Read Chapter 32: The Debt Comes Due

The bell over Mrs. Hartley’s door had barely stopped swinging when Tom shoved past the woman at the threshold, his bandaged hand pressed against his ribs like a shield against the world. Élodie followed three steps behind, her bonnet still tied from the street, watching the color drain from his face as he stared at the man standing in the parlor.

Alfred Marchand was thinner than the photograph on Tom’s dresser had suggested, hollow-cheeked and raw-eyed, his fine coat hanging loose on shoulders that had once filled a cavalry uniform. He rose from the horsehair settee with the awkward deference of a man who had stopped expecting welcome.

“Tommy,” he said. The word came out cracked. “I thought you were dead. I thought you were at the bottom with the rest of them.”

“I was,” Tom said. His voice was flat, dangerous. “I was in the water for three hours. Where were you?”

Alfred’s jaw worked. “Boat nine. They took women and children first, and then they just—they pulled me over the rail. I didn’t choose it, Tommy. I swear to you, I didn’t choose it over anyone.”

“You chose to let me believe you were dead.” Tom stepped forward, and Élodie saw the tremor in his shoulders, the way his good hand curled into a fist at his side. “You chose to let Marie grieve a husband who was drinking himself into the sea in New York while she—” He stopped, swallowed. “You chose to let me find out from a stratosphere-riding busybody in Brooklyn that my brother was a coward and a blackmailer.”

Alfred’s face went gray. “It’s not what you think.”

“Then tell me what it is.” Tom’s voice cracked on the last word. “Tell me why you made Marie’s life a misery. Tell me why you held her letters over her head like a whip. Tell me why you—” He broke off, pressing his palm against his injured ribs, and Élodie moved without thinking, her hand finding his elbow.

“Sit down,” she said quietly. “Both of you. This hallway is not the place for a reckoning.”

Mrs. Hartley hovered in the kitchen doorway, her mouth a tight line of disapproval, but she said nothing as Élodie guided Tom to the settee and took the chair opposite. Alfred remained standing, twisting his cap between his fingers like a penitent before a judge.

“I was in debt,” Alfred said finally. “Before the voyage, I’d been in debt for three years. Gambling, drink, a woman who bled me dry in Liverpool. I owed money to men who break legs, Tommy. Men who don’t stop at legs.”

“So you married an heiress and expected her fortune to save you.”

“I didn’t know she was an heiress.” Alfred’s laugh was bitter, broken. “God help me, I didn’t. Her brother was a professor at Cambridge. Respectable, comfortable, but not wealthy. When the lawyer came to me with the marriage contract, I thought I was gaining a wife and a modest annuity. I didn’t know her husband had left her a fortune in trust.”

“Her husband,” Tom repeated. “Louis’ father.”

“Joseph Whitfield.” Alfred spat the name. “He was older, wealthy, and cold as charity. Marie was nineteen when she married him. He treated her like a possession, and when she ran back to her brother, he…” Alfred trailed off, looking away. “He sent men after her. She was terrified. That’s why she agreed to marry me—a blind, stupid refuge, and I was blind and stupid enough to take her.”

Élodie felt the pieces click together like a lock turning. “The blackmail,” she said. “It was Whitfield who blackmailed you.”

Alfred’s eyes flicked to her, surprised, as if he’d forgotten she was in the room. “You know about that.”

“Elise told us. Before she—before she disappeared again.” Tom leaned forward, his voice rough. “She said you were being squeezed by a man who knew something. She thought it was a lover’s scandal. We both thought you’d found a mistress.”

“It was Whitfield.” Alfred’s hands shook as he raised them, palms open. “He found out about the debts. All of them. And he came to me before the wedding and said—he said I could have Marie and her money, but the child would remain his. He had papers. Legal papers, naming me as an unfit guardian, naming himself as the boy’s legitimate father. He said if I ever tried to take Louis, or if Marie ever tried to claim him, he’d destroy us both.”

Élodie’s breath caught. “The duplicate locket.”

Alfred stared at her. “How do you know about that?”

“A guess,” she said, though it wasn’t. The Whitfield woman had been too confident, too certain of her claim. “He has proof of the boy’s parentage. Something that would stand up in court.”

“He has a second locket,” Alfred confirmed. “Same as the one Marie wears. Inside, there’s a lock of hair and a photograph of Marie when she was carrying the boy. The marriage certificate, too. He had it copied and witnessed. He can prove Louis is his son in any court in New York.”

Tom’s jaw tightened. “Then why does he need the children now? If he has legal claim, why take them by force?”

“Because the legal claim is worthless if Marie is dead.” Alfred’s voice dropped. “Whitfield’s marriage to Marie was annulled after she fled. He has proof of parentage, but not of marriage. Without Marie alive to confirm the annulment was never finalized, the boy falls under her brother’s guardianship. Whitfield needs the child to force her hand—to make her come out of hiding and validate his claim.”

Élodie’s mind raced. “So the children are leverage. He doesn’t want them—he wants her.”

“He wants revenge,” Alfred said. “But yes. They’re leverage.” He paused, and something shifted in his face. “And they’re being moved. Tonight or tomorrow. I overheard the men who were sent for the Whitfields—they said the house in Brooklyn was burned. They’re moving the children to a secluded estate in Connecticut.”

Tom was on his feet before Alfred finished speaking. “Where? What estate?”

“I don’t know the name.” Alfred’s voice cracked. “I swear, Tommy, I don’t. But the men mentioned a place called Hartwell. An estate outside Hartford, owned by a cousin of Whitfield’s first wife. They said there’s a gala tomorrow night—a cover. No one will question wagons moving through the grounds while half of society is inside drinking champagne.”

Élodie stood, her heart hammering against her ribs. “Then we have to go. Now. Before they move the children again.”

Tom turned to her, and for a moment, she saw something raw and desperate in his eyes. “You don’t have to—” He stopped, shook his head. “You don’t owe me anything. You’ve already risked everything.”

“The children are not a debt,” Élodie said. “And neither are you.” She looked at Alfred, who was watching them both with a hollow, haunted expression. “You know the estate. You know the grounds. You will tell us everything you know, and then you will stay here, under this roof, until we return or until the police come for you—whichever comes first.”

Alfred nodded, defeated. “There’s a stable at the back,” he said, his voice barely a whisper. “The children are kept in the loft above it. There’s a false wall behind the tack—you can reach it from the outside, if you know where to press.” He met Tom’s eyes. “I’m sorry, Tommy. I was a coward. I let him own me. But I never wanted to hurt Marie. I never wanted any of this.”

Tom stared at his brother for a long moment, and then he turned away, his voice flat. “We leave within the hour. Pack what you can, Élodie. Heaven knows we don’t have money for finery, but we’ll need to look like we belong.”

Élodie climbed the stairs to her room with the weight of his words pressing on her chest. She had no money, no papers, no history beyond a dead woman’s name. The only thing she owned of value was her mother’s Bible—and that was already gone, traded for the papers that had bought her this far.

She opened the wardrobe, surveyed the plain wool dresses within, and began to plan.