A Dangerous Nativity by Caroline Warfield

you'll
enliven the winter holidays."
    White-blond eyebrows shot up over ice-blue
eyes. "I'm hardly one for the sentiments of the season."
    "Even your hidebound dignity improves the
mood of this place, Richard. It is driving me to drink." He downed
another glass, while he poured out his woes to his best friend in
the world. "What can you add?" he asked when he his tale wound
down.
    "Not much. Lord Arthur is, as you surmised,
the second son of the seventh duke of Murnane. By reputation, he
presented a mild-mannered contrast to his rakehell older brother,
when the two came down from university. Lord Arthur actually
finished a degree and took a first. He went about during the Season
for a few years, sowed a few wild oats—damned few—courted a few
chits unenthusiastically, and avoided house parties. He shunned
society entirely after his marriage. He supports himself on a
meager income from his books."
    "That, and a well-run farm. What about his
marriage?"
    "He wed Miss Mary Harlow, daughter of the
Wheatton vicar, in 1801. Their son, Frederick, was born less than a
year, but more than nine months, later."
    "Catherine?"
    Glenaire's sardonic look at Will's use of her
given name spoke volumes, but the marquess didn't comment on it.
"About Miss Wheatly, if that is her name, I could find little. Her
mother departed Wheatton abruptly late in 1788, and came to live
with an aunt in a remote village in Scotland, with an infant, soon
after. Of marriage or a father, we found no trace. I have people
looking into it, but, if there is no paper, they are reduced to
listening at keyholes."
    "Call them off."
    The eyebrows rose.
    "We can assume the obvious. No point in
causing Catherine embarrassment or upsetting Lord Arthur any
further. The man is fiercely protective of her." Will watched the
deep purple liquid swirl around in his glass. "It might help to
know, however," he murmured.
    "To what purpose?" Glenaire asked, knowing
eyes boring into him.
    Before I take her to wed. He couldn't say the
words out loud. Not until he was certain enough of his own feelings
to put them to the test. "Something isn't right," he said instead.
"Nothing you've said accounts for the animosity. Emery put the fear
of God into Sylvia. She seems to believe Catherine—Miss Wheatly—was
Emery's mistress."
    "Perhaps she was."
    "No!"
    Glenaire waited with exquisite patience.
    "I would bet Chadbourn Park on it. If Emery
took Catherine, it wasn't voluntarily. It might account for his
determination to keep Charles and Sylvia away, though I just can't
see it. What of Songbird Cottage?"
    Glenaire leaned forward and put both elbows
on the table, cupping his glass. "Songbird Cottage and its acres
belong outright to Lord Arthur, left to him by his mother from her
settlements. Neither the seventh nor eighth duke had any claim to
it."
    Will nodded. "Catherine said as much. She
said his father resented it."
    "Some men would dislike loss of control."
    "Isn't that the point of settlements,
protecting something for the woman and her children?"
    "True, but some begrudge it. Perhaps, the old
duke expected it to come directly to him upon marriage. Perhaps
Emery felt the same. Is it a nice piece of land?"
    "Not large, but tidy and productive. The
best."
    "There you have it."
    "Maybe. There has to be more, and I'm going
to find it, for those boys' sake if nothing else. They are a duke's
grandsons. The estate owes them better. A gentleman's education, at
least."
    Long minutes passed. Glenaire watched Will.
Will stared at his port until he finally sat back and let a grim
smile show. "I think it's time Lord Arthur visits his childhood
home."
    "From what you have said, he won't come."
    "Catherine will persuade him, if only for her
brothers' wellbeing. I have her support for that, at least. She
hasn't said it, but I know it's there. She'll persuade him."
    He counted on it.
     

Chapter Seven
    "Brilliant!" Randy shouted.
    He ran up the hill to greet his new friend.
Charles walked down the lane