Love's Harbinger (5 page)

“Mam’selle Ondit is composed of many people. I’m just her conscience. I decide what items to include. Her legs and eyes are several different ladies. Lady Marie Struthers is taking in the Ankers’ ball for me tonight. She’s an astute observer.”

“Lady Marie! How did you meet her?” she asked in surprise.

He adopted a lazy smile and said, “Her chaperone fell asleep one evening and I, being a cur, naturally took advantage of the situation to foist myself on the young lady.”

“There is no need to be satirical, Mr. Delamar.”

“If you knew the alternative, you would not say so,” he said through thinned lips.

Mr. Delamar’s carriage, when it rolled up to the door, was seen be in the highest kick of fashion, and the team of bays harnessed to it were prime goers. But that Lady Marie Struthers was on close-enough terms to be reporting for him was the greater shock.

“How does it happen I never see you anywhere when apparently you attend a good many parties?” she asked.

“I must assume we don’t often attend the same parties, though I’ve seen you a few times here and there. My more intimate friends are Whigs, you see, and it’s well known the Mordains are high Tories.”

‘‘I see.’’

“Oh, I am not actually a partisan—objectivity is essential to good reporting—but I first established my reputation by doing some articles on the plight of returned veterans and it made me a minor hero with the Whigs.”

“I thought your first reputation was based on social trivia,” she reminded him.

“That doesn’t establish a reputation, ma’am, only notoriety, which is, unfortunately, the easiest step for a man without connections. Hot gossip catches on more quickly than serious news.”

“I wouldn’t have thought you’d be interested in the easiest step.’’

“I was in a hurry. Poverty is a sharp goad, but you wouldn’t know anything about that.”

“I know something about being in a hurry at least. How long do you think it will take to find Thomas?”

He looked across the dark carriage to where she sat in the shadows. “We can cut an hour off the time if you’ll agree to something a trifle unusual,” he said diffidently.

“Of course, anything.”

“You are precipitate—you didn’t even ask what I had in mind.”

“I would do anything for Thomas,” she announced nobly.

Darkness concealed his disbelieving stare. “I’m going to make a reconnaissance mission to Lord Thomas’s flat in Albany. It’s practically on our way home. It wouldn’t do for a lady to visit that bachelor establishment in the ordinary way, but you might be some help to me. I’m thinking of an address book with abbreviated names or places, a letter that would mean something to you but not to me. Are you game?”

“I’m not concerned with propriety when a man’s life is at stake.”

His eyes narrowed, though she couldn’t see it in the dark carriage. “A man’s life” seemed a vague, unemotional way for a lady to refer to her fiancé. “Especially when the man in question is the man you love,” he said.

“Yes.” Her answer was hardly more than a whisper.

The carriage drew up in a square cul-de-sac in front of a long, double row of houses. Thomas’s flat was at the end nearer to Piccadilly. Mr. Delamar got out first and checked to see that no one was about. When he determined that the coast was clear, he gave Faith his hand, and together they ran to the door.

“How are we going to get in?” she asked.

“The same way I got into Elwood’s office. With this.” He held up a small metal tool, not a passe-partout key but a twisted piece of metal. The front door was unlocked, but he used it to open the door to Thomas’s chambers. They stepped in to a pitch-black, airless room.

“There must be a lamp or some candles here somewhere,” Faith whispered.

“We’ll draw the draperies first.”

When this was done, they found a lamp and lit it. The flat wore the disheveled look of a dwelling hastily abandoned. The desk in the corner stood with its drawers open, and papers were strewn about on top and on the floor. They went first to investigate these, but the papers were mostly bills, with a sprinkling of IOUs. Faith found a few letters but hesitated to read Thomas’s private correspondence.

“What have you got there?” Delamar asked.

“It’s from Thomas’s father. I—I don’t think we should read it.”

Without an instant’s hesitation, he reached for the letter. “My conscience is less scrupulous. I put a man’s life above his privacy.” He glanced quickly through the two pages. “Nothing of interest to me here. It’s about your marriage settlement.” She looked at him with sharp interest. “Sure you don’t want to take a peek? Just read it with one eye, the way Methodists dance on one leg,” he tempted.

“No, thank you. I’ll have a look in the bedroom.”

“Intestinal fortitude as well as grace under pressure! You would have made a fine soldier.”

Faith did not appear to be listening. She lit another lamp and went off alone to the bedchamber. It was in a mess, with the bed unmade and soiled shirts and cravats scattered about. The clothespress door was slightly ajar. On the bedside table rested a stack of gentlemen’s magazines. They were of no weighty sort, mainly sporting and sartorial literature. Thomas had never posed as a heavy intellectual. She noticed the picture of herself was missing. That at least he had taken with him, which showed a continued regard for her. She went to the dresser and saw that the drawers were empty except for his Book of Common Prayer. She was saddened to see that he had left it
behind; it
almost seemed a symbol that he had abandoned proper thinking. It put the awful idea into her head that Thomas was indeed guilty. She was standing, holding the book in her hand and frowning, when Delamar appeared at the door. He went to the wardrobe and flung the door open. A diaphanous red peignoir hung haphazardly on a hanger.

Faith turned and saw Mr. Delamar running his hands over it. He looked at her, one eyebrow cocked at a quizzing angle.

She stared, unbelieving, at the peignoir, but her first instinct was to protect Thomas. “His sister sometimes visits,” she said curtly.

“I admire her taste, though I shouldn’t like to see such an item on my own sister if I had one. And neither would Lord Thomas.”

Her hand longed to reach out and slap his bold face. It took all her willpower to restrain it. But really it was Thomas she wanted to revile. How could he? Of course she knew Thomas was a flirt—all the women were after him. That peignoir had probably hung in the closet for months, untouched—since long before their engagement.

“Take it, then, if you admire it, Mr. Delamar. Thomas is through with it and its owner, I assure you,” she said with a semblance of calm.

He shook his head and a reluctant smile broke out. “Propriety wins out—again. One day that composure will break and London will suffer another earthquake.”

“Not at all. There is nothing unusual in a bachelor’s entertaining a woman in his rooms.”

He shrugged his shoulders. “I’ve got what I’m after. Let’s go. Or have you found something?” he asked, looking at the book in her hands.

“No, just a book,” she said, and closed the drawer. “What did you find?”

“We’ll discuss it in the carriage. We don’t want to loiter here longer than necessary. Douse the lamp.”

Delamar held his ear to the door before leaving. They hurried down the stairs and out to the waiting carriage.

“What did you find?” she asked.

“A map. I already knew he’d been to a travel agent and was inquiring for ships abroad. Now I know what port he’s headed for and what ship he’s booked passage on.”

“Dover?”

“No, the surprising thing is that he’s marked Bournemouth. Not the fastest route to France. You don’t suppose he’s making a dart to America? His agent implied he was going to France.”

“Thomas—America?” she asked, astonished. “I shouldn’t think so. I can’t see Thomas with dusty boots and provincial society. He’s a town buck. It must be Elwood’s doing. He’s luring Thomas to Bournemouth to kill him there, in that out-of-the-way spot, where no one will recognize him. I mean, no one goes to Bournemouth.”

 “Does his family own any real estate on the Isle of Wight?”

“No. This is Elwood’s idea, I tell you,” she said impatiently. “Will you go after him?”

“I’ll be leaving tonight as soon as I deliver you home.”

“He’s innocent, you know,” she said softly. “You must believe that.” And she must believe it, too. She must have faith in Thomas. If nothing else, the fact that he was cut off from England and all of his friends would prevent him from acting so badly. “Promise me you won’t do anything to hurt him.”

Delamar’s voice, when he answered, was cutting. “I am not an assassin. I don’t shoot first and ask questions after.”

“I was thinking of your being a soldier. Killing would be nothing new for you.”

“The war is over. I’m a journalist now, not a professional killer.”

When the carriage pulled up to Lady Lynne’s house, Delamar opened the door and accompanied Faith inside to speak to her aunt.

“Ah, good. You found her and brought her home. How did the rout party go, Faith?” Lady Lynne asked. “Did you tell the old cats what I told you to?”

“Yes.”

“Did anyone dance with you?”

“I stood up a few times.”

“I made her waltz, as I promised,” Mr. Delamar added.

“Poor you!” Lady Lynne laughed. “Faith has two left feet when it comes to waltzing, but she will soon get the hang of it.”

“She’s as supple as a cat already. She always landed on my feet,” he said, and smiled at Faith to show her that he was joking.

“What’s that you’ve got there, Guy?” was the chaperone s next question.

Faith looked surprised to hear her aunt on such familiar terms with Mr. Delamar after so short an acquaintance. He placed the map on the table, and they all gathered around to look at it.

“He has this line drawn between London and Bournemouth,” Delamar said, tracing the route with his finger. “He’s going by way of Winchester—he wouldn’t get that far today. Lady Faith thinks it’s France he’d be headed for. What do you think, Lady Lynne?”

“Thomas would like Paris, but don’t folks usually go by the shortest route, from Dover to Calais?”

“Yes, but if he’s on the run, he wouldn’t go the usual way and Bournemouth is not far from Cherbourg,” Delamar explained. “These notes Lord Thomas made indicate that America is his destination. On the other hand, he might have left the map and notes behind to throw dust in our eyes. There’s a ship to America leaving Bournemouth later this week. Is he that cunning, in your estimation?”

“Thomas is not cunning, and he is not a thief,” Faith said firmly. “Elwood arranged the whole thing. I think he means to murder Thomas, Auntie.”

“Rubbish!” was her aunt’s opinion of that. “Murder is a very serious matter. He’d stick at murder. No, he may very well have conned Thomas into dashing off to Bournemouth on some pretext or other. His aim may have been to set the law chasing after Thomas while he slipped away somewhere else with our money. Otherwise they would have gone off together, I think. Do you have any line on Elwood at all, Guy?”

“He was spotted leaving his office this evening. Unfortunately, the man who saw him didn’t follow him, so I have no way of knowing where he was going. I only learned tonight where his office was or I’d have had it watched, of course.”

“Why, we knew all along! You should have asked us!”

“I did ask you for your help, ma’am,” he reminded her, but it was Faith who was subjected to an accusing glare.

“Then you shall have it,” Lady Lynne said, and laughed. “We shall accompany you on this mad dash to Bournemouth. It will get Faith out of town, away from all of the old cats who are sharpening their claws to rip her to ribbons.”

“I travel alone,” Delamar said simply.

“Fine, then we’ll travel along beside you.”

“That is a bad idea. There might be trouble. It’s no place for ladies,” Delamar said through thinned lips.

“The highways are common property,” Lady Lynne riposted.

Faith quickly considered this outlandish idea and found much to recommend it. Getting away from the cats of London was as tempting as helping to prove Thomas innocent. “I have every right to go, more right than you,” she told Delamar.

His face took on a forbidding aspect. “I can’t stop you, but don’t expect me to slow down to ten miles an hour to accommodate you.”

Lady Lynne tossed her head. “My late husband had the best bits of blood money can buy, and I have them still. Ten miles an hour, indeed! Call for the carriage, Faith. The traveling carriage. Oh, bother, my groom is at the DeGrues’ rout. I’ll send a footman after him while we throw a few things into cases.”

Then there was the great commotion of Delamar stalking out of the house, of a footman rushing after the groom, of servants assisting with the packing, and of a few social engagements that had to be canceled at the last minute.

It was while Faith folded linens into a valise that she began to wonder why Mr. Delamar was going after Thomas when she knew in her bones that it was Elwood who was the guiltier party. Of course they didn’t know where Elwood had gone, while Thomas, being less cunning, had left a trail. Still, with all his connections, Mr. Delamar ought to be able to snoop out something, or how had he earned his reputation as a bloodhound?

For her part, she was sure Elwood was following Thomas to kill him, and she wondered if Mr. Delamar believed it as well. It added to her nervousness that he might believe it. His disbelief had given her hope that it was untrue. Some small corner of her mind had begun to put faith in his intelligence, if nothing else. And if it was true, they must make haste to overtake Elwood before he murdered Thomas.

Chapter Four

It was more than an hour later by the time Lady Lynne’s traveling carriage was packed and ready for the journey. Any person with a ha’pence of common sense knew that it was ridiculous to strike out into the night on such an uncertain quest, but Faith did not say so, in case her aunt changed her mind.

Lady Lynne made herself comfortable on a pile of pillows and said, “I mean to catch a few winks, my dear. If Guy’s carriage is spotted, awaken me. Or, better still, have Nubbins whip up the team and keep it in sight.”