Beneath a Silent Moon (48 page)

"I'm not a traitor."

"That doesn't precisely answer the question."

"The question is a bit of damned impertinence I shouldn't have to listen to from my godson."

"Do you deny you were part of an organization called the Elsinore League?"

"I could deny it if I wanted, but I see no reason to do so." Glenister spread his fingers on the sofa arm. "Kenneth and I were certainly never lovers in any form of the word, and we never did anything to betray our country. The Elsinore League were a sort of club your father and I formed at Oxford."

"For what purpose?"

Glenister turned his head and let his gaze drift over a Fragonard oil depicting a young man about to unlace a young woman's bodice in a garden lush with ripening spring. "All the amusements one might expect of young men with healthy appetites."

"So you chose the name Elsinore because something was rotten at its core?"

"Let us say because it seemed to our undergraduate ears to symbolize indulgence in vice. We used to have house parties. At one or the other of my estates. Here after your father bought the property."

"I think I found the rooms Father built for the purpose. In the caves off the secret passage."

Glenister's brows lifted. "You're quicker than I thought. I suppose we should have been grateful you never stumbled across them as a boy. Though the door has a lock. Rather a good one."

"I have a set of picklocks. Rather good ones. Not all the League's members were English, were they?"

"Some of our Oxford friends were foreign born. We met others when we made the Grand Tour who became part of the Elsinore League. As might be expected, they ended up on various sides in France in the war. But neither Kenneth nor I ever did anything to betray our country."

"Were any of your fellow Elsinore League members involved in the French Revolution in any way?"

"As far as I know, lad, you're by far the most radical thinker ever to grace your father's door."

"Was your brother a member of the Elsinore League?"

"Yes. But Cyril's revolutionary sentiments were too romanticized to be taken seriously. And most of the time he knew better than to drag politics into convivial gatherings."

"Was the shooting party where he died one of the Elsinore League's gatherings?"

Glenister's face twisted. "A gathering I wish to God we'd never held."

"Who else was present for it?"

"William Cathcart. Billy Gordon. Tony Craven, I think. I'm not sure of the others."

"Aunt Frances thought two of them might be French."

Glenister stood and took a turn about the hearthrug. "Yes, all right. A couple of the members had slipped over from France on one of Wheaton's smuggling runs. It was after the war started, so they had to come under assumed names. No harm in revealing the truth now, I suppose."

"What were their names?"

"Du Bretton. They were brothers."

"Aunt Frances also remembers an Irishman with cold blue eyes."

"Christ, I haven't seen some of these men in ten years. I couldn't tell you their eye color. Arthur Donnell may have been there. He was Irish."

"You're sure there wasn't another Frenchman present called Coroux?"

Glenister jammed his hands in the pockets of his dressing gown. "Never heard the name."

Charles couldn't be certain of whether or not his godfather was telling the truth. "What about the man you and Father had smuggled out of France a fortnight ago? Who was he?"

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Wheaton remembers receiving the orders quite clearly," Charles said, neglecting to add that Wheaton's account of the events had not included Glenister.

Glenister wandered over to the card table and absently turned over one of the cards. "I had nothing to do with smuggling anyone out of Paris. I don't know about your father, though I can't imagine why he would have done so."

Which meant that Glenister wasn't going to fall for the bluff. Or, just possibly, that he was telling the truth. "Do you think it's possible any of the members of the Elsinore League could be Le Faucon de Maulévrier?"

"Le who? You mean that butcher from the Revolution? My God, if that's the sort of thing Castlereagh's going about saying, he has less wit than I credited."

"You admit some of your friends ended up on the opposite side during the war. You can't know what they were all up to during the Terror."

"The era of the Revolution was our salad days when we were in closest contact."

"But you can't rule out one of your friends being Le Faucon for a certainty?"

"There's very little in life that I can rule out for a certainty. I thought you were the one who was supposed to be getting to the truth of the matter."

"I'm endeavoring to do so. What were you and my father afraid of Honoria discovering?"

Glenister stiffened. "There's no reason Honoria should have learned of any of this. Gently bred girls—young women don't concern themselves with such matters."

"One of the things we seem to have established today is that Honoria didn't play by the rules. She was asking questions about you and Father and possibly about the Elsinore League. She thought the whole thing had something to do with her father's death."

Glenister stared down at the card clutched between his fingers. "Cyril's death was a tragic accident. An accident for which I blame myself, but only because as his elder brother I should have looked out for him. As an elder brother yourself, I'd expect you to understand."

Charles saw the accusation in Gisèle's eyes in the lodge kitchen and the horror beyond her years when she'd looked down at their father's body. "I understand that. It doesn't explain what you were afraid of Honoria learning."

"Honoria liked to pry into things. Sometimes I think she imagined things that weren't there. Precisely as you're doing now."

"How can you be sure I'm imagining things if you're not aware of the full story yourself?"

The muscles in Glenister's neck tensed. He dropped the card as though it burned him. "That's enough, Charles. I'm going to bury Honoria tomorrow beside my brother. And then I'm taking Evie and my disgraceful elder son and my even more disgraceful younger son and going back to London."

Charles stepped between Glenister and the door. "Last night you wanted to know who killed Honoria. You don't care anymore?"

"Of course I want to know. But not—"

"Yes, sir?" Charles said into the silence.

"It's been twenty-four hours since Honoria's death, you've learned nothing, and someone else has been murdered."

"I've learned a great deal. Just not who killed Honoria."

"Nor will you, if you waste your time asking impertinent questions." Glenister stepped past Charles.

Charles grasped his wrist. "Do you really think David and his father will let the question of who killed Honoria drop? Do you think I'll let my father's killer go unpunished?"

Glenister pulled away from Charles's grip. "Such a display of filial devotion. Kenneth would be impressed. Especially since he wasn't even—"

"Remotely fond of me," Charles finished for him.

Glensiter stared at Charles for a long moment. "Quite."

But they both knew that that wasn't what he had been about to say.

As most of the house party knew of Kenneth Fraser's death, Charles decided it would be better to wake the others—Lady Frances, David, Simon, Evie, Val, and Quen—and tell them as well. Once again they gathered in the Gold Saloon, supplied with plentiful coffee. Mélanie presided over the coffee urn, still dressed in her breeches and grubby coat, uncombed hair spilling over her shoulders, a bruise beginning to show on her jawline. She managed to look as in command of the scene as if she wore muslin and pearls and white gloves.

The company greeted the news of Kenneth Fraser's death with the numb horror of those who have been half prepared for some other calamity to befall and are only rather surprised that this is the form it took.

"But—" Evie stared round the room as if her brain had ceased to function. "Did the same person who killed Honoria kill Mr. Eraser?"

"Not necessarily," Charles said. He was standing in front of the fireplace, where he had stood with his father and Glenister and David less than twenty-four hours before.

David stared into his coffee cup as if he wasn't sure what it held. "Surely it's stretching coincidence for the two murders to be unrelated."

"Probably," Charles agreed. "But that doesn't mean the same person killed both of them."

Lady Frances fingered a fold of her dressing gown. Her eyes were like glass. "The bastard. The bloody, careless, inconsiderate bastard. He was always miserable at goodbyes." She dashed a hand across her eyes. She was, Charles realized, the first of them, including himself and Gisèle, to express any grief over Kenneth Fraser's death.

Quen leaned forward, chin resting on his clasped hands. "So what happens now?"

"Honoria's funeral will take place in the morning as planned." Glenister spoke before Charles could do so. He was standing by the windows, as far from Charles as the width of the room allowed. "Then you and I and Val and Evie will return to London."

"
What
?" David sprang to his feet. "We had an agreement, sir. No one leaves until we know who killed Honoria."

"This changes things. There may be danger."

"You're turning tail and running because you're afraid?"

"Of course not. But I've already lost one niece. I have to think of Evelyn—"

"Evie can return to London with her maid if you wish. But so help me, sir, if you leave with this matter unresolved—"

"You'll what?" Glenister surveyed the younger man, gaze cold with contempt.

"I'll refer the entire matter to Bow Street."

"You wouldn't dare."

"Try me."

"I mink your father will have something to say about that."

"My father will want to know who killed Honoria. And why his co-guardian didn't stay to face the consequences."

"Your father won't want his niece's name dragged through the mud any more than I do. We've already risked—" Glenister let his gaze rest on Val for a brief, angry moment. "I'll call on your father as soon as we return to town."

"No."

The word, spoken with quiet emphasis, came not from David but from Quen. He, too, was on his feet, staring at his father.

Glenister's gaze rotated slowly in his eldest son's direction. "No, what?"

"I can't stop you from leaving, sir, but I have no intention of doing so myself until we learn what happened to Honoria. And to Mr. Fraser."

"Quentin—"

"I'm not leaving."

"Nor am I." Evie went to stand beside Quen.

"Nor I." Val got to his feet as well. He seemed rather surprised at himself for having spoken.

"Right" Quen reached for Evie's hand and cast a brief glance at his brother. "We're all staying. Assuming Charles will have us. It's his house now."

The words brought Charles up short. In the midst of everything else, he hadn't yet considered this. "Lord Glenister knows that I'd prefer to have everyone stay."

Evie went to her uncle and took his arm. "I know you're worried after losing Honoria, Uncle Frederick, but surely the least we owe to her memory is to find out what happened. Think how shocking I'd feel if you made me the excuse for running off to London."

Evie Mortimer knew how to handle her uncle. She'd neatly undercut the one creditable argument he could make for leaving. Run now and he looked like a coward. Or a guilty man.

Lady Frances pressed her hands over her lap. "I suppose you want to know where we all were last night."

"It's possible Father was killed by someone from outside the house, but yes, I do."

Not surprisingly, they'd all been alone in their rooms. That much established, the company scattered to dress for the day. Mélanie walked over to Charles, put out her hand, and then dropped it to her side without touching him. "David's going to have more questions."

Charles nodded. "I think it's time for another council, one that includes Gisèle and Tommy. You talk to them. I want to go through Father's papers before anyone has a chance to tamper with them."

"Charles—"

He summoned up the best approximation of a reassuring smile he could muster. "I'll take Andrew with me. He'll make sure I don't have a nervous collapse. And he knows the accounts better than anyone."

She scanned his face for a moment with a gaze like a lancet. Then she nodded and went to gather up the others.

He and Andrew walked to the study in silence. Charles struck a spark to the Chinese porcelain lamp on the desk and turned it up so the light fell over the tortoiseshell marquetry and gilded green leather of the desktop. His father's desk. His father who was lying wrapped in a coat on the library sofa, who would never again flay him with his tongue or cut him with a cold stare or slice the ground from beneath his feet with the lift of his eyebrow. Or answer any of his questions.

Charles pressed his shaking hands down on the desktop and turned to look at Andrew. There was at least one dilemma revealed tonight that he could sort out. "Andrew. What Quen said—it's true. Father never got round to changing the entail, so Dunmykel's mine."

"Yes, of course, as it should be."

"And more important, I'm Gisèle's guardian."

Andrew tugged open a desk drawer and took out a stack of papers. "That's good. She needs you. She has for a long while."

"Yes. And while I don't know her as well as I should, a few things were painfully obvious tonight. My sister is head over heels in love with you. And though you seem to have managed to convince her that you don't return the sentiment, you can't deceive your oldest friend. I can't imagine a man I'd rather have as a brother-in-law."

Andrew listened to his words with a face that was as closed and set as the fifteenth-century marble bust in the corner. Then he slammed his hand down on the desk, spattering ink from the ink pot and knocking the penknife onto the floor. "Jesus. You really don't know, do you?"

"Know what?" Charles bent down to retrieve the penknife.

"There's no reason you should, I suppose. I didn't myself until—" Andrew strode across the room, gaze moving over the paneling, the curtains, the Gentileschi Cleopatra, the Fragonard oil, anywhere but Charles's face. "Gelly—Gisèle—visited Dunmkyel with Lady Frances last Christmas. She was very concerned about how the tenants had been faring since the Clearances. She put Christmas baskets together and she wanted to go with me to deliver them in person. At first I didn't think much of it, she always used to follow us about when she was a child and she was always kindhearted, when she wasn't—"