Page 89 of Return to Satterthwaite Court

“Honor and integrity always make a difference,” Charles said. He’d discovered that for himself. It’s what had drawn him to the Navy—and what had compelled him to resign from it. “It’s never too late to do the right thing, my lady. But you already know that. Your conscience commands it. It’s why you wrote me that letter.”

Lady Darly hung her head. “Yes,” she acknowledged quietly. “Yes. You’re right. I can’t keep the secret any longer.” Sliding her hand from his, she inhaled a steadying breath. “I found the papers when I was clearing out my father’s safe after he died. Legal papers. I read what I could of them in the moments before the documents were taken from me. They showed that it wasn’t my father who broke the entail. It was Sir Charles.”

Charles stared at her. Whatever he’d been expecting, it hadn’t been that. “That’s impossible. Your father was the heir. He would have had to agree to it.” Arbogast had explained as much when Charles met with him in Tiverton.

“I expect he did agree—for a sum. At the time, he would have valued ready money far more than he’d have valued the future promise of property. For all Father knew, Sir Charles might have lived another dozen years.”

“If what you’re saying is true,” Charles said, “the estate should have gone to my mother.”

“No. Not according to Sir Charles’s original will. My father was named in it as the heir to Satterthwaite Court. A necessity, I suppose, since the property had been entailed upon him for eons. But when my father died, I saw another will among the documents in his safe. It had Sir Charles’s name on it quite clearly.”

“There was a second will?” Charles was stunned. “I don’t believe it.”

Lady Darly poured herself another glass of wine from the decanter on the table. Her hand was trembling. “I know what I saw. It was there along with the papers about the entail. Father must have come into possession of them before the contents of both could be made public. Without those documents, the estate and most of Sir Charles’s fortune came to him, leaving your mother all but destitute.”

Charles shook his head. “It’s impossible,” he said again. “There would have been a solicitor involved. Witnesses to the will. Someone would have spoken up if Townsend had attempted anything illegal.”

Lady Darly’s mouth quivered into a sad smile. “You didn’t know my father. He had tremendous power once. He could have made any man bend to his wishes, from the lowliest copy clerk to a duke of the realm. A country solicitor and a handful of unschooled witnesses would have been as nothing to him.”

“Does Catmull know about this?” Charles asked.

“I should think so,” she said. “It was he and his mother who spirited the documents away after I found them.”

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Kate linked her arm tighter in Christine’s as the two of them navigated their way through the crush. Lady Chesham’s ballroom was packed full to bursting. Everywhere they turned, they bumped up against the full skirts of some lady’s sumptuous ball gown or the pointy elbow of some elegantly clad gentleman.

Aunt Jane glanced back at them. She was tall and lithe, like her daughter, with a plain face made beautiful when lit with the animation of her splendid character. “Mind your dresses, girls.”

Kate caught up her ribbon-bow-festooned silver-blue silk gauze skirts in one hand as she and Christine soldiered on. A lively galop had just ended, and couples were departing the floor before the next dance began. Kate’s dance card hung at her wrist. It contained more blank spaces than it did names. She’d been reserving as many dances as she could for Charles, though the infuriating man had yet to show his face this evening.

“Here,” Aunt Jane said, guiding them to a trio of upholstered chairs at the edge of the ballroom. “These will do nicely.” She sat down, flicking open her painted fan. “Just a brief respite to catch our breath.”

Kate and Christine took the vacant chairs on the left of her.

“Perhaps he couldn’t manage an invitation?” Christine said quietly. “It was all very last minute.”

“I refuse to believe that anything is beyond him,” Kate stubbornly whispered back, “least of all something so trifling as an invitation to a ball.”

“Not so trifling. It’s important to you, isn’t it?” Christine gave her a sympathetic smile. “You mustn’t despair. He may yet show his face. The most tonnish gentlemen often come late. It’s why I don’t expect Sir Lawrence to arrive until after eleven.”

Kate refrained from pointing out that Sir Lawrence hardly qualified as a Bond Street Beau. If her friend was happy, Kate must be happy for her, too. In any case, Christine was right. The ball had only begun at ten and wouldn’t end until the wee hours of the morning. So long as Charles appeared before the one o’clock supper, Kate would be satisfied.

She would have to be.

Never mind that he hadn’t called on her since Monday. Or that he hadn’t sent her a Valentine’s Card. Even Sir Lawrence had had the good sense to perform that small loverlike task. Christine’s Valentine had arrived with today’s post—a lacy, heart-shaped confection, which proclaimed:

The day when first I saw thee, love,

The hour when first we met;

I never did forget my love,

I never shall forget.

It was all so much treacle. A pit had nevertheless formed in Kate’s stomach as she’d read it. Would it have been so difficult for Charles to have bought a similar Valentine for her? Such cards were displayed in the windows of every periodical shop in London at present.

“I’m engaged with Lord Barrow for the next dance,” Aunt Jane said. “Who do you have down, my dear?”