Comfort and Joy (34 page)

“I have been shadowing Maeve O’Malley.”

“You’ve been following my wife?”

There! He’d said it again. Wife.

“Your wife?” Lynch repeated in a rasp.

Outraged, Charles bellowed, “What sort of private investigator are you? You did not even know Maeve was my wife?”

Lynch smacked his lips. His deep frown brought his bushy brows together at the bridge of his nose to form one furry line. “No, Mr. Rycroft, I didn’t know. You never mentioned it”

“And you are supposed to be an investigator.”

“Well, I know she’s the woman who saved you from freezing to death in the alley after you were beaten. After you were beaten.”

“And so?”

“Suspicious coincidence,” he whispered, nodding his head sagely. “Suspicious coincidence.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“That she should just happen along.”

“My wife did not attack me and steal my sketch, if that’s what you’re implying.” Charles took a menacing step toward his investigator.

The Civil War veteran backed up. “I didn’t say that, didn’t say that. Before I knew the lady was your wife I suspected she might be an accomplice.”

Charles turned away and slammed his fist against the mantel. “If you knew anything about Maeve O’Malley you could never suggest her as an accomplice to any illegal or unkind act.”

“Yes, sir.”

“While engaged in following my wife, have you discovered anything of significance?” Charles asked caustically as he turned to face his inept investigator once again.

Lynch did not reply immediately; he looked thoughtful as if he were weighing the effect of his answer. “Just an hour ago I saw Miss O’ Ma...Mrs. Rycroft go into Edgar Dines’s gallery. Edgar Dines.”

“What?”

“I’m hating to say this in light of the fact she’s your wife but all along I thought the two might be working together.”

“Are you mad?”

“I may,” he hesitated, “I may be wrong.”

“You are fired.”

Charles strode to the door and held it open.

Herbert Lynch stood his ground. “How was I to know the O’Malley woman was your wife without you giving me all the facts? All the facts. Now that I know, I’ll investigate another avenue. Avenue.”

“No, Mr. Lynch. You are off the case.”

Charles could barely contain the anger shooting through his blood in a red-hot stream. “I’m holding the door for a reason. This is the way out.”

“She stayed in Dines’s gallery a long time. A long time.”

“You can pick up your payment at my office.”

“She may still be there. Still there. I watched for an hour and Miss O’Malley ... Rycroft, didn’t come out.”

Lynch’s words hit Charles like a fist to the stomach. “What?”

“Your wife is with Edgar Dines.”

“Impossible.” Charles turned on

his heel and strode to the window. He peered out into the dark, expecting her to bound up the steps, out of breath and eager to reach the warmth and safety of Rycroft House.

But no one raced to the door. The street was deserted save for the light, powdery snow falling from the dark night sky. He clenched his jaw and drew a deep breath. The only thing the Irish vixen feared in this world was being alone in the dark.

What had Maeve got herself into? Why had she gone to Dines’s gallery and why hadn’t she come home yet?

Charles turned back to the investigator. “Are you carrying any kind of weapon?”

“A small pistol.”

“Come,” Charles commanded. “We’re going to pay a call on Edgar Dines.”

Herbert Lynch’s frown lifted.

Charles instructed Stuart to bring the town coach around and called for Dolly. “On the chance that Maeve returns before I do, sit on her if you must, but do not let her leave the house until I return.”

“Yes, sir.”

Charles did not miss the amused twinkle in the housekeeper’s eye. Dolly believed Maeve led him a merry chase. And she was right. Except in this instance, it was not so merry. He was sick with worry, a new and exceedingly unpleasant feeling.

“We will devise a plan on our way, Lynch,” Charles said, as he donned his cloak. “More than likely Dines has closed his gallery by now.”

The private investigator gave a smug, twisted smile. “I’m skilled in the art of forced entry, sir. Skilled in the art.”

Charles felt heartened to hear the man was skilled at something.

As he marched out the door and down the steps to his coach, a steady pain burned within Charles’s chest. His pulse throbbed hard and fast as if he’d been galloping for miles astride a runaway horse.

It seemed improbable that the bespectacled art dealer was behind all this. But if he was and if he had harmed Maeve in any way, the sparrow man would pay. Edgar Dines could steal from Charles, attack him, even kill him. But if he hurt so much as a hair on Maeve’s head, Charles would see that he spent the rest of his life behind bars.

* * * *

Alone in the dark with tears streaming down her cold cheeks, Maeve said her prayers and lashed out at the wee people, blaming them for her present distressing predicament. She hummed every Christmas carol she knew in a futile attempt to gather the threads of her composure.

She had been left to die. Sour-faced and unsympathetic, O’Brien had bound Maeve tightly to a wooden chair centered in the back room. Her hands were tied behind the chair and her feet lashed together at her ankles. Flailing and kicking at the thug had done no good. The back spindles of the chair dug into her and she shivered with the cold. Second only to the frightening blackness was the numbing cold. Maeve could barely feel her toes.

Her heart crashed against her chest. Tension gripped her body in its tight, powerful fist until she could barely breathe. The soggy woolen muffler stuffed in her mouth tasted like an old fuzzy boot.

Before he left her to die, Dines had written a ransom note which might mean he intended for her to live. The art dealer did not strike Maeve as a man with the heart of a killer. He might be smug, and sly, but he wasn’t a killer. He might be dull-witted, but not deranged.

Dines seemed almost childlike when he’d confided that the ransom note offered the return of Maeve and the sketch of St. Nick both, for only a thousand dollars more than Rycroft’s reward.

Maeve was not at all certain Charles would pay for her return when he planned to divorce her in a matter of days. But she did not share her concern with greedy Edgar Dines.

Stroking his mustache and grinning rather wickedly, Dines had dispatched his boxer henchman to carry the note to Rycroft Publishing. “Rycroft works well into the night. Leave it, but don’t let him see you leave it.”

“Aye.”

After O’Brien left the gallery, Dines shared his plan with Maeve as if he were used to talking to himself. “Now, Miss O’Malley. In my ransom request I have informed Mr. Rycroft that you and the sketch he wishes are safely hidden where he will never find either one. He has been instructed to leave the ransom money in a satchel at the base of the George Washington statue in the public gardens at dawn tomorrow.”

Dines appeared quite lighthearted as he put on his hat and cloak. “I shall visit my mistress, Lydia, now and make arrangements for you to spend the night with my lady. Under the circumstances, I am certain she will be glad to see me again, and only too happy to accommodate us in this small matter. She does so enjoy a rich man, as I will be soon.”

Maeve pleaded with her eyes and a smothered burbling sound for the little man not to leave her.

“In the meantime, you’ll be safe here. Forgive me for not leaving a light burning but since the great fire of last year it would not be the thing. Further, a light might intrigue any passersby.”

Maeve blasted him in a muffled manner.

“I should have liked the time to plan this better, but one must seize the opportunity when it occurs, Miss O’Malley.” His smirk reminded Maeve of a cat stalking a canary. “Don’t go away now.” He pointed a finger and chuckled. “I will be back for you within the hour.”

It seemed as if two hours had passed since he’d left her to the mercies of the dark, cold night.

In the stillness Maeve heard the hands of a clock tick and the rustle of rats. She feared she would swoon from pure terror before Dines returned. Attempting to free her hands only made matters worse as the rope cut deeper. She’d rubbed her throat raw with strangled cries that evidently no one could hear.

In the deadly dark, Maeve struggled to control her anxiety. She’d come so close to obtaining the sketch of St. Nick. She was so close to it now. Maeve had no doubt the stolen sketch resided in the safe beside Dines’s desk, only a few yards away.

* * * *

Rushing headlong through the night, Charles’s town coach came to a hurried stop in front of Edgar Dines’s gallery.

“There’s no light, no sign of anyone in the gallery,” he barked at Lynch. “Are you certain Maeve did not leave?”

“Certain, sir. Certain.”

Charles jumped out of the coach, hoping against hope that his private investigator was right about something. Although he’d kept his eye on the street during the drive, he’d not seen many people walking, and no women who resembled Maeve in size or stride.

“Well? What are you waiting for?”

“I’m waiting for you to authorize a break-in.”

“Do your best,” Charles growled. No authorization from him would make what Lynch was about legal.

Hunched in a stealthy manner, much like a mole approaching his burrow, the investigator scurried to the door and rumbled at the lock for a full minute before Charles heard the door give.

Stepping in front of Lynch, Charles pushed the door open. A soft creak gave way to a jangle of bells. He closed the door quickly.

“Can’t see a thing,” Lynch hissed.

“Did you hear something?” Charles asked.

“Bells. Bells.”

Charles carried a box of cigar matches in his coat pocket. Groping in the darkness, he found the box and using his fingers to guide him, as a blind man might, he struck a match against the side of the box. The illumination was enough to see a kerosene lamp set on a table in the center of the gallery. He burned his finger before he reached the table. But on the second match he was able to light the lamp.

“Doesn’t appear to be anyone here now,” Lynch whispered, hovering behind Charles.

“Do you hear that?” Charles cocked his head, straining to hear the sound.

“What?”

“Humming.”

“Humming?” Lynch looked at him as if he were mad.

“Humming, coming from the back. Let’s go.”

Holding the lamp up with one hand, Charles pushed the dividing curtain aside.

“Dear God!” His heart slammed against his chest. “Maeve!”

The humming abruptly stopped.

Bound and gagged, her beautiful blue eyes wild with fright, Maeve brightened with evident relief when she saw Charles. To his horror her little body trembled involuntarily, in fits and starts. Tears spilled down her cheeks, pale as the snow on the window ledge. Her gleaming raven curls tumbled in total disarray about her shoulders, and her jaunty, holly-green hat sat at a precarious angle.

Shoving the lamp at Lynch, Charles rushed to her side and tore at the ropes holding Maeve and then loosed the muffler covering her mouth. Within seconds he pulled her up from the chair and gathered her into his arms. Charles crushed her against him, silently vowing never to let her go.

Maeve cried out his name on the ragged edge of belly-deep sobs. “Oh, Charles! Charles!”

At length he stepped back. Holding her by her forearms, Charles scrutinized her anguished face and skirted his gaze down her cold body, looking for signs of physical harm. “Are you all right? Have you been hurt?”

“No. No, I’m, I’m fine,” she stammered.

Thankful to find his brave little wife in one still-perfect piece, Charles’s heart overflowed with happiness. If anything had happened to Maeve, life would never have been the same for him.

He could no longer deny it. He loved her!

Maeve’s sobs subsided. Still clinging to Charles, she wiggled in his arms to point behind her. “The sketch of St. Nick is in Dines’s safe. I’m certain you’ll find it there.”

“Is that why you came here?”

She lowered her eyes. “I wanted to recover the sketch and give it to you on Christmas. I couldn’t think of anything you would like more. Dines must have had O’Brien steal the sketch from you so that he might sell St. Nick again. I’d hoped that was the case and that he would sell the sketch to me.”

Charles felt his heart melt in that moment, honey-thick and hot, pouring over carefully constructed walls that once protected him from this very thing. Caring, loving. Needing.

He gently lifted Maeve’s chin between his thumb and forefinger until her eyes met his. “But there is something I want more than Barnabas’s sketch, my wild Irish lady.”

Appearing crestfallen, Maeve frowned. “There is?”

“You. I want you by my side for the rest of my life. You are the one work of art I cannot, will not, live without.”

Her lips trembled as they slowly turned up into a blinding, dizzying smile. Mesmerized, Charles dipped his head, focusing on the delicious lips he meant to kiss.

But Lynch, still crouched behind Charles, made his presence known. “The door!”

Charles’s head snapped up. Newly alert, he listened. A key turned in the back door lock. Clasping Maeve’s hand, he motioned Lynch to stand on one side of the door while he quickly strode to the other.

Positioning Maeve flat against the wall, Charles poised to spring on whoever walked through the door in the next second.

Edgar Dines.

Charles jumped the villain while Lynch slammed the door shut behind him.

Dines passed out from fright.

It took several minutes to revive the art dealer and by then Lynch held him fast.

“Rycroft!”

“I understand you sent me a ransom note,” Charles said. He spoke calmly, he thought, for wanting to rip Dines’s heart out.

“Who told you that?”

Maeve stepped forward. “I did.”

While he burned to pummel the bird-like man with his bare fists, Charles instead kept a grip on his emotions. He spoke quietly and distinctly. “And now I’d like you to open the safe, Edgar.”