Candace Camp (26 page)

“Change? What is wrong with what you are wearing?” he asked.

“Oh, no, this will not do at all. I, um, this is, well, it is not what I planned to wear.” She flashed him a dazzling smile. “Can our talk not wait until this evening? Or tomorrow? When we have more time?”

His mouth tightened in irritation, but he said only, “Of course. We shall speak later.”

Relieved at having escaped the confrontation, Eleanor slipped off to her bedroom. She rang for her maid, wishing that she had thought up a different excuse, for now she would have to actually change into a new dress.

When she went back downstairs, the others were waiting for her. Eleanor was surprised to see that Lady Honoria had decided to join them. “One must put forth an effort,” Honoria explained with the air of a martyr. “For Samantha’s sake.”

Since Samantha could just as easily have gone with Anthony and Eleanor alone, this seemed an unlikely reason to Eleanor. It was more likely that Honoria simply wanted to go but could not admit that fact.

“I do hope no one has heard about the magistrate visiting the house,” Honoria continued as they exited the house. “I don’t know how I shall hold up my head if the
ton
all knows about the dead body in the hallway yesterday. Really, Eleanor, you must stop doing such things.”

“I did not actually intend to do it,” Eleanor replied mildly.

They rode to the park in Anthony’s open-air landau so that they would be able to sit in their carriage and watch the progress of the balloons. As they neared the park, the number of other vehicles grew, many of them open curricles or landaus like theirs.

Before long, Anthony pulled their vehicle into the ragged line edging the large open field where the balloons were sitting. He neatly maneuvered the landau so that it was backed in, with the horses facing away from the large baskets and brightly colored balloons that might make the animals nervous.

“It will be some time before they take off, I believe,” he said, jumping down from his perch and turning to look up at Eleanor. “Would you care for a stroll around first, Lady Eleanor?”

“Of course,” she replied without thinking, remembering too late that it would not do to give Anthony an opportunity to have his “talk” with her. “Samantha? Lady Honoria?”

“Oh, my, no, it sounds quite exhausting,” Lady Honoria said in a die-away accent, wielding her fan. “You are entirely too active for a lady.”

“And Samantha should stay with her mother,” Anthony put in firmly, before Samantha, her face eager, could speak.

Samantha grimaced and sank back in her seat, resigned. Anthony held out his hand to Eleanor. She took it and stepped down from the carriage. Her stomach was curling with worry, but she put a good face on, smiling at Anthony as he offered his arm.

They strolled along the line of carriages, looking at the various balloons in different stages of readiness. It seemed to Eleanor to be a scene of chaos. She only hoped that the men manning the balloons were more in control of what was happening than they appeared.

“Oh dear, there are the Colton-Smythes,” she murmured, quickly stopping and turning aside to admire the nearest balloon, a brightly-colored red-and-yellow affair.

“You do not wish to see them?” Anthony asked, humor dancing in his eyes. “We can simply turn and walk back the direction we came.”

“No.” Eleanor sighed. “I must offer my sympathy to them on the death of their houseguest.” She shouldered her parasol, like a soldier preparing for battle, and started to turn, but Anthony took her arm, stepping neatly in her path.

“First, before we throw ourselves on the fires of that social sacrifice, I must speak with you.”

This was it, Eleanor thought, and though she cast about wildly for something to say to stave off his words, her mind was utterly blank.

“Lady Eleanor, I wanted to ask you…that is to say—I have been thinking the last few days…” He glanced up at her, his eyes so warm that Eleanor wanted to cry. “I have never known anyone like you, never felt anything such as I have felt for you. I—” He stumbled to a halt, then grated out an oath.

“I think I know what you want to say,” she told him, sorrow tingeing her voice. “You have realized…” She had to pause and swallow hard before she could continue. “You have realized that what happened the other afternoon was a…a grave mistake. And you—”

“Mistake!” Anthony stared at her. “You think we are a mistake?”

“No!” Eleanor looked at him, astonished by the fury flaming to life in his eyes. “I do not think that. But surely you are looking for a way to end this. To—”

“To end this? Blast it, Eleanor, will you let me speak?”

“Of course,” she replied, her voice a little chilly. “Please, go ahead.”

“Thank you. I am not trying to end anything, other than my supreme frustration. I am asking you to marry me.”

E
LEANOR STARED
at Anthony blankly. For a moment she wondered if she had heard him correctly. “You—I—is this a jest?”

“I have never been more serious,” he replied grimly.

“But you can’t—I mean—” Joy welled up in Eleanor, making her almost giddy. She wasn’t sure whether she was about to laugh or cry.

“Lady Scarbrough!” Mr. Colton-Smythe’s voice sounded behind her. “What a pleasant surprise! Didn’t expect to see you here today. And Lord Neale.”

Eleanor had never been less happy to hear anyone. It took all her willpower to paste on a grimace of a smile and turn around to face the man. “Mr. Colton-Smythe. And Mrs. Colton-Smythe. Lovely day, is it not?”

Anthony sketched the merest bow toward the other couple, but they did not seem to notice that his response bordered on rudeness. Instead, Mrs. Colton-Smythe began to babble about the weather and balloons.

Finally, as she appeared to be winding down, Eleanor hastily interjected, “I was so sorry to hear about Signora Malducci.”

“Oh, yes.” Mrs. Colton-Smythe shook her head, setting her side ringlets to bobbing in a comical way that was at odds with the gravity of her expression. “Terrible thing, when one cannot walk down the street without being afraid that one will be run over. Such a careless driver.”

“Did he have an explanation?”

“Not he.” The other woman looked indignant. “He didn’t even have the common decency to stop. We only knew about it because the lad sweeping the crosswalk knew she was our guest and ran to tell us. It was dreadful. She was still alive when we got there.”

“How terrible for you.”

“It was, yes.”

“Was she, um, able to speak when you found her?” Eleanor asked.

“No.” Colton-Smythe shook his head. “She barely lasted a minute after that.”

“I regret that I did not come to call upon her earlier,” Eleanor said. “I arrived an hour or so after the accident.”

“Yes, it might have put her mind at ease. She was so distressed, you see, kept saying that she must talk to you.”

“Do you know why?” Eleanor asked.

“I’m not sure. She was so distraught, though I did not think it warranted such worry. It seems of little importance that she saw Sir Edmund that day. It was sad, of course, but I saw nothing untoward about what he or his friend did.”

“His friend?” Eleanor stiffened. “She saw Edmund with a friend?”

“Yes. That was what she wanted to talk to you about, although I cannot imagine why it exercised her mind so much. But when she saw Mr. Paradella at the consul’s—”

“Dario?” Eleanor interrupted, astonished. “Dario Paradella? But he was not at the consul’s ball, was he?”

“No, I think not. He had just left the consul’s house as we were arriving. He almost ran into us. We had arrived a trifle early, it is true; I know it is terribly unfashionable of us, but I do like to be on time, don’t you?”

“Yes, of course. But what happened when Signora Malducci saw Mr. Paradella?” Eleanor asked, trying to mask her eagerness.

“Well, she spoke to him about Sir Edmund. She said that she had seen them right before Edmund left, and how sad it was that he had died on their voyage. But he said almost nothing, just looked at her and denied that he had seen Sir Edmund that day. Really, he was almost rude, and I had always held him to be such a polite young man. Well, I suppose one never knows.”

“Was she sure of the date?” Eleanor asked abruptly, cutting into the woman’s flow of words. “Could it not have been that she remembered another day when she had seen the two of them?”

“Oh, no, she was sure of that. She saw them quite near the docks. She had gone to say goodbye to a friend who was setting sail, so she was certain of the date, because that was the day her friend left. Her carriage passed Sir Edmund and Mr. Paradello as they were walking toward the docks. She said that they were deep in conversation.”

“How odd,” Eleanor commented, her mind racing.

“Yes, it was, rather, and after Isabella—Signora Malducci—spoke with Signore Paradella, she was quite silent for a time. Then, when I saw that you were there, she told me that she had to meet you. She wanted to talk to you.”

“Yes, I know. I am so very, very sorry that I did not come to call earlier.”

Eleanor cast a look at Anthony, and he quickly took her elbow, saying to the other couple, “Dreadfully sorry. We must go now. Appointment, you see.”

“But—what—” The other couple stared at them, astonished.

Anthony doffed his hat. “See you another day.”

Quickly he turned and steered Eleanor back in the direction of his carriage.

“Anthony, what does this mean?” Eleanor asked.

“You know as well as I what it means,” Anthony growled. “It means we have apparently just given that list to the very man who killed Edmund.”

“I cannot believe it!” Eleanor exclaimed, hurrying to keep up with Anthony. “Why would Dario have killed Edmund? They were good friends.”

Anthony stopped, turning to her. “Did you know that Paradella went out with Edmund that day?”

Eleanor shook her head. “No. He had intended to go with him, but then he sent a note saying that he could not. He was…I thought he was somewhere else when Edmund died.”

“Where?”

“I don’t remember. His horse had come up lame, and he could not ride back into town. I think perhaps he was visiting friends who lived in the country.”

“There are two things here that I find important,” Anthony told her. “First, Paradella was seen leaving the consul’s house, where Conte di Graffeo, a man he supposedly hated, was staying. And secondly, an eyewitness saw him with Edmund walking toward the docks on the day that Edmund died in a boating accident, supposedly alone, while Paradella claimed to be elsewhere. Yet Paradella never said a word about having seen Edmund shortly before he died, and when Mrs. Malducci mentioned having seen him with Edmund, he adamantly denied it. Why?”

“Oh, God, Anthony, this is a nightmare,” Eleanor murmured. “I trusted Dario. He spoke with such affection of Edmund. He offered me his sympathy, his help—and all the time, he had killed Edmund?”

“I don’t know for sure. But I have to say that he looks highly suspicious.” He paused, then added, “I think it’s possible he might have been working for di Graffeo.”

“But he hated the man. You should have seen his face when he saw him, spoke of him. Dario was a member of
L’unione.
”

“It is possible to hate someone yet still work for them.”

“He kept the count from killing you,” Eleanor pointed out.

“True. He shot him. But he did not have to shoot him, Eleanor. I did not think about it at the time. I was too glad for his help. But why didn’t Dario simply come forward and help me wrest the gun away from the man? It was a difficult shot to make. Why risk it? I had di Graffeo down. He could have taken his gun. He and I could have overcome the man together.”

“It is hard to fault a man for a decision made in an instant,” Eleanor argued. Yet she could not help but remember that her instinct had been to get the gun out of di Graffeo’s hand; that was why she had grabbed the vase.

“As for his being a member of
L’unione
—what if he joined the group to spy on them, or he was already in the group and di Graffeo paid him to turn on them? Or perhaps the count held something over Paradella’s head to force him to work for him. That would certainly make a fellow hate him even as he worked for him. Remember how the count looked rather surprised when Dario shot him? And he called Paradella a traitor, which Paradella neatly treated as meaning a traitor to his country. But what if di Graffeo meant that Paradella had betrayed
him?
” He paused, then added, “We cannot get past the fact that he lied, that he was with Edmund right before Edmund died.”

“I know,” Eleanor agreed sadly. “And Mrs. Malducci was killed before she could give that news to me.” She straightened her shoulders. “We have to find him. If he killed Edmund, we cannot let him get away.”

They hurried to the landau. It took some time and a good deal of persuasion to get Lady Honoria to vacate the carriage. Samantha, naturally, was quite happy to; she would have preferred to watch the ascension sitting on the ground on a blanket, or roaming up and down the line of carriages. But Honoria valued her dignity and her health, she informed them. She was not about to sit on the ground like a heathen. They finally got her out when Anthony, exercising a great deal of charm, wangled an invitation for Honoria and Samantha to join Lady Thornbridge, one of the doyennes of the
ton,
in her own elegant carriage.

Once that was accomplished, Eleanor climbed up on the driver’s seat with Anthony, and they made their way out of the crowd. It took them several minutes to negotiate the traffic. Once they were away from the park, they were able to make better time, and before long, they pulled up in front of the house in which Dario was lodging.

His rooms were on the second floor. They climbed the stairs quickly, and Anthony rapped on the door. Eleanor was sure that she had heard noises from inside as they approached, but the sounds stopped now. There was a long, breathless silence.

Eleanor and Anthony glanced at each other. She raised her gloved fist and knocked again, saying, “Dario, it is I, Eleanor. I would like to speak to you.”

Now she was certain that she heard sounds within the rooms—something that sounded very much like hurried footsteps.

“Paradella! Open this door!” Anthony bellowed, and when there was no reply, he threw his weight against the door.

The second time he did so, the door popped open, and he stumbled into the room, Eleanor on his heels. They ran through the empty sitting room into a short hallway, which ended in a bedchamber. There was no one in that room, either, but a window was flung open. Anthony ran to the window and looked out.

“Bloody hell! There he is, heading around the side of the house. He’s scarpered.”

“Anthony, look!” Eleanor pointed with a trembling finger to the traveling bag that lay open on the Paradella’s bed. There, fallen between two rows of neatly folded shirts, was a gold locket.

Anthony let out an oath and reached in to pick up the locket. He opened it; inside lay a miniature portrait of Sir Edmund. He turned and looked at Eleanor.

“You were right. It
was
Dario that night in my room,” Eleanor said. “When he described to me how you could have escaped back into your room and undressed so that you looked as if you had been in bed, he was simply telling me what he had actually done.” She picked up the locket and folded it into her palm. Her gaze hardened. “We must not let him get away. He cannot leave the country.”

Anthony grabbed her hand, and they ran back through Dario’s rooms and down the stairs to their landau. Anthony flipped a coin to the urchin who was holding the reins, and they climbed in and started off. Eleanor shielded her eyes, looking all around for any sign of Dario.

“There he is!” she exclaimed. “Turn right.”

Anthony turned the horses’heads and started after him. Dario had a good head start, but their conveyance traveled more quickly than he could run. Glancing back, he saw them gaining on him. He looked around frantically, then darted out into the street and threw himself at a man riding along. The startled horse reared, and the man was unseated, tumbling to the ground. Dario grabbed the reins and lithely swung up into the saddle. He took off at a gallop.

Anthony slapped the reins across his horses’ backs, and they took off after the fugitive. Anthony’s horses were prime blood, and they were able to keep up with Dario, but the bulky conveyance was less than maneuverable, and as they went around corners and wound in and out among traffic, they gradually lost ground.

Still, Dario was in their sights as they once again approached Hyde Park, where Dario took off across the grass. Anthony let out an oath. A carriage was meant for the road, not the uneven ground of an open field. He hesitated for an instant, then turned his horses onto the grass after Paradella.

Eleanor hung on to the seat as they rattled across the ground. Dario rode into a group of trees, no doubt hoping they could not follow, but Anthony drove along the edge of the grove, keeping Dario in sight. He and Eleanor ducked beneath the wide overhang of two spreading oaks, and suddenly they found themselves on the edge of the balloon ascent.

Dario had pulled up, staring at the scene before him, and Anthony seized the opportunity to regain the ground he had lost. He pulled the landau behind Dario, blocking his escape to the rear. The crowd of people kept him hemmed in on the sides, and the balloons stopped him from going forward. Dario heard the sound of their carriage and whirled, kicking his horse, but the animal, tired from his run, merely shied.

Anthony tossed the reins to Eleanor and leaped from the carriage seat directly onto Paradella. The two men went spilling off the far side of the horse. They fell into some of the bystanders, eliciting shrieks and angry oaths. Dario’s horse, taking exception to all this unusual behavior, reared.

Eleanor watched with her heart in her throat, fearful that the animal would come down on top of the two men rolling across the ground, punching and grappling. The horse, however, neatly managed to elude them and trotted away from the fray. Eleanor wrapped the reins around the whipstand to hold Anthony’s horses and clambered down the side of the carriage.