Father shrugged. “They made it quite clear no one was welcome. They were content to fester in the country, quarrelling with one another and complaining bitterly about the pittance of an allowance they received.”
This surprised me. “They were not given proper allowances?”
Father named a figure that made me gasp. “Generous enough, by anyone’s standards,” he commented dryly, and I was forced to agree. “Added to which, Grandfather settled the Norfolk house on them and paid for the maintenance. Their expenses were virtually nonexistent. I’ll wager there is a small fortune stuffed under a mattress or behind a fireplace brick in that house.”
“But I thought that side of the family was poor,” I protested. “Emma and Lucy, always coming to us looking little better than charity children, complaining about cold-water baths and wearing the aunts’ castoffs.”
Father sipped at his tea. “Living in isolation can turn a person’s mind, and their minds did not have far to turn,” he said with a meaningful look over the rim of his spectacles.
“You mean they becamepeculiar?”
“In a word. They began to hoard things from the reports my father received. Money, newspapers, jars of jam. And never spent a ha’-penny if they could help it. Dorcas even had her sisters buried in paupers’ graves in the churchyard in Norfolk to save a few pounds. She was certainly not going to spend her life’s savings educating two girls she viewed as the fruits of sin.”
“Their parents were married,” I pointed out.
“Hmm. Yes, well, there was some confusion on that point.”
I blinked at him. “Good heavens. Why did I never know any of this?”
Father shrugged. “Old family gossip. You were always burrowed somewhere with your nose in a book.”
“And here I thought the family was in danger of becoming respectable.” I still could not quite take it in. Lucy and Emma, bastards, and Dorcas and her sisters mad as hatters, after a fashion.
“But Aunt Dorcas’ pearls and the lace,” I began. Father shook his head.
“The pearls are glass beads, and the lace was her mother’s. Her maid has been tearing it off and sewing it onto different gowns for fifty years. And what she has not hoarded, she has pilfered. Mind you lock up your valuables, I cannot vouch for their safety,” he said with a sigh. “I could almost feel sorry for the old trout, but she is one of the most tiresome women I have ever known.”
“Then why did you invite her for the wedding?”
Father’s usual benign expression turned murderous. “I did not. That would be the handiwork of your Aunt Hermia, who I hope is suffering mightily from the pangs of her conscience as well as a toothache. She insisted if Lucy was to be married from here, Dorcas had to be present, and then she hared off to London while I have endured the old terror,” he said with real bitterness.
“Aunt Hermia cannot help a toothache,” I chided. “Besides, with so many other guests, you cannot be much bothered with her.”
“Emma was not best pleased to see her,” Father confided. “Although I imagine she has had an easier time of it than her sister. I would rather have the keeping of ten children than one old woman.”
“You did have the keeping of ten children,” I reminded him. “Now, tell me how it came to be that Lucy is to be married here.”
Father shrugged. “Cedric is an acquaintance from the Shakespearean Society. Lucy was visiting London with friends. She called upon me, quite properly. I was just about to leave for a meeting, and the girl trotted along.
Cedric was there, and I introduced them. He was instantly smitten, and since then they have been inclined to view me as something of a faery godfather. I have been told they mean to name their firstborn after me. It is all incredibly fatiguing.”
“And Mrs. King? She is a member of the society also?” I asked carefully.
Father levelled his clear green gaze at me. “She is. As is Brisbane. They both began attending in September. I introduced them as well.”
“You are a regular Cupid,” I commented lightly. “You will want only a bow and arrow to complete the illusion.” I chose my next words carefully. “I am surprised their courtship has progressed so quickly. Mrs. King does not strike me as the type of woman to become engaged to a man she has known but for two months, although perhaps I have misjudged her.”
Father said nothing, but he sipped at his tea and his eyes slid away from mine. He knew something, and he was determined not to speak of it. And when Father made up his mind, it was pointless to attack him directly.
“What do you think of Violante?” I asked, and I do not think I imagined he looked relieved.
“I like her fine. She seems a rational sort of girl, from what I could determine with my faulty Italian. Pleasant enough, although with a beastly temper, I should think.”
“Then you are not still angry with Lysander for marrying her?”
He set the cup into the saucer with a sharp rap. “Why the devil should I be angry? Ly has to live with her—”
Too late, he remembered the letter, the summons home with dire threats if we failed to obey. It had been a blind then, a lure to bring us back, for some other purpose entirely. But Father could hold his counsel well enough when he chose. If I wanted to know what he was about, I should have to lull him into security first.