Page 58 of The Viscount and the Vicar’s Daughter

The color drained from Valentine’s face, turning her porcelain skin to alabaster. “I don’t understand.”

Tristan was at her side in an instant. He rested a hand on the small of her back and guided her to a nearby settee. “Sit down and I shall explain.”

Once he had her established on the settee, he sank down beside her. Her skirts bunched around his legs in a profusion of brown wool and starched petticoats. He was aware he was too close, but he made no effort to set himself at a distance. How could he think of propriety when she was looking so lost and vulnerable and utterly dear? When the faintest scent of her perfume sent his senses reeling?

Orange blossoms. A sweet, feminine fragrance that turned his brain to mush and caused his heart to thud heavily in his chest.

He wished to God his father, Stokedale, and Lady Hermione would see fit to leave. But they showed no interest in going. They were each watching with avid attention. Each waiting for him to tell them what the devil it was he was talking about.

“The illustrations in your book of Bible verses,” he said. “In Yorkshire they were covered with ink. I never saw them properly until yesterday. When I did, I recognized them. At least, I recognized the drawing you recreated on the frontispiece.”

“The stag and the lion,” Valentine said.

Tristan nodded. “It’s from a coat of arms. Initially I didn’t know which, but a visit to my club soon answered the question. It belongs to the Baronage of Rutherford.” He paused, worried he was overwhelming her. But there was nothing for it. She needed to know. And, if the scraps of conversation he’d overheard before entering the room were any indication, so, too, did Lord Stokedale. “The late Baron Rutherford had three sons,” he said. “The youngest was secretary to George Fortescue, Earl of Worthington.”

“Rutherford’s youngest son,” Lord Stokedale repeated. “By God, now I remember. He accompanied Worthington here in the spring of ’34. And then again that summer. Worthington and my father were consulting over some political matter. Something to do with the poor laws.”

“Val Rutherford,” Lady Hermione said. “Astonishing.”

“Valentine Rutherford,” Tristan corrected. He gave Valentine a fleeting, private smile. “I told you I had never before met a woman named Valentine.”

“I thought I was named after a saint,” she said. “It’s what Papa always told me.”

“You were named after your father,” Tristan said. “Your natural father. The man who Lady Sara Caddington went to meet at that inn in Surrey. The man in whose memory she sketched all those stags and lions and wrote all those mournful, romantic Bible verses.”

“He never came.”

“He couldn’t. He died when the fire broke out. His mother tells me he was attempting to rescue two servants who were trapped in an interior room. He managed to save them in the end.”

“At the cost of his own life,” Lord Lynden said. “I remember the incident. It was in all the papers.”

Tristan couldn’t remember it himself. He’d been too young. Just a child, really. And all he had learned in the years that followed was that the Palace of Westminster had been largely destroyed in the conflagration. He’d had no knowledge of the people affected by the blaze—and certainly not of the twenty-year-old man who’d perished.

“Do you suppose she read it in the papers?” Valentine asked him softly. “And that was why she was sitting in the church and weeping?”

He took one of her hands in his. It was small and slim and cold as ice. He held it gently in his much larger grasp. “I suspect so.”

“You said she was too proud to go home.”

“I believe her heart was broken,” he said. “And that whatever her father said to her was unforgiveable.”

“It was,” Lord Stokedale said abruptly. For a weighted moment it seemed as if he would say no more. And then he spoke again, his tone brusque. “He told her he wouldn’t accept her child. That she must consent to send it away. She refused. At the time I thought…” One fist clenched at his side. “I thought it was merely her damned pride. But if she loved Rutherford, and if he’d died in such a way…”

“She would never have given up her child,” Lady Hermione said. “Not for worlds. Not our Sara.”

Tristan looked at Valentine’s pale face. “Does it help to know the truth?”

Her brows knit. “Yes, but…”

“But?”

“This lady you saw in Westminster…”

“Your grandmother.”

“Does she know about me?”

“I didn’t tell her,” he said. “That must be your decision. But if you decide you’d like to meet her, I don’t think she’d turn you away.”