A Daring Liaison(30)

“No. I have been thinking about your concern that the answer to this mystery could lie in your past. I’ve come to ask you what you remember.”

She looked down at the fire. “I do not recall a past, Mr. Hunter. My earliest memories are of seeing Aunt Caroline for the first time and being terrified. I was just a toddler, you see, and did not understand her disfigurement. I thought she was a monster, and when I was taken away with her, I...well, I cried.”

He recalled seeing the vivid scars on Lady Caroline’s face through the veil she wore, so he could imagine the effect it had had on a small child. He hadn’t been terrified, but he’d been curious. “Did she ever speak of her injury?”

“Never. I asked once, when I was a bit older, but she struck me and told me to never mention it again. I did not.” Her hand rose to her cheek as if she could still feel the sting.

“You frequently refer to her as your aunt, yet she was your guardian rather than a blood relation, was she not?”

She nodded. “Though she was the only mother I ever knew, she had no wish for me to take her name. She said I was born a Carson and should remain so until marriage. And I was a bit old to start calling her mama at that point. We were content with things the way they were.”

He did not know whether to feel sorry for the lost child she had been, or to be envious of the peace and solitude of such a life. He had a picture in his mind of two women living quietly in the country, without expectations, without intrigue or drama. That is, until Lady Caroline decided it was time for her ward to marry.

“Do you recall them? Or anything about them?”

“My parents?” She took a sip of her sherry and looked thoughtfully into the fire. “Just what Aunt Caroline told me. My father was a naval officer and my mother had come from a good family. Aunt Caroline met her through mutual friends and they struck up a friendship at once. When my mother married, Aunt Caroline stood up with them and even became my godmother when I was christened. My father died first, when his ship went down in a Channel storm, and my mother died several months later. I was given to a foundling home while the hospital searched for any remaining family. When there was none, they took Aunt Caroline’s name from the parish baptismal register and notified her.”

“And this took, what, two, three years?”

“Yes. Aunt Caroline told me I was no better than a savage when she rescued me. Truly, I have no clear memories of my own. I cannot imagine what my life would have been like had she not come for me.”

“Where was that? Kent?”

“Cornwall. A village called Mousehole.”

Mousehole. The far end of England. A village of pirates and wreckers. The nearest naval garrison to that godforsaken place was in Plymouth. If she’d been taken from Plymouth to Mousehole, then someone had wanted her lost forever. But who, damn it? And why?

He’d send Richardson to Kent tomorrow. If he learned nothing, he’d send him to Cornwall. If anyone could ferret out the truth, he could.

“And that is all you remember?”

She nodded and her smile was sad. “I do not even have a likeness of them, though Aunt Caroline told me I resemble my mother. If there were ever portraits, they were stolen by authorities or the foundling home. Aunt Caroline said they were all scoundrels, every one.” She clasped her hands together and sat forward in her chair. “Do you really think this is important?”

“You are the common link between your husbands, Mrs. Huffington. If these incidents are not coincidental, then I’ve come to believe it is your past we must look into.”

“I was a penniless orphan, Mr. Hunter. What could I have worth killing for?”

“You were a penniless orphan. From the moment Lady Caroline Betman made you her heir, you could have become the object of envy or resentment.”

A frown knit faint lines between her eyebrows. “If that is so, then it is the Foxworthy brothers who bear scrutiny. They thought they were Aunt Caroline’s heirs. They have brought suit to become my conservators. Well, the eldest brother has, Walter, I believe.”

This was a surprise to Charles. He did not like surprises. “And who, perchance, are they?” He placed his glass on the side table before he could snap the fragile stem.

“Distant cousins of my aunt. I do not think she liked them, since she did not mention them in her will, nor did she ever invite them to visit. Truly, I would not know them if they knocked upon my door.”

“And they would inherit the bulk of the Betman fortune should something happen to you?”