“Oh, only in the broadest sense, Fitz. I have not yet won your money!”
Several days later found them elbow to elbow in the Darcy-Matlock pew on a warm May Sunday. In the intervening time, Darcy had not tried to see Elizabeth, nor had he any business, real or imagined, in the vicinity of Gracechurch Street that might make a chance meeting possible. There would have been no point in it. The last thing Darcy wished to behold was the tight look of politeness, or the hurried excuses to be gone that such a meeting would generate. He would deserve no better in return for that uncharitable letter that he would give almost anything now to have written differently. No, it was better to retain his memories of her in a gentler hue. She would not be in London long. Opening his prayer book, he nudged a corner into Richard’s arm and pointed to the scripture for the day as Dy’s clergyman began the reading.
The shadows were lengthening, the corners of his study already in darkness, when Witcher knocked and delivered a calling card. “Who is it?” Darcy asked, reaching for the card.
“The Honorable Mr. Beverly Trenholme, sir. I cannot say that I recall the gentleman.” The old butler’s brow wrinkled in distress. “But he says he is an old friend.”
“Yes, Witcher, but from university days. I do not believe he has ever called on me here in Town. I spent some time after Christmas with him and his brother, Lord Sayre, in Oxfordshire.”
“Oh, begging your pardon, sir. Of course, Oxfordshire!” Witcher shook his head. “Shall I bring him in, sir?”
“Please, Witcher. There’s a good man.” Darcy rose, straightened his waistcoat, and pulled at his cuffs, the habitual motions helping to clear the tumble of questions Trenholme’s sudden appearance had provoked. Dy’s warning stood out starkly from among them all, and Darcy wondered whether agreeing to see the man might be more than Brougham would think wise.
The door opened. “Mr. Trenholme, sir.”
“Darcy! It is good of you to see me!” Trenholme advanced into the room, one hand extended. In the other was a handle attached to a long, thin leather case.
“Trenholme.” Darcy nodded his greeting and took his hand. It felt cold, and he could almost swear that it trembled as they shook. “Please, be seated.” Trenholme pulled forward a chair and then, after laying the case gently on the desk, he sat down with a sigh.
“Can you believe that it has been almost four months since last we saw each other?” He sighed again. “Such an awful business. Sayre and I are more than grateful that you have kept mum about my step-mother’s suicide and Sayre’s financial straits. It only postponed the inevitable, but one is glad for whatever time the wolves may be kept from the door.”
“It is over, then?” Darcy asked evenly.
Trenholme shook his head. “I will not pretend it is not, not with you. Everything movable has been stripped and delivered here for auction at Garraway’s. The estate itself goes on the block at the end of the week.” A look of murderous hatred shaded Trenholme’s face. “It should have been mine! Sayre never cared about anything more than the coin he could wring from it for one more go at the tables. And then that Irish b ——!” His voice rose. “Turned our own people against us. You watch her, Darcy! Watch her for the lying little traitor she is! She’ll stab you in the back without a thought.”
“What do you mean?” Darcy stared hard into Trenholme’s eyes while in his mind he tried to piece together names, faces, and conversations from his fractured memories of Sylvanie’s soiree. “Traitor? What do you know?”
“What I know is that, between her and Sayre, I no longer have enough money to get drunk on, which is the only state in which I do not wish to send them to —” He stopped. “That is not why I have come. I came to deliver this.” He leaned forward and nudged the case toward his host. “You won it fairly, and it should not be sold to pay one farthing toward Sayre’s debts.”
Darcy opened the case; his breath caught in his throat. The Spanish sword lay there, cradled in velvet. It caught the lamplight immediately he picked it up, blazing in a living fire.
“I may be a coward and a drunk, but I know what is right in a debt of honor. Sayre will damned well pay this one!” Trenholme declared with vehemence.
Darcy hefted it, adjusting his grip on the pommel. It was every bit as perfectly suited to his hand as he remembered.
“Trenholme, I hardly know what to say!” Darcy placed the exquisite weapon back in its velvet swathing.
“There is nothing to say. It has been yours since that night, and you had every right to it all these months. You certainly had enough witnesses to go to the Law if you had wished. Sayre should be grateful that you did not, grateful enough to have sent this to you himself.”
“He does not know you brought it to me?” Darcy asked sharply.
“He does now!” Trenholme laughed mirthlessly and rose. “Left him a note!” He nodded his leave. “I’ll not take up any more of your time, Darcy, but remember what I said about Sylvanie. Monmouth’s taken a viper to his bosom, no doubt about that. If there is any deviltry afoot, Sylvanie will be in the thick of it, make no mistake.”
“But what will you do?” Darcy’s question stopped the Honorable Beverly Trenholme as he reached for the doorknob. There must be something! Darcy cast about for anything he could offer the man that would answer yet not offend or humiliate him.
“I am for America, I think.” Trenholme turned back. A grim smile played upon his face, but even the slight animation that lent never reached his eyes. “I hear English gentlemen are still welcome in Boston, even if tea is not.”
“Tea?” Darcy looked askance at him. “I do not believe the current grievances of the Americans have anything to do with tea, Trenholme.”
He shrugged. “I thought they sent a shipload of tea overboard into Boston’s harbor.”
“Over thirty-five years ago! Tea has been safely shipped to Boston for thirty years and more!” Darcy’s jaw worked fiercely to suppress the laugh that threatened insult to his guest. “You need have no fear of going without tea in Boston.”
“Oh. Well…” Trenholme seemed to have run out of life as well as words.
“Wait a moment!” He left Trenholme and went to his desk, drawing out a diary from the top drawer. Flipping through the pages, he came to the section detailing his shipping interests. “If I could arrange your passage to Boston, would you take it?”
“Free passage?” Trenholme’s eyes sparked faintly.
“Free passage,” Darcy affirmed. “I have controlling interest in a ship bound for Boston, but it leaves tomorrow morning. That is little time…”
“I do not require any more time than it would take to gather my things and get to the docks. Do you know what this means, Darcy?” the man cried as his host bent to write out a note to the ship’s captain. “Saving the passage money, I shall not arrive in America a pauper.”
“Certainly inadvisable.” Darcy straightened and handed Trenholme his authorization. “Give this to the captain, and he will take you aboard. It will not be comfortable, not what you are accustomed to…”
Trenholme took the note and then Darcy’s hand. “You’re a good man, Darcy. I shall never forget this.” He gulped once and then, turning swiftly, walked out the door, leaving his benefactor to look after him in hope that it was true.
“Why do you continue to check your watch?” Georgiana asked her brother as he pulled the timepiece once more from his waistcoat pocket. The weather continuing so fine the next day, they had decided to take a turn in St. James’s Park.
“A friend left for America early this morning. According to the schedule, his ship should reach the open sea within the next quarter of an hour. I suppose I was trying to guess exactly where he might be.”
“A good friend?”
“Perhaps. I hope I was a ‘good friend’ to him whatever the case.”
The sound of a horse’s hooves pounding the turf at a reckless pace caused Darcy to turn sharply about and then to push his sister behind him and away from the path. The horse and rider continued toward them, checking
