Virtue

30

Judith lay awake through the last remaining hours of darkness. She stared upward at the canopy over the bed, her eyelids peeled back as if they were held open with sticks, her eyeballs feeling shrunken and dried like shriveled peas. Despite a bone-deep bodily fatigue and total emotional exhaustion, she couldn't imagine sleeping. She lay straight-limbed in the bed, the sheet pulled up to her chin, her body perfectly aligned on the mattress, feeling the throbbing bruises on her arms where Marcus had held her and shaken her as the only truly alive parts of herself.

There ought to have been a sense of completion: The long dark road to vengeance had been traveled. Sebastian was in possession of his birthright and whatever depredations Gracemere's profligacy had worked upon the estate,

Sebastian would work to put right. George Devereux was avenged; his children had a place in the world he had been driven from.

There ought to have been a sense of completion, of satisfaction. But there was only emptiness. Where there should have been gain there was only the greatest loss. What price vengeance when set against the loss of love? She had tried to have both and what she'd won was ashes on the wind.

Except for Sebastian, she reminded herself. Sebastian could now have the love of his Harriet, now that he had something to offer her. Sebastian could retire to the country and fulfill his bucolic dreams. And for herself…?

The only thing she could do for Marcus was to remove herself as gracefully as possible from his life. There was no legal impediment to such a disappearance. She would tell him so as soon as she could. On which melancholy decision, she managed to fall asleep just as the sun came up.

She awoke at midmorning, rang for Millie, rose and dressed in desultory silence. "Is his lordship in, do you know, Millie?"

"I believe he went out after breakfast, my lady." Millie brushed a speck of lint from the sleeve of a blue silk spencer before holding it out for her. "You're looking a trifle fatigued, my lady," she observed with concern. "A little rouge might help."

Judith examined herself in the glass. Her eyes were dull and heavy in a pallid complexion. She shook her head. "No, I think it would just make things worse." She fastened a string of coral around her throat and went downstairs to the yellow drawing room.

"Mr. Davenport left his card an hour ago, my lady." Gregson presented the silver salver.

"Thank you, Gregson. Could you bring me some coffee, please?"

Sebastian had scrawled a note on the back of the card: Why aren't I jubilant? I feel as if we lost not won. Come to me when you can. I need to talk to you.

Judith tossed the card into the fire. She would probably be feeling the same as her brother even without the catastrophe with Marcus. The intensity had been too great to leave one feeling anything but drained. And she needed Sebastian now as she'd never needed him before.

"Lady Barret, my lady," Gregson intoned, entering the room with a tray of coffee.

Judith saw Agnes's face as it had been last night, a mask of rage and hatred. Her heart jumped then seemed to drop into her stomach. She opened her mouth to tell Gregson to make her excuses, but Agnes walked in on the heels of the butler. Her face was almost as pale as Judith's.

"Lady Barret." Judith bowed, hearing how thin her voice sounded. "How kind of you to call. Another cup, Gregson."

"No, I don't wish for coffee, thank you," Agnes said. She didn't return Judith's bow but paced the room, waiting for Gregson to finish pouring Judith's coffee.

When the door closed on the butler, Agnes swung round on her daughter. Her eyes blazed in her face, where two spots of rouge burned in violent contrast to her pallor. "Let us take off the gloves, Judith. I don't know how you did it, but I know what you and your brother did last night."

"Oh?" Judith, struggling for calm, raised an ironic eyebrow. "And what was that?"

"Somehow, between you, you cheated Gracemere." Agnes's voice shook and her pallor had become even more pronounced. Her hands trembled and she clasped them tightly together. "You ruined him!" Her voice was a low hiss and she advanced on Judith, who stepped back, away from the force of this vengeful rage.

"He would have ruined my brother as he ruined our father," Judith said, a quaver in her voice. There was no point in denying the truth with this woman, who seemed somehow to know everything anyway. Unconsciously her hands passed through the air as if she could thus dispel the enveloping evil miasma.

Agnes laughed, a shocking crack of amusement. "Unlike you and your brother, your father was a weak fool. He had no idea how to stand up for himself… or to hold onto what he owned."

Judith stared at the woman. Even through her fear and outrage, she recognized the truth of what Agnes had said. But she had always assumed exile and poverty had destroyed George's stability and willpower. Agnes was implying that it had an earlier genesis. "What do you know of my father?" she demanded. "What could you possibly know of the life he led?"

Agnes laughed again and abruptly Judith turned from her. "Get out of my house, Lady Barret."

"I'll leave when I've said what I came here to say, Judith." Her voice dropped to barely a whisper, but each word had bell-like clarity in the still room. "You will pay for what you did… you and your brother."

"Oh, I am paying," Judith said softly, almost to herself. "You don't know how much." Then her voice strengthened. "But my brother will now enjoy his birthright. Sebastian will take his happiness with both hands now. His happiness and place in the world is assured."

"He will pay," Agnes reiterated with a cold certainty that sent renewed chills up Judith's spine.

She could think of nothing to say to combat the menace in the room and, when Gregson opened the door, turned with blind relief toward the distraction.

"Lady Devlin, Lady Isobel Henley, and Mrs. Forsythe."

"Judith, it's the talk of the town," Isobel exclaimed, swirling into the room in a cloud of muslin. "Your brother exposed the Earl of Gracemere as a cheat!"

"I left before midnight," Cornelia put in. She tripped on the edge of the rug and caught herself just in time. "But Forsythe was full of it over the breakfast table. He says Gracemere will never be able to show his face in Society again… Oh, I beg your pardon, Lady Barret. I didn't see you standing there."

Under Judith's incredulous stare, a complete change came over Agnes. The ice left her eyes, a tinge of normal color returned to her cheeks. Her voice was as light and nonchalant as ever. "As Lady Isobel says, it's the talk of the town. I'm sure everyone will be beating a path to your door, Lady Carrington, to talk of your brother."

"I wonder how long the earl has been cheating," Sally commented, sitting down beside the fire. "It couldn't be that he only began last night, could it?"

"Unlikely," Judith said, trying to respond normally. If Agnes Barret could behave as if there were no history and the things that had been said in this room had never been spoken, then so could she. She drew on a lifetime's experience with a masquerade and showed her own mask of insouciance.

"But how did Sebastian know?"

"He's been playing with the earl for the last two months," Judith said, shrugging, averting her eyes from Agnes. "I imagine he realized something wasn't quite right before."

"Miss Moreton, my lady." The door again opened and an excited Harriet bounced in.

"Oh, Judith, I could barely contain myself… such extraordinary news. Is it true that Sebastian discovered the Earl of Gracemere cheating? Oh, how I wish I could have been there." Then Harriet saw Agnes and subsided, blushing furiously.

"You have, of course, never cared for Gracemere, have you, my dear?" Agnes remarked. "Nevertheless, one shouldn't gloat over another's misfortune."

"I find it hard to call it misfortune, ma'am," Isobel said, scrutinizing the plate of sweet biscuits on the coffee tray. "When a man deliberately sets out to injure another man and is unmasked, misfortune seems a misnomer." She selected a piece of shortbread.

Agnes bowed coldly and began to leaf through a periodical on a console table. Cornelia kicked Isobel's ankle with lamentable lack of delicacy and an uneasy silence fell for a minute. Then Sally spoke with customary good nature. "It's quite shocking news, of course. But one can only assume that the earl had a compelling reason to play in that manner. Debts of unmanageable magnitude… what other explanation could there be?"

"You're right," Cornelia said. "We shouldn't be the first to throw stones."

"No," Sally agreed, thinking of four thousand pounds' worth of pawned rubies.

In the next half hour, it seemed that half London was indeed beating a path to Judith's door, agog to learn any details that might not be generally known. Judith dispensed hospitality, asserted she had no inside snippets of gossip since she hadn't seen her brother since the previous evening, and all the while her head spun with conjecture. What possible revenge could Agnes and Gracemere have in mind? The speculation took her mind off her trouble with Marcus to some extent, but did nothing to restore her equilibrium. She waited impatiently for her guests to take their leave, so that she could go to Sebastian.

"Judith, I must go home, Annie has the croup." Sally appeared at Judith's elbow. "Nurse is quite good with her, but the poor little love frets if I'm away too long."^

"I'm sorry." Judith received this information with less than her usual attention. "It's not serious, I hope."

"No… Judith, is something the matter?" Sally regarded her friend closely. "You seem distrait."

"It's hardly surprising," Judith said, trying to pass it off, gesturing around the crowded room. "After last night."

"I suppose not. What did Marcus have to say?" It was a shrewd guess, but Sally was good at guessing games when it came to Devlins.

Judith shook her head. "Not now, Sally."

Sally accepted this with a nod and a compassionate kiss. "Oh, I was forgetting, Harriet had to leave… some errand she has to run for her mother. You were deep in conversation and she didn't want to interrupt, so I said I'd say good-bye for her."

"Thanks. I expect Sebastian will be able to answer all her questions later." Judith smiled, but the strain in the smile was obvious. Sally pressed her hand briefly and left.

Judith looked around the room and realized that Agnes Barret had also made a discreet departure. But then she wouldn't have expected her to make any farewells.

Judith walked to Albemarle Street as soon as the last visitor had left. Sebastian had been watching for her from his front window and came to open the door himself. "I've been hiding," he confessed. "I saw Harry Middleton this morning, but I've had Broughton deny me to everyone else."

"Wise of you," she said. "My drawing room's been full since midmorning with people trying to pry some additional tidbit out of me." She unpinned her hat and drew off her gloves.

Sebastian poured sherry. "You look the very devil," he said frankly. "What happened to you last night? I looked up and you'd gone."

"Marcus took me away just as you were exposing Gracemere."

Sebastian whistled soundlessly. "He saw." She nodded. "All of it." "Bad?"

She nodded again. "Very. As bad as we knew it would be if he found out."

"I'm sorry, love." Sebastian took his sister in his arms and she wept quietly for a few moments while he stroked her hair. "When he's had time to calm down, to look at it clearly, he'll understand. He knows you love him. He'd have to be a blind man not to know it."

"I hoped he loved me," she said drearily. "But love is easily killed, it seems. He despises me." She heard again his voice telling her to go away… to get out of his sight. Such furious contempt.

"Stuff," her brother said. "Of course he doesn't despise you."

"Yes, he does. Anyway, let's not talk of it anymore now. Agnes Barret paid me a visit this morning."

She explained what Agnes had said and Sebastian listened attentively. "There's nothing she could do," he said at the end. "Neither of them has any redress, Ju. Gracemere will have to leave London. He's already been obliged to resign from his clubs, according to Harry. He can rusticate in the country or go abroad. But there's no place in Society for him now… or ever again." "And Agnes?"

"She's untarnished. She can continue as before."

"But without her lover. And if her fortunes are tied with Gracemere's then his ruin is hers, one way or the other."

"Either she ends her relationship with Gracemere, or she abandons her place in Society and joins him in exile. Not comfortable choices. Now, what are we going to do about Marcus?"

Judith shook her head tiredly. "I don't believe there's anything to be done. I'll leave him as soon as I can decently do so without causing remark. We'll concoct some story to put me out of the way, and Marcus will be free to marry or to continue to live as he did before he met me."

Sebastian could think of nothing to say in the face of this dreary future. Any option he might offer would be just as wretched when compared with what might have been.

Judith reached for her hat and gloves. "I'd better go home. Maybe Marcus will be back by now."

She walked back to Berkeley Square and found Harriet's maid on the doorstep. "Beggin' your pardon, m'lady, but Lady Moreton sent me." The girl bobbed a curtsy. "She asks as 'ow could you send miss 'ome as soon as possible."

"Send her home?" Judith stared at the girl. "But she went home a long time ago." It was a mere ten minutes' walk from Berkeley Square to Brook Street. "Oh, but she said she had some errands to run for Lady Moreton. I expect that's where she is."

"Oh, no, m'lady," the girl corrected. "Miss already sent the footman home with her ladyship's tonic."

"You'd better come in," Judith said, and the girl followed her into the house.

"Gregson, did you see Miss Moreton leave earlier?"

"Oh, yes, my lady. She left with Lady Barret."

Judith felt the blood drain from her face. Harriet… with Agnes. She saw again those tawny eyes, glittering with maleficence, heard again the hissed threats.

She thought of Harriet, the perfect means of revenge upon Sebastian.

"Tell your mistress that Miss Moreton went with Lady Barret. I'm certain she'll be returning shortly," she instructed the maid. "Gregson, send someone to find his lordship." Her voice was crisp, offering no hint of the terror she felt. "In fact, send as many people as necessary. He may be at one of his clubs, or at Jackson's Saloon… at one of his friends' houses. But he must be found immediately."

"Is there a message, my lady?"

"Simply that he's needed at home immediately."

Judith went up to her drawing room. Once private, she paced the room in agitation, feeling completely helpless. What would they do with Harriet? Marcus had an inner knowledge of Gracemere, he'd have some idea of what he intended. She was far too agitated to worry about how she would face him after last night's hideous scene; neither did it occur to her that her husband would withhold his help, however deeply disgusted he was with his wife and her brother. Marcus was not vindictive. With the greatest difficulty, she resisted the urge to send a message to Sebastian. What could he do, except join her in impotent fear?

Marcus was in Gentleman Jackson's Saloon, when one of the six footmen ran him to earth. Stripped to the waist, pouring sweat, he was attempting to exorcise misery and disappointment in a violent bout with a punchball.

He had passed no better a night than Judith, but the sharpest spur of his hurt was becoming blunter and some elements of rationality beginning to offer a spark of light in his darkness. He could hear her voice clearly now demanding that he understand the driving power of vengeance. He knew that power. Once he'd obeyed its spur himself… and with Gracemere. There was a perfect appropriateness to the vengeance Judith and Sebastian had taken. But still he couldn't reconcile himself to the knowledge that he'd been used. If only she'd taken him into her confidence…

But how could she have done so? He would have stopped her. However sympathetic he might have been to her brother's situation, to her father's ruin, he would never have permitted Judith to do what she'd done. And the destruction of Bernard Melville, Earl of Gracemere, was central to Judith's view of the world. Until that had been accomplished, nothing else could take precedence… not even her husband. Had he the right to believe she should have dropped the most powerful imperative of her life-and her brother's life-simply because he had come on the scene? Her bond with her brother was too complex and too strong to be severed by the simple ties of passion… of lust and a burgeoning love.

He didn't countenance what she'd done, but he understood it. From understanding could come acceptance…

"My lord, one of your men has a message for you."

Marcus grabbed a towel, rubbing the sweat from his face. "Someone for me, Jackson?"

"Yes, my lord." Gentleman Jackson indicated the lad in Carrington livery, standing at the far side of the room, gazing wide-eyed at the sparring couples.

"What the devil can he want?" Marcus beckoned and the lad trotted across, his message spilling from his lips. "Her ladyship, my lord, wishes you to return home immediately."

"Her ladyship!" His heart lurched. Only the direst necessity would send Judith in search of him in this fashion.

"Is her ladyship well?" he demanded, toweling his sweat-soaked head.

"Yes, my lord," the man said. "I believe so, my lord. Gregson said we was all to search London for you."

"All?"

"Yes, my lord. There's six of us."

"Go back to Berkeley Square and say I'm on my way," Marcus instructed tersely, his heart slowing as he went into the changing room. If Judith was well and unhurt, that was all that mattered. Surely she wouldn't have sent all over London for him just to tell him that she was leaving him… although, knowing his lynx, maybe he shouldn't be so sanguine. So far, he hadn't managed to keep a step ahead of her. Why should he assume he could do so now?

He dressed in haste and took a hackney home. Greg-son had the door open as he ran up the steps. "Her ladyship…?"

"In the yellow drawing room, my lord."

He took the stairs two at a time. "Judith, what is it?" The question was on his lips almost before he had the door open. Her white face and scared eyes stopped him on the threshold. "What is it?"

"Harriet," she said, moistening her lips. She wanted to run to him, but the memory of the previous night was too raw. "I believe Agnes and Gracemere have abducted her."

He dosed his eyes for a minute. He didn't ever want to hear the name of Gracemere again. He had no interest in his old enemy and Agnes Barret. If he was to pick up the pieces of his shattered marriage, Bernard Melville, Earl of Gracemere, had to be consigned to the pits of hell. And then he saw Martha as she'd been that morning, ten years before, crouched in a corner of the room, her face bruised, her eyes sightless with tears, soft whimpers coming from her mouth as she'd rocked herself in her hurt. A man who raped once could do so again.

"Tell me what you know."

Judith explained, finding it possible to slow her thoughts and present facts rather than impressions under Marcus's calm attention. "I'm so frightened," she said at the end. "I've always felt the evil in both of them. What will they do to her, Marcus?"

Marcus thought swiftly. There was no point exacerbating her fears. Later, when it was over, he would tell her the truth about Gracemere and Martha. But for now he had to prevent the violation of another innocent. He had to get there in time. He had failed once; he wouldn't fail again.

He spoke suddenly with precision and clarity and Judith quailed at the fury and the purpose in his eyes.

"I will not permit any harm to come to Harriet. This lies between Gracemere and myself. You are to say nothing to anyone and you will stay here until I return. You and your brother will not involve yourselves in this. I'll brook no interference. Do you understand?"

"I understand," Judith said as he strode from the room.

But I don't accept it.