The Mask of Night (28 page)

“What were you afraid of last night?”

“How the devil should I know? How can I know when Will won’t even tell me—?”

“Tell you what?”

Pendarves detached her hand from his arm with the careful formality of a gentleman executing a dance step. “Forgive me, Mrs. Fraser. I fear I’ve lingered too long.” He got to his feet. “May I escort you to join some of your friends before I take my leave?”

“Thank you, Lord Pendarves. I’m well able to look after myself.”

He gave a stiff nod and moved away. Through the open doors to the parlor, Mélanie could glimpse Charles still in conversation with Will. She could only hope her husband was managing his interrogation more adroitly than she had her own.

“Mrs. Fraser?” Clara Bartlett materialized beside the settee, holding a decanter. “Would you like some more sherry?”

“No. Yes. It can’t hurt at this point.”

Clara refilled her glass and perched on the settee. “Your dress is pretty. I saw a picture of one like it in the
La Belle Assemblée
you gave me the last time you visited.
Dress in a peculiar shade of lavender
. It had a pelisse that went with it and a bonnet with blond lace and silk roses. With a brim in the capu-something style.”

“
Capuchin
,” Mélanie said.

“That’s it. I looked it up in the dictionary and it said it was a hood for monks, but I think the bonnet was prettier.”

Mélanie smiled at the girl. “I’ll send a new
La Belle Assemblé
e
round for you.”

“Thanks.” Clara ran a practiced gaze over Mélanie’s gown. “That dress goes with a walking costume, doesn’t it?”

“So it does.”

“You probably didn’t have time to change for the evening since you and Mr. Fraser are investigating the murder that happened last night.”

“Clara. Who’s been talking to you?”

“Oh, everyone’s been talking about the murder. Well, almost everyone. I don’t think it’s what Lord Pendarves and Mr. Gordon were arguing about.”

Mélanie looked into Clara’s hazel eyes, every bit as sharp as either of her parents'. “Lord Pendarves and Mr. Gordon were arguing?”

Clara glanced at Pendarves’s abandoned sherry glass. “I heard them when I went to refill their drinks earlier. They didn’t realize I was there at first. Mr. Gordon was annoyed because Lord Pendarves had followed him here, and Lord Pendarves was upset because Mr. Gordon wouldn’t tell him where he was going tonight.”

“You mean Mr. Gordon hadn’t told Lord Pendarves he was coming here tonight?”

“No, Lord Pendarves knew about that. Mr. Gordon’s here just about every Friday. He was trying to get Mr. Gordon to tell him where he was going after he left here."

“Mr. Gordon’s going somewhere special?”

“Lord Pendarves thought so. He seemed angry— No, not angry exactly. He seemed scared.”

Jeremy Roth stared at the notes spread on the splintery tabletop. The coal oil lamp emitted flickering light and puffs of smoke from its blackened chimney. Usually he found it easier to think through the details of a case here, in an upper room of the Brown Bear Tavern, adjacent to Bow Street. But the scribbled papers before him seemed more disconnected ramblings than the beginnings of a coherent theory. He feared they might have to locate Raoul O'Roarke to to get at the heart of the matter.

And if the Frasers found O’Roarke, Roth was not at all certain they’d share the information with him. Or with each other. He had a clear memory of O’Roarke meeting Mélanie Fraser’s gaze over Colin’s head in the torchlit alley just after they had recovered the boy from his captors. That look had spoken of ties that went deeper than the comradeship of fellow spies. Suppose Mrs. Fraser had known O’Roarke was at the ball? Suppose she’d known St. Juste was there? Suppose she’d spoken with them…

Roth threw down his pencil. Dawkins had had no luck in tracing the owner of the diamond earring. Roth’s own visit to the Three Kings had yielded only a vague acknowledgement that someone resembling Billy Simcox might have had a drink there in the last fortnight.

The creak of the door cut in on his thoughts. He looked up to see the silhouetted figure of a woman in a dark cloak, with a man behind her. He assumed it was the Frasers, but as he got to his feet, the woman walked forward and pushed back her hood to reveal hair that gleamed like copper.

“I apologize for the disturbance, Mr. Roth,” Laura Dudley said.

“Is it Mr. and Mrs. Fraser?” Roth said, aware of an unaccustomed bite of alarm.

“No. They haven’t returned.” Miss Dudley turned to the man who had accompanied her. “Allow me to present Mr. Trenor. His friend Miss Simcox is sister to a man apparently employed by the unfortunate gentleman who met his death at the Lydgates’ last night. Miss Simcox has disappeared and Mr. Trenor fears she’s gone to meet her brother.”

Her gaze held a faint question as to his understanding of the names and situations. Roth nodded, the Frasers’ story of this afternoon fresh in his mind. “Do you know where Miss Simcox has gone?” he asked Trenor.

“No.” Trenor’s voice was sharp with self-reproach. He held out a creased paper. “Can you make sense of this?”

Roth scanned the note. “I think Billy Simcox was asking his sister to meet him at the Running Hare. It’s a gin mill in Mercer Street.” He lifted his coat from the chairback.

“I’m coming with you.” Trenor looked him square in the eye. “If you say no, I’ll follow.”

Roth slipped the note into his pocket. “Then you’d best accompany me. It seems to me you’ve earned the right.”

“Good,” Miss Dudley said. “We have a carriage waiting down stairs.”

“Thank you. I’ll arrange for a hackney to take you back to Berkeley Square.”

“Don’t be absurd, Mr. Roth.” Miss Dudley moved to the door. “Naturally I’m coming with you as well.”

Chapter 20

Never stop questioning, my boy. There's very little in this life that doesn't bear being looked at from a fresh perspective.

George Bartlett to Charles Fraser,

12 August, 1812

“Darling. I thought I’d never get you to myself.” Mélanie caught Charles by the arm as he came into the Bartletts’ drawing room from the parlor. She pulled him to one side, her lips against his cheek. “Where’s Will?”

“In the parlor.” Charles stooped his head close to his wife’s own. “Talking with Harriet de Boinville.”

“Will's going somewhere when he leaves here.” She backed him against the Grecian molding, her hands on either side of his face. “Somewhere he wouldn’t tell Pendarves about. Clara Bartlett overheard them arguing."

Charles stroked his wife’s hair. He could see Henry Brougham grinning at their display of connubial affection. “If Will’s worried about eluding Pendarves, not to mention us, he’ll probably try to slip out the back,” he murmured into her ear.

They returned to the parlor (where Will, Charles was relieved to see, was still in conversation with Mrs. de Boinville). John Cam Hobhouse cornered them and wanted to talk about the new Parliamentary session. A quarter-hour later, when Pendarves’s attention had been claimed by Marianne Hunt, Will excused himself and wandered down the passage toward the gentlemen’s retiring room. Mélanie and Charles went down the backstairs to the kitchen and exchanged a cheerful greeting with Mrs. Ford, the Bartlett's cook. While Mélanie darted into the hall, Charles took up a position in the shelter of an oak tree in the back garden. The rain had let up, but the air had grown colder, frosting against his skin and numbing his gloveless fingers. A few moments later, Mélanie joined him, wearing her pelisse and carrying his greatcoat.

“I left our hats,” she said. “They’d be in the way. Your gloves are in the pocket.”

“A bit like the Cantabrian Mountains.” He shrugged into the greatcoat and pulled on the gloves.

“The Cantabrian Mountains were colder. Charles, for heaven’s sake, what are you doing?“

“Trying to keep us both warm.” He tightened his arms round her.

“There are advantages to cold,” she said, her voice muffled by his cravat. “Remember—“

She broke off as the area door creaked open. Will emerged and slipped through the garden gate. They followed, with the careful, near-silent footfalls they both had perfected long since. Will went through the mews to Wyndham Place. Gusts of wind bent the leafless trees and sliced through their layers of clothing. A hackney rattled by, but Will made no attempt to flag it down. He crossed Oxford Street into the more fashionable precincts of Mayfair and then cut across Green Street to Park Lane, past mansions shuttered for the night and one or two blazing with candlelight. Charles half-expected him to go into one of the houses, but instead he turned through the Grosvenor Gate into Hyde Park.

The moon emerged from behind the clouds in intermittent flashes. The gravel was slippery underfoot. Charles kept his senses tuned to the trees and shrubs on either side. Nighttime attacks by footpads were a common occurrence in Hyde Park. An owl called in the distance. A squirrel raced up a tree trunk and along a branch, shaking loose a hail of raindrops. A dark blur that might have been a fox or a badger darted into the shelter of the trees. A couple of larger dark blurs huddled beneath the branches. Charles ran a wary gaze over them, but they appeared to be lying motionless. Even in winter, the park was a refuge for those with nowhere else to sleep.

Will left the path. They followed onto grass slippery with frosting raindrops. Twigs and fallen leaves scrunched under foot. A sound caught Charles’s attention above the whir of the wind. It took him a moment to realize it had been a human cry. They had reached the slope of ground above the Serpentine River. The undulating mass by the water’s edge was more than just wind-tossed trees. A brawl was in progress. Three men or perhaps four. Difficult to tell the numbers in the dark.

Will, a dozen yards ahead, ran forward. Charles stared at the brawlers, trying to sort out who was fighting whom. A gunshot ripped the air, closely followed by another. No one fell, but the combatants froze for an instant. It looked to be three against one. Three against two, as Will launched himself at a man’s back.

Charles exchanged a quick glance with Mélanie. “Unequal numbers,” she said. “And whatever he’s up to, I like Will.”

Charles nodded and pulled off his gloves. They ran down the slope. Will was grappling with one of the men. He seemed to have a good purchase on the man’s arm, so Charles ran to the two men who were pummeling the original victim. One was trying to pin the victim’s arms. The victim twisted away. The other attacker swung a cudgel toward the victim’s head. Charles grabbed the cudgel-bearer’s arm and spun the man round to face him. The man gave a grunt of surprise, jerked away, and swung the cudgel at Charles. Charles ducked and grabbed the cudgel. The heavy wood came away in his hand. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the second man reach for Mélanie’s throat. Mélanie tossed the contents of her scent bottle in the man’s face.

Mélanie’s attacker screamed. Charles’s original opponent hurled himself at Charles and slashed at his arm with a knife. Charles twisted away and banged into rough, crumbly tree bark. His boots skidded on the frost-crusted leaves. As he felt himself falling, he grabbed his attacker and pulled him down with him.

They pummeled each other, rolling over fallen leaves and icy ground and hard tree roots. The impact carried them to the river’s edge. The cudgel went flying. Charles’s opponent scrambled to his feet. Charles grabbed at the man’s ankles. The man stumbled to his knees, caught up the cudgel, and swung it at Charles’s head. They both fell back on the icy ground. His opponent scrambled away. Charles slipped into freezing water.

He fought his way to the surface and scrabbled for the bank. His sodden boots and greatcoat tugged him downward.

A cudgel blow caught him on the back of the head. He recovered his vision to see his opponent sent flying backward. A firm hand was extended to grip his own.

“Allow me,” said Raoul O'Roarke.

Mélanie turned on the riverbank to see her former lover pulling her husband from the freezing water. Her own opponent had run off through the trees when she wrested his knife away from him. Will, his nose bloody and spectacles askew, was holding the third man with his arms pinioned behind his back. The man looked groggy. She had seen Will bashing his head against a tree trunk.