Reckless Rules (Brambridge Novel 4) (31 page)

Ponzi lay close to Brutus’ side. She had eaten less of the poisoned food and recovered faster. It seemed her only concern now was for her companion.

“I’m never going to be able to split you two apart, am I?” Bill murmured gently. “Let’s hope your mistress will take me on, despite what she thinks about my motivations.”

“You just have to find the Heracles Club first.” Chantelle shook her head. “That is not going to be an easy task.”

“Did you say the Heracles Club, Chantelle?” Carruthers sat up. “I’ve certainly heard those words before.”

Chantelle frowned. “Now that you say that, I think I have too. But I have no idea when.”

“I do.” Carruthers banged a fist against his head. “It was in the weeks after Lord Colchester died. Lady Colchester hired me from Lord Anglethorpe. Quite a few of the old staff were still here then. Lady Colchester was going through a black spot.” Carruthers grimaced.

“So she was.”

“Lady Colchester disappeared off without telling me where she was going and came back looking quite pleased with herself. A short while later, a woman came to the door.”

“Lady Vanderguard,” Chantelle exclaimed. “She left in floods of tears after Lady Colchester wouldn’t see her.”

Carruthers nodded. “She implored me for an audience with Lady Colchester. But each time, Lady Colchester sent me back downstairs with a no. Finally Lady Vanderguard said to give Lady Colchester a message. That the Heracles Club would no longer meet. That she would deny anything that Lady Colchester said. That would Lady Colchester please forget the whole affair.”

Bill frowned. “I don’t believe I’ve met Lady Vanderguard. It seems strange that a woman would be caught up in selling other women.”

“Oh don’t you believe it, sir,” Carruthers said bitterly. Chantelle put a hand on his arm. “My mother… she ended up on the streets. The other women were the worst, the madams. Just because a woman has ‘lady’ in the front of her name doesn’t make her one.”

“She didn’t seem very nice at the time.” Chantelle gave Carruthers a concerned look. “But I’m not sure how one would go about finding her direction. Lady Colchester hasn’t mentioned her for years.”

“Freddie will know,” Bill said confidently. His friend knew everyone in the ton. His knowledge was encyclopedic. He found Freddie in the hallway, gazing at the painting of Victoria with Lord Colchester.

“You know, Standish. There is something very fishy about this painting.” Freddie murmured, pulling a quizzing glass to his eye. “The perspective is all off. I mean take the position of the—”

“Freddie, I don’t have time for your art appraisal.”

“—book, or is it a bible? Completely wrong balance. And the whole thing has been painted very quickly. The color is very slapdash.”

“Frederick Lassiter!” Bill shouted. “Where does Lady Vanderguard live?”

Freddie dropped his quizzing glass from his eye with a jump. “68 Brook Street,” he said quickly without pause. “Er, why?”

“Because that is our main lead for the Heracles Club.”

“Ooh. Odious woman. Might have known she was caught up in something like this. She has the manners of a fishwife.”

“What does that make me, with the manners of a smith?”

Freddie ignored Bill’s question. “I pity her poor husband. He was told he was getting a fortune when in reality what he got was a jumped up younger sister.”

“Will you listen to yourself, Freddie? You sound like a starched piece of blanket. What are you going to say when I marry Victoria?”

Freddie swung round his eyes wide. “So you are going to do it? Good on you, man. Never thought you would come to your senses and see how well you were both suited.”

“So you don’t think I’m a jumped up smith masquerading as a Crown operative chancing my arm with a well born lady?”

Freddie laughed. “I couldn’t have described you better myself.” He shrugged his shoulders. “That’s exactly what you are. And?”

“But what you said about Lady Vanderguard?”

“What Lady Vanderguard was described to be, was something that she wasn’t. In this life it is better to go in knowing rather than finding out later. Who cares about someone’s pedigree? Who cares about how much money they have? So long as they are not trying to be someone that they are not, that is all that counts.”

It took Bill a few moments to digest Freddie’s statement. He
had
cared too much, he had to admit. And now it was Victoria who was guilty of that, as she had refused to see him, believing that he would no longer be interested in her due to her monumental fall from grace.

Chantelle was right. The English and their social class obsession had a lot to answer for.

“We should go and see Lady Vanderguard,” Freddie murmured, still squinting at the portrait on the wall. Bill nodded. Time was of the essence, and he was wasting it with his preoccupation with Victoria, who was in more danger every second he wasted.

The journey to 68 Brook Street was short. The carriage, normally occupied just by Freddie on his social outings, held not just him, but Bill, Chantelle and Carruthers too. Percy and George rode on top with the coachman and the Tiger. The heavy weight of the men on the back of the carriage caused it to squeak dangerously on its back axles as it careered around the cobbled corners.

“Lucky that we only have to travel a couple of streets,” Freddie remarked, biting the top of his cane. “Either that or you could put Percy and George on a diet.”

“I theenk George is just the right shape,” Chantelle said huffily, “my lord.”

Carruthers rolled his eyes. “I’m sorry, Lord Lassiter. Chantelle is just like her sister Isabelle, always speaks her own mind.”

“I can understand why Lady Colchester employs her,” Freddie said admiringly.

“We’re here.” Bill opened the door to the carriage and jumped out. “Percy, George, go round to the stables and see if you can find anything out. The rest of you stay right where you are.” Bill gave a warning glance to Carruthers, who was already trying to step out of the carriage. He subsided and sat back down on the carriage seat.

Bill turned back to the house and adjusted his cravat. He hated calling on members of the ton unannounced. Sometimes they didn’t receive him. The house was of the imposing kind. A great brass knocker dominated the dark door. Surprisingly, the door was answered on the first knock.

“Mr. Standish to see Lady Vanderguard.”

“She’s not here,” the butler said snootily. “Please leave a card.”

“Where has she gone?” Bill demanded.

“I am not at liberty to say…” The butler stopped as a quavering voice shouted hoarsely from the front room.

“Is it that Landigno man again, Rogers? Tell him to stop harassing my wife.”

The butler grimaced and made a shooing motion to Bill. “Please leave. The master is agitated.”

The quavering voice started up again. “Coming round here talking about the Heracles Club. Don’t he know that I’ve banned her from that activity? The silly fool didn’t know what she was doing five years ago.”

Bill stared at the butler. Lord Vanderguard was obviously the owner of the quavery voice. He sounded very old to Bill. As he looked more closely at the hall in front of him, he could see where the carpet had worn through and not been replaced. Paint was peeling from the ceiling. He remembered Freddie’s comments about Lord Vanderguard expecting to marry a fortune. It had obviously not materialized.

“I need to speak to Lord Vanderguard immediately.”

“No.” The butler opened the front door in front of him. “His Lordship is old and easily confused. Please leave.”

Bill evaded the half-hearted grasp of the butler’s arm and strode into the front room. It was obvious that anything of value had been sold off; faded patches on the wall indicated where paintings had hung. Lord Vanderguard sat hunched in a wheeled chair, a blanket over his knees. He looked up when Bill strode in.

“Eh, Landigno again? I thought I told you to go away. Rogers! Rogers, get rid of the man.”

The butler strode in after Bill. “I told you, sir, not to disturb him.”

“Look, Rogers, I need to talk to your master.”

The butler glanced at the old man in the wheeled chair. “I am not Rogers, I’m Andrews,” he said softly out of the side of his mouth. “I’ve been with his lordship for thirty years.”

Bill frowned. “Then who is Rogers?”

“His previous butler.”

“Oh.”

“Yes. It’s just perfect for Lady Vanderguard,” the butler said bitterly. He strode over to Lord Vanderguard and twitched the blanket that was slipping off the man’s knees higher onto the chair.

“So you can’t or won’t tell me where she’s gone?”

The butler sighed. “Can’t. Mr. Landigno turned up. He hasn’t called for five years. He used to be a regular here. Got Lord Vanderguard very agitated. He tried to stand up and practically fell out of his chair. Lady Vanderguard just laughed. Told the coachman to ready the horses and she was gone. I’m sure we’ll see her again. We always do.”

“Rogers! Who is this man?” Lord Vanderguard grasped at his butler’s arm. With a muttered apology, Bill left the two men and pulled the front door back into place himself. He shook his head as he walked down the steps. It had been a sad scene inside the lord’s house, with no one to care for the man apart from his butler.

Freddie leaned out of the carriage window. “Anything?” Bill shook his head silently. Whilst it had been interesting, they were no further in finding out where the Heracles Club was. He just hoped that George and Percy would have more luck.

They arrived a tense five minutes after he did. “We’ve got an address, Bill,” George said triumphantly. “I held ’em down whilst Percy punched them. They sang like canaries after that.”

Bill rolled his eyes. He could see that George had elevated his voice somewhat so that it carried into the carriage to the avidly waiting ears of Chantelle.

“12 Hoxton Square,” Percy said proudly. “That’s where the missus went. No idea what’s there, of course. It’s the east end of London.”

Carruthers leaned out of the carriage. “12 Hoxton Square? That’s Mr. Robertson’s establishment for paupers. Lady Colchester sends the money from her investigations there.”

“Investigations?” Freddie raised his eyebrows.

“Later,” Bill said. “We’ll talk about it later. The East End is over four miles away. We can’t all get there in this carriage. Freddie, Chantelle, Carruthers, can you make your own way back from here? I need Percy and George for their… muscle. I think things could become ugly.”

“But who will look after Lady Colchester when you find her?” Chantelle cried, distressed.

“I will,” Bill said quietly. “I will.”

CHAPTER 31

The candles guttered and flamed as Victoria took gasping breaths of air. The crowd of people around her had drawn back, muttering.

“I’ve never seen opium affect the girls in this way before.” Mr. Cryne’s voice was full of doubt.

“Haven’t you ever visited one of the smoking dens in Wapping? Opium takes people in many different ways.” Pedro strode into Victoria’s line of vision. She was too busy trying to control her breathing to concentrate on him. The swipe to her face caught her by surprise. “Shut up, woman. Go back to whatever dreamland you were in.”

“Perhaps you should give her some more wonder tablets,” the lady in the crowd shouted. “It might take her under a bit more. Gosh, what I would give to see that woman at my mercy.”

That was more sobering than any slap to the cheek. If Victoria were to reveal that she was
compos mentis
then she would definitely be administered more of the drug, even though she was securely bound. She
needed
to stay awake. She had an inkling of what she could do to secure her freedom, but not
how
she was going to do it. What a time to be thankful to her dead husband for his rules.
Record and remember
was going to get her out of this mess.

“We had better start the bidding,” Mr. Cryne said nervously. “Your father might arrive at any time.”

“I’d like to see him stop
this
,” Pedro sneered. “Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to the fifteenth meet of the Heracles Club.
Struit insidias lacrimis cum femina plorat!”

“Struit insidias lacrimis cum femina plorat
!” the crowd repeated with gusto around him.

For goodness sake. This club of scoundrels even had a Latin motto. Victoria tried to work through the words in her head. When a person, no, when a woman weeps, she sets pits, no, traps with her tears. Heavens above, even the motto was topical for a group of people intent on selling girls into slavery. The name of the club must have been to give misdirection. Heracles, better known as Hercules, was one of the greatest masculine heroes of the ancient age. In some kind of twisted way did these men, and lone woman, identify with the man who seemed to win every battle that he started?

Victoria licked her lips. Well, there was one woman who defeated Hercules and she was his third wife, Deianira. Never mind, the poisoned shirt of Nessus had turned Hercules into a full time god; at least it banished him from the mortal world. She was going to destroy the Heracles Club and all the people in it once and for all.

She hadn’t been paying attention. Pedro was speaking, but his voice still droned on.

“—and with the wonderful of addition of Lady Colchester exhibited before you I will also include in the price a list of names that the government would rather were not published.” Pedro clearly awaited the oohs and aahs of his audience.

“Why not?” a dark haired gentleman asked abruptly.

“Is it not enough that you know that they want it back?” Pedro said snidely. “Don’t bid for it, if you don’t know why.” Pedro glanced down at Victoria, his Adam’s apple bobbing jerkily. Goodness. Victoria blinked. Swallowing was a nervous man’s game. He didn’t know what the list was for. The silly man
didn’t
know what he had in his hands. Obviously Bertrand Lisle, the Viper, had never trusted him with his knowledge. He had been right to do so. This could be yet another spear in Victoria’s armory.