His men? Could the runners have caught up with her?
“My men don’t resort to this kind of violence,” he countered. His conscience gave a little twinge as he realized that he wasn’t sure exactly how far the runners would go in carrying out his orders. And where was Luke in all this?
“But they said their employer had ordered them to kidnap me,” she said. “They would have succeeded, too, if Matt hadn’t come along.”
Now he was getting somewhere. “And who is Matt?”
“Matt Sweeney. I hired him to escort me. He was late and when I went to find him they grabbed me. Oh God, and then Matt came and he tried to get me away but they stabbed him. I think he’s dead.” She started shaking as she relived the horror.
Alexander grabbed the glass before it could fall from her hands. She looked so young and vulnerable that he had to resist the urge to put his arm around her and comfort her. He had to remind himself that her troubles were none of his concern.
“I didn’t set the villains on you but someone clearly did. I can help you but only if you tell me everything. Tell me who was behind the scheme to fix the race.”
“But I don’t know!”
She was stronger than she appeared, and a worthy adversary. But she was also in shock from the attack, and half-drunk on his expensive brandy. It was time to home in for the kill. “Do you want to wind up dead in the streets like this Matt? Tell me who put you up to this. If you help me I’ll help you. Otherwise—”
He let the threat trail off into silence.
She opened and closed her mouth, at a loss for words. His experience told him that she was ready to break, to spill her secrets. But the words that came our of her mouth were the last thing that he expected to hear.
“You stupid Englishman! Didn’t you hear what I said? I have no partners. You’re the only one who thinks I am part of some scheme.”
“But what about the race? What about the prediction you made at Lady Stanthorpe’s?”
“It was a mistake,” she cried out. “I intended a different reading, but the cards went wrong. It was all a stupid mistake. I should never have been at that party. If Madame Zoltana hadn’t broken her leg none of this would have happened.”
He didn’t want to believe her. It could still be an act, but his instincts told him otherwise. She had nearly lost her life tonight. A guilty woman would have grasped at his offer of protection. Even an innocent might have been tempted to lie, telling him whatever he wanted to hear, rather than putting herself back in jeopardy. But instead the Gypsy asserted her innocence, which made it just possible that she was telling the truth.
“But if you are innocent, then who wanted you enough to commit murder?” he asked. It was the one hole in her story.
“If it wasn’t your men—”
“It wasn’t.”
“Then I don’t know,” she insisted. “It makes no sense. Until a fortnight ago I was just an out-of-work seamstress.”
It made no sense to him, either. But he had faith that he could get to the bottom of the matter. And in so doing, he would prove her innocence or her guilt. “It makes no sense to me, but I am very good at puzzles, and I will figure it out eventually.”
The Gypsy sank back against the cushioned sofa, the brandy and events of the night finally catching up with her. “If you were so good at solving things you would have known I wasn’t to blame,” she argued.
“Rest now,” he said. “Things will look better in the morning.”
It was good advice for himself as well. It was too late tonight, but in the morning he could start checking out her improbable story. And he would start with Bob Parker. The timing of the attack on Mademoiselle Magda was a little too coincidental. The guilty twinge he felt now would be nothing compared to how he would feel if he learned Luke or one of the runners was behind the botched kidnapping attempt. But he swore that no matter who was responsible, he would find that person and make him pay.
Chapter 5
Magda woke to the long-forgotten sensation of warmth and comfort. She opened her eyes to find herself lying in bed under a satin coverlet. A soft light seeped through the pale pink curtains, while a month’s worth of coal burned merrily in the fireplace. This must be a dream, she thought to herself. But pleasant as it was, she could not linger. She stretched her arms in an effort to wake up.
The movement caused a sudden, searing pain in her neck. Magda sat up abruptly, hands reaching for the bandage at her throat, as the events of the previous night came flooding back. The attack on her, Matt’s death, and then the strange encounter with Lord Kerrigan, who seemed to menace and then to rescue her. Looking back, it seemed unreal, something out of a Drury Lane play. But the bandage on her neck proved otherwise.
As did her presence in this bedroom. She must still be in Lord Kerrigan’s townhouse, and Magda blushed at the realization that she could not remember how she had gotten to this room. She remembered his unexpected gentleness as he bandaged her wound, so strange when contrasted to his ruthless questioning as he tried to get her to admit to some imagined crime. But she could not remember how the conversation had ended, or when indeed she had fallen asleep.
If she was still in his house, then the enigmatic earl was bound to come looking for her. She jumped out of bed, mortified when she realized that she was wearing only her thin and much-mended chemise. Her clothing from last night was nowhere to be seen, but someone had thoughtfully laid out a brown wool dress and half-boots by the dressing table. The dress, undoubtedly some maidservant’s Sunday best, was too loose around the bosom and the hem dragged on the floor. But with judicious use of pins she was able to make herself presentable.
She debated over waiting in the room till she was summoned but decided it would give her host the wrong impression. She didn’t want him to think that she was cowed by her surroundings. Grateful for his help, yes. But intimidated? No. It was not in her nature to show such weakness, especially toward someone whom she still did not trust.
She descended the stairs, reasoning that Lord Kerrigan was most likely to be found in the living quarters below. A gentleman crossing the foyer witnessed her descent and paused at the foot of the stairs.
“Good morning, Mademoiselle,” the stranger said. “We didn’t expect to see you awake so soon.”
The man seemed close to her age, with close-cropped dark brown hair and brown eyes that hinted at a sense of mischief. His clothing was plain but of excellent quality, making it difficult to tell if he was a servant or a gentleman. Magda decided to err on the side of politeness. “Good morning, sir,” she said, giving a half-curtsy. “Can you tell me where to find Lord Kerrigan? I must speak with him.”
“I can do better than that. Let me take you to him.” He gave a half-bow and gestured with his right arm for her to proceed him. “Luke Stevenson at your service, milady.”
“Thank you,” she replied. She did not give her own name, not knowing what story Lord Kerrigan had told his staff to explain her presence.
Luke Stevenson led her down a corridor, passing several doors, till he came to the end of the hall. He tapped once and then threw open the door with a flourish. “My lord! I bring you a damsel in distress,” he announced, bowing her into the room.
Lord Kerrigan looked up from his breakfast. A faint grimace crossed his features.
Now that she was face-to-face with him, she knew not what to say. How do you thank someone for saving your life? Especially if you’re not sure why he did it.
Magda took a few steps into the room. “My lord, I must thank you—”
“That’s not necessary.”
Magda crossed the few feet that separated her from the table. Lord Kerrigan did not rise to greet her but instead assessed her with his cold blue eyes that seemed to measure her and find her lacking. Even seated, he was an imposing presence.
“But it is necessary,” she insisted. “You may have saved my life last night.” But it was also true that he may have been behind the attack on her in the fir
st place. So she would be polite, but she must remember not to confide in him. Nor to place her trust in anyone else until she knew who was responsible for last night’s attack.
“Sit down,” he said, gesturing at the empty chair on his left side. “We never finished our conversation last night, but I’m sufficiently civilized that I’ll allow you to break your fast first.”
Magda sat down gingerly. Luke helped himself to the chair on the opposite side without waiting for an invitation, then picked up a silver bell and rang it once.
A footman appeared as if by magic. “Mademoiselle desires breakfast,” Luke announced. “And another plate for me as well, to keep her company.”
“If you keep eating like that you’ll rival Prinny one day,” Lord Kerrigan grumbled. But there was affection in his tone. So much for her supposition that this Luke was a servant. It was a good reminder that nothing here was as it seemed.
Lord Kerrigan switched his attention to her. “In the excitement of last night we were never properly introduced. And you can hardly expect me to call you Mademoiselle Magda. What is your true name?”
“My name is indeed Magda. Magda Beaumont.”
“Magda.” It was an exotic name, at odds with her demure appearance. Dressed as she was, he could have mistaken her for a maidservant were it not for the cool intelligence that hid behind her hazel eyes.
Breakfast appeared within moments. Luke chattered away about nothing in particular, but Alexander’s attention was all for his mysterious guest. Magda Bowman ate her meal with the elegant manners of a lady. So much for her claim to be a seamstress. No mere sewing girl would have dared sit down to breakfast with a peer of the realm.
Used to Alexander and Luke’s enormous appetites, Cook had sent up a hearty meal for their guest. But she consumed only a small portion before laying down her knife and fork with obvious reluctance.
“Finished so soon? But you ate barely enough to keep a bird alive,” Luke said. “Is there something else you would like?”
“No, this was wonderful, truly,” Magda replied. “I can’t remember when I’ve eaten so much.”
From the looks of her it was all too easy to believe. Without the enveloping costume there was no hiding the finely drawn lines of her face or the unnatural thinness that spoke of illness or recent hunger. Alexander fought off the impulse to urge her to eat more.
“We need to talk about last night,” he said instead, deliberating breaking the mood.
“The more I think of it, the less likely it seems that our meeting last night was a coincidence. What were you doing in Covent Garden?” she challenged.
He decided to give her at least some of the truth. “I was there to speak with Mrs. Brightwell, in hopes of tracking you down. But I happened to find you instead. It was lucky for you that I did.”
“I suppose,” she said, her right hand creeping up to touch the bandage at her neck. “But I’m sure my friend would have been able to take care of me.”
Even if his intervention had been for purely selfish reasons, the least she could do was show a little more gratitude. “And what if the men who attacked you knew about your friend? They seemed to know just where to find you before.”
Her eyes widened. It was clear she’d never considered this possibility. “I don’t know how they could have known I would go there for help. I was so lost I didn’t know where I was until I was almost there. And I still don’t know why they came after me. I thought they were in your employ—”
“Most definitely not.” Bob Parker was too experienced an investigator to try such a harebrained stunt without talking to him first. And Luke, while capable of such a scheme, had denied all involvement. Alexander believed his friend. Luke had no reason to lie. Besides, he knew Luke’s flair for mayhem. If Luke had been behind the kidnapping then Magda Bowman would have disappeared exactly according to plan, with no messy consequences. “Is there someone else who has reason to harm you?”
She shook her head firmly. “No, no one. At first I thought they had mistaken me for someone else, but that doesn’t make sense, either.”
“I know you wish that was true, but from what Alexander told me it sounds like they were definitely after you. And they knew just where and when to find you,” Luke interjected. From the wry expression on his face, Alexander knew that his friend was still disappointed that he had missed the excitement last night.
“They must have been waiting for me,” she said, her eyes wide with remembered fright. “They must have followed me from Damon Lane. I wasn’t paying attention to the passersby when I left my lodgings, but as soon as I turned into the alley, there they were.”
Luke gave a low whistle. “Damon Lane’s a pretty rough area. So how does a seamstress wind up living in such quarters?”
“There are worse places than Damon Lane. My friend has lived there for years. It’s close to the theaters and relatively cheap. Not everyone can live in Mayfair,” she added pointedly.
“My apologies if I offended you,” Luke said.
Alexander wasn’t as concerned with her feelings. “You said your friend lived there?” Perhaps this was the connection he was looking for.
“Mrs. Brightwell. She’s a dresser at the New Majestic theater. I’ve known her for years. I was a shop assistant to Mrs. Spenser, but when I fell ill this winter I lost my position and the lodgings that came with it. I’ve been staying with Mrs. Brightwell ever since.”
He recognized the name of Mrs. Spenser, a popular mantua maker. He would check her story out, of course, but somehow he knew that she was telling the truth. No wonder she had been so hard to find. Who would have believed an unemployed seamstress was really the celebrated Mademoiselle Magda?
“What you really want to ask is how I became a Gypsy fortune teller.”
“I was getting to that.” He wondered why she didn’t try to play on his sympathies and elaborate on the hardships she had endured. But instead she glossed over her misfortune as if it was of no account, refusing to be pitied. He felt a reluctant admiration for her spirit.
“Mrs. Brightwell works in the same theater where Madame Zoltana performs. When Madame Zoltana had her accident, Mrs. Brightwell suggested that I could take her place that night. She knew I could use the work, and between the two of them they were confident they could teach me enough for one evening’s performance.”
“You hardly learned to cardsharp in a single day,” he pointed out drily.
“Oh, that.” She actually blushed, displaying yet another trait that clashed with his preconceptions. “When I was young there was a Monsieur Villeneuve, who was a friend of my mother’s. I suppose he was a gambler but to me he was simply an older man who liked to speak French with Maman. Not knowing how else to amuse a small child, he once taught me how to stack a deck. After that, whenever he came to visit we would play cards and cheat each other outrageously.”
“Now there’s a practical skill to teach a child,” Luke said admiringly.
“Not really,” Magda disagreed. “I hadn’t played in years and when it came to that night I botched the reading. I really meant to predict that Foolish Pride would win.” She reached over and placed her hand on Alexander’s arm as if to convince him of her sincerity. “Everyone there agreed that he would win, so it seemed the safest thing to say.”
He moved his arm away, reaching for his coffee so it did not seem as if he were pulling away. But he did not want her to touch him. He did not want to think of her as a person with hopes and feelings of her own. He had a mystery to solve, and for now she was still under suspicion. He could not let his emotions get in the way. “But someone knew differently. Someone had arranged for him to be tampered with, and knew he would lose.”
She nodded, unsurprised. “I thought as much. After you questioned me at Lady Burnett-Hodgkins’s I knew it had to be something of the sort.”
She had an answer for everything. But it was all too easy, too perfect. Before he had left England he had been a trusting fool. But in India, Alexander h
ad learned to depend on his instincts in situations where knowing who to trust meant the difference between life and death.
Now his instincts were telling him to proceed cautiously. She had told him the truth, but not the whole truth. She was holding something back. It could be nothing but it could be the clue that would link her to the horse race and answer the question of why she was attacked.
“I must thank you for your kindness last night and for the breakfast this morning,” she said. “And now I really must be on my way. My friends will be worried over my absence.”
He had no intention of letting her out of his sight. Not until he was absolutely certain that her secrets held no bearing on this matter.
“I have hired a Bow Street runner to look into this for me,” he said. “I am meeting him this morning and I’d like you to come along so you can describe your attackers to him.”
“Is that really necessary?”
“I thought you’d be grateful to have Bow Street looking for these men. Unless you’d prefer to meet them again on your own?”
A look of fear flashed across her face but she swiftly brought herself under control. “It seems you have thought of everything,” she said in a tight voice. “Tell me, do you feel responsible for me because you think you saved my life? Or is it simply that you still don’t trust me?”
“A little of both,” Alexander said, surprising himself with his honesty.
He could swear there was a look of disappointment in her eyes. But what cause had she to be disappointed? He had never pretended to be other than he was.
“I’ll tell John to have the carriage ready,” Luke said, breaking the awkward silence. “Do you want me to come with you?”
“No need. I am sure you have your own errands to keep you occupied.”
“As you wish,” Luke said, nodding almost imperceptibly in the direction of their guest to show that he understood. While Alexander and Magda were busy with the runners, Luke would be seeking out the truth of her story.
An Unlikely Alliance Page 6