Free Gail Whitiker by A Scandalous Courtship Page B

I could see how much the child meant to her. And in truth, I did not see that any harm could come of it. After all, you were the rightful heir. You did not stand to lose anything by your mother bringing home a female child. It would have been different had the baby been a boy, but it wasn’t. And if you could only have seen the difference it made to her—’
    ‘It might have made a difference, but it does not excuse what she did!’ Robert snapped, wishing he could find it in his heart to be more forgiving of the heinousdeceit his mother had perpetrated on their family. ‘She brought a Scottish bastard home and let everyone think it was a legitimate member of our family!’
    Lady MacInnes met his gaze without flinching. ‘Yes, she did. And I cannot deny that what she did was wrong. But neither could I find it in my heart to condemn her, nor to expose her for what she had done. Not when she was so desperately lonely and heartsick.’
    Struggling to regain control of his temper, Robert turned away. Damn it! His cousin might be calmly accepting of what his mother had done, but she’d had twenty years to come to terms with it. He had just learned of it, and there was still a hell of a lot he needed to know and to understand. But how was he to learn any of it now? With his mother gone, what hope had he of finding out what was truth, and what was not?
    He didn’t know whether to be furious with his mother, or to feel wretchedly sorry for her.
    ‘I suppose this explains why the two of you saw so little of each other over the years,’ he said stiffly. ‘I often wondered, knowing what good friends you once were.’
    For the first time, Robert saw colour rise to Lady MacInnes’s cheeks. ‘My husband has always had…strong convictions about morality,’ she admitted. ‘When I told him—as I had to—what Charlotte had done, and what she had asked of me, he said that he could not, in all good conscience, see his way clear to receiving her in our home, or to recognising the child as her legitimate daughter. Nor could he feel comfortable about allowing me to socialise with her in public.’
    ‘And you knew what that would mean?’ Robert turned back to face her. ‘You both knew what it would mean?’
    Lady MacInnes nodded, and the sadness returned to her eyes. ‘We knew. And it hurt us both deeply to knowthat our friendship would have to come to an end. But I could not go against the wishes of my husband. And for what it’s worth, Charlotte believed that if the forfeit of our friendship was what was necessary to ensure my silence, it was a price she was willing to pay. We never spoke of Hannah’s origins again. Nor did I see your mother in private after that. If we met at family or society functions, we were cordial but that was all. I regret that such was the outcome of the event, but I had no choice. I felt I had done enough in making her the promise I had.’
    Robert locked his hands behind his back and turned to face the window again. He was silent for a very long time.
    ‘I hardly know what to say,’ he finally said in a voice devoid of all emotion. ‘For years I suspected my mother of having had an affair with another man. I came to hate her for it. You cannot imagine how I feel now upon learning the truth.’ He lapsed into silence again, thinking through not only the situation as it stood but also the ramifications that could result from it. ‘Who else knows about this?’
    ‘Very few people, to my knowledge. My husband, of course, but he agreed to keep silent.’
    ‘And your children, Cedric and Fiona, do they know?’
    ‘No, they were too young. Cedric was just four and Fiona barely two when your mother came to stay with us, and since there was very little talk of Charlotte after she left, there were no awkward questions raised. But I imagine some of the servants here must know. The coachman who brought your mother north, and the out-riders. And certainly Sally.’
    ‘Sally?’
    ‘Your mother’s