“It’s quite all right. People always underestimate my wisdom.” He sighed. “I suppose we ought to bunk down for the night. See what the new day brings.”
“I’m sure tomorrow will be a vast deal more to your liking,” Parker promised.
Hector closed his eyes, seriously considering taking a nap before dinner. “One can only hope so.”
Chapter Three
Hector was suddenly and rudely shaken awake. “I’m sorry to wake you, my lord, but I’ll be off to find our supper.”
Hector yawned, glancing around and then squinting at the dark window panes. “Is it night already?”
“A little after nine, my lord. The minute your head hit the pillow, you were asleep.”
Hector scrubbed at his head. “Clement and my sister?”
“There have been no new arrivals, I’m afraid.”
“Any word from Vyne?”
“Nothing.”
Hector sat up. “I don’t know why Vyne would be discourteous to me. I didn’t have a hand in taking his wife away from him or forced his son to marry m’sister. The damn fellow couldn’t be stopped from declaring that he loved Meg. What could I do? I had to agree to the match, or they might very well have eloped. If anything, it was I who have reason to be upset with them. I truly think she would have married him without my blessing. Imagine that.”
“People in love do the strangest things,” Parker agreed but he started to frown before rushing to look out the window. “There’s a carriage approaching.”
Hector got to his feet and stretched. “M’sister?”
“I couldn’t say for sure,” Parker muttered. “I don’t think so. The carriage is smaller than I would expect for a traveling chaise. It is still some distance away.”
“I’d better fortify myself with a stiff drink before I go back downstairs.”
Parker left the window and started to pour Hector’s drink.
“Give it over,” Hector said as he drew near. He took a warming swallow and smiled. “Only the best at The Vynes,” he murmured to himself. “I have missed that this past year.”
Parker returned to the window, and Hector joined him in looking out. There was indeed a carriage drawing closer. He could see a pair of lamps swinging back and forth, carried by men guiding the horses down the long drive. But with so little illumination, there wasn’t much else he could make out.
While Parker straightened the bed, Hector continued to track the carriage’s progress, warming himself with another small glass of Lord Vyne’s excellent port. The carriage reached the house finally, but then circled to the servants’ entrance. “Not m’sister.”
Hector moved to the far window, threw aside the drape in a bid to see more below.
A cloaked figure clambered out, and then reached back inside the carriage. Hector was taken aback to see a child jump into those outstretched arms. Instinct told him the cloaked figure was female. “A lady and child,” he mused out loud.
“What was that?”
“I said the carriage just brought a woman and child to the servants’ entrance.”
Parker came to see, too. “Odd.”
Hector followed their progress until he couldn’t see them anymore. But he was sure they had come in. “How is it odd?”
“I don’t know, but…”
“I’m curious too,” he murmured. His stomach rumbled. “Be a good fellow and go below and bring me back my supper. While you’re there, find out what’s afoot.”
“Yes, sir,” Parker promised before slipping from the room.
Hector glanced out the window again, noting the carriage was being turned around to leave again. “Now, who would visit Lord Vyne with a young child on a night like this?”
Intrigued, he headed for the door and stepped outside into the hall to take a peek, only to dart back inside his room when he saw movement. Three figures were just down the hall at the top of the staircase.
Hector peeked out carefully again, noticing they were moving toward the family wing. No. Not just the family wing…but directly to Lord Vyne’s bedchamber door.
The distant door opened, and for a brief moment, the trio was illuminated. A woman and child’s outlines were as clear as day beside Peter, the butler’s stand-in. They entered, but Peter remained outside. And then the bedchamber door shut behind the new arrivals, throwing the hall into darkness again.
Hector withdrew into his room as Peter headed for the stairs and rushed down them loudly.
When all was quiet, Hector risked another peek. The hall was empty now. Eerily still.
Hector took a few steps toward the family wing, feeling an odd sense of concern about the woman and child arriving so late at night. It smacked of a scandal in the making. If that were true, he’d better find out the details before Clement and Meg came.
“My lord, is something the matter?” Parker queried from directly behind Hector.
Hector spun about, caught by surprise. He was about to complain about Parker’s stealth when he noticed a footman standing behind his new valet. “No. Just stretching my legs.”
The footman stepped forward, his expression grim as he held a large tray. “Your supper, my lord.”
“Yes, good.” He cast a discreet glance toward Lord Vyne’s chambers and then headed back into his warmer room, where the tray was being set on a low table before a chair nearest the fire.
Hector picked at the food until the footman was gone. “That woman and child were taken into Lord Vyne’s private chambers. What did you learn below?”
Parker whistled. “Perhaps that’s the cause?”
“Of what?”
“The odd feeling I just got from the other servants. I know I’m a stranger, but the mood below stairs is grim. No one is talking, and I sense the servants in the kitchen couldn’t wait for me to leave again.” Parker’s lips twitched. “But perhaps it’s nothing at all, and I imagined the strangeness where none exists.”
The man had good instincts. “Get back down there.”
“Why?”
Although he didn’t have to explain himself to his valet, he wanted to impress upon Parker a sense of urgency. “My sister is due to arrive, and her delicate state…”
Parker nodded. “You don’t want her made upset if there’s a scandal brewing. I understand.”
Hector nodded. “Find out who that woman is before morning comes, and I’ll double your wages.”
“Yes, sir,” Parker agreed, eyes alight with a mix of greed and excitement.
Chapter Four
Ruby Roper hugged her son tightly to her chest. The little boy was sleeping soundly in her arms at last. Their journey had been hard for him. The cold and urgency of their flight from Scotland had unsettled him. Surely it couldn’t be too much longer before they met her uncle, Lord Vyne, and they could finally rest.
If they were to receive the help they needed from Lord Vyne, and perhaps be allowed to stay at one of the family estates, they had to make a good impression. She had hoped to see her aunt and cousins, too, but they hadn’t come yet. Ruby was sure that with their support, the matter of her son’s future would be easily achieved.