Dukes By the Dozen

“He tried to nab her!” Hattie cried, giving the man’s other leg a kick for good measure as Georgie clutched her little girl to her. “Right out of my hand!”

Murphy growled and shook that leg, setting up another whimper of pain from the man. Georgie could almost feel sorry for him. She saw that blood stained his leg.

“I kicked him too, mama!” Georgie announced, trying to pull from her mother’s arms to deliver another blow.

Georgie held on, just in case. “I believe Murphy has this well in hand, my heart. Stay here with Hattie, please. I must speak to the man.”

She had only taken two steps when the rest of her staff arrived, yelling and threatening and bristling with various weapons. Georgie held them all off.

“Thank you so much,” she said, handing Lully into Hattie’s care. “If you’ll wait a minute until I can find out what is going on.”

But when she turned the kidnapper over, it was to receive another unpleasant surprise.

“Jem? Jem Collins?!”

The young son of her parents’ head groom tried to move, but subsided quickly with Murphy’s renewed growl. “Miss,” the boy pleaded. “My leg. I fear it’s broke.”

“Éasca as,” she murmured. “Do not move, Jem, or it will go worse for you.”

Murphy gave her a doleful look but sat back, the leg freed.

“Balach cróga,” she murmured the praise with a smile, ruffling the dog’s head. Then she simply pointed to Lully and the dog walked over to stand right by her.

“Now then, Jem Collins,” Georgie said, hands on hips. “What is this about?”

By now the boy was weeping outright. If she remembered, he was all of about eighteen, a good worker and as upright as an oak. She simply couldn’t understand.

“He told me….he….said that me dad would be...turned out without...reference...” He hiccuped and swiped his face with his sleeve.

“Sit up, Jem,” she said.

He did, his face down, his shoulders still shaking with suppressed sobs. Georgy could feel Adam coming to a halt behind her. She almost expected him to try to take over, but he didn’t.

“Who told you that?” she asked Jem.

Jem gave her a terrified look, but couldn’t hold her gaze. The minute he looked away, she knew. She thought she might be sick. The Marquess of Wyndham had told him that. Her father.

“But that’s absurd,” she protested. “Why would my father kidnap my child, when he would just be bringing her back to the Abbey when Jack and Olivia are there?”

She was met with another stricken silence. Georgie couldn’t breathe. She simply could not…

“You were working with someone else?” Adam asked behind her.

Jem nodded. “Carriage up by the lane. They’re to wait for me.”

Georgie didn’t move. “I see.”

She felt Adam shift, as if working up to another question. Casting a quick warning look over her shoulder, she saw him nod to her, acknowledging her authority. It was all she could do to maintain her composure. Forcing herself to calm so she didn’t further frighten Lully, she crouched before her daughter.

“Well, Sprite,” she said. “You have had an adventure. I need you to do me a big favor now. Will you take Miss Hattie up to the nursery? She has had a severe fright, you know. She thought she had lost you. You were both very brave. I imagine this man will never think to tackle two such heroines again. But Miss Hattie needs a cup of tea. I need to see to Jem here, and then I will be up, all right?”

“And Murphy? He was ‘mazing!”

“He was indeed. We shall have cook find him an excellent bone. But I need to borrow him for a few minutes.”

“We will at that,” she heard from behind her in Mrs. Prince’s gruff tones.

The tableau held until Lully, hand clutched in Hattie’s, cleared the garden gate. Left behind, Murphy whined, but a hand on his head settled him. Then, pulling another calming breath, Georgie turned back to business.

“Can I be of some help?” the duke asked.

“Yes, please,” she said, attention still on Jem. “Come with me on my errand. Young Tom, I am not going to ask where you got yon blunderbuss. Is it loaded?”

“It is, ma’am.”

“Then please hand it to Peter Miller for the moment. Peter, I need you and one other person to sneak up on that carriage and hold it til we can get there, please.”

Peter Miller, Jack’s bluff, white-haired and broad-shouldered stableman, gathered the blunderbuss into his meaty hands. “My pleasure, ma’am.”

He pointed to another groom and off the two melted into the trees in the direction of the village lane. Georgy battled an overwhelming urge to clutch the duke’s hand for support, reassurance. The next question she must ask was the most difficult she thought she ever would.

“You were not to bring Lully back to Wyndham Abbey, Jem,” she said. “Were you?”

He began to weep again. “I’m that sorry, miss.”

“It’s all right. It is not your fault. Where were you to go?”

“I don’t know that, just that another coach was to be waiting somewhere on the North Road near Grantham.”