learn that the marriage was a sham: she had guessed it for years. All the same she was not going to let Emily get away with this. 'We can't have a scandal,' she said firmly,
'It wouldn't be a scandal--'
'Of course it would,' she barked, exasperated by his shortsightedness. 'It would be the talk of London for a year, and it would be in all the cheap newspapers, too.' Edward was Lord Whitehaven now, and a sexual sensation involving a peer was just the kind of thing featured in the weekly newspapers that servants bought.
Edward said miserably: 'But don't you think Emily has a right to her freedom?'
Augusta ignored that feeble appeal to justice. 'Can she force you?'
'She wants me to sign a document admitting that the marriage was never consummated. Then, apparently, it's straightforward.'
'And if you don't sign?'
'Then it's more difficult. These things are not easy to prove.'
'That settles it. We have nothing to worry about. Let's speak no more about this embarrassing topic.'
'But--'
'Tell her she can't have an annulment. I absolutely will not hear of it.'
'Very well, Mother.'
She was taken aback by his rapid capitulation. Although she generally got her way in the end, he normally put up more of a fight than this. He must have other problems on his mind. 'What's the matter, Teddy?' she said in a softer voice.
He sighed heavily. 'Hugh told me the devil of a thing,' he said.
'What?'
'He says Micky killed Solly Greenbourne.'
Augusta felt a shiver of horrid fascination. 'How? Solly was run over.'
'Hugh says Micky pushed him in front of that carriage.'
'Do you believe it?'
'Micky was with me that evening, but he might have slipped out for a few minutes. It's possible. Do you believe it, Mother?'
Augusta nodded. Micky was dangerous and bold: it was what made him so magnetic. She had no doubt he was capable of committing such a daring murder--and getting away with it.
'I find it hard to accept,' Edward said. 'I know Micky is wicked in some ways, but to think he would kill....'
'He would, though,' Augusta said.
'How can you be sure?'
Edward looked so pathetic that Augusta was tempted to share her own secret knowledge with him. Would it be wise? It could do no harm. The shock of Hugh's revelation seemed to have made Edward more thoughtful than usual. Perhaps the truth would be good for him. It might make him more serious. She decided to tell him. 'Micky killed your uncle Seth,' she said.
'Good God!'
'He suffocated him with a pillow. I caught him red-handed.' Augusta felt a flush of heat in her loins as she remembered the scene that had followed.
Edward said: 'But why would Micky kill Uncle Seth?'
'He was in such a hurry to get those rifles shipped to Cordova, don't you remember?'
'I remember.' Edward was silent for a few moments. Augusta closed her eyes, reliving that long, wild embrace with Micky, in the room with the dead man.
Edward brought her out of her reverie. 'There's something else, and it's even worse. You remember that boy Peter Middleton?'
'Certainly.' Augusta would never forget him. His death had haunted the family ever since. 'What about him?'
'Hugh says Micky killed him.'
Now Augusta was shocked. 'What? No--I can't believe that.'
Edward nodded. 'Deliberately held his head under the water and drowned him.'
It was not the murder itself but the idea of Micky's betrayal that horrified her. 'Hugh must be lying.'
'He says Tonio Silva saw the whole thing.'
'But that would mean Micky has been wickedly deceiving us all these years!'
'I think it's true, Mother.'
Augusta realized, with a growing sense of dread, that Edward would not give credence to such a wild story without a reason. 'Why are you so willing to believe what Hugh says?'
'Because I knew something Hugh didn't know, something that confirms the story. You see, Micky had stolen some money from one of the masters. Peter knew and was threatening to tell. Micky was desperate to find some way of shutting him up.'
'Micky was always short of money,' Augusta recalled. She shook her head in incredulity. 'And all these years we've thought--'
'That it was my fault Peter died.'
Augusta nodded.
Edward said: 'And Micky let us think it. I can't take it in, Mother. I believed I was a killer, and Micky knew I wasn't, but he said nothing. Isn't that a terrible betrayal of friendship?'
Augusta looked sympathetically at her son. 'Will you throw him over?'
'Inevitably.' Edward was grief-stricken. 'But he's my only friend, really.'
Augusta felt close to tears. They sat looking at each other, thinking about what they had done, and why.
Edward said: 'For nearly twenty-five years we've treated him as a member of the family. And he's a monster.'
A monster, Augusta thought. It was true.
And yet she loved him. Even if he had killed three people, she loved Micky Miranda. Despite the way he had deceived her, she knew that if he walked into the room at this moment she would long to take him in her arms.
She looked at her son. Reading his face, she saw he felt the same way. She had known it in her heart but now her mind acknowledged it.
Edward loved Micky too.
Chapter TWO
