Sheri Cobb South (11 page)

“Yes, for he escorted Lady Fieldhurst,” concurred her ladyship, recovering her composure.

“You were not surprised to see them together?”

“Lud, no! Sir Rupert was mad for her before her marriage—Miss Runyon she was then, of course. I wonder if she will marry him, now that Fieldhurst is dead? She is far too young and beautiful to wear black for the rest of her life.”

Pickett found himself in complete agreement with this assessment, although he was less than enthusiastic at the prospect of her marriage to Lord Rupert Latham.

“So she arrived with Lord Rupert. What next?”

“I believe they had the first dance together, although I could not swear to it, for I was still greeting guests at the door. My husband partnered her for the second, as she was the next-highest ranking lady present, after the countess of Farnsworth.”

“Did she dance a great deal?” Pickett asked, duly taking notes as Lady Herrington prattled on.

“Oh, Lud, yes! I daresay she reserved the supper dance for Lord Rupert—no, that cannot be right, for I saw her at the table with Mr. Fretwell—’tis a wonder he didn’t break his neck, dashing off to Brighton in that rackety way! And before that, Captain Sir Charles Ormond had partnered her in the cotillion—now that I do remember, for I noticed particularly what a handsome pair they made, he in his scarlet regimentals and she all in white.”

Pickett, deciphering this speech with some difficulty, came to the conclusion that Lady Herrington might well prove to be a veritable font of information, provided he was able to curtail the occasional rabbit-chase (precisely when, and for what purpose, Mr. Fretwell had made his perilous trip to Brighton, for instance, he knew not and cared less) and steer her ladyship gently back to the subject at hand. In this manner, he was able to piece together a fair accounting of Lady Fieldhurst’s movements, particularly after Lady Herrington conceived the happy notion of retrieving the invitation list from her escritoire. Armed with this voluminous document (which, Mr. Pickett was rather surprised to observe, ran to more than a dozen pages), she was able to provide him with a roll-call of gentlemen with whom she had seen the viscountess paired, in an approximation of the order in which these dances had occurred.

Alas, her recollections were incomplete, as she had frequently been distracted by her duties as hostess. Pickett foresaw that he would be obliged to spend several hours in questioning a number of unknown gentlemen for whom he had unaccountably conceived a violent dislike. But even if every one of these gentlemen recalled dancing with the viscountess in vivid detail, there still remained a period of a quarter-hour in which Lady Herrington could not recall having seen the viscountess at all.

“Perhaps,” suggested Pickett blandly, “her ladyship was obliged to withdraw from the ballroom in order to check her hair, or her gown.”

“Indeed, yes! I can see you are well acquainted with the idiosyncrasies of my sex, Mr. Pickett. If Lady Fieldhurst withdrew for such a reason, my Jane should have known of it, for I instructed her to remain at my guests’ disposal all evening.”

“Would you send for her, if you please?”

“Would that I might, Mr. Pickett, but I was obliged to let the girl go.” Leaning forward in her chair, she lowered her voice to a scandalized whisper. “One of the guests discovered her in flagrante delicto with the second footman. I was obliged to dismiss the pair of them. One simply can’t tolerate that sort of thing, you know.”

“Do you know where I might find this—Jane, was it?”

“Jane Mudge. As for where she might be found, I have no idea. To be quite frank, Mr. Pickett, I hope I may never set eyes on the wretched girl again!”

Having pursued this line of investigation to a most unsatisfactory conclusion, he thanked Lady Herrington for her trouble and assured her that she had been most helpful. He asked if he might borrow her invitation list and, permission being granted, thanked her again, bade her good day, and took his leave. It was perhaps as well for his peace of mind that he was out of earshot by the time the lady returned to her guests, and so could not hear her breathlessly exclaim, “My dears, you will never credit it! I have just had the most extraordinary interview!”

Chapter 9

In Which John Pickett Conducts an Experiment

Methodically working his way down Lady Herrington’s guest list, John Pickett was somewhat daunted by the scope and variety of Lady Fieldhurst’s male acquaintance. There were Lords and Sirs and Honourables, to say nothing of the plain Misters who compensated for their lack of more exalted titles with an assortment of hyphenated surnames. There were military men and fops, dissipated rakes, and one besotted youth who grew quite truculent when he realized the direction of Pickett’s questioning. While some of these gentlemen had more relevant information to offer than others, one constant remained: there was a fifteen- to twenty-minute period of time in which no one could recall having seen the viscountess.

Worse, without the maid to corroborate her statement, he had only Lady Fieldhurst’s word that she had torn her gown at all. While that might be good enough for him, he had no illusions as to how far it would get her in a court of law.

His steps slowed as he neared Bow Street. It appeared he might have spoken too soon when he had assured the magistrate of her innocence. For beyond the damning circumstances of her bedchamber and her nail scissors, it now appeared that she had both motive and opportunity to rid herself of a husband she no longer loved. And yet, try as he might, he could not reconcile the memory of the newly-widowed viscountess, dressed in unrelieved black and beset by her husband’s domineering relations, with the image of her ladyship’s white-clad figure fleeing down the gas-lit streets of Mayfair with malice aforethought.

The picture that formed in his mind caused him to stop in mid-stride halfway across Long Acre, inspiring the driver of a passing hackney to shake his fist as he struggled to regain control of his startled horses. But Mr. Pickett had no thought to spare for such mundane matters, nor did he hear the verbal tirade directed against loitering pedestrians who considered their own leisure to be more important than the business of honest tradesmen. For he had suddenly recollected in vivid detail Lady Fieldhurst’s appearance on the night of her husband’s murder. He had been kneeling over the viscount’s body, and she standing nearby, the dying firelight flickering over the hem of her gown and the toes of her soft kid slippers.

Was it possible for any woman, dressed as she had been, to travel on foot from Portman to Berkeley Square and back again within, at most, twenty minutes? Of his own ability to do so, he had no doubt; not for nothing were the members of the Bow Street force called “Runners.” But a lady in evening dress, to say nothing of those shoes—

He was abruptly startled from his reverie as a plump arm looped through his. Pickett looked down to see a pert young female in a faded bonnet falling into step beside him.

“Bone chewer,” she caroled in cheerful, if unrefined, accents.

“Lucy! You startled me. But—what did you call me?”

“It’s French,” Lucy explained, preening herself on this new, if dubious, accomplishment. “It means ‘good day.’ I’ve a young gentleman who’s teaching me.”

Pickett had little doubt as to what this obliging “gentleman”—Lucy’s concept of class structure was surprisingly fluid—was receiving in return for his expertise. But her assistance as an informer had been invaluable on more than one occasion, so he continued to supplement her income, while turning a blind eye to her less reputable activities.

“He says French girls can find work as lady’s maids. So I figures I’ll learn to speak French, then go to work for a fine lady in a big house.”

Pickett thought of Lady Fieldhurst’s French maid and wondered whether the haughty Camille de la Rochefort would recognize her native tongue on Lucy’s lips.

“Lucy!” he exclaimed as an idea took form. “You’re just the person I want!”

“And about time, too, John Pickett,” she retorted with a saucy sway of her hips.

“Can you meet me tonight, very late? Two o’clock, say? You’ll be well compensated for the inconvenience, I promise you.”

“I don’t doubt it,” Lucy purred, looking him up and down in a manner which, had he been less caught up in his own plans, would have made him extremely uncomfortable.

* * * *

He arrived by hackney carriage at the designated hour, and disembarked before the ramshackle dwelling where Lucy shared a room with two other young women of the same profession. He climbed the narrow, uncarpeted staircase up three flights, and rapped with his baton on a wooden door from which the paint had long since peeled. Lucy flung it open, wearing a frilly but threadbare dressing gown and an expression of high dudgeon.

“We’ve got to go someplace else,” she informed him without preamble. “Moll thinks her new cully is too fine to share a roof with the likes of us!” This last was delivered in ringing tones, and directed somewhere over Lucy’s shoulder. Suddenly Pickett realized that Lucy had definite, and quite erroneous, ideas about the evening’s entertainment.

“That’s not what I meant,” he protested feebly. “Lucy, you know that’s not what I meant!”

“Well, I thought it would be a new lay for you, who’ve never once tried to take advantage of a poor working girl, more’s the pity. And as for what Moll will say, when she hears I wasted the whole night jawing with a prig-napper—

“You can tell Moll that I called to take you for a carriage drive, just as if you were a fine lady.”

This interruption, couched in soothing tones, had the desired effect. Lucy forgot her grievances with a readiness which, while hardly flattering to Pickett’s manhood, boded well for the success of his mission.

“Go on with you!” Lucy exclaimed, torn between hope and doubt. “You don’t really mean it!”

“Yes, I really mean it.”

As Lucy’s world was largely confined to the streets where she plied her trade, a ride in a hired hackney constituted untold luxury. As Pickett flagged down a vehicle and settled himself and his fair passenger on its worn and poorly sprung seats, she entertained herself hugely with predictions of Moll’s envy and wrath upon learning of Lucy’s adventures. It was not until the dark and narrow streets of Covent Garden gave way to the broader thoroughfares of the West End that she thought to inquire as to their destination.

“We’re going to Mayfair,” Pickett informed her. “Portman Square, to be exact.”

“Not amongst all the nobs!” exclaimed Lucy, her cup by now running over. “But why?”

“I need a favor from you, Lucy. I need to know how long it takes a lady to travel on foot from Portman to Berkeley Square.”

The hackney had by this time rolled to a stop, and Lucy, without waiting for Pickett to assist her, flung open the door and leaped to the pavement. She stood at one end of an elegant square lined with tall, narrow dwellings whose pilastered facades and long, arched windows gave the impression of aristocratic faces gazing haughtily down patrician noses at a trespasser. Halfway down the square, one building blazed with light in spite of the lateness of the hour, and lilting violin music drifted on the night breeze.

“Gor!” Lucy breathed, awe-struck. “You are flying high these days, aren’t you?”

Pickett merely shrugged and consulted his watch. “Murder looks much the same in Mayfair as it does in Seven Dials. Now, if you’re ready, let’s go.”

“Murder?” echoed Lucy in thrilling tones, falling into step beside him as they set out on foot across the square. “Who’s got hisself rubbed out?”

“A viscount by the name of Fieldhurst.”

“And this lady you want me to pretend to be?”

“His wife—widow, I should say. Lady Fieldhurst.”

“Lud, it’s better nor a play!” Lucy exclaimed with ghoulish zeal. “Did she snuff him?”

“No!”

This denial was uttered with such vehemence that Lucy stopped in her tracks. She resumed her steps at Pickett’s urging, but cast a coy sidelong glance in his direction. “Is she pretty?”

“Yes.”

Lucy waited for him to elaborate on this rather curt reply and, when he did not, drew her own conclusions. “You’d better watch yourself, John Pickett, before you get in over your head.”

He offered no response to this cryptic warning, and the remainder of the trek passed in silence, punctuated only by Lucy’s labored breathing as she struggled to maintain the pace set by the determined Runner. At last he took her elbow as they drew abreast of an elegant residence whose door knocker was tied up with black crape.

“We can stop now.” As Lucy gawked at the splendors of Berkeley Square, Pickett consulted his pocket watch, and was pleased with what he found there. “Lucy, you’re an angel! Eight minutes, forty-three seconds. Allowing her ladyship, say, five minutes to reach her room, quarrel with his lordship and stab him with the scissors, then the return trip to Portman Square—no. Impossible for her to do it in less than twenty minutes.”

“Unless she took a coach,” suggested Lucy eagerly, apparently not nearly as angelic as Pickett had supposed.

“There is that,” acknowledged Pickett, somewhat deflated. “I’ll have a word with Lord Rupert’s coachman.”

“Or,” persisted Lucy, “she could’ve hired a hackney.”

“Faugh!” snorted Pickett, dismissing this suggestion out of hand. “Did you ever know a hackney to turn up just when it was wanted? And well off the main roads, too!”

As if determined to prove him a liar, a hackney carriage chose that moment to lurch round the corner into Berkeley Square, stopping before an imposing edifice and disgorging a rather unsteady gentleman in rumpled evening dress who whistled tunelessly as he staggered up the front steps. Lucy, arching a knowing eyebrow at Pickett, merely grinned.

* * * *

Mr. Colquhoun, the magistrate, was not grinning several hours later, when apprised of his youngest Runner’s nocturnal activities. Indeed, the revelation of Lady Fieldhurst’s apparent innocence garnered no response from him save the lowering of bushy white brows over his hawk-like nose.