“I take it Ashendon House is closed.”
“Indeed it is, and has been since your father died—your brother preferred his own house.” He paused diffidently, then added, “He dismissed all your father’s servants.”
Cal’s brows drew together. Some of those servants had served his father for decades. “I assume he pensioned the older ones off, and gave the others character references?” He read the answer on Phipps’s face.
Damn Henry for a selfish louse. To dismiss a servant without “a character” was to condemn them to future unemployment. A poor return for years of loyal service.
Phipps cleared his throat diffidently. “I, er, took the liberty of penning character references for those few who cameto see me. As for the others—I gather most of the upper servants found suitable positions quite quickly. Your late father was known among the ton to be an exacting employer, so people assumed—quite rightly—that any servant who’d worked for him and kept a position with him longer than six months would be well trained and reliable.”
Cal nodded. “Make inquiries of the remainder. Any of an age to retire, arrange a suitable pension, depending on their length of service. The others, discover their situation and let me know. I would not have my brother sully my father’s reputation for fair dealing.”
Smiling, Phipps made a note. “Do you intend to reopen Ashendon House, my lord? If you wish, I could make arrangements—”
“No, leave it as it is. I’ll stay at my club—the Apocalypse.” Ashendon House was his father’s London home, and too big and formal for Cal’s taste. A waste to open it and employ a dozen or more servants for the handful of nights Cal intended to stay in London. And he didn’t want to raise expectations.
“Your father was a member of Whites.” A hint, if ever Cal had heard one.
“The Apocalypse suits me well enough.” The Apocalypse Club had been started some years before for officers and former officers who’d been to war. It had a relaxed, slightly raffish ambience that perfectly suited Cal’s mood.
Besides, there might be men who’d served with the Rifle Brigade there who could help him in his quest for information.
***
The Apocalypse Club provided just the haven Cal had hoped for. He’d run into a few old acquaintances on the first night and spent a convivial evening catching up on news and gossip before making an early night of it.
The next morning he’d made a hearty English breakfast—a nostalgic pleasure after the continental breakfasts he’d become used to—then set off to Rifle Brigade headquarters to inquire about men who’d been dismissed after the war.
Rifle Brigade sharpshooters had proved so useful in the late war that the Rifles hadn’t been as drastically reduced in size as most of other regiments. Most of them were still in the army, which meant their every move was easily accounted for. It made the list of men he planned to investigate that much shorter.
By the end of the day, Cal had compiled a very useful list of names—men who were reputed to be able to take out a man’s eye from more than two hundred yards away but who were no longer in the army.
It was too long a list, however, for one man to investigate—the men were scattered across southern England. Reluctantly—because he wanted to catch this bastard himself—he took the problem back to Gil Radcliffe.
They divided the list into five geographical regions. Cal took southwestern England, which took in Bath, as well as Cal’s family seat, Ashendon Court in Oxfordshire—he ought to at least check on the place, now that he was responsible for it. And while he was at it, he could call in on Aunt Dottie and the girls.
Radcliffe assigned some of his best men to the other four regions.
With Radcliffe’s facilities at his disposal, Cal was quickly able to cross a number of names off the list. Four men had died by accident or disease. Another two had been killed in drunken brawls.
Three of the men on the list had been transported for poaching. Cal shook his head at that. Teach a man to shoot straight, then punish him for hunting to feed his family. The world didn’t make sense.
That night Radcliffe took him for a meal at his own club, Whites, and Cal ran into more old acquaintances there; a few fellows he knew from the army, and some from his long-distant schooldays. The first of the schoolfellows seemed remarkably pleased to see him, and insisted Cal dine with him the following night.
“No need for formal dress, old fellow, just a casual affair,en famille.”
Cal was a little taken aback at the man’s delight in seeinghim. He’d had very little to do with Frampton at school. Still, it wasn’t as if he had any other engagements, so he accepted.
To his surprise within the next hour or two he was invited to several more casual, intimate family dinners from men he barely remembered. Bemused, but seeing no reason why he should refuse, he accepted them all. He supposed it was their way of welcoming a returning soldier, even if the war was well in the past. They had no idea he was still on active service, and he had no intention of telling them.
The next day he continued working through the list of names, starting with the ones in London. He found two more former sharpshooters, one of whom had been a hero of Badajoz but was now a drunk, a skeletal wreck of a man whose hand shook so much he could barely hold the murky bottle he clutched to his chest like a baby.
The other he found, after some trouble, begging in the street. He’d lost three fingers of his right hand and couldn’t get a job. Former soldiers were everywhere, surplus to requirements. His wife and children had left him. They wouldn’t stay with a man who couldn’t feed them.
Cal gave the man a guinea and walked away, disturbed by what he’d found.
England had not done well by her brave soldiers.
***
