A Covent Garden Mystery clrm-6

by Ashley Gardner

  "You spoke to her," I said.

  Louisa nodded. At that moment, a footman bustled in balancing a tray with a coffeepot and cups. The wonderful aroma of coffee filled the room. Louisa wiped her eyes while the footman set down the tray, arranged the cups, and laid out the sugar bowl, silver tongs, and a jug of cream. He took the tray and slid from the room while we sat in silence.

  Donata took up the pot and poured coffee into my cup. She knew I liked it black and strong, so while she dropped sugar and cream into her own liquid, she offered me none. She stirred her coffee and cream until it became the color of Felicity's skin.

  Lady Breckenridge tapped her spoon lightly on the edge of the cup and set it down, her movements elegant and economical, polished by a host of governesses and nannies. "What did you say that upset her, Mrs. Brandon?"

  Louisa's cheeks burned red. Brandon looked on, brows lowered.

  "I told her that her mother had deserted Gabriel," Louisa said. "I told her exactly what Carlotta had done-cuckolded him and left him for no good reason. I told Gabriella she'd been taken away and lied to because Carlotta did not want her returning to her true father. I told her what Carlotta's actions had done to Gabriel, how wretched he'd been when he'd learned that his daughter was gone forever."

  "Louisa," I whispered. "Dear God."

  "I know it was utterly stupid," she said in an anguished voice. "But Gabriella deserved to know the truth. I know that Carlotta painted you a villain and would have said that she had to run away from you and your cruelty. Carlotta wants her little nest in France with her lover and her children, and you know she will not risk losing Gabriella to you."

  I fell silent, having no idea what to say. Louisa liked to be my champion, but I could imagine the effect her words must have had on Gabriella.

  Donata sipped her coffee thoughtfully. "And Gabriella was visibly upset?"

  "Yes." Louisa bit her lip, not wanting to look at us. "She cried. I tried to comfort her, but she would not have me. She told me very clearly to leave. It broke my heart, but I did."

  "You did not see… Mrs. Lacey?" Donata asked.

  "No. I left Gabriella in the downstairs parlor. By that time I was crying too, and I knew I could not face Carlotta. I decided to go home." Silent tears trickled from Louisa's eyes. "It must have been after that interview that Gabriella left the house. I upset her, and she ran away. She might have been coming to see you, Gabriel, to demand the truth from you, or perhaps she simply wanted to walk and think, I do not know." She wiped her cheeks with the heel of her hand. "I will not ask your forgiveness, because I do not deserve it."

  I sat in stunned silence, trying to take in what she had told me.

  Brandon noisily gulped his morning chocolate, leaving a dark stain above his upper lip. He wiped it away with a napkin. "You are not to blame, Louisa. She might have walked out of the house because you upset her, but if she got lost, it is not your fault." He shrugged his broad shoulders. "Who knows? She might have gone straight upstairs and had a row with her mother, and then decided to run away. Carlotta Lacey, as I recall, could try a saint's patience."

  He flicked a glance at me but did not apologize. He had thought Carlotta a flighty woman from the first and had never been overly friendly to her.

  "The point upon which we must focus," Lady Breckenridge cut in crisply, "is not why Gabriella left the house, but where she went."

  "I have been over that in my head," I said. I felt relief and gratitude toward Donata for simply being there. "If she tried to go back to Grimpen Lane, she'd walk through Covent Garden to Russel Street. That is a straightforward route, no reason to go any other way."

  "Perhaps she stopped to shop in the market and got turned around," Donata suggested. "She thought she was heading toward Grimpen Lane when, in fact, she was walking down Southampton Street. This is her first time in London-England even-and she might easily have become confused."

  Louisa had said nothing, remaining with her head bowed, the golden curls at her forehead trembling. So worried was I over Gabriella's disappearance that I did blame Louisa at present. She'd had no right to tell Gabriella those things, no right to interfere. Louisa thought she'd acted for my sake, but had she? I had told her to leave Gabriella and Carlotta alone, and Louisa had not listened.

  Colonel Brandon broke in. "It seems to me, Lacey, that you are predicting dire events before the fact. Perhaps the girl simply made her way back to France. She was upset and wanted to go home. If she had money and was resourceful, she could buy a coach ticket to Dover. Or she could have stolen whatever tickets and money her parents had put aside for their return. Or sold gewgaws or some such, in her determination to go home."

  "Alone?" I asked. "A young woman as well raised as she would not think to travel alone. No maid went with her."

  "My reasoning takes in the fact that she is your daughter," Brandon said. "And you are the most bloody stubborn man I know. If Gabriella decided to return by herself to France, I am certain she would try to do it no matter what she had to do to get there. I know you have done more than a few damn fool things in your past, and you succeeded only by dint of your refusal to see reason. Young girl or no, she is a Lacey."

  I sat still, torn between pride and irritation. "You do have a point," I said tightly. "I will check the coaching inns in and around London to see if she boarded a mail coach." Another thought struck me. "Auberge told me that they'd brought Gabriella to London with them because an unsuitable young man was pursuing her. We might be making a mare's nest of this, when all she's done is elope."

  "As you did," Brandon said.

  "As I did. And as Carlotta did with Auberge."

  "We'll find her, Lacey," Brandon said. He sat back in his chair, sipping his chocolate as though it were finest brandy. "I know a commander whose soldiers are in sad need of something to do. Drilling is making them soft. I'll have him put them on to hunting down your daughter."

  I stared at him, touched that he would want to help. "Thank you," I said.

  He scowled at me. "You did save my neck from the noose, damn you."

  "If you find my daughter, sir, we will be more than even."

  "Thank God," Brandon said, and fervently drank his chocolate.

  "Where to now?" Lady Breckenridge asked when we were in her carriage again.

  "You do not have to do this," I told her. "Have your coachman set you down at home, although I would be grateful for a ride back to Grimpen Lane. I must find Pomeroy and check in with Auberge."

  Donata looked at me without expression. "Of course I must do this. She is your daughter, and I will do everything I can to help you find her." She leaned out of her window. "John, take us to Russel Street in Covent Garden."

  I heard her coachman's terse, "Yes, my lady," then his chirrup to the horses as we clopped off down Davies Street toward Berkeley Square and south.

  We rode through awakening London, neither of us speaking much, then Lady Breckenridge's coachman stopped in Russel Street to let us descend. I expected Lady Breckenridge would want to wait for me in the comfort of her coach, but she bade her footman help her down after me.

  Donata had never seen my rooms, and I hoped she had no intention of coming to them now. But she walked with me serenely down the lane, her skirts lifted out of the mud.

  Mrs. Beltan's bake shop was open, and business was thriving. I suggested that Lady Breckenridge wait there for me and enjoy Mrs. Beltan's yeasty bread.

  "Not a bit of it, Gabriel," Donata said. "Let us be scandalous and ascend to your rooms."

  I stopped her. "I live rather meagerly."

  "I gathered that. Do not be vulgar; I care nothing for your money, or lack of it. Worrying about money is only for the parvenu. We of breeding shrug it from our shoulders."

  "It is a very convenient thing, on the other hand," I said, trying to keep my voice light.

  "Gabriel, I have fountains of money, if you wish to continue on this vulgar footing. Let us please cease speaking of it; it is making me queasy." />
  Her sardonic smile was firmly in place, and again, I felt gratitude. She was trying to put me at my ease.

  I led her into the stairwell. She looked around in curiosity, taking in the faded murals with the shepherdesses and shepherds of old chasing each other in idyllic bliss. Halfway up, I handed her to a stair above me and kissed her.

  She eased away when we finished, looking pleased. "Donata," I began.

  A door above us opened and Grenville's weary tones floated down to us. "Lacey, is that you?" He stepped out to the dark landing and looked down. "Oh, I do beg your pardon. I am a gooseberry, am I?"

  To hear the most fashionable man in England describe himself as a gooseberry made me laugh, the first amusement I'd felt since Gabriella had gone missing.

  "I stayed the night," he said, ushering us into the sitting room. "I hope you do not mind. Matthias and Bartholomew fixed me up well."

  The two young footmen were sitting on either side of my table, going at a repast that looked like all my breakfasts for the past week combined. The tray that Grenville must have eaten from, the plate scraped clean of food, reposed next to the wing chair.

  Matthias and Bartholomew sprang to their feet when they saw Lady Breckenridge, Bartholomew hastily chewing a buttered slab of bread.

  "Steady, lads. Finish your meal," I said. "Any news?"

  Grenville sent me a grim look. "I hoped you would bring some. No, we searched until we could not keep our eyes open, then I returned here for a few hours' sleep. Pomeroy's lads are still at it, as is my coachman, and Matthias and Bartholomew have been in and out. I succumbed to sleep; I am sorry."

  "I did as well, but we may start fresh. Have you heard from Auberge this morning?"

  "Yes. He came as I was getting out of bed. No, she did not return."

  I took the news unhappily, but I'd somehow known that would be the outcome. I told Grenville of Brandon's idea that Gabriella had tried to journey back to France, and Grenville agreed that it was a possibility.

  And so the second day of the search for Gabriella began. Jackson returned with a fresh set of patrollers, five of them this time. Lady Breckenridge's servants joined in, two footmen and a coachman, and before long, servants from the households that Lady Breckenridge and Lady Aline had notified turned up, ready to look. Nancy and Felicity came as well, with a couple of girls in tow.

  At the last came Colonel Brandon. He turned an uncomfortable shade of red as Grenville, neat and fresh and shaved despite making do with my bed, stared at him in surprise. Brandon had brought four others with him, lieutenants of the regiment he'd said needed something to do. We could not all crowd into my rooms, and so we spread out among Grimpen Lane while Grenville and I gave orders. A few urchins who generally hung about looking for handouts or odd jobs also said they'd join, for appropriate pay, of course.

  I outlined the task: Comb London and find Gabriella or find out where she'd gone. I sent a contingent to check the coaching inns, the urchins to check the bawdy houses, for which some of them already did jobs. A few of the patrollers were to make their way up and down the river, asking the watermen if they'd found her in the night.

  I sent Brandon's soldiers farther afield, to check the roads that led from London, especially those toward France. They were to ask at every inn and every posting point if anyone had seen a young girl, either alone or with anyone else, pass that way. Colonel Brandon joined them, riding out on their cavalry-trained horses.

  They dispersed, and Grenville walked with me back upstairs. "What shall I do, Lacey? You did not give me an assignment."

  We entered the sitting room, where Lady Breckenridge had been watching out the window. She joined us when we came in. "I need the two of you for inside information on Mayfair," I said. "I am not completely convinced that searching alone will be the answer, either for Gabriella or for Black Bess."

  Grenville cocked a brow. "Inside information?"

  "Yes." I described seeing the coach stopped last night in Covent Garden, while the gentleman fetched himself a girl. "I met him with you once, I believe. Mr. Stacy?"

  "Jeremiah Stacy?" Grenville looked taken aback, then thoughtful. "I cannot see him doing such a thing; he is a shy man. If you had said his friend Brian McAdams, I could believe it. McAdams enjoys erotic novels and talking rather crudely about the act." He caught Lady Breckenridge's eye and blushed. "I do beg your pardon."

  Donata waved away his apology. "Do not be reticent on my account. My husband knew every crudity invented and openly boasted of doing each one, in my hearing. I think I can no longer be disgusted."

  Grenville looked embarrassed, and familiar anger for the dead Lord Breckenridge simmered.

  "You could not have mistaken McAdams for Stacy, could you?" Grenville asked me. "If it were dark. Perhaps Stacy lent him the coach?"

  "No, it was Stacy. I remember him distinctly. He has a very long nose and a tall, lanky build, correct?"

  "Yes," Grenville said. "McAdams is beefy. I never thought Stacy would slum. Not the type, I should think."

  "I mean to ask him. I'll send around my card and pay a call." Because Grenville had introduced me to Mr. Stacy, I could presume to call on the man or at least arrange to meet him somewhere.

  "He won't be at home this morning. He'll be at Tatt's. That's his passion, horseflesh. At least, I would have said so before you told me this. I'll go with you, and we'll quiz him."

  Lady Breckenridge leaned against the writing table and crossed her ankles. "You think he might have something to do with Gabriella?"

  "I have no thoughts one way or the other," I said. "He might have seen something while he was busy chatting up game girls. He might know something about Mary Chester and Black Bess. He might know something about Gabriella. Then again, he might know nothing at all and is simply enjoying having it off with girls from Covent Garden."

  "Well, we can quiz him at any rate," Grenville said. "I'll take you to Tatt's this afternoon. What else do you want us to do to storm Mayfair?"

  "If you know of any other gentleman with a fixation on street girls, please tell me," I said. "I will quiz every one of them if I have to."

  "My husband certainly knew gentlemen of odd tastes," Lady Breckenridge said. "I could find out what some of them have been getting up to, lately."

  "Thinking of you even speaking to them is repugnant to me," I said.

  She shrugged. "I am not overly fond of them myself, but I can find out what they know without much trouble. I will ask Barnstable to invade their servants' halls and refresh himself on gossip. He'll enjoy it."

  I had no doubt that Lady Breckenridge's energetic butler would be delighted to be asked to help with covert investigation.

  "What will you do?" Grenville asked. "While we're hard at it?"

  I had thought of my idea last night before Lady Breckenridge found me. "I want to pay a visit to a nearby house, one Marianne showed me during the Hanover Square investigation. It's possible that Gabriella or Black Bess went there."

  Grenville looked dubious. "Are you definitely connecting the two-or the three, rather-disappearances?"

  "I do not know whether to connect them. But two game girls vanish from Covent Garden, and then my daughter goes, all in the space of a few weeks. I hardly think it coincidence. Brandon reminded me that Gabriella was my daughter-but that is only another point toward her being kidnapped. I go off halfcocked, but I am also resourceful. Unless her mother has purged that quality completely from her, I doubt Gabriella would have run away without preparing. Everything points to her having meant to return to the boardinghouse quickly. No bundle of clothing missing, none of her personal possessions gone. I will ask Auberge whether she stole any money from him or Carlotta, but I feel in my bones that she did not."

  "But if she eloped," Lady Breckenridge said, "she might have gone with the clothes on her back and trusted the young man to provide for her. Perhaps this man is quite rich, and his unsuitable qualities are something besides lack of funds. "

  "True," Grenvill
e said. "He might be a bounder, or have a reputation for ruining young women, or have a gambling addiction. So many things can attract a young woman and upset her parents at the same time." He winced as he said it, having discovered his own daughter in a marriage with a man he found detestable.

  I wondered which scenario disturbed me more, the thought of Gabriella snatched as she innocently walked through the square or the idea of her willingly running off with a rakehell.

  "I will certainly ask Auberge all about him," I said. I looked at them, my friends so ready to drop their appointments for the day to help me. Grenville, the great man of fashion, had turned his back on a social engagement the night before to keep searching for Gabriella. I could not help but be touched by their generosity.

  "Thank you," I said. "To the pair of you."

  True to their upbringing, both looked slightly embarrassed at being caught out doing good deeds.

  "My dear friend," Grenville said. "I would a hundred times rather help you find your only daughter than be at home to the dozens of dandies and aristocrats who assail me at White's, coffeehouses, and gaming hells. Most of them are half-drunk and only want my approval on their cravat knots and the cut of their coats. Their company, quite frankly, has palled. Far more interesting things happen around you."

  "I am happy I can provide entertainment," I began, but I did not mean it harshly. I'd said the words so many times that they had become rather a joke between us.

  "More than just entertainment. You soothe my vanity by making me think I can actually do some good in the world."

  "It must be difficult being one of the wealthiest, most influential men in England," I said.

  Grenville gave me an ironic glance, but let it go.

  Lady Breckenridge came to me. "I am quite fond of you, of course, Gabriel, but I also very much enjoy prying into the affairs of my Mayfair neighbors. The veneer hides such sordid secrets, I have always found. I can dig through the dirt for you and feel virtuous at the same time." She laughed softly, self-deprecating.