A Gentleman's Position (Society of Gentlemen) (14 page)

“Hell and the devil,” he said under his breath. “Julius, Mason, go and get him.”

“I beg your pardon?” Julius said.

“I can’t do it, and he likes you both. Go to Cricklade and get him. I shall give you a note—no, that won’t do. Just tell him I need him, and offer him anything. You may tell him that from me.
Anything.
” Mason was giving Richard a look. Richard met his eyes. “If you have thoughts, you may share them.”

“Within reason,” Dominic added swiftly.

“
Anything
is all very well, your lordship. I’m wondering what I tell him if he asks me why he should bother.”

Richard ignored the glances around the room. “Tell him…” He couldn’t think of anything that would salve David’s pride without seeming a cheap manipulation; any message that might be worth his listening to. He couldn’t think why David
should
bother. “Tell him that I am in need of his skills. That I require him, and a gentleman will not do at all. Tell him that I am quite specifically in desperate need of a redheaded bastard.”

Julius blinked. “And that will help, will it?”

“Got you, your lordship.” Mason nodded at Julius. “Coming?”

“At your service, citizen.” Julius swept him a bow. “I don’t think I’d miss this for the world.”

Mason and Julius left at dawn the next morning. It was ninety miles to Cricklade, a full day’s hard journey even with a curricle built for speed and unlimited changes of horses. David could not be expected back in London before the following night at the very earliest. If he came at all.

If David did not come…

If he did not come, it would mean that he was truly no longer Richard’s man, and the thought was so intolerable that his mind flinched from it. If he had made such an accursed tangle of things that David no longer cared to come to his aid, the cascade of impending disasters would be his fault.

“You place a lot of reliance on Cyprian,” Dominic remarked as they sat in the book room the following day. “He’s a clever man but not a magician.”

“He has other ways of seeing things,” Richard said. “That’s what we need. None of us had even considered stealing the letter back before Mason suggested it.”

“And what if he doesn’t come?”

“I don’t know.” Richard put his hands through his hair. “I can’t think of any way around this damned business. We can’t pay Maltravers off, can’t threaten him or appeal to his better nature. I have no idea what we can do, except pray Cyprian is more ingenious than I and that he is willing to help.” He smiled without mirth. “Ironic, isn’t it? I spent so long telling myself that I might not touch him because I have all the power and he has none. It does not feel like that now.”

“Indeed not. Richard, if we are faced with a decision, I need to know what you will do.”

“I promised you that I would protect Mason while you need me to. I will do it if I have to rush him and Ash out of the country together.”

“You understand the consequences to your name and Harry’s.” Dominic looked rather pale.

“I understand them very well. I made you a promise. And in any case, I should not insult Harry by protecting him at Mason’s expense. He would not take that.”

“No, he wouldn’t. Richard, I’m frightened.”

“I imagine you are.”

“Silas doesn’t deserve this.” Dominic was staring at the wall. “He’s the worst sort of democrat and guilty as hell of seditious libel, but he had nothing to do with that accursed conspiracy of fools, and to see him hounded like this…I
can’t.
We still have so much to talk about.” His smile was a grimace. “I know you don’t understand—”

“Of course I damned well understand,” Richard said. “If I had bothered to look and listen, I should have understood from the start. I’m sorry I failed you in that.” And if he had not, perhaps he might have understood what he felt for David instead of denying what was in front of his own face for so long.

Dominic was silent for a few moments. Finally and carefully he said, “You know, Richard, you are a very imposing man, and of course a rich one, and used to having your way, and it is easy to feel that you are invulnerable. I wonder if I have ever quite understood that you are afraid too.”

Richard opened his mouth on a denial that somehow stuck in his throat.

“The burden of your father’s expectations, of course,” Dominic went on. “Duty, loyalty, responsibility, all excellent things, except that he did not forgive anything less than perfection, did he? Especially not from the second son who was obliged from birth to be ‘useful to your brother’ and ‘live up to your position.’ I grew to hate those words on your behalf, you know. Your mother may have called you the reserve, but it was your father who taught you that you had always to earn your right to exist.” Dominic made a face. “Well, I am damned sorry if you feel there was something more you should have done for me or that you owe me anything now, because you don’t. And I know we are all leaning on you, as we always do, but if you were as frightened and helpless as the rest of us, nobody would think the less of you for it. You don’t need to earn our affection, my dear. You have it anyway.”

Richard could find nothing to say. Dominic put a light hand on his. “I would wager, moreover, that Mr. Cyprian knows your feelings better than I do. Tell him the truth, and let him deal with it in his own way.”

“If he comes. And if he does, there’s every chance it will be out of loyalty to Mason rather than me, and I cannot let my personal affairs get in the way of dealing with this appalling tangle.”

“Whose personal affairs?”

Richard blinked at him, confused. Dominic returned a wry look. “Is it just your affair, Rich, and just your decision?”

“God damn it. Perhaps you could speak to him for me. I feel sure you would do better.”

“I have every faith in your ability to learn,” Dominic said, and added, under his breath, “Eventually.”

Richard went to visit Philip that afternoon. It was something to do with the endless day.

“Are you well, brother?” Philip asked. “You look somewhat worn.”

“I feel it. I am just back from an errand to Tarlton March, and any amount of business cropped up in my absence. Tell me something. What do you do when you and Eustacia disagree?”

“We rarely do. She knows my position and her own.”

Richard looked up from his teacup. “That does not sound like Eustacia.”

“On the contrary. I don’t mean that she is subservient. I mean that she does not disagree with me unless she thinks she must. And in all honesty, Richard, I have found that on those occasions she is correct or at least that she has identified something I had not considered. I have learned to listen to her.”

“Listening,” Richard said. “I have been told I need to do more of that.”

“It is…not easy.” Philip carefully rearranged the sugar bowl and milk jug. “One cannot be the Marquess of Cirencester, or even the master of lands such as you own, without certainty. If one is easily swayed or self-doubting…”

“No.”

Philip gave his quick, shy smile. “But even I should rather be married and occasionally corrected than stand alone, convinced of my own rightness.”

“Even if you are right?”

Philip raised a brow. “What’s troubling you, brother?”

“I don’t know. Thinking about Mother, and Father. Will you mind if I do not marry, Philip?”

“Yes, of course I should. Very much. I should like to stand groomsman at your wedding—or I dare say you might wish Frey to do that, of course, but I want to see you married. I want nephews and nieces to spoil now that we expect no more additions to our nursery. I want to see you happy.”

Richard took a deep breath. “Suppose I were happy outside marriage?”

“Oh.” Philip considered that. “You mean—a lady you are not able to marry?”

“Precisely,” Richard lied.

“I had not thought you would—”

“Nor did I.”

“Oh,” Philip said again. “I cannot approve. You must see that. I cannot believe happiness can come through illicit connections. You don’t
look
happy.”

“I’m not happy. I have attempted to stick to my principles instead of pursuing my happiness and caused a deal of hurt by it.”

“Oh, Richard.” Philip put his cup down. “I’m very sorry to hear it. I suppose you have thought of all the things that I should say to this.”

“Repeatedly. You have no need to disapprove of me. I can do that myself.”

Philip thought a moment. “You must be honest,” he said at last. “I am quite sure of that. No good can come of deception.
To thine own self be true
—”

“Thou canst not then be false to any man,”
Richard completed. “But which self should I be true to, Philip? My private self, the one who…wants? Or the public face of Lord Richard the marquess’s son, who must behave as befits a Vane?”

Philip looked alarmed. “How can you be anyone other than yourself? Of course you must behave as befits your position. You must conduct yourself as a gentleman, and you may only do that by behaving in private as you would in public. There are plenty of men who indulge in liaisons out of the eyes of the world, but really, Richard, have we not seen where such things lead?”

“Oh, yes. Mother strayed, and Father never forgave her. Imagine if he had, though, Philip. Imagine if he had understood.”

Philip gave a short, harsh laugh. Richard sighed. “I am fanciful, I know. I beg your pardon, brother. Ignore me. And don’t worry. I shall not do anything to bring discredit on the family.”

“You never would. I have every faith that you will do the right thing. Uh…I am not very good at these matters, Richard. Perhaps if you talk to Eustacia?”

“I like to talk to you,” Richard said. “I don’t expect you to provide the answers. And I care for your good opinion as yourself, not just as Cirencester.”

“You have it. And you may talk to me whenever you wish.” Philip visibly steeled himself to add, “About any subject you wish.”

I wish to God I could,
Richard thought.
I wish you might understand.

He had not called a meeting of the Ricardians that evening, but they gathered in the private rooms of Quex’s anyway as if dragged there, all of them too on edge for other society. Richard felt that as much as anyone. A note had come from Philip just before he left the house; he had shoved it into his pocket without opening it. If it was some sort of considered warning against immorality, he didn’t want to know.

No good can come of deception.
That was easy to say when the truth didn’t earn you the pillory or the gallows.

“If we had only lived a generation ago, it would be simple,” Dominic was saying. “One of us could force some spurious quarrel on Maltravers and deal with him that way.”

“What, a duel? You’d be lucky,” Ash said. “Mal never fights with anyone his own size. He’s Lord Maltravers. He can’t be seen to be beaten.”

“He always made sure he had at least three henchmen at Eton,” Francis observed. He had been brutally bullied by Maltravers during their school days, as a weaver’s son who did not belong among gentlemen. It lay at the heart of their mutual hatred.

“Julius could probably force a quarrel on Maltravers,” Harry said. “He could provoke a stone when he puts his mind to it. And he’s a damned good fencer.”

“So is Richard, though less offensive,” Dominic said. “Rich, will you be our champion and challenge Maltravers for Ash’s good name? Hit him with a glove or some such.”

He and Harry carried that nonsense on for a while, talking because silence was not tolerable. Ash and Francis did not look in the mood for chatter. They were sitting close to each other, shoulder to shoulder. If sardonic, unforgiving Francis had expressed a word of blame to Ash for his folly, Richard had not seen it.

The talk died at last, and silence descended “I wonder when he’ll be back,” Harry said into it. “Julius, I mean.”

Richard ran both hands through his hair. “Tomorrow. They would have had to set off at dawn to return to London tonight. We cannot expect that.” He had told himself that a dozen times in the past hour.

“I hope they are back tomorrow,” Ash said. “And I hope Cyprian is with them, and I hope to God he has some ideas. Richard, should I flee the country?”

Everyone turned. Ash held his hands up. “Everyone’s being terribly kind, but the fact is, this to-do is my fault, and it’s up to me to take the consequences. If I run, it’s admitting guilt, I know, but you could all be shocked and appalled.” He offered the room a watery smile. “And I’d rather bring disgrace on my family from France than in the pillory.”

“Would that not mean Francis would have to run as well?” Richard asked.

“It may come to that,” Francis said. “The accursed thing is, if we run, we proclaim our guilt, but every day we don’t, I feel a growing conviction that I shall find a Bow Street Runner breathing down my neck.”

Dominic sat up. “Have you been followed? Men hanging around, servants questioned?” Ash and Francis glanced at each other and shook their heads. Dominic frowned. “That’s odd. I would have thought—”

“Listen!” Harry yelped.

Rapid footsteps on the stairs. It was one man, not a crowd, and Richard had just time to register
Not an arrest
before the door opened and Harry leapt up with a cry.

“Gentlemen.” It was Julius, still wearing his hat and greatcoat. He swept them a bow. “Admire my celerity.”

Richard found he was on his feet as well. “Did you get him? Where is he? Did he come?”

“I see the situation has not improved in my absence,” Julius said. “Yes, I have him. He has requested a private interview with you first, Richard.”

Richard nodded. “Send him up. Leave me, gentlemen. We will speak tomorrow when, please God, Cyprian may have some better ideas than the rest of us.”

“I really don’t feel like waiting on his convenience,” Francis said through his teeth. “The man’s a valet. Can you not soothe his damned amour propre with a new set of livery and get on now?”

“No,” Richard said. “It was not his idea or mine to write that letter, and we may all be grateful if he chooses to help us avert the consequences, so you will kindly do as I ask at once.”

Dominic was already standing. “Of course, dear fellow, carry on. Be
quiet,
Francis.” He steered Francis out as Harry followed pushing Ash. Julius stepped aside to let them out, gave Richard a quizzical look, and closed the door.

The minute they had left, Richard wished they had not. He had not wanted to be alone all day, except that he had not enjoyed anyone’s company either.

“Damn it,” he said aloud, and fished out Philip’s note. He probably needed some moral disapproval now.

It was in Eustacia’s hand. Philip always had her write for him, since even Richard struggled to decipher his efforts.

Dear Richard,

In your conversation today, Philip omitted to observe that some things are of necessity private but may still be conducted honestly. He asks me now to assure you of his faith in your conduct, both in public and in private, and of his continuing regard, whatever course you think best to pursue.

Ever yours,

Eustacia

Underneath that, Philip had scrawled three words in his childlike hand:

I stand corrected.

Richard was still staring at that when David came in.

He looked travel weary, pale, and tired after what must have been a full day in the coach at uncomfortable speed. He wore a brown coat that went better with his hair than the severe black Richard had seen him wear before and his manner was decidedly wary.