Lynne Connolly (28 page)

“And drag the man back to London?” Richard shook his head. “I think not. If he’s there, it’s better to leave him. Let him be dead.”

It sounded terrible. So cold, but I knew that under the flat tone lay a world of torment. Without a pause, he continued. “Sebastian Garraway doesn’t sound like the name of a man from the streets. I can say with reasonable authority that he didn’t belong to the people I—we—customarily meet with. I’d suggest that our best approach is to put all the resources available into discovering where he came from.”

Alicia nodded. “I left Jones at the office with two likely men to protect him.”

Richard shot her a sharp glance. “Add two more.”

“You think it’s necessary?”

“More than necessary.” He paused and paced around the room, finally coming to stand beside my chair. “I think Julia is running out of control. We have her cornered and cornered animals grow vicious. I’m not about to apologize for calling her an animal.”

Nobody asked him for an apology.

We arrived at Martha and James’s just a few moments late, having agreed on our strategy. We hadn’t any reason to discuss it, the solution seemed simple. Unfortunately it meant that we had to keep my guard in place for now. At least Richard ordered it so, and while I didn’t meekly obey all his dictates, this one had merit, if only that it kept my husband from worrying about me.

To our surprise we found the dinner a little thin of company. Martha had given me to understand that there would be twenty people at dinner. There were, in fact, merely ten. Richard and I, Gervase and Ian, Ruth, Martha and James, and Lord and Lady Somerfield with their eldest son, Julian, who had shown a discreet interest in furthering his acquaintance with Ruth.

But if Martha hadn’t told me beforehand, I wouldn’t have suspected a thing. Martha’s domestic management was always her strongest point, and it consisted of a skill many hostesses envied and proved one of the reasons my family had settled into society almost seamlessly.

The paucity of company eased me a little until I wondered at the reasons for it. I came to the inevitable conclusion that society was avoiding us, the news of John’s death causing a ripple that most people would rather avoid. I put up my chin and prepared to accept it. Nobody would suspect that I might fear even more than I usually did that I’d enter a ballroom only to see people’s backs as they gave me the cut direct.

Before we left, my brother Ian offered to escort me to the Exchange the next day. I accepted. I wanted to speak to him anyway, and I’d learned that sometimes a person could be more alone in a crowd of people she didn’t know rather than seeking privacy where there was none.

So the next day, trailed by the usual two footmen and my maid, Ian and I strolled under the arches of the building, peering into the various shop windows and occasionally going inside one or the other. I found a new fan to match my dark blue gown, and a toy for Richard, who despite his aversion to actually taking snuff as copiously as some, collected the pretty boxes it came in.

I passed my purchases to one of the footmen, since that was ostensibly why they accompanied me. We had to walk around the groups of stockbrokers who wouldn’t have noticed us had I been Princess Augusta. Engrossed in their daily dealings, shouts and handshakes prevailed. Men in sober clothes and plain bob-wigs jostled against men in elaborate dress and tie-wigs, who habitually stood in fashionable poses, and those in between, hurrying from one group to another to discuss deals that could make or break great financial concerns. I loved it but resented the fact that my sex precluded my taking part.

I glanced at Ian to see him watching me, a quizzical quirk to his lips. “What?” I demanded.

“Ever practical, Rose. If you wanted to, you could employ someone to deal for you.”

I shrugged. “I’d have to trust him implicitly. He’d have to make decisions independent of me, and believe in his own judgement. And I prefer to oversee it all.”

He cocked his head to one side and appeared for a moment like the boy I’d spent so much time with in the past. My brother had been a sickly child, and with his pale face and sharp, intelligent features sometimes appeared so to others, but surviving the illnesses that children were heir to had made him as strong as an ox, or so I liked to tell him from time to time. “Would you let me do it?”

“Don’t you have enough to do?” Ian’s position as Gervase’s political secretary involved more than gracing his house and bed. Ian took his situation seriously, and Gervase sometimes told me how essential he considered Ian to his success in Parliament.

A shadow of concern crossed his face. “I fear we may have to retrench. Gervase has made his fortune, and he needs an occupation, but he may have to reconsider politics.”

We pushed past a group of men jabbering in various languages. I recognised Italian and French, and wondered if they were using interpreters or if they knew the languages. I guessed the latter from the rapidity of the conversation. I would so like to push my way in and join in their discussions, but while women could control businesses and set fashions, they couldn’t take part in the financial world. I wished I had the courage to invade the coffeehouses and the discussions here, but while there was no formal bar, nobody would have taken me seriously.

But Ian, the highly intelligent brother who I loved and respected, and who I know was suffering some trouble of his own? Yes, I could do that.

“What’s wrong?” I relished the way I could ask him directly instead of employing polite disclaimers and inching around the subject.

From the way he glanced around, I could detect his uncertainty. Satisfied that no one was listening to us, he leaned closer. “People know about Gervase and me. About our—relationship.”

I hated his hesitation. He loved Gervase, who fully returned his regard. I hated the way they had to hide something the ancient Greeks they both loved would have shouted to the skies. But the one time Gervase had tried to do so he’d had to leave Britain for twelve years of exile, something that had marked both brothers. “They know, but they prefer to say nothing. They like you, Ian.”

“The moment Gervase supports a controversial opinion, they’ll bring it up.”

I laughed, though my heart ached for my sensitive sibling. “As they bring up Newcastle’s affairs, Devonshire’s wealth, Pitt’s love match. They’ll hit on anything to score a point.”

He sighed. “I suppose so.”

He had brought Gervase great happiness. Although they behaved, models of propriety in public, they couldn’t help the occasional loving glance. “You knew they’d call you names, Ian. Gervase must have explained all that, and what to expect.”

“He did. It makes him unhappy at times. He thinks I can’t see it.”

We exchanged a speaking glance and grinned. We loved Kerres, so we had to take what came with that. “At least you don’t have to go to Lady Southwood’s interminable salons and dinners.”

Ian gave a derisory laugh. “You think not? You know how she can choose to be blind to what she refuses to see. One salon, I couldn’t take any more.”

“Lady Strang!”

Shocked, not to say surprised at anyone positively yelling my name in a public place, I remembered the predilection of the gossips and didn’t turn around until I realised the voice sounded familiar.

I turned to see a small, middle-aged man in the hands of my protectors, his arms gripped and the taller footmen almost lifting him off the ground. His sensibly shod feet scrabbled for purchase on the cobbles under him, the silver buckles glinting in the sunshine. Alicia’s assistant and right-hand man in the office, Mr. Barraclough.

I waved to the footmen to let him go. He stumbled, but regained his footing, and brushed his coat down with his hands in an automatic gesture, because it would do little good. His soot-smeared face and the dark marks on his clothing made him appear like a chimney sweep. “My lady, the office is on fire!”

I started forward, pushing Ian away when he put his hand on my shoulder. “Dear God, Barraclough! Is it serious?” Fear clutched my heart. Even a chimney fire could prove fatal.

“Yes, my lady. I fear the whole building might go up. I need someone to stop Mrs. Thompson. I’ve sent a boy to find Lord Strang and Mr. Dixon. She keeps running in for things, and the building isn’t safe.”

Already I was moving, hurrying towards the exit, heedless of the stares of the people thronging the yard. Thank God I’d brought my chair, because I couldn’t get there fast enough. It wasn’t far.

I climbed into the chair and ordered the men to run. My subsequent journey might have jolted me severely and given me a few new bruises, but I disregarded them. My footmen trotted by the side of the chair. We must have created quite a sight, but I went past caring when I saw the hungry fingers of flames reaching up into the sky.

Every fire in London reminded people of the disastrous conflagration of nearly a century ago. Since then, the new rules had helped to make it safer, but in the City many buildings were still crammed against each other, people living cheek by jowl, the streets packed. It still created a potentially combustible situation.

A small crowd thronged the street, now the site of desperate activity. Furnishings lay outside the tall building, and people with grubby faces, smeared with greasy smuts, stood back, watching. My men set the chair down some distance away, and casting off the help of my footmen, I ran towards the building, Nichols at my heels. I grabbed at the ribbon from my hat, tied decoratively at one side, and fastened it more firmly just to keep it out of the way. When I nearly stumbled on the uneven cobbles here, Nichols caught my elbow. I glanced behind me. I hadn’t shaken off my bodyguards, not that I intended to, and Ian raced up to me, panting a little from the exertion.

The heat from the flames seared my face, and I watched as a cart bearing a huge barrel of water, dragged by two horses, clattered to a halt to join the others clustered close to the building. Flames and smoke poured out of every window, and it was obvious that all the firemen could do was to contain the flames. The building was done for.

But I couldn’t see Alicia.

As I watched in horror, a dull roar came from somewhere inside and a renewed burst of smoke heralded her appearance, like a creature from Hell, out of the front door. She held a motley collection of items, two of the tea dishes she used, a brown file of something unidentifiable, three or four account books. Before anyone could stop me, I darted forward to grab her elbow and drag her out of the way.

A low rumble turned into a greater roar, and gusts of smoke and debris belched out of the openings. Glass crashed by my side, where one of the last remaining windows blew out.

“What in hell do you think you’re doing?” I shrieked above the cacophony. “Get back here!” A touch on my shoulder and a flash of silver told me of the presence of one of my footmen. “Take her out of danger, and don’t let go of her. She’s run mad.”

The man seized Alicia’s arms, and she kicked and screamed, drumming her heels against the man’s shins when he lifted her. His arm around her waist and the other banded around her chest, he bore her off to her shrieks of, “The accounts! The registry!”

Another pair of arms seized me and I fought back until someone growled in my ear. “Fight me and I’ll throw you over my shoulder.” I sagged against him. Richard had arrived.

At the edge of the crowd, Richard dumped me without ceremony on to my feet but as I rounded on him, I saw someone lying on the ground. An African, his dark face darker with soot and grime. He lay on his back, his fists clenched below the cuffs of his plain green coat, his eyes open, widely straining. By his side lay another body, this one in the unmistakeable slump of death.

I shook off Richard’s restraining hands and raced towards them. My modest skills in dealing with injuries had served us well in the past. Heedless of my fine gown, I kneeled next to the man. He stared at me, liquid brown eyes wide in terror, the vivid whites bloodshot. “It was—for—me.”

“What, the fire?” I touched his arm, felt for injuries.

The man nodded. “They set—the fire in my room. I awoke—room full of smoke.”

“How?” Richard, standing beside me, barked the question.

“Window open. Arrow, burning cloth.”

Thompson’s had some secured rooms on the second floor, the windows barred. For restraining people and to protect them, if they needed it. I assumed that was where they’d kept Elijah Jones, for this must be the man. He gasped for breath, but apart from some sores on his legs and arms, I thought he’d survive.

“Come away, Rose.”

Reluctantly I stood and faced my husband. His face was pale, his lips firmed in a thin line. “Go home. Now. I’ll speak to you when I get there.”

“Would you rather—?”

With one downward slice of his hand, he cut off my words. “Not here. I’ll ensure the man is kept somewhere safe. Now go.”

A touch on my elbow made me turn and look at Ian, who tried to give me a reassuring smile. “You can’t do any more here, Rose. Do as he says.”

With an exaggerated sigh, I turned and headed for my sedan chair.

Back home, Nichols busied herself removing my soiled clothing and tutting over it. I’d ruined my elbow lace, she said, but I didn’t care. I let her undress and wash me and help me into a different gown. I was only interested in the speed of her actions. She took down my hair and re-dressed it, in the process of setting the final pin when Richard burst in to my room. The door slammed against the wall and bounced back. He caught it and pushed it closed, not as loudly this time.