Midnight Marriage: A Georgian Historical Romance (Roxton Series) (19 page)

“Three days ago.”

Julian scanned the elegantly sloping handwriting then folded the page and laid it aside to flick through several other letters. “I’ve been summoned to Paris,” he said conversationally and held up a letter drenched in scent and sniffed at it tentatively before tossing it aside with a frown.

“The Duke is not—pleased—you chose to ignore his earlier summons,” Martin told him. “You were to be in Paris six weeks ago.”

“Put bluntly, he’s as mad as hell fire with me,” said Julian, continuing a casual search through the cards and letters, picking up an invitation here, a letter there, aware his godfather watched him with a critical eye.

“Two Parisian lawyers, sent by his Grace, arrived this morning,” Martin stated. “They spent the day in the book room consulting their papers and tomorrow morning will brief you on matters in Paris. I should warn you that the Lieutenant of Police for Paris has issued a warrant for your arrest. M’sieur Lefebvre has brought a charge of breach of promise against you on behalf of his daughter.”

When Julian shrugged and looked unconcerned, it put up the old man’s hackles. It angered him that his godson could be so nonchalant about so serious a charge. He expected the Marquis to at least be concerned how M’sieur Lefebvre’s publicly declared accusation was affecting his parents, particularly his mother. The Duchess might show the world a beautiful face of disinterest that her eldest son was being vilified and lampooned by French newssheets as the embodiment of the worst sort of English nobleman, but in private she looked so worried about the effect this charge was having on the ageing Duke’s deteriorating health that it broke Martin’s heart. It made the old man forget decades of trained restraint and say curtly,

“Will you alert the Marchioness as to why two French lawyers have invaded the book room, or shall I?”

“My wife is not your concern,” came the flat reply from behind the pages of a closely scripted letter.

“I beg to remind his lordship of the considerable part I played in watching over your wife these past few years,” Martin Ellicott replied in a steady voice. “My letters to the Duke concerning her welfare have placed me in a most awkward position. My loyalty is and always will be to the House of Roxton but I cannot but feel a responsibility for her well-being and—and
happiness
.”

Julian tossed the letter aside and met the old man’s gaze with an unblinking stare. “That you were Father’s most trusted and devoted servant for over thirty years gives you a certain latitude, but it does not give you leave to lecture the son on his duty as a husband. I repeat: My wife is not your concern.”

The two men stared at one another; the old man was the first to look away. He inclined his gray head with extreme politeness.

“Duty to one’s name and rank is indeed a heavy burden, Julian, but it should never be endured for its own sake; or to the arrogant exclusion of everything and everybody else. The Duke your father learnt this lesson when he fell in love with your mother. Good night, M’sieur.” He bowed and left the room, and as he closed over the door he heard Julian swear loud and long in vernacular French, fist coming down hard upon the table, rattling the china and the silver domed dishes and toppling the wine glasses.

Early next morning, Fibber directed Deb to the terrace where Martin sat with his morning coffee perusing a London newssheet. When he saw Deb hovering by the table in shy expectation of being noticed he quickly folded the paper and stood up. He thought she looked far lovelier than his remembrances of her from her weekly visits to his house. She was dressed very simply in a day gown of yellow cream silk and wore matching mules. A single ribbon pulled the weight of her deep red curls across the back of her slender white neck and over one shoulder. But it was not only her choice of gown that complemented her natural beauty; there was a radiance about her person, of good health and happiness that served to further depress the old man. He noted her one piece of jewelry, a long single strand of exquisite milky pearls. He knew them well. They were the Alston pearls: Passed down through the generations and presented by the heir to the Roxton dukedom to his bride on their wedding day.

“Did you sleep well, my child?” Martin asked, managing a bright smile. He took the hand she held out to him, offering her the seat opposite with the warmth of the sun on her back, and sent Fibber away to fetch her breakfast.

“Very well. So well in fact that I am much more the thing this morning,” she said with a smile. “I may even be able to eat something.”

“Good. I am glad to hear it. There are fresh fruits of the season and newly baked croissants.”

“Do you know, I don’t recall, in all the times I rode out here for French conversation, that we ever spoke in English,” she said with a laugh. “And here we are! Not one word of the French tongue! You have no accent at all. I had assumed you to be French all along.”

“My mother was a Frenchwoman. And in my other life, before I retired here to Bath, my master and I conversed mostly in French. His mother too was French, as is his wife. But no,” said Martin with a warm smile, “my English is not accented, although the same could not be said of Julian’s mother who has not spoken two words of English in my presence these twenty six years.”

Deb took the mug of chocolate offered her. “Julian’s mother is a Frenchwoman?”

Martin cursed himself for not guarding his tongue better. “Yes.”

“Will she approve of me, do you think?”

The old man saw the apprehension in her brown eyes and smiled kindly. “Very much, child.”

Deborah was not so certain, yet there was a twinkle in her eye. “Perhaps upon first introduction I should not mention that I play a viola or that I am a better marksman than I am an embroiderer?”

“Not at all, my dear. I think it is you who will be pleasantly surprised by her—Julian’s mother. She is, to say the least, a most fascinating lady.”

“And his father?”

Martin put down his coffee dish. “Ah. Now Monseigneur, he is an acquired taste.”

“M’sieur Ellicott,” Deb said with a heightened color, “you may find this strange and almost unbelievable, but I have been married to your godson for almost ten weeks now and still I know so little about his family. Oh, he has spoken of them in a general sense but I know no specifics and while we were in Cumbria I did not feel the necessity to question him; indeed my happiness made me not want to ask for fear of discovering some awful impediment to our marriage. It was as if by the very act of asking I would somehow shatter my hopes for the future.” She gave a tinkle of laughter. “Oh dear, you are looking at me as if I am the silly goose I feel I am!” She took a croissant from the plate Fibber placed in the middle of the table and gently teased apart the layers of flaky pastry, yet the thought of eating it made her inexplicably nauseous. She had suffered the same unpleasant sensation at the Duckpond Inn, and before that in the last days of her stay in Cumbria. She pushed the plate a little away from her. “Forgive me if I have made you uncomfortable by my confidences. I am being one of those missish females I so despise and I can’t account for it.”

The old man lightly touched her hand but could not bring himself to look into her eyes. “My dear, if at anytime you feel you need—support… What I am trying to say is,” he stumbled on, “that we have known each other for a number of years now, and I have come to regard you as one would a granddaughter. You must know that I care for you and that your happiness is important to me. What I am trying to say is that I—I am here if ever you should need me.”

Deb stared at his thin white hand and then at his clear blue eyes and frowned. Her heart thudded against her chest. “Thank you. Your support means a great deal to me, M’sieur,” she said gratefully, and then voiced in a whisper her inner most dread, “Am I truly married to Julian?”

The old man’s smile was reassuring. “Very much so. And before you ask it, yes, Julian truly is my godson; an honor bestowed upon me by his parents. Those two facts are not in dispute.” He squeezed her hand before sitting back in his chair. “And as you are married to my godson I would like you to call me Martin.”

“I should like that very much. Thank you.” She nervously toyed with the curls that fell into her lap. “It would be naive of me to think Julian hadn’t discussed me with you, so perhaps you offer your support because you are worried lest his parents object to his choice of bride. After all, I did defy my brother to live in Paris and did not come home again until forced to by him. Well bred young ladies do not behave that way.” Her face flooded with color. “Nor do they elope.”

“My dear girl, Julian’s parents cannot but love you as I have come to love you. I do indeed know a little about that episode in Paris, and it does you credit that you felt compelled to defy Sir Gerald to be at the bedside of your very ill brother. You, a young girl, nursed him and took care of his wife and young son when other family members, more obligated than you, failed him. You are to be commended not condemned, and I am sure this must surely be the view of Julian’s family.”

Martin refilled his coffee dish wondering how best to explain his inner most and most pressing concern without being disloyal to his godson.

“His father can be overwhelming. Indeed, Julian was overwhelmed by him when a youth, so much so that he found it almost impossible to live under the long shadow cast by his father’s consequence. I would not be exaggerating if I told you my godson’s boyhood was stormy and somewhat notorious.” He glanced up at Deb. “In the coming months you will, I have no doubt, hear many conflicting reports. Some may be true, others are the fabrication of those who seek to damage Julian in retribution for what they believe are past wrongs. I make no excuses for his behavior, nor do I judge him. All I ask is that you remember that he is shaped by what he is destined to become. I have every faith in you being able to come to terms with these unalterable facts. If you cannot…” He stopped himself and forced a smile and changed the topic completely before Deb could utter a word. “I have not been to Crewehall, but I am told its situation on the foreshores of Lake Windermere is something to behold…”

Deb was still digesting his advice that his inane question about her honeymoon destination did not immediately register. She wanted to probe the old man further about Julian’s background but they were distracted by a horse and rider, galloping across the lawns between the terrace and the river and heading for the stables. It was her husband.

The Marquis reappeared on the terrace, in a lather of perspiration and dust. His thick black curls were damp, as were his white shirt and buff breeches. He looked as if he had ridden himself and his horse to breaking point, and as if he hadn’t slept at all the night before. Deborah and the old man slowly rose to their feet. They waited for him to speak. He wiped the hair out of his tired eyes and focused on the broken but uneaten croissant on Deb’s plate.

“You need to eat, and more than that,” he stated and turned to Martin, saying in French, “I’ve put a stack of correspondence on the table in the hall. Would you see it is taken into Bath today?”

“Certainly,” Martin answered in kind and without a blink.

“Has M’sieur Muraire risen?”

“Yes, M’sieur.”

“I won’t keep him waiting. I need only bathe and change.”

“I shall have Fibber inform M’sieur Muraire that you will see him in—say—an hour’s time?” the old man asked politely as if nothing was amiss.

Deborah glanced from Martin to Julian, unable to fathom the formality in the tone of their French tongue nor the fact that both men were at pains to avoid stating the obvious. It was too much for her.

“Good God, Julian, you’re exhausted!” she blurted out in English. “You’ve been up all night. You need sleep.”

The Marquis bowed to her but did not make eye contact. “Thank you for your concern, my dear,” he answered. “Now you both must excuse me,” and he went into the house, Deb watching him go, biting her bottom lip, and she hadn’t done that in months.

E
IGHT

‘
D
OES
M
ONSEIGNEUR
understand that if we are unable to persuade mademoiselle Lefebvre to change her outrageous claim then it will be necessary for him to be interrogated by M’sieur Sartine, the Lieutenant of Police for Paris?” M’sieur Muraire, the celebrated French lawyer, explained patiently. “I tell you, her father he is determined to have you up before a judge. If we cannot convince Sartine that the girl she is a liar then our efforts they are wasted. I am sorry for it, Monseigneur, but Sartine he will have no choice but to charge you with breach of promise.”

“That is very bad for you, Monseigneur, very bad indeed,” Auguste Pothier, the lawyer’s flunkey, breathed with something akin to relish.

“Pothier! You great fool! Be quiet!” snapped the lawyer and glared so hard at the flunkey that Pothier bowed deeply to the straight wide back of their noble client and retreated behind a sheaf of dog-eared pages, muttering to himself about the correctness of his pronouncement.

M’sieur Muraire cleared his throat loudly. “I apologize if Pothier’s great stupidity alarmed you, Monseigneur.”

“Lefebvre’s threat hardly strikes dread in my heart,” drawled the Marquis, refilling his glass with claret. “Once I state my case to Sartine this preposterous charge will be dropped.”

M’sieur Muraire eyed his client warily. “There is a way perhaps that might be considered worth pursuing with the girl’s father. M’sieur Lefebvre he is a very proud and very rich man. This breach of promise nonsense it can be overcome if Monseigneur was to—to—” The lawyer fortified his nerves with a luxuriant sniff of his scented handkerchief. Pothier stared at his master with breath held. “If Monseigneur was to agree to
marry
mademoiselle Lefebvre.”

The proposition hung in a heavy silence with both Frenchmen staring at one another with breath held.

“Marry? Marry a
putain
?” Julian growled in angry incredulity. “Have you taken leave of your senses? That is precisely why that whore has accused me of seducing her, you imbecile! Christ, I’d rather take my chances with a hanging judge!”