Dear heaven!

Clara was flipping through prints of medieval-style rooms that certainly looked unwelcoming. She paused on a sheet. "There! I told you so."

Lucy took one look and then shut the portfolio. The picture had indeed been of a torture chamber, including a rack, shackles on the wall, and a brazier full of implements. As Clara said, there had been figures howling in torment as the instruments were used by what might have been other waxworks, but had looked like real people.

Aunt Mary should have taken that print away, too. She should have burned it. No wonder Clara had been driven to the extreme of warning her.

"I'm sorry I doubted you. Hard to believe anyone could be so vile."

"Oh, not really," Clara said, putting away the prints, and switching mood in her usual unpredictable way. "After all, people go to see Madame Tussaud's waxworks when they're in Town, and some are quite horrid. Victims of the guillotine and such. I understand the Mad Earl had her create the figures for his dungeon." But then Clara turned to fix Lucy with an anxious look. "So you see."

"Yes, I see. Thank you."

"You have many other suitors," Clara said and returned to the drawing room.

Lucy remained, desolate, facing reality.

His house was as bleak as he'd said, and the setting every bit as harsh. That could be endurable, but his father truly had been mad, and viciously so. What's more, hadn't the earls of Wyvern been described as odd for generations?

She found a guide to the peerage and looked them up, but such a book didn't give scandals. All she learned was that none of them had been long lived and they had produced few children.

She replaced that book and sought a guide to Devon. She found one which gave gossipy details about notable places. Crag Wyvern got three pages and travelers were encouraged to make the arduous journey to the remote coastal spot to admire the stark medieval grandeur. They were warned, however, not to attempt to see inside the house, for the earl permitted entry only to select guests.

Ones who enjoyed lewd fountains and torture chambers, Lucy supposed.

The book was eight years old. Did David keep out visitors? Did he . . . ? No, she wouldn't believe that he amused guests with the rack or burning hot pincers.

There were numerous anecdotes, designed to amuse and t.i.tillate the reader. The first earl was supposed to have killed a dragon. There was a footnote explaining that a wyvern was a winged dragon with a serpent's tail. He'd designed Crag Wyvern to be proof against further dragon attacks. The dragon's hide was nailed to the wall of the great hall. There was an ill.u.s.tration.

His son, the second earl, had kept a fire burning on the battlements every night, all year round, to ward off marauding dragons. That had been a command in his father's will, but he had also been notorious for holding depraved parties that might have inspired the later h.e.l.lfire Club.

The third earl had died young by riding his horse off a cliff. It had been judged an accident, but the book enjoyed reminding the reader of the insanity in the family.

David's grandmother had fallen to her death from the battlements. The disturbing detail was that her body hadn't been found for twelve hours. What a bleak life that implied.

Her son had been the Mad Earl. Perhaps the earls had merely been eccentric until she brought true insanity into the family, but David had her blood through his father, the Mad Earl.

According to the guide, the current earl was unmarried and without issue, but that had been the known situation at time of writing. David had been born by then, but thought to be the son of Miss Isabelle Kerslake and the smuggler with the odd name. Melchisadeck something.

Why had the earl ignored his legal heir? When she'd asked David, he'd turned cold. Because it was evidence of insanity in his bloodline? The father in The Peasant Earl had kept his existence secret because . . .

She would not bring novel fancies into this! These matters were real and could shape the rest of her life. Were the children of a madman inevitably insane?

No. Only think of the poor mad king. He had many children, and though some were eccentric, none showed signs of derangement. Princess Charlotte, his granddaughter, was completely normal.

She'd seen no trace of insanity in David or his sister. Surely if it lurked there, it had to show at times. Maria had described him as the levelheaded one of the pair. If Maria knew of mental instability in David, wouldn't she have felt obliged to warn Lucy?

Lucy put the book back onto the shelves and went up to her bedroom. She must a.n.a.lyze the situation as if it were a matter of trade. There was no place for emotion in trade. Emotion led one astray. Led to bad bargains. Her decisions now would shape her life.

She would write in her journal to clarify her thoughts.

There is no reason to believe That David is insane.

However, I have heard Of occasional madness, As with lunatics.

If he has fled because of Impending derangement, I must follow to find out.

There. The truth had emerged. She must find a way to get to Devon, but all the difficulties remained.

If I ask to go, no one will permit it.

If I leave on my own, I will be pursued.

If only there were balloons or kites To waft me there and back in hours!

My father has pigeons, which fly with speed, Carrying information that helps Him triumph over compet.i.tors.

I'm tied to the ground, but if I Could go and no one know . . .

Impossible, especially when her father's wedding was only a week away. She couldn't be absent for that.

Lucy paused, an idea stirring. It shocked her so much the pencil fell from her fingers. It couldn't be done. Of course it couldn't. But if it could . . .

She closed her book, thinking over it some more. The challenges were considerable, but she'd not been raised to quail at challenges. The biggest challenge was that she needed help.

She doubted Maria would support the deceit. Despite her unconventional marriages, she was a conventional lady. Even Betty might balk, but in any case she was on her honeymoon. Who was unconventional but trustworthy? As she'd realized, she was sadly short of friends.

The Delaneys? She hardly knew them, but Mrs. Delaney had given their address and a meaningful invitation, as if she'd expected Lucy to need help. Hardly help such as this, but she remembered how Mr. Delaney had neatly claimed her from her suitors. Despite his careless manner and unfashionable dress, he'd been master of that situation. What he set out to do would be done, no matter how outrageous.

Moreover he had seemed to know David quite well. He might know the best way to get to Crag Wyvern. Both David and the guidebook had described it as remote and implied some difficulty in traveling there.

Of course, the Delaneys might also know potent reasons why she shouldn't go. Then they could tell her. Otherwise, she was determined on her plan.

She'd not only settle the matter of his mental stability, but she'd be able to see just how horrible his home, his estate, and his area were. She'd be able to make a sane decision. If marriage was impossible, she felt she'd die of it, but she knew that despite poetry and novels, people didn't die for loss of love. She'd recover and she'd find a new path for her life. If she didn't cut through all this, however, she'd linger in misery all her days, haunted by what might have been.

Chapter 25.

She sent round a note and was invited to call. When she arrived, Eleanor Delaney greeted her with a relaxed ease that implied that her being there was the most normal of circ.u.mstances. Indeed, it felt it.

The drawing room was casual in the extreme, and scattered with books, handicrafts, and children's toys. Three children were playing there, a boy and two little girls, one dark haired, one with her mother's auburn hair.

Eleanor introduced Lucy to her daughter Arabel, and to Arabel's friend Delphie and Delphie's brother Pierre. The lad bowed but returned to a book. Both girls curtsied and were eager to show off a collection of dolls. Oddly, the favorite of both, called Marriette, was made of twigs and sc.r.a.ps of cloth.

"Toys have significance according to circ.u.mstances, don't they?" Eleanor said. "Did you have a favorite doll?"

Lucy thought back. "I had pretty ones and I remember enjoying dressing them in different ways, but I left them behind without a qualm."

"As did I, as perhaps Arabel and Delphie will. Arabel is quite fond of a toy soldier and recently made a sword out of sticks."

"Don't you mind?"

"To what purpose? She will be what she will be."

That echoed Maria's thoughts.

"I wanted to be my father's heir." It no longer hurt to say it.

"If Nicholas were your father, you would be." Eleanor wrinkled her brow, smiling. "If you can untangle that."

"I can. My father shattered conventions to become what he is, but chooses convention for me."

"Perhaps he understands how hard it is to take unconventional roads, as he and your mother did."

As Maria had said.

"Apparently she wanted me to be a conventional lady. I thought my father wrong about that, but Maria Vandeimen implied as much."

"I suppose we all hope our children will find a smooth and easy path. You are contemplating barriers?"

Lucy eyed her. "You're perceptive."

"It doesn't take great insight, but Nicholas expected this. He's annoyingly insightful."

"I suspected as much."

"He predicted that you'd want to travel to Devon."

Lucy stared at her. "Now that is irritating."

"But is he right?"

"Yes. I can't swing in the wind like this anymore. I need to know the truth. There is a truth to be known?"

"Many of them," Eleanor said, not seeming uncomfortable with the question, but not answering it, either. "Isn't that always the case? Even conventional people have their secrets and surprises."

"And Wyvern is not conventional. Does he still have a torture chamber?" Lucy braced herself for the answer, suddenly aware that if he did, there was no hope.

"Heavens, no! Con started the destruction when he was earl. I gather there were offers to purchase what was left, but David had everything smashable smashed, everything meltable melted down, and anything flammable burned."

Lucy let out a breath. "Good. Good." She risked a direct question. "Is he insane? At times, at least?"

Eleanor didn't seem startled. "Are any of us sane all the time? I don't think he's fit for Bedlam."

That wasn't entirely satisfactory, but it was better than it might have been. Lucy had come here in a ferment of need and uncertainty, but Eleanor's calm manner was settling her. It made it seem that alarm was unnecessary and anything possible.

"I must go to Devon to find out for myself why David is so certain we should not wed, and I want to go now. No one will approve my going there, however, so no one can know I've gone. I have an idea of how it might be done, but I need help."

Eleanor smiled. "You are not at all as you appear, are you? I'll summon maids for the children and we can join Nicholas in the library."

When they entered the room, Eleanor said, "You were right on all counts, you irritating man. Except that Lucy needs to get to Devon now."

She outlined the situation as they sat and Nicholas Delaney listened.

"We live in Somerset, not very far from Crag Wyvern," he said, "and we've been thinking of leaving Town. We prefer the country and there's nothing to hold us here anymore."

"We came to help a Rogue," Eleanor explained, "and lingered to help Lord Darien."

"The murderous one?" Lucy asked, surprised.

"That was his brother," Nicholas said. "The current one's burdened by the scandal of his name."

"Like David," Lucy said.

"Even the Mad Earl of Wyvern didn't slaughter a young lady of the neighborhood and leave b.l.o.o.d.y tracks back to his house."

"Goodness, I remember that now! I'd forgotten the name."

"Alas, few in the beau monde did. Now that Darien is settled, we lingered for David. I had a hand in persuading him to claim the earldom. That was for Con's sake, but it created its own obligation."

"I see."

"I think you do."

"Balance is important in trade. In ideal circ.u.mstances everyone feels they did well from a transaction."

"Even though there is nearly always a winner and a loser."

Lucy shrugged, for it was true. "Do you have time to help me?"

"What do you need?"

His tone was so commonplace that Lucy hesitated to put her outrageous plan into words, but she must.

"No one is going to allow me to go to Devon on the instant in pursuit of Wyvern, so I have to go unnoticed." Neither listener seemed shocked. "My father marries in a week. There's no habit of communications between him and my aunt, Lady Caldross. When I returned to the City recently, she didn't write to him about it. If I say I want to return again to a.s.sist in the preparations for my father's wedding, it should happen the same way."

"And as no one will be expecting you," Delaney said, "no one will report that you haven't arrived. Ingenious. It could go awry."

"They won't hang me for it."

He nodded. "What do you need?"