Heiress Gone Wild Page 3

  “She was. She married beneath her, and her family disowned her for it.” As he spoke, he made no attempt to hide his disdain for Britain’s snobbish upper classes. “Our family was in newspapers—upstarts, unworthy of notice, particularly after my father’s mismanagement bankrupted the company. Society’s view of us only began to change six years ago.”

  “Due to your silver mine, or your eldest sister’s marriage?”

  “Both, I’m sure. Nothing like millions in the bank and a duke in the family to elevate one’s social position. My second sister also married into the ton.”

  “And your sisters like that life, do they?”

  “From their letters, it seems they do, though I’ll never understand why. Still, if they’re happy, that’s all that matters. They deserve some happiness. Our father, God rest his miserable soul, was a difficult man. And I,” he added with cheer, “seem to have been equally difficult, at least in his opinion. When I was eighteen, he tossed me out, disinherited me, and told me to make my own way.”

  “And you did.”

  Jonathan shook his head. “Billy was the one who found the mine. I merely helped him work it.”

  “You don’t give yourself enough credit. Mr. McGann, though an excellent mining engineer, had no head for business. He was wise to let you handle the money. The investments you made provided both of you with a far greater fortune than the mine alone would have done.”

  “I enjoy the challenge of making money, I confess.”

  “And spending it?”

  “That’s far less interesting.”

  Jessop chuckled. “Spoken like a true entrepreneur. So, you’ve no desire to become a man of leisure, buy an estate, marry a lady, and become local squire to some English village?”

  “God, no. I’m not a settling-down sort of chap. I was once . . .” He paused for another gulp of whiskey. “Not anymore.”

  His mind flashed back to his youth, and the approving voice of his grandfather, who’d turned a handful of newspapers into a vast publishing empire.

  You’ll take over Deverill Publishing one day, expand our fortunes. You’ll be the one to carry on my dream.

  It had been Jonathan’s dream, too, until his grandfather’s death had changed everything.

  This company’s mine now, his father’s voice echoed through his head, taunting him even from the grave. If I want your advice on how to run things, boy, I’ll ask you for it.

  With an effort, he forced his mind out of the past. “No, Mr. Jessop, even without Billy alongside, I fear I’m destined to wander. The proverbial rolling stone.”

  Jessop smiled. “That’s the image every bachelor has of himself. Until Cupid’s arrow hits him.”

  Jonathan thought of his own experience there, of the girl who’d loved him madly when he was the grandson of a wealthy newspaper hawker, whose love had died the instant his father had disinherited him. He thought of his parents—his mother cast out by her family and friends because of her love for a middle-class rakehell, and his father, whose inherent weaknesses had become so obvious in the wake of her death. No, any illusions Jonathan may have had—about love, marriage, or anything else—were long gone.

  “No worries,” he assured the lawyer, tapping his chest with his palm. “I’ve got armor plating.”

  He noted the other man’s knowing smile in some amusement, but before the married Mr. Jessop could say something about how all men are broken to the yoke in the end, Jonathan changed the subject, for they didn’t have much time. “About Billy’s investments,” he said, gesturing to the documents on the table beside them, “I have concerns about the South African ones. This business with the Boers is getting sticky.”

  “Yes, you’re wise to investigate now, before things get worse. Those investments are still lucrative, but if things become unstable, the value of the shares will plummet rapidly.”

  “I’ll cable you as soon as possible what needs to be done. And there are some mining conglomerates forming in East Africa that I’d like to investigate. What is your opinion regarding Billy’s other investments?”

  “As I said, you’ve done well with them. I think they will continue to provide a good return. Have you made any plans for the girl?”

  “My plan,” Jonathan countered dryly, “was that she would remain in school for about half a dozen more years.”

  “And now?”

  “She’ll have to stay where she is until I can return from Africa to fetch her. By then, I’ll have made new arrangements for her. She’ll be all right at Forsyte Academy in the meantime, I trust? Looked after, chaperoned, all that?”

  “Oh, yes. Mrs. Forsyte is an excellent woman and most capable chaperone. How does the girl feel about remaining behind? I imagine she was disappointed at not being able to accompany you to London?”

  “She was, but I explained that it’s the only thing to do.”

  “And she took it well?”

  “Well enough.” As he spoke, Jonathan felt a sudden uneasiness—doubt or guilt, he couldn’t be sure. “It can’t be very amusing for her there. Look in on her often while I’m away, see how she’s getting on. Bring her down to the city to stay, take her to dinner, or the opera once she’s in half-mourning.”

  “My wife and I have done such things in the past. We would be happy to continue.”

  “And double her pin money. Those things may take the sting out of waiting until I return.”

  “But what will you do with her then?”

  He considered. “She has no family at all?”

  “Her mother is from South Africa and has some relations there—very distant ones, I’m afraid. Her father was an orphan, so she has no connections here.”

  “Which means the Knickerbockers won’t accept her, all her millions notwithstanding. Given that, the girl herself may have already determined the best plan for her future.”

  “Possibly. But would Mr. McGann approve?”

  “I know he would,” Jonathan said with a sigh. “Shortly before his death, when he told me he’d made me guardian to the girl, he admitted part of the reason was my connections. The girl will need ladies to chaperone her, and I know he hoped my sisters could do that.”

  He didn’t add that he wasn’t sure his sisters would agree, not after he’d let them down six years ago. “I have no right to commit my sisters to this until I’ve discussed it with them. But an heiress worth millions can’t be shut away from good society forever, and marriage to a peer would give her a position.”

  “True, but there are risks. Her money remains in trust only until she marries, or she turns thirty, whichever comes first. Word of her father’s death and rumors of her enormous inheritance have already made the New York papers. We must do our best to protect the girl from fortune hunters.”

  “Of course.” Jonathan met the lawyer’s shrewd gaze with a hard one of his own. “But I trust your firm is capable of drafting an ironclad marriage settlement, should the need arise?”

  Mr. Jessop smiled. “We can tie up the money tight as a drum.”

  Satisfied, Jonathan glanced at the clock on the wall and set aside his glass. “If that’s all, I shall be on my way.”

  “Before you go, there is one more thing we need to decide. What are we to do with her jewels?”

  Jonathan paused, frowning in puzzlement. “The Rose of Shoshone, you mean? I thought her father had Charles Tiffany cut and set it. Isn’t it in the Tiffany vault?”

  “Oh, yes,” the lawyer hastened to assure him. “There’s a substantial quantity of uncut stones in the vault as well. Being a mining engineer, Mr. McGann acquired many gemstones over the years.”

  “Yes, I know. Silver made him wealthy, but gemstones were his passion. That’s why he went to South Africa—Idaho, too, for that matter. But to address your question, why do we need to do anything with the stones?”

  “Your plan is to remain in Africa for the next eight months?”

  “About that, yes. What of it?”

  “The girl is supposed
to receive the jewels when she turns twenty-one, and her birthday is August thirteenth. At that point, the gems cease to be part of the trust, and we are obligated to hand them over to her.”

  Jonathan considered. “Does she know about the gems?” he asked after a moment. “Does anyone?”

  “Not to my knowledge. But once the will passes through probate, its exact terms will become public knowledge, and the existence of a necklace containing a flawless, thirty-two carat pink sapphire is the sort of sensational news the papers will jump on.”

  “Can’t we leave the jewels where they are until I return?”

  The lawyer frowned, seeming affronted. “As executor, I have a legal obligation to fulfill the will’s exact terms. And even if the law did not require it, my ethics would.”

  Jonathan was tempted to offer a witticism about the mention of lawyers and ethics in the same sentence, but he doubted Mr. Jessop would appreciate the joke. “Still, why would she want them? Mourning doesn’t allow her to wear jewels until April.”

  “Not publicly, no, but do you think she’ll be content to leave a priceless necklace of pink sapphires and white diamonds in a vault untouched and unworn until next April?”

  “Probably not,” he conceded with a sigh. “She’ll want it close by, I suppose, so she can try it on and show it off to her friends.”

  “Exactly. We can protect her inheritance far more easily than we can her jewels. They are insured, of course, but it would be a shame if they were stolen.”

  “I take it,” Jonathan said, studying the lawyer’s urbane countenance, “you have a suggestion to make?”

  “Her jewels remain part of the trust until August thirteenth, and we can safeguard them however we wish. If they were moved to London now, perhaps placed in your brother-in-law’s ducal vault . . .”

  He paused again, and Jonathan gave an unamused laugh. “So, in addition to deciding how to manage the life of a beautiful young heiress, I now have to cart a half a million dollars’ worth of her jewels across the Atlantic on a moment’s notice?”

  “You could have a Pinkerton man do it for you.”

  He could, but he’d never been the trusting sort, and since he and Billy had held off dozens of claim jumpers and the henchmen of four mining conglomerates to maintain control of their mine, he doubted any Pinkerton man could safeguard the girl’s jewels any better than he could himself.

  “Tiffany’s will allow me to remove the jewels if I present the trust documents and my power of attorney, I assume?” he asked.

  “Of course.”

  Satisfied, Jonathan gathered the documents from the table and stood up, bringing the other man to his feet as well. “Well, if I’m going to Tiffany’s before my ship sails, I really must be on my way.”

  “You’ll cable me the moment the gems are safely stored in London? And you’ll confirm whatever arrangements you’ll be making for the girl?”

  “I will. And I shall see you this winter when I return for her.” He held out his hand. “Until then, I leave Miss McGann in your safekeeping.”

  “Mrs. Forsyte and I will continue to keep close watch over her, as we have always done,” the lawyer assured him as they shook hands.

  “It isn’t just the British fortune hunters we need to worry about,” Jonathan reminded as they walked together toward the door of Mr. Jessop’s office.

  “Mrs. Forsyte is perfectly capable of dealing with anything of that kind. Men won’t get anywhere near her. And I doubt the unsavory ones will want to, given that I shall make sure her guardian’s determination to have an ironclad prenuptial agreement is made known to the press immediately.” Mr. Jessop smiled. “I assure you, no scoundrel will scrape up an acquaintance and elope with her to Niagara while you are away.”

  The Neptune was a new steamship, the very best the Cunard line could offer, with every amenity a man of wealth could expect. His stateroom was a parlor suite with windows giving onto the promenade, crisp, clean sheets, and a mattress and pillows of the softest down. But the best thing about it was the private bath, and as Jonathan eased back in the tub filled with steaming water, he couldn’t help a groan of appreciation. A hot bath was a luxury that his life the past ten years had given him little opportunity to enjoy.

  He did it now, though, savoring the piping hot water and castile soap provided by Cunard. After rinsing off, he stood up and started to reach for one of the thick Turkish towels that hung from hooks in the wall, but then he changed his mind.

  Miss McGann’s jewels were safely stowed in the Neptune’s vault, and the coming week stretched before him with nothing more crucial to do than explore the ship, shoot clay pigeons off the stern, read books, and sip vintage port in the smoking room. Right now, he was in a luxurious bathtub and the water was still hot. Why waste it?

  He once again sank back down. His muscles, tense from days aboard crowded train cars, slowly relaxed, his eyes closed, and his mind drifted into oblivion.

  Something roused him, and he woke with a jump, reflexively reaching for his Colt, realizing only after his hand emerged from the water that he didn’t need it. He wasn’t in a frigid mountain stream where some claim jumper might take a potshot at him, or in a chipped iron tub above a saloon where some drunken miner might fire a bullet through the ceiling. He was in a luxurious bathroom on a steamship bound for home.

  Home.

  It seemed an alien concept to him now, for when he’d left England a decade ago, he’d also left behind the shattered pieces of his dreams, his heart, and his future. Since then, the closest thing he’d had to a home was one of the two shacks he and Billy had built in northern Idaho’s Silver Valley, crude affairs of pine timber and tar paper that had sheltered them while they’d pulled silver ore out of their mine at a frantic pace.

  The shacks were gone now, sold along with most of their shares in the mine when Billy had developed that cough two and a half years ago, a hacking, phlegm-laced cough that just wouldn’t go away. His suspicions awakened, Jonathan had wanted his friend to see a doctor, but Billy had shrugged off that suggestion, not confirming Jonathan’s fears about his illness until nearly a year later, when he’d started coughing up blood.

  At that point, Jonathan had dragged his friend to one of Colorado’s famous sanitoriums for treatment, but there was little the doctors could do. Consumption was always fatal.

  Jonathan leaned forward in the bathtub, plunking his elbows on his bent knees and resting his head in his hands, the pain of Billy’s death squeezing his chest like a vise.

  He closed his eyes, but strangely, it wasn’t an image of his friend, emaciated and dying, that came into his mind. Instead, he saw the girl, with her flaming hair and dark eyes. A month ago, promising to take care of Billy’s daughter had seemed an easy promise to make. Only now, after discovering she was a full-grown woman with a stunning face and the body of a goddess, was he able to truly appreciate the enormity of his responsibility.

  A knock sounded on the door of his stateroom, interrupting his contemplations. It was the same sound, he realized, that had woken him a few moments ago. He heard the turn of a key and the opening of a door, and then a cheerful voice calling his name.

  “Tea, Mr. Deverill,” a young man called through the open doorways of his suite. “As you ordered. And I’ve laid out the sandwiches and cakes.”

  Jonathan jerked upright. “Thank you,” he called back. “Tip’s there,” he added, remembering the change he’d tossed on the table earlier when he’d emptied his pockets.

  “Thank you, sir.” The waiter’s grateful voice told him the amount of change must have been generous. There was another rattle of tea things, the sound of the change being scraped off the table, and then the waiter’s voice came again. “Can I do anything more for you, Mr. Deverill?”

  “No.” He rose, stepped out of the bath, and pulled a towel from the hook nearby. “I’ll ring if I need anything.”

  “Yes, sir. Thank you again.”

  Jonathan heard the outer door close and the k
ey turn as he dried off. Tossing aside the towel, he walked to the washstand, opened his shaving kit, and turned on the hot water tap.

  He’d already lathered his brush by the time he remembered the tea. Deciding he’d better drink it before it got cold, he set down his shaving brush and turned off the tap, then donned his dressing robe and left the bath.

  Tying the sash of his robe, he pushed the door wide with his shoulder, but at the sight that met his eyes, he came to an immediate halt in the doorway. “What the devil?” he muttered.

  Sitting on the petit point sofa of his stateroom, eating crumpets and drinking tea, her bright hair gleaming in the light of the lamp beside her, was Marjorie McGann.

  Chapter 4

  Had Jonathan possessed any doubts that making him the guardian of his best friend’s daughter was an awful idea, the fact that Miss McGann was sitting in his stateroom aboard a ship crossing the Atlantic instead of securely tucked away at Forsyte Academy would have shredded them.

  “What are you doing here?” he demanded. Glancing past her toward the windows that opened onto the promenade deck, he was relieved to see that at least she hadn’t drawn back the curtains. But then, he remembered they were far out of New York Harbor, with no way to take her back, and his relief vanished again. “I left you in White Plains.”

  “Fortunately for me, I know how to ride a bicycle, purchase a train ticket, and hail a taxi. And since you provided me with the name of the ship on which you had booked passage . . .” She paused to pop the last bite of crumpet into her mouth and reach for a sandwich, then she leaned back against the sofa and smiled, looking far too pleased with herself. “Here I am.”

  “How did you get into my room?”

  “I came in with the waiter.” She gave him an apologetic look as she ate a bite of sandwich. “I fear he thinks we’re both terribly depraved.”

  “Good God,” he muttered, rubbing his hands over his face as he worked to make sense of the situation. “Does Mrs. Forsyte know you’ve gone?”