Black Gold (23 page)

Anne felt her chest tighten, her heart pound. She had to help him. He was ashamed to admit he could not write. “I'll prepare the message and pay one of the grooms to deliver it. That's the most I can do tonight. Will that help?”

“Yes. They will begin to look out for themselves.”

Jeffery seemed relieved and grateful, Anne thought. Perhaps Roach's malicious scheme could be thwarted.

A clock struck 10:30 when she showed him out. As he left, he said he would take some medicine and go to bed. She wished him good night and went into her room. As she sat at the table writing out his message, she had an unsettling feeling that he was withholding something from her. Before returning to the ballroom, she had to speak to Paul.

***

Jeffery took the servants' stairs down to his basement room, relieved that Miss Cartier would send his message to Sarah. He still seethed with anger, but there was nothing more he could do. Roach himself was beyond his reach.

In the basement hallway, he heard a burst of laughter from the kitchen. Peter Hyde was keeping the cook company. Jeffery managed to forget his pain and grievances for a moment. Their good natured banter always lightened his spirits. He joined them at a plain scoured wooden table.

“Mrs. Powell, would you kindly make a hot tisane for me?” He pointed to his arm in its sling. “It hurts.”

“That's what you get for fighting,” she replied, a teasing glint in her eye. “But I'll fix something anyway.” She walked to a counter and started to prepare the concoction. Hyde nodded him to the seat across the table and they began to chat.

“How's the arm, Jeff?” the coachman asked solicitously.

“It's bad, especially at the end of the day.”

Mrs. Powell came back with a glass in her hand. “This should make you feel better,” she said. “Drink it up.”

Jeffery did as he was told. In a few minutes the potion began to reduce his pain but made him a little drowsy. He understood she had added a drop of laudanum. In a short while, he was feeling well enough for a walk in the fresh air. “I'll just step outside for a few minutes and then go to my room.” He rose from the table and wished them goodnight.

He left by the door adjacent to the kitchen. The night was misty and cool. At first, he intended only to walk back and forth in the dark a few times and then return inside. But he fell into reverie, yearning for Sarah. She would be anxiously waiting for word from him. Hopefully Miss Cartier's message would reach her soon. When the vision finally left him, he found himself in front of the tennis hall, chilled and damp.

He stepped inside to dry out, but didn't light a candle. It would attract attention. The steward might object to a footman wandering about outside in the mist, when he was supposed to be sick and in bed. A candle was anyway unnecessary. He easily found his way in the dark to the training room.

To warm up his body, he lifted weights with his good arm. After perhaps ten minutes, he was feeling much better. He had left the room and had come to the middle of the antechamber when he heard someone at the main entrance. He quickly slipped into the dressing room just as a large figure approached with a lantern. It was Jack Roach.

Jeffery's right arm yearned for a sixteen-pound iron shot. In his present frame of mind he would have hurled it at Roach's head. Instead, when the man turned his back, Jeffery stole out of the dressing room and through the tennis court. As he reached the back hall, he heard someone else at the front door.

“Jack! where are you?” cried a high nasal voice.

“Hurry up! You're late,” Roach shouted back. “I'm in the training room.”

Jeffery was tempted to find out what was going on. But that seemed dangerous. Roach was armed and would gladly shoot him. Still, who was his visitor? A certain person came to mind. And what were they going to talk about? Perhaps the fate of a troublesome black slave! Or, more likely, Lady Margaret's stolen package. Otherwise, why meet in such secrecy?

Frozen to the spot, he argued with himself. Should he creep up to the training room and listen? Or, should he leave? An insistent inner voice urged caution.

***

Peter Hyde saluted the cook and left her chuckling over his last anecdote. He had entertained her for almost an hour with his farfetched tales of youthful adventure. She had treated him to delicious tidbits meant for the guests upstairs.

He had hardly stepped into the hallway when the door to the outside opened and Jeff entered, his shoulders bent, his step heavy. The coachman shook a finger at him. “What have you been doing out there in the cold and damp? You're sick. Get to bed. I'll bring you a hot drink.”

Jeff acknowledged the coachman with a grimace and went on to his room. Hyde returned to the kitchen wondering at the curious change in the footman. Then he recalled from his own experience how a feeling of depression set in some hours after a fight, even when he had won. “I know the remedy,” he said to himself. He prepared a cold pack for the broken wrist and a steaming cup of hot buttered rum.

“Drink this, Jeff,” Hyde commanded in his usual gruff way. “It'll cure whatever ails you.”

The sick man gazed at Hyde with troubled eyes. “Thank you, Peter. You're a good friend.”

***

In the entrance foyer, a clock struck eleven. Saint-Martin walked up to the drowsy footman who had taken Jeffery's post at the door. Anne had just told the colonel about the black man's predicament, and the secret bargaining she had observed during the party. Critchley, the tennis hall, and a thousand pounds were involved. What it all meant was still a mystery.

“Where is Mr. Roach?” Saint-Martin asked the footman. The Red Devil was surely somewhere in the picture.

“I don't know, sir. He came out of Sir Harry's study a few minutes ago and left the house. I heard him say he'd be back in half an hour. Sir Harry seemed angry. Cursed him roundly. Heard it even here.”

Saint-Martin stepped outside. Mist was thickening on the path to the tennis hall. Judging from Anne's report, that's where Roach was likely to go. A gust of cold wet wind struck the colonel's face. He shivered. There wasn't time to go back to his room. The footman inside the door was trying vainly to suppress a great yawn. Saint-Martin pressed a shilling into the palm of his hand. “I need your cloak and lantern.”

Open-mouthed, perplexed, the footman closed his hand on the coin, then threw the cloak over the colonel's shoulders and gave him the lantern.

Saint-Martin felt his way on the graveled path, aided by a small crack of light from the lantern. Roach was most likely already in the tennis hall, but it was best to be cautious. When the colonel reached the clearing in front of the building and fully shuttered the lantern, he was surprised to see a man—a bit too slender and timid to be Roach—hovering at the entrance, as if uncertain what to do next. Light shone faintly in the high windows of the training room. Roach must be there.

Saint-Martin stepped back into a grove of pine trees and pulled the hood of the cloak over his head. Who was the stranger at the door? Was he hesitating to enter? Or, had he already been inside? Finally, the person stole away into the darkness. Saint-Martin would wait to see if Roach or anyone else left the hall.

After what seemed like twenty minutes, he heard the sound of approaching feet on the gravel. Two hooded figures passed by the pine grove carrying lanterns. At the door to the tennis hall, they dropped the hoods. Saint-Martin recognized Captain Fitzroy and Lady Margaret. The Irishman opened the door, called Roach's name, listened for a few moments, then cautiously entered the hall followed by his companion. The colonel unshuttered his own lantern and checked the time. Thirty minutes before midnight.

Fifteen minutes later, Fitzroy hurriedly left the hall dragging Lady Margaret by the hand. In the faint light of his lantern, he seemed distraught and breathing heavily. She stumbled after him, clutching her throat. Something had gone wrong in there, Saint-Martin thought. No point in following them. They were going back to the house. Better to wait for Roach.

Saint-Martin scanned the windows of the hall. The light was out. Odd, he thought. Would Roach wait in the dark? Or, if he had left the building, why hadn't he used the front door?

At midnight, Saint-Martin again heard footsteps on the path. Sir Harry walked by with a small lantern and went into the tennis hall. After a few minutes he emerged, a puzzled expression on his face. What's going on? Saint-Martin wondered.

A short while later, with still no sign of Roach and no sound of anyone on the path, Saint-Martin crept up to the hall. Listened. No sound. He quietly opened the door. No light inside. He unshuttered his lantern and looked into the training room. No one there. He ventured on to the tennis court and called out. No answer, only his echo. He stood there motionless. The silence of the place was eerie.

***

Saint-Martin left the tennis hall, perplexed by what he had witnessed. At the entrance to the house, a preoccupied Sir Harry was bidding his last guests good-bye. The colonel hurried to the ballroom. Anne was on the stage, gathering her things and about to leave. Though weary from an hour of entertaining, she brightened when she saw him and listened eagerly to his account.

“So, Roach seems to have vanished into thin air. What can that mean?” she asked. “Lady Margaret has retired to her rooms, and Captain Fitzroy to his. Both seemed distressed. Had they met Roach or not?”

“It's difficult to tell,” Paul replied. “Jack Roach follows his own whims. For whatever reason, he might have chosen to leave Combe Park unnoticed. Perhaps he sensed that someone was tracking him, that person hovering around the tennis hall door. I didn't notice any sign of foul play at the tennis hall. But something is amiss. We shall have to wait until the morning's light to find out.”

“Paul, this may seem foolish, but Jeffery worries me. He was in an angry, desperate state of mind this evening. And now you tell me that Roach has disappeared. I shudder even to think of it, but there just might be a connection.”

Paul nodded gravely. “I'll ask Georges to inquire among the servants in the basement about Jeffery's movements during the past few hours. Let's hope he stayed in bed.”

Chapter 20

Foul Play?

Thursday, April 5

Shortly after dawn, Saint-Martin led Georges through a thin chilly mist to the tennis hall. It was still unlocked. Inside, a pale light sifted through the high windows, leaving much of the interior still in darkness. A hushed silence hung over the rooms. Saint-Martin was uneasy. Where had Jack Roach gone?

“The tennis hall must be searched thoroughly,” he said to his adjutant. “We'll begin in the training room.”

Georges lit a pair of lanterns and handed one to Saint-Martin, who stepped cautiously forward, scanning the room. Nothing seemed out of order.

Since the building had not been cleaned during the past two or three days, a very fine dust had settled. While Saint-Martin held the lanterns, Georges squatted down and studied the floor from different angles, looking for telltale signs of violence.

He rose to his feet, held a lantern high enough to cast a wide arc of light, then pointed to an area at the far side of the room near a bench. “Scuffling feet have scattered the dust there.” He peered into the closet in the adjacent wall where he had eavesdropped on Sir Harry and Roach. “Before I left, I put things back where I had found them. Since then, someone has cleared space for a large object, then dragged it away.” He stepped back for the colonel to look.

They followed a barely visible trail in the dust out of the training room, across the tennis court to the back exit. Small strands of fabric had caught on the door sills and on the rough boards of the narrow rear hallway. A black shoe lay near a wall. In the soft sodden turf outside the back exit were hoof marks and wheel tracks, as well as a jumble of fresh boot prints.

Saint-Martin bent down and ran his fingers over the indentations. “Miss Cartier and Charlie sculpt objects with plaster. I'll ask her to cast these boot prints before someone disturbs them.”

Georges grimaced. “It's hardly worth her effort. I see three, maybe four different sets, all mixed up.”

“Why so many, Georges? Was a gang involved?”

“Not likely, sir. No sign of struggle. I think one man surprised Roach, stored his body in the closet, then came back later with servants and carted it away.”

“Roach? Are we sure?”

“He's the only missing person we know of. The bits of fabric and the shoe must be his.”

“Burton's problem,” said the colonel. “But I think we can help him.” Unbidden, a sense of relief swept over him. Anne was safe now. In all likelihood, Roach would not be found alive. His vices had overtaken him. “We'll close this building. Sir Harry said last night he would be too busy to play tennis and Jeff wouldn't train with a broken wrist.”

“I'll get the key from the steward,” Georges said.

“When you've locked up, we'll arrange to meet Mr. Burton.”

The two men retraced their steps, careful not to touch the suspicious marks in the dust. As they left the tennis hall, Saint-Martin had already lined up suspects in his mind.

***

After breakfast, Saint-Martin and Georges rode to the city with the steward on his way to the city market. In Stall Street they left the wagon and walked the few remaining steps to the Pump Room. Before departing from Combe Park, Saint-Martin had sent a message to Burton concerning Roach's apparent disappearance. Now, together, they would see if Roach paid his usual visit. An unlikely prospect.

As he approached the Pump Room, Saint-Martin wondered how much he should tell Burton about last night's suspicious activity at the tennis hall. Supposing Roach were found murdered, should he help Burton investigate Captain Fitzroy's possible complicity and risk putting him in an English jail or in a hangman's noose? That could jeopardize his mission to bring Fitzroy to France. In the end, Saint-Martin decided to take that chance and tell Burton what he'd seen. The Bow Street officer had a sharp mind. Attempting to deceive him would be foolish. Build trust instead.

Burton was waiting for them off to one side of the room, surveying the crowd with a critical eye and drinking a glass of warm, tawny water with obvious distaste. His cane hung on his arm. When he glimpsed the two Frenchmen, his face brightened. He listened attentively to Saint-Martin's account of the previous evening, clearly pleased by his willingness to share.

“Colonel, it sounds like murder, but we don't have a body. If Mr. Roach doesn't come here this morning, we'll try his home.”

The two Frenchmen walked to the counter, each purchased a glass of water, then joined Burton where they could watch the entrances. While they sipped from their glasses, Georges recounted the exchange between Critchley and Roach in the dining room.

Burton frowned, shook his cane. “Critchley's playing a dangerous game, holding something back, trying to bargain.”

A half-hour passed. No sign of Roach, though a pair of his ruffians looked into the room, furrowed their brows, and asked if anyone had seen him. Apparently, no one could say they had.

When an hour had passed without any sign of him, Saint-Martin and Dick Burton left to visit Roach's rooms and Georges set off to search at The Little Drummer and among the riffraff of Bath. On North Parade, Burton stopped before a rather ill-kept house in an otherwise elegant row. Trash had been allowed to accumulate in the window well, and dark green paint was flaking off the surrounding wrought iron fence. He knocked on the door until it opened a crack. A thin middle-aged woman peered out warily.

“Dick Burton, ma'am. Officer, Bow Street, London. Is Mr. Jack Roach at home?”

She hesitated, glancing from one gentleman to the other, then shook her head. “I don't think he came home last night.” She must have noticed a look of surprise in Burton's face, for she added, “He's often called away suddenly on business.”

“Would you allow us to examine his rooms?” asked Burton in a tone more like a demand than a request.

“Sir! This is a respectable house. Mr. Roach wouldn't want me to let strangers into his rooms. Indeed, he would be very cross with me.” She began to wring her hands and back away, as if about to close the door.

“Would you rather that I trouble the mayor for a warrant to search?” Burton paused to allow the dire implications of his threat to sink into the woman's mind. “We won't disturb anything. Mr. Roach has gone missing. We're looking for clues to where he might be.”

Saint-Martin understood the woman might have good reasons, apart from Roach, to avoid a legal search. Contraband brandy or lace or tea. Probably implicated in Roach's schemes.

The woman chewed on her lip for a moment, then let them in. Gathering her skirts, she led them up to the first floor and unlocked a door to a small entrance hall. A pair of riding boots stood beneath a greatcoat hanging from a hook on the wall; whips and spurs and other riding gear were piled on shelves.

“Is this his only riding outfit?” Saint-Martin asked the woman.

“It's the only one I've seen him in.”

He turned to Burton. “Then he hasn't ridden from Bath.”

“That puts a small piece of the puzzle in place, Colonel. I'll check the coaches and livery stables later.”

The entrance hall opened to a sparsely furnished parlor. Ink pots, quills, sealing wax, a stamp, piles of paper cluttered a table by the window. Nothing of interest. A small cabinet stood against the wall. Inside were boxes of bills and receipts which Burton fingered through quickly. None of them seemed remarkable.

Saint-Martin inspected the bedroom off the parlor. “Roach didn't sleep here last night.”

“So?” said the woman. “Mr. Roach often has work that keeps him out all night.”

“Could you tell me where he was most likely to have
worked
last night?” Burton asked.

“Sir!” she spluttered. “I don't pry into the private affairs of my tenants.”

Burton waited, staring at her with steely eyes. Finally, she gave him an address on Alfred Street.

As the two men left the house, Saint-Martin remarked, “We haven't seen any notes to or from the excise officers, lists of his extortion victims, evidence of smuggling or scandal that he could use against them.”

“That's true,” Burton agreed. “And Roach must have kept such papers hidden close by. He worked in his rooms. I'll take a closer look at another time.”

Alfred Street was ten minutes away through the busy heart of the city. At midmorning, the fashionable brothel was being cleaned and aired. Its front door stood ajar, its windows wide open. A servant led the two gentlemen into a small, richly furnished front parlor and disappeared. Saint-Martin noted the gold drapes embroidered in purple, the fine brown mahogany table and chairs, the costly Turkish carpet on the floor. Judging from first impressions, he concluded the house catered to a discriminating clientele. It wasn't where he would have expected to find Jack Roach.

“Surprised?” Burton asked with a chuckle, after he too had surveyed the room. “Roach comes from a noble family—by the left hand, as they say. Son of a lady's maid and a baronet. Never been shy about it. Indulges in the fine things when he's in money. As a youth, he wenched, gambled, and drank his way through Eton and Oxford, bent on wasting a small fortune. But his father cut him off. He's lived by his wits ever since.”

Footsteps sounded in the hall. A handsome, stylish woman in a rose dressing gown entered the room, attempting to conceal the puzzled look on her face. For a long moment she studied the men with cold gray eyes, then her face relaxed in a tentative smile. Her visitors didn't mean to cause her trouble, but they weren't patrons either.

Yes, she told them, Jack Roach was a frequent and welcome visitor. Made no secret of it. No, she hadn't seen him last night and had no idea where he might be.

For the rest of the morning, the men went separate ways: Burton to inquire at coach inns and stables; Saint-Martin to visit shops on Milsom Street upon which Roach preyed. After a fruitless search, Saint-Martin stopped to visit Madame Gagnon. Leaving her customers in the hands of an assistant, she led the colonel upstairs to her parlor. To his questions about Roach, she replied with a scowl; she hadn't seen him either and suspected foul play. At least a hundred men in Bath would have gladly killed him.

“But I have something for you,” she said, reaching into the drawer of a nearby table. “A letter. It arrived an hour ago by overnight post from London. Read it while I prepare tea.” She handed him the letter and left the room.

Saint-Martin scanned the cover, noted Comtesse Marie's elegant hand and seal. Mailed from Paris. He opened the letter, dated March 27. Folded inside was a note sealed by the baron. He set it aside and began to read his aunt's message, his lips moving silently.

Dear Paul, I am sorry to send you sad news. Sylvie looks pale and haggard. Stares into space, never speaks, pushes her food aside. It's been five days since she attempted to kill herself in the stable. We have moved her to Chateau Beaumont for the fresh air and the garden she loves. The servants and I keep a close watch over her. I am also concerned about her godfather, Baron Breteuil, who seethes with anger, doesn't sleep well, and snaps at people. He has sent along a note to you.

He laid the letter in his lap and looked inward. His cousin Sylvie appeared with brutal clarity, standing in her shift, the rope around her neck. She seemed to gaze at him with eyes dull and despairing.

He felt a rush of pity for the young woman, followed by a visceral urge to beat her assailant into a mass of bloody flesh and broken bones. Fitzroy had callously destroyed her spirit. Yet, revenge seemed inadequate and self-serving, and would do Sylvie no good. Saint-Martin groaned softly, bowed his head, and prayed she would find her way back to a healthy mind.

By the time Madame Gagnon returned with the tea, he had composed himself. Without comment, he read the letter aloud to her. And then the baron's note:

Bring back Fitzroy, whatever the cost.

She listened grim-faced on the edge of her seat, her back stiff. When he finished, she drew a deep breath and slowly exhaled. “What can I say? The villain shows no remorse for what he's done. He's put himself beyond the pale.”

“And perhaps beyond our reach.” Despair threatened to overwhelm his spirit. “I may disappoint the baron—and Sylvie. If Mr. Burton were to discover that Fitzroy has murdered Roach, he would lodge the rogue in an English jail. His trial might take place months from now during what the English call Quarter Sessions. Fitzroy would then plead self-defense and Lady Margaret would back him up. The court might acquit him and set him free or convict him of manslaughter and transport him to one of the colonies. In the meantime, my hands would be tied.”

She stared at him, wordless, with a mixture of horror and disbelief.

He felt stricken, rose from his chair, picked up his hat. At the door, he turned to her. “Fitzroy might escape justice entirely—the baron's included.”

***

In the early afternoon, Georges unlocked the tennis hall for Dick Burton and Colonel Saint-Martin and stood aside as they entered. Neither of them had found Roach in the genteel parts of Bath. Georges could not find him on Avon Street or at his other vulgar haunts. The rogue had clearly come to a bad end. But where was his body?

The light inside the hall had much improved. In the training room Burton was shown where a heavy body had been recently dragged. Leaning on his cane, he lowered himself painfully to the floor. With a magnifying glass he closely examined several brown spots. “Blood. Beyond a doubt!”

Georges shrugged respectfully. “But you'd expect to find some in a room where bruisers spar.”

The colonel raised a finger. “I believe shedding blood is less likely in a tennis match.” He pointed out a few brown spots along the body's trail across the court.

Burton took note of them, then examined the fibers Georges had discovered earlier on the rough floor boards of the rear hallway and on the sill of the back door. They were red, presumably from Roach's coat.