Rushed to the Altar (45 page)

Jasper lay awake most of the night.
Where could she have gone?
He couldn’t for the life of him come up with an answer. She had funds, that much he knew. Had she left the city? Stagecoaches went from the Bell Inn at Cheapside to destinations all over the land; she could have been on her way to Scotland for all he knew. He fell into an unrestful doze just before dawn and awoke determined to visit the coaching inn. An elegant young woman and a small boy were distinctive enough to stick in the memory. Someone would have noticed them buying tickets and with luck would remember their destination. If he drew a blank there, then he would try the inns on the main routes out of London that hired postchaises. There weren’t too many of them. He had no idea how much money Clarissa had, but she could well have sufficient to hire a postchaise for a few stages at least.

He left the house without breakfast and rode to the Bell at Cheapside, where he drew a blank. The usual posting houses on the main routes out of the city also brought him nothing, and, dispirited, he returned to Half Moon Street at midday, intent on looking again through everything Clarissa had left behind. There must be a clue somewhere.

Sally greeted him anxiously. “Is there news of Mistress
Ordway, my lord? She didn’t say nothing to me about being called away so sudden like. Could she have ’ad an accident, sir?”

“If I knew the answer to that, Sally, I wouldn’t be here now.” Jasper went upstairs and began a methodical search through the drawers, the armoire, the linen press, the secretaire, and everything he found made him question whether Clarissa had left of her own free will. Surely, even if she wanted nothing to remind her of a liaison that had ended with so much pain, she would have taken her toothbrush . . . her hairbrushes . . . the portmanteau that she had brought with her from King Street. Her own plain, simple gowns. They had nothing to do with him. They were not tainted by his touch.

It was a bitter reflection and brought him no comfort. He was looking once more through the contents of the secretaire when he heard the front door knocker. Frowning, he went to the window looking down on the street. Did Clarissa often have visitors he didn’t know? Or was it his brothers once again? Two strange horses were tethered to the hitching posts that lined the street.

Voices rose from the hall in answer to Sally’s inquiring tones. Jasper went to the door and stepped out onto the small landing.

“We are here to see Mistress Astley, my girl. Be so good as to inform her?” The voice was plummy but redolent of authority.

“But, sir, there’s no one of that name ’ere.” Sally was confused and apologetic.

“Don’t talk nonsense, girl.” The second voice lacked the richness of the first but was every bit as authoritative. “Mistress Astley wrote to us from this very address. Where is your mistress?”

Jasper felt his spirits lighten for the first time in two days as a glimmer of hope pierced his dread. He came swiftly down the stairs. “Gentlemen, perhaps we may be of service to each other.” He bowed as he reached the hall. The two prosperous-looking gentlemen bowed punctiliously, but their expressions were not particularly friendly.

“I don’t know about that, sir. Whom do we have the honor of addressing?” Lawyer Danforth asked.

“Blackwater, at your service, sir.” Jasper extended his hand, saying over his shoulder, “Sally, you may go.”

“Blackwater who?” the other gentleman demanded.

“Earl of,” Jasper informed him with a wry smile. “But you have the advantage of me, gentlemen.”

They both subjected him to an astonished scrutiny. “You are the Earl of Blackwater, sir?”

“The very same.”

“Then perhaps you would be good enough to explain why you are giving orders in the house where Mistress Astley lodges?”

“Astley?” Jasper raised an eyebrow. “So that’s her name. Gentlemen, the lady you seek is known to me and my household as Mistress Clarissa Ordway. If we
can clarify that, then maybe we can converse to good purpose.” The glimmer of hope became a full-blown sunburst.

“
Your
household, my lord?” Doctor Alsop was outraged. “Then permit me to tell you, sir, that you are a blackguard.”

“Certainly you may tell me that, although I would dispute its truth.” Jasper gestured to the stairs. “As it happens Clarissa is my affianced bride, just so that there may be no misperceptions at the outset. Will you go up, gentlemen? I believe we need to exchange some information with a degree of urgency. Clarissa, you see, has disappeared, together with a small boy she seemed rather fond of.”

“Francis,” his visitors said in unison.

“That would be the urchin in question, although I know him as Frank.
Please,
gentlemen . . .” He gestured to the stairs again and this time the two men preceded him up and into the drawing room without demur.

Jasper poured claret for his guests. “I need you to tell me the whole. Who is Clarissa? Who is responsible for her? And who let her loose in London, and why?”

The doctor and the lawyer exchanged glances. Then Lawyer Danforth said, “Before we give you any such information, my lord, as the friends of Clarissa’s father, and as such her unofficial guardians, we would like to know why you consider you have the right to ask for it.”

Jasper picked his words carefully. “Clarissa, as I said, is my affianced bride. She said she had no guardian, no
family, and I thought it right that throughout our betrothal she should reside under my protection . . . in this house.”

“And you believed her, sir?” Doctor Alsop made no attempt to hide his skepticism.

“Not necessarily,” Jasper responded with a bland smile. “But she would divulge nothing more to me, so I judged it politic to go along with her fabrication.” He frowned suddenly. “Gentlemen, this is truly a matter of some urgency. Clarissa and the child—her brother, I assume—are in danger. There’s no other explanation.” No other explanation for any of it, he thought. For her prevarication, her lies, her manipulation. She had been desperately dodging danger as best she could.

Danforth coughed, sipped his claret, glanced at the doctor, who nodded, and then the lawyer gave Jasper finally the whole picture.

“So this piece of vermin has a house on Ludgate Hill?” Jasper was already at the door before the lawyer had reached his final period. “We’ll start there.”

“He is their guardian, Lord Blackwater,” Danforth put in, as much for form’s sake as anything.

“And he will shortly regret that fact,” Jasper stated curtly. “You are welcome to remain here, gentlemen, until I return with Clarissa and her brother.” He had reached the head of the stairs when the door knocker sounded again and Sally hurried across the hall to answer it.

“Is Mistress Ordway in, Sally?” Sebastian came in
on the question and saw his brother on the stair. “Oh, Jasper . . . will we be in the way? We came to see how Clarissa is.”

“You will not be in the way, either of you.” Jasper nodded at Peregrine, who stood just behind his twin. “As it happens you will be very much to the point. Come with me.”

Chapter Twenty-three
 

The morning inched by in the attic bedchamber. No more food or water had been supplied and Clarissa was hard-pressed to find any kind of comfort for her little brother, who had sunk into an almost catatonic reverie, lying on the bed sucking his thumb, which he hadn’t done in years.

She had tried hammering on the door but this time the noise had produced no response. It was just before noon when the door opened at last and Luke stood there, his wicked little knife in his hand. “Well, my dears, I’m sure you’ll be happy to hear that my plans are now made.” He smiled at them. “Bring that sniveling brat over here, Clarissa.”

She hesitated, and with sudden startling speed his arm flashed in another vicious blow across her face that made her reel, her head spinning. At least it wasn’t his knife hand, she thought with a strange mordant humor, which seemed to her as absurd as it was out of place.

“Bring him here.” The command cracked with the same vicious intent as his hand.

Clarissa went to the bed and gently lifted Francis to his feet. “Start to scream, love,” she whispered. She had no plan, could think of nothing except that if she let Luke take the boy without her, she would never see him again. Francis began to shriek, an ear-splitting scream that made her eardrums ache. Luke opened his mouth to speak but his voice had no power against the child’s wild screams.

“He’ll stop if I come with him,” Clarissa shouted. “He won’t let you take him without me.”

Francis picked up his cue rapidly. He flung himself on the floor, kicking, screaming at the top of his lungs, and when his uncle approached, bending to pull him to his feet, he sank his teeth into his hand. Luke yelled, yanking his hand back.

“He’ll come quietly if I come with him,” Clarissa repeated desperately. They both needed to get out of this prison. There would be no opportunities for escape if they didn’t.

Luke glowered, sucking his hand. He looked down at the screaming, flailing child. “Bring him,” he said savagely. “It makes no difference to me whether you’re with him or not.”

Clarissa bent to lift Francis to his feet. He looked at her for guidance and she murmured, “Well done,” as she urged him to the door.

Luke raised his knife hand. “One false move, Niece,
and I’ll slice off the boy’s ear.” Francis shuddered with fear, pressing close to his sister as they went downstairs. Clarissa looked for the manservant, or whoever it was who had been behind Luke the previous day, but it felt as if the house was empty of all but themselves.

“In there.” Luke gestured to a door to the right of the small landing. It gave onto a shabby salon. He thrust Francis down onto a sagging sofa and went to a sideboard to pour himself a tumbler of brandy. He turned back to them, cradling the glass in his palm. He surveyed them coldly for a long moment before beginning to speak. “Well, now that I have my wards safely in my guardianship once more, let me explain a few facts to you both.”

Clarissa stood behind the sofa, her hands on her brother’s shoulders, reassuring him of her presence with the firmness of her grip. Her eyes were on the knife that Luke had laid down beside the brandy bottle on the sideboard. If she could get hold of it, she would kill her uncle without a moment’s hesitation.

Luke was continuing to speak. “It seems to me, Niece, that your behavior in recent weeks indicates a certain witlessness, not to mention corruption of mind. My poor, dear brother would be turning in his grave if he knew that his gently bred daughter had embraced a life of such shocking depravity . . . shamelessly selling her body. Fortunately there are places where the depraved and weak-minded can be cared for, and I intend to see you safely committed to such an institution
without delay.” His thin smile flickered across his lips, as poisonous as the tongue of an asp.

Clarissa stared at him, for the moment unable to make sense of what he was saying, and then as the horror unfolded she thought she would vomit. “Bedlam?” she whispered. “You would threaten me with Bedlam?”

He shook his head. “No, no, my dear niece, you much mistake the matter. I am not threatening you with anything, merely telling you how things will be.” He looked down at Francis. “You, my boy, will remain here with me in this house. We shall deal together extremely well, I’m sure. My attempt to educate you outside my house in a congenial family setting met only with ingratitude, so you will stay here. Your education may be a trifle neglected, but for that you have only yourself to blame.”

Clarissa wondered if she really had lost her mind, listening to this extraordinary fabrication. No one would believe it; how could they? And yet, only she and Francis knew the truth of the baby farmer, and why would anyone believe such a tale of wickedness when their uncle and guardian smiled and swore the opposite? Besides, she would be locked up in a madhouse, anything she might say construed as the insane ramblings of a weak mind, and Francis would be alone with his uncle.

It couldn’t happen. She couldn’t let it. She met her uncle’s self-satisfied smile with a cold stare, determined that he would not see her fear. “Since we appear to be your guests at present, sir, may we trespass upon your hospitality for some refreshment once again? It’s been
a long time since that piece of moldy bread and stale cheese you saw fit to provide yesterday. Perhaps some coffee and bread and butter wouldn’t be too difficult to find . . . oh, and a glass of milk for Francis. He’s a growing boy.”

She was rewarded with a flash of uncertainty in Luke’s eyes as for the first time a tiny crack marred his air of utter confidence. Then he recovered. “I suppose, since it will in some way be your last meal, my dear niece, something could be contrived.”

“Are you saying they don’t feed the inmates of Bedlam?” she inquired, raising her eyebrows.

Luke took a step towards her, his hand raised to strike again. She held her ground, meeting his fury-filled gaze steadily. It took every last vestige of courage she possessed, but it worked. Her uncle gave her a look of loathing, but his hand dropped and he turned away to pull the bell rope. When his servant appeared, his curious gaze darting to the boy on the sofa, his master told him irascibly to bring coffee and bread and butter, and a cup of milk.