Redeeming the Rogue (28 page)

“I thought we had reached an agreement over possession of this room,” she said, knowing there was little she could do to buttress her claim. Bravado remained her sole weapon.

“Have you forgotten that for the purposes of our subterfuge, my wardrobe and personal effects are here?” he asked, his eyes crinkled. “After all the effort you’ve expended to have me dress in this fashion, do you wish me to sleep in these clothes?”

“No, not at all.” She relaxed and shook her head. “My apologies. I shouldn’t have presumed . . .”

He eased closer to her, untying the knot of his neck cloth. “What exactly did you presume, Arianne?” His eyebrow raised. “Did you assume that I’d revert to the morally depraved scoundrel you first met in Lord Henderson’s office?”

“I assumed you’d collect your clothes and change elsewhere,” she said, holding her ground.

He laughed. “Indeed I shall, in deference to your innocence. But for the sake of any watchful eyes in the household, allow me to linger a bit longer in my own quarters.” He removed his jacket, then disappeared into their shared closet.

He assumed she was still innocent. In many ways she still was. Her experience had not been expansive, nor particularly pleasant, but in all the ways that truly mattered, she could no longer claim that description. However, he had no need to know that.

She returned to her list. The timing of their arrival in Washington was awkward. According to Lady Weston, so many of those who mattered had already left the city for the summer. Given the restricted hours allowed for calls and the return of same, she’d have to race about the unfamiliar city like a street peddler hawking rotting fruit. They needed a social function that would draw those remaining in Washington to the legation.

A light repetitive thump from the tiny closet room caught her ear along with the realization that Rafferty was taking extraordinary time gathering bits of his wardrobe. “Rafferty?” she called lightly.

No response. She didn’t wish to raise her voice in case “the watcher” had ears as well. She decided to investigate.

The drawers in a small chest were extended while Rafferty judiciously slid his hand behind her gowns and foundation pieces that hung on hooks on the closet’s walls. He rapped his knuckle lightly, listened, then moved on.

“What are you doing?” she whispered.

“Looking for a safe, or a hidden compartment behind these walls,” he explained tersely.

She frowned. “Why would you believe there’s a safe in the closet?”

“I found a key carefully hidden in Lord Weston’s study. It has to fit somewhere.” He rapped on another section before moving on again. “I’ve already searched the study.”

A key! Now that was promising. No wonder Lord Henderson said Rafferty was competent. “What can I do?”

“Search the bedroom for a safe or a locked box.” His knuckles tapped on a new section of the wall, then he stepped around a hanging gown to start the process once more. “I’m almost finished here.”

Together they looked under tablecloths, tugged on the bricks on the fireplace looking for loose mortar, tapped on the walls, and checked drawers. Nothing.

A trickle of perspiration ran down her back. She grasped her fan off the desk and sat on the bed while stirring a breeze in the humid air. Rafferty’s shirt was molding to his chest in a most flattering fashion. “Where do we look next?” she asked.

Wiping his brow with his shirtsleeve, he sat heavily beside her. “I suppose the key could be for a safety-deposit box in a bank or at a hotel. However, I would have thought he’d like to keep his secrets close. I know I would.”

“We’ve looked everywhere in this room,” she said. Strange. She should be frustrated by their failure, yet she felt exhilarated by the search. They were working together, not as instructor and pupil, nor aristocrat and . . . not. They worked as equals, and it was refreshing. She hadn’t felt so free, unfettered by society’s restrictions, since she was a child.

“You’re smiling.” He glowered, then his lips twisted to a smile. “Why are we smiling?”

“I was thinking this was fun, working together like this.”

“It would be more fun if we found the safe.” His eyes narrowed. “I thought Lady Weston packed all the family’s possessions in anticipation of her trip.” He pointed to a framed picture hanging on the wall near the water closet. “Why did she leave that?”

Heat rose to Arianne’s cheeks. “I think she left it for me. Her daughter Kitty painted that portrait of me when we were both very young.” She laughed. “I’m surprised she’s kept it all these years.”

Rafferty raised a brow and walked to the portrait. He pulled it from the wall with barely a glance at the girl in a freshly starched pinafore. “Eureka.” He grinned. “Here’s the safe.”

While he reached in his trouser pocket for the key, she came to investigate. The key fit, and soon Rafferty extracted several documents, a letter, and a Webley RIC revolver. Rafferty looked at the gun and replaced it in the safe, but he carried the papers to the writing desk where the light was better. Arianne slipped onto the desk chair. Rafferty hovered over her shoulder.

Arianne held the letter so they both could read it, that is if the jasmine scent on her neck didn’t distract him. She read the letter out loud, something about the assassination of Tsar Alexander II earlier in the year and the resulting influx of Russian immigrants.

Rafferty had no interest or concern about Russian immigrants. It wasn’t part of his assignment from Lord Henderson. Instead, he listened to the lovely lilting sound of her voice and gazed at the wide expanse of skin from her earlobe, around her jaw, to her neck. If he leaned a little closer, he could nuzzle that neck with his chin, an enticing temptation.

She picked up another document. “Looks like shipping schedules,” she said, oblivious to the true nature of his focus. “Look, here’s the
Irish Rose
.” She tapped the paper. “And here . . . and here . . .”

Rafferty’s attention snapped to the paper. He pulled the sheet from her fingers to study it closely. The ships listed all traveled between Ireland and America with a stop in London along the way. While several ships were listed, the
Irish Rose
was listed more than most. “I’ll have to take this up with Captain Briggs,” he said. “Maybe he can make sense of it.”

Arianne pulled the other letter from the envelope. Unlike the previous letter, this one was not written to Lord Weston. Arianne read:

“O’Shay,” Arianne repeated. “Isn’t that the name of the woman found murdered with Lord Weston?”

“I knew it!” Rafferty straightened, slamming a fist into his open palm. “I knew Toomey was behind this.”

“You believe it to be the same Toomey?” Arianne asked, incredulous.

“One and the same, but he won’t get away with it,” he said with grim determination. “Not this time.”

Arianne pushed the papers aside to uncover the list she’d begun earlier. She wrote the name
Rosie
beside her note to talk to the housekeeper about the servants. Already they were making progress. She glanced up at Rafferty with awe, grateful that Lord Henderson had the foresight to choose Rafferty to solve the murder of her friend. He was going to make a fine British minister.

 

BY NOON THE NEXT DAY, ARIANNE PACED IN THE SALON. What was Lord Henderson thinking to assign Rafferty as British minister? He obviously had no regard for the significance of meeting President Garfield.

Lady Weston glanced at her with concern. “You’re expected at the Executive Mansion at three o’clock. Did your husband say where he was going?”

Arianne chafed with the reference to her husband. While it was highly doubtful that she would ever have the legitimate right to refer to another man as “husband,” if she did, it would be someone who could be counted upon to be where he should, when he should. Her question was all the more awkward, as Rafferty had left before she rose for breakfast. She hadn’t a clue where or when he had disappeared with his friend Phineas. To acknowledge that might cast aspersion on their separate sleeping arrangements.

Fortunately, Rafferty walked into the legation before she was forced to add another layer of falsehoods. Before he dashed upstairs to change, he kissed her on the cheek.

Lady Weston grinned. “I do believe that man takes every opportunity to kiss you. You are ever so fortunate to find a devoted husband, Annie.”

Arianne smiled but decided this need to constantly embarrass her would be grounds for another negotiation.

The appointment with the president was a diplomatic necessity, as it opened the door for introductions to other diplomatic and political personages. Once the legation driver delivered them to the Executive Mansion, they waited in a small antechamber until called by the president’s secretary.

“Mr. Rafferty, is it?” The bearded president walked around his desk and extended his hand. “It’s about time they sent someone without some fancy title. Welcome to the United States of America, Ambassador Rafferty.”

Arianne bristled at the incorrect use of title—Rafferty was not an ambassador—but knew enough not to comment. The ends of Garfield’s full mustache lifted, the only indication of a smile.

“Mr. Rafferty is just fine, Mr. President.” Holding his hat in one hand, Rafferty shook hands with the other. “And may I congratulate you on your successful campaign.”

Garfield nodded his head. “Much to be done, much to be done.” He turned to Arianne. “And this must be your wife, Mrs. Rafferty.” Arianne dipped in a partial curtsy.

“Lady Arianne Rafferty,” her husband corrected.

The president’s tired eyes widened a moment. “I didn’t know that could happen.”

“My wife obliged me by marrying beneath her,” Rafferty explained with that half smile.

“Don’t they all,” Garfield exclaimed with a hearty laugh. “I know my Lucretia did.”

Arianne fought to keep her smile in place. Levity had no place in diplomacy.

“I wish you could meet Mrs. Garfield, but she’s recuperating from malaria,” the president said to Arianne. “Blasted mosquitoes.”

“Please convey our best wishes for her full recovery,” she said.

“She’s convalescing along the New Jersey shore. I will pass along your wishes when I see her in a few weeks,” he promised. “Mr. Rafferty, thank you and the missus for advising me of your arrival. I hope I can call upon your expertise should there be occasion.”

“Most assuredly, Mr. President.” They exchanged handshakes once again.

After they had left the strange oval room, another man with a drooping mustache and bushy sideburns approached from the far end of the hallway. Christopher, these Americans loved their furry lips! Even the Baron had confined his mustache to his upper lip and didn’t allow it to droop down his face. At least Rafferty demonstrated a competent hand with a razor.

The man approached on their left. Rafferty’s brow furled a moment. “Mr. Vice President? Mr. Chester Arthur?”

The man stopped cautiously.

“I recognize you from the illustrations in the
Washington Post
.” Rafferty extended his hand and grinned. “I’m Michael Rafferty, the new British minister and a County Cork man, myself.”

Wariness faded from the vice president’s eyes, and he accepted the offered handshake. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, sir. British minister, you say? Isn’t that unusual given Ireland’s political climate?”

Rafferty’s eyes crinkled. “May I assume you have an interest in the parliamentary discussions on home rule?”

Arthur smiled cautiously. “My opinions on home rule are well known but are of little consequence. My loyalties are to my country and my constituents.” He paused, his brow knitted. “Your name sounds familiar, but I can’t place where I heard it.” He studied Rafferty a moment and laughed. “I’m certain it will come to me after you’re gone.”

Rafferty introduced Arianne, and the vice president acknowledged her with a nod.

While they spoke, Arianne noted the scrutiny of a newcomer to the waiting area. She supposed the man was as shocked as she at Rafferty’s aggressive behavior, introducing himself to a stranger without the recommendation of another, especially when the stranger was the second most powerful man in the American government.

As soon as they had left the Executive Mansion and were situated in the legation carriage, she let him know her mind.

“Did not Lord Henderson instruct me to assist you in areas of deportment? Why then do you not listen and ignore the very advice I have striven to teach you?”

“Christ. Not another lecture on attire. Arianne, I’ve cut my hair for your satisfaction. I’ve shaved. I’m wearing gray trousers, white shirt, swallowtail black jacket.” He held up his hand. “Gray gloves.” Then he thumped his finger on the top of his gray top hat. “Gray as well. I am the epitome of a proper British minister.”

“You forgot to use your calling cards.” She hated the whiney tone in her voice, but it just slipped out of her mouth.

He sighed. “Arianne, the people I’m accustomed to working with don’t carry calling cards. They know who I am and why I’m there. I need time to adjust to this card business.”

“We were late because of you,” she complained as if he’d never spoken.

“We weren’t late.” He looked at the passing scenery. “We just didn’t arrive as early as you wished.”

That was true. She had hoped that by arriving early she would meet the president’s wife, but then, that was not possible.

“I didn’t know where you were.”

“I left a note. I needed to speak with Captain Briggs.”

“A note?”