Dangerous to Kiss (3 page)

When the shock of the news had dulled, on thinking it over, he could not accept Talleyrand’s account of Gil’s murder. It was too pat, too much a coincidence. Before his death, Gil had stumbled across something significant. He’d had no proof, but he had a name for him. If he had only kept that appointment with Gil, the traitor in their midst might well have been unmasked by now, and Gil might still be alive. It was then that he began to question the note Gil had sent him canceling their appointment. Was it forged or was it genuine?

He’d made up his mind to reserve judgment until Miss Weyman arrived in England. He didn’t suspect her of anything, not then. He simply wanted to question her since she had been one of the last people to see Gil alive. He knew approximately when she would be arriving in England. This was something else Talleyrand had arranged. She and the boy had been given a safe-conduct as far as Calais. They had arrived in Dover all right, but his suspicions had taken a new twist when both Deborah Weyman and Quentin had slipped away from the escort he had provided to convey them to London. It was quite deliberate on her part, and on the boy’s too. There could be no mistake in that. His coachmen had pursued them both, but had lost them in one of Dover’s busy thoroughfares.

From that day to this, the chase was on. He might have raised the alarm and set militia from one end of the country to the other to flush her out. He had rejected that idea for only one reason. Nothing must be done that would put the boy’s life in jeopardy. A panicked woman was a dangerous woman. Quentin’s welfare and only Quentin’s welfare counted for anything now. He had one consolation. Quentin knew nothing of the danger
he was in. His willingness to go with Miss Weyman convinced Gray of that. He didn’t know what story she had told the boy, but he was glad, for Quentin’s sake, that he was not going in fear of his life.

Before charting his course, he had weighed everything in the balance. At first, he’d taken no one into his confidence except the coachmen she’d run from in Dover, and they had been well paid to keep their mouths shut. Anticipating that she would demand ransom for the boy, and fearing that if word of the abduction got out she would be scared away, he had let it be known that Miss Weyman and his ward had arrived safely in England and were now secluded in one of his distant estates. When a week had passed, and no ransom was demanded, he had not known what to think. If she didn’t want money, what did she want?

He’d gone over it in his mind a thousand times. The only other thing of value he could supply was information that she could sell to the enemy. Then why hadn’t she communicated with him? When another week went by with no word from her, he had quietly approached Lord Lawford, head of Intelligence at the War Office, and he’d put the whole matter before him. Lawford’s view, which Gray soon came to accept, was that she was holding the boy hostage for some nefarious scheme that had yet to unfold. They had to find Quentin, and soon. With this in mind, Lawford had loaned Gray his best agent, a man he trusted implicitly.

Campbell, the agent, had asked him questions he could not answer. What was Miss Weyman’s background? Who were her parents, her friends? Where was she likely to go? Who had employed her before Lord Barrington? It soon became clear that Miss Weyman was a woman of mystery. For four years she had been Quentin’s governess, yet none of Gil’s friends seemed to know anything about her. Few of them had even met her. She never ventured out in society, but kept to herself.

The next few weeks were the longest of his life. He had almost given up hope, and was on the point of making everything public, when Campbell’s report reached
him. He’d gone down to Devon to question Gil’s widow, Sophie Barrington, not openly, but posing as Miss Weyman’s long-lost cousin who had lost her direction. In the course of the conversation, he learned that Deborah Weyman had come to Quentin from a girls’ school in Bath. It wasn’t much to go on, but it was the only lead they had. What Campbell finally came up with was a certain Mrs. Deborah Mornay, a widow, newly come into Bath to take up a teaching position at Miss Hare’s School of Deportment for Young Ladies. One of the coachmen who had been at Dover to meet the girl was dispatched to help Campbell identify her. He was almost sure that Deborah Mornay and Deborah Weyman were one and the same person.

It wasn’t all good news. In fact, some of it was harrowing. The boy was no longer with her.

Becoming aware that his fingers were wrapped around his glass in a death grip, he forced himself to relax. Quentin was safe. He would stake his life on it. She would not have dragged him across the length of France only to kill him in England. It was far more reasonable to suppose that she had hidden him away somewhere close by. She couldn’t keep him with her, not now that she had taken up a position as a teacher in a girls’ school. At any rate, he had to proceed on the assumption that Quentin was safe and well. Anything else was unthinkable.

Suddenly straightening, he reached for the drawer in the small table that flanked the fireplace. Inside, he found letters written in a round, childish hand, letters from Quentin thanking him for various gifts he had sent him on his birthdays and at Christmas. For a long, long time, Gray stared at those letters. There was no need to read them. He knew them by heart. He’d read them more than a dozen times since Quentin had been abducted.

He saw now what he had not seen when he had first received them. Quentin was a lonely little boy. There were no uncles and aunts, no cousins to play with, no relatives to care for him. That’s why he and Miss Weyman had been named as Quentin’s guardians in Gil’s
will. Quentin’s only living relative was Gil’s brother, a young man who had settled in the West Indies and had hardly troubled to write to Gil in years.

The boy’s stepmother was not much better. When he’d told Sophie he thought it best for Quentin’s peace of mind if he remained quietly at his estate in Gloucestershire, she had not protested or demanded to see the boy. She would write to Quentin, she’d told him in an offhand way as she had entered the carnage that was to take her to her parents’ home in Devon. But no letters had been forwarded to him in London.

He shouldn’t judge her too harshly. Sophie was very young, and she had been married to Gil for less than a year. She and Quentin had hardly had time to get to know each other. But, damn it all, there should have been
someone
to demand access to the boy! There wasn’t a single soul, and though it suited Gray’s purposes, it also saddened him. A boy deserved better than that!

A clock chimed the hour, breaking into his reveries. Setting down his glass, he stretched, rose, and began to prowl the room. He felt like a caged tiger. What he wanted was to be off and doing. All along, he’d wanted to be in the thick of things, helping Campbell with the investigation. Lord Lawford had cautioned patience. No one knew what the woman would do if she were panicked, or whether the traitor at the Foreign Office was working hand in glove with her. He must do nothing to alert them to their danger. The time to act would come, but not yet. And because Lawford knew his business and Gray respected his opinion, he had played a waiting game.

This last month, it had been almost impossible to carry on as though nothing were happening, for by this time, they had found her. He’d forced himself to do nothing until he was sure of his ground. Now, Campbell’s part was over, and he had returned to his duties with Lord Lawford. The rest was up to him, and for what he had in mind, there were only two people he was willing to confide in. One was his brother, Nick, and the other was his brother-in-law, Lord Hartley. Nick and
Hart were already in Bath, waiting for him to arrive so that he could set things in motion.

In his mind’s eye, he reviewed the information he had received on Mrs. Mornay that had helped him devise his plan of action. She was nervous, very nervous. The position at the school was only temporary. She was seeking a position in the country with a congenial family. On every second Wednesday, without fail, Mrs. Mornay took a party of girls to Wells, to visit the famous cathedral or to do a little shopping. No other teacher from the school visited Wells. Only Mrs. Mornay.

He hoped to hell he wasn’t miscalculating. He thought about it for a moment, and his nerve steadied. The plan he had come up with posed the least threat to Quentin. At any rate, it was too late to draw back. Still, he wasn’t underestimating his adversary. Deborah Weyman had proved that she was a clever, resourceful woman. She might well be implicated in Gil’s murder.

A cold, wintry rage settled over him. Soon, very soon, Deborah Weyman would be in his power, and she would know how foolish she had been to cross swords with him.

Deborah studied her reflection in the small looking glass above her washstand, and she nodded her approval. The lady who nodded back at her appeared to be on the wrong side of thirty. Her skin, though unlined and fine-pored, had lost its first bloom of youth. The wire-rimmed spectacles added a little dignity. Her hair, what little could be seen of it for the muslin cap that was pulled low on her brow, was dull and mousy. Her high-necked, dark kerseymere gown was as drab as the rest of her. Well satisfied with what her mirror told her, Deborah quit her chamber.

In the corridor, she paused for a moment. She had learned from experience that hunching her shoulders gave her a backache. She could do nothing with her erect carriage, but there were other measures a young woman could take to add a few years. Her movements must be slow and sedate. Slow and sedate, she repeated to herself, and glided toward the stairs.

“Good morning, Sarah.”

“’Morning, Mrs. Mornay.”

“Good morning, Millicent.”

“’Morning, Mrs. Mornay.”

As she greeted the girls she met on the stairs, Deborah set her lips in a careful half-smile. As much as possible,
she tried not to smile. She had been cursed with dimples, and dimples ruined the effect she had labored so hard to achieve.

Arriving at the headmistress’s office, she knocked once before entering. She was expected. At the sight of her, Miss Hare reached for the teapot on her desk and poured Deborah a fresh cup of tea.

With Miss Hare, there was no need for pretense. “Morning, Bunny,” said Deborah, and dropped a kiss on the top of Miss Hare’s capped head before accepting the proffered cup and saucer.

The relationship between these two ladies was much more than that of employer and employee. There was real affection here, and it showed. Deborah’s childhood had not been a happy one. Miss Hare, or “Bunny” as Deborah had nicknamed her, had been the source of what little security she had known. Miss Hare had once been Deborah’s governess. Over time, she had become Deborah’s bastion, the one sure refuge in a treacherous world.

“Good morning, Deborah.” Miss Hare’s voice was as no-nonsense as the rest of her. She was tall and well built, verging on the stout side. Her mode of dress was not unlike Deborah’s, though not quite so old-fashioned. She’d had her dressmaker lift the waistlines and hems on all her gowns to suit the current mode. In her clothes press, swathed in tissue paper, was one of those new, square-necked, puff-sleeved muslins that was becoming all the rage. When the right moment arrived, that is, when the fashion became universally accepted, she intended to wear it. Though Miss Hare had no real interest in fashion, she believed it her duty to set an example in taste to all her pupils. She wished her teachers would adopt her rule. In her opinion, they were too conservative by half. Deborah was no exception. But then, Deborah had good reason to disguise her appearance.

“I think,” said Miss Hare, “that I may have found a position for you.”

This was good news to Deborah and it showed in her flashing dimples. “Bunny, you are an angel.”

Miss Hare did not share in Deborah’s enthusiasm. Leaning forward in her chair, she said seriously, “Deborah, are you sure this is what you want? Why not stay on at the school? This is as safe a haven as any you are likely to find.”

“You know I’m not cut out to be a teacher. I do much better with only one or two children in my charge. Besides, I dare not stay in one place for long, not until I am quite certain I have thrown Lord Kendal off the scent.”

A level look was exchanged, then Miss Hare sighed.

“Bunny, you know I am not exaggerating. The man is dangerous. I swear it.”

“Are you sure? Forgive me, my dear, I know you hate to speak about that night, but isn’t it possible that in the confusion you somehow misheard the name Lord Barrington cried out? I can hardly credit that a man of Lord Kendal’s eminence would stoop to murder. Besides, Lord Barrington was his friend.”

Deborah gave the answer she had repeatedly given Miss Hare since she had arrived at the school seeking asylum. “I heard it, I tell you, and there is nothing wrong with my hearing. Lord Barrington addressed his assailant as ‘Lord Kendal,’ not once, but twice. Besides, they had an appointment that night. Who else could it have been?”

“But you didn’t see his face?”

“It was too dark. The candle was behind him.”

Miss Hare sat back in her chair and considered Deborah thoughtfully. “Deborah,” she said finally, “even if everything is as you say, you must surrender the boy. Surely you see that?”

“I do intend to surrender Quentin.” Deborah spoke eagerly. “You know I do, just as soon as I receive a response to the letters I have sent to his uncle.”

“The uncle who owns property in the West Indies and whose correspondence with Lord Barrington has been irregular, to say the least, in the last several years?”

Deborah looked away. “Yes.”

“And if there is no response to your letters?”

“Then I shall take Quentin to him in person and lay
the whole business before him. What would you have me do? If I give Quentin up to his stepmother or anyone else, you know he would be handed over to his guardian, Lord Kendal, the man who murdered his father. And what do you think would happen to Quentin then?”

Seeing Deborah’s agitation, Miss Hare tactfully busied herself setting out a plate of sugar biscuits and macaroons. It was Deborah who eventually took up the conversation where it had left off.