Free Silence of Scandal by Jackie Williams Page B

Jennings had been coerced into other work and he could now be seen every morning feeding the chickens or hanging out washed linens.
    Giles frowned as he thought about his friend’s words.
    “That puzzles me too. Someone is spreading something and it smells exactly like the manure Geoff and I cleared from the stables the other day. Ormond should be able to raise another loan from the banks easily enough but none of them are biting. Now that you are home and dealing with everything it’s obvious that the estate is beginning to pull round. It looks a good investment to me and if I had more than a few pounds to my name I would be tempted to invest in you myself. Someone is clearly scuppering your efforts.”
    Alexander stopped at his bedroom door and headed inside.
    “I have thought the same thing but rumours of my ultimate failure are probably staying their hand. I am also wondering when the next demand for money will come. It has been several weeks since I stopped any payments to the mysterious Oakley and no further request has been forthcoming. Hardacre doesn’t appear to be pressing Carter for the money owed on Phillip’s notes either. I am beginning to think that with my brother gone so has the blackmailers leverage to raise funds and he is now trying to find yet another hold over Ormond. Clearly he cannot blackmail the dead and he won’t have had much luck finding fault with me. It’s not as though I have been here long enough to darken my own name.”
    Giles pondered his words.
    “It’s a pity Lady Anne left so soon. She was going to tell us some things, I know it, but her brother turning up like that to remove her from the dower house was a bit premature don’t you think? He looked a bit of an upstart, barely out of school I shouldn’t wonder. I was surprised that she went; she clearly didn’t go willingly. I was hoping that she would overlook my humble beginnings.” He looked a little affronted and more than disappointed.
    Alexander laughed. Lady Anne had clearly caught his handsome friend’s eye.
    “Idiot, that was nothing to do with your beginnings. They are noble enough anyway even if you don’t have a title. She was removed from Ormond to distance her from my family name when the final curtain falls on Ormond. I suspect that her father already has another suitor in mind for her hand and he wanted her to be unsullied by the relationship with us. A month separation is a long time for the London tongues to wag in another direction. I suspect that I am already forgotten about with whatever the scandal to next hit the ton.”
    Giles’s expression had darkened at the thought of another suitor for Anne. He leaned against the door frame and watched as his friend tugged at his soiled shirt.
    “I console myself that Lady Anne is the height of propriety. She won’t marry again within the year whatever her brother or father want. She had fire in those emerald eyes of hers and looked a determined woman to me. I doubt she will let them walk all over her. She still has her title. They’ll be hard pressed to make her do anything she doesn’t want after you promised her the income from selling your commission. But all that aside, what are you going to do now Alex? With Evenleigh sold do you have anywhere to go at all? You know that I have a small place in Yorkshire that you are welcome to share. It’s not much but you would have a roof over your head at least until you can sort out some form of employment or get your stud farm started.”
    Alexander slumped onto the bed.
    “Thanks, old friend but you need to go there anyway soon. You’ve been helping me for far longer than I have any right to expect though it has been much appreciated. You must go and sort out your own living and as it happens I do have a plan. Smith’s abandoned farm cottage at the edge of the estate was never part of the title. I have checked the deed and it’s not included in any of the debts or mortgages. Father bought it years ago when