When she entered the room, Amy had no doubt that she’d found the woman she sought. Though her hair was silver grey, Mrs Lovell had the same high cheekbones and piercing, dark eyes as her son. But there was also the faint cloud of sadness that she sometimes saw when Ben bothered to lower his guard. There was a wistfulness about this woman that spoke to a lost time that could never be regained.
‘Miss Summoner?’ Mrs Lovell greeted her with courtesy, but was obviously surprised by an unannounced visit from a total stranger.
‘Mrs Lovell.’ What was one supposed to say at a time like this? And would his mother even welcome the visit? ‘I am a friend of your son.’ It was not quite true, but it was ever so much easier than the truth.
But it was enough. Before she could say another word, the woman rushed to her side, reaching to take her hands. ‘You know my Benjamin? Do you have word from him? Was there a message?’
The look in response to the slight negative shake of Amy’s head was more desperate than she could have imagined.
‘It has been so long,’ she whispered, closing her eyes, as if in prayer. ‘Is he well?’
‘He is fine,’ Amy added quickly. By the sudden, relieved slump of the older woman’s shoulders, it appeared she had been worried that Amy had come to deliver news of his death.
‘He is a great man in London. He is welcome in the best homes and has many friends.’
Mrs Lovell squeezed her hands in gratitude, so moved that she could hardly speak. Then she whispered, ‘Tell me of him. Tell me everything. When did you see him? How did he look?’ She was clearly hungry for any scrap of information.
‘I saw him just last night,’ she admitted, hoping that her face did not reveal how it had been when they parted. ‘It was at a house party in his home in Kew. He is in excellent health, wealthy, well mannered and well respected. He is the most handsome man in London.’ And now she had been too effusive in her praise. She wet her lips, embarrassed to go on. ‘He is engaged to my sister.’
‘Oh.’ Mrs Lovell gave her a slow, probing look, as though reassessing everything she had suspected about the visit and Amy’s reason for making it. ‘But more importantly, is he happy?’
‘He’s not.’ It was the one question she was sure she knew the answer to.
‘Oh, dear,’ the other woman murmured. ‘Oh, dear. I knew, from the first moment that the Duke and his lascivious young wife got their claws in him that it would end in tears.’ Mrs Lovell shook her head.
Amy held her hands and led her to sit on the sofa by the fire. ‘He has told me only the most basic facts. But he sent me to you to learn the rest.’
‘He was a beautiful boy.’ She shook her head again. ‘He was not even eighteen, when that she-devil first saw him. The Duke was away in London, with friends of his own.’ She wrinkled her nose. ‘He was no better than his wife and some might say worse.’
‘He had mistresses?’ Amy said, eyes wide.
The woman nodded. ‘And no interest in his duchess after the first boy was born.’
‘So she took a lover.’
Mrs Lovell shook her head in regret. ‘At first, he would come home from the manor with gold in his pocket and a smile on his face.’ Her face contorted with the shame of the memory. ‘I took the money he offered. His father died before Ben could learn a trade and left us with nothing. What was I to do?’
‘You had no choice,’ Amy agreed.
‘But then the visits became longer and longer. And when the Duke returned, rather than putting a stop to it, he encouraged it.’
‘He befriended him,’ Amy said.
‘He called him son.’ Mrs Lovell’s eyes narrowed in loathing. ‘Andrew Lovell was a good man. An honest man. When I heard that Ben was claiming that old reprobate as father, I gave him the lecture he deserved. And rather than beg forgiveness for his proud ways, he moved to the great house and did not come back.’ By the time she had finished, tears of regret were running down the older woman’s face.
‘And the Duke allowed him to live there, with his family.’ She offered the woman her handkerchief.
‘They kept my son like a pet. And when I saw him after that, he was riding through the village in the Duke’s carriage, dressed like a gentleman. Or side by side on horseback with that red-headed succubus of a duchess, talking French and laughing at her jokes.’ She gave a shudder of distaste. ‘No matter how hard he laughed, I could see he was not happy. But when he saw me...’ She flinched again. ‘He looked right through me.’
‘And he did not come home, even after the old Duke died?’ He must have known how he’d hurt her. How could he have left his mother to suffer?
She shook her head. ‘By then, it was too late. After what they gave him, he was too good to come home to me.’
‘I am sure it was not that,’ Amy said and paused, remembering the bleakness in his voice as he had told her his story. ‘I think he was ashamed.’
‘I would have forgiven him for what he had done,’ Mrs Lovell said, her lip trembling. ‘And I did not care what people might say, when they saw us together.’
‘What did they say to you?’