Regency Masquerade

Chapter Nineteen

Meanwhile, back in Devonshire Street, Lady Anna Murray sent her footman scurrying up to the attic with orders to find and bring down all the papers left by Lady Julia. Eventually Tom descended, covered in dust and bearing two small hatboxes.

"Would these be what you were wanting, my lady?"

"Two brown hatboxes? Yes, give them to Mrs Pearson will you, Tom? You may leave us."

The old nurse was as eager as her mistress to start searching for any letter or paper which might shed some light on the circumstances surrounding Frances' birth. She blew the dust off the first box and opened it. Fearful of overlooking anything of importance, she took out each page and examined both sides before placing it on the small table beside her.

"Nothing yet, my lady, merely letters from yourself and Sir Thomas' family."

Lady Murray sat straight in her chair, her suspense betrayed only by the ceaseless opening and closing of her fan.

"There won't be anything," she declared abruptly, as Mrs Pearson came to the end of the first box. "Julia would never have kept such a matter secret from me!"

"No, my lady," responded the other woman a shade doubtfully. "Do you wish me to continue?"

"Heh? Of course continue! Can't leave the job half done!"

"No, my lady," agreed Mrs Pearson for the second time. She started on the second box. Some half hour later, she had to confess failure. "I've looked through the lot now and there's nothing here at all."

"Thought as much!" exclaimed Lady Murray with mixed satisfaction. Mrs Pearson was still unconvinced, her brow furrowed in concentration.

"Where else would she have put documents of any importance? Perhaps she considered the boxes of letters too risky, too likely to be disposed of without much attention. Did she have a safe box?" She looked up to find her employer shaking her head from side to side.

"No. All the families' important papers were lodged with Grayson's solicitors at Lincoln's Inn and they were all examined at the time of the accident."

"What happened to the rest of her things, her personal things? Are they still up in the attic?"

"I suppose they must be, I had everything packed away at the time. I have been meaning to look through it all but I have not had a spare moment."

Realising that what her ladyship really meant was that she had never been able to face that heart rending task, Mrs Pearson tactfully allowed this to pass without comment.

"I suppose you want me to sort the trunks out now? Put me to all that trouble to please that chit of a girl who is an adventuress if ever I saw one! Bold as brass, coming here like that. Nothing of her mother in her at all. She looked like Henry you say?"

"There is a very definite resemblance," stated Mrs Pearson firmly, trying to halt her employer from rushing into a position of denying Frances' claim outright. "She has his nose and his chin, and the colour of her hair is just like Henry's as a boy. I don't think there can be any doubt who her father is."

"Perhaps not," conceded Lady Murray still fighting, "but there's nothing of Amanda in her, is there?"

"Well no, not really," agreed the nurse reluctantly, "although her eyes are the same colour. There was something about her voice, I fancied it reminded me rather of someone ... not Miss Amanda exactly but ... Miss Julia! That's who! Not the accent of course, but the same low pitch, don't you think so, my lady?"

"Nonsense!" denied Lady Murray briskly, ignoring the jolt of familiarity Frances' voice had given her. "I think I've had enough excitement for the day. Perhaps we will look through those trunks another time, if the girl comes back. Now she knows she has to provide proof before she can claim the money she might give up."

"You can't deny the child her birthright just because you've taken a dislike to her," came the rather stern reply.

"No. No, if she can prove she is Amanda's child I will have to see what I can do for her. But if not, I tell you right now I will not lift a finger for Henry's bastard!" With those rather vindictive words hanging in the air, Lady Murray rose and made her way up to her chamber.

~~~

Frances returned to the Regent Hotel with her companion and was greeted by John, bursting with curiosity about her excursion to Devonshire Street.

She dismissed Madame Lebrun and then turned to her manservant with a question of her own. "How long were you with my father, John? When did you meet him?"

"In Nice it was, just after your mother died. Must be nigh on twenty years ago now. I'd got separated from the army in Spain and was working my way back to England, when your father found me, working in a livery yard, and hired me on the spot." Frances nodded, she had heard that part of the story before.

"What was he calling himself then? Can you remember?"

"James Wentworth," answered John promptly.

"Did he ever go by the name of Metcalf?"

John shook his head dubiously, "I don't remember that one. Why?"

Frances grimaced wryly, "It is just that now it appears Metcalf was his real name!" She went on to describe the rest of her afternoon, while John stared in amazement. "Her granddaughter!" he exclaimed, "Well I never!"

However, he knew as well as she did the difficulty of proving her ancestry to a solicitor.

"And even if by any remote chance, my claim could be proved, as soon as she discovers the way I have lived, Lady Murray would disown me utterly!" finished Frances, throwing up her hands. "The irony is, if I were a real adventuress which I am, this would be a perfect opportunity for me to make as much money as I could! Except of course, if I had been going about this professionally, I would have equipped myself with a better story than the one I have!"

John had been frowning in hard concentration. "I am not so sure about that, Miss Frances, after all you have told the truth so they won't be able to disprove what you have said. A simple story is the best in any case. I think you have the right of it. If they do not accept you as the legitimate heir, you will have to hold out for as big a settlement as you can, to withdraw your claim and go away."

She stared at him in dismay.

"Well what else can you do? A thousand pounds, even five hundred, would set you up nicely in France. But it may not come to that," he added bracingly. "Could we hire a solicitor of our own to make some enquiries? Find out exactly when they eloped. If your mother was a gently bred girl like that, I can't see your father travelling far without marrying her. Chances are they were married in England, before they left for France."

"Yes, I think you are right. I will consider it," she promised.