Page 68 of A Perfect Gentleman

“No, of course not.” Abby heaved a sigh. “You’re right; I must have put it there.” No doubt her momentary carelessness, like her sleepiness and the nausea and the occasional swings in her mood, was caused by her pregnancy.

“Well, all I can say is that you best be more careful. It’s not only yourself you have to think of now, is it?”

Abby’s eyes widened. “What do you—you mean, you know?”

“Of course I know. What kind of gudgeon do you take me for? Do you think I haven’t noticed you can’t keep down anything but toast in the morning? Or that it’s been nigh on two months since your time?”

Of course. She had been foolish to think she could keep anything hidden from Molly. “I’m right, aren’t I? It’s not just nerves or—” She stopped and sighed again. “I should tell Graeme, shouldn’t I?”

The truth was, Abby wanted to tell him—indeed, she ached sometimes with the need to share her excitement with him. It would be glorious to see his face light up at the news. They could talk and plan and daydream about their child and their future. More than once, it had been on the tip of her tongue, but always at the last moment, she backed away, an icy fear twisting through her. What if it changed everything?

“Och, well, there’s naught wrong in keeping quiet for a while. Many things could happen.”

“I wouldn’t want to get his hopes up and then be wrong.” Abby clutched at the excuse. Indeed, she thought with a sudden chill at the center of her being, what if what had happened last night had hurt the baby? Breathing in smoke, falling out of bed—what if her carelessness had caused irreparable harm?

“Now, don’t be getting in a bother about hurting the wee one,” Molly said, accurately interpreting the look of panic blossoming on Abby’s face. “I’m sure the bairn’s fine.” She patted Abby’s arm. “You just worry about taking care of yourself from now on. Come, now. I’ve drawn you a bath. You’ll feel more yourself once you’ve gotten that smoke off you.”

Molly was right, of course. She did feel much better after she was clean and dressed. As often happened, the queasiness in her stomach subsided, too. Molly had found a dress for her to wear. It has been downstairs in the laundry and was thus uncontaminated by the smoke that had permeated the room. Abby left the room, heading for the stairs, but she stopped outside her chamber door and looked inside. She was suddenly chilled again.

The bed was in ruins, the headboard charred, the canopy hanging in blackened tatters, the mattress charred and strewn with debris from the canopy. The wall beside the window was scorched, as were the draperies (what was left of them). All of it was sodden. The open window had cleared the room of smoke, but the smell still hung in the air. All her clothes would have to be laundered again to get rid of the smell.

“Thank God you awakened in time last night,” Graeme said behind her. Abby gave a start, surprised; she had not heard him come up the stairs.

“It’s ruined.”

“The damage looks worse than it is.” Graeme slid his arms around her, and Abby leaned back against his chest. “The structure of the wall is intact; even the bed can be reclaimed. Only the bedding and drapes are complete losses. The fire brigade got here in good time last night, and the servants had managed to keep it mostly confined to the bed.”

Abby could not hold back a shiver, and Graeme’s arms tightened around her.

“It will soon be good as new.” He bent and murmured in her ear, “In the meantime, I’ll be happy to share my bed with you.”

Abby smiled and slid her hands over his arms as they curled around her. His breath tickled her ear, sending little tingles through her, and he nipped lightly at her earlobe.

“In fact,” he went on, “it occurs to me that you really ought to go back to bed and rest after your ordeal.”

She laughed and swung away from him, her eyes dancing. “Oh, no, you don’t. Not until you’ve told me what you found out from ‘Bangs.’ ”

He let out a mocking groan. “Don’t remind me.” But he linked his hand with hers and started toward the stairs. “Mostly I learned that Bangs is a dead bore. He told me—more than once—that Reggie was ‘a capital fellow’ and that the world was much worse without him. He also related at great length that George Ponsonby was another ‘capital fellow,’ though not, apparently, as capital as my father, and that he—Ponsonby, that is—accidentally fell off a cliff while walking near his home. In Bangs’s opinion, it was Father’s grief over his good friend George that made him bring the fund to an end. He clearly didn’t know about the embezzlement. Even if he had heard a hint of it, I think he would have refused to believe it. I can well imagine him following my father about like a puppy, as Grandmother said.”

“Oh.”

“However, the trip wasn’t a dead loss. I managed to get a roster of names from him, including that of our elusive vicar. Alistair Cumbrey is the man’s name, and the church in question was St. Veronica’s in Audley Gate.”

“Where is that?”

“In the Cotswolds somewhere, I gather. But Cumbrey is no longer there. Bangston told me the vicar retired a few years ago. Unfortunately, Bangston hasn’t the slightest idea where.”

“Someone will be bound to know. At least now we can write the church and inquire about him.”

“And we have an entirely new complement of people to find and question,” Graeme pointed out.

In the weeks that followed, they did just that. Tracking down each name, they maneuvered to run into the men at a party or the theater. Many people had retired to their country estates now that the Season was over, so their progress was spotty.

Abby didn’t care. She was more interested in spending the time with Graeme than she was in any actual result. No doubt that said something terrible about her. But, truthfully, Abby didn’t care about that, either.

The wall in her bedroom was repainted, the bed and drapes replaced, her clothes thoroughly cleaned and put back in place. Soon it was as if the fire had never happened . . . though Abby made sure each night that every light in the room was extinguished before she went to sleep.

The ballroom was crowded with people and noise. Tonight was Lady Middleton’s farewell ball, for she was spending the winter in Italy, and it seemed as if all of London had come to bid her adieu. Abby, trapped in a conversational circle with Lady Eugenia and her friends, kept a smile on her face as her eyes scanned the room, looking for her husband.