Deadly Affair: A Georgian Historical Mystery (Alec Halsey Crimance) (7 page)

Alec drank the claret. “I don’t thank you for this, Charles.”

“Perhaps not now, but you will. Calling Stanton out would’ve been the ruin of your career. His Grace’d see to that.”

Alec stared at him, still in a white-hot temper. “I wonder, Charles: Did you intervene on my behalf or to save Cleveley the embarrassment of seeing his drunkard stepson worsted in a one-sided duel? You really must cut the leading strings.”

Sir Charles glanced down at the claret in his glass. “Surely she isn’t worth your career?”

Alec thrust his empty glass at Sir Charles and went to leave but Sir Charles detained him, a hand firmly on the upturned cuff of his frockcoat. Alec frowned down at that restraining hand and Sir Charles instantly removed it.

“We need to talk,” Sir Charles stated and when Alec merely raised his eyebrows, reminiscent of his mentor’s haughty treatment of him when he was displeased, he stumbled on, feeling slightly foolish. “To talk about the other night. Blackwell’s—what happened to him.”

“Blackwell’s death?”

Sir Charles nodded. “There’s been much gossip—
whisperings
—about it.”

“Not surprising, is it, given he up and died in the middle of your dinner party.”

“The gossip concerns you.” Sir Charles looked up then and was secretly pleased his friend was disconcerted. “Yes. Unrelenting, aren’t they? People can’t leave the past buried. Your brother’s unfortunate
accident
…”

Alec hoped his voice held a note of detachment. “I won’t discuss that here or anywhere.”

“Of course not,” Sir Charles said sympathetically. “You and I know,
your friends know
, that you couldn’t possibly have had a hand in Blackwell’s death, but that’s not what others think; what’s being whispered behind your back.”

“Indeed? You seem to have made it your business to know what others think, Charles.”

“And you seem to forget that it was in my house that the wretched man up and died!”

“I doubt anyone will forget that circumstance. Now, you must excuse me…”

“No!”

Alec turned and looked down at him.

Sir Charles went on in an under voice; too many powdered heads had turned in their direction for his liking. “We need to talk and soon. There are certain particulars, certain matters concerning Blackwell that I
must
discuss with you.”

Alec, too, saw the interest they were attracting.

“Not here. Not now,” he said impatiently and shouldered his way into the crowd waiting the unveiling of the draped canvas. He soon found himself just a few wide-hooped petticoats from the canvas itself.

The patroness of the exhibition was addressing the gathering. Talgarth Vesey, Gavin Hamilton and the two other painters whose works were displayed were standing at her side. Just to the right of them stood the small cluster of journalists, pencils at the ready, and the Duke of Cleveley with Selina Jamison-Lewis beside him. There was much laughter and applause, but Alec heard none of it. He was forcing himself to remain calm, but he could not stop himself from looking at Selina.

While chatting with her brother and introducing the Duke to him, out of the corner of her eye Selina saw Alec turn away and merge into the crowd. Later she watched as he put on his gold-rimmed spectacles to better view one of the many portraits in the assembled collection. The portrait just happened to be of herself, leaning a silk clad shoulder against the trunk of an elm, a broad-brimmed straw hat in her hand, its wide blue ribbon caught by the breeze. It had been painted a year ago.

She must have flinched because the Duke glanced at her, saying as soon as he could break conversation, “Do I sense a certain tense expectation, my dear? Rest easy. Your brother is a considerable talent. His first exhibition will be a resounding success. My being here will see to that.”

“I doubt Talgarth has a notion as to your social consequence, your Grace,” Selina said truthfully, which had the Duke’s fawning cronies gulping for air at her bluntness. “The shape of your face, yes; the length of your hands, that too, but as to your name and title, they are of supreme indifference to my little brother. I warned you, he hasn’t an ounce of social grace. But he does paint wonderful pictures, doesn’t he?”

Far from finding offence the Duke smiled. “That is why I came. You promised me wonderful pictures, and wonderful pictures they are.” He saw her gaze wander longingly across the room. “Shall I introduce you? Ah! But I forget. You are already
known
to Lord Halsey, are you not?”

Selina feigned disinterest and flicked open her gouache fan, not daring to raise her chin for fear the Duke would see the desolation in her dark eyes. Yet, the Duke was uncannily attuned to her feelings for he guided her to a quiet corner where a couple seated on an over-stuffed sofa obliged them by going off to find refreshments. He sat her down and took up his quizzing glass to better observe the crowd, all the while speaking to Selina in a low voice.

“May I offer you a word of advice, my dear? Maintain distance from your friend. There has been talk... Questions are being asked about his activities.”

Selina blanched. “Surely not to do with the death of that vicar?”

“Reason enough for you to distance yourself.”

“You can’t think he had anything to do with that man’s death? It’s absurd!”

The Duke laughed softly. “Matters did not go at all well in Paris, did they?”

Points of color appeared in Selina’s high cheekbones but she bit her lip and fanned herself with an agitated motion. “I do not appreciate being spied upon by your Grace’s toad-eating secretary!”

“Charles is no longer my secretary, and he does not spy; he has others to do the gutter work for him,” the Duke replied calmly, continuing to scrutinize the crowd through his eyepiece. “Believe me, my dear. You have chosen the wisest course.”

Selina glanced Alec’s way. He was talking with Sir Charles, a good head height taller than the Duke’s henchman, his blue eyes not once glancing her way.

“Whatever you privately think of him, your Grace, he is a man of honor and would never do anything to jeopardize my happiness.”

“You are misguided, my dear,” the Duke apologized, offering her his lace ruffled covered hand. “It is for his sake, not yours, that I ask you to maintain a discreet distance,” and directed his quizzing glass to a corner of the room. “Now this draped canvas intrigues me…”

Talgarth Vesey was grinning. The crowd assumed it was because his moment of glory had arrived. The Duke of Cleveley was persuaded to unveil the draped canvas. But Talgarth was pleased with himself because he had finally remembered where he had seen the Duke before. It wasn’t at Bath but, as his sister suggested, in the wilds of Somerset. It had been several months ago, perhaps a year, just after Talgarth’s return from Florence. He was on his way to visit Ellick Farm and the Duke had passed him on the narrow tree-lined road, riding away from the direction of the farm toward his mansion atop the ridge that overlooked the valley in which nestled Ellick Farm.

Here at the exhibition, it was the Duke’s magnificent powdered wig that had made it difficult for Talgarth to place
the great man
immediately. When Talgarth had last seen him Cleveley was without a wig. His wide-brimmed country hat had blown off just as they passed each other on horseback, revealing the Duke’s head of natural brown hair, short cropped above the ears like that worn by a medieval prince. He was ‘rusticated’: dressed in a shabby riding frock and a pair of dusty jockey boots in need of polish, and as far removed in appearance from the unapproachable great statesman as was possible.

A series of small tugs and the cloth finally came away from the large canvas.

There was a collective gasp from the crowd that brought Talgarth Vesey back to the immediate moment. He stepped forward to receive due praise for his full-length portrait of a young woman and her daughter. He knew it to be his best work and structured in such a way as to gain maximum benefit from the majestic scenery of cliffs and sky and the pale innocence of the subjects. But he was not such an egotist that he failed to recognize the crowd’s appreciation of the woman’s stunning beauty. That was what made the painting so much more important than a mere portrait. The sitter’s beauty was exceptional. No one in London but his sister knew who she was. She lived a reclusive life at Ellick Farm. Talgarth would not have been at all surprised had he been accused of conjury. He could not wait to refute the doubters. His sister would support him, for it was she who had given Miranda Bourdon a home.

He scanned the faces in the crowd, eagerly awaiting their praise, yet none was forthcoming. Their expressions confused him. They looked dismayed, some were angry, someone at the back of the room wanted to know what the painter meant by such barbarity. Another shouted abuse. Talgarth looked to his fellow painters but all three had turned away, and in so doing had disassociated themselves from him and his wonderful painting.

Selina took Talgarth’s hand, wide-hooped petticoats a protective barrier between her brother and the outraged crowd. “How could this have happened, Tal?” she whispered, eyes brimming with tears. “It’s
monstrous
.”

Talgarth Vesey wondered at his sister’s distress. “I don’t understand. Why don’t you like it, Lina? You
must
like it!”

As he said this he turned. What he saw was incomprehensible. It was his canvas. It was his painting. But there was nothing beautiful about it. Nothing to show for the long loving hours spent mixing just the right hue of flesh-toned paints and the blues of the stormy sky, each stroke of his brush carefully pondered. Thick red paint, or was it blood, had been splashed across the canvas from gilt-edged corner to gilt-edged corner, smeared with hand or fist over blue sky and silken gown in what looked to be a frenzied, hate-filled attack. More horrifying, the face of the reclusive beauty had been slashed out of existence. Where once radiated from the canvas the exceptional youthful beauty and kindness in a perfect oval face, now remained only the shredded remnants of painted canvas. Her young daughter too had suffered a similar fate, perhaps even more savagely treated than the mother, for her entire image had been hacked out from the picture. Only her small bare toes remained as visible evidence that she had once existed. The defacement was so viciously wrought that it was no worse had mother and daughter been murdered before the shocked eyes of mute onlookers.

The painter dropped to his knees and wept.

Alec was in no mood to see Sir Charles Weir. He had just spent an hour in strenuous fencing practice, leaving him hot, sweaty and craving the scented waters of his bath. His house was in a state of upheaval preparing for his uncle’s departure for Bath; portmanteaux were stacked in the hall to be loaded into the travelling chaise the following morning. He had a hundred matters to attend to and a mountain of correspondence to read before the arrival of his man of business from his estate in Kent.

He was about to give his excuses to the waiting footman when his butler appeared, deftly side-stepping the servant mopping up the sweat from the Gallery floorboards. Alec tossed aside the bath sheet he was using to wipe his face, neck and bare forearms and looked at Wantage with annoyance. The butler picked up his master’s frockcoat and offered it to him, saying that Sir Charles had stressed it was most important he have five minutes of his lordship’s time.

When Alec rejected the frockcoat, Wantage said meekly, as he carefully laid the coat over the back of a ribbon back chair, “Sir Charles was most imploring, my lord.”

“Five minutes,” Alec stated as he sat on one of the window seats with its view of the Green Park and rolled down his shirtsleeves.

The butler refilled the tankard with the last of the ale and placed the empty carafe and tankard left by the fencing master on a tray and hovered.

Alec met his butler’s gaze with stony silence and waited.

After what seemed an inward struggle as to whether he should speak or not, Wantage said, “Shall I have Jeffries assist with your morning toilette, my lord?”

“I am capable of dressing myself.”

The butler bowed. “Very good, my lord. I thought perhaps with Master Thomas—
otherwise engaged
—you would need Jeffries to—”

“That will be all,” Alec said firmly and turned to the window.

The butler bowed again and went about his business, leaving his master to contemplate the view of dairy cows grazing on dew-covered grass.

Alec was well aware Wantage was alluding to the fact Tam had leave from his valeting duties to study for his apothecary’s examinations, and that he did not approve. Alec was sick and tired of the below stairs jealousy directed at his valet and knew Wantage took every opportunity to make life difficult for Tam. So he had decided to do something about it. Besides he had “made-do” long enough and had every intention of employing a gentleman’s gentleman. The newspaper advertisement was written and merely needed delivery. But how best to handle the situation without offending Tam and disrupting his household? He did not want the boy upset nor did he want Wantage to think he was victorious, however petty the victory. So the advertisement could wait until after Tam’s examinations, perhaps until his return from Bath.