Roding blinked. ‘What the devil for?’
‘Messenger,’ Gerald explained. ‘I don’t want that girl running her head into any more danger.’
‘As if you could stop her.’
‘Probably not. But, whether she likes it or not, I aim to be on hand to get her out of it.’
‘Quite right, Gerald,’ approved Lucilla.
‘She won’t like it,’ prophesied the captain gloomily. ‘And nor do I. You’ll end up dead, that’s what.’
‘Nonsense. I’ll have to wait here, of course, which means you, Hilary—’
‘Will have to do tomorrow’s patrol. Yes, very well. Better check on Remenham House, I suppose.’
‘Yes, do. I’ve seen Brewis Charvill, by the by.’
‘Eh? Why did you not say so, man?’ demanded Hilary crossly.
‘I am saying so,’ protested Gerald mildly.
‘Dunderhead. Get on with it, then. I suppose you came right out and asked him about his family?’
‘Nothing of the sort. I was extremely subtle—in fact, as devious as Melusine. I told him Valade had tried to borrow money off me and asked if he could vouch for the fellow. It seems Valade visited him that day to present his credentials, and Charvill posted straight off to inform his great-uncle. Which is why I wasn’t able to see him until today. He gave Valade the go-ahead and they’ve gone off to visit him.’
‘Well? Well? What did the fellow have to add to this rigmarole?’
‘He confirmed that Nicholas Charvill—presumably Melusine’s father—had been disinherited for marrying Suzanne Valade.’
‘Ah, so that’s where Valade comes in,’ nodded Lucy.
‘Precisely. Madame Valade—for want of any other name to call her by—told me that she, in her character of Melusine, was the daughter of Suzanne Valade and Nicholas Charvill.’
‘But that would make her half French,’ Hilary pointed out.
‘Whereas Melusine insists she is entirely English,’ agreed Gerald. ‘Therefore she cannot be the daughter of Suzanne Valade. Voilà tout, as Melusine herself would say.’
‘Oh, this is becoming nonsensical,’ exclaimed Lucilla.
‘Of course it is,’ corroborated Hilary. ‘Must be another of her lies.’
‘Or she imagines that being half English is the same as being completely English,’ suggested Lucilla.
‘Parbleu,’ said Gerald. ‘I borrow the expression from Melusine. She may be an infuriating little devil, but she is far from stupid. Moreover, she claims that this whole enterprise of hers is purely for the purpose of marrying an Englishman.’
‘That’s fortunate,’ murmured Lucilla.
Gerald frowned. ‘What?’
‘Nothing,’ snapped Roding, with an odd look at his bride to be that Gerald could not interpret. ‘Does Charvill know that this Melusine of yours is here?’
The question distracted Gerald. ‘You mean that there is a rival Melusine to the one he has heard about? He does not. At least, I frustrated her design in calling upon him this morning. I can’t but feel it’s an undesirable complication to drag in the Charvills at this point. Time enough to do so when she has her affairs settled—if she can settle them.’
‘And if she can’t?’ asked Lucy.
‘We’ll cross that bridge if and when we come to it.’
‘What if she goes back to Charvill?’ demanded Roding.
‘Why do you think I want a man ready to run to me with every move she makes?’ countered Gerald. ‘She may well try to go back. She says she will have to, though she does not wish to. Which is also puzzling.’ Gerald frowned. ‘I only wish I might have won her confidence.’
Lucilla sat up. ‘She won’t confide in you? Now, why?’
‘Because that scoundrel Leonardo drummed it into her head that no man was to be trusted,’ Gerald announced viciously.
‘The more I hear about this Leonardo,’ Lucy said severely, ‘the more I want to meet your Melusine. I daresay you have the whole thing wrong, Gerald. Men usually do.’
‘It’s immaterial, in any event,’ Roding put in. ‘What we have to find out is whether or not the wretched female is in fact Lord Charvill’s granddaughter. What had Brewis Charvill to say to that, Gerald?’
‘He had nothing to say to it. It does not matter to him either way. But what he did say is that he thinks the Valades will receive very short shrift from his great-uncle the general.’
***
Everett, General Lord Charvill, master of a barony stretching over a wide estate that encroached on the hundreds of Witham, Thurstable and Dengy, stood before his own fireplace, glaring at his visitors from under bushy white brows from a head held necessarily low above a back painfully bent by rheumatism. He was a thin old man, a wreck in a ruined body, but nothing would induce him to stand in any other way than as stiffly erect as possible like the soldier he had always been, even though he was obliged to lean on his silver-handled cane to do so.
That he received guests of the name of Valade at all would have surprised anyone who knew his history. But he had been forewarned by his great-nephew. His first reaction had been explosive as the hurts of the past rose up to taunt him. Lord Charvill’s sense of justice would not, however, allow him to repudiate his granddaughter, if indeed this female proved to be the infant lost to the family so many years ago.
To be confronted with the girl’s damned Frenchman of a husband was another matter altogether. Particularly when it was obvious the fellow was one of these pitiful wretches weak enough to allow themselves to be ousted from their inheritances and thus obliged to come seeking succour of their neighbours. The general had little doubt he was going to be asked to provide for the fellow as well as for his legitimate descendant.
