Dangerous Diana (Brambridge Novel 3)

by Pearl Darling

  “That would fit with what Carlos said about the chandelier,” Melissa murmured to herself.

  “What are you going to do now then, miss?”

  Melissa took one last sip of her cold ginger tea. The strong concoction burnt a trail down her throat and a fire burned bright in her heart. After Eliza and Edgar she had vowed that no one was going to direct her actions ever again, and yet she was still being pushed around by the mysterious Viper and an acrobat. Not to mention the attempts by the high handed but irresistible Hades.

  “First, I am going to find that book.”

  Mr. Hobbs nodded.

  Melissa looked at the kitchen floor where the despicable coal man had lain after she had dealt with him in the only way she had known how. “And then I’m going to find the Viper and I’m going to make him wish he had never tangled with me.”

  CHAPTER 13

  The gas lighting outside Whites burned a cold and luminous blue. Inside was brighter, but less harsh, lit with candles and mirrors. Gentlemen gathered in small salons, talking, smoking or gaming. Hades stalked through the halls without looking left or right. He headed directly towards where he knew the betting book was kept.

  Freddie left him to catch up with some ‘old cronies’ as he referred to them. Hades knew that Freddie hadn’t liked the look in his eye when they had met on the steps outside Whites. Hades had no apologies to make, however. He needed to find out who knew about the Viper and why they were making his mission public knowledge before everything he had put in place was compromised.

  Two gentlemen were examining the book when he arrived at its station in an alcove on a desk table by the stairs. He cursed and hung back a little. It was to no avail however; one of the men looked up and spotted him.

  “Your lordship!”

  Hades groaned. Now they were going to engage him in conversation.

  “We were just discussing whether or not we would put a bet on for you against the Viper.”

  “Interesting,” Hades drawled. The man who had spoken flushed, but the other gained confidence in his reply.

  “Yes, everyone’s heard about how you routed the Frenchies with your little known scorpion strategy in the Peninsular. In fact, the rumors are that you were behind many of our victories. I’ve decided to bet for you.” He turned defiantly to his friend, “I don’t care what you say about the Viper killing everything he dislikes, I think the earl can best him.”

  Good God. It seemed that his notoriety was growing. Someone had even been blabbing about his military service as well. How was he to catch anyone if they all knew that his forte was strategic warfare? They would constantly be trying to second guess him.

  “Where did you hear about the scorpion strategy?” Hades asked curiously. Both of the men flushed.

  “Old Granwich was in here a couple of days ago. Some bore of a professor from the Royal Society was spouting off about contributing to the war effort and complaining about the fact that if Earl Harding didn’t do it, then he shouldn’t have felt obliged to do it either. Granny was apoplectic. He kept saying that you were the greatest strategist we had ever known, and that we would have lost the war without you…”

  Hades grunted. Normally Granwich was the soul of discretion. This man must have really got under his skin.

  “I’d be interested in seeing the book, if you don’t mind?” he asked gruffly. With muttered acquiescence, the two young men walked away, throwing covert looks at him over their shoulders.

  Hades waited until they had finally re-entered one of the card rooms before turning his attention to the book. Darting a quick glance up and down the hall, he began to read.

  The bets were placed across several pages. He had never placed one at Whites himself, but it was easy to see how the book was put together. The oldest bets were first followed by more and more current bets towards the middle of the book. Several middle pages were taken up with bets concerning his mission against the Viper.

  In curiosity he counted the bets for and against. Sixty percent were against him succeeding, with some even going so far as to say that he would die a similar death as the others. He smiled grimly. There was no way he would let that happen.

  Paging back through the book, he reached the first of the bets regarding his interaction with the Viper. It was an inauspicious one line bet that was made by Mr. Edward Fiske against Mr. Leonard Trump. It said that the Viper would win against the earl.

  Making a mental note of the names, Hades paged a little further back in the book, to check that he had not missed anything. He blinked. He didn’t just feature in bets against the Viper, but every page held a bet regarding when he was going to marry (if at all), who he was going to marry, and how many women would die from a broken heart after his conquest.

  Devil be damned. Till now he hadn’t really stopped to think about how others perceived him—a too serious, boring, bookish man. But these bets made him out to be a lothario of the highest order.

  Hades made to close the book, but as the pages flicked by, another name caught his eye, appearing again a few years previously. Each bet was for a Miss Melissa Sumner to marry a gentleman of the ton. Dozens of men were listed. Each one was lost. A roaring rose in his ears. Despite Freddie’s explanation of Melissa’s actions, Hades wanted to rip the pages from the book and shred them with his bare hands.

  Around him the candles flickered in a short gust of wind as the front door to Whites opened again. Glancing up, Hades caught sight of Edward Fiske. He was deep in conversation with Henry. Hades straightened. Henry was meant to be on his honeymoon. Perhaps Granwich would remove Hades from the case now that the spymaster was back.

  Closing the betting book with a snap, he pushed it firmly back onto its table and strode towards the front door. Neither Edward nor Henry noticed him until he was almost upon them. They looked up with a start.

  “Harding!” Henry smiled warmly. It seemed that the memory of Hades’ failed seduction of his now wife was in the past. That and the insinuations that he had made about her also being a French spy.

  “Anglethorpe.” Hades nodded with a jerk of his head. “Thought you were meant to be on your honeymoon?”

  “Some things have come up. I must speak to you about them later.”

  “I will leave you gentlemen to it,” Edward interjected softly. “I can see you have much to discuss.”

  “Actually, Henry, if you don’t mind, I need to speak to Edward,” Hades said seriously.

  Henry raised his eyebrows. “Of course,” he murmured. “I will call on you in the morning. Good evening, Edward, Hades.”

  Edward took a step backwards. “I hope I haven’t done anything wrong?” he stammered. “You have the same look that Anglethorpe had when I turned up at a house party with his ex-mistress.”

  Interesting. Hades filed that one away for later. Edward hadn’t finished babbling. “However, he has turned out to be a very good business contact.”

  Hades snorted. The spymaster was a good business contact because Edward didn’t realize that most of the information was going in Henry’s direction. He knew Edward to have a brilliant business brain but it certainly seemed that his conspiracy acumen was low.

  “I’d like to talk to you about a little bet you made with Mr. Trump.”

  Edward’s face turned blank. “Bet with Mr. Trump?” he said, frowning. “I’m not sure I remember that bet.”

  “It was regarding an entity called the Viper versus myself.”

  Edward’s expression cleared. “But there was no bet!” He stopped and reconsidered. “I might have said that I bet you would win against such an entity, but I did not put it in the betting book. It was a figure of speech!”

  “Can you remember who you were talking to, and how it came up?”

  Edward frowned, and stared over Hades’ shoulder. Glancing back, Hades could see a group of men gathering behind them, picking up their cloaks, hats and canes.

  “Perhaps we should go into the sitting room? It might be quieter.” Hades nod
ded to the little used salon door opposite where they stood. It was usually the room in which the owners of White’s served coffee during the day should any of their club members drop by, or in some cases, not leave the night before.

  Edward seemed to pick up the seriousness in Hades’ voice. He nodded once and crossed the hall to the salon. Opening the door quietly, he stepped into the salon and quickly looked from left to right. He turned and held the door with his fingertips. “We’ll be able to speak here,” he said.

  Hades stood back to let the party of gentlemen pass.

  “Not dead yet then, Harding?” one good-natured, drunken voice shouted.

  “My bet’s on the Viper!” another slurred.

  Hades stepped forward and surveyed the group. They shrunk back as one.

  “Shut up, Johnnie! Don’t you know the earl is a dangerous man? It’s said he keeps dangerous dogs and will take your woman if you so much as look in his direction.”

  “He won’t take my Regina!” the hapless Johnnie slurred back.

  Hades had had enough. He tapped his cane thoughtfully on the floor. “Hmm, Regina? That wouldn’t happen to be the lovely Regina who resides at the Lamb and Flag, would it?”

  Poor Johnnie gasped. “You devil!”

  Hades laughed. “Oh no, but close. I wouldn’t go there. She’s well known for giving men lice. Have you found yourself itching lately?”

  To the general amusement of the gaggle, Johnnie scratched his head and his arm. His friends moved away from him slightly.

  “I think we should go,” another person in the group said.

  “Yes,” Johnnie said sadly. “How am I going to get rid of these lice?”

  Hades relented. Scribbling quickly on a piece of paper, he gave it to Johnnie. “Visit this address. The apothecary will help you out. It is said that she can cure almost anything.”

  Without turning to see if Johnnie kept the paper, Hades strode back to the now closed salon door and pushed his way in. Edward sat ensconced in a corner set of tub chairs. He had collared a manservant to bring them coffee.

  “Impressive,” Edward said as he took a sip of coffee.

  “Hmm, it is rather nice,” Hades said, appreciatively grasping his own cup.

  “No I didn’t mean the coffee, I meant your show of knowledge out there. Now the tide will turn on the bets in the book, I shouldn’t wonder. I took a look at them whilst you were busy having your discussion.”

  The tips of Hades ears burned. He did not want to admit that his knowledge was not that of a spymaster, but that of an all-male household that liked to gossip. Carlos and Charles were the main protagonists and Carter liked to drop a few morsels into Hades’ ear of an evening. That had been when Melissa was with them, of course. Now Carter would barely speak to him.

  “Tell me about your conversation with Mr. Trump.” He sipped some more of his coffee and then put it aside.

  Edward scrunched his face up, trying to remember. “I was sitting, here in this room in fact, reading the morning papers.”

  Hades nodded. He had done that on occasion too.

  “A man came up that I had not seen before, and asked to sit opposite me,” Edward continued. “The salon was full at the time, and the chair opposite was the last one left.”

  “Did you know him?”

  “No.” Edward frowned. “I didn’t see him greet anyone else either.”

  “What did he look like?”

  Edward paused and scratched his ear. “That’s just it. I can’t remember. The harder I try, the less I can even picture him. He was just another gentleman in breeches etc. Not tall, not short, nondescript hair, features, moustache…” Edward shook his head. “He just blended into the background. I forgot he was even there until he asked me to pass him the sugar.”

  Hades sighed. There was no way that Edward was going to be able to give a good description of the man. “How did he bring up the subject of the Viper?”

  “I think he saw a picture of a snake on the front cover of the Times—it might even have been the coverage of the bodies being pulled out of the Thames. He said that you were fighting against the Viper and that he thought you wouldn’t win.”

  “And what made you think that I would?”

  Edward looked him straight in the eye, and proceeded to tick points off on his fingers. “One, you are a friend of Lord Anglethorpe. Celine, my mistress—” Edward coughed—“his ex-mistress, told me that Lord Anglethorpe collected information. Two—” He held up his middle finger—“you have a reputation for getting what you want.”

  “With the ladies,” Hades said flatly.

  Edward nodded, “Yes, but in my line of business of investing, if a man is good at one thing, he is normally good at another. Three,” he said hurriedly, seeing Hades shifting in his seat, “I saw you in action bidding for the son of Demondale at Newmarket.”

  Hades had to revise his opinion of Edward. He seemed a good-natured but boring man. However, it seemed his reputation for business was founded on an acute mind, and even better observation skills. At Newmarket, Hades had been up against every man and his dog in bidding on the horse that was the son of a renowned race horse from the end of the last century. He had really wanted that horse.

  So it made it even stranger that Edward could not remember what this man looked like.

  “I do remember one thing,” Edward said slowly, “In conjunction with commenting on the picture of the snake on the front cover, he mentioned visiting the Royal Society earlier that morning. I’m sorry it’s not much.”

  Hades nodded. “All of it is relevant.”

  “I haven’t even asked you why you want to know,” Edward said, squinting sideways at Hades.

  Honesty was the best policy. “Because no one is meant to know that I’m chasing the Viper. I was assured that it was to be done in the utmost secrecy.”

  “Hmm.” Edward sat back in his seat. “That is a problem.”

  CHAPTER 14

  It took some time to set the Bayswater house to rights again. Mrs. Hobbs recovered sufficiently to return to some part of her domineering self. Melissa was ordered to heat some water, and then go and have a lie down whilst Mr. and Mrs. Hobbs swept and cleaned the entirety of the house.

  Instead Melissa spent the time again searching all the nooks and crannies that the house had to offer. She poked under the floorboards, stuck her hand up the chimney, and even peeped into the eaves above her attic bedroom, but it was to no avail. There was no book in the house.

  Melissa withdrew her head from between the eaves of her room and roundly clunked herself against one of the supporting beams in the process. As she clutched at her head, she wondered. Could the book that the Viper was hunting for be among those that her mother had given away? It seemed doubtful. Melissa knew them almost by heart. She had pored over the plant journals from head to toe, learning as much as she could from her father’s memory after his death. The animal ones written by his colleagues she had used to weigh down her flower press.

  Perhaps he had encoded something in them? Perhaps some of the knowledge in there was false, a clue as to why the Viper might seek the book so assiduously? Melissa rubbed the spot on her forehead where she had made contact with the beam. She had to admit that sometimes some of her remedies had not worked as well as she hoped. And there were any number of patients that did not seem to get better no matter how she treated them.

  The only way she would find out was by getting the books back. And that meant a trip to the butchers.

  “What are you going to bargain with, then?” Mrs. Hobbs asked when Melissa laid out her plans, back in the now cheerful kitchen. “That butcher is a sly one. He’s always trying to get the one over on me, even though I pay him with good coin.”

  Melissa shuddered. She remembered her mother’s form of bargaining with the coal man. All he wants is a kiss. Luckily they had found a new man who wasn’t so intent on gathering ‘favors’, and with the money from the apothecary, had managed to keep the relationship firmly
on a client basis.

  “I think she should take the money, Mrs. Hobbs,” Mr. Hobbs said, drinking his tea. “We can all make more money after this, but we can’t go forward if the Viper is constantly troubling Miss Sumner.”

  “But it’s more money than we’ve seen in our life, Albert!”

  “I know, but it ain’t ours, it’s Miss Sumner’s! We live in her home, we used her recipes and know-how. If she hadn’t ‘taken a holiday’ she would have all the money herself instead of it lying under our bed.”

  Mrs. Hobbs sighed. She looked at Melissa balefully but soon smiled. “Albert’s always right, dear. It is your money.” She got up from the kitchen table and clumped up the dark stairs to the Hobbs’ first floor bedroom that lay above the kitchen.

  Mr. Hobbs and Melissa sat in silence as the floorboards creaked above them under the heavy weight of Mrs. Hobbs.

  “She was a cook at the Grenadier, you know. A really good one,” Mr. Hobbs said wistfully. “It’s helped us with your recipes. Too bad that she got arthritis in her hands. Things would have gone better for us.”

  The sound of Mrs. Hobbs on the stairs was followed by a large clunk with every step. She reappeared at the kitchen door with a very red face, and hair flying out in all directions from under her cap.

  “Pooh!” she said, “It’s even heavier than I remembered. We just kept adding the day’s takings.”

  “Hmm, we might have put up the prices a little,” Mr. Hobbs said thoughtfully, “but it seemed to increase the amount of people queuing against the wall.”

  “Perhaps it was the quality effect,” Melissa murmured, absently gazing at the sack of coins that threatened to spill over on the floor. “The more you charge, the more people think it is worth it.”

  “I think it was Albert’s humor,” Mrs. Hobbs said loyally. “He’s always been a good salesman.”

  Melissa nodded. “How much is in there?”

  Mrs. Hobbs mumbled something.

  “Pardon?” Melissa said.

  Mrs. Hobbs mumbled again.

  “Go on spit it out dear,” Mr. Hobbs said tiredly.