and given his threats to the duchess and Henry, I will need to think on it.”
I squeezed his hand in support.
He sat very still, contemplating something significant, and I waited patiently for him to speak. “I asked Henry if his mother had named him Henry deliberately.”
I frowned in confusion. “Aren’t all the Kerr children named after former kings and queens?” Then I gasped, realizing something I hadn’t before. “Your grandfather.”
“Yes, my father’s father was named Henry. Sir Henry Gage. That’s why it’s one of my middle names.”
I searched his face, trying to decipher what he was feeling. “Does it bother you that he’s named Henry?”
“Actually, no. In truth, it seems rather fitting. Father might have tried to hide from the truth, but in her own way, the Duchess of Bowmont made sure he would never forget it.”
I couldn’t help but smile in approval. “Yes, that does sound like Her Grace.”
Gage reached for my face then, cradling it between his hands before he pressed his lips to mine tenderly, once, twice, and a third time. “Are you in pain now?”
“No. Bree’s application of hot water bottles has helped.”
One of his hands dropped to rest on my abdomen. “When does Dr. Fenwick expect the baby to arrive now?”
“He said it would be at least another week.”
He smiled sympathetically. “So a little more discomfort.”
“Yes. But I can manage.”
“And I will help,” he pledged, kissing me even more deeply.
And he certainly did.
* * *
• • •
I had decided to make it my goal the following day at luncheon to direct our discussion to the lightest topics possible, but Gage and Henry seemed determined to discuss Rookwood’s murder. Eventually I gave up trying to introduce a different conversational gambit and sat back to smile at their mutual enthusiasm. There was no doubt they were brothers, despite their only having known each other for such a short time.
I didn’t venture many of my own theories, curious to hear what they thought instead. Gage had been so silent the past few days, I hadn’t been as privy to his impressions as I normally was. And even Henry appeared to have followed along as best he could, even from a distance.
“If only Kirkcowan had cooperated with us,” Gage lamented. “Or if he would wake so I could question him now.”
Henry paused with a bite of jam tart halfway to his mouth. “Then, you haven’t heard? Lord Kirkcowan passed away. Sometime in the middle of the night.”
I set down my fork, thinking of Lady Kirkcowan and her children. I would write her that afternoon, though I didn’t know what I could possibly say.
Gage took a drink from his glass of wine and set it on the table before speaking. “I suppose we knew it was inevitable.” He twirled the stem. “His bad conduct caught up with him. I do wonder if there’s any way to find out where his money was coming from. He was blackmailing someone. Possibly several someones. But I can only imagine they paid him in cash.”
“Let me look into it,” Henry offered. “I might be able to find out something.”
Gage gazed at his half brother in approval. “If so, I’d be grateful.”
Chapter 22
While I generally dreaded society events—finding them to be tedious and the other guests to be overcritical—dinner parties were often the exception. Especially when they were hosted by Lady Bearsden. Charlotte’s great-aunt was not only acquainted with a wide range of interesting people, who invariably had more fascinating things to discuss than the usual small talk and petty gossip, but she also despised cruelty in all forms.
The fact that she was a collector of such gossip would seem to contradict this, but she’d admitted to me once that she only gathered tittle-tattle because it was amusing to be informed of everyone’s foibles, particularly at her age. In any case, since her niece and I had become friends, I knew I needn’t worry about suffering any slights from her other guests. She wouldn’t stand for it. And so I entered the drawing room of the town house she often rented off St. Andrew’s Square with great anticipation.
“My dear Mrs. Gage,” she exclaimed with delight from her chair near the door. Her white hair was piled up on top of her head in a style that seemed reminiscent of the wigs worn sixty years prior. She pushed to her feet with the aid of her gold figure-headed cane and then grasped both of my hands with her own, holding them wide so that she could