny, Susie, and Sophie.”
Dodson looked pleased, the idiot parasite. “Anything else, Your Grace?”
Forgive me, Jane. “I have a duchess. I must inform her of my good fortune.”
* * *
“He’s alive!” Joshua Penrose never shouted, never displayed even the cold temper that characterized his business partner, but a damned roll of black crepe sat on the sideboard, and the footman already sported a black armband.
“The bloody sod’s alive and pardoned. Althea! Constance! Stephen! Quinn is alive and he’s coming home.”
Joshua had posted eyes inside the prison, and what those eyes had related nearly restored his faith in a God with a sense of humor.
Althea, dressed head to toe in black, appeared on the landing. “Mr. Penrose, have you taken leave of your senses?” She descended one dignified step at a time, until she was on the bottom stair, which put her nearly eye level with Joshua.
She was beautiful in her grief, but then, she was beautiful all the time. “I have indeed taken leave of my senses, and so has the Crown. Quinn Wentworth received a royal pardon. The news is all over the prison, and he’ll be home this afternoon.”
Althea’s knuckles showed white as she gripped the newel post. “He accepted the pardon? I did not want to hope.” She bit her lip and stared past Joshua’s shoulder.
Overhead the clank of metal and the sound of ratcheting chains suggested Stephen was using the lift to descend from the upper floors.
“Get Miss Wentworth some damned brandy,” Joshua said, taking Althea’s hand. “She’s had a shock.”
“Yes, Mr. Penrose,” the footman replied. “At once, sir.”
The footman—Ivor or Kristoff, Joshua could never tell them apart—sprinted for the steps that led belowstairs, though the closest decanter was two doors away in the library.
“Not the morning room,” Althea said, drawing her fingers from Joshua’s grasp. “I’ll be in Quinn’s study. Fetch Constance and Stephen.”
She swished away, then stopped ten yards down the corridor, her hand on the door latch. “He’s truly alive?”
Joshua closed the distance between them, because an uncertain Althea was painful to behold. “Quinn’s alive, giving orders to the warden and guards, taking half a dozen common prisoners out with him, and threatening riot.”
Althea rested her forehead against the door, more weakness than Joshua had ever known her to show. “He likely beggared himself for his freedom. Money well spent, I say.”
“There’s more,” Joshua said, “and it’s not bad news.”
Constance came up the corridor. “He who shouts in a house of mourning had better have a good explanation.”
“Quinn’s alive,” Althea said. “He’s coming home.”
Constance studied the parquet floor, a complex mosaic of oak. “He outbribed somebody. Thank God and the greed of the average Englishman.”
Stephen wheeled himself down the corridor, Duncan trailing behind. “Quinn’s alive? He’s cheated even the hangman?”
“Barely,” Joshua said, “but one of the guards had a very sharp knife when a knife was much needed, and Quinn’s only slightly the worse for his ordeal.”
“Let’s discuss this in the study,” Althea said.
They filed in, a radiant footman bringing up the rear with a tray bearing a decanter and five glasses.
“Half holiday belowstairs, Ivor,” Althea said. “A double round for everybody in honor of the glad tidings, senior staff outside the kitchen may have the evening free. A cold collation for lunch will do.”
Ivor set the tray on the low table and bowed. “Very good, ma’am. Felicitations on the wonderful news.”
His accent was so thick—vonderful nuis—as to make the words nigh unintelligible, but his smile needed no translation. The servants’ hall would host a near-orgy, though somebody would remain sober enough to answer the bellpull.
“Burn the crepe,” Constance added, “or donate it to the poor, but get it out of the house before Quinn comes home.”
“And the armbands,” Stephen added. “Go naked from the waist up if you must, but get rid of the armbands.”
Duncan, ever a practical fellow, busied himself pouring the brandy. He was a cousin at some remove, recruited to manage Stephen, but he had the Wentworth dark hair, blue eyes, and height. He’d come when needed and Quinn considered him family, so family he was.
While Joshua remained a business partner.
“A toast,” Althea said, “to Wentworth resilience.”
To Wentworth money, which was a result of that resilience. Joshua had no doubt that Quinn’s fortune had come between him and death—this time.
“To Wentworth resilience,” Joshua murmured. “Or should I say, to the Duke of Walden’s resilience?”
Stephen set his glass on the tray. “He got the title too? I told you lot it was real, and you wouldn’t believe me. If Quinn’s a duke, then I’m a courtesy lord, and you have to listen to me now.”
“If you’re a lord,” Constance retorted, “I’m a lady, and so is Althea. You’ll have to learn a whole new set of manners.”
Stephen doubtless already knew all the protocol, all the forms of address. As fast as Duncan threw subjects at him, Stephen gobbled down the knowledge. The boy was what Quinn could have become, had Quinn been allowed to think about anything but survival.
“Speaking of ladies,” Joshua said, “we’d all best have a seat.”
Duncan brushed a glance at Stephen, who lived half his life seated. The women arranged themselves on the sofa, leaving the wing chairs for Joshua and Duncan. They might have been any well-to-do family enjoying a glass of cordial on somebody’s birthday.
“You’ve said there’s more,” Althea prompted. “What could be more than a reprieve from death and a lofty title to go with it? Doubtless Quinn will have to take some neglected estate and put it to rights, probably a half dozen of them, but that’s a stroll down the lane for him.”
The extent of the Walden debts would be a challenge even for Quinn, though exactly the sort of challenge he was equipped to meet.
“The dukedom, as Stephen has noted, is real,” Joshua said. “In typical Quinn fashion, he’s anticipated his obligations and already found himself a duchess.” And a potential heir. Joshua would let Quinn explain that development, if any explanation were needed.
“Quinn is engaged?” Althea asked, drink halfway to her lips.
“Not engaged,” Joshua said, with the same direct gaze he used when he foreclosed on a mortgage. “Married. Quinn has taken a bride, and she’ll be coming to live with you here.”
A historic beat of silence went by, for the three younger Wentworth siblings were all quiet in the same room at once.
Stephen stared at his cordial, his lips moving in a silent pattern of what appeared to be French profanities.
Constance muttered, “I believe I’ll have another,” and reached for the decanter.
Althea, dignified, self-assured, lady-of-all-she-surveys Althea, spluttered her drink all over her skirts, while Duncan patted her back and said absolutely nothing.