It was a totally untutored hand, a jumbled mixture of capital and lowercase letters, some large, some small, some cramped, most looping. Who on earth . . . ?
You will perswaid that luver of your’s to leve here and stay away, it read, or you may cum to harm, yore laidyship. This is a frendly warning. Heed it.
There was no signature.
Imogen held the paper with both hands, both of them pulsing with pins and needles. She ought to have understood as soon as she saw the outside of it. More than ten years had passed, but she should have realized anyway. If she was not mistaken, the same person who had written the threatening letters to Dicky and herself before they left for the Peninsula had written this.
Oh, Percy, she thought, what have you started?
Imogen had learned a great deal about self-control and self-containment during the past eight years. She did not open her other letters, but she did eat her way through a whole round of toast and drink her coffee before folding her napkin and leaving it neatly beside her plate and getting to her feet.
“I will be going up to the hall this morning,” she told her housekeeper. “You may let the fire die down in the sitting room.”
“Take your umbrella, my lady,” Mrs. Primrose advised, “if you can keep it from blowing inside out, that is.”
* * *
Percy was in the drawing room, as was almost everyone else except the older ladies, who were at their meeting in the morning room. Percy was devising a tournament that included, among other things, card games, billiards, dart throwing, and a treasure hunt. Everyone was in high spirits despite the rain that was lashing against the windows. Everyone, it seemed, turned a laughing face toward Imogen.
“You are just in time to join us, Lady Barclay,” Viscount Marwood told her. “You can be on my team. That will give us one more player than the other team, but the others have Percy, who really counts for two when it comes to games. Are you good at darts? You may pick off one or two of our foes, if you wish—as long as you do not do any permanent harm, I suppose. That might upset the other ladies.”
And the bizarre thing was that she did join in, though the contest lasted a great deal longer than she expected. Indeed, there was even a break halfway through for luncheon, which was supposed to last an hour and actually lasted an hour and a half.
Everyone was having a merry old time, including the older gentlemen. And even Cousin Adelaide, who did not participate, was looking less crusty than usual, though she did complain that too many of the activities were taking place beyond the drawing room doors.
Cats darted everywhere. Bruce did not move from the hearthrug. Hector sat beside Percy’s empty chair, thumping his tail at any sign of action.
It was all that a family house party ought to be, Imogen thought. The twins squabbled with each other at least half a dozen times, though they were on the same team. Leonard Herriott accused his brother of cheating during the treasure hunt and found himself at the wrong end of a blistering retort before their father stepped in to restore order and remind them that there were ladies present. But good nature and laughter prevailed every time, as well as a hotly competitive spirit, until finally everyone had completed every activity and the scores were added up by a committee of two—one person from each team—and it was discovered that Percy’s team had won by the slimmest of margins.
Boos from the losers mingled with unruly cheers from the winners, and Aunt Lavinia rang for the tea tray, the ladies’ meeting having long ago come to an end.
“Lord Hardford,” Imogen said, “may I have a private word with you?”
It was perhaps not the best way of going about it, she realized too late. He looked surprised—and perhaps a little annoyed?—and everyone else looked a bit surprised too. Imogen flinched slightly as she noticed Mr. Welby winking at Viscount Marwood.
“It is a matter of business,” she added.
“But of course, Cousin.” He led the way to the door and opened it for her to pass through. He preceded her to the morning room and followed her inside before closing the door behind them.
He looked a bit grim, she thought as she turned to face him.
“What is it?” he asked.
She took the letter from a pocket of her dress and handed it to him.
He opened it and stared at it, then spoke a word she had only ever heard before in Portugal, on the lips of soldiers who had not realized they were being overheard by a woman. He did not apologize.
He raised his head and looked at her for a long while in silence. “He could do with a few spelling lessons, could he not?” he remarked. “Not to mention penmanship.”
“It is no joke, Percy,” she said.
“No, indeed it is not,” he agreed. “Instead of threatening me, which I might have taken as a joke, he has threatened my lady and very seriously annoyed me.”
She might have taken exception to that description of herself as my lady at any other time, but this was not any other time.
He continued to look at her without moving for a few moments longer. “With your permission,” he said then, “I will summon a few more people here. Men. Shall I summon my mother too? Or Lady Lavinia, perhaps?”
“No,” she said, remembering one phrase of the letter—that luver of your’s. “Which men?”
“My steward,” he said. “Mr. Knorr, that is. My two friends. Cyril Eldridge. My uncles.”
It suddenly occurred to Imogen that it really was possible that Dicky’s valet had been murdered; that Mr. Bains had been coerced into withdrawing his permission for Colin to accompany them to Portugal as Dicky’s batman; that James Mawgan had been planted quite deliberately in that position. Yesterday it had all seemed too preposterous to be taken seriously. It still did today. But someone had just threatened her life—again. That seemed too ridiculously melodramatic as well, but it had happened.