The Lawrence Browne Affair

by Cat Sebastian

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  Lawrence glanced again at the scrap of paper he had carried in his pocket all the way from Penkellis. It was creased and soft from having been clenched in his fist.

  “Are you quite sure you don’t want me to come with you?” Lady Standish asked again when Lawrence made no move to exit the carriage.

  “You and Simon go see the lions at the Tower,” Lawrence insisted. “Keep an eye on Courtenay.” As bizarre as it was to see Courtenay play the part of a doting uncle, Lawrence had yet to see anything less than proper in the man’s conduct. Still, having Lady Standish there might curb any stray impulse on Courtenay’s part to revert to bad habits and wander into the nearest brothel.

  They had arrived in London in the middle of the night. Lady Standish had insisted that they all stay at her home, and Lawrence had been too weary to protest. He scooped Simon up in his arms to carry him upstairs, and the next thing he remembered was waking in an unfamiliar room. Moments later, a pair of servants had arrived with a bath and pitchers of steaming water.

  The result was that when Lawrence finally emerged from the carriage and climbed the steps to this narrow, unassuming house, he was freshly washed and shaved, his hair neatly combed into a queue. Somebody had even bathed Barnabus, which was just as well, since Lawrence wasn’t going anywhere without the dog. All this strangeness was bad enough, even with the dog’s companionship.

  He assumed an expression that he hoped approximated good cheer and waved to Simon, who was happily sitting on the box beside the coachman as the carriage drove away. Before lifting the brass knocker, he bent to scratch Barnabus’s furry neck. A moment passed and still nobody came to the door. He felt exposed, vulnerable, standing on this strange doorstep on an unfamiliar street in a city he didn’t want to be in. Lawrence had gotten this address from Halliday; in this house lived the man Halliday had written about investigating Lawrence’s mental state. He lifted the knocker again and let it fall, and the unpleasant clank of metal against metal jolted unpleasantly through his body. London was a noisy, chaotic place, and every sound chipped away at the veneer of calm he had tried to assume.

  After another interminable moment, Lawrence heard footsteps, and then the door was opened. It was not a servant who stood in the doorway, but a gentleman. He was close to Lawrence’s own height and leaned heavily on a walking stick, which was perhaps why it had taken him so long to answer the door.

  “How can I help you?” the gentleman asked, with a wary glance at Barnabus.

  “I’m Radnor,” Lawrence said simply, watching as the gentleman’s eyes went wide. He looked like he wanted to take a step back, but then his manners won out over prudence. “I’m looking for Oliver Rivington.”

  “Of course. I’m Rivington.” He gestured for Lawrence to come inside. “And you’re Halliday’s earl. Not a recluse after all, I see. Georgie must have been—” He stopped.

  “Right,” Lawrence said. “About Georgie. Where is he?”

  “Georgie?” The man’s astonishment could not have been feigned. “He’s supposed to be with you.” His lips went tight with concern, then he gestured for Lawrence to enter. “Come in, come in. There’s nothing to do but wait for Jack.”

  Rivington led the way to a small sitting room that smelled of lemon oil and brandy. “I went to school with Halliday,” the gentleman said. “And he wrote me a kind letter when I was recuperating from my injury.” He gestured at his leg. “When he mentioned in passing that his patron’s, ah, mental state had been called into question and that he was in danger of being plunged into some kind of legal proceedings, I offered to help.”

  Barnabus must have sensed Lawrence’s disquiet, because he pressed his body close to his master’s leg and kept his ears pricked up. At that moment, the front door opened and slammed shut.

  “My fuckwit of a brother is in prison,” called a voice from the vestibule. There was the sound of a coat being shrugged off, keys dropped on a table. “Some or another noble-minded shite.”

  The new arrival appeared in the doorway to the sitting room. “Lord Radnor,” Mr. Rivington said pointedly, “allow me to present Jack Turner, Georgie’s brother.”

  Lawrence drew in a sharp breath. Georgie’s brother. Which meant Georgie was in prison.

  “So you’re Georgie’s fancy man.” The man was a larger, rougher version of Georgie. Where Georgie looked carved by hand in ivory, this man was roughhewn from stone. And evidently he lived here, in this respectable little house, along with the handsome gentleman with the bad leg.

  “Don’t torture him,” Rivington chided. “He’s as worried as you are.”

  Barnabus let out a low growl. “I came to see that he was safe,” Lawrence said.

  “Well, he isn’t,” Jack spat. “I’m trying to see that he isn’t hanged, but once a man is in Newgate, there isn’t much I can do.”

  But there might be something that Lawrence could do.

  Lawrence declined Rivington’s offer to drive him, instead asking for instructions on how to reach his destination by foot. He needed to burn off some of the anxious energy that was stopping him from thinking clearly. In the absence of wood to chop or water to swim in, that left walking.

  So with little more than a vague sense of where he was heading, he and Barnabus kept up a brisk pace as they strode along the pavements. He didn’t know whether it was the sight of Barnabus or his own thunderous expression that caused people to keep their distance, but Lawrence was given a wide berth, even when he skirted the edge of a rookery.

  This squalid warren of dilapidated buildings and dirty streets could have been the slum where Georgie was born. Barefoot children loitered in doorways, wearing little more than rags. Women leaned out of windows, and skinny dogs roamed the streets. The smell of filth and gin hung in the air despite the chill. When a pair of boys Simon’s age briefly ventured too close, Barnabus let out a low growl. Lawrence suspected that these urchins were a team of pickpockets. Might as well spare them the trouble. He dug a couple of pennies out of his pocket and tossed two coins to each of the boys.

  When he emerged into a solidly respectable neighborhood, he looked over his shoulder at the rookery, glad to be out of it. He could only imagine how desperately Georgie must have yearned to do the same, to get as far away from that place as possible. However little Lawrence liked the idea of Georgie defrauding innocent people, he had never really doubted that Georgie had every reason to take his fate into his own hands. Still, seeing the alternative with his own eyes made Lawrence understand just how much a man would do to escape a place like this.

  He arrived at his destination, took a reassuring look at Barnabus, and crossed the wide courtyard of the Admiralty.

  A uniformed sailor stationed by the door moved to block his entry. “Can I help you, sir?”

  “I’m Radnor.” Lawrence didn’t break stride, and the sailor stepped aside to make way for the brutish lord and his enormous dog. “I’m here to see Admiral Haversham.” Haversham was one of the fellows who assisted the Lord High Admiral. More importantly, he had written to Lawrence about the telegraph.

  “If you’ll take a seat, sir, I can see if his lordship—”

  “Most unnecessary,” he said as he walked up the stairs, Barnabus trotting beside. “I’ll find him myself.”

  As he had hoped, the prospect of a peer of the realm—one of the historically deranged Earls of Radnor, no less—barging into the chambers of the Lord Commissioners of the Admiralty, accompanied by an eight-stone mongrel who snarled at anyone who approached his master, was enough to send the young man skittering ahead to lead the way into the proper set of rooms.

  Lawrence had never been in a building like this: wide marble corridors hung with portraits of men long since dead, people who must all know one another bustling purposefully about, a vaguely efficient and martial air. Perhaps boys who went to school or men who joined the army or navy could get used to the sensation of being a bee in such a grand hive. But Lawrence felt sorely out of pla
ce; he belonged among the crumbled stones and rotten wood of Penkellis, not here. If it weren’t for Georgie, he’d turn on his heel and leave, never stopping until he reached home.

  Instead, he tried to swallow his fear. He reminded himself that this would soon be over, no matter how terrible it was. Besides, he knew that he looked every inch the earl. He was wearing the clothes Georgie had bought, and he was freshly shaved. Nobody needed to know how uneasy he was, nobody but he could hear the blood rushing in his ears or feel the heart pounding in his chest.

  He walked through a final set of doors and found a gray-haired man reading a letter at an enormous desk.

  “Haversham?”

  “Yes, what’s the meaning of this?”

  “I have your telegraph.” Lawrence pulled a sheaf of papers out of his coat pocket and slapped them onto the glossy mahogany surface of the desk.

  “Telegraph?” Haversham flipped through the papers. “Are you Lord Radnor?” he asked, looking over the rim of his spectacles. “I was under the impression that you, ah, didn’t come to town much.”

  Lawrence arched an eyebrow and gestured at his person, as if to say, guess again. He swept the telegraph plans out of the older man’s hands. “You can have these after you’ve granted me a favor.”

  “Excuse me? No, no. Not possible. The Admiralty has decided that we don’t need this kind of device. The war is over. We’re at peace. No need to send urgent messages.”

  “Then I’m free to sell the plans to anyone else?” Lawrence grabbed the papers off the man’s desk. “A private person or another government, perhaps?”

  Haversham turned an angry shade of puce. “Certainly not.”

  “Good. Then we can discuss price.”

  The older man made a noise that Lawrence interpreted as grudging assent.

  “All I require is that you pull some strings to have my secretary, George Turner, released from Newgate.”

  “This is most irregular,” Haversham sniffed.

  “We both know I could hire a solicitor or throw my weight around in some other way in order to have my secretary set free.” But those courses of action required time and a level of participation on Lawrence’s part that he’d rather avoid. “I suggest we spare ourselves the inconvenience.”

  “Tomorrow I can discuss the matter with my—”

  “No. Today.”

  “Lord Radnor,” Haversham said, “these things take time. Messages need to be sent to the appropriate parties.”

  “If only there was some device that allowed for messages to be sent instantaneously,” Lawrence said pointedly, waving the papers in his hand. “Besides, you’ll do well to remember whose son I am, whose brother I am. There’s no telling what I might do if I’m crossed.” As if on cue, Barnabus bared his teeth. “You have until tomorrow morning,” he said, and Haversham blanched. Lawrence nearly felt bad for the man. But there was power in being considered beyond reason, and Lawrence fully intended to exploit every advantage he had.

  “Somebody has mighty special friends.”

  “What?” Georgie was half-asleep, slumped against the slimy stones of the cell wall.

  The guard snorted. “You’re to be released.”

  “What?” Georgie repeated, staggering to his feet. “Why?”

  “I don’t know. They don’t tell me things,” the guard groused. “All I know is that there was a runner from the Admiralty and the next thing I know I’m being told to let you go.”

  The Admiralty. That couldn’t mean . . . There hadn’t been time for Lawrence to find out about Georgie’s imprisonment and request help from his acquaintance at the Admiralty. Well, never mind what it meant. Georgie shrugged into the coat the guard thrust at him and walked out the open cell door before anyone could think better of setting him free.

  The foggy gray London sky was blindingly bright after the darkness of Newgate. Georgie started walking in the direction of Jack’s house, for lack of any better plan. At least he’d get a meal and a bath along with whatever scolding Jack saw fit to dole out.

  Worse than the scolding would be the pity for Georgie having lost his heart in a foolish way. Perhaps even a little bit of respect for Georgie’s attempt to do something that wasn’t entirely self-serving.

  Georgie didn’t want any of that. He didn’t deserve it, and he didn’t think he could sit there and endure anything like kindness when he knew how little he merited it. After a lifetime spent stealing and scheming, he belonged at Newgate more than he belonged in a comfortable chair by his brother’s fire. He didn’t regret the past, but all those years spent harming—yes, harming, even though he tried his best not to think of it that way—innocent people had left their mark. He wasn’t a decent person anymore, and there was no use trying to live like one.

  He was exhausted. It had been days upon days since he had slept properly. After so many hours on the cold floor of the prison, his bones ached with every step. Judging by the scruff on his jaw, it had been nearly a week since he had shaved, so he must look as rough as he felt. The very model of a ruffian, like something out of a Hogarth sketch depicting a cautionary tale of hard living.

  That suspicion was confirmed when he crossed into a respectable neighborhood. A nurse tugged her young charges to the opposite side of the street. A lady and gentleman out for a stroll steadfastly refused to look at him. Georgie tugged the brim of his hat low on his forehead, obscuring his face.

  He sat heavily on a bench in Grosvenor Square, facing the house he had frequented for his last job. The Packingham house. He didn’t know why he needed to come here, whether it was to rub some salt in his wounds and remind himself of how he had nearly robbed that poor lady, or whether he wanted to cling with both hands to the first good deed he had ever done, which was to spare Mrs. Packingham.

  The wind whipped through the square, and Georgie halfheartedly pulled his coat tighter around his chest. His gloves had gone missing—which was to say they had been stolen—at Newgate, along with his coin purse. Georgie could hardly begrudge any fellow thief his takings. All the same, he was bitterly cold.

  The door to the house opened, and he saw Ned Packingham load the old lady into her carriage. She appeared unaltered, which stood to reason; her fortune was intact, her nephew still danced attendance on her in hopes of inheriting her estate, and all was well—or at least as well as it had been before Georgie had arrived. He wondered if the nephew untangled her embroidery silks as carefully as Georgie had, or if he lazily snipped off any stubborn knot, leaving her with frustratingly short strands.

  Tears prickled in his eyes. This was why he never let himself think about his marks after he was done with them.

  Tired and miserable as he was, he knew that he was thinking of Mrs. Packingham to avoid thinking of Lawrence. He had very carefully not let himself wonder how Lawrence and Simon must be getting on without him, or about how Lawrence might be distressed by the arrival of Simon’s uncle. He was trying not to think about Lawrence at all.

  One of Georgie’s earliest memories was of his sister’s cat. He couldn’t have been much more than a baby, if Sarah was still living at home. The cat had kittens, and Sarah and Georgie’s father had insisted that they needed to be killed. He had brought up a bucket and drowned them, one at a time. Georgie, confused by his sister’s tears and unsure why the soft kittens required a bath, had toddled over. “You hold them under until the bubbles stop,” his father had said, as if he were teaching Georgie how to toast a crumpet rather than how to drown a newborn cat. Georgie watched as the bubbles stopped, one kitten, then the next, then the next, all the while Sarah cried in the background.

  That was what he was trying to do to his love for Lawrence, but no matter how hard he fought to push his feelings deeper, they kept bubbling up.

  All he had to do was shut his eyes, and he could almost smell Lawrence’s scent, feel the pleasant coarseness of his beard against Georgie’s face, imagine the way he stroked that mongrel of a dog with his huge hands.

  Georgie imagine
d Lawrence putting an arm around him, comforting and warm.

  And then, out of nowhere, there was an arm around him.

  But it wasn’t Lawrence. It was Mattie Brewster.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Under other circumstances, Lawrence might have been amused to discover how many doors were opened to him by virtue of his rank, his wealth, and his presumed dangerousness. But today he was too busy pretending not to be panicking to within an inch of his life.

  He playacted the role of imperious aristocrat. When in doubt he simply channeled Percy—arrogant, entitled, reckless—and people promptly gave him whatever he desired. He wanted his secretary released from jail? It was done. He wanted to know precisely what his secretary had tried to confess to the magistrate? A runner was dispatched to find out, while Lawrence drank brandy in a cozy parlor next to Haversham’s office. He wanted a hackney to take him and his enormous dog to a warehouse in Cheapside? Not five minutes later he was headed along the Strand, Barnabus sitting beside him on the carriage bench.

  Lawrence had never been inside a warehouse before. As far as he knew, he had never even been outside one either. This particular specimen was a dirty brick building, boxy and unimpressive, with tiny windows barely breaking up the monotonous facade. As he climbed the short set of stairs to the door, he saw a faded, peeling sign indicating that the building was the property of some or another shipping company. But this was the address Georgie had given as Brewster’s headquarters.

  Lawrence, figuring that a wretchedly unpleasant and harrowing couple of days could hardly get much worse, had decided to dispense with Brewster. Any man fearsome enough to make even the unshakable Georgie Turner flee on the spot needed to be done away with. Lawrence, after the misery of the past week, was in a foul enough temper to put a bullet through the head of a man far less deserving of death than Mattie Brewster. He patted the coat pocket where he had placed Percy’s dueling pistol.

  Not that it would necessarily come to bullets or death. If Brewster could be dealt with in some other way, that would be acceptable, as long as the man never again had anything to do with Georgie.