The Leopard Prince (24 page)

“You know I can’t do that, my lady.” His voice sounded no better.

She rolled over and snuggled against him. Her hand stroked down his sweaty belly until she found his penis again. She held it. The argument could wait for tomorrow.

But when she woke in the morning, Harry was gone.

He knew all this, and yet something still held him here in Yorkshire. As a result, Harry had become a master at sneaking. He hid from Granville’s watchful eyes and the men who had begun roaming the hills in the last few days, seeking him. Tonight he made almost no noise, just a faint creak from his leather boots. The man on the bed stirred not at all.

Still, the boy on the pallet beside the bed opened his eyes.

Harry stopped and watched Will. The boy nodded slightly. Harry returned the nod. He walked to the bed. For a moment, he stood looking down at Bennet. Then he leaned over and covered the other man’s mouth with his hand. Bennet jackknifed convulsively. He threw out his arms and managed to knock Harry’s hand aside.

“Wha—?”

Harry slapped his hand back down again, grunting as Bennet elbowed him. “Hist, you beef-wit. It’s me.”

Bennet fought for a second more, and then Harry’s words seemed to reach his brain. He froze.

Cautiously, Harry lifted his hand.

“Harry?”

“You’d better hope.” He spoke barely above a whisper. “The way you sleep, it could be marauders. Even the boy woke before you.”

Bennet leaned over the bed. “Will? Are you there?”

“Yes, sir.” Will had sat up sometime during the struggle.

“Jesus.” Bennet flopped back on the bed, covering his eyes with an arm. “You nearly gave me apoplexy.”

“You’ve gotten soft living in London.” The corner of Harry’s mouth twitched. “Hasn’t he, Will?”

“We-ell.” The boy clearly didn’t want to say anything against his new mentor. “Wouldn’t hurt to be more alert.”

“Thank you, young Will.” Bennet removed his arm to glare at Harry. “What’re you doing, creeping into my bedroom in the wee hours?”

Harry sat on the bed, his back against one of the posts at the end. He nudged Bennet’s legs with a boot. The other man stared at the boot indignantly before moving.

Harry stretched out his legs. “I’m leaving.”

“So you’ve come to say good-bye?”

“Not exactly.” He looked down at the fingernails on his right hand. To the place where one should be but wasn’t. “Your father is hell-bent on having me killed. And he’s none too happy with Lady Georgina for saving me.”

Bennet nodded. “He’s been rampaging around Granville House the last week, roaring that he’d have you arrested. He’s insane.”

“Aye. He’s also the magistrate.”

“What can you do? What can anybody do?”

“I can find whoever is really killing the sheep.” Harry glanced at Will. “And Mrs. Pollard’s murderer as well. It might dampen his temper.” And turn it away from his lady.

Bennet sat up. “Very well. But how are you going to find the killer?”

Harry stared. A pendant on a thin chain around Bennet’s neck had swung forward: a small, crudely carved falcon.

Harry blinked, remembering.

Long, long ago. A morning so bright and sunny it hurt to open your eyes wide to the full, blue sky. He and Benny had stretched on their backs on top of the hill, chewing grass.

“Lookee here.” Harry took the carving out of his pocket and handed it to Benny.

Benny turned it over in his dirty fingers. “A bird.”

“It’s a falcon. Can’t you see?”

“’Course I can see.” Benny glanced up. “Who made it?”

“Me.”

“Really? You carved it?” Benny stared at him with awe.

“Aye.” Harry shrugged. “My da taught me. It’s only my first, so it’s not so good.”

“I like it.”

Harry shrugged again and squinted into the blinding blue sky. “You can keep it if you want.”

“Thanks.”

They had lain for a while, almost falling asleep in the warm sun.

Then Benny sat up. “I’ve got something for you.”

He’d turned out both pockets and then dug down again, finally bringing up a small, dirty penknife. Benny rubbed it on his breeches and handed it to Harry.

Harry looked at the pearl handle and tested the edge with his thumb. “Ta, Benny. It’ll be good for whittling.”

Harry couldn’t remember what he and Bennet had done the rest of that day. Probably rode their ponies about. Maybe fished in the stream. Come home hungry. That was how they’d spent most days back then. And it didn’t really matter. The next afternoon Da had found his mother humping old Granville.

Harry looked up and met eyes as green as his own.

“I’ve always worn it.” Bennet touched the little falcon.

Harry nodded and glanced away from Bennet for a moment. “I had started asking around, before I was arrested, and I’ve tried again this last week, discreetly, lest your father track me.” He looked back at Bennet, his face under control now. “Nobody seems to know much, but there’s plenty besides me who have a reason to hate your father.”

“Probably most of the county.”

Harry ignored the sarcasm. “I thought maybe I should search a bit further back.”

Bennet raised his eyebrows.

“Your nurse is still alive, isn’t she?”

“Old Alice Humboldt?” Bennet yawned. “Yes, she’s alive. Her cottage was the first place I stopped when I got back into the district. And you’re right, she might know something. Nanny is very quiet, but she always noticed everything.”

“Good.” Harry stood up. “Then she’s the person to question. Want to come?”

“What, now?”

Harry’s mouth twitched. He’d forgotten how fun it was to bait Bennet. “I had thought to wait for sunrise,” he said gravely, “but if you’re eager to go now . . .”

“No. No, sunrise is fine.” Bennet winced. “I don’t suppose you could wait until nine o’clock?”

Harry looked at him.

“No, of course not.” Bennet yawned again, nearly unhinging the back of his head. “I’ll meet you at Nanny’s cottage, shall I?”

“I’ll go, too,” Will spoke up from the pallet.

Harry and Bennet glanced at the boy. He’d nearly forgotten Will. Bennet raised his eyebrows at Harry, leaving the decision to him.

“Aye, you’ll go, too,” Harry said.

“Ta,” Will said. “I’ve got something for you.”

He burrowed under his pillow and came out with a long, thin object wrapped in a rag. He held it out. Harry took the bundle and unrolled it. His knife, cleaned and oiled, lay on his palm.

“Found it in the stream,” Will said, “after they took you. I been taking care of it for you. Until you was ready for it again.”

It was the most Harry had ever heard from the boy’s mouth.

Harry smiled. “Ta, Will.”

George picked up the swan. “Yes.”

She’d questioned the servants after the first carving. Nobody had seen Harry enter or leave Woldsly, not even Oscar, who kept the irregular hours of a bachelor. Her middle brother had remained behind after Tony had left for London. Oscar said it was to keep her and Violet company, but she suspected the real reason had more to do with his creditors in London.

“Romantic of Mr. Pye, isn’t it?” Tiggle sighed.

“Or irritating.” George wrinkled her nose at the swan and placed it carefully on her dressing table beside the horse.

“Or irritating, I guess, my lady,” Tiggle agreed.

The maid came over and laid a hand on George’s shoulder, gently pressing her into the chair before the dressing table. She took up the silver-backed brush and began to stroke it through George’s hair. Tiggle started at the ends and worked to the roots, teasing out the tangles. George closed her eyes.

“Men don’t always see things the same way we do, if you don’t mind me saying so, my lady.”

“I can’t help but think that Mr. Pye was dropped on his head as a baby.” George squeezed her eyes shut. “Why won’t he come back to me?”

“Can’t say, my lady.” The tangles worked out, Tiggle began stroking from her crown down to the ends of her hair.

George sighed in pleasure.

“But he hasn’t gone too far away, now, has he?” the maid pointed out.

“Mmm.” George tilted her head so Tiggle could do that side.

“He wants to go—you’ve said so yourself, my lady— but he hasn’t.” Tiggle started on the other side, brushing gently from the temple. “Stands to reason, then, that maybe he can’t.”

“You’re speaking in riddles and I’m too tired to understand.”

“I’m just saying maybe he can’t leave you, my lady.” Tiggle set down the brush with a thump and began braiding her hair.

“A lot of good that does me if he can’t bring himself to face me, either.” George frowned in the mirror.

“I think he’ll be back.” The maid tied a ribbon at the end of George’s braid and leaned over her shoulder to meet her eyes in the mirror. “And when he comes, you’ll be needing to tell him, if you don’t mind my saying so, my lady.”

George blushed. She had hoped Tiggle wouldn’t notice, but she should have realized the maid kept track of everything. “There’s no way of knowing yet.”

“Aye, there is. And you being so regular like . . .”

Tiggle gave her an old-fashioned look. “Good night, my lady.”

She left the room.

George sighed and dropped her head into her hands. Tiggle had better be right about Harry. Because if he waited too long to return, there would be no need to tell him she was expecting.

He’d see it.

“Good morning, Mistress Humboldt. My name is Harry Pye. I’d like to talk with you.”

“Best come in, then, hadn’t you, young man?” The tiny figure smiled at Harry’s left ear and opened the door wider. Only then, in the light let in by the open door, did he see the cataracts that clouded the old woman’s blue eyes.

“Thank you, ma’am.”

Bennet and Will were there before him. They sat by a smoldering fire, the only light in the dim room. Will was munching on a scone and eyeing another on a tray.

“Late, aren’t you?” Bennet was more alert than he’d been five hours before. He looked quite pleased to have got the first dig in.

“Some of us have to travel by back lanes.”

Harry helped Mistress Humboldt lower herself into a fan-backed chair piled with knitted pillows. A calico cat padded over, meowing. It leaped into the old lady’s lap and purred loudly even before she started stroking its back.

“Have a scone, Mr. Pye. And if you don’t mind, you can help yourself to tea.” Mistress Humboldt’s voice was thin and whistling. “Now. What have you lads come to talk to me about that you must do it in secret?”

Harry’s mouth twitched. The old woman’s eyes might be fading, but her mind surely wasn’t. “Lord Granville and his enemies.”

Mistress Humboldt smiled sweetly. “Have you got all day, then, young man? For if I was to list everyone who ever had a grudge against that lord, I’d still be talking tomorrow morning.”

Bennet laughed.

“You’re quite right, ma’am,” Harry said. “But what I’m after is the person poisoning the sheep. Who has such hatred of Granville that they’d want to do these crimes?”

The old woman cocked her head and stared at the fire for a moment, the only sound in the room the purring of the cat and Will eating his scone.

“As it happens,” she said slowly, “I’ve been thinking on these sheep killings myself.” She pursed her lips. “Bad things they are and evil because while it hurts the farmer, it merely bothers Lord Granville. Seems to me that what you really should be asking, young man, is who has the heart to do this.” Mistress Humboldt took a sip of tea.

Bennet started to speak. Harry shook his head.

“It takes a hard heart to not care that others are hurt along the way to getting at the lord.” Mistress Humboldt tapped a shaking finger on her knee to punctuate her point.

“A hard heart and a brave one as well. Lord Granville is the law and the fist in this county, and whoever goes against him is gambling their very life.”

“Who fits your description, Nanny?” Bennet leaned forward impatiently.

“I can think of two men that answer, at least in parts.” She wrinkled her brow. “But neither are quite right.” She raised her teacup to her lips with a wavering hand.

Bennet shifted in his chair, jiggled one leg up and down, and sighed.

Harry leaned forward in his own chair and selected a scone.

Bennet shot him an incredulous glare.

Harry raised his eyebrows as he bit into the scone.

“Dick Crumb,” the old woman said, and Harry lowered the scone. “A while back, his sister, Janie, the one who’s weak in the head, was seduced by the lord. A terrible thing, preying on that child-woman.” The corners of Mistress Humboldt’s mouth crumpled in a frown. “And Dick, when he found out, why, he nearly lost his head. Said he’d have killed him had it been any man but the lord. Would have, too.”

Harry frowned. Dick hadn’t said he’d threatened Granville’s life, but then what man would? Surely that by itself . . .

Mistress Humboldt held out her cup, and Bennet silently poured tea for her and placed the cup back in her hand.

“But,” she continued, “Dick isn’t a mean man. Hard, yes, but not hard-hearted. As for the other man—Mistress Humboldt looked in Bennet’s direction—“perhaps it’s best to let sleeping dogs lie.”

Bennet seemed bewildered. “What sleeping dogs?”

Will stopped eating. He looked between Bennet and the old woman.
Damn.
Harry had a feeling he knew what Mistress Humboldt was getting at. Perhaps it would be better to leave it alone.

Bennet caught some of Harry’s unease. He leaned forward tensely, his elbows on his knees, both heels tapping now. “Tell us.”

“Thomas.”

Shit.
Harry looked away.

“Thomas who?” It seemed to hit Bennet all at once. He stopped moving for a second, then exploded out of the chair, pacing in the tiny space before the fire. “Thomas, my
brother?
” He laughed. “You can’t be serious. He’s a . . . a
milksop.
He wouldn’t say nay to Father if he told him the sun rose in the west and he shat pearls.”

The old woman compressed her lips at the profanity.

“I’m sorry, Nanny,” Bennet said. “But Thomas! He’s lived under my father’s thumb so long he has calluses on his buttocks.”

“Yes, I know.” In contrast to the young man, Mistress Humboldt was calm. She must have expected his reaction. Or maybe she was simply used to his constant movement. “That’s exactly why I name him.”

Bennet stared.

“A man so long under his father’s power isn’t natural. Your father took a dislike to Thomas when he was very young. I’ve never understood it.” She shook her head. “Lord Granville hating his own son so thoroughly.”

“But even so, he’d never . . .” Bennet’s words trailed off, and he abruptly turned away. Mistress Humboldt looked sad. “He might. You know it ourself, Master Bennet. The way your father has treated him shows. He’s like a tree trying to grow through a crack in a rock. Twisted. Not quite right.”

“But—”

“Do you remember the mice he’d catch sometimes when he was a boy? I found him once with one he’d caught. He’d cut off it’s feet. He was watching it try to crawl.”

“Oh, Jesus,” Bennet muttered.

“I had to kill it. But then I couldn’t punish him, poor lad. His father beat him enough already. I never saw him again with a mouse, but I don’t think he stopped. He just got better at hiding it from me.”

“We don’t have to pursue this,” Harry said.

Bennet swung around, his eyes desperate. “And what if he is the sheep poisoner? What if he kills someone else?”

His question hung in the air. No one could answer it but Bennet.

He seemed to realize it was up to him. He squared his broad shoulders. “If it is Thomas, he’s murdered a woman. I need to stop him.”

Harry nodded. “I’ll talk to Dick Crumb.”

“Fine,” Bennet said. “You’ve helped us, Nanny. You see things nobody else does.”

“Maybe not with my eyes anymore, but I always could read a person.” Mistress Humboldt held out a wavering hand to her former charge.

Bennet grasped it.

“God save and protect you, Master Bennet,” she said. “It’s not an easy task you have.”

Bennet leaned down to kiss the withered cheek. “Thank you, Nanny.” He straightened and clapped Will on the shoulder. “We best be going, Will, before you finish those last two scones.”

The old woman smiled. “Let the lad take the rest. It’s been so long since I had a boy to feed.”

“Thank you, ma’am.” Will stuffed the scones into his pockets.

She saw them to the door and stood and waved as they rode away.

“I’d forgotten how sharp Nanny is. Thomas and I could never get anything past her.” Bennet’s face darkened when he spoke his brother’s name.

Harry glanced at him. “If you want, you can put off talking to Thomas until tomorrow, after I’ve sounded out Dick Crumb. I’ll have to wait until nightfall to find him, anyway. Best time to catch Dick is at the Cock and Worm after ten o’clock.”

“No, I don’t want to wait another day to talk to Thomas. Better to do it right away.”

They rode for a half mile or more in silence, Will clinging behind Bennet.

“So once we find whoever’s doing this,” Bennet said, “you’ll be leaving?”

“That’s right.” Harry watched the road ahead but could feel the other man’s gaze on him.

“I was under the impression that you and Lady Georgina had an . . . uh . . . understanding.”

Harry gave Bennet a look that usually shut a man up.

Not him.

“Because, I mean, it’s a bit thick, what? A fellow just up and leaving a lady.”

“I’m not from her class.”

“Yes, but that obviously doesn’t matter to her, does it? Or she’d never have taken up with you in the first

“I—”

“And if you don’t mind me being blunt, she must be pretty gone on you.” Bennet looked him up and down as if he were a side of spoiled beef. “I mean, you don’t exactly have the sort of face that women swoon over. More in my line, that.”

“Bennet—”

“Not to blow my own horn, but I could tell you quite a tale of a delectable bird in London—”

“Bennet.”

“What?”

Harry nodded at Will, who was wide-eyed and listening to every word.

“Oh.” Bennet coughed. “Quite. Shall I see you tomorrow, then? We’ll meet and exchange information.”

They had neared a copse of trees that marked where the main road crossed the lane they traveled on.

“Fine.” Harry pulled his mare to a halt. “This is where I must turn off, anyway. And Bennet?”

“Yes?” He turned his face and the sun fell full upon it, tracing the laugh lines around his eyes.

“Be careful,” Harry said. “If it is Thomas, he’ll be dangerous.”

“You be careful as well, Harry.”

Harry nodded. “Godspeed.”

Bennet waved and rode off.

Harry spent the rest of the daylight hours laying low. When dusk fell, he made his way to West Dikey and the Cock and Worm. He ducked his head as he entered and scanned the crowd from under his low hat brim. A table of farmers, smoking clay pipes in the corner, burst into boisterous laughter. A weathered-looking barmaid dodged with practiced ease a heavy hand aimed at her rump and made her way to the counter.

“Dick in tonight?” Harry bawled in her ear.

“Sorry, luv.” She pivoted and shouldered a tray of drinks. “Maybe later.”

Harry frowned and ordered a pint from the counterman, a lad he remembered seeing once or twice before. Was Dick hiding in back or was he really not in the building? He leaned on the wood counter while he thought and watched a gentleman, obviously a traveler, judging from the mud on his boots, enter and stare bemusedly around. The man’s face was handsome but long and bland, rather like a goat’s. Harry shook his head. The traveler must’ve missed the sign for the White Mare. He wasn’t the Cock and Worm’s usual type of customer.

The boy slid Harry his mug of ale, and Harry rolled a few coins back. He moved over and took a sip as the traveler came to the counter.

“Pardon me, but do you know the way to Woldsly Manor?”

Harry froze for a second, his mug at his lips. The stranger hadn’t paid him any attention; he was leaning over the counter to the boy.

“Say again?” the boy shouted.

“Woldsly Manor,” the stranger raised his voice. “Lady Georgina Maitland’s estate. I’m an intimate of her younger sister, Lady Violet. I can’t seem to find the road—”

The boy’s gaze darted to Harry.

Harry clapped his hand on the other’s shoulder, making the stranger start. “I can show you the way, friend, soon as I finish my ale.”

The man turned, his face brightening. “Would you?”

“No problem at all.” Harry nodded at the boy. “Another pint for my friend here. I’m sorry, didn’t catch your name?”

“Wentworth. Leonard Wentworth.”

“Ah.” Harry suppressed a feral smile. “Let’s find a table, shall we?” As the other man turned, Harry leaned over the counter and murmured urgent instructions to the boy, then passed him a coin.

An hour later, when the middle Maitland brother strolled into the Cock and Worm, Wentworth was on his fourth pint. Harry had been nursing his second for some time now and felt as if he needed a bath. Wentworth had been quite forthcoming about bedding a fifteen-year-old, his marriage hopes, and what he would do with Lady Violet’s money once he got his hands on it.

So it was with some relief that Harry spotted the red Maitland hair. “Over here,” he shouted at the newcomer.

He’d only spoken to Lady Georgina’s middle brother once or twice, and the man hadn’t been all that friendly. But all of Maitland’s animosity was reserved for Harry’s companion at the moment. He made his way to them with a look that would’ve sent Wentworth running, had be been sober.

“Harry.” The redheaded man nodded at him; only then did Harry remember his name: Oscar.

“Maitland.” Harry nodded. “Like you to meet an acquaintance of mine, Leonard Wentworth. Says he seduced your younger sister this last summer.”

Wentworth paled. “Now w-w-wait a—”

“Really?” Oscar drawled.

“Indeed,” Harry said. “He’s been telling me about his debts and how her dowry will help settle them, once he’s blackmailed her into marriage.”