The Deception (32 page)

I gave an unwilling grin.

“Here comes Adrian now,” Harry said, and we all turned to watch the bareheaded rider on the big chestnut gelding as he maneuvered his way through the crowd in our direction.

* * * *

Castle Rook won the Guineas. He got caught behind a wall of horses when he tried to go inside, and his jockey had to drop back and bring him around the outside. A groan had gone up from the crowd when this happened, as most of the people there had visions of their money going down the sewer. But once the colt had open track in front of him, he ignited.

It was a monumental performance. The dark bay colt’s powerful driving strides seemed to eat up the ground beneath him. He passed first one horse and then another as if they were standing still.. He swept into the lead at an eighth of a mile from the finish, and by the time he passed in front of us at the finish line he was ten horse-lengths ahead of the colt in second place.

Chills were running up and down my spine as I watched him run.

Pandemonium reigned among the spectators.

Adrian’s eyes were blazing. “What a magnificent performance!” he said to me. “Have you ever seen anything to equal that, Kate?”

I could only shake my head. I had never seen anything like it before. No one had.

The intense blue sky of East Anglia looked down upon the splendid bay colt as he was ridden in triumph back up the track. The spectators cheered themselves hoarse as he went by. The Marquis of Stade, his owner, was hidden from sight by the congratulatory crowd that had mobbed him.

Let him enjoy his moment in the sun, I thought grimly. He was going to find his face in the mud soon enough.

* * * *

By the end of the day, Louisa was fretting at Paddy’s absence. I was more than fretting; I was terrified that something had gone wrong. At least half the spectators had left the course by the time Paddy finally put in an appearance. Louisa and I were so glad to see him that we almost fell out of the phaeton into his arms.

He spun Louisa a charming tale about a horse that he had almost bought, and then Harry dragged him away from the phaeton to have a private word. I had my eyes glued to their faces, and when I saw Harry break into a smile, I knew that Paddy had been successful, that Sean had identified the stallion as Finn MacCool.

I had to wait until the following morning before I was able to hear for myself what had transpired. Harry arranged for us to meet Paddy and Sean near a little bridge that went over the stream at a spot halfway between Harley Hall and the village. The morning was still not a good time of the day for me, but I was getting a little better. I thought that perhaps the country air was agreeing with me.

Fortunately, Adrian had gone out ahead of me to take the hounds for a run with Sir Charles, so I did not have to make up an excuse for him as to why I wanted to be out so early.

Harry and I reached the appointed place first, and we dismounted and let the horses graze as we waited on the stream’s flat, grassy bank. Behind us the bank grew steeper, and the green grass was liberally sprinkled with cuckooflowers and marsh orchids and cowslips. It was another impossibly beautiful spring morning. I watched as a few sheep grazed their way across the hillside. Cuckoos were shouting somewhere in the distance, and from the steep, wooded bank on the other side of the stream there came the steady tapping sound of a woodpecker busily at work.

We waited for perhaps fifteen minutes, and then we were joined by Paddy and the small, wiry, black-haired man whom I knew to be Sean MacBride.

“That stallion is Finn MacCool himself,” Sean said. “He was stolen away from Mr. Farrell during the fire.” The man’s greenish eyes were blazing with anger. “I’ll have him back,” he said. “I’ll have him back in Ireland, where he belongs.”

“That you will, boyo,” Paddy said. “We must just decide now how best to do it.”

“And stud fees!” Sean said fiercely. “He will be owing stud fees for all those mares he bred to our stallion!”

I hadn’t thought about stud fees. I nodded emphatically. “You are right, Sean. Mr. Farrell is certainly owed stud fees.”

“Sean took a good look at the Marquis of Stade yesterday while he was peacocking around after he won the Guineas,” Paddy said. “Sean identified him as the man who tried to buy Finn MacCool before the fire.”

This was getting better and better. I almost rubbed my hands.

“Lord Barbury is the president of the Jockey Club,” I said. “I think our next step is to lay this evidence before him.”

“Stade will deny it,” Paddy said. “And I’m after thinking that the word of an Irish stable lad will not count for much against the word of a fine English marquis.”

I disagreed. “There has been a great deal of speculation about the amazing success of Alcazar as a sire,” I said. “They will have to investigate these charges.”

“And how will they be doing that?” Sean asked.

“Someone from the Jockey Club will have to go to Ireland to take a look at Mr. Farrell’s horses. He must still have some of Finn MacCool’s get in his stables.”

“That he does,” Sean said with satisfaction. “There is Conchubar, and hasn’t he won the Galway Cup the last five years running?”

“If he’s the horse I saw run two years ago,” I said, “you cannot miss the resemblance to Castle Rook.”

“They’re all the image of their da,” Sean said. “He throws true, does Finn MacCool.”

“What about Mr. Daniel?” Paddy said. “Is there no way we can charge Stade with his murder?”

Something of what I was feeling must have shown on my face, because Harry put his arm around my shoulders. I leaned against him gratefully. “I don’t think there is, Paddy,” I said. “Of course, we can mention our suspicions to Lord
Barbury, and I think that they will weigh with the Jockey Club, but we have not enough evidence to bring Stade to public justice.”

“It is not enough that he should just suffer the banning of the Jockey Club,” Paddy insisted. “He should be made to pay for Mr. Daniel. A life for a life.”

“I agree,” I said. “But I don’t think we can bring it off.”

Harry had been uncharacteristically silent this whole time. Now he said, “Paddy, for a man like Stade to be ostracized by his own kind, well, that is an even worse punishment than death. He will be a pariah.”

“In the racing world he will be a pariah maybe,” Paddy said. “But what will the rest of the world care about such a thing when even the Regent himself has been banned from the track by the Jockey Club?”

“The offenses are not the same,” I said. “The Prince was suspected of telling his jockey to stop a horse. Once. And a great number of people think that the jockey most likely acted on his own. Stade stole a valuable stallion and quite probably killed a man to keep from being found out. Harry is right. He will be a pariah. He will never be able to show his face in good society again.”

Paddy looked unconvinced.

I said passionately, “Paddy, don’t you think I would like to see him drawn and quartered? Don’t you think I would like to see his head stuck up on London Bridge?” I drew a deep, unsteady breath. “But I do not think we have the evidence.”

No one spoke. The woodpecker had fallen silent, but the cuckoos were still calling to each other from the woods on the other side of the stream. Two ewes followed by their lambs had made their way down from the hillside and were taking a drink from the stream. The sweet-smelling early-morning breeze stirred the hair at my temples and rippled through the grass.

The world looked so very beautiful. It wasn’t fair that Papa could no longer see it, and that Stade could.

Paddy sighed. “I suppose you are right, girl. But it’s a strange kind of justice.”

Sean returned us to the business at hand. “We will be getting back Finn MacCool?”

“That you will, lad,” Paddy said grimly. “That you will.”

* * * *

Sir Charles, Adrian and two other gentlemen were having breakfast when Harry and I returned to Harley Hall. Adrian looked surprised when he saw me walk into the breakfast room. Since my morning-sickness problems had begun, I had been taking tea in my room like all the other ladies.

Harry said to Sir Charles, “After you have breakfasted, I wonder if we might speak to you for a moment, sir.”

Sir Charles looked mystified, but he replied with perfect courtesy, “Of course.” He drained his teacup. “I am finished now. Come and we’ll go into my office.”

I could feel Adrian’s eyes on me as we followed Sir Charles out of the room.

Sir Charles’s office was off the library and contained a mahogany secretaire and two chairs. The bookshelf part of the secretaire was filled with assorted copies of the
Racing Calendar, Baify’s Racing Register, The Turf Register, Sporting
magazine, and, of course, the Stud Book; the desk part contained a pile of papers, a quill pen, a Sheffield plate wax jack for melting sealing wax, and a pair of spectacles. Sir Charles and I took the chairs and Harry leaned against the carved mahogany mantelpiece. Sir Charles moved his spectacles a few inches, then looked at us inquiringly.

Harry didn’t mince words. “We would like you to convene a meeting of the Jockey Club as soon as possible, sir,” he said. “We have charges to bring against the Marquis of Stade.”

Sir Charles looked thunderstruck.
“What?”

Harry repeated himself.

“What are these charges?” Sir Charles demanded. He did not seem pleased with us.

Harry and I exchanged glances, and then Harry proceeded to relate to Sir Charles all that we had discovered.

When Harry had finished his saga of greed, theft, and murder, the Jockey Club president said, “It is possible, of course, that this Irish groom is lying, that he is hoping to steal a great stallion for his master.”

This made me angry, and I spoke for the first time. “Sir Charles, I saw Mr. Farrell’s horse run in Ireland. He is unmistakably of the same blood as the horse that won the Guineas yesterday. If you, or any other of the Jockey Club stewards, will travel to Galway, you will see this for yourself. Furthermore, I suggest that you try to trace Alcazar’s old grooms. I think you will find that they will confirm the fact that the horse Stade is trying to pass off as Alcazar now is not the same horse that they were looking after.”

A ray of sunlight slanted in the room’s single window and glinted off the glass lenses of the spectacles lying on Sir Charles’s desk. He said slowly, “One has always wondered how the mediocre Alcazar could produce such magnificent offspring.”

“I know my father wondered,” I said. “And that is why he suspected a switch. That is why he tried to take a look at Alcazar.” I stared steadily at the spectacles on Sir Charles’s desk and said flatly, “And that is why he was killed.”

“That may be so, Lady Greystone,” Sir Charles said, “but that is not something that the Jockey Club is competent to judge.”

I lifted my eyes. “I understand that, Sir Charles. I am only asking for a hearing so that this information may be made known to the stewards. It will be up to the stewards then to take what action they deem fitting.”

“Most of the stewards are presently in Newmarket for the running of the Guineas,” Sir Charles said. He rubbed his right temple as if it was paining him, then he sighed. “Very well. I will notify the stewards and we will hold a meeting at the Jockey Club Headquarters in Newmarket tomorrow. You will please be there, Mr. Woodrow, at eleven o’clock. And bring with you the two Irish gentlemen to testify.”

“I am coming too,” I said.

Sir Charles looked at me in surprise. “That will not be necessary, Lady Greystone. I would not subject you to such a stressful experience.”

I said, “I wouldn’t miss it for all the rubies in India, Sir Charles.” I could feel my mouth set. “I have been waiting a very long time to confront the man who killed my father.”

Sir Charles looked a little taken aback at my blood-thirstiness. “Mr. Woodrow?” he said. “Surely you will be able to convince Lady Greystone of the inadvisability of her attending.”

Harry, bless him, said, “I think she should come.”

Sir Charles looked annoyed.

I stood up. “That is settled, then,” I said. “Tomorrow morning at eleven.”

Sir Charles also rose to his feet. “Will Lord Greystone be accompanying you?” he asked.

Harry and I exchanged looks.

“I don’t know,” I said. “I’ll have to ask him.”

* * * *

I went upstairs to our bedroom and was not overly surprised to find Adrian there waiting for me. The maids were busy in the room next door, and I said to him, “Come for a walk in the garden and I will explain to you why Harry and I wanted to see Sir Charles.”

“I would like that,” he said in an expressionless voice.

I shot him a furtive glance as we went down the stairs and out through the French doors onto the terrace, but his face was as expressionless as his voice had been. No one was better than Adrian at keeping his thoughts to himself.

We met Lady Mary, her mother, and two other ladies on the terrace. We all smiled, and commented on the beautiful weather, and then Adrian took my arm and we began to make our way toward the two stone lions in the center of the lawn that I knew guarded the entrance to a circular yew enclosure.

We were silent until we were within the privacy of the hidden garden. There were a few stone benches placed on the lawn so that one could view the ten Corinthian columns of Portland stone that the yews framed, and Adrian guided me to one of them. Then he waited.

I had not seen that reserved look on his face since I had told him about the baby. My stomach sank as I realized—too late—that I should have told him of my suspicions about Stade long before this.

Damn,
I thought unhappily.
Why do I always do the wrong thing when it comes to Adrian?

I had wanted to tell him, I remembered, but Harry had said that we shouldn’t bother him, that he had too much else on his mind. At the time Harry’s advice had seemed sensible. I saw now that it had been disastrous.

I made my voice as steady as I could and told him everything. He listened in absolute silence.

“I wanted to tell you ages ago, Adrian,” I finished, “but Harry said that you were so preoccupied with political problems that it wouldn’t be fair to burden you with this.”