Page 41 of Never a Duke
Ned stood because he finally had Walden’s attention. “I will continue to pursue Lady Rosalind’s causes, Your Grace, because nobody with the proper authority to do so can be bothered. My regards to your duchess.”
Walden’s gaze was unreadable, but he bowed slightly and took his leave.
That bow was still on Ned’s mind hours later, when he closed the last ledger and realized he was hungry.
Famished, in fact, and the hour was too late to patronize the chophouse down the street. Ned donned his cloak and gathered up his hat, gloves, and walking stick, and prepared to spend the rest of the evening making inquiries in places low and bawdy.
“Good night, Mr. Wentworth,” the watchman called as Ned headed for the side door. “Mind how you go out there. Rain’s on the way.”
Brilliant.Ned detoured to the umbrella stand. “Are the boys all in for the night?”
The watchman, a former sailor by the name of Rawlings, shook his head. “The newest one, Artie, hasn’t come in. He thinks I don’t notice that he’s left a window cracked, but I do, and it won’t serve, Mr. Wentworth. Somebody sees him slippin’ in the window, they’ll slip in after him and have a look about.”
Nothing of any value was left unlocked on the bank premises, but Rawlings had a point. The boys were valuable, Rawlings was valuable, and they could come to harm in the course of a failed robbery.
“I’ll have a word with him,” Ned said. “Another word. Any idea what he’s getting up to on these nocturnal sorties?”
Rawlings looked past Ned, to the gloom beyond the door. “Says he has business to tend to, but you ask me, that lad is worrit something fierce.”
Chapter Eight
“Neddy is managing us,” Stephen said, rocking gently with the infant cradled in his arms. “Sending us off on harmless errands to keep us safe while he does the real work. This child will soon no longer be a baby.”
The boy was marvelously solid, and thank all the minsters of heaven, he charged about on two sturdy legs as his father could not.
“He will always be our baby,” Abigail said, “and you have, as usual, rocked him to sleep. Jane says Walden had the same skill. He could calm a teething infant when all the nursery maids and Jane herself could not.”
“The ducal touch,” Stephen said, kissing the baby’s forehead. “The wee ones recognize it.”
Abigail glanced up from her stitching. “The novelty of a father’s affection. You show up at the end of the day, after that child has been fed, dressed, changed, entertained, scolded, and otherwise kept safe by women since dawn’s early light. Of course he’s fascinated with you. I miss you too.”
The child sighed, the sweetest sound under heaven. “I’m at the bank more,” Stephen said. “I know that. I’m not always sure what I’mdoingat the bank, but Quinn is caught up in his parliamentary schemes, and the navy has little need for new cannons these days. I’m happy to assist Neddy with his mystery of the missing maids, but he’s not really letting usdomuch, is he?”
Abigail was working on a quilt, stitching together squares of flannel into the Walden coat of arms. Stephen thought the design daft, but Abigail intended that the quilt become an heirloom, passed from one generation of Wentworths to the next.
“Ned has told us what we’ll need to know should he require reinforcements,” Abigail said, “and in the early days of an investigation, it’s important to keep an open mind. The apothecaries might know something. The club gossip might yield a scrap of information.”
“Neddy truly expects me to sit in the clubs twiddling my thumbs while he frequents the brothels and taverns. I don’t like it, Abigail. Ned isn’t a brothels-and-taverns sort of fellow.”
She tied off her thread and snipped the needle free. “I don’t like it either, Stephen. He’s too alone. Always observing, always cordial and quiet. As a girl who didn’t have friends, and as a woman who never fit in, I want better for him. What do we know of his family?”
“We are his family.” Stephen shifted the baby so the lad was cradled against his shoulder. “Neddy is smitten with Lady Rosalind. I can’t recall another occasion when he has been smitten.”
Which was either a testament to extraordinary discretion on Ned’s part, or evidence of manly humors severely out of balance.
Abigail folded the fabric into a soft pile. “To hear Jane tell it, she was smitten with Ned as a boy. He was so fierce and so loyal to Walden.”
“And so dirty,” Stephen said. “Stank like a muck pit and at the mention of a bath he fought like a…”
“What?”
“A cornered badger. Ned wasn’t wary of soap and water, he loathed it. Once Jane laid down the law to him, he would not allow anybody in the laundry when he was at his ablutions. He’d not only lock the door, he’d lock the windows and make Davies stand guard outside the laundry room. I found it hilarious.”
Abigail looked thoughtful. “If your young son behaved like that, would you find it so entertaining?”
“No,” Stephen said, “and the memory, as well as the recollection of my reaction, are both uncomfortable. We love Neddy, but we don’t know his early particulars. He has more dignity than Walden in some regards, and one doesn’t trespass on his privacy lightly.”
“Maybe Lady Rosalind can be family to him,” Abigail said, setting aside her sewing. “In her way, she is fierce too. I’ve never seen anybody else actually walk out of a Wentworth conversational affray, but the tactic was effective. We were on better behavior after that.”
