“The rescue of the girls did not hurt her finances, Olympia, as it is clear she had already gotten her payment for them,” said Brant. “The loss of the captain might be more damaging. If nothing else, it will mean she must arrange something else. I just wish I could say for certain that that will be a difficult thing for her to do.”
Quentin finished off a small cake and then shook his head. “It is a filthy trade but it has gone on forever and will continue to go on. We saved some and those we saved will be much more aware of the dangers out there. I did discover, Fieldgate, that many of the girls were taken from lands belonging to you, the Earl of Fieldgate.”
“She means to help herself to all of my people then, to treat my lands as if they are some market.” He sighed. “I had thought it was just the bastards my father bred but Thomas’s little aunt is no blood of mine. She is just a pretty young girl.”
“Pretty young girls have been victims before and will be again. That is something you will never stop. So how do you intend to stop your mother?”
The fact that none of the Wherlockes appeared horrified that a genteel woman, a mother and pillar of society, would do such things as sell children told Brant that the family had suffered. They had also seen a lot of suffering. Olympia had also been told all of that had happened when Ashton had met his Penelope and saved her from trouble.
At times Brant still reeled in shock over all his mother had done when he thought about it. He did not even wish to search for other crimes she may have committed in the past for he had too much to accept now. More horrors would surely break him. He carefully explained yet again how he was trying to soften the blow to the family for the sake of his siblings and the name of Fieldgate. With each new thing he discovered about his mother, those reasons began to look selfish and uncaring.
Quentin nodded. “You have three who have not even stepped out into the world much yet. To suffer the kind of scandal this could bring down on their heads could break them. One needs some tempering before standing straight and proud while the storm rages over your head. And your sister deserves her chance to make a good marriage.”
“Mother feels she has taken care of that by negotiating a marriage agreement with Lord Sir Horace Minden.” Brant nodded when Quentin stared at him, his eyes slowly widening. It appeared Wherlockes and their cousins the Vaughns could indeed be shocked.
“That is something you had best hurry to stop. He is filth and it is a wonder he has not been gutted before this. From all I know and have heard there is no perversion the man will not try or does not like to indulge in. I have also heard that he likes virgins because he thinks bedding them will rid him of the pox that is eating away at him.”
“Lord Fieldgate?” Pawl called from the door. “Andras Vaughn has just sent you a message. He would like to meet with you as soon as possible. Do you wish to reply? The boy he sent is waiting.” He nodded when both Brant and Olympia paled.
Shaking free of the horror of his mother selling her child to a man riddled with the pox and sensing his hopes rising, Brant went to talk to the boy Andras had sent, made sure he understood the reply, and gave him a shilling. He hurried back into the drawing room and smiled at Olympia. Perhaps matters would now begin to go their way.
“I must change and go speak with Andras,” he told her.
“Of course.” Olympia stood up and, not caring what Quentin thought, gave Brant a brief hug and a kiss on the cheek. “I will pray that this is the news you have been looking for.”
The moment Brant left and Olympia retook her seat, she could feel Quentin’s gaze on her. She idly wished she did not have the sort of family that felt it had the right to stick their long noses into all private business within the family. She could not complain too much, however, for she was guilty of that little sin herself.
“Just how good a friend is Fieldgate?” demanded Quentin.
“Do you forget that I am a baroness,” she said, ignoring his snort of laughter over her announcement, “and a widow of six and twenty? I do not believe it is necessary for you to know such things. What goes on between me and Brant is none of your concern.” The look on Quentin’s handsome face told her he was just patiently waiting for her to finish and not really listening. She wanted to hit him.
“And he has a mother who sells babies to the flesh markets.”
She sighed. There was that to consider. Her family would not be the shelter it was to all of their kin if they did not worry when one of their own became connected to such a man.
“Brant is not involved in all of that.”
“Oh, I know that. Could see that right away. He does not have that taint.”
“He would be pleased to know that as I know he worries. How could one not when it is the person who bore you? But, he will end her crimes in one way or another.”
Quentin nodded. “I could see that as well. Honest man. Good man. Also a man so stuffed with guilt that it could take form, step outside of him, and walk along his side as a brother.”