“Hold up!” Ethan yelled to his sons, but they’d seen Heathgate’s mare as soon as he had, and pulled up so hard their ponies were practically sitting. Heathgate had angled the mare right across the path, but turned her when he saw the ponies come to a stop.

“And here I thought I was saving a couple of runaways,” the marquis drawled. “Fancy riding, gentlemen. My boys would be envious. Morning, Grey.”

“Good morning, your lordship,” the boys replied politely enough.

“We were out riding with Papa,” Joshua added helpfully. “I was the master, and he and Jeremiah were the field.”

“I see. My compliments, Grey, for I’ve neglected to introduce my children to that particular means of scaring the hair off a parent. Shall we let your horses blow a little?”

“Papa?” Jeremiah looked uncertain.

“His lordship means to walk them,” Ethan said, “and since your ponies are heaving like bellows, it’s a good idea.” Even Argus had settled down over the course Joshua had chosen. Ethan let the boys pass him, then fell in beside his neighbor.

“I almost didn’t get my ride in this morning,” the marquis began. “Too much peach brandy. You’ll want to provide a few flasks to the Regent and get his imprimatur on it. Have you considered what I told you last night?” Heathgate asked, quietly enough not to draw the children’s notice.

“Not much. Hart Collins is a subject of the Crown. He was bound to return to England someday.”

“You could bring charges,” Heathgate suggested.

“Right. And have the whole world know I was incapable of defending myself? Only to have one of his cronies testify I enticed the man, or Collins was nowhere in the vicinity, and as I was facedown over the top of a barrel, how could I know for certain who was violating my person?”

Discussing the matter in the pretty summer morning seemed blasphemous, but the topic had lingered in Ethan’s imagination—a reptile lurking in the muddy marshes of his memory—since the moment Heathgate had called him aside the previous night.

“You bring the charges,” Heathgate said. “You don’t expect to prosecute them.”

“He’s a member of the bloody Lords, Heathgate.” Ethan spoke tiredly. “I’m a bastard who married my mistress. Bringing charges would be a joke, and as far as my family is concerned, a joke in poor taste.”

“It’s your choice, but you will likely run across him sooner or later, or Nick will, because he’s a member of the bloody Lords too—as am I, come to that.”

Ethan shot Heathgate a look, but the man was impossible to read. “No offense intended.”

“Likewise. I thought you should know he’s back.”

“My thanks for the warning.”

“You never told your family, did you?” Heathgate pressed. “Not even Nick.”

“Especially not Nick.” Heathgate had kept his peace on this most unfortunate subject for nearly twenty years. It was a relief, in a way, to have it in the open, but the old humiliation was there as well.

“Why not? He’s your brother, the head of your family, and he loves you cross-eyed.”

“He loves me. I love him.” Hence Ethan would never bring up at least two very personal subjects with his brother.

“If I had a bottle of whiskey for every time I’ve heard him brag on you or reminisce about his perfect childhood with you, I could get the Royal Navy drunk.” Heathgate paused and eyed the children.

“Your point?” Ethan inquired, very politely.

“You are trying to protect your brother,” Heathgate said gently, “because it will hurt him to know what you’ve suffered. It will hurt him more you didn’t think him worthy of your confidence. I have a younger brother, you will note, and speak from experience.”

Ethan sighed, not sure if being a marquis gave one the right to divine minds or hearts. “The incident in question left me more deeply ashamed than I care to discuss.”

Heathgate watched the ponies before them. The boys were concocting another scheme involving pirates on horseback. “Do you have any idea how much shame a man can build up when he has the wealth and the temper to pitch a nine-year-long tantrum? There were times I got some toothsome, titled young idiot drunk and indulged in all manner of foolery on a bored whim. Or I’d take women to bed, knowing they would not guard their hearts, and liking it better for being able to strike at them that way. I won fortunes from men too drunk to hold their cards and was only too happy to collect on their vowels, regardless that it would beggar them and put their women on the charity of relatives.”

“This recitation doesn’t flatter you, Heathgate.” Ethan could not take his eyes from his horse’s neck. “Why burden me with it?” Though Ethan suspected he knew—there were many situations in life that yielded a harvest of regret and shame.

Heathgate let out an exasperated sigh. “I have lifetimes of regrets I should be ashamed of, and I am. But you are ashamed of being a victim. If somebody did to your Joshua what was done to you, would you be disgusted with Joshua? Would you want him to be ashamed of himself?”

“For God’s sake, don’t be ridiculous. He’s just a boy, and of course I would not want him ashamed of being the victim of a crime.”

“You were fourteen,” Heathgate said, “and set upon by six boys older, bigger, and stronger than you. They laid in wait, they plotted this violence, and they carried it out against you, knowing you had none to aid you. And yet you don’t feel compassion for the boy you were. You feel ashamed of him. One can only wonder, Ethan Grey, what your own father might have done had he learned of your fate.”

Heathgate urged his horse forward, having mercifully had his say. He engaged the boys in a pleasant discussion of foxhunting, climbing trees, and what it must be like for poor young Lord Penwarren to have a twin sister. Ethan was so lost in thought he didn’t hear his children laughing at something Heathgate said, or realize his horse was for once being docile, until he was almost hit in the face with a low-hanging branch.

Fourteen

“It’s an interesting mix of news,” Benjamin Hazlit reported as he lounged in a comfortable chair in the Marquis of Heathgate’s library. His arrangement with Heathgate, as with most clients, was that nothing was written down. For the sake of security, his reports were made in person, except under rare circumstances. This meant his clients had to meet with him face-to-face, and usually in their homes, since most of them would have been loathe to be seen calling on him.

And meeting them face-to-face gave Benjamin all manner of opportunity to learn about them and placate his own well-hidden curiosity.

“Well, don’t beat about the bush, Benjamin.” Heathgate paused while a footman brought in a tray. “Lemonade, cider, or something stronger?”

“Cider.” Heathgate’s version of something stronger was usually a whiskey too smooth and rich to be profaned by business conversation.

Heathgate passed him a tall glass. “I’ll send a little something else along for your private delectation when we’re through.”

“I won’t refuse.” Not that sane men refused Gareth Alexander, Marquis of Heathgate, much of anything. “And now that you’ve impressed me with your manners, here’s what we know: Hart Collins has been traipsing about the Continent since Waterloo. Before that he was holed up on some Greek island. But to pick up the story closer to the beginning, you need to know, after leaving Stoneham—one of several institutions to send him down—he finally made a try at Oxford, where he lasted not one term. Cambridge flat wouldn’t have him, so he took himself back north to Papa’s barony and seemed to make an effort to grow up.”

“A successful effort?”

“Hardly.” Benjamin paused to rein in his disgust. Heathgate needed information, but not every fact in Benjamin’s head was pertinent to the marquis’s inquiry. “He was engaged to the local equivalent of the darling of the shire, an earl’s daughter, but the engagement ended amid some hushed scandal, and then he was off. Scotland first, Scandinavia, even the Americas, before returning to Europe. He pops back to England from time to time, but never for long. One can live cheaply on foreign shores, but Collins hasn’t acquired the knack.”

“He comes back when he’s out of funds?” Heathgate’s expression gave away nothing, but Benjamin knew the man well enough to sense heightened interest. “Too bad I’ve not set foot in a hell for years. I could probably ruin him in a single night of hazard.”

Heathgate’s tone said he’d enjoy that evening’s work a bit more than a night at the opera.

“Doubtless, you could, and you need to get out more, old man.”

“You should have a wife and children, old man. Except then you would not be available for my little queries and investigations. What else do we know about Collins?”

Benjamin met glacial-blue eyes, knowing his lordship might well be planning that outing to the gaming tables. The notion appealed to a protective older brother’s instincts mightily.

“He came into the title about five years ago, and his papa did what he could to tie up the unentailed wealth. Collins is back now, wrangling with the solicitors and getting nowhere. I have personal reasons to keep tabs on the man, particularly if he should malinger in the vicinity of the family seat.”

Heathgate refreshed their drinks. “For once the solicitors are of use. And what of Collins’s accomplices?”

“Two are dead. Both soldiers who didn’t come home. One has emigrated to America, another has the living at some obscure little crossroads in Derbyshire, and the fifth is in the hulks.”

“Can we buy the clergyman or the debtor?”