“Senhor Noronha has betrayed us! Amália has left his house, and I cannot find her.”
Vasconcelos hissed in disgust. “You came to London to report a missing wife to me? I left you with duties to attend!”
“It is not merely my wife,” Miguel dropped into a chair. “Did you not hear me? Noronha no longer answers to you. He refused our demand to have her returned! I called every day after you left, long after she ought to have recovered from that supposed ‘indisposition.’ At last I found a maid who was willing to part with information. She told me that Fitzwilliam had been there two days before, and that he had taken Amália away alone, in a hired coach. Noronha said nothing of this. He lied to us, and gave her to Fitzwilliam!”
Vasconcelos’ hand tightened until his pen bent. “Fitzwilliam? Richard Fitzwilliam?”
Miguel’s only answer was a spitting curse.
“But you do not know for certain where they have gone?”
“Where else would they go? No, I am certain that he brought her to London the instant he had her in his possession.”
Vasconcelos slitted his eyes. “Captain Noronha remains with his regiment in Lisbon?”
“That was the last word I had, but I sent Pereira to investigate before I sailed. Pai, Fitzwilliam has brought her to London, I am certain of it!”
“We have been betrayed by more than one party,” Vasconcelos mused bitterly. “Fitzwilliam would not have gone to Noronha at all, unless someone else had leaked information.”
His son snorted. “Are you certain those men you hired kept your secret? Like enough they took money from more than just yourself.”
“Someone would have to know to look for them before they could be bribed. London is filled with rats such as they.”
“Do not underestimate Fitzwilliam! For four years, I have heard little else but his praises, and he is known for a short temper where his comrades are concerned. Surely, he would have sought revenge for his cousin, and it would be the work of a moment for him to have those streets and docks searched and the sailors followed.” Miguel raked his fingers through his hair and ripped open his neck cloth. “He has my wife, and I want her returned!”
“Whatever for? Her connections were useful, but I never understood your obsession with her. It seems that even her father is of no use to me now, and she is likely compromised by the Englishman. Your first son might well have blue eyes! You would be a fool to take her back.”
“Fitzwilliam has brown eyes. I know, for she told me once.”
Vasconcelos shot his son an incredulous glare. “You should have taken a firmer hand. What wife dares describe her former suitor to her husband? It sounds as though you cannot manage a woman!”
“She always claimed he was nothing of the sort, that he was no more than Ruy’s friend,” grumbled Miguel. “What does it matter, he has no right to take her! The law, even English law, recognises her as my wife!”
“That may be, but I am not interested in your whore just now. I will have dealings with her father when I return to Porto, but I must have that deed! Without it, everything else is useless.”
“The deed!” Miguel rolled his eyes. “We ought to have drawn up a new one long ago, and to the devil with all this foolishness. Who would have been the wiser?”
“No!” his father snapped with a sudden heat. “The Darcy and Fitzwilliam families must pay for the disgrace done to our name! I will have it from Darcy’s hand, and see my father’s honour vindicated!”
Miguel sighed and threw his arm over the back of the seat. “Well, you may bother with that. For my part, I intend to search for my wife.”
“Fool! Hear you nothing I have said? If Fitzwilliam has Amália, we will recover her when we force them to give us what is ours!”
“And I am to leave her to be his mistress until then?”
“Do you honestly think one week will make a difference?”
Miguel looked away from his father, staring in blind anger at the wall of the rented flat. His teeth were clenched and the thumb of the hand resting on the chair back worked furiously against his fingers.
Manuel Vasconcelos watched his son narrowly. The last complication he needed was for Miguel to do something rash and selfish over that tainted woman, just when he was stretching to pull all the threads together at last! He growled in frustration and returned to the note he had been starting to pen, but it was some while before he could again find the proper words.
Pemberley
Darcypausedandturnedabout just before he ducked through the door of the housekeeper’s room. “Mrs Reynolds, I thank you for your generosity, and for explaining my aunt’s letters in detail. I behaved unforgivably, and I am honoured by your goodness.”
The housekeeper—now reinstated to her duties and endowed with a healthy increase in her salary—dabbed misty eyes as she saw him out. “Gracious, Mr Darcy, but t’was naught but a misunderstanding. Pay it no mind, sir!”
“No, I am afraid I cannot simply put it aside. I had no right to speak as I did to you, nor to anyone else. It is clear you have been more faithful than I, and I am rightly humbled.”
