“But alas, they cannot,” Hargrave continued, his voice subdued now, his expression dour.
What is he doing? Iris asked herself. The crowd was alive with salacious glee. They’d all heard the stories, gossiped about the grand estate overhanging the river. From Iris’s investigation, she knew they all envied it, feared it, and could not keep the name Darlyrede from their lips for long.
There had been no missing persons for months now. No vanishings. And the crowd was eager to know why they had really been gathered here.
So was Iris.
“As you all know, Thomas killed Cordelia on the eve of their wedding, and it was later discovered that he had done many other terrible deeds, befouling both our fair land and his parents’ good names.”
“Those are lies.” Padraig stood in a rush, and his voice rang out clearly over the hushed crowd. “My father didnae kill anyone.”
Oh, my God. Hargrave’s plans were becoming clear to her now, and Iris wanted to take hold of Padraig’s arm, beg him to sit, be silent.
But it was too late. Hargrave turned his sickeningly condescending smile toward the Scotsman as if he’d all but forgotten Padraig was there.
“Ladies and gentlemen, allow me to introduce Master Padraig Boyd, Thomas Annesley’s alleged heir, and my special guest at Darlyrede House.”
Any nod to polite quiet was forgotten by the crowd in that moment as guests leaned their heads together to exclaim, or craned their necks to look at the large man standing behind the lone table set apart from the rest of the room.
Hargrave was giving them what they all wanted: a victim in their very midst. They were going to witness with their own eyes, with Hargrave in plain sight, blameless. Iris’s heart raced.
Padraig’s voice rang through the chatter like a hammer on an anvil. “Did you think me to sit in silence while you so freely slandered my father, Hargrave? There’s nae so much English in me as to roll over for that.”
“No,” Hargrave admitted quietly. “I did not think you would remain silent. Not in the least. And while I can understand your reluctance to accept the horrific truth of your errant sire—even respect that reluctance, to a degree—I must beg your forbearance to hear me out in full.” He paused, and the pleading sorrow on his face was so thickly applied that Iris thought it might slide off and crash to the tabletop at any moment. “Please, Master Boyd. Allow me to finish. I assure you, you will have an opportunity to rebut what you will at the end. I am, after all, a fair man.”
Iris could feel the anger radiating off Padraig. She had never experienced the quiet, deliberate Scotsman in such a way—she fancied the silk of her sleeve was rippling like the surface of a pond.
“Go on, then,” Padraig demanded, but he did not sit.
“It has been my sole mission these past thirty years to find Thomas Annesley and bring him to justice for his heinous crimes. I do admit to you all that I became rather obsessed with the man in my passion to avenge my daughter’s death, and to give peace to the many families in our own village as well as throughout Northumberland whose loved ones are missing.”
Hargrave paused and artfully looked down at the tabletop as if shamed, and Iris had to concede that the man was a master at his craft.
“So much obsessed that I even went so far as to track down Thomas Annesley’s bastard children, who he had sown throughout Scotland, intent on making them pay for the crimes of a man they’d never even met,” he ended in a ragged whisper. He raised his eyes to the crowd again, his delivery perfect. “I regret that, now. And I confess before you all—before Sir Lucan, the king’s own man, before God and before Father Kettering—that I heaped blame upon blameless heads.”
Hargrave suddenly struck the tabletop with his fist, causing many gathered before him to startle. “No more! Padraig Boyd has come to Darlyrede House along with Sir Lucan Montague, to lay claim to Thomas Annesley’s title and estate as the fugitive’s only legitimate heir. And I have welcomed him into my home.”
The crowd broke out in exclamations again, and in their midst a thin man with an odd, potbelly stood, his black hair combed back from a high widow’s peak that pointed to his thin beard.
The man’s servant announced him. “Lord Adolphus Paget, Viscount Elsmire.”
Iris tried to stifle her gasp, and her fingers itched for her quill and paper, even as her heart trilled in her chest, so close to danger herself now.
“Lord Hargrave, are you saying that this man from some godforsaken, primitive Scots island”—Lord Paget extended his arm toward Padraig—“claims openly not only to be that monster’s son, but is demanding that he now somehow has a right to Darlyrede House, which you have built with your own hands?”
This is a farce, Iris realized. He’s memorized it as a verse from a manuscript. Lord Paget couldn’t know where Padraig Boyd was from unless Hargrave had told him beforehand.
“I’ve given Lord Hargrave leave to say what he would, sir,” Padraig said in a cautionary voice, drawing the scrawny man’s attention. “But as we’ve nae yet met, I’ll thank you to keep your opinion a bit closer to the vest, if you ken my meaning.”
A thrill of pride raced up Iris’s spine. Perhaps it wasn’t the way the nobility in the hall spoke, but she had to admit, Padraig Boyd’s warning was very effective.
Hargrave made placating motions with his hands. “Lord Paget, if you please.”
But Lord Paget apparently did not please. “If I ken your meaning?” He winced at Padraig. “Good lord. You can’t
