Memoirs of Lady Montrose Read Free Page B

sense of peace.

Chapter Three
     
     
     
    Bassett, Henry’s manservant, brought the mail in with their morning tea. Three days had passed and the autumn wind had turned bitter, chilling the house as well as her bones. The fire crackled in the hearth, trails of light sparking their way through the soot on the chimney’s back. Beside its cheerful glow, Helen and Henry sat reading sections of The Times. After Bassett had left, Henry lifted the mail from the silver tray.
    “I think this is what we’ve been waiting for, darling, addressed to you. Rather poor quality paper at that.”
    Ever the gentleman, Henry offered her the plain envelope. She shook her head and waved his hand away, not wishing to even touch it. Nausea rose in her throat and her stomach clenched. After three days of tension, her insides were now wound as tightly as a hangman’s noose. “You do it.”
     She watched him slit the top with the paperknife and studied his face, fighting the urge to close her eyes and not see his reaction. His eyebrows rose and a smile played at the corners of his mouth.
    “As I thought. It’s a summons to meet ‘for a discussion of mutual interest to you both’. I’m quoting him here,” Henry said, then continued, “this fellow says he doesn’t wish to cause you distress but feels his knowledge of your Brighton activities would be of interest to others and as he desires to live in London, with the possibility of your meeting again in public, he suggests a financial arrangement would be of benefit to you both.”
    Henry dropped the letter onto the table between them then pushed it towards her. Her gaze was riveted on the paper and she brought her hands to her lap. Just looking at it made her feel ill.
    “Pure and simple blackmail, dressed up in flowery terms, but blackmail all the same.”
    Tears welled and one trickled down her cheek, causing Henry to rise slowly and come to sit beside her.
    “Hush, my love. He’s asked that you set a time and place. I’ll be there, close by and we will confront this young pup. I’ll sort it out.”
    She sniffed loudly and, unable to find her handkerchief, wiped her wet cheeks with the back of her hand. Henry handed her his ‘kerchief with a flourish as Bassett returned to remove their tea things.
    “Is everything alright, m’lady?” Bassett asked.
    “She’s fine, lad. Just a bit of soot in her eye. Must get the chimney cleaned.”
    Poor Bassett looked puzzled, not taken in by Henry’s lies and she could see him passing his worries on to Mrs Bassett, their cook, within minutes. Why Henry continued to call him ‘lad’ she didn’t know. Bassett had fought as a corporal under Henry’s command and they’d both begun to look old. Bassett, standing more erect than Henry, being a few years younger, had lost a hand in the war, but managed well with the stump that remained. Henry had employed him when the war had ended and Bassett and his wife were loyal servants to their house.
    Once Bassett had left the room Henry reached to pat her arm. “You can write him a short note, Helen. Shall we send him to the Huntsman’s Arms? It’s an hour’s drive away on the banks of the Colne River.” Henry’s brow furrowed as he formulated a plan. “It’s private, a good-sized dining room, and not too expensive. We can’t have him dining too well on our purse. You can bet he won’t pick up the account.”
    As much as she hated to do it, she knew she had to. Henry fetched a pen and paper. They choose a day the following week when Henry would be free and stipulated noon as the meeting time. The return address, a post office box, revealed nothing of where the man might live.
    “He calls himself Christopher Mortlock, if we can believe it,” she said, and wrote the address on the envelope before she licked it then pressed it closed.
    “I shall call him Lucifer,” Henry said.
     
    * * * *
     
    The day of the meeting arrived. The watery sun shone through the branches of the trees in the