Lyons Gate

CHAPTER 9

Jason didn’t return to Northcliffe Hall. He rode directly back to London in clothes he borrowed from his twin.

When everyone arrived at the Sherbrooke town house late afternoon of the following day, he was waiting for them in the drawing room.

He wasn’t all that surprised when Hallie Carrick ran into the drawing room ahead of everyone, her right hand fisted, blood in her eyes.

He managed to catch her fist before it landed. “You miserable sot.” She managed to twist her hand free and hit him in the belly. He grunted as he grabbed both wrists.

She stood on her tiptoes, right in his face, squirming and tugging, but he wasn’t about to let her go again. “You paltry cretin, you puling weasel-let go of me so I can hove your ribs in!”

“I might be paltry and puling, but I’m not stupid. I’m not about to let you get loose again, Miss Carrick.”

“Let me at you, let me have more leverage, and I’ll send my fist into your liver.”

Corrie said, “She’s been muttering all the way to London about the most satisfying ways to kill you, Jason. Even my best conversational efforts didn’t deter her from quite innovative murder schemes, including stuffing you in a herring barrel and sailing you off some place on the other side of the planet.” Corrie paused a moment, tapped her fingertips against her chin, and sighed. “But you know, Hallie, in the end, you’ve let me down.”

Hallie jerked around at that. “What do you mean let you down?”

“You obviously are not acquainted with boxing science. When all’s said and done, you hit him like a girl-a straight shot, nothing subtle, nothing surprising at all.”

James said, “I hesitate to insert myself in the middle of this battlefield, but how the devil do you know anything about boxing science, Corrie?”

“I followed you and Jason to a boxing match near Chelmsley when I was twelve. You, Jason, and a half dozen wild young men from Oxford came down to get debauched and lose your groats on some sweating idiot trying to kill another sweating idiot.”

Douglas said, “You never saw her, James? You never knew about this until now?”

“She was always sneaky,” James said. He raised his eyes to the ceiling. “Thank you, God, for not letting all the gentlemen present realize she was a girl. You were wearing your britches, weren’t you?”

“Yes, naturally. I even won a pound betting on the very sweaty man-now what was his name? Crutcher, I believe. I wagered on him because he had longer arms. I figured that gave him the advantage.”

“You’re right,” Jason said, “Crutcher was his name. No, Miss Carrick, don’t try to knock me into the fireplace again. That’s better, hold still. Your wrists are staying right where they are. I bet on him too, Corrie. Won a hundred pounds off Quin Parker. I’d never even seen a hundred pounds before that day. James tried to extort a share, but I hid my booty.”

James said, “I searched your room at least three different times looking for that money. Where did you hide it?”

“In the gardens, not a foot from Corrie’s favorite statue.”

“Oh dear, how do you know which is my favorite statue, Jason?”

“It’s every female’s favorite statue,” Jason said.

Jason and James’s mother, Alex, said kindly to Hallie even as her husband gave her an astonished look, “They are large, very nicely carved statues of men and women in an unclothed state, very artistic, naturally, and I suppose you would say their subject matter is explicit. They were brought over by one of my husband’s ancestors in the last century.”

“Explicit what?” Hallie asked.

“I’ll show them to you, Hallie,” Corrie said. “They are vastly educational.”

“But how?”

“Well, they show you all the ways that a man and a woman can be intimate-”

“Intimate?” Hallie asked, her voice lower, vibrating with interest. “What do you mean ‘intimate’?”

“Well-oh dear, perhaps we’d best not discuss that here.”

Jason rolled his eyes.

“Amen,” said Corrie’s husband. “Forget about the statues.”

Hallie said, “They’re naked, you say? The male statues?”

“Well, yes,” Alex said.

“Hmm. You can show me these statues, Corrie-I don’t suppose the weasel here compares favorably to them?”

“Actually, truth be told, the statues don’t compare favorably to the weasel. Or to James.”

“Enough!” Jason roared.

Hallie jerked, found that he hadn’t let up on his grip at all, and said, “I’ll wager you dug up the one hundred pounds as soon as you could and lost it all in twenty minutes in a gaming hell.”

Douglas said, “My sons only visited a gaming hell once, Miss Carrick, and that was with me, their father, when they were seventeen.”

Alex said, “Goodness, Douglas, you never told me about that. How I should have liked to have seen it. I could have dressed in a pair of Corrie’s britches, perhaps worn a mask, sipped on brandy-”

“It was pretty bad, Mother,” James said. “Men were drunk as loons, wagering huge amounts of money as if they didn’t have a care in the world. The place smelled, to be blunt about it. As for the man who owned the hell, he looked like he’d willingly shove a knife in your belly if you didn’t pay up your losses.”

Corrie said to her father-in-law, “That was quite brilliant, sir. You did it as a lesson.”

Douglas nodded. “The unknown is a powerful lure. Strip away the mystery and you see the rot beneath. As I recall, my own father took me to a notorious hell when I was about that age.”

Alex said on a sigh, “I don’t think it ever occurred to my father to take Melissande or me on an educational experience like that one. I’ll wager there were gaming hells in York, don’t you think, Douglas?”

“Lord give me strength,” Douglas said, eyes heavenward.

Hallie jerked once more on her wrists, but Jason’s hold was still unbreakable. “This is all well and good, all these educational lessons, my lord, but may we get back to business?”

“What business?” James asked. “Oh, sorry, I forgot. You want to kill my brother.”

“No,” she wailed, “I want my stud farm! It’s mine, it belongs to me, I paid good money for it right into the cupped open hands of the owner himself, not his smarmy solicitor.”

“Before we return to that subject,” the earl said, “I’m curious about what you did with the money, Jason.”

“Do you know,” Jason said slowly, “I forgot about it. I think it still must be buried there.”

“You forgot one hundred pounds?” Hallie said. “That’s impossible. A young man never forgets his money, even one like you with more looks than brains.”

“Excellent,” Corrie said. “Hallie, you’ve regained your sense of humor.”

Hallie wanted to leap on Corrie, but Jason kept tight hold of her wrists. He did give her enough freedom so she could shake one fist in Corrie’s direction. “You have the unmitigated gall to make fun of me?”

Corrie said, unruffled as a sleeping hen, “Not at all. You still want to flatten Jason? I’ll teach you to box, Miss Carrick. What do you say to that?”

James’s eyes, like his father’s, went heavenward. “She saw one boxing match when she was twelve and now she’s going to give lessons?”

“Well,” Douglas said. “I gave her lessons. And your mother as well.” He gave a pirate’s grin to his slack-jawed sons.

Jason tightened his grip even more, shot his father an appalled look. “Now, Miss Carrick, enough reminiscing, though it has brought revelations that have shaken my poor brother to his toes. You never saw Corrie in britches. Now, Corrie is right. Simple hits in the gut show no real depth of boxing science.”

Hallie said, “I merely wanted to get your attention. Murder comes later.”

The earl, who now stood with his shoulders against the mantel, arms crossed over his chest, said, “I wonder where Willicombe is. He should be in here pouring tea down our gullets and-”

“My lord! Ah, Master Jason is home as well. What a delight, what a brave new day it is. Just see how the sun is now pouring in through the large window to shine upon your returned face. I say, Master Jason, why are you holding that young lady by her wrists?”

“Willicombe, this girl wants to lay me out. Her name is Miss Hallie Carrick.”

“Shall I fetch Remie to deal with her, Master Jason?”

“Not yet, Willicombe, I’m currently holding my own.”

Willicombe turned to Alex. “Refreshments, my lady?”

“Whatever cook can put together would be fine, Willicombe. How is Remie?”

“He pines, my lady, pines until he has become thin as a chicken’s leg. Trilby is a lady’s maid and she knows all the tricks from her mistress on how to make a young man sweat.” He shook his head as he left the drawing room.

“Remie in love,” Corrie said. “Trilby? Who is her mistress, I wonder? Did Willicombe say she learned tricks from her mistress? Hmm, I wonder-”

“Corrie, I will teach you all the tricks you need to please me.”

Douglas said, “Why don’t we all sit down? No more baiting, Jason, no more violence, Miss Carrick. Now, Jason, I tried to explain to Hallie that this wasn’t some sort of underhanded trick, that you were simply trying to get things moving. Your mother tried to assure her you were honorable and you simply wanted to get things moving as well. Your brother tried to assure her that moving things smartly forward was one of your special gifts-”

To Douglas ’s absolute astonishment, the young twit had the nerve to interrupt him. “Ah, yes, everyone was talking about moving things along. What things, I asked, but naturally, no one had an answer to that.” She jerked once more, then looked up at Jason. “As for your bloody twin, he turned up his nose at me for daring to accuse you of being a foul creature fit only to have your guts stuffed in your ears. Let me go!”

“All right.” Jason released her and strolled over to sit in a high-backed wing chair. He steepled his fingers, stretched out his long legs and crossed his ankles. “Miss Carrick, what did Corrie say? After all, you were telling me how smart she is.”

“What’s this? You think I’m smart?”

“Be quiet, Corrie,” Jason said. “Miss Carrick?”

Hallie was still too angry with him to think straight, and now he was sitting at his ease in a damned chair. What had Corrie said? She managed to get herself under control. She became aware that all the Sherbrookes were strewn about the large drawing room, looking on, obviously enjoying themselves at her expense. “Corrie said you were one of the more moral men she knew and I was to stop carping.”

There was a lovely moment of silence.

“You really said that about me, Corrie?” Jason asked.

“It’s the truth,” Corrie said.

James said, “Well, maybe she is pretty smart after all. Just look at the twins she produced. You waltzed with them, Jason, saw how graceful and enthusiastic they were. It was Corrie who taught them how to dance.”

Corrie laughed. “Yes, they nearly float, they are so light on their feet.”

Hallie felt bludgeoned to the carpet. They were all laughing, happy as larks, and her role, which she was playing superbly well, was that of an ill-bred harridan.

Jason looked at Hallie for a long moment. “If you are ready to listen to me now, Miss Carrick?”

“Yes, I am ready.”

“It isn’t good news.”

“I wasn’t expecting any,” she said.

Douglas didn’t like the look on his son’s set face. Something was very wrong. It was hard not to leap right in and protect him, but he forced himself to say nothing. He walked to his favorite wing chair and sat down opposite his son. Alex moved to stand next to him, her hand on his shoulder. He looked up at her, smiled, and pulled her down onto his lap.

As for James, he studied his twin’s face. Like his father, he didn’t like what he saw. He didn’t want his brother to be unhappy, dammit, he wanted him to have Lyon ’s Gate. He wanted him to have what he deserved and that was whatever he wanted. James didn’t want his twin to leave again. The excitement in Jason’s eyes when he’d walked into the Lyon ’s Gate stables had made James want to dance. He heard the fear in his own voice as he said, “What is it, Jase? What is the bad news?”

Jason sighed, rubbed the back of his neck. “It turns out Thomas Hoverton had already sold Lyon ’s Gate to a Mr. Benjamin Chartley of Manchester for a modest sum of money. He hadn’t bothered to notify Mr. Clark, his solicitor here in London. When Miss Carrick showed up on Thomas’s doorstep, he saw his opportunity and took it. When he heard from his solicitor the following day that he’d sold Lyon ’s Gate to yet another buyer, Thomas decided it would be best for his health if he left for the Continent that very evening. Of course, what’s really important here is that Mr. Chartley now owns Lyon ’s Gate.”

The silence in the room was absolute.

“Well,” his father said finally, “I didn’t think Thomas Hoverton had the guts for this sort of thing.”

Alex said, “He must have been very desperate. And to leave England, that is indeed a surprise.”

Hallie said nothing; she walked to the fireplace, stared down at the empty grate, and kicked a log.

Jason said to her back, “I’m sorry, Miss Carrick. I know this comes as quite a shock. It did to me as well.”

She turned to face him. “I’m leaving tomorrow morning to find that little worm and shoot him. I will get my money back, and yours as well, Mr. Sherbrooke, since you are the one who discovered what he’d done so quickly.” She picked up her skirts and walked quickly from the drawing room.

Alex said, “That was a fine exit, but she doesn’t know where her bedchamber is.” She regretfully left her husband’s lap and hurried after her.

“What are you going to do, Jase?”

“I’ve already contacted Mr. Chartley. He is willing to sell me Lyon ’s Gate, but the price has now doubled. He owns three successful factories in Manchester. He knows desperation when he sees it.”

Douglas said, a dark eyebrow raised a good inch, “Does the fellow know who you are?”

“Well, he knows that I’m Jason Sherbrooke. Does he know that I’m your son? If he didn’t, he probably does now. But what difference would that make in any case?”

Douglas smiled at his innocent boy. “The first thing we need to know is why Mr. Benjamin Chartley, factory owner, is in London. I’m thinking it’s very likely he has hopes to enter London society. More than likely he has a daughter of marriageable age. If that is the case, we’ve got him.”

“But I don’t-”

“Jason, he will sell you Lyon’s Gate at the price he paid for it or he will find every door in London closed to him. Then I’ll consider ruining him.”

Jason laughed. “Now, aren’t I a moron for not thinking of that?”

Douglas said, “You would have, given a couple more hours. You’ve been in America too long. Do you really think Miss Carrick is off for France to bring Thomas Hoverton to ground?”

“I wouldn’t doubt it. I keep telling her that she’s more American than English and this certainly proves it. It’s exactly what Jessie Wyndham would do. Give her a whiff of a villain and she’d be off. She’d take at least two guns with her, the whip she uses on jockeys who don’t play fair on the racetrack, and a knife in her boot, strapped to her ankle.” He laughed, couldn’t help himself, and shook his head. “What a debacle.”

Corrie said, “It is something we never considered. I like Hallie, but let me be painfully honest here. I was perfectly ready to have her kidnapped and removed to the Shetland islands. I fancy she could spruce up one of those ancient Viking huts and be perfectly content raising the local ponies.”

The twins’ nanny appeared suddenly in the doorway, looking harried, nervous, and resolute. James and Corrie were on their feet. “Yes, Mrs. Macklin? Is something wrong?”

Mrs. Macklin said, “No, no, don’t worry, my lord. It’s just that Master Everett wants to waltz.”

“Waltz?”

“Yes, my lord. With his uncle.”

At that moment, they heard a loud yell.

“He is rather insistent,” said Mrs. Macklin over another yell that made James’s left eye twitch.

Corrie said, “You waltz very well, Eliza. Why don’t you take him for a spin around the nursery?”

“Master Everett says I’m not man enough to do it right,” said Mrs. Macklin.

“Oh dear,” Corrie said. “It’s begun already?”

“Master Everett says my feet don’t cover enough ground.”

Jason was laughing. “Well, who can play the piano whilst I dance with Everett?”

His mother appeared in the doorway, Willicombe behind her, a large silver tray on his arms. Alex said, “I’ll do it. Goodness, Everett ’s gotten bigger in the last day and a half.”

“We’re off then to the music room. Mrs. Macklin, what about his brother?”

“Master Douglas is currently chewing on Wilson ’s bone and the puppy is trying to drag it away from him.”

Corrie said, “He is only seven weeks old, a Dandie Dinmont terrier, so ugly and precious all you want is to hug him until he creaks. Wilson and Douglas are good friends.”

“More ugly than precious,” James said. “But he fits quite nicely against my neck at night.”

Mrs. Macklin said, “I’m sorry, my lord, but Wilson slept against my neck last night.”

“Well, Wilson is in a new house,” Corrie said. “We’ll see whose neck he seeks out tonight.”

“Unfortunately,” the earl said, “it would appear that Douglas also likes to eat from the puppy’s bowl.”

“Oh dear,” Mrs. Macklin said, “and here I hid Wilson ’s bowl underneath Everett ’s bed.”

Smacked in the face at the same time by both the absurd and the ridiculous, Jason thought as he hauled Everett off to the music room, the little boy kicking his legs and waving his arms and singing at the top of his lungs in Jason’s right ear. James and Corrie went with Mrs. Macklin to pull the bone out of Douglas ’s mouth all while slipping the new puppy another one. Neither of them doubted Douglas would be waltzing with his uncle in under five minutes.

As for Hallie Carrick, she was upstairs in a lovely bedchamber, changing into her oldest clothes.