Deadly Peril (3 page)

“To Haderslev?”

“No, to our Margrave-in-waiting Prince Ernst.”

Westover was surprised and shot a look at Sir Cosmo, who was staring up at the ornate plaster ceiling through his quizzing glass. He scoffed.

“Unless he’s got a king’s ransom aboard ship, you’re wasting your breath and my time!”

“Do you remember the last ambassador from England? It was before the war. Snub-nosed fellow by the name of Parsons. Got himself expelled; his secretary stayed on.”

“What’s Parsons to His Highness?”

“Not Parsons. The secretary.”

“Get to the point, Luytens!”

“The point is, the English ambassador’s secretary became good friends with the Prince—
very
good friends. They were inseparable. Reason Parsons got expelled. The Prince didn’t like sharing the secretary’s time with him…”

Westover shrugged. “So? Parsons should think himself fortunate he got out of here at all. What of it?”

Jacob Luytens suppressed the desire to sigh his impatience and explained.

“It was the Prince who introduced the secretary to his sister, against the wishes of the Margrave, and by all accounts it was that perverted
ménage a trois
that led to the Princess and the English secretary—”

“Shut it! Not another word!” Westover growled, and pulled the consul by his upturned cuff further down the room. “His Highness is not cold in his bed; the Prince is within a breath of being declared Margrave in his place, and you have the-the
stupidity
to resurrect an episode that, were the Prince to come to hear what we were discussing, would cost us our lives!”

Luytens could not suppress his excitement. He almost hissed.

“Ah! So you
do
know all about the English secretary and the Princess!”

“I know enough not to talk about it openly! What’s your game, Luytens? If you weren’t married to my cousin, I’d have had you thrown off a parapet by now.”

“Not so hasty with your condemnation, Westover. I’ve found a way for you to do something which will make the Prince forever grateful. We stand to gain much more than what was lost during the war. I promise you. But you have to act, and act quickly. You have to detain my English friend over there.”

The Captain looked across at Sir Cosmo Mahon, who was now staring at the face of his pocket watch, as if he were late for a prior appointment, and pulled a face. The foreigner looked a fat-witted fool.

“Detain? For what?”

“Does it matter? Just detain him. Make up a reason.” Luytens grinned. “Sir Cosmo Mahon just so happens to be the said English secretary’s best friend. And there is a female traveling with him, a Miss St. Neots, who is presently awaiting him onboard ship. From what I can gather, she’s the English secretary’s sweetheart. So we have the means…”

Captain Westover’s straight black brows drew across the bridge of his long nose. “The means…?”

“Sir Cosmo and Miss St. Neots. They are the means.” When the Captain still looked puzzled, Luytens added as one enunciates to a child, “If you detain them, make them stay here—”

“Arrest them is what you mean!”

The British consul nodded. “Have it your way. If you arrest them then they will need rescuing, won’t they? And who better to do that than the Englishman with whom the Princess became infatuated? I’ll write to my masters in London seeking their help. A letter from Sir Cosmo will reinforce the need for his return.”

A light came into the Captain’s eyes. “Have the Englishman return to rescue Sir Cosmo?”

“Yes. He’ll want to. And besides, he’ll have no choice if his government says he must.”

“And the Prince?”

“He’ll be Margrave Ernst, and you’ll be able to offer up this Englishman to him any way you please. His Highness will be eternally grateful to you, and in turn, you will owe me. I think it a fair trade, don’t you?”

Westover threw back his head with a laugh and gave the British consul an affectionate punch on the arm. “You sly devil, Luytens! I like it. I like your plan very well indeed!”

“Westover! For God’s sake! This is no time for levity.” It was Baron Haderslev flanked by two soldiers. “Why are you standing around sharing a joke when something must be done? Prince Ernst has called for a priest!
A priest
. And the dear Margrave—he has finally breathed his last! God rest his soul. And this lot won’t go until they’ve seen his body.
Do
something!”

The double doors to the bedchamber were flung wide and the crowd of nobles had lost all patience with waiting. They had broken the line of soldiers, who had not been ordered to draw their bayonets and so were doing their best to stem the tide with brute strength. But through sheer weight of numbers, the nobles pushed through the line, and forged
en masse
into the bedchamber, wanting to be the first to see with their own eyes their much loved ruler was indeed dead. And to save their own skins by offering up their undivided loyalty to the Margrave-elect. And while the curious and the loyal supporters of Prince Ernst rushed forward, those who were in two minds, and the nobles who had thrown their lot and their lives in with the fortunes of Prince Viktor, slowly backed out of the room in the hopes of being able to slink away unseen and forgotten in the melee. Once out of sight of the troops, they ran.

A few gestures from Westover and his men knew what to do. They scattered, some into the bedchamber to protect the Margrave’s body and the Margrave-elect, others to round up those nobles who had chosen to flee. Another few went to inform their fellows, down in the barracks in the vaulted casemates, and out along the parapets and at the gates, that the castle must be secured against egress.

In the midst of this turmoil, Sir Cosmo remained fixed to the parquetry, not knowing what to do or where to go. He looked to Luytens, as a ship does a lighthouse, to provide safe passage through this sea of chaos, oblivious that at that very moment he was being betrayed and cut adrift.

As Westover strode across the room to the bedchamber he barked orders to two of his men to arrest Sir Cosmo. This Englishman was now a prisoner, and to throw him in the cells.

Luytens followed him, saying at his back, “He’s not a common criminal—”

“He’s no longer your responsibility, Herr Luytens. I’ll send some of my men to fetch the girl. There can’t be too many Englishwomen at the docks.” Westover looked over his shoulder. “And the other Englishman, the one who was secretary here? You’re certain he’ll come?”

“Yes. For them. I’d stake my life on it.”

“Good. That’s incentive enough for you to make certain he does.”

Baron Haderslev, who had rushed on ahead of the Captain, now stopped in the doorway to wait for him. He had recognized the British consul and wondered what Luytens wanted. The man was untrustworthy. Despite his mother being a Midanichian and his father a Dutchman, he was neither, and he certainly wasn’t an Englishman, which meant his loyalties were to no one but himself. A more treacherous individual the baron had yet to meet. His thoughts were interrupted when he was diverted by shouts in a foreign tongue. He heard the name Luytens but the rest of the tirade was impenetrable. It was a tall well-fed gentleman in a tailored coat and powdered wig calling out for the British consul as he was forcibly ejected from the room by two of Westover’s soldiers.

“What’s going on, Westover?” Haderslev demanded. “Who was that? Why is Herr Luytens here?”

“The gentleman under arrest is an English traveler. He is going to be very useful to us, and to our new Margrave.”

Baron Haderslev was intrigued but skeptical. “To Prince Ernst? How so?”

“Because, my dear baron, he will bring us what the Prince and Princess have craved for a very long time.”

“What’s that?”

“Revenge on the Englishman Alec Halsey.”

T
HREE

LONDON ENGLAND,
WINTER
1763

A
LEC
H
ALSEY
and his uncle had returned to London from Bath to a note from Olivia, Duchess of Romney-St. Neots demanding they alert her the instant they set a foot inside Alec’s St. James’s Place townhouse. But both nephew and uncle agreed they should wait until morning. They were travel weary, covered in the grime of riding in inclement weather, and the hour was late. Both knew what drama awaited them the next day, so with a nod of understanding, one to the other, they went off to their respective apartments to bathe and sleep off their exhaustion.

However, the following morning as they ate a breakfast of soft-boiled eggs, bread and butter with marmalade, and sipped coffee, neither felt any more rejuvenated for a good night’s sleep.

“It’s the worry,” Plantagenet Halsey offered, pushing aside his plate. “Can’t sleep while m’mind is churnin’ with all sorts of possibilities, real or imagined, of what’s happenin’ to those two young people and their entourage. We’ll all feel better when we can
do
somethin’ about it.”

“Yes,” Alec replied, preoccupied with his thoughts as he sliced up an apple. “What mystifies me is why Cosmo and Emily were in Midanich at all. It was not on their itinerary, and it’s not the usual destination, even for those who travel to the northern kingdoms of Norway and Sweden, or even as far as St. Petersburg. In fact, it’s a backwater in every sense. It has a bland, flat, featureless landscape which is constantly flooding because it is below sea level, and there’s
always
a gale blowing in off the North Sea. As for the court politics—” Alec swallowed hard. “Suffice that since my return, and with the war, no Englishman has had to set foot across its borders. So it’s not a place for the traveler. One must have a reason to go there.”

“Your second or third posting was to Midanich, wasn’t it?”

“Posting?” Alec huffed laughter at the word. He offered his uncle slices of the apple. “It was my second posting. But it’s not where I requested I be sent. I was
relegated
. I asked for an Italian state, and Lord Cobham saw fit to send me to a Germanic principality, and as the secretary to Sir Gilbert Parsons, the most punctilious diplomat in the service. He never wrote or dictated a report or letter the entire time I was his junior that he then didn’t have me rewrite at least twice!”

Plantagenet Halsey chomped on the slice of apple. “Perhaps Mahon and Miss St. Neots ended up in Midanich by mistake. You did say Mahon has no sense of direction.”

Alec chuckled. “There might be something in that. After all, they were supposed to be traveling on to Berne, which is in the opposite direction. They would be in Switzerland now if Selina—if Mrs. Jamison-Lewis—if—” Alec met his uncle’s steady gaze. “If she had not miscarried in Paris.”

“You can’t blame her for that,” the old man replied quietly. “But—”

“Uncle, I—”

“—you do.

Alec put aside the ivory-handled paring knife. “I don’t
blame
her. Miscarriages are a fact of life. It’s just—”

“She did what she had to do to survive that hell of a marriage to a sadistic lunatic. As a consequence, she worries she can no longer bear children.”

Alec was stunned. “She confided that to you?”

Plantagenet Halsey shrugged as he reached for a second slice of apple. “I just happened to be there when she let down her guard… Fell all to pieces upon seeing Miranda and her newborn. Holding an infant can do that to you.” He gave a huff of laughter. “I remember holdin’ you for the first time…”

“Uncle, it’s not what Selina did in her marriage that concerns me. God knows I’d forgive her anything—murder—where that monster of a husband is concerned. It’s just that she did not see fit to confide in me what happened in Paris. She miscarried our child. Not hers—
ours
. I had a right to know. As it was, I found out in the most public of settings. It was a shock. I was in shock. I think I still am.”

“I dare say she was tryin’ to spare you the—”

“—grief?”

“That, and other particulars…”

“Other particulars?”

“I’ve said too much already,” the old man answered gruffly. “Not my place. What I do know is that she thinks you blame her.”

“That’s not what I think at all!” Alec said bluntly, frustration with his uncle’s evasiveness making him sound harsh. “She should know me better!”

“Well, my boy, you have a strange way of showin’ her differently. You left Bath without exchangin’ a civil word with her. A’course she thinks you blame her.”

Alec scraped back his chair and went to the sideboard to collect the silver coffee urn off its warming stand. It gave him a moment to collect himself, to cool his temper, and to turn his thoughts from Selina, if only momentarily. He poured into his uncle’s porcelain dish then his own, before setting it back over the candle and returning to the table, adding coolly,

“I don’t want to discuss this now. It’s stupidly self-centered of me to be maudlin over something that could have been, and now won’t be.” He looked across at the old man, saying gently, “And, it seems, may never be. Though I think that an overly dramatic reaction on her part… Did I tell you Tam is spending a fortnight as guest of the Cleveleys?” he said, abruptly changing the subject because his uncle was regarding him with sadness. “They won’t have anyone else attending on their newborn.”

“Amazin’ how the love of a good woman brings out the best in a man…”

“Yes. So you won’t be amazed then when I tell you Cleveley has agreed to be Tam’s sponsor for the final year of his apprenticeship.”

“Ha! With the Duke’s backin’, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if the Worshipful Company of Apothecaries just hands the lad his seal, no questions asked! So I take it Tam has reconciled himself to his profession and
not
being your valet?”

“Yes. I can’t wait to share the news with Wantage that Mr. Thomas Fisher will be residing here as a member of our household. Jeffries will be accompanying me to Midanich.”

The old man selected a sugar lump with the silver tongs and dropped it into his coffee, choosing his words carefully as he stirred the liquid. “As I remember it, you barely escaped that country with your life. And I’ve never been able to prise much out of you about your three years there, other than you were imprisoned, and it was through the personal intervention of Midanich’s king—”