Prologue
14th May 1790
My name is Nicolas Benedict Redmayne, and I have lost ten months of my life.
I was thrown from my phaeton, apparently as I was returning to my father’s country seat in Lincolnshire on the 12th of March 1790, presumably to attend my mother’s funeral. I say apparently and presumably because I can recall nothing of my purpose or intention prior to this event, as I sustained a severe head injury in the accident and was insensible for some time. Fortunately for me, I was near enough to my ancestral home to be recognized, and I was transported there to recover my senses.
Unfortunately, I have not been able to recall a single damned thing about my life from the ten months prior to the accident. The last thing I remember from May 1789, is leaving my London residence in Ryder Street, with what intention I do not know. I remember distinctly mounting my phaeton to the driver’s seat, dressed for a journey in an overcoat and tricorn. My luggage was affixed to the boot of the vehicle, and I was traveling alone. It seemed that for this journey, I was taking neither groom nor valet with me. Where I was bound I cannot for the life of me recall, and it was the last that any of my staff or myfamily saw of me until I apparently reappeared on the 12th of March just outside of Spalding, lying on the side of the road beside my vehicle.
I am keeping this diary on the advice of my physician, in the hope that by writing things down, my mind might be persuaded to return my missing memories to me.
Chapter One
8th of August 1818
Emrys Fitzgerald, ViscountAshford, surveyed his three offspring with misgiving.
“We are not going another step until you tell us where we are bound, Papa!” Miss Lizzie, the eldest at eight years old, was the instigator of this mini rebellion, and she was regarding her sire with a minatory eye, her arms akimbo and her feet planted firmly apart.
He contemplated picking her up and placing her in the carriage, but decided such high-handed tactics would result in repercussions down the road that he didn’t wish to deal with.
“Yes, Papa,” agreed Charlotte, or rather Charlie, his second daughter, crossing her arms and assuming a stubborn expression in imitation of her sister. Charlie was six and was a miniature of her mother with strawberry-blonde curls and deep-green eyes, a resemblance which caused him no small degree of pain. Everyone predicted she would be the beauty of the family.
Little Ewen regarded his older sisters with bewilderment and stuck a thumb in his mouth. Ewen was three.
Lizzie and Ewen resembled him more closely, which was a shame for Lizzie, since he knew he was not handsome, and a female version of him was unlikely to become a beauty. Not that such a thing could diminish his love for her one whit, of course.All three of them had such firm hold of his heart that he would gladly die for them in a blink.
“It is supposed to be a surprise,” he protested.
“We don’t like surprises,” said Lizzie firmly. “Tell us!”
“Very well,” he said with an exaggerated sigh. “We are going to The Castle and the Watsons will be there.”
Lizzie looked at her sister with a burgeoning smile and whooped. “Yay! Zibby and Emanuel!”
Charlie grinned and said breathlessly, “Japheth and Zeke!” Charlie flung her arms round Emrys’s legs and hugged him. He patted her curly head as she looked up at him and said, “Thank you, Papa!”
Unable to resist, he bent down and picked her up. “You’re welcome, poppet.” He looked at the other two. “Now will you get into the carriage?”
Lizzie nodded enthusiastically and, grabbing Ewen’s hand, clambered into the carriage dragging Ewen with her. Hastily Emrys set Charlotte down and picked up Ewen, depositing him on the seat, and helped Charlotte up the steps. With a wave to his coachman, Jacob, he climbed up after the children, and they were at last underway.
They had left his grandmother’s house in Bath two days ago, and the girls had pestered him for their destination all the way, speculating on it as they stared out the window and tried to guess their location and direction of travel. That is, until this morning’s little rebellion.
Ah, well.
At least the weather was excellent, if hot. It was late July, and the roads were in fine shape. They were making good time, and he expected to reach their destination in Leicestershire by mid-afternoon, the principal seat of his friend the Duke of Troubridge, dubbed The Castle. Though it wasn’t actually a castle, as the name was only a romantic carryover from itsorigins as a Norman keep. Nothing of the original building was left except a few tumbledown walls and a scattering of stones in the grounds.
The Watsons in question were the younger siblings of the duke’s new wife, Sarah, who was the eldest of the Vicar of Littledon’s brood of eight children. The children had all become acquainted on the occasion of the duke’s wedding some four months earlier and had become fast friends. As the carriage rocked its way along the road, Emrys watched his offspring playing a guessing game, trying to identify objects they could see out the window, and was glad for the first bit of joy in what felt like a long time. Though it had truly only been four months since his world fell apart.
He had gone from being—so he’d mistakenly thought—a happily married man, to a cuckold and then a widower in the space of three weeks, and the experience had torn the heart from his chest and left him a wreck of his former self. It was really only his children that had kept him from unravelling.
The last time he left The Castle, after the wedding, it had been only himself and Caro in this carriage. The children had ridden in the second one, a hired vehicle, with the servants. And Caro had been furious with him. Seated opposite to him, the anger had come off her in waves as she stared out the window and refused to look at him, her hands clenched tightly in her lap.
“For God’s sake, Caro, you cannot believe there is anything in it!” he’d protested.
“If there was nothing in it, why did the duke feel compelled to give you a black eye?” she’d asked, throwing a scorching glance in his direction.
He’d put up a hand to the swollen purple extrusion forcing his left eye almost shut. It was still giving him a thumping headache.
