Page 31 of Tempting the Earl
"That would be most appreciated," answered Philip dryly as he turned towards the door that had been pointed out.
As they entered the building they were assailed by the pungent stench of a multitude of unwashed bodies. James nearly gagged before getting himself under control. By taking short breaths through their mouths they managed to maintain their composure as they went in search of whoever was in charge of this horrific place.
After a moment another ghoulish-looking brute of a man approached them, wanting to know what business they had there. After they identified themselves, the man's demeanour changed and he ushered them into his office trying to appear genial. Philip tried to keep his approach polite knowing that they would get no information out of this man if he felt threatened in any way. As Philip explained the purpose of their call, the man appeared incredulous.
"Don't have no marchionesses here, milord, I'm sure of that. If you want you can go check for yourselves, search through the women and see if she's here, but I know for sure we don't." He was edging towards belligerence and Philip tried another tack.
"I don't mean to question your establishment, sir. We have been searching for this young woman for a few months now, and this is where our trail has led us. I actually doubted it myself that she would be here. Is it possible she was here and died?" Philip asked hesitantly, unsure if he wanted to hear the answer.
His efforts at gentleness paid off since the warden appeared more reasonable. "Never been any marchionesses in Bedlam, milord. The Quality looks after their crazies on their own." He paused for a moment in thought. "Haven't had any dead in a while either, 'cept for one old geezer who croaked a couple weeks back; but you said this was a young woman, didn't you?"
Philip felt a powerful mixture of relief and disappointment. Relief that the young noblewoman wasn't enduring such a place, but disappointed that he was at another dead end in his search and had no further leads to go on. He decided to ask one more question before they left.
"Just to be certain, could you think back over the last several months? Have you had any noblemen deliver any patients here?"
The warden sighed deeply in thought. "Let's see. I can only think of one example. A gent calling himself Lord Maximilian dropped off a poor unfortunate girl about five or six months ago. Pretty young thing she was. He said she had gone crackers thinking she was Quality when she was just a housemaid. He paid real good to have her locked up by herself, he said she needed time to reflect, whatever that was supposed to mean."
Philip's stomach felt like it dropped into his boots. Max Woolfe. He closed his eyes for a moment to absorb his anger, not wanting to stem the flow of information. James asked the next question.
"And is she still here, this pretty little maid?" He couldn't quite keep the scorn from his tone, but the warden didn't seem to notice.
"She was a wily one, she was. She was only here a few weeks before she escaped. Escape! Can you imagine? We never let 'em get away, and a young wench manages it," he declared in disgust. "Don't know what happened to her after that. We couldn't find her. She's probably dead, she was so cracked in the head and then wandering around by herself. Escaped at night, you know, on foot. No chance she'd make it very far."
"How hard did you search?" questioned Philip harshly, unable to contain his wrathful disgust at the thought of the young marchioness being confined in such a decrepit place.
"We searched hard, let me tell you. Won't get much coin from his lordship if we don't hold on to the wench, will we?" was the shrewd reply. "Why do you care anyway about a cracked servant? She was always yammering on crying for her nurse and offering to pay us if we'd let her go."
"Did it never occur to you that there was something shady about a lord paying handsomely for you to keep his maid?" Philip wondered.
"It's not for me to ask questions, milord," was the lofty reply.
There was a moment of silence while Philip thought about what to do next. "Would anyone here have any information about where the girl could have gone?"
"No. Believe me; I did everything I could to find out! I really did not want to tell his lordship we'd lost his servant."
"So you did inform him eventually? What was his reaction?"
"At first he was powerful angry. Threatened to kill us all, which of course was an empty threat as you can see." The huge man grinned gesturing to his physique. "But after he calmed down he started to laugh. I think he might be cracked in the head, too, come to think of it."
"You're right; I think he is cracked in the head, too." Philip shook his head in disgust; another dead end. But now they truly knew the lengths Ridley and his friend would go to. The old nurse was right; they had taken the young marchioness to Bedlam. The king would have Ridley's head.
Philip and James thanked the man and paid him for his cooperation before trudging back to their carriage despondently. They drove in silence back to the London house. Philip realized it was his duty to inform the king of the results of his search. It was not an interview he was looking forward to. The normally level-headed monarch was known to have a temper and would be very angry at this development. No doubt he would blame the earl for how long it had taken to get this information.
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Sure enough, the audience with the king did not go well the next day. His majesty was furious that one of his nobles could be so reprehensible. But he kept his anger rightly directed towards Ridley, who by late afternoon had been summoned before the king to explain himself. There truly was no evidence that the girl Bedlam lost was the missing marchioness and Ridley denied all knowledge of the incident. What business was it of his if his friend wanted to have one of his servants locked up, he asked in reasonable tones. And he explained that the old nurse was grieving and not in her right mind. Who would the king believe, the viscount or the nurse? Despite his anger and mistrust, the king had little choice but to concede that there was no proof of Ridley's misconduct and had to let him go.
After Ridley was dismissed from the room, Philip and the king mulled the matter over in great detail.
"So we're back to where we started," declared Philip in disgust. "The marchioness is missing and we have no idea where to look for her."
"She is most likely dead, Yorkleigh," was the king's caustic conclusion.
"Your Majesty, with all due respect, I refuse to accept that she's dead. If she managed to escape from Bedlam, she's a resourceful chit and would have found a way to survive," argued Philip.
"You may be right. She will have reached her twenty-first birthday in about two months from now. If she has not shown herself by a month after that, she shall be declared dead, and all her holdings and titles will be disposed of as I see fit," decided the king.
"Very well, your Majesty." Philip had to be satisfied with that. Although he was filled with frustration at his inability to find any trace of the young woman, he was convinced she was alive somewhere, waiting until Ridley had no hold over her before she revealed herself and claimed her true position. He would have to be satisfied with waiting it out. He had come to take the matter quite personally and was determined to make the acquaintance of the young woman who had led him on such a chase.
