Amanda Scott - [Dangerous 02] (49 page)

Edythe said grandly, “Indeed, Duke, we were certain, after so tiresome a day, that you would prefer a smaller company and some peaceful tranquility.”

“I’m easy to please, madam,” Wellington said. He nodded to Alfred and bowed over Edythe’s outstretched hand, but Charley observed that he did not kiss it. Easy to please or not, the Duke’s interest did not include females of Edythe’s stamp.

“I fear you find me still in some distress, Duke,” Edythe said, dabbing her lips with a lacy handkerchief. “So upsetting to see our pretty ceremony spoiled.”

“Look at it this way, madam,” Wellington said. “Many prettier ceremonies may lie ahead, but none, I venture to say, will be as memorable as this one today.”

“Very true,” Edythe said. “Won’t you take one of those wing chairs near the fire, Duke? They are quite the most comfortable in the room. Charlotte, do sit down. His Grace cannot sit until we do, after all. And Letty, dear, run away upstairs to the nursery now with the other children. Good gracious me, if you haven’t brought that heathenish animal inside with you! What were you thinking? Alfred, tell her to take it directly outside again!”

Since Letty looked mutinous, Charley said, “If you will ring for Jago, Cousin Edythe, I believe he will be quite willing to look after Jeremiah. As for sending Letty to the nursery—”

“Must forgive me, Mrs. Tarrant,” Wellington said, cutting in smoothly. “Afraid I took the extraordinary liberty of inviting Lady Letitia to sit at my right hand tonight at your table. Knew you’d be on my left, of course, but I’m acquainted with Lady Letitia’s father, you see. He served as one of my brigade majors at Waterloo. Captain Lord Gideon Deverill he was then. Saw him now and again on the Continent—his charming wife, too—but this is the first time I’ve had the honor to meet his little daughter. Hope she’ll tell me what Gideon’s been up to since I last clapped eyes on him.”

Charley could see that Edythe was struggling to overcome indignation, and taking pity on her, she said, “I’ll find Jago, Cousin Edythe, and take Letty upstairs to tidy up. Where shall I find Grandmama and Great-Aunt Ophelia?”

“In Lady St. Merryn’s sitting room, I believe,” Edythe replied faintly. “We dine in fifteen minutes, Charlotte, so please don’t dawdle.”

Letty said happily to the Duke, “We won’t be long, sir.”

Chucking her under the chin, Wellington said, “See that you aren’t, my dear. I’ll be counting the minutes.”

Charley was afraid that last exchange might prove too much for Edythe’s tattered dignity. But as she swept Letty out of the room, she heard the woman say in much her customary way, “Won’t you tell us all about your Catholic Emancipation, Duke? I own, I find it difficult to understand how that astonishing law came to pass.”

Outside the drawing room with the doors safely shut, Letty gurgled with laughter. “What a thing for His Grace to say to me! Cousin Charley, am I really going to dine with the grownups?”

“You are, darling, so we must find Jago to look after Jeremiah, and then you must tidy yourself as quickly as ever you can. His Grace ought not to have said such an improper thing to you, of course, but I daresay that with only Alfred and Edythe and his own few people to talk to, he really will be counting the minutes.”

Antony and Harry Livingston had not arrived when Charley and Letty returned to the drawing room just before Medrose announced that dinner was served, but Rockland and Elizabeth had joined the group, along with Lady St. Merryn, Miss Davies, and Lady Ophelia. When the Duke offered his arm to a beaming Edythe, Lady Ophelia took advantage of the opportunity to say in an undertone to Charley, “Do you really think it wise to allow the child to join us?”

“We’ve not much choice, ma’am, for Wellington himself arranged it,” Charley said, “but have no fear. Letty has often dined in distinguished company, you know.”

“More distinguished than this, for that matter,” Lady Ophelia said with a sniff.

“Aunt Ophelia, what a thing to say!”

“I did not mean Wellington, for goodness’ sake. Not that I hold with his stand on Reform. A woman would deal much better with that, but he has done well enough supporting Peel on his Police Bill, and he
is
the Prime Minister, after all.”

“Quite, ma’ am,” Charley said swiftly, with a warning glance in the direction of Miss Davies, who was near enough to overhear. It was doubtful that she had done so, however, since her attention, as always, centered on Lady St. Merryn’s comfort.

Their numbers were uneven, for no one had known how many members of the Duke’s retinue would join him, and the number of ladies was limited. In the end, fifteen covers sufficed. The place at Alfred’s left and the one on Charley’s right remained unoccupied, awaiting Antony and Mr. Livingston. Lady St. Merryn sat at Alfred’s right.

Conversation continued sporadically while two footmen served the meal, and Jago took advantage of a surge in the general chatter to inform Charley that Jeremiah was contentedly exploring a bowl of his favorite fruits and nuts in the housekeeper’s room. When Medrose caught Jago’s eye, the footman straightened abruptly, saying, “Will you have a bit of the dressed crab, madam?”

“Thank you,” Charley said, smiling at him.

She could see that although Wellington did not neglect his hostess, he turned more frequently to Letty, and when one of those unexpected silences occurred that strikes every group from time to time, Letty’s voice sounded clearly. “But you never explained, sir, how a person can know
when
it is seemly to laugh, and when not.”

With everyone clearly listening, Wellington winked at the child and said, “I wouldn’t advise you to laugh in church, my dear.”

“No, certainly not,” Letty said, giving him a look of disapproval. “I thought you would understand me better than that.”

“Letitia, that will do,” Alfred said blightingly.

“Nonsense,” Wellington said. “I began this. Let her go on.”

“I just wondered,” Letty said patiently, “how one can know when laughter is seemly again after such an event as we witnessed today. Or after any death. I have observed some people—females in particular—who refuse to laugh for fully a year after someone dies. Is that not excessive?”

“Yes, yes, certainly,” Wellington said, watching her now with a fascinated eye.

“Then is six months of gloom not also excessive?”

“Lady Letitia,” Wellington said, smiling, “I cannot say how much is enough or not enough. What I can say, sincerely, is that it is most unfortunate that by the time you are old enough to accept suitors, I shall be far too old to be one of them.”

“That is not a proper answer, sir,” Letty said with another of her direct looks. “Moreover, you are already married, are you not?”

“Good gracious,” Edythe exclaimed, “what will the child say next? Certainly His Grace is married, miss. He had the honor to marry Miss Kitty Pakenham, Lord Longford’s daughter, some twenty-three years ago. She is said to have been deep in love with His Grace, too. So romantic I always thought it, although people do say—”

“For mercy’s sake, be silent, Edythe,” Lady Ophelia said tartly. “You don’t know the first thing about His Grace’s marriage, and to be offering it up like another course to be digested with dinner is the height of bad manners. You make me blush, and I can tell you, with all that I have seen in my ninety years, that takes some doing.”

“Well, I declare, ma’am, I cannot think what you mean! To have allowed that child to chatter on at the poor Duke until she must have bored him senseless, and then to reprove
me!
What
can
you be thinking?”

To Charley’s relief, Medrose took that moment to announce wooden-faced from the doorway, “Lord Antony Foxearth and the Honorable Mr. Livingston, my lady.”

Glancing toward them, undisturbed by the exchange that had just occurred, Wellington said, “Well, lads, did you discover the whole yet?”

“We may never know the whole truth,” Antony said, taking the empty chair next to Charley and waving Harry to the one by Alfred. “We did find a journal that appears to be Gabriel’s, indicating that he was even more adamantly opposed than we thought to the proposed civilian police force. We brought the journal along for you to see. If we are interpreting correctly the bits we have read, it was Gabriel himself who sent to warn you of an assassination plot.”

In the midst of the general consternation stirred by Antony’s words, Rockland exclaimed, “Did he, by Jove? But why the devil would he do such a thing if the plot was of his own devising?”

Antony exchanged a look with the Duke, and Charley recalled as he did that the others knew nothing about his mission in Cornwall. When they had fallen silent again, he said quietly, “It appears that he did so merely to convince His Grace that he should have a military escort to protect him during his visit here.” To Wellington, he added, “At that time, sir, he was sincerely worried about your safety, a concern that later apparently included fear that certain rumors he heard of a plot to wreck a merchant ship might cover a more deadly plot against you.”

Harry Livingston said, “We think he told Tony about those rumors, hoping Tony might carry enough influence with county authorities to demand that they bring in the military at last. It evidently had escaped his understanding before then that you, sir, would dislike such an action very much, but at some point he learned that you would.”

“Good mercy,” Charley said, “I told him that.” Looking at Wellington, she added contritely, “I tried to explain to him your views about the military being more suited to violence than peacekeeping. But how,” she demanded, turning to Antony, “could he have thought the wrecking scheme was really a plot against His Grace?”

“He points out in the journal that, had Michael’s gang wrecked Wellington’s ship, they might have killed all aboard to justify scavenging the cargo, using that old legal precedent he once told us about. He said they could have claimed later that they had mistaken the ship for a merchantman and never known who was aboard.” Turning to the Duke again, he said, “We were right to think it was learning of his daughter’s death that turned him into a fanatic, sir. He mentions several times that he had warned you of the danger, almost as if, having done so, it was quite fair for him to attack you. Even then,” he added with a wry look, “he seemed quite remorseful over the need to assassinate you. Evidently, he had come to believe that an important figure had to die to prove that the military is the only force strong enough to control real crime.”

Over the indignant comments that followed, Wellington’s voice carried calmly when he said, “But you, Tony, have proved Gabriel wrong. You showed clearly that an unarmed civilian officer can protect the populace more efficiently than the army can. The number killed today—and last night, too—might well have been enormous had the military dealt with them. Instead a gang of louts are on their way to the Assizes, and the only one killed was the assassin himself.”

Elizabeth said quietly, “It seems very sad to me. Though I could not care for him as he clearly hoped I might, I did think he was a good man.”

“He
was
fundamentally good,” Antony told her. “Despite the events of the past week, he did many good things for Cornwall, and he was a good mayor for his town. The journal contained no entry for yesterday or the day before, but the last pages are filled with guilt over his daughter’s death. Evidently, he had accepted without question Michael’s account of Annie running away to London, just as he had accepted their rules of apprenticeship. He had even been a little ashamed of Annie, feeling that she had not lived up to the standard set by his late father and himself. But his ramblings evolved into a fury against what he perceived as a lack of protection against criminals, a lack that, in his mind, had actually resulted in his daughter’s murder.”

Harry Livingston said, “Gabriel disliked Michael Peryllys even before he learned of Annie’s murder, and seems to have suspected him of leading the coastal gang. Tony and I thought that somehow Gabriel might even have initiated the plot last night, in hopes of catching Peryllys and his men in the act.”

Charley said thoughtfully, “Still, they did catch Michael Peryllys, and if Mr. Gabriel had not revealed what he knew, Michael might still be at large.”

Smiling at her, Antony said, “That’s true. The only part that did not come from Gabriel was the information about the merchantman being the real target. I doubt that we will ever know the whole truth about his activities, but if I had paid more heed to the man, I might at least have recognized the real danger sooner.”

“Don’t beat yourself for that, lad,” Wellington said. “Eat your dinner now, for you are well behind the rest of us.” Turning to his hostess, he made a quiet remark, and following his lead, the others lowered their voices to a more formal level.

Antony leaned close to Charley and murmured, “I collect from their silence on the subject that you’ve refrained from saying you once suggested Gabriel as a villain.”

Astonished, she said, “I certainly never thought him capable of such a fearsome act as he attempted today. I only ever mentioned him in the context of wrongdoing because of those old tales about that mayor of St. Ives who connived with smugglers. Did Gabriel really think that by murdering heaven-only-knows-how-many people, he could bring peace to Cornwall? He must have gone mad.”

“We think he did,” Antony said quietly.

Polite conversation rumbled around them again until suddenly Rockland said across the table, “I say, Foxearth, I’ve been thinking about all you’ve said, and it seems to me you know the devil of a lot about this business. Did you have all that from this journal you say you found in Lostwithiel? And how is it His Grace calls you Tony?”

In the silence that followed, Charley heard a sharp intake of breath from Antony.

Wellington said, “I say, Tarrant, I believe in taking the shortest route in a charge, and I think you must be the chap who wrote the War Office some weeks ago, inquiring into the whereabouts of one Antony Tarrant, late of His Majesty’s army. Ain’t that so?”

Taken aback, Alfred looked for a moment as if he would deny all knowledge of such a letter, but the Duke and every other person in the room looked directly at him.