with the earl. Several of the other villagers confirmed this, letting their disapproval be known. I gather Miss Renton did not receive many visitors. What a lonely way to live. But perhaps she preferred it that way.
As for Lord Helmswick, the villagers were fairly closemouthed about their opinions of him. I gather he is not well liked, but they’re all too afraid of him to say so aloud.
I don’t know what further information can be gotten here. I’ll wait to receive your next letter, and if nothing pertinent is raised, I’ll return to Sunlaws.
My shoulders slumped. “Then he has nothing new to add that we haven’t already uncovered.”
But Gage suddenly straightened as he turned over the letter. “Wait. There’s a postscript. And it’s been hastily scrawled.”
Renton’s neighbor just came to call on me. Apparently, she’s no fool. She recognizes something is amiss. She claims that Renton told her that if anything ever happened to him, it would be Lord Helmswick’s doing. That he would be silencing him from revealing the fact that his sister is not simply Helmswick’s mistress, but his wife. That their marriage occurred years before he wed the current countess. I don’t know whether any of this is to be believed, but I’m off to search the parish church records at first light.
I pressed my left hand to my mouth at the rightness of such a revelation. So much of what had made little sense before now fell into place. The reason Lord Helmswick was willing to receive Renton and apparently continue to pay his blackmail. Helmswick’s insistence on Renton’s sister ridding herself of her child and his hastening home for her funeral—to ensure there were no loose ends, as it were, or other claimants for the place as his rightful heir. The secret Lady Helmswick had claimed to possess that would force her husband to allow her to live apart from him. She must have known! Even the odd words Lord Helmswick had spoken to Charlotte—“Now, you will make a suitable bride for a man such as me. Yes, a much better countess.”
And particularly Lord John’s fury upon learning the truth from Renton. Henry had said he was protective of their sister. If someone had threatened to reveal such a secret, one that would render Helmswick’s second marriage as invalid and disinherit the son Eleanor had bore him, then what would Lord John be willing to do to silence the man? How far would he go?
Trevor sank down on the settee opposite with a low whistle. “Do you think it’s true? Is Helmswick a bigamist?”
“Yes,” I stated with such certainty that it seemed to startle the others. “Yes,” I repeated, perching on the edge of my seat. “And we need to find Lord John before he does something drastic.”
I briefly explained the outburst we’d heard from Lady Helmswick, and how Lord John had fled. I could read from Gage’s expression that he was not pleased I’d gone to speak with Marsdale without him, but we didn’t have time to address that now.
He seemed to agree, though the look he cast my way told me he would not forget it. “Trevor, begin a search of the upper floors. Try the bachelors’ tower first. Maybe Lord John has simply retreated to his bedchamber.”
My brother leapt to his feet. “On my way.”
Gage’s gaze flicked to Bree where she stood quietly near the window. “Miss McEvoy, organize what servants you can, and spread out through the ground floor, working your way upward. Be as vague as possible, but convince them of the urgency that Lord John be found. Invoke my name for authority, if need be.”
She nodded, hastening off to do as he bid.
He reached for my hand, helping me to my feet and threading my arm through his. “You and I are going to pay another visit to Lady Helmswick.” His face was stern. “Perhaps if we confront her with what we now know, she’ll finally agree to reveal what she knows instead of hedging and demurring.” His arm flexed beneath mine. “And if Marsdale should attempt to impede us, he shall find my charm and wits are not the only skills I have to boast of as an inquiry agent.”
Minutes later, we knocked on both Lady Helmswick and Lord Marsdale’s chamber doors. When neither answered, we even went so far as to barge inside, startling her ladyship’s maid, but neither the countess nor the marquess were in their rooms. The astonished maid thrust an undergarment she had been