Five
The first rays of light that came through the window of Victor Pembroke’s bedroom managed to hit him directly in the face and he groaned and rolled over, not ready in the slightest to wake up. The woman beside him opened her eyes and smiled.
“Good morning,” she said, her voice still soft with sleep. Victor looked at her, trying his best to remember her name and failing. To buy himself more time to think, he sat up and yawned.
“I trust you slept well,” he finally said when he gave up trying to figure it out.
“Yes, thank you.” The woman sat up and put her hands on his shoulders from behind. Victor shrugged her off and stood up, crossing the room to get his dressing gown from the chair by the window and pulling the curtains closed. “I halfway expected you to tell me to go home last night.”
“I’m not such a bastard that I would make a lady walk home in the dark, but just enough of one not to call for a carriage.” He felt he was rather stretching the definition of ‘lady’ but it didn’t seem like the sort of thing to say. She may not have been the highest-class woman but he disliked being rude to people unless they had earned it, and spending the night with him certainly didn’t qualify as earning anything more than coolness. “That being said, I must be getting to work. I trust you’ll be able to find your way home?”
“Of course,” the woman said, pulling back the covers. She slid out of bed and picked her clothes up off the floor. While she got herself dressed, Victor gave her some privacy and went down the hall into the bathroom so as to avoid any further small talk.
His house wasn’t large by any means, but it was just the right size for a single man. The only time anyone other than Victor and his servants was there was when he brought someone home, which was getting less and less frequent. As he got older, it became more tiresome than anything else, as evidenced by his desire to get rid of the woman whose name he couldn’t remember.
Victor gave her enough time to get herself put together before he flushed his toilet and went back out into the house. The woman had gotten dressed as best she could with no one to help her and had her bag in hand. Now that he saw her in the morning light, she wasn’t as attractive as he had thought the night before.
“I’d offer you some tea before you go, but my valet hasn’t woken up yet,” Victor lied. Brian, his valet, was most likely off somewhere in Greenley buying groceries and sundries for the week and would surely have left a tea kettle on the stove so that Victor would be able to have a cup when he woke up.
“That’s quite all right,” the woman said with a smile. Feeling it was the least he could do, Victor walked her to the front door and opened it.
“Take care on your walk home,” he said, and when the woman leaned in to kiss him on the cheek he turned away. She looked more than a little disappointed but took the hint and left. Victor didn’t bother watching her go down the stairs before he shut the door and went toward the kitchen to see about the tea. If he was lucky, Brian would have also left him something for breakfast.
As he’d expected, Brian had left a tea kettle on the stove with a cozy over it. He couldn’t have been gone long, as the back burner was still warm. Victor checked inside the stove and found a plate with a cover on it, which he took out with a cloth and set on the kitchen table.
While he ate, he considered the problem of Lord Whittemore. The man wanted to divorce his wife, and urgently. The clause in the former Lord Whittemore’s will that was at issue prevented him from doing so, and he had employed Victor to help him find a way to get around it.
He had been spared the trouble of firing his previous solicitor, the man who had written and filed the old man’s will, by the simple expedient of Andrew Wilshire’s dying of a heart attack in the midst of a church service.
Wilshire had been Victor’s associate at the law office, and his death had been so sudden that he hadn’t specified what to do with the practice afterward. Ironically enough, he hadn’t left a will, so with no one else to take it over and his widow indifferent to its fate, Victor had become the sole proprietor of his own law firm at the age of thirty-one. Unfortunately, that also meant that Victor was left to sort out his former associate’s problems and mistakes as well. At the moment, the biggest problem was what to do about the Whittemore estate.
The main knot he was trying to untangle was whether or not Arthur was bound by the terms of the will. He’d seen more than one noble completely disregard their parent’s wishes once they’d passed, but the estate itself and potentially his title had never been in danger the way Arthur’s was.
Why he wanted to divorce Lady Whittemore was beyond Victor. From the moment he saw her he’d known she was something special. She was beautiful, of course, so much so that he hadn’t wanted to take his eyes off hers but more than that, she was talented. The music that flowed from her fingers put him in mind of his childhood, when his mother had played for him and his younger sister Catherine. He wanted to get to know her better but wasn’t sure how he would go about it, especially when he was being watched in her house. Lady Whittemore wasn’t one of the women he brought home from time to time, either. She was different, and if he was going to pursue her he couldn’t do it in his usual manner. It wasn’t as if her husband would care.
In any case, he was certain that Arthur’s problem was outside his area of expertise. He would have to call in one of his many favors, but no one leapt to mind. While he was considering it, he heard the front door open. He wiped his mouth just as his valet walked through the kitchen door.
“Good morning, sir,” he said, setting a box of groceries on the counter. “Is your female guest here?”
“No,” Victor said, pushing his plate away. “I’m afraid she had a previous engagement.”
“Ah. I’m not surprised.” Brian Taylor had been his valet long enough that he didn’t have to mince words. He picked up the plate and set it in the sink, then took two envelopes out of the inside pocket of his jacket. “Some post for you. I took the liberty of picking it up while I was near the post office.”
“Thank you, Brian,” Victor said, taking them from him. One was from his sister Catherine, the other bearing his name in flowing script. There was no return address and he opened it first.
Lord Arthur Whittemore requests your company at six o’clock in the evening on the Eighteenth of April, 1908. Music will be provided, along with a piano recital by Lady Cordelia Whittemore.
Please RSVP to Delphine Richmond care of Whittemore Manor by the Eighth of April, regrets prior to the Tenth.
Victor stared down at the card in his hand. A party so soon after the late Lord Whittemore had passed was sure to raise some eyebrows in polite society, particularly if he was able to work around the will and allow Arthur to divorce his wife as quickly as he wanted. Still, he couldn’t resist the allure of seeing Lady Whittemore again and hearing her play.
“Cordelia,” he said, her name making music of its own on his tongue. Brian looked over at him from where he was putting away the food.
“I’m sorry, sir?”
“Nothing,” Victor said. He tossed the letter from Catherine on the table to read later and stood up. “It’s an invitation to a party next month on the eighteenth. I’m going into town for a bit. I’ll send my response to Whittemore Manor while I’m there.”
“Are you sure? I’d be happy to do it for you,” Brian said. “There’s plenty of time for you to reply before the party.”
“I need to go to my office anyhow. There’s an address I need to look up,” Victor said, draining his teacup and setting it on its saucer. “I appreciate the breakfast. And your discretion, as always.”
“Of course, Mr. Pembroke.” Brian put the last of the dry goods into the pantry, then collected the dishes from the table and put them in the sink for the maid to take care of. “It’s my pleasure.”
“To be honest, I had every intention of employing a cook but you’re so talented you changed my mind. Would you like me to ready your clothes while you wash?” Brian took the empty envelope and deposited it in the trash and Victor shook his head.
“I’m not going to spend long in town, I’ll wash when I get back. The clothes from last night will suffice.” Victor was certain he wasn’t imagining the dubious look that passed over Brian’s face for a moment but it disappeared as quickly as it came.
“Very well, sir.”
Victor turned away from him and went to his bedroom before Brian could say anything else, though he knew he wouldn’t. His suit and tie from the previous evening were laid across the chair he’d taken his dressing gown from and in reasonably good condition. As a concession to common courtesy, he put on a clean undershirt and underwear before dressing and combing his hair in the mirror. He was presentable enough for a trip to town in which he didn’t plan to associate with anyone.
Greenley was a quiet town to say the least, and progress toward modern living was slow but the shops and dining establishments were like something out of a much larger town. Victor stopped to post his reply to Mrs. Richmond, then thought he might enjoy a pint at the pub before going to his office.
“Mr. Pembroke,” the barkeep said with a smile. “You’re looking well today. I trust you had a good time with Eleanor after you left us last night?”
“Eleanor, that’s right,” Victor said, leaning on the bar. “A pint would make going into work on a Sunday much more enjoyable, Phillip.” The smile he received from the man behind the bar was all he needed to make him sit down and Phillip passed the glass over.
While he was taking his first sip, two more men came into the pub and took a seat at one of the tables. Phillip excused himself to go to their table while Victor tried to decide which of his associates would be best to go to for advice when a snippet of the men’s conversation reached his ears.
“Right in front of everyone, bold as brass,” the first man said. “He wasn’t even trying to hide it.”
“Maybe it’s not what you think,” Phillip said fairly. “It wouldn’t be unusual for a man to be meeting a business acquaintance at a pub.”
“Even if he left with the young man in question not half an hour after they’d met?” The second man at the table had a grin in his voice and Victor’s hand stopped with the pint glass halfway to his lips. He was suddenly much more interested in the conversation. “A very young man by my estimation.”
“And that’s not the only time he’s been seen doing such a thing,” added the first man. “Not here or in Elston. He might think he’s being discreet, but I pity Lady Whittemore. There’s no way she doesn’t know.”
Victor’s eyes widened and he set the glass down a little more heavily than he intended, sloshing a little of the beer on the bar. He could hardly believe he was hearing that Arthur, of all people, was meeting young men in pubs.
“Thanks for the beer, Phillip,” Victor said, tossing some money on the bar beside his unfinished drink and hurrying out of the pub before Phillip could so much as say goodbye.
His office was on the other side of town and Victor somehow managed to keep from running into anyone on the way there. He unlocked the front door and went toward his office, not bothering to lock it behind him.
Once he was in his office, Victor took out his keys and unlocked his desk drawer, taking out a dark brown folio with a copper clasp. He pulled out his copy of the late Lord Whittemore’s will and read through it as fast as possible, wanting to get to the section about conditions and confirm what he thought he remembered.
“I’ll be damned,” Victor said as his eyes fell on the clause he was looking for.
In the event that Arthur Whittemore is unwilling or unable to remain married and produce a male heir to the Whittemore estate, the entirety of said estate will be ceded to the charities listed in section five. All titles and benefits thereof shall also be forfeit.
Everything was becoming clear to him. Arthur was looking for a way out of his marriage that wouldn’t cost him his lordship not because he wasn’t in love with his wife, but because he preferred the company of men. Young men, if the men at the pub could be trusted.
“I have to speak to Lady Whittemore at once,” he said to no one in particular. Surely she knew of her husband’s predilections, and most likely wanted to be free of the marriage just as much as he did. A smile spread over his face as he realized that as soon as he found a way around the clause in the will, Lady Whittemore would be his for the taking.
Cordelia, he reminded himself as he put the papers back in the folio and locked them in his drawer. With any luck, she won’t be Lady Whittemore much longer.