Widow in White

Chapter Thirteen: Raining Indoors

The next morning, Neil came to Richard's room before breakfast, looked down at him, and said, bluntly, "What are you going to do with her?"

Richard looked up groggily from his pillow. "I don't know. Go away."

"Is she going to stay here?" Neil demanded. "She can't. You've got to get rid of her. It'll ruin your political career."

Richard groaned and folded his pillow over his face. "Go. Away."

"No." The bed dipped as Neil sat down on its end. "When the papers hear of this there will be no end of trouble! A woman staying alone under a bachelor's roof?"

"A woman slept under your roof once," Richard said sleepily. "You married her."

"And if you married Laura, it'd be worse trouble!"

Despite himself, Richard laughed. He let the pillow fall back and sat up and looked at Neil.

"I'm not going to marry her."

He was clear on that now. He could not marry a woman he did not trust, and he did not trust Laura. Not after she had betrayed him to Fordham. He had only been able to force himself to ask her last night because he was fairly confident she would again refuse.

"And what of your career?" demanded Neil.

"My career will survive," Richard said drily. "At the very least, I'll know whereof I speak now, when it comes to discussing adultery bills."

Neil fixed him with a skeptical look. Richard shrugged.

"She won't be here long. A few days, perhaps a week or two. I'll think of something." An idea came to him. "Jane is in New York now. She might take Laura under her wing. And Americans will forgive anything for a title, even a courtesy one."

"That'll take months to organize, even by steamer post. And I doubt either will be willing. They were never friends."

"It's worth a try. I'll write to her today." That reminded Richard. "And her father — we have to tell him that she's been found and is safe. Can you run down to Leamont today and do it in person? While you're there, you could ask for some of her old clothes."

"I could ask for him to take her back."

"She won't go."

"Between the two of you, you could make her."

Richard hesitated. "Perhaps. But I'm not sure I should. He's different to our father, but in his own way, I think just as cruel."

Neil chewed his lip thoughtfully. "You might be right. But what if he wants her back, when he knows where she is?"

Richard shrugged. "Then he must want."

As it happened, he didn't want. Neil returned home with a carpetbag full of Laura's oldest clothes and a curt message from Lord Brocket: Better Albroke than me. Laura, called down to Richard's room in a nightgown borrowed from a housemaid, flinched when she heard it but said nothing. In silence, she grabbed the carpetbag and went back to her room. Neil and Richard were left staring at each other.

"And not a word of thanks," Neil grumbled. "I had a job to persuade Brocket to give me anything of hers at all. He says he bought them, so they're his, not hers."

"She's probably upset."

"That's no excuse to be rude," Neil said more firmly. "What was it like with her today?"

"It wasn't." Richard shrugged. "Her maid says she didn't leave her room."

Neil looked surprised. "Not even to come down and ask if you needed anything? Not even to say hello?"