“My valet,” said the Duke calmly. “Albert Danton, by name. A good fellow with neckcloths and stockings, but a trifle excitable, as so many of these Frenchmen are. Incredibly superstitious, too.” He frowned disapprovingly at the closed door. “Bloody papists, with all these saints and smells and such. Believe anything at all.”
My breathing was slowing, though my heart still banged against the whalebones of my bodice. I had trouble drawing a deep breath.
“You filthy, disgusting, outrageous.…pervert!”
The Duke seemed bored by this, and nodded negligently.
“Yes, yes, my dear. All that, I’m sure, and more. A trifle unlucky, too, at least on that occasion.”
“Unlucky? Is that what you’d call it?” Unsteadily, I moved to the love seat, and sat down. My hands were shaking with nerves, and I clasped them together, hidden in the folds of my skirt.
“On several counts, my dear lady. Just look at it.” He spread out both hands in graceful entreaty. “I send Danton to dispose of you. He and his companions decide to entertain themselves a bit first; that’s all well and good, but in the process, they get a good look at you, leap unaccountably to the conclusion that you’re a witch of some kind, lose their heads entirely and run off. But not before debauching my goddaughter, who is present by accident, thus ruining all chance of the excellent marriage I had painstakingly arranged for her. Consider the irony of it!”
The shocks were coming thick and fast, and I hardly knew which to respond to first. There seemed one particularly striking statement in this speech, though.
“What do you mean ‘dispose of me’?” I demanded. “Do you mean to say you actually tried to have me killed?” The room seemed to be swaying a bit, and I took a deep gulp of tea as being the nearest thing to a restorative available. It wasn’t terribly effective.
“Well, yes,” Sandringham said pleasantly. “That was the point I was endeavoring to make. Tell me, my dear, would you care for a cup of sherry?”
I eyed him narrowly for a moment. Having just stated that he’d tried to have me killed, he now expected me to accept a cup of sherry from his hands?
“Brandy,” I said. “Lots of it.”
He giggled in that high-pitched way again, and made his way to the sideboard, remarking over his shoulder, “Captain Randall said you were a most diverting woman. Quite an encomium from the Captain, you know. He hasn’t much use for women ordinarily, though they swarm over him. His looks, I suppose; it can’t be his manner.”
“So Jack Randall does work for you,” I said, taking the glass he handed me. I had watched him pour out two glasses, and was sure that both contained nothing but brandy. I took a large and sorely needed swallow.
The Duke matched me, blinking his eyes at the effect of the pungent liquid.
“Of course,” he said. “Often the best tool is the most dangerous. One doesn’t hesitate to use it on that account; one merely makes sure to take adequate precautions.”
“Dangerous, eh? Just how much do you know about Jonathan Randall?” I asked curiously.
The Duke tittered. “Oh, virtually everything, I should think, my dear. Most likely a great deal more than you do, in fact. It doesn’t do to employ a man like that without having a means at hand to control him, you know. And money is a good bridle, but a weak rein.”
“Unlike blackmail?” I said dryly.
He sat back, hands clasped across his bulging stomach, and regarded me with bland interest.
“Ah. You are thinking that blackmail might work both ways, I suppose?” He shook his head, dislodging a few grains of snuff that floated down onto the silk waistcoat.
“No, my dear. For one thing, there is something of a difference in our stations. While rumor of that sort might affect my reception in some circles of society, that is not a matter of grave concern to me. While for the good Captain—well, the army takes a very dim view of such unnatural predilections. The penalty is often death, in fact. No, not much comparison, really.” He cocked his head to one side, so far as the multiple chins allowed.
“But it is neither the promise of wealth nor the threat of exposure that binds John Randall to me,” he said. The small, watery blue eyes gleamed in their orbits. “He serves me because I can give him what he desires.”
I eyed the corpulent frame with unconcealed disgust, making His Grace shake with laughter.
“No, not that,” he said. “The Captain’s tastes are somewhat more refined than that. Unlike my own.”
“What, then?”
“Punishment,” he said softly. “But you know that, don’t you? Or at least your husband does.”