Mistress by Midnight (5 page)

“No,” Merryn said, “it is not. But I think that you have an interest in it all the same. I’ve thought so from the beginning.”

Tom looked startled. “Why do you say that?”

“Because I know you,” Merryn said. “Don’t prevaricate with me, Tom. Is there a client?”

Tom stared at her for a moment and then shook his head. “I cannot tell you anything,” he said. “Client confidentiality—”

Merryn made an exasperated sound. “Tom!”

“Oh, very well,” Tom said. He moved the files around on his desk. “There is someone who is interested,” he said. “One of Farne’s brothers. There is no love lost there.”

“One of Garrick Farne’s brothers wants to see him hanged?” Merryn pressed. She had known that Garrick was estranged from most of his family but still she was shocked. “Why on earth…”

Tom shrugged. “I don’t ask questions like that. I simply take the money. But you see…” He paused, looked at her. “That is another reason why we cannot afford for Farne to know.”

“I understand,” Merryn said.

Tom ran a hand through his hair. “It is a pity that Farne saw you. He may start asking awkward questions. And he’s a dangerous man to cross. He worked for the War Office for years when he was in exile.”

“As a translator,” Merryn said dismissively. “It’s hardly the front line.”

“It is when you are translating between the British and the Spanish guerrillas,” Tom said dryly. “One might as well live on a powder keg. Farne was, and still is, a famed swordsman, a crack shot—” He stopped. “Sorry, that was tactless of me.” He opened a drawer in his desk and took out a file.

“I have found out a little more information,” he said. “I checked out the seconds at the so-called duel. Farne’s second was a man called Gabriel Finch. He went to Australia as a curate. And your brother’s second was Chuffy Wallington and we all know what happened to him.”

“He drank himself to death,” Merryn said. “I remember Chuffy. He was a frightful soak.”

“Easily bought off, I expect,” Tom said. “As for the doctor, he is locked up in the Fleet prison for debt. I might well pay him a discreet visit.”

“I’ll go,” Merryn said. “He will be more likely to talk to me.”

“Possibly not,” Tom said, “when he knows who you are.” He closed the file softly. “I have to admit,” he said, “that it looks very bad for Farne. Three shots, two bullets, one in the back… Reports suppressed and rewritten, witnesses disappearing, no doubt paid off… And he runs away abroad and then his father fixes it all with the authorities so that he never has to stand trial and can come home a decade later with everything forgiven and forgotten…” Tom shook his head. He paused. “Perhaps we should reconsider. We’re stirring up a lot of trouble. All this was buried years ago. People won’t like it.”

Merryn shivered. A little ripple of anticipation mingled with apprehension fluttered down her spine.

“I’m not giving up now,” she said. “I want to know the truth and I want Farne to face justice. But if he finds out…”

If Farne finds out there will be hell to pay…

She remembered the ruthlessness she had sensed in Garrick Farne the moment she saw him. Tom had been right: he was no ineffectual scholar, he was a man with a dangerous past.

Tom was watching her face.

“You had better make sure he does not find out,” he said, “but if you are too scared to do it—”

His tone was all the incentive Merryn needed.

“No,” she said. “No, I will do it. It will be my pleasure.”

CHAPTER THREE

“I
HAVE FOUND YOU
an inquiry agent, your grace, Hammond by name.” Pointer, his nose twitching in a manner that indicated that he could not quite believe how low he had stooped, stood back to allow the ingress of a man into the library at Farne House. The late autumn evening was already drawing in, darkness dropping over the streets of London and creeping into the room. Garrick had forced himself to work for another four hours on the Farne estate papers, acquainting himself with all the dependents on the Dukedom, all the pensions to be paid, the widows and orphans, the servants, estate workers, the whole panoply of his fiefdom. It was terrifying how many people depended upon him.

Despite the presence of a full branch of candles the room looked gloomy and bare, the bookshelves standing like sentinels. Garrick stood up and stretched, only now aware of how stiff he had become poring over the books for hours on end. He shook the newcomer by the hand and gestured him to a chair. The long mirror that stretched along one wall reflected back their images. It was easy to see why Pointer disapproved, Garrick thought. In the butler’s eyes the visitor would be categorized as most definitely not a gentleman. There was about him an indefinable air of seediness. It seemed soaked into his person, from the battered hat he held in his hand to the world-weary expression in his deep-set gray eyes to the cut of his clothes. He was the type of man Garrick had met on many occasions in his work in the Peninsular—the fixer, the intelligence man, for sale to the highest bidder, exactly the man Garrick needed now.

“Mr. Hammond,” he said. “How do you do?”

“Your grace.” The man did not bow. It was more a meeting of equals, Garrick thought. He needed a service Hammond could provide and the inquiry agent saw no need to be deferential.

“A drink?” Garrick offered. “Brandy?”

“Not on duty, thank you, your grace.”

That, Garrick thought, argued a certain discipline. He nodded. “You will excuse me if I do?”

Hammond’s smile indicated that he recognized this was merely a courtesy. He sat in one of the large wing chairs before the fire, his hat on his knee, politely waiting for Garrick to state his business. Garrick poured for himself—no sense in summoning Pointer simply to perform that function, although no doubt the butler would feel he should have preserved the formalities—and took the chair opposite, crossing one ankle over the other. Mr. Hammond raised an interrogative brow. Garrick paused, chose his words with care.

“I need you to find a lady for me, Mr. Hammond.”

Hammond snapped open a notebook with such alacrity Garrick jumped.

“Is she lost, your grace?”

“No,” Garrick said. “What I should have said is that I need you to
identify
a lady for me.”

“Ah,” Hammond said. “Semantics.”

“Quite,” Garrick said, warming to him. “There is a lady I have met, I do not know her name and I want you to find her and tell me who she is.”

Hammond nodded. “Description?”

“Small, fair-haired, blue-eyed…” Garrick struggled.
A pocket goddess, beautifully rounded, soft, smooth skin, vivid blue eyes, hair like a tumble of golden corn…

Get a grip on yourself,
he ordered himself.

“Age?” Hammond’s sharp gray gaze was unblinking.

“Twenty-five,” Garrick said, “or so she told me.”

Hammond nodded. “And you met…”

“Here,” Garrick said. “She broke into my house last night. Or rather,” he corrected himself, “I believe she might have been staying here for a little time.”

“Lady Merryn Fenner,” Hammond said.

Garrick blinked. “I beg your pardon?”

“Lady Merryn Fenner,” the inquiry agent repeated. “Sister to Joanna, Lady Grant, and Teresa, Lady Darent, and daughter of the late Earl of Fenner. Your grace.”

Lady Merryn Fenner
.

Garrick felt as though someone had emptied a bucket of ice down his back. The woman he lusted for, the wraith who haunted his thoughts, was Stephen Fenner’s youngest sister. In a flash he remembered the initials in the copy of
Mansfield Park,
the entwined
M
and
F.
He remembered her eyes and saw the vivid blue of Stephen’s.

“How the devil,” he said slowly, “did you know? There must be a hundred small, fair, twenty-five-year-old ladies in London. Two hundred. A thousand.”

Hammond permitted himself a small, wintry smile that was nevertheless full of satisfaction. “Aye, your grace. Normally it would take me—” he paused “—oh, at least a day to come up with that information. But Lady Merryn Fenner works for Tom Bradshaw and we like to keep an eye on his business.” He waited, then as Garrick looked blank: “Bradshaw the inquiry agent, your grace. A rival company.” For a moment Garrick thought Hammond was about to spit but he clearly thought better of it in the ducal library. “Bradshaw’s a cocky fellow,” Hammond said. “Smooth as you like, but bent as a guinea note. A good job you didn’t approach him with your inquiry, sir. He would have taken your money and spun you a line.”

Garrick frowned. Oddly the thought of his midnight visitor working for a corrupt inquiry agent filled him with a strange sense of protectiveness. Merryn Fenner had seemed too innocent and too honest to be mixed up in crooked business. But clearly his instinct about her was wildly astray. She had broken into his house, after all, had been searching his library and his study and his bedroom. She was not a sheltered debutante. She was a burglar and very possibly a thief.

“So you knew,” Garrick said slowly, “that Lady Merryn Fenner had broken in here last night because you were watching her?”

“One of my men reported it,” Hammond said. “She’s been here every night for the past five days.”

Five days. Sleeping in his bed.

Garrick thought of the slide of the sheet against his body and Merryn’s scent enveloping him, soft, sensuous, seductive.

Five days. Searching his papers.

She had nerve. He would give her that. He thought about what Lady Merryn Fenner might be hunting at Farne House. The conclusion was inescapable. The connection between the two of them was her brother. The object of her search therefore must be something to do with Stephen’s death.

He got to his feet abruptly and strode over to the fire, stirring it to flame with his booted foot. The logs settled with a hiss.

He had feared this for twelve years. His father had told him that the matter was settled, all witnesses paid off, all evidence destroyed, all those who needed protection kept safe. The Earl of Fenner, Kitty’s father Lord Scott, and the Duke of Farne had buried the matter so deep they had believed it could never be revived. Manifestly, however, that was not true. Something—or someone—had started to stir matters up. It could be Merryn Fenner herself, he supposed, embittered over her brother’s death, bearing him an understandable and very real grudge. Or there could be more to this, someone else behind it, someone pulling Merryn’s strings perhaps. For the sake of all those who depended on him, he had to find out.

He turned to Hammond, who had been watching him gravely and in silence.

“This Bradshaw,” he said. “What do you know about him?”

Hammond laughed. “That he’s a bad lot. Brought up on the streets, knows the rookeries like the back of his hand. Made a bit of money—best not ask how—set himself up in business, not too fussy about the cases he takes if the payment is right.” He shrugged. “Rough, tough…”

“Dangerous to know?” Garrick said ironically.

“Without a doubt, your grace.”

Garrick pulled a face. There was no immediately obvious reason why Tom Bradshaw should be interested in a twelve-year-old duel so perhaps Merryn Fenner really was the instigator in this.

“I need to know where Lady Merryn plans to be tomorrow,” he said. Then, as Hammond nodded, “and I need to know more about Tom Bradshaw. Anything you think might be useful.”

“Aye, your grace,” the man said.

“Thank you, Hammond,” Garrick said. “You have proved yourself invaluable.”

Hammond grinned. It was startling and not particularly pretty. “Bradshaw thinks he’s the best,” the man said with satisfaction. “But he ain’t.”

“Of course, if Bradshaw spies on you as you spy on him,” Garrick said gently, “he will know all about our meeting.”

After Pointer had shown the inquiry agent out, disapproval in every quivering line of his body, Garrick went back to the desk and took out the papers relating to the Fenner estate, weighing them in his hand. Merryn Fenner would know that his father had profiteered from her brother’s death by buying up the family estate. It would be another reason for her to hate everything that the name of Farne stood for.

Tomorrow, he thought, he would seek Merryn out. He would find out what she knew and what she intended to do. He swore softly under his breath. Merryn Fenner had been determined and passionate and, he would wager, a total innocent. There was no more dangerous combination than honesty and passion when it came to someone set on discovering the truth. And he could never allow that truth to come to light.

M
ERRYN SMOOTHED DOWN
her plain blue pelisse and took a slightly tighter grip on the worn leather handle of her briefcase. This afternoon she was very much in her own character, bluestocking and avid student of literature. She had arranged to visit the Octagon Library to peruse the catalog of periodicals in the collection. Alongside his extensive collections of classical, English and Italian literature, King George III had a rather less august selection of newspapers and periodicals. It was in one such obscure publication that Merryn hoped to find another reference to her brother’s death that might bear out the details in the Dorset newspaper Tom had found. Most reports she had read reported the official line on the duel but one or two might have written the truth—before the Farne family clamped down, suppressed the real version of events and paid off anyone who might have proved awkward.

“This way please, madam,” the clerk said respectfully, gesturing her through a doorway on the right and into the most marvelous library she had ever seen. “Sir Frederick will be with you shortly.”

The room was magnificent. Light fell from windows high in the octagonal white dome of the ceiling. On all eight walls the bookshelves stretched above head height with a wrought-iron balcony and further shelves on the first floor. Merryn had never seen quite such an impressive library. If she browsed for years she knew she could never be sated.

Sir Frederick Barnard, the King’s librarian, came over to shake her by the hand and lead her across to a seat at the center table. She had already written to ask for permission to scrutinize the catalog and she saw that it was now laid out in front of her. Sir Frederick explained how the entries were compiled then left her to leaf through at her leisure. A deep peace settled over the room, the sort of reflective silence that one found in libraries, broken only by the rustle of pages and the soft footfall as Sir Frederick or one of his clerks trod quietly across from one shelf to another.

After about ten minutes, however, a gentleman took the seat opposite Merryn. He was tall and broad, no dandy but elegant enough in a plain jacket and pristine buckskins. His hair, an unusual dark red, was disordered by the wind rather than the ministrations of his valet, and as she watched he raised a hand and smoothed it down. Then he looked up and his eyes met hers. They were deep brown eyes and so dark that they were unreadable.

Garrick Farne. The Duke of Farne was here, in the King’s Library.

Merryn’s heart stuttered for an instant and then began to race. She tilted her head down deliberately so that the rim of her bonnet sheltered her face from view. She knew that she had blushed. Or perhaps she had turned pale; she was not sure which, only that she felt hot even though her fingers seemed icy cold. Her hands shook a little, sending the precious documents scattering to the floor. A soft-footed clerk came forward to retrieve them and she murmured an apology. She had to compose herself. This was foolish, to be disturbed simply because Garrick Farne was sitting opposite her. He could not possibly know that she was the woman who had been in his bedroom two nights ago. Then she had been covered in dust and cobwebs. He had not even been able to see if she were young or old. That was the beauty of her indeterminate appearance. She was completely unmemorable.

And if he challenged her she had simply to deny it. She was Lady Merryn Fenner. She did not disport herself in men’s bedrooms in the dead of night.

Even so, it was the first time that anyone had come close to unmasking her and she felt anxious. Her fingers slipped and slid on the parchment and she found it unconscionably difficult to concentrate. She could walk out, of course. She could simply get to her feet, tell the librarian that she had a headache and would return on another occasion. Except that that would look odd given that she had been there only five minutes. And it was poor-spirited, and she was no such thing. She, Merryn Fenner, was scared of nobody and nothing. Gentlemen of the ton, in particular, held neither fascination nor danger for her. She had their measure. They never discomposed her. Only this man, with his perceptive gaze and his effortlessly authoritative presence, seemed to be able to disturb her, and that was only because for the past twelve years he had haunted her thoughts, and now that she knew that he had lied about her brother’s death she wanted to take from him everything he had—friends, reputation, respect.

She tried not to look at Garrick and found it disturbingly difficult. How had he known she would be at the Octagon Library today? It could be no coincidence. He was already a step ahead of her. A horrid thought struck her. Perhaps Garrick had gone to an inquiry agent like Tom and asked them to identify her. Merryn had no illusions about the sort of information that could be bought—or suppressed, for that matter—with enough money. She had seen it happen time and again.

She risked a glance at Garrick underneath the brim of her hat and then wished that she had not. He was not reading. His book lay discarded to one side, his quill idle on the desk.