Slightly Wicked (24 page)

Judith’s spirits rose, knowing that finally she was going to see Bran, that she would be able to hear his story from his own lips. She fervently hoped he would be able to deny all knowledge of the theft of Grandmama’s jewels, but even if he could not then perhaps she would be in time to salvage something from the situation. Perhaps she could persuade him to restore the jewels and beg Grandmama’s pardon, inadequate as the gesture would be. Time was of the essence, though, she knew. She was very thankful that Rannulf had come after her and brought her to London so quickly.

Why had Horace decided to wait a whole day before pursuing her? she wondered. If he had hoped to catch Bran red-handed before he could dispose of the jewels, would he not have wanted to set out that very day? Had he waited perhaps because he knew there was no hurry? Because he knew there were no jewels for Bran to get rid of?

So much pointless speculation was sending her brain into a spin again.

The journey proved to be a wasted one. Branwell was not at home and his landlord did not know when to expect him.

“Though the ’ole world ’as been arsking for ’im last night and this morning,” he said, “And now two females. If
that
don’t beat all.”

“Mr. Law is my brother,” Judith explained. “I need him urgently on . . . on family business.”

“Ah,” the man said, leering at them and revealing a wide array of half-rotten teeth, “I figured one of you was prob’ly ’is sister.”

“Did you indeed, my man?” Lady Freyja said, looking at him along the length of her nose. “And did you also figure to amuse us with your impudent observation? Who else has been asking for Mr. Law?”

The man lost his leer and looked instantly more respectful. “Now that, begging your pardon, ma’am,” he said, “is confidential.”

“Of course it is,” Lady Freyja said briskly, opening her reticule. “And you are, of course, the soul of integrity.
Who?
”

Judith’s eyes widened when she saw that her companion had drawn a bill worth five pounds from her reticule and was holding it folded between the middle and forefingers of one hand.

The landlord licked his lips and half reached out one hand. “There was someone come last night,” he said. “’e was some nob’s servant, wearing blue and silver livery. Two gents come this morning and a tradesman right on their ’eels. I know ’im—Mr. Cooke. I s’pose Mr. Branwell owes ’is bootmaker some money again. I din’t know them gents from Adam, and I din’t arsk, though they was both real nobs. Then another gent come ’ere just before you. I didn’t arsk ’o ’e were neither. And I ain’t arsking ’o you are.”

Lady Freyja handed over the bribe though she had got precious little information for such a vast fortune. Judith looked on aghast. Bran’s creditors were still after him, then. Who were the three gentlemen? Lord Rannulf and two others? Or Lord Rannulf and one of his brothers and
one
other?

Horace?

Where on earth was Bran? Was he just out for the morning? Selling or pawning some jewels perhaps? Or had he left London again?

She felt sick to her stomach.

“Come along,” Lady Freyja said to her. “We will get no more information here, I believe.” She gave directions to the hackney cab driver. “Take us to Gunter’s.”

“I am so sorry,” Judith said. “I have no money with which to reimburse you. I—I left Leicestershire in such a hurry that I forgot to bring some. I will have to repay you some other time.”
But when?

“Oh, pooh,” Lady Freyja said with a dismissive wave of one hand. “That is nothing. But I wish we might have been more royally entertained. You do not really believe your brother is the thief, do you? I far prefer the idea of its being Mr. Effingham. I have set eyes on him once or twice. He gives me the shudders though he presents all the appearance of believing himself to be the consummate ladies’ man.”

“I do
hope,
” Judith said fervently, “that he is the guilty one. But however am I to prove it?”

Gunter’s, she discovered, sold ices. What an indescribable luxury! And in the morning too. She and Lady Freyja sat at one of the tables, and Judith took small mouthfuls from her spoon and savored every one, letting the ice melt on her tongue before swallowing. It seemed strange to indulge her senses this way when disaster hovered about every corner.

Whatever was she going to do next? She could not keep on staying at Bedwyn House or keep on relying on Rannulf to fight her battles. Yet there was no hope that she could move into Branwell’s rooms and await his return.

What was she going to
do
?

T
he Duke of Bewcastle, having returned at dawn from a night spent with his mistress, had gone out for his usual early morning ride with his brothers and sisters. He had gone to White’s for breakfast afterward, but did not then proceed to the House of Lords, the spring session having finally ended two days before. In fact, had his sisters not arrived unexpectedly from the country just two days before that, he would probably have been at home in Lindsey Park by this time to spend the rest of the summer.

He returned home from White’s and withdrew to his library for the rest of the morning to deal with some correspondence. He looked up with a frown not half an hour later when his butler tapped on the door and opened it.

“There is a Mr. Effingham waiting in the hall to see you, your grace,” he said. “Shall I tell him you are from home?”

“Effingham?” The duke frowned. The whole melodrama surrounding Rannulf’s return to London the day before was something he would prefer to ignore. But the matter needed to be cleared up. He must go to Grandmaison before it was too late to see his grandmother. “No, show him in, Fleming.”

Horace Effingham was unknown to the Duke of Bewcastle. But he came striding into the library, smiling and confident, as if the two of them were blood brothers. The duke did not rise. Effingham strode across to his desk and half leaned across it, his right arm outstretched.

“It is good of you to see me, Bewcastle,” he said.

His grace availed himself of his quizzing glass, through which he looked briefly at the offered hand before letting the glass fall on its ribbon against his chest.

“Effingham?” he said. “What may I do for you?”

The other man smiled even more broadly as he withdrew his hand. He looked about as if for a chair, did not see one close by, and so continued to stand.

“I understand that your brother is in residence here again,” he said.

“Do you?” his grace said. “I trust that my butler has seen fit to inform my cook. I do, of course, have three brothers.”

Effingham laughed. “I referred to Lord Rannulf Bedwyn,” he said.

“Ah, quite so,” the duke said.

There was a short silence during which Effingham appeared disconcerted for a moment.

“I must ask your grace,” he said, “if he brought a lady here with him. A Miss Judith Law?”

“You
must
ask?” The duke’s eyebrows rose.

Effingham set both hands flat on the desk and leaned slightly across it. “Perhaps you do not know,” he said, “that if she
is
here, you are harboring a criminal and a fugitive. It is a crime in itself, your grace, though I am certain you would not continue to harbor her once you knew the truth.”

“It is a relief,” his grace said, repossessing himself of his quizzing glass, “to know that I hold such a high place in your esteem.”

Effingham laughed heartily. “
Is
Miss Law here, Bewcastle?” he asked.

“It is my understanding,” the duke said, half raising the glass, “that rape is also a felony. When the charge is merely
attempted
rape, of course, a conviction might be less assured. But the word of two persons against one might carry some weight with a judge and jury, especially when one of those persons is the brother of a duke. Can you find your own way out, or shall I summon my butler?”

Effingham straightened up, all pretense of affability gone.

“I am on my way to hire a Bow Street Runner,” he said. “I plan to run them to earth, you know, Judith and Branwell Law. And I mean to recover my stepgrandmother’s jewels. There will be a nice little scandal surrounding the trial and sentencing, I daresay. If I were you, your grace, I would distance myself from it and advise your brother to do the same.”

“I am infinitely grateful,” the Duke of Bewcastle said, raising his glass all the way to his eye, “that you esteem me sufficiently to come all the way to Bedwyn House to advise me. You will close the door quietly on your way out?”

Effingham was slightly white about the mouth. He nodded slowly before turning on his heel and striding out. He banged the door shut.

His grace looked after him thoughtfully.

CHAPTER XXI

R
annulf looked at Judith in some exasperation. She looked vivid and gorgeous with her red hair uncovered, nothing like the almost invisible shadow she had been at Harewood. She had also been out this morning, venturing into an area of London where respectable ladies did not go, dragging Freyja with her. No, that at least was unfair. Freyja would have needed no dragging.

It had been entirely unnecessary for her to go. She knew that he was going himself to see if her brother was at home. Branwell Law had not been there, of course, and all the inquiries he and Alleyne had made at various likely places had turned up nothing useful. Several men knew Law. None of them knew where he might be.

But Bewcastle came into the room before Rannulf could rip into Freyja—since he had no real right to rip into Judith. Perhaps it was just as well. Judith would surely have witnessed a family brawl. Wulf had come to suggest in that soft, deceptively languid way of his that it might be in the interests of all concerned if the effort to find Branwell Law were redoubled.

“I have just had a fascinating visit from Mr. Effingham,” he said. “He was under the strange illusion that I harbor felonious fugitives at Bedwyn House. Since he received no satisfaction here, he will no doubt seek it elsewhere from another perceived fugitive, who has presumably not found a safe sanctuary and perhaps is even unaware that he needs to. You did not, I suppose, find Mr. Law at home this morning, Rannulf?”

Rannulf shook his head.

“Someone else is looking for him, though,” Freyja said and won for herself a long, silent stare from Wulf’s silver eyes. But Freyja was made of stern stuff. She merely stared right back and told Wulf what she and Judith had already told Rannulf and Alleyne. She added that she had bribed the information about the other visitors out of the landlord.

Wulf’s eyes, still regarding their sister, narrowed. But instead of the blistering setdown Rannulf had fully expected, Bewcastle’s next words were directed at him.

“You had better go back there, Rannulf,” he said. “I smell a proverbial rat. I’ll go with you.”

“I am coming too,” Judith said.

“Judith—”

“I am coming too.”

She gazed with stormy determination into Rannulf’s eyes, and for the first time he wondered if there were not perhaps some truth to the old cliché about redheads and tempers. All he wanted to do was sort out this mess for her so that she could be at peace, so that he could get back to the business of wooing her. And
this
time he would do it properly. He would make her his lady . . .

“In that case,” Bewcastle said with a sigh, “Freyja had better come too. It will be a veritable family outing.”

They went in one of Bewcastle’s private carriages—a plain one that he used when he did not wish to draw attention to himself. Soon they were back at Law’s lodging house. Rannulf could see no particular point in returning there, but Wulf was in one of his incommunicable moods.

The landlord tossed his glance skyward when he opened the door to the coachman’s knock and saw them all arrayed on his doorstep.

“Lord love us,” he said. “’ere we go again.”

“Quite so,” Bewcastle said, quelling the man’s impudence with a single cold glance and causing him to bob his head respectfully instead and pull at his forelock. How did Wulf
do
that, even to strangers? “I understand that Mr. Branwell Law is a popular young man this morning.”

“That ’e is, sir,” the man said. “First a servant last night, then that gen’leman there with another this morning, then a different gent, then them two ladies back there. Quite a morning it ’as been.”

“And you could give none of them any information about Mr. Law?” Bewcastle asked. “About whether he has been here during the last few days? About when you last saw him?”

“I could not, sir.” The man drew himself up to his full height. “I do not give out personal hinformation about my tenants.”

“You are to be commended,” Bewcastle said. “Some men in your position might try to make some extra money on the side by taking bribes in exchange for information.”

The landlord’s eyes slid uneasily toward Freyja and away again.

“When did you last see Branwell Law?” Bewcastle asked.

The man licked his lips. “Last night, sir,” he said, “after that servant come ’ere. And this morning.”

“What?”
Judith cried. “You said nothing about this to me this morning.”

“’e come after you left, miss,” the man said.

“But you could have told me he was here
last night,
” she said. “I told you he was my brother. I told you there was a family emergency.”

Bewcastle held up his hand in a slight staying gesture, and Rannulf drew Judith’s hand through his arm and settled his hand over hers. She was trembling—with rage, at a guess.

“The gentleman who called alone this morning,” Bewcastle said. “Describe him, if you will.”

“Blond hair, blue eyes,” the landlord said. His eyes had become shifty, Rannulf noted. “Short. With a limp.”

“Ah,” Wulf said. “Yes, quite so.”

It had not been Effingham, then, Rannulf thought with some disappointment. But surely he would be here soon. He was in London—he had already called at Bedwyn House.

“That is all I can tell you, sir,” the landlord said, making to close the door. Bewcastle set his cane against it.

“I suppose,” he said, “you did not admit this blond-haired, blue-eyed, short gentleman with a limp to Mr. Law’s rooms?”

The man recoiled in shock. “Let ’im in, sir?” he said. “When Mr. Law was from ’ome? Not me. No, indeed not.”

“I wonder,” Bewcastle said, “how much he paid you.”

The man’s eyes widened. “I do not take—”

“Ah, but you do,” Bewcastle said gently. “I will not pay you one penny. I do not deal in bribes. But I will warn you that if a felony has been committed in Branwell Law’s rooms this morning and if you took money from the felon to let him into those rooms, you are an accessory to a crime and will doubtless pay the price in one of London’s notorious jails.”

The landlord gaped at him, his eyes as round as saucers, his color suddenly pasty. “A felon?” he said. “A felony? ’e was a
friend
of Mr. Law’s. I seen ’im ’ere before with Mr. Law. ’e just needed to go in for a minute to get something ’e forgot last time ’e was ’ere.”

“Then it was magnanimous of you to allow him in,” Bewcastle said while Judith’s hand tightened about Rannulf’s arm. “Unescorted, I presume? This
dark
-haired man?”

The landlord licked his lips and turned shifty-eyed again.

“I daresay,” Bewcastle said, “he paid you very well indeed to describe him as you did if questioned, to allow him in unescorted, and to claim that Mr. Law was here both last night and this morning?”

“Not very much,” the man mumbled after a lengthy pause.

“Then the more fool you,” Bewcastle said, sounding bored.

“You villain!” Rannulf dropped Judith’s arm and stepped forward. “I should throttle you within an inch of your life. What did he take from the rooms? Or, more important, what did he leave there?”

The landlord took one terrified step back and held up both hands.

“I din’t know ’e were up to no good,” he said. “I swear I din’t.”

“Save the pathetic pleas for a judge,” Rannulf said. “Take us to Law’s rooms immediately.”

“I believe it might be preferable,” Wulf said, still sounding damnably unruffled, “to proceed more calmly, Rannulf. I am sure this good man has a tolerably comfortable room in which we can wait. I believe too that from this moment on he will be scrupulous in telling the exact truth to whoever asks it of him. It might save him his neck or at least years of his liberty.”

“Wait?” Rannulf’s eyebrows snapped together in a frown.
Wait?
When Effingham was out there somewhere and so was Branwell Law? When Judith’s good name and liberty were still in peril? When there was probably planted evidence in Law’s rooms?

“If I am not much mistaken,” Bewcastle said, “this house will be receiving yet another visit soon.” He looked at the landlord again. “I believe you also agreed to show no recognition when the same
dark
-haired gentleman returns with a Bow Street Runner?”

The man’s Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed and looked from Bewcastle to Rannulf.

“Show us to a room within earshot of the door,” Bewcastle said.

It was a small, dingy room with dark, faded furniture. The four of them were ushered inside and left alone there, the door ajar.

Freyja laughed softly. “Sometimes, Wulf,” she said, “I cannot help but admire you. How did you guess?”

“I believe it was at our mother’s knee,” he said, “that I learned that two and two invariably add up to four, Freyja.”

“But what if they do not on this occasion?” Judith asked. “What if there is nothing in Bran’s room? Why will you not let us look, your grace?”

“The landlord will tell the truth now,” he said. “It is best, Miss Law, if he can say with all honesty that no one has been into your brother’s rooms since Effingham left them this morning.”

“Bran was not here last night or this morning, then, was he?” she said. “Where is he?”

They were rhetorical questions. She was not looking for answers to any of them. Rannulf took both her hands in his, squeezed them tightly, and then held them flat against his chest. He did not care what Wulf or Freyja might think.

“We will find him,” he told her. “And if Wulf’s guess is correct, as I would wager it is, his name will have been cleared by the time we do. Stop worrying.”

Though, of course, the brother was probably in serious trouble even apart from all this business of stolen property. If he had been desperate enough to leave Harewood in the middle of the night because so many creditors were hounding him, he would be desperate enough to do some pretty heavy gambling to recoup his fortunes.

“Don’t worry,” he said again, raising one of her hands to his lips and holding it there for a few moments until she looked into his eyes and half smiled.

Freyja, he saw, had taken a seat and was looking at them with an unreadable expression in her eyes. Bewcastle was standing slightly to one side of the window, looking out at the street.

“Ah,” he said, “not a moment too soon.”

J
udith was terribly afraid. Afraid of what was about to happen, afraid of what would be discovered in Branwell’s rooms, afraid of what might
not
be discovered. She was afraid for Bran even apart from all this, afraid for her family and for herself. And she was afraid of this proud, haughty, powerful family which was fighting her battles for her.

Most of all perhaps she feared the look in Rannulf’s eyes, the firm kindness of his hands, the warm gentleness of his kiss on one of them. Did he not
understand
?

She could hear the landlord open the door again—they were all very still, listening. She recognized Horace’s voice and another, deeper, gruffer voice.

“I am with the Bow Street Runners,” that other voice was saying, “and investigating a large jewel theft. I must insist upon your letting us into Mr. Branwell Law’s rooms, where I expect to find evidence.”

“I s’pose it is all right, then,” the landlord said.

“I am
hoping,
” Horace said, sounding both grave and pompous, “that we will find nothing, Witley, though I fear the worst. Branwell Law
is
my stepcousin, after all. But I do not know who else would have stolen his grandmother’s jewels but him and his sister. They both fled during that same night. I pray this will be a wild-goose chase and they have already discovered back at Harewood that some vagrant broke into the house during the ball.”

“It is unlikely, sir,” the Bow Street Runner said.

There was the sound of boots on the stairs going up and then the jingle of keys and the squeak of a door opening upstairs.

“Wulf and I will go up,” Rannulf said. “Judith, stay here with Freyja.”

Freyja snorted.

“I am coming up too,” Judith said. “This concerns me as well as Bran.”

There was an open door at the top of the first flight of stairs, presumably opening into Branwell’s rooms. Judith could see the landlord standing just inside. He turned a worried face toward them as they stepped onto the landing. Horace was standing in the middle of the room, his back to the door, his arms crossed over his chest. The Bow Street Runner, a short, rotund, bald man, was coming out of an inner room, perhaps the bedchamber, clutching a glittering pile of what must be Grandmama’s jewelry.

“He did not even hide it very carefully,” he said with some contempt.

“And
that,
if I am not much mistaken,” Horace said, pointing to a chair that was just in Judith’s line of vision, “is one of Judith Law’s caps. Oh, my poor Judith, how careless of you. I was hoping you might be left out of this.”

“She more or less had to be an accomplice, though, did she not, sir?” the Runner said, setting down the jewels with a clatter on a small table and picking up the bonnet cap Judith had so detested.