Page 56 of An Innocent Bride for the Duke

“But what kind of legal action?” Damien pointed out. “What can you actually say Lord Ashbourne has done yet? He has certainly made himself as nuisance with all those crazed letters to you, and there’s good circumstantial evidence that he has been trespassing at Rosemere, but can you prove he has broken any law?”

“Do you know the most important word in all that you just said to me, Damien?” Benedict said calmly, now chalking his own cue and stepping up to the billiard table. “It was the word ‘yet’. I cannot wait for him to do more than vent his spleen in letters to me.”

“Take Louisa to Northwick after the wedding, as Lady Esher suggested,” Damien urged him. “He may forget her once she is away from Rosemere - out of sight, out of mind.”

“He will not,” Benedict answered very surely, “but before I consult my solicitors, I intend to call on Lord Ashbourne and make my feelings very clear to him. Let us see what he has to say for himself, face to face.”

“I will come with you,” his friend immediately told him. “Please, whatever you do, be careful in confronting Lord Ashbourne. He is a dangerous man, and he has killed before.”

“I am also a dangerous man, Damien,” Benedict retorted, potting another ball on the table, and remembering afresh the sight of a man’s body on flagstones viewed from high above, dark blood pouring out around the still figure.

I too have killed before…

Chapter Twenty-Three

“Tea, Your Graces?” offered Lady Huxley, recovering herself quickly after her initial surprise at finding the Duke of Northwick and Duke of Wexford at Huxley Manor in the middle of the morning, asking to speak to her cousin.

Closing her book with a snap and laying it on the table, the fair-haired dowager recomposed her face and sat down again on the armchair from which she had risen sharply at their arrival. A golden lorgnette dangled on its chain about her neck.

“No, thank you, Lady Huxley,” declined Benedict, with a polite bow of his head. “Our business with Lord Ashbourne should not take long.”

“Baines,” called out Lady Huxley as her butler began to leave the drawing room after showing the visitors in. “Go and tell my cousin that he has guests from Rosemere.”

“Very good, My Lady.”

“It is good of you to call, Your Graces. I recently had a rather curious message from Lady Esher and wonder whether you can make sense of it.”

“We could not presume to comment on Lady Esher’s correspondence,” answered Benedict, assuming that Lady Huxley was referring to being disinvited to the engagement party. “I shall however, convey to her that her message has been received.”

Pursing her lips, but managing to keep her countenance, Lady Huxley gestured them towards a sofa. Again, Benedict shook his head.

“We will not trouble you for long, Lady Huxley, and our business with your cousin is private. It might be best if we speak to him elsewhere.”

At this, Lady Huxley flushed with displeasure. Indeed, under other circumstances, it would have been rude to pay so little attention and courtesy to the lady of the house. However, after all that had occurred in recent weeks, good manners were not at the top of Benedict’s priorities.

“I assure you that my cousin and I are very much in one another’s confidence and whatever concerns Edmund, concerns me also,” she told them stiffly. “You need have no reservations on that score, Your Grace. There can be no need for a private conference with Edmund…”

“All is well, Emily,” said a deep but slightly hoarse voice as the tall, thin figure of Lord Ashbourne appeared in the open doorway. “I will take our guests to walk in the gardens. I wanted to have a cigar anyway and I know how much you hate the smell of tobacco indoors.”

“You are always so considerate, Edmund,” Lady Huxley declared, casting a sideways glare at their callers. “It is no wonder that some people take advantage of your good nature.”

At this, Benedict could easily have laughed aloud after all that he had learned of the Earl of Ashbourne’s black character. Good Lord, without the protection of title and fortune, the man would likely be behind bars. Ashbourne’s cousin likely knew none of it, however – or didn’t want to know. Lady Huxley struck Benedict as the latter kind of woman.

“Shall we, Your Graces?” said Lord Ashbourne with a cold, amused smile that was more a smirk, gesturing back to the hallway with a cigar in his hand. “It’s a fine day for a walk.”

Bowing a minimal farewell to Lady Huxley, they followed Lord Ashbourne outside.

“Can I offer you both a cigar too?” he said, stopping at a stone bird table on the upper lawn, and producing several from his pocket. "They are the finest Havana.”

“I don’t smoke,” Benedict said bluntly, having always hated the habit and the pathetic dependency it seemed to breed in those gentlemen who took to tobacco.

“Thank you, but my wife prefers that I don’t smoke,” declined Damien with a touch more politeness and humor. “As it is not Christmas, I must decline.”

Damien’s probably was the better way to handle such a man as Lord Ashbourne but his nerve and manner had got under Benedict’s skin.

“You don’t mind if I smoke, do you?” Lord Ashbourne queried with pretended solicitousness and goading amusement in his dark eyes.

Benedict shook his head and then waited impatiently while their host went through the ceremony of preparing and lighting his cigar. At last he took a long puff with great satisfaction and then slipped the matches back into his jacket.