Even so, after each battle, I had always been surprised to find myself still upright and walking.
Lydia Westin would not be cowed. "My husband was a colonel because his father was a colonel. The honor of the regiment again. Following in his father's footsteps. Roe was like that. He would sacrifice his happiness, his peace of mind-everything-for honor."
"Many do," I said dryly. "We live in honorable times."
"My husband's honor was true. It was the most important thing in the world to him."
Her eyes flashed. I could not tell if she had admired or despised her husband. Both, probably.
"He was prepared to admit to the murder," I pointed out.
"Oh, yes. How could he stand by and let those with great names be sullied? They asked it of him. When they heard that John Spencer was near to discovering the truth, they visited him. Here. Upstairs in his chamber for hours and hours. They played upon his sense of honor, knowing he'd agree. And he did it. He was willing to make the ultimate sacrifice. For them."
"But if he were willing to do so," I pointed out, "why do you believe they murdered him? Surely they would want him to go on to be arrested and tried."
"I thought of that." Her brow puckered. "It is one thing to agree to take the blame for a crime. But another when one actually stands in the dock. Who knows what he might have said? Would he have told the truth about what happened to Captain Spencer? Perhaps he would not have been believed, but then, some magistrates are quite canny. They might have asked awkward questions." Her eyes dared me to tell her she was wrong.
I sat silently. Again I was struck by the incongruity of this woman traveling to the dark bridge in the rain. She believed her husband's innocence, would fight like a lion to preserve the honor he'd held so precious. This was a woman who would glare down her enemies and dare them to stop her.
So would she, in despair, decide to walk to an unfinished bridge and fling herself from it? Or had she gone for another purpose? Either action simply did not fit.
"Find these gentlemen," she said. "And make them admit that they murdered Captain Spencer."
I began to grow exasperated. While I'd listened, I'd allowed my senses to bathe in her beauty, but her vehemence was becoming unreasonable. "Not an easy thing to do. And you cannot tell me for certain that they did kill your husband." I held up my hand as she drew a breath for angry protest. "Think, Mrs. Westin. If they did not kill him, and you pursue them, the true murderer gets away with it."
She stared at me, startled, and I saw she had not thought of that. "But they must have done it."
I tried another tack. "What time did your husband go to bed that night? The usual?"
"Yes. Millar undressed him and left him in bed at half-past eleven, his usual time to retire."
"And no one saw him until ten the next morning, when you entered his bedchamber, and no visitors came to the house and were shown up to see him."
"No." She said the word reluctantly.
"But that implies, does it not, that someone inside the house could have killed him. Such as one of your servants."
"No!" The cry rang sharply against the portraits. "They would not. They were devoted to him, and to me."
Perhaps. But once upon a time, my acquaintance Lucius Grenville had hired a well-trained, efficient butler who had come with glowing recommendations from the Duke of Merton, to whom said butler had been most devoted. The butler had, three months later, organized a gang of thieves to rob Grenville blind. This had happened during a huge gathering at New Year's at his house, which I had happened to attend. Grenville and I had caught the robbers together, and thus we'd begun our odd friendship.
"What about this Mr. Allandale, your daughter's fiance?"
She shook her head, but with less fervor than she had when defending her servants. "He was not staying in the house. He hired a house in Mount Street."
A house in Mount Street must be ruinously expensive, I mused, even now that the Season was over. I wondered if the good Mr. Allandale had asked to marry the Westin daughter because of her parents' obvious wealth.
"Did it not occur to you," I said, "that the newspapers would remark upon the convenient timing of his accident? Sparing you the disgrace of an arrest, trial, and conviction? Please do not be offended, but did none of them speculate that it was your hand that pushed your husband to his death?"
She smiled a fey, feral smile. "William and I thought of that. We contrived it so that Millar and William claimed to see him fall when I and Chloe were well out of the house. Chloe was on her way to Surrey, to her uncle, and I had dressed and gone out to attend a morning garden party given by Lady Featherstone in Kensington. Everyone who had not yet scattered to the countryside was there. They all saw me. While I was gone, William and Millar arranged my husband's body at the bottom of the stairs and ran for a constable. They also brought back a doctor, an elderly man. The wound was tiny and Millar cleaned it so it could barely be seen. No one else found it."
Clever. No doubt she had chosen a garden party full of gossips who would all clamor that Mrs. Westin had been with them when news of her husband's accident was brought to her. I imagined them describing her emotion, her paling face, her tear-filled eyes.
I said, "Does Mr. Allandale know the truth? Would he not ask why you had suddenly sent your daughter away?"
She shook her head. "I explained to him that Chloe was ill and needed to take the country air. He asked no questions, and said it was a mercy she had not been here to witness her father's death."
"This Mr. Allandale seems to be quite understanding," I remarked. "He stood by you and your family, even through the scandal of Captain Spencer?" A lesser man might have cried off, saved himself from being touched by the shame.
"Oh yes, he has stuck by us," Lydia said. "Like a cocklebur! He is most devoted." The derision in her tone was unmistakable.
I puzzled on this, but went back to the main problem. "But you believe that these three gentlemen, or at least someone hired by them to do the deed, entered your house sometime in the night and killed your husband."
"I do." She gave me a cold look, then relented. "I am sorry, Captain. I know it sounds ridiculous. But equally I know they must be responsible. I ask you-I am begging you-to help me."
I absently traced my forefinger. "I wonder that you would trust me. My own colonel was ready to swear that your husband was drunk enough to have committed the crime at Badajoz. Why do you believe I do not agree with him?"
She gave me a tight smile. "Because you would have already said so. And Mrs. Brandon told me that you had helped a young woman escape from her tormentor earlier this year. And that you brought a murderer to justice."
I wondered what edited version of the tale Louisa had imparted. True, I had helped a girl return to her aunt after she had been used by her purchaser for his amusement, but Louisa and I were the only two who knew the entire truth of the matter.
"Mrs. Brandon is too quick to sing my praises."
Again, the white smile. "She did not praise you. She claims you are highly exasperating. But that you are honest, and more interested in truth than in pleasing lies."
I was not certain whether to be flattered or annoyed.
"Make them tell the truth, Captain," Lydia Westin said. She caught and held my gaze. "Make them clear my husband's name and pay for all they have done."
I found myself agreeing. The story stirred my hazardous curiosity. They had known, Louisa and Lydia between them, that I could not have refused.
Chapter Four
I asked Lydia leave to speak to her servants. I hoped that the valet, who had been with Colonel Westin throughout the war, might be able to impart something about the incident in Badajoz. Also, I wanted to know what the servants could tell me about the night of Colonel Westin's death. Lydia might be convinced of who murdered her husband, but I was not so sanguine. The quicker I ferreted out the truth, the better.
She agreed to let me ask questions, though limited me to the three servants
already in on the secret. I also mentioned Grenville. If I were to investigate the gentlemen she'd named, I would need an introduction to them. Grenville, beloved of society, whose acquaintance was much sought after, could smooth my way in that regard.
She was reluctant to let me enlist his help. I assured her that Grenville could hold his tongue, but I understood her hesitation. It was one thing to confide in a nobody like me, yet another to tell your secrets to the gentleman at the top of society.
At last she conceded, but made me promise to tell him nothing about the death of her husband beyond what was in the newspapers. I disliked to lie to him, but I agreed.
I spoke to William, Mrs. Montague, and Millar in the servants’ hall. I explained that I had agreed to help Mrs. Westin as much as I could. They eyed me doubtfully, and I did not blame them their reluctance. She had literally plucked me off the street and asked for my assistance. I could sell them out to the journalists as easily as breathing for all they knew.
They answered my questions politely enough, but the stony light in their eyes told me that they had decided it their duty to answer me only because their mistress wished it.
I recalled asking similar questions of servants in a house in Hanover Square not long ago. My experience here was much different. Those servants had been inefficient, impudent, and lazy. They had stayed employed only by virtue of the fact that they would look the other way at their master's disgusting proclivities. The three facing me now had been hired by Lydia Westin. Their manners were impeccable, and they spoke correctly, deferentially, and coolly.
Only the valet, Millar, a Frenchman with a round face, betrayed emotion. He dabbed at his eyes with a handkerchief while he spoke, blinking back tears that would not completely cease. One person in this household, I thought, had looked upon Colonel Westin with true affection.
I did not, overall, learn much from them. They concurred that Colonel Westin had gone to bed at half past eleven on the night of the tenth of July and had been found dead in his bed the next morning at ten o'clock. No one had entered the house, as far as they knew, all night, though they admitted that between the hours of one in the morning and five, they would have all been asleep. No one had come in via the scullery early the next morning, save the coal man, but they all knew him and he had not lingered.
I thanked them for their time, a bit depressed at their lack of information, and left the servants’ hall.
When I emerged onto the ground floor, I collided with a spare, blond gentleman just hurrying in through the front door.
He stopped short and stared at me. I waited for him to beg my pardon, to explain what the devil he was doing walking into the Westin house unannounced, but he merely raised his well-groomed brows, and looked me over from head to foot. Annoyed at his impudence, I did the same.
The gentleman was younger than I, but not by much, possibly in his early thirties at the least. His blond hair was pomaded into place, but so artfully that it appeared to wave naturally. Women probably found him handsome. His face held the sculpted perfection of a Greek statue, and was just as alabaster. He could be described as beautiful; only a squarishness to his jaw saved him from a womanly appearance.
Lydia emerged on the landing above. She gripped the rail with a white hand.
"Captain," she said, "May I present Mr. Allandale. Mr. Allandale, Captain Lacey."
The understanding fiance. He regarded me coolly. "Who is he, mother-in-law?"
"He was in the army with Colonel Westin," Lydia replied, stretching the truth a little. "I have asked him to look into the matter of Captain Spencer."
"I see," Mr. Allandale answered, still looking at me.
"He is also a friend of Mr. Grenville," Lydia continued.
Mr. Allandale’s lip suddenly uncurled, and his expression changed to instant politeness. "Ah yes. Captain Lacey. I have heard your name." He held out his hand. "You must take supper with us one day soon. A week Monday?"
Lydia remained silent. I spoke some polite, noncommittal words, and shook his offered hand.
Allandale nodded as though all were settled. "We will stay quiet, because of the colonel’s death you know. But I would be glad to make your acquaintance. Good morning, Captain."
It was a dismissal. I bowed to Lydia, who inclined her head and said nothing. Allandale saw me out the door, smiling and friendly all the way, but his eyes were watchful.
I returned to Grimpen Lane and wrote to Grenville, telling him I had come upon something interesting. I said nothing more than that, hoping to pique his curiosity. I had not spoken to Grenville in at least a month, and I did not know if he had even remained in town, nor if he would take offense at the presumption that he would help me the instant I asked. But I had to risk it.
I boldly wrote to Lady Aline Carrington, asking whether she knew of Louisa's whereabouts. Brandon had told me that Lady Aline had claimed to know nothing, but what Lady Aline would tell Brandon and what she would tell me was bound to be different. Lady Aline did not much like Colonel Brandon.
But it worried me that Louisa had not contacted me, even with a brief letter to assure me she was well. The most logical thing to assume was that Brandon had annoyed her in some way, and she had simply gone away to think things over, as he'd said, undisturbed. I could not discount, however, the possibility that she had been spirited away and the note sent as a blind. I knew the second speculation was not as far-fetched as it sounded. London abounded with opportunists waiting to seize a lady for a number of purposes. I'd heard of lone women robbed of all they had, and then held for ransom. Even a lady of good standing could be lured into a trap by someone pathetically requesting assistance. Once the generous lady entered the house, she could be seized, robbed, or worse.
I seriously doubted that Louisa would have gone out alone to some dire part of London. She was brave, but not foolish. All of which pointed toward the first scenario-she'd left to think something over.
But though I tried to make myself believe that the first speculation was more likely, the vision formed in my mind of Louisa lost, beaten, robbed, insensible, her golden hair lying in an arc beneath her limp, pale body. The vision would not release me.
I toyed with the idea of persuading Milton Pomeroy, the Bow Street Runner, to, as a favor to me, keep an eye out for Louisa. Runners, in addition to solving crimes-often they were hired by the victims of those crimes-also helped track missing persons. Those hiring them offered a reward, and the Runner, if he found the criminal and obtained a conviction or found the missing person, reaped it.
I did not have the means to offer a reward, but I might convince Pomeroy, who was not as thick as he pretended to be, to help me. But I disliked revealing what might be Louisa's personal quarrel with Brandon, did not like to set the tenacious Pomeroy on her.
I posted my letters then went to Covent Garden market to purchase the necessities of life, including more candles, made easier because my half-pay packet had been recently released to my bank. I had paid Mrs. Beltan for my rooms the previous day, but I had to make what little was left last for another quarter.
Many officers came from wealthy families-even second or third sons might have a generous allowance-and their army pay was a secondary income. Then there were officers like me, gentlemen, but destitute. My father had been furious with me when I'd run off with the army, following Brandon, who was then a captain, to the 35th Light Dragoons. My father had cut me off from whatever funds he possibly could.
Which was laughable to me, because my father had already managed to squander away most of the Lacey money before I even reached my majority. He had disgraced himself with debts and spent his days scrambling to pay them. He'd sold off every scrap of land that was not entailed, and allowed the house we lived in to fall into rack and ruin. I'd gone to school only because my mother, before her death, had put money in trust for my education, a trust so firmly set with traps that my father had not been able to touch the money, no matter how he'd tried.
After I'd arrived on the
Peninsula, my father, who had celebrated my desertion by going into yet more debt, went into a decline, and died the day I was promoted from lieutenant to captain, the morning after the bloody battle at Talavera.
The creditors had stripped the house of everything before they'd at last declared the debts satisfied. Nothing was left of the estate now except the house, which was entailed to the son I doubted I would ever have. I could let the house, but either I or a zealous tenant would have to spend an enormous amount of money to repair it and make it livable. So far, I had not found that zealous tenant. So it sat, forlorn in its corner of England, waiting for the last Lacey male to come home.
Absorbed in these thoughts, I wandered through Covent Garden market. Golden peaches like pieces of sunshine mounded on stalls, and carts overflowed with bright greens from fields beyond London. The sky held clouds, some of them still gray with last night's rain, but Covent Garden shimmered with an air of festivity. The summer day was warm, riots of blue, red, and gold flowers overflowed baskets, women in cool linen haggled prices like the best of fishwives, game girls in bright reds and blues and greens sashayed about, darting into dark corners with gentlemen or hiding behind carts when a watchman strolled by.
I touched a peach, letting my fingers find joy in its downy softness. I paid the seller with a coin as bright as the fruit and bit into the peach's delight.
As I savored the fruit, sweet as a summer day, I thought again of Lydia Westin.
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