Indiscreet Part 12

"Since Graeme is always off with the regiment and Bertram thinks of no one but himself, I cannot feel that that is the highest recommendation."

They returned to the sitting room, where Cousin Bertram and Lydia still sat, now joined by Anthony.

"h.e.l.lo," Camilla announced merrily. "Look who we came upon in the garden!"

She was not sure which of the occupants of the room looked up at them with most horror. Anthony glanced quickly around, as if seeking escape, and Lydia turned a reproachful gaze upon Camilla. Cousin Bertram merely sighed in a resigned way.

"Hallo, brother dear," he said languidly, rising to execute an elegant bow. "So we are to have the pleasure of your company again. I had not realized it was so near time for luncheon."

Camilla had to press her lips together to keep from giggling. Harold was well known for dropping in right at the time for a meal, though no one was entirely sure if this was due to his parsimoniousness or to the quality of his housekeeper's cooking.

Harold's eyes narrowed at his brother's comment, but he replied blandly, "Is it that late? I was unaware of the time. I have been out all morning visiting the sick of the parish."

"Of course."

Harold greeted Anthony, managing to annoy him by clapping him heartily on the shoulder and calling him "son." Harold had decided since Anthony's own father had died that it was up to him to act in a father's stead to Anthony, giving him frequent advice and even more frequent lectures on the wickedness of his ways.

"How are your studies?" Harold went on to ask Anthony, sitting down beside him.

"Fine."

"I shall have to ask you a few questions later to make sure of that," Harold told him in a ponderously playful manner, wagging his forefinger at him. More seriously, he turned to Lydia and said, "You know, I am not completely convinced that Mr. Forbes is an adequate tutor for Anthony. Last time I talked to Anthony, it seemed to me that his Greek was woefully lacking."

"Lacking what?" Lydia returned sweetly.

"Mr. Forbes is an excellent tutor," said Anthony belligerently, despite the fact that his usual views on the aforesaid Forbes were that he was an "old bore" or a "stuffy bagwig."

Harold patted Lydia's hand in an avuncular way, though he was in fact much younger than she. "My dear Viscountess, I know that you find the subject of Anthony's studies confusing, but you must see that it is vastly important to the boy's future. How can Anthony a.s.sume his place among his peers with a country education? I have thought time and again that he should have been educated at Eton, as all of us were."

Anthony shut his mouth, looking frustrated. For once, Harold's opinion happened to coincide with his, and he could not argue with him, no matter how much it pained him not to do so.

"Perhaps I should take it up with the Earl...."

"No!" Lydia and Camilla exclaimed in almost the same breath.

"You will give him apoplexy again if you start arguing with him, Cousin Harold," Camilla told him bluntly. "You know he cannot abide your telling him what to do."

"Camilla, you wrong me. I would never think of telling a man as old and respected as my grandfather what to do. It would be a gross impertinence."

"You are right there," Anthony stuck in.

"However, I am sure that the earl would not be averse to listening to a reasoned argument regarding the future Earl's education."

"Then you don't know Grandpapa."

He smiled at Camilla indulgently. "Dear Camilla, I must differ with you in that regard. You forget that I have held this living for some years now and have visited our grandfather often. I know him very well indeed. I think I can say with a.s.surance that the Earl values my advice regarding Anthony."

Camilla could see from the expression on Anthony's flushed face that he was getting close to being unable to keep a lock on his tongue. She cast about for something to divert Harold from the present course of his conversation.

To her surprise-and relief-Benedict spoke up. "I am sure the Earl does value your advice. I find him to be a very sensible man."

"Yes, of course," Harold agreed, adding a caveat. "Although he can be a trifle careless about certain virtues."

"Really? Well, I must admit that when we were talking earlier, he did seem somewhat lenient about the practice of smuggling."

"Smuggling!" Anthony exclaimed. "What the dev- I mean, why on earth were you discussing smuggling?"

Benedict shrugged. "The conversation simply turned that way. I cannot remember why. We were, of course, deploring it."

"I am sure Grandpapa never said anything so poor-spirited," Anthony contested hotly.

Benedict's brows rose lazily. "But, surely, smuggling is illegal."

"Of course." Cousin Harold pursed his lips disapprovingly and sent a stern glance in Anthony's direction. "But far too many people, including people who should be setting an example for their inferiors, are too permissive-one could even say supportive of such activities."

"You mean, the locals support the smugglers?"

Harold shrugged expressively. "It is well known around here that many a case of brandy is left on certain doorsteps on certain nights."

"Really, Harold," Cousin Bertram drawled, raising the quizzing gla.s.s that hung from his waistcoat by a ribbon and focusing it on his brother. "Do stop prosing on so. We are discussing liquor, not murder."

"That is precisely the sort of att.i.tude I mean," Harold said stiffly. "Young Anthony is even worse. Really, Aunt Lydia, the boy needs more control."

"Not from you!" Anthony rose to his feet, then subsided with ill grace at a quelling look from Camilla.

"One would think," Harold went on, "that with the death of Nat Crowder, everyone would have realized that the wages of sin are death. But it seems to have made no one regret their actions, or even think about them."

"Nat Crowder?" Benedict asked innocently.

"Yes. A local chap, found dead a few weeks ago. Rumored to be one of the smugglers, even the head of them. The sort of end that comes to people like that."

"People like what?" Anthony was white-lipped with anger. "Nat was a good man. At least he wasn't a pharisee who went about beating his chest in public."

"He was a criminal," Harold retorted flatly.

"This man was murdered?" Benedict interjected. "Because he was a smuggler?"

"He was found at the bottom of a cliff with his neck broken," Anthony said. "That does not mean he was murdered."

"It does make it likely," Cousin Bertram put in. "No one knew the cliffs around here any better than Nat."

"You knew him?" Benedict asked.

"Oh, yes, when we were boys. He was much the same age as I. We would often play together when I was down here visiting. Don't you remember, Harold?"

"Of course I remember. Just because we used to play blindman's buff together doesn't mean I approve of what Nat grew up to become."

"Gave me quite a start, his dying like that," Cousin Bertram said reflectively. "I mean, well, makes you think, doesn't it?"

"It ought to make you think about what you are doing with your life," Harold told his brother darkly.

Bertram lifted his brows in feigned astonishment. "Really, brother, one might think that you disapproved of me."

Harold let out a snort.

"But what about Nat Crowder?" Camilla asked, trying to steer them away from the conflict that seemed to be springing up on every side. Really, Cousin Harold managed to rub everyone the wrong way. "Why was he murdered? What did it have to do with smuggling?"

"Nothing," Anthony said sourly. "It was probably caused by something else entirely."

"Perhaps it was a struggle for power," Benedict suggested.

"Someone else trying to take over the smuggling ring?" Camilla nodded. "That makes sense."

"Then who is the new head of the smugglers?" Bertram asked. "That would seem to tell us who the murderer was."

"No one knows," Harold answered, shrugging.

"But everyone apparently knew that this Crowder fellow was the ringleader," Benedict pointed out.

"Yes. But I have heard nothing about anyone taking his place."

"Who would tell the village vicar anything like that?" Bertram asked disdainfully.

"You would be surprised how many rumors find their way to the door of the church. My sheep often bring their troubles to me."

Bertram rolled his eyes.

"Harold, dearest!" Aunt Beryl sailed into the room, holding her hands out to her youngest son. Camilla had long thought that Harold was her aunt's favorite child; they were, after all, so much alike in their sanctimonious, bossy ways. "I just now learned that you were here. Why didn't you send a message straight up to me?"

"Dear madam, I hope you will pardon me when I tell you that the news of my fair cousin's arrival drove all other thought from my head. I hastened at once to greet her."

"You naughty boy," she said with a roguish look, first at him, then at Camilla. "But I know how you young people are. Always more interested in each other than in seeing one's poor old mother." She smiled archly and waggled a playful forefinger at Camilla, as if she had been engaged in some youthful hijinks.

Camilla gazed back at her in amazement. Though Aunt Beryl had always disapproved of Camilla, she had nourished the hope that Harold would prevail on her to marry him. Camilla did, after all, have a tidy little inheritance. But Camilla could hardly believe that the woman actually seemed to still be encouraging a romance between her and Harold. Did she not believe Camilla's marriage was real, even after that scene in the garden today?

"Indeed?" Benedict asked coldly. "Precisely what do you mean, madam?"

Camilla turned toward him. Benedict's voice was like ice, and his face might have been the model for a disdainful aristocrat. Even Aunt Beryl seemed at a loss in the face of his disapproval.

She gaped at him for a moment, then went on in a fl.u.s.tered way, "Well, ah, that is, I was merely teasing Harold a little. He and Camilla have been close since childhood."

Camilla's brows went up at that gross overstatement. Cousin Bertram sighed and began to twirl his quizzing gla.s.s, looking at Benedict.

"Really?" Benedict drawled. "How odd that Camilla had not mentioned him to me."

Aunt Beryl and Harold both looked affronted at this statement, and Camilla hastened to say soothingly, "Now, Benedict, you know that I told you about all my relatives."

"Did you?" Benedict replied in a bored way. "I fear I have forgotten."

Aunt Beryl's face hardened, and Camilla could see from the way she looked at Benedict that she was growing to dislike him as much as she did her niece. Camilla hoped she would not say anything, for Benedict seemed to be in a wretched mood, and she feared that he might give her aunt a set-down.

At that moment, however, Mr. Thorne walked in, breaking the mood of the scene. His hands were clasped behind his back, and his forehead was wrinkled in thought. Anthony, who had been watching the brewing confrontation between Benedict and Aunt Beryl with interest, let out a groan at Thorne's arrival. Thorne looked up and glanced around in surprise, as if he had not been aware of where he was. Then his eyes fell upon Lydia, and he smiled rapturously.

"Ah, fair Diana," he exclaimed, going to her and bowing low over her hand. "I have been composing a verse this morning. You are my inspiration. How fortunate that I have found you."

"Have you?" Lydia returned vaguely. "Isn't that nice?"

Anthony jumped to his feet, looking as if he had been goaded beyond his endurance. "I am going to my room to study."

Lydia looked at him in astonishment. Harold nodded and beamed approval.

"Good lad! I am glad to see that my words had some effect on you."

Camilla had to smother a laugh at the frustration on Anthony's face. She knew that he was almost tempted to stay in the room, rather than have Harold think that his advice had had any influence on him.

"I told my tutor that I would come back," Anthony said ungraciously. He turned toward Camilla suddenly and said, "Milla, won't you come, too? Mr. Forbes is eager to see you again."

Camilla did not betray her surprise that Mr. Forbes had expressed any opinion about her at all. Instead, she stood up, glad for an excuse to leave her aunt and cousin. "Benedict, dear..." She ignored Anthony, who was turned with his back to the rest of the room and was winking at her madly. "Would you like to meet Anthony's tutor?"

She was offering him an escape from Cousin Harold's stultifying conversation, as well as Aunt Beryl's entrapping questions, so she expected Benedict to leap at the chance. Instead, he smiled and said, "Thank you, Camilla, but why don't you go along by yourself? I would enjoy visiting further with your cousin Harold."

"Of course." She tried not to look as astounded as she felt.

As she and Anthony walked out the door, she heard Cousin Bertram saying to his brother, "Doesn't Mr. La.s.siter look familiar, Harry? I've been trying to think all morning where we've met before. Where did you go to school, Mr. La.s.siter?"

Camilla smiled to herself, thinking that it served him right for staying.

"I can't believe that you asked him to come with us!" Anthony hissed once they were out of hearing distance of the sitting room. "Didn't you see me winking at you?"

"Of course I did. And you looked quite silly, too."

"Silly be d.a.m.ned. I didn't want him with us."

"I know you don't like Benedict, Anthony, but I am at a loss to understand why. You don't even know the man."

"Do you like him?"

The question took her aback. "Of course not." She shook her head and repeated, "Of course not. I was worried about what Aunt Beryl might trick him into saying. That's the only reason I wanted him to come with us. I cannot understand why he would not seize the chance to leave."

"Because he wanted to try to get more information out of them. Didn't you see?"

"No. What are you talking about? What kind of information could he possibly get out of Aunt Beryl or Lydia?"

"Gossip, that's what. And Cousin Harold's the main one, not my mother or Aunt Beryl. Didn't you hear Benedict asking about the smugglers?"

"Yes."

"Well? Don't you see? It proves that he is an excise man, just as I told you last night. As soon as he brought up that smuggling thing, I knew it."