A Momentary Marriage(121)

“Miss Barstow does?” Laura remembered the time they had seen Netherly coming up the back stairs and heading toward the nursery.

“No.” Robbie laughed. “Mum likes him. He’s her friend. But it’s a secret.” Robbie turned to Laura anxiously. “You won’t tell her I said that, will you? I swore not to tell.”

“No. I promise.”

Mr. Netherly was Adelaide’s secret friend? Was Claude’s wife having an affair with Tessa’s admirer? Perhaps she had become too cynical, living with James. Maybe it was just flirtation, or he simply showered Adelaide with the same sort of flowery comments he gave Tessa. Still . . .

“Robbie—” Laura began as she followed the boy into the sitting room over the ballroom. “Did Mr. Netherly ever borrow your slingshot?”

Robbie cackled. “No, he doesn’t do things like that. He’s boring.” He crossed the room and opened the doors onto the balcony. “Come see what I found.”

She stepped out onto the balcony after him, alarmed when she saw the child loop his arms over the balustrade and pull himself across it until his head was hanging over the edge. Dem let out a sharp bark, and Laura exclaimed, “Robbie! Be careful!”

“I’m fine,” he said, shooting her a scornful glance. “Look.” He pointed downward.

Laura planted her elbows on the stone railing and peered over the side. There, on a narrow lip, tucked in against the wall of the building, was a nest of twigs holding three small speckled eggs. Laura laughed, delighted. “Bird eggs!”

“I thought you’d like it. You’re nice. Like Uncle Walter.”

“Thank you, Robbie.” Laura’s mind was racing. “Robbie, did anyone ever borrow your slingshot?”

He glanced at her curiously. “No. Do you want to borrow it?”

She smiled. “I’m afraid I don’t know how to use it. It’s not a toy girls often have.”

“My mum did,” he said with pride.

Laura went still. “Your mother can use a slingshot?”

“Sure. She’s capital! She learned it from her brothers. She’s the one taught me.”

“Robbie!” His name came down the hall in a high, slightly wobbly voice.

“Miss Barstow.” Robbie shot Laura a guilty glance. “I better answer.”

He took off, leaving Laura standing on the balcony, staring numbly after him. Adelaide?

Laura sank down, sitting on her heels on the floor. Demosthenes, after an inquiring snuffle against her ear, lay down beside her and laid his giant head on her lap. Absently, Laura petted him as she contemplated the news she’d just learned. Had fluffy, silly, sugary Adelaide tried to kill her?

If James died, Adelaide’s husband would inherit the title. She would be the lady of the manor. And her son would someday inherit it all—sooner rather than later if Claude, too, suffered some mysterious illness.

Laura thought about Netherly, Adelaide’s “secret friend.” She remembered the small, shady spot hidden deep in the garden and the blanket she and Walter had found there. Secluded and sylvan, it was a perfect place for a lovers’ tryst as well as for an expert to aim a slingshot at a passing horse. That day that she and Walter had seen the man climbing the back stairs perhaps he had been going to meet Robbie’s mother in some unused room, not the boy’s governess.

It made sly, slimy sense. Two people to commit the crimes. Netherly to obtain the mercury and plant it in London when he called on Tessa and Adelaide to frighten the horses into bolting, sending Laura’s carriage down the treacherous hill. He would have pushed off the urn and probably crawled under the carriage to loosen the brake slipper. Either of them could have laced the medicine with mercury or put it beneath James’s bed.

Claude’s wife, she was beginning to think, must have been the brains behind the scheme. After all, she was the one who benefitted. Netherly, presumably, had done it for love—or at least for lust. Laura wondered whether the man had been an admirer of Tessa’s and strayed into an affair with Adelaide, or had been Adelaide’s lover from the beginning and only pretended to be one of Tessa’s swains to disguise his true interest.

“Come, Dem.” Laura rose to her feet. She must discuss all this with James.

James’s study, however, was empty except for Claude, who rose politely at her entrance. “Are you looking for James? He hasn’t returned yet.”

“Do you know where he is?” Laura asked.

“He was going for a walk, I believe, but that was some time ago.” Claude frowned. “But I’m sure there’s no reason to worry, now that Netherly’s locked up.”