In Bed With the Devil(10)

In hindsight, I can see that I was arrogant to believe that I alone had the wisdom to determine his fate. But I was intimately familiar with the judicial system, having been arrested at the age of eight. I served three months in prison. I bore the mark of my crime upon my right thumb. A T, for thief, burned into the tender flesh.

A year after my incarceration, it was determined that the practice of marking criminals in that cruel manner should be stopped. And so it was.

I knew prison was not a pleasant place. I knew some criminals were transported on great hulking ships away from England’s shore, but I didn’t know the particulars and so I could not judge the fairness of it.

I’d attended a public hanging or two. It seemed a harsh way to go.

But still I was not willing to risk that the man who’d hurt Frannie would go unpunished or that his punishment would not fit his crime. So I killed him.

The policeman who arrested me assured me that I’d soon find myself dancing upon the wind. I listened to his grave predictions with stoicism for I had no regrets. When someone harms those whom we love, we must do as we must. And I had always loved Frannie.

I was waiting in an interrogation room at Whitehall Place when they brought in an old gent. Vengeance burned in his eyes and I knew, without being told, that it was his son I had killed. By his dress and manner, I recognized that he was a man with the power to see me delivered into hell.

He stared at me for the longest, and I stared back. Since my arrest, I’d spoken not one word, other than my name. I neither denied nor confirmed the charges.

“Always ’old yer tongue,” Feagan had advised us on the matter of being arrested. “No matter wot ye tell ’em, truth or lie, they’ll twist it around to suit their own purposes.”

I’d learned early on that Feagan’s words were not to be dismissed. He knew of what he spoke.

Then the old gent did the strangest thing. He stepped forward, clamped his gloved hand around my chin, and turned my face one way and then the other. “I need more light,” he declared.

More lamps were brought in and set upon the table, until I felt completely exposed. The anger in the old gent’s eyes changed into something softer, an emotion I didn’t recognize.

“What is it, my lord?” an inspector asked.

“I think he’s my grandson,” the old gent rasped.

“The one that went missing?”

The old gent nodded once, and I saw a way out of my predicament. Already I had learned how to read people. I knew what the old gent wanted. With my answers to his questions, I deceived him into believing it was me.

When he was convinced that I was his grandson, he told the inspectors to give us a moment alone. He sat in a chair across from me.

“Did you kill my son?” he asked.

I nodded once.

“Why?”

For the first time that night, I spoke the truth. In the end, it was the truth that convinced the old man that I was redeemable. It would be some time before he forgave me completely.

My salvation and my punishment were to live my life as his grandson.





Chapter 3




“It’s so monstrously difficult to decide,” the Duchess of Avendale said. “I don’t know which one would be best.”

Looking across the small table in her garden, she caught Catherine in the midst of an embarrassing yawn, not that the duchess seemed to notice. She pushed the selections across the table. “Which do you favor?”

“Winnie, you’re selecting parchment for invitations,” Catherine told her. “Great Britain will not fall because of your decision. Which one do you like best?”

Winnie gnawed on her lower lip. “I don’t know. I think I like the look of the cream, but it’s more expensive. Is it worth it?”

“If it pleases you then it’s worth the extra expense.”

“It’s not I who has to be pleased, it’s my husband. The stationer is expecting me this afternoon. Will you come with me to make sure I do the invitations properly?”

Winnie had been Catherine’s dearest friend since they were small girls. It bothered Catherine immeasurably to see Winnie’s confidence waning. “You’ve given balls before. You know how to properly order invitations.”

“But Avendale is always disappointed in some aspect of the affair. I want everything to be perfect.”

Catherine couldn’t believe there were many men in London who truly gave a fig about ball preparations. It was Winnie’s misfortune that she’d married one of them. Always striving for perfection, he made her life miserable and took the joy out of every task.

“There’s no such thing as perfection, and even if there were, I think it’d be rather boring. Still, let’s go with the cream color,” Catherine said. “I think it looks a bit more elegant and I’ll purchase the invitations.”