Murder in Bloomsbury

by D. M. Quincy

  The current dance ended, and their conversation ceased while they made their way onto the dance floor. There was quite a crush, but everyone made way for their hostess, sister to the venerable Duke of Somerville. The duke’s guests also pretended not to stare, but more than a few eyes followed Atlas and Lilliana.

  They came to a stop at the center of the dance floor. Atlas put his right hand around Lilliana’s trim waist and held her gloved hand. He had never danced with her before. Even though he was a large man, well over six feet with the strapping form of an athlete, she was statuesque enough to easily rest her left hand on his shoulder as they glided into a waltz. He concentrated on the steps—he was not one who waltzed often—conscious of the curious eyes closely monitoring their movements. He felt big and awkward next to Lilliana, whose posture was sublime as she waltzed with such grace that it seemed as though dancing came as naturally to her as breathing.

  “I begin to see how the rhinoceros at the Exeter Exchange must feel,” he remarked, referring to the royal menagerie on the north side of the Strand, which also included a tiger, a lion, a camel, monkeys, a hyena, and a hippopotamus. “I am unused to being on display.”

  “Rhinoceros? Surely not.” Her topaz eyes twinkled. “At the very least, you should count yourself as one of the big cats. You can be rather fierce at times.”

  “You are teasing me, which is most uncharitable.” He led her in a circle, trying his best to avoid entangling them with another dancing couple. “I am far more accustomed to the role of inconspicuous observer.”

  “You could never go unnoticed.” He assumed she referred to his size, but then she added, “I have caught more than one lady taking your measure this evening.”

  “They are no doubt wondering the identity of the man to whom the lovely Lady Roslyn has deigned to grant a waltz.”

  “Some of them, perhaps,” she allowed. “But that is not why the young marriage-minded maidens are watching you with such unabashed curiosity.”

  He brushed off the notion. “Once they learn I have neither a fortune nor a title, they will turn their attentions elsewhere.”

  “I would not be so certain of that if I were you.” They took another smooth turn. “In any case, the reason we are drawing more than our share of attention is because this is my first major entertainment since leaving off my mourning.”

  “I hadn’t realized.”

  They glided past Thea, who was dancing with Charlton. She was rigid in the earl’s arms, her lips pressed into a hard line, the rest of her face stamped with the exasperated expression she often wore in the earl’s company.

  Lilliana noticed them as well. “I see Charlton has finally persuaded Thea to take a turn with him.”

  “I wonder why he bothers. She treats him abominably.”

  She regarded him with surprise. “Surely you’ve noticed Charlton has a tendre for your sister.”

  “What?” Atlas scoffed. “That’s absurd.”

  She shook her head. “For an observant man, you can be remarkably obtuse at times.”

  He gave a huff of skepticism. “Thea is hardly the sort of woman to interest Charlton. For one thing, she is married, and he is drawn toward—” He stopped short, not wishing to discuss with Lilliana the earl’s sexual exploits.

  “Actresses and opera singers,” she said tartly. “Yes, I am aware.”

  “And Thea is a prickly mathematician who pays little attention to her appearance and even less to the social graces.” His sister couldn’t be more different than Charlton’s usual painted beauties, who excelled in the art of conversation, flirtation, and, well, sexual congress.

  “Men.” She shook her head. “At times you cannot see what is right before your eyes.”

  He scanned the crowded dance floor until he found his sister and friend again. The earl was certainly staring at his sister with keen appreciative interest. He frowned, considering the possibility that Lilliana might be correct. “Charlton is holding her rather closer than he should.”

  “Nonsense. There’s a perfectly respectable distance between them.”

  “How long has this been going on?” The thought crossed Atlas’s mind that perhaps his travels had put him too out of touch with important happenings in his own family.

  She looked heavenward. “Nothing is ‘going on,’ as you put it. Thea is a married woman.”

  “True, but her husband is rarely in residence.” Charles Palmer spent most of his time in the country. It was unfashionable for married couples to appear too fond of each other, but Atlas had always sensed that Palmer would prefer to spend more time with his wife. “Is Charlton the reason she doesn’t want Palmer around?”

  “Now you’re being ridiculous.” They executed a one-two-three promenade. “While it is true that Charlton carries a torch for your sister, I’m fairly certain she’ll douse that flame with a bucket of ice water should he ever find the courage to declare himself.”

  “Oh.” A strange sort of relief filtered through him. “So I’m not completely mistaken. She does find him tiresome?”

  Lilliana lifted one elegant shoulder. “It would appear so.”

  It took him a moment to realize the music had stopped, bringing their dance to an end. As he escorted her off the floor, Atlas’s thoughts returned to the investigation. “When did you say Lady Lavinia plans to call upon you, with the . . . erm . . . proof of Davis’s prurient nature?”

  “On the morrow. At two o’clock.”

  He frowned, filtering the possibilities through his mind. “I still cannot imagine what form this evidence might take.”

  “Come and see me tomorrow at three o’clock if you’d like to find out,” she said as they reached the side of the ballroom—just before her next dance partner whisked her away.

  * * *

  The following day, when Atlas called upon Lilliana at the prescribed time, he expected to be shown to the same tasteful sitting room as when he’d last visited, but she received him instead in one of the duke’s numerous formal drawing rooms.

  The space was elegantly ornamented with flowers, plants, sculptures, and engravings, artfully arranged on various mahogany and marble tabletops. Gilded mirrors adorned the walls, reflecting the daylight filtering through the drawing room’s sizable windows, which gave the room a light and airy feel. Atlas suspected the value of the artifacts in that room alone far exceeded that of everything he would own in his lifetime.

  As soon as he joined Lilliana, Atlas saw she was not alone. While Lady Lavinia was nowhere in evidence, a well-dressed gentleman Atlas had never seen before was ensconced in the stuffed chair opposite Lilliana.

  “Atlas,” she said after Hastings, the butler, announced him. “Do you know Roxbury?”

  The name sounded vaguely familiar, yet Atlas felt fairly certain he’d never met the pleasant-faced man taking tea with Lilliana. “I’m afraid I have not had the pleasure.”

  The man rose to his feet. He was of medium height and cut a fine figure in his expensive tailored clothing. “Jonathan Bradford, Marquess of Roxbury.”

  Atlas bowed. “I believe I am acquainted with your brother, Adam. We were at Harrow together. I hope he fares well.”

  In that moment, Atlas recalled why the name sounded familiar. Charlton had mentioned that Roxbury was courting Lilliana.

  At the lady’s invitation, Atlas took a seat, discreetly examining the man with more interest. Roxbury had an agreeable demeanor, and while not overtly handsome, the marquess’s features were neat and even. Atlas judged him to be in his late thirties, about a decade older than Lilliana.

  “I understand you were most recently in Jamaica.” The marquess exuded an easy confidence. “Lady Roslyn has told me as much.”

  Lilliana had discussed him with the marquess? At his surprised look, she interjected, “Roxbury was present when your sister last visited. Mrs. Palmer was kind enough to share the contents of your letters with us.”

  Not that there was anything particularly intimate in his rambling missives, but
it had never occurred to Atlas that Thea might share their contents with others. “I do beg your pardon if she bored you with the details of my journey.”

  Lilliana regarded him over the rim of her porcelain teacup. “I was anything but bored.”

  “Your descriptions of the sugarcane fields were most vivid,” the marquess said. “How will the island fare, I wonder, now that the slave trade has been abolished?”

  “The slave trade is banned. However, slavery itself is still firmly entrenched in Jamaica.” He accepted a cup of tea that the butler brought in for him.

  “Your abhorrence of slavery is quite apparent in your letters,” Lilliana remarked. “You were most passionate.”

  His face warmed. As a rule, he did not guard his emotions in letters to his sister in the way he might to others, but they’d touched upon a subject that Atlas felt strongly about. “Until the very institution of slavery is banned, I suspect the island will continue on its current course, at its own peril. It is inevitable that an economy based on enslaved people will eventually fail.”

  “An interesting point.” Interest flicked in the marquess’s eyes as they continued the conversation about Atlas’s time in Jamaica. Thirty minutes later, both men had finished their tea, but neither showed any sign of departing. As a rule, morning calls were not long, and Roxbury had far exceeded the acceptable duration of a visit. Perhaps Lilliana regularly allowed the marquess this particular liberty. However, Atlas noted with satisfaction, she had not invited her suitor into her private sitting room as she had Atlas.

  “More tea?” Lilliana finally asked. “Shall I ring for Hastings to bring in a fresh pot?”

  Roxbury stood, no doubt because he’d stretched the rules of protocol almost to the breaking point. Lords were expected to set an example by adhering to etiquette rather than flouting it. “No, thank you, my dear. I really should be leaving.” He paused, casting an inquiring glance at Atlas.

  Atlas did not take the other man’s unsubtle hint. He felt no compunction to abide by the ton’s rigid strictures. After all, Lilliana had invited him to call upon her at three o’clock, a time when morning calls normally ended. Besides, he had no intention of going anywhere until he saw the evidence Lady Lavinia had dropped off.

  Lilliana answered for him. “It was good of you to come, Roxbury.” She rose and rang the bell. “Hastings will see you out.”

  If Roxbury was surprised by her less-than-subtle dismissal, he gave no sign of it. He made his farewell with grace and followed the butler out the door. Once the door closed behind them, Lilliana exhaled.

  “Thank goodness he’s gone.”

  Her candor took Atlas by surprise. “Roxbury seems like an amiable enough fellow.”

  “Oh, he is. Most amiable and very charming.” She whisked over to a settee by the window and knelt beside it. “But I am keen to see what proofs Lavinia Fenton has of Gordon Davis’s lesser nature.”

  She pulled a small box out from under the settee and tossed the top off. Her face fell.

  “Why, it’s just a book.” She lifted the tome out and flipped through a couple of pages, and her dubious expression transformed into one of complete shock. “Oh, my.”

  Chapter Eight

  Alarmed by Lilliana’s reaction, Atlas strode to her side. “What is it?”

  She’d become so engrossed in the book that she seemed to have forgotten his presence. “I had no idea,” she murmured, turning the pages far more slowly now, studying some of them rather closely. “Surely not . . .”

  When he drew near, she slammed the book shut and lobbed it back into the box as though it were one of the deadly scorpions he’d once seen in Carthage. She stood and scooted away, putting distance between them, her cheeks flushed as she avoided his gaze. It was the first time he’d ever seen her flustered.

  Curious as to what had shattered Lilliana’s crystalline reserve, Atlas squatted down on his haunches and reached for the book. He flipped it open and inhaled sharply, shock coursing through his veins. Aghast, he paged through it.

  The book was full of indecent illustrations, one page after another showing graphic portrayals of men and women engaging in sexual congress or performing various sex acts upon one another. Some involved more than two people; others depicted men in explicit situations with other men or two women enjoying each other. More than indecent, the drawings were outright obscene, so detailed that they left nothing to the reader’s imagination.

  He closed the book with a sharp thud and remained staring down at it for a moment as he regained his composure. Exhaling long and steady through his nostrils, he put the book aside and straightened to his full height, appalled that Lilliana had been subjected to the base drawings, which no doubt introduced to her a litany of sex acts she couldn’t have even imagined before now. He forced himself to look at her and found the lady watching him with undisguised curiosity.

  “What is that?” she asked.

  He didn’t quite know how to answer her question. A rising anger heated his words. “Gordon Davis was a vile, repugnant man to show such things to an innocent, gently bred woman such as Lavinia Fenton.”

  “Is that the sort of thing men . . . read . . . erm . . . regularly?”

  His cheeks were hot. “No, most decidedly not.”

  “But you have seen the like before.”

  Of course he had. “At Harrow, the boys secretly passed dirty books around.”

  “Oh, I see.” She swallowed, her composure returning. “And is this common?”

  He hardly understood what she asked. “Is what common?”

  “These sorts of books.”

  “They can be.” Inwardly, he breathed a sigh of relief. He had feared she wanted to know whether the explicit acts portrayed on the book’s pages were common. “There is a street, Holywell, off the Strand, where these types of materials can be found for a certain price.”

  “Holywell?” Her forehead wrinkled. “But isn’t that where radicals sell their books and pamphlets?”

  “You will find both. Recently, authorities have cracked down on dissenters, prompting many on Holywell Street to turn to alternate ways to make a profit.”

  She remained silent for a few moments, seeming to consider his answer. “And two men, together in that way . . .” She hesitated. “Is that done?”

  He wondered if she inquired for the reason he suspected. Something about the grave manner in which she asked, the seriousness of purpose in her eyes, told him her interest wasn’t of a prurient nature.

  “Not by most men, no.” He spoke with care. “But there are some whose tastes deviate from the norm.”

  He abruptly turned the conversation back to the investigation. It was, after all, why he’d come. Besides, he wasn’t about to discuss buggery with Lilliana. “About Lavinia Fenton. What did she tell you about this book? Aside from the fact that Davis gave it to her?”

  “Very little. Roxbury arrived before we had an opportunity to talk about the contents of her package and her acquaintance with Mr. Davis.”

  “This book suggests their acquaintance might have been of an intimate nature.”

  Interest gleamed in her eyes. “You think Lavinia is the mysterious Lady L.”

  “The book certainly makes it seem very possible, but we need to learn more about how well they might have known each other. I also have not told you about my visit to Clapham.” He went on to share the details of his encounter with the Archers.

  “Is the elder Miss Archer a candidate for the unknown Lady L?”

  “It is hard to tell. We do know she was acquainted with Davis, but on the surface, it appears that they barely knew each other.” He leaned forward and helped himself to a biscuit from the tea tray. “And she is betrothed. It is difficult to imagine Miss Archer carrying on a torrid affair with a footman-turned-clerk while promised to another man.”

  “What do we know about her intended?”

  “His name is Gregory Montgomery. He appears to be besotted with Miss Archer, and she seems to enjoy hi
s regard.”

  Lilliana contemplated the possibilities. “It would be exceedingly difficult for a well-bred young woman to carry on an illicit liaison. It is difficult for maidens to go anywhere without a chaperone.”

  “Quite right. But Davis did manage to get those books to Lady Lavinia.”

  “We must talk with her.” Lilliana tapped a tapered finger against her pale cheek. “When Lavinia departed today, she mentioned she walks in the park every morning at eleven.”

  “An unsubtle hint of where to find the girl in the event you wish to speak with her again?”

  “I believe so. She is anything but shy.”

  He wondered exactly what Lilliana meant by that, but he supposed he’d find out soon enough. “I gather you plan to take a walk tomorrow morning?”

  “Yes,” she said with that lopsided smile of hers, “and you can just happen upon us after I accidentally run into Lavinia.”

  * * *

  Although Atlas had never met Lavinia Fenton and knew almost nothing about her, he realized the moment Lilliana introduced them that the girl was trouble.

  He’d pretended to accidentally encounter the two ladies in the park late the following morning, just as he and Lilliana had arranged. Lady Lavinia was very young, blonde, fair, and somewhat buxom, but what left the deepest impression on him was the mischief sparkling in her vivacious blue eyes.

  “How delightful to make your acquaintance, Mr. Catesby.” The girl batted her eyelashes and, to his surprise, thoroughly perused his form with unabashed inquisitiveness—all the way from the tip of his black beaver-skin top hat down to the pointy toes of his polished boots.

  Startled by her boldness, he exchanged a look with Lilliana before greeting them both with a bow. “Lady Lavinia, a pleasure.”

  Lilliana’s eyes twinkled. “Mr. Catesby, what a surprise it is to run into you here.”

  “A very pleasant one,” Lavinia added with a saucy grin. That this cheeky girl might have a penchant for trouble would not surprise Atlas in the least.

  The three of them strolled along the path, exchanging the usual polite pleasantries, with Lavinia’s maid strolling at a distance behind them. It was not the fashionable hour to be seen in Hyde Park—that would come much later in the afternoon—so the atmosphere was sedate. The weather had held; the air was damp and thickly humid, but it wasn’t raining.