Prince Of Secrets

‘He knows the child can’t be his, but he’s prepared to accept it, it gives him an heir, keeps the money from his cousin, but I’m frightened that he might find out that it’s yours.’

Sir Ratcliffe gave a coarse laugh. ‘Never tell me that he thinks it’s Apollo’s!’

Susanna put her face into the pillow, said in a muffled voice, ‘For some reason he took it for granted that it was. I suppose he thought that it happened just before you and I became friendly. He thinks Cobie’s my lover.’

She fell silent, then raised an agonised face.

He said, brutally, ‘I’d have thought that it would have disturbed him more for Grant to be the father than myself. After all, Grant’s an illegitimate nobody, I’m the possessor of an illustrious name.’

Susanna said tearfully, ‘I know, but since he’s always believed that I’ve been unfaithful to him with Cobie, he didn’t mind a child by him—he half-welcomed it. But if he knew that it was yours he would be enraged. It would mean that I’d been unfaithful with two lovers, not one. He couldn’t stand that.’

Sir Ratcliffe began to laugh. ‘A good joke, isn’t it—seeing that you’ve assured me that you were never Grant’s mistress. Well, it’s to both our advantages to let him think that it’s Grant’s, so why worry?’

‘Because—’ and now Susanna’s voice was agonised ‘—I’m doing Cobie a dreadful wrong. He’s always behaved honourably towards me, and now everyone thinks that I became pregnant by him before I began my affaire with you. I’ve even let his wife believe that—as much by what I haven’t said as what I have. Now I don’t know how to tell the truth. Oh, it was a wicked thing to do…I can’t think why I did it….’

‘But sensible,’ said Sir Ratcliffe briskly, rising and putting on his heavy brocade dressing gown, ‘seeing that I can’t afford to keep a mistress and an illegitimate brat, and I don’t want to be involved in a nasty divorce case either. Now, if your husband doesn’t mind Apollo’s get, why should you have qualms? You gain every way. I’d better go, it’s getting late, and you’d better stop all this pious talk about doing wrong.

‘First of all you don’t mean it, and secondly, I find it a damned bore. I can get that sort of whining cant from my wife—from my mistress I expect better things. So put a bright face on, my dear, if you want to keep me in your bed.’

He had never spoken so coarsely to her before, but he was beginning to tire of her. Ordinary love was always milk-and-water to him: he needed strong brandy, but for safety’s sake, he dare not, at the moment, try to find any. It was too soon after he had enjoyed the last child. He wondered how long Susanna would go on clinging to him if he meted out to her some of the treatment his wife received. It might be interesting to find out.

He was humming cheerfully to himself when he walked along the corridor to his room, the morning light growing stronger by the minute. No one was about, although he knew that by now the servants in the attics would be stirring, getting ready for the day. He unlocked the bedroom door to let himself in, and switched on the light.

He didn’t, at first, see the open safe on the dressing table, only the bed, turned down for him, but not yet entered. He pulled off his dressing gown, yawned, and strode towards it…

To see on his way—no, he couldn’t be seeing that, no, not that! There was the safe, yawning as widely as he had just done, and empty, quite empty, except for a piece of card left on its floor. Fearfully he leaned forward, picked up the card, and felt the breeze from the window, which was wide open, although he had left it almost shut.

The message on the card was plain and unequivocal. I’VE TAKEN PAYMENT FOR LIZZIE STEELE—BUT IT’S NOT THE FINAL PAYMENT was printed on it in bold capitals. Sir Ratcliffe’s head buzzed and roared. For a moment the loss of the diamonds and the Prince’s letters were forgotten. Someone knew! Someone was aware of Lizzie’s death and his part in it, and that someone had taken the diamonds—and the letters—to punish him.

He was no longer safe, his secret was no secret. Some midnight thief had come through the window and robbed him, not only of his last few pieces of wealth, but of his security. Still holding the card, he sank on to the bed. What to do? He must report the theft of the diamonds. He couldn’t keep that from his wife.

Whatever he had said to her, he still wanted her to wear them every night. They were the only proof left that he wasn’t entirely bankrupt, wasn’t beginning to sell the last remnants of the Heneage wealth, everything else having gone. No, he must reveal the theft, but not the card which the thief had left—for what questions might not the police ask him about it?

He fetched his wallet from where he had left it on the previous evening and stuffed the card in it. As soon as there was a fire going and he was alone with it he would destroy the incriminating thing, but he couldn’t destroy the fact that someone, somewhere, knew the dreadful truth of him—and was seeking revenge.

Worse, the one salvation he had, the talisman which had kept him safe for so long, was his possession of the Prince’s incriminating letters—and they had gone, too. If they had been returned to the Prince he was done for, because the Royal favour, which had been the only thing to keep him afloat, would now be removed.