Page 63 of With Good Grace
Olivia nodded sympathetically.
‘Marchant adores me, but if those letters were ever to come to his attention or, worse, fall into the hands of his children, it would destroy him.’ Tears glistened on her thick lashes. ‘I am willing to do whatever is necessary to spare him that pain. So, when Sir Hubert contacted me and said they were in his possession I was, as you can imagine, beside myself with worry. But I had the presence of mind to ask him to read one of them to me, and when he could not do so I realised he did not actually have them.’
Olivia nodded. ‘He had heard about them from Marcus, I suppose.’
‘Yes, but Marcus didn’t use them. He didn’t need to. He was very successful by then and had well-known actors beating a path to his door voluntarily, begging him to represent them. I was no longer an actress at that point, having left the stage to marry. I asked him to return the letters. He did not, but promised me they were safe.’
Typical Marcus, Olivia thought disgustedly. He could not quite bring himself to do the honourable thing, just in case times became hard and he needed to use the letters for his own benefit.
‘What’s the point of raking this over?’ Hubert asked, kicking at a loose floorboard. ‘Time’s a wasting. Where has become of that silly girl and the child?’
Olivia noticed Molly bridle at his description of her but she did not move. Olivia took a step to the right so that Hubert would not see Molly’s hiding place if he changed position.
‘And so,’ Olivia said. ‘You offered Hubert money, a great deal of money I would imagine, in return for the letters.’
‘He assured me that he had access to them and I believed him because I assumed they were in your household. I did not anticipate that he would have someone break into Barber’s office and that someone else would lose their life.’ Lady Marchant looked genuinely distressed. ‘That poor man. I have sent an anonymous donation to his family.’
Olivia nodded her approval. In Lady Marchant’s position, she would have done the exact same thing.
‘And now this.’ Lady Marchant spread her hands. ‘I was promised faithfully that the letters would be in his hand today. Naturally, I did not believe it and was not prepared to pay a penny until I felt assured I had every single one of them, so I insisted upon being here myself when Sir Hubert took possession of them. But, I beg you to believe, I was not aware that he had restored to kidnapping a child in order to do so.’
‘No, I believe you did not. Anyway, it was unnecessary. As I already explained, I fully intended to return your property to you.’
Lady Marchant reached out a hand to Olivia. Olivia took it in hers and gave it a reassuring squeeze, completely convinced that Lady Marchant told the truth. Presumably, after all that Molly had just heard, she would be totally disillusioned with Hubert too. She glanced over her shoulder, her gaze clashed with Molly’s and the girl appeared to hesitate. Then, to Olivia’s intense disappointment, she made her decision, turned on her heel and disappeared.
A tense silence ensued. Although Olivia sensed that Lady Marchant was now in her corner, she also knew that Hubert was too desperate to let either of them go. She expected him at any moment to lunge for her and extract the letters from inside her tunic by force. How he would react when he found they were not the ones he sought was anyone’s guess, but Olivia knew it would not end well. Hubert, just like Marcus, was a vindictive man with a vicious temper when crossed.
Olivia’s heart lifted when Molly returned to the room with Tom cradled in her arms. But her joy was short lived when she realised her child was totally still. Her heart stalled. He could not be dead; he simply could not be!
‘Give him to me!’ She reached out her arms and snatched Tom from Molly’s grasp. He was breathing, thank the Lord, but even when Olivia gently shook him, he did not wake. ‘What have you done to him?’ she asked sharply.
‘Just a little laudanum rubbed on his gums,’ Molly said with total unconcern. ‘The brat would not stop crying, or asking for you.’
‘You drugged my child?’ Olivia felt as though she might very well explode with anger. ‘You could have killed him!’ Olivia smoothed the curls from her son’s face and kissed his brow. ‘What sort of demons are you?’
‘The letters,’ Hubert said, sighing with impatience. ‘Come along, we don’t have all day.’
Before Olivia could decide what to do, Molly lunged for her and pulled the file free of Olivia’s tunic. She could not prevent her without dropping Tom so did not even try. She sent a warning glance towards Lady Marchant, not sure what good it would do her. When Hubert realised he had been duped, there was no telling how he would react, and Lady Marchant needed to be prepared.
‘Here we are, my dear,’ Molly said with a superior smirk. ‘All’s well that ends well.’
Hubert smiled vaingloriously as he took the papers from her but his smile quickly vanished as he flipped through them. ‘What the devil…’ His face blazed with anger focused upon Molly. ‘You stupid, stupid girl! Can you not get anything right?’
‘You asked me to get the letters and I did!’ Molly cried indignantly.
‘I told you to check and make sure they were the right ones. I warned you, told you repeatedly, that her ladyship here would try to gull you.’
‘I couldn’t look. Didn’t have time. Someone was coming and I couldn’t be seen or we would have been prevented from leaving that house.’
Hubert’s eyes blazed. ‘One thing, one tiny thing I asked you to do for me and you can’t even manage to get that right.’
‘We still have the child,’ Molly whined. ‘Don’t be angry with me, my love.’ She clawed at Hubert’s arm but he shook her off like an irritating fly. ‘We have come such a long way together. Have such plans. Besides, it was me as took all the risks.’
‘If you still think Hubert intends to take you away with him, Molly, then you are deluding yourself,’ Olivia said, checking Tom every second or two to see if there was any change in his condition; desperate to get him to a doctor. She would have fought her way past Hubert and Molly if she did not have Tom’s welfare to take into account, so the next best thing would be to drive a wedge between them and slip away during the ensuing melee. ‘Surely it has occurred to you by now that he was using you?’
‘We love each other,’ Molly said stoutly, her voice wobbling with uncertainty.
Olivia tossed her head. ‘Hubert does not love anyone expect himself.’
