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The earl looked away, and his wife reached out to him, putting her hand over his from where she sat.
Kate still did not understand, but something was tugging at her, as if the truth was hiding just out of sight.
‘The doctor gave the babe to Poppy,’ Frances said, her voice tight. ‘I never saw the girl again.’
‘Are you suggesting that the maid switched the infants? That she replaced my daughter with her own stillborn child?’
A horrid chill passed through Kate as she began to comprehend Frances’s claim.
‘My mother—was not my mother?’ she breathed.
Frances looked from the earl to Kate, then gave the young woman a nod. ‘That is precisely so, Miss. You must think poor Poppy was your mam, I reckon. She must’ve nursed you, for she was ready, the miserable lass. But your mother was her ladyship, the Countess of Inverley. You were stolen from this family by a girl half out of her mind with grief. Raised as her own, no doubt. But a child of the Aldens, all the same.’
‘This is preposterous,’ Lord Inverley exploded. ‘What a tale! You must think me a fool!’
‘And why would I lie about such a thing?’
Lord Inverley began to pace. ‘It cannot be possible. How could she have replaced one babe for another? There were half a dozen people in the bedchamber all the time!’
Frances was shaking her head. ‘She was carrying something, when I saw her lurking in the corner, my lord. She had her daughter with her the whole time, I believe. And then when she took your child from the doctor, she weren’t holding anything anymore. She must’ve put the poor wee one in the cradle, then made off with your daughter.’
The earl’s expression was incandescent. Kate shuddered before him, terrified at the sight of such fury.
Lord Thorburn was glancing from Kate to the man in red with a sharp look in his eyes.
‘See here, Lord Inverley,’ he said. ‘Look at their eyes.’
Lord Inverley stopped pacing and stared at Lord Thorburn as if the latter had spoken in some foreign tongue. ‘What can you possibly mean, Thorburn?’
The marquess stood and gestured to the man in red, causing him to walk with him to Kate’s side, where he had the gentleman stand with her, shoulder to shoulder. Kate felt most embarrassed, but she dared not move, allowing Lord Thorburn to lift her chin as he gave the earl a significant nod.
Lord Inverley came closer, studying Kate’s eyes and then the other fellow’s. His stormy expression froze, and then smoothed, color draining from his face. ‘By the Devil. She has the Alden eyes.’
Now it was Lord Inverley’s turn to take Kate’s chin in his hand, and he moved her face to the side, examining her features as one might evaluate a horse. Her heart was thudding hard in her chest, and she felt as though a scream was building within her. A great fear took hold of her then, that she might release the scream involuntarily.
‘And her nose...’tis the very image of the late Lady Inverley’s nose,’ he muttered. Stepping back, his eyes still roving over her features in fascination, he added, ‘Now that I look at her, of course I see it. She is the portrait of her mother.’
A movement from the sofa drew Kate’s eye to the current Lady Inverley, and she saw a sour expression on the countess’s face.
Quite overwhelmed, Kate attempted to formulate words, to no avail. Her ears were ringing, and she still felt compelled to swallow an incoherent cry which threatened to burst from her lips at any moment.
‘See here, she’s unwell!’ Lord Thorburn exclaimed, and the next thing Kate knew he had his arm around her waist and was moving her to the armchair he had vacated. ‘Please sit. We should need some tea, I daresay!’
More tea,Kate thought vaguely, then leaned against the chair’s back, resting her head and closing her eyes. Her head was spinning.
Daughter of the earl?
Legitimatedaughter of the earl.
What can this all mean?
James
’Twas an extraordinary scene. James watched as the earl took in the truth of his daughter’s existence—a child he had believed to be lost to him twenty years prior.
Lord Inverley was an imposing figure, a man known as intimidating and severe. But now, in the moment, his hands shook. His eyes were wide. He stared at Miss Norwood—no, that was no longer her name, James realized—she was the Lady Katherine.
The Lady Katherine.
