Music Master

by Barbara Miller

  “Good, because I sent my invitations for Saturday evening,” Lady Haddon said.

  Leighton choked on his wine but covered it with a cough. Maddie now sent him an accusing look.

  “That’s only a few days from now,” he finally managed to say.

  Lucy turned a worried look on him. “You said we could be ready.”

  “Of course we can but we must spend every spare moment practicing.”

  * * * * *

  Leighton had planned to leave after dinner but Sir Phillip begged him to stay one more night to assure him that he had taken no serious hurt from his fall. The doctor agreed with this plan and Leighton was almost glad he was being released. He missed his room at the hotel and that charming fountain in the courtyard. He could not really be intimate with Maddie until they were married, so there was no advantage to living under the same roof.

  There was temptation, of course, though he did not think that was intentional. She probably thought she was being sympathetic. But he didn’t want Maddie’s sympathy. He wanted her. And since he could not have her yet, he must busy himself with something else, or those intimate moments in his bedchamber would drive him mad.

  Besides, if they were to be practicing music half the day, he would have ample opportunity to talk to her. He thought his latest capitulation would tempt Maddie into looking into the puzzle of the music with him. He loved watching the way her eyes sparkled when she was thinking. She had looked particularly dazzling in the green silk dress and he had neglected to mention it. He must get a grip.

  Gifford had not come into the drawing room after dinner and the doctor had departed. He and Maddie started discussing the selections for Saturday and he went upstairs for his portfolio of music. What he found was Tibbs organizing his room.

  “Oh, no, not again!”

  “It wasn’t you?” the man asked as he picked up Leighton’s shaving gear.

  “I’ve been downstairs these past two hours.”

  “Mostly they made a mess of your music sheets. What could they have been looking for?”

  “I think I know. By now they have come to the conclusion that I carry it with me. So that should prove interesting.”

  “I do not like the way you say ‘interesting’. That usually means mending and laundering for me and more bruises and healing for you.”

  “Sorry I am such a trial to you.”

  “Then why not settle down with that nice Miss Westlake?”

  “I intend to.”

  Leighton took the music downstairs, knowing Maddie would chide him for mixing it up. But he would have no chance to talk to her about anything of importance until tomorrow.

  Leighton went to bed wondering if it was Dr. Murray who had searched his room. But he would have had ample opportunity while Leighton had been unconscious the day before. Lieutenant Reid wasn’t with them tonight but did that mean he could not have gotten into the house? Gifford, possibly but Leighton could not for the life of him imagine the man capable of intrigue.

  He hoped Maddie had a clue about the solution, for he was nonplused. He kept trying out possibilities in his mind but nothing fit neatly. Perhaps it wasn’t a simple substitution cipher but a twisted path code, or a screen. Maybe even a combination. If there was a key, it could take even longer. Obviously if the message was intended for him, it did not have a key and it must have been sent by someone who knew he could solve it. Damn but he was losing his edge. Maddie would have some ideas.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Leighton removed from Marsden House directly after breakfast, promising to come back at two o’clock to begin the practice sessions. He had music to pick up in town and a puzzle to solve in his head. He could picture most of the code in his mind’s eye and began to wonder if he had started with a botched assumption. There were enough special symbols, including the notes themselves for the code to be something like the Mason’s cipher but instead of cross-hatched lines and x’s, the grid could be the musical staff itself.

  He had lunch in the courtyard at his favorite table and put some finishing touches on Maddie’s song. But his mind kept going back to the message and an odd association. He had realized before that the message was scented with pipe smoke. He had smelled that recently in Patience’s morning room.

  He decided on the way up the hill to call on Patience but her butler denied her to him. He had no reason to suspect the man of lying, except for the odd notion he was being watched. He was an expert at acting normally even when he knew he was under scrutiny but it was unnerving not to know for sure.

  Arriving early at Marsden House, he went to visit his horses. Sir Phillip had insisted his head groom take care of Chandros until the scrape was on the mend. And Leighton had offered to leave Jasper there for Maddie’s use. This prompted Sir Phillip to insist that Leighton stable both his mounts there for the duration of his stay in town.

  It was perfect. Even after this musicale, he would have an excuse for showing up at Marsden House any time of the day or night and if they arranged things carefully, Maddie could meet him in the garden between the house and stable.

  After a short discussion with the groom, Leighton was about to go and practice on the pianoforte until Lucy came down for her lesson. He was walking toward the house when Maddie burst out of the back door with a dossier under her arm and dark circles under her eyes.

  “Where the devil have you been?” she demanded in a fierce whisper.

  She was wearing a gray walking dress and had ink stains on her delicate fingers.

  “Why, what’s the matter? You look distressed. Come and sit in the garden.” He led her through the box hedge to a remote bench not easily visible from the house.

  She sat and spread the leather case open in her lap. “I have been up all night with this cipher you gave me. It is such a short message, there is little to work with.”

  “I know. Perhaps I was wrong and it is simply a badly written piece of music.”

  “No, I solved it.”

  “What?” He found himself staggering and got a shiver. Maddie was better at this than he was. He also felt a glow of pride in her. “God, Maddie. I wish you had been with me in Spain.”

  “Thank you. It is a substitution cipher, of course, with the half note being A, the dotted half B, and so on.”

  “But you need four variations to get the other three fourths of the alphabet,” Leighton protested.

  “Didn’t you notice how some notes have the staff backward and others up when they should be down?” She pointed to the scrap of paper in her lap.

  “Of course!” He slapped his forehead. “Four variations.”

  “Yes. Staff up and to the right, the half note to the 32nd note represent A to F. Staff down and right G to L, down and left M to R, and up and left for the letters left, with the last note representing X, Y and Z. So a Z would be what?”

  Leighton stared into space. “A 32nd note with the staff up and left.”

  “Correct.”

  “Well, what does it say?”

  “Will know location of fleet. Getting ships in train. Do you back enterprise? S-N.”

  “Good work, Maddie.” He put his arm around her. “S-N could be Scrope-Nevins. Isn’t that the name of your sister’s crony?”

  “True but she may not be the only S-N, or the only Scrope-Nevins on earth and I don’t think Patience knows her all that well.”

  “We shall have to find that out as soon as this musicale is over. Oh, God!” Leighton thought back over the last few days.

  “What?”

  “The last two times I called, Patience was acting nervous and kept the doors shut that lead into the adjoining salon. At first I thought she was having an affair but—”

  “A what? Patience? Are you sure that fever hasn’t come back on you?”

  She felt his forehead and he loved the familiar feel of her hand on his skin. He took her hand and kissed it. “I know that was silly of me. But this could be worse. What if she is letting this Scrope-Nevins woman listen i
n on her guests in the hope of, of…”

  “Of, what, Leighton?” Maddie snapped the folder shut and stood up to glare at him. “Spit it out. Are you accusing my sister of being a spy?”

  Too late he saw the error of speculating in Maddie’s presence. “Perhaps a pawn in a plot she does not understand.”

  “And you do? No I will not even allow that.” Maddie vaulted from the bench and brushed past him.

  “Maddie, wait. That is not as bad as what I was thinking of her before.”

  “What, that she has a lover?” she said over her shoulder.

  “No, I would not even care for that. But Patience may be no stranger to conspiracy. When your mother…took ill you were hurried off to your sister in York but Patience stayed home.”

  Maddie clutched the notes to her breast. “Yes, Patience came for me at Longbridge one evening, would not even let me say goodbye to Mother, since they thought the chance of infection so great. What of it?”

  “So you never saw her. For all you knew she might have been dead already.”

  “But she wasn’t.” Maddie shook her head and almost staggered. “She died the next day and by the time word got to me I was already in York.”

  “They could have just had you stay with my sisters at Longbridge.”

  “I never thought of that. What are you driving at?”

  “That Patience was in a position to cover up for your father, if in a fit of rage he…”

  “He what? Killed my mother? You are insane to suggest such a thing, such a hurtful thing.”

  When the tears came to her eyes, Leighton realized building a case against Patience wasn’t his brightest idea, not when it angered Maddie.

  “Maddie, I am so sorry.” He rushed to take her in his arms, regretting his excitement and tendency to think out loud. “I don’t know what made me think of it. You are right. If I have not got a plot to work on, I make something up.” He stroked her back and tried to press her head against his shoulder but she stared at him. “You’re not saying anything. What is it?”

  “Sometimes I hate you, Leighton. You make me reach into the dark corners of my mind and drag out all the things I don’t want to look at.”

  “Then you too think… I should have said nothing.”

  “It’s only that Papa always looks at me with such contempt and I do look like Mother, more each year, I suppose.”

  He could see the tears gathering in her eyes and knew he had caused this, all to prove his theory about Patience. “I’m sorry.”

  “It could explain why he dislikes me so, if he…”

  “If he was unkind to her, that does not mean my flight of fancy is true.”

  “He was more than unkind to her. He never hit her but he might as well have. She shed enough tears over his cutting remarks to fill the pond.” Maddie pushed herself back from him, still clutching the case in one arm.

  “Unfortunately there is no way to prove it one way or the other,” he said.

  “What good would we do if we could prove it? She would still be dead.” Maddie shook her head and began to back away from him.

  “But you would know if you could trust him or not.”

  “It does not matter. I shall never go back to him.”

  “Then you still mean to marry me?” Leighton took a hesitant step toward her, hoping he had not again ruined his chances.

  “I-I don’t know. Have you got any other nasty shocks up your sleeve or are you through making me unhappy?”

  Leighton came and held her again. “I never meant to hurt you and I will have a care never to do so again. Why do you think I moved back to my hotel when I would much rather have stayed?”

  “To avoid Lucy, of course.”

  “It is not fair to let her think she can have anything she wants. I hope neither of her parents have put the idea of marriage to me in her head.”

  “She has thought of it herself. Give her some credit. You shouldn’t have let your title slip out.”

  “Tibbs blundered, then Dr. Murray ratted me out, though I had asked him not to reveal my identity.”

  “I wonder why he told Sir Phillip.”

  “I cannot imagine.”

  “Perhaps he wants you connected to the Haddons.”

  “But why?”

  “Or wants you to stay here. That gives him more of an entree.”

  “He knew them before I did. I imagine he could call here any time he pleased.”

  “But not have the run of the house.”

  Leighton stiffened and Maddie glanced up at him.

  “What is it?”

  “Last night the music in my room was all mixed up. And someone had gone through the rest of my things.”

  “Could it have been the doctor looking for this?”

  “Do you feel unsafe having that?”

  “No but I don’t want anyone clubbing you over the head for it. If this was meant for the doctor—and he does have the room next to your suite at the hotel—then we have to assume he does not know Mrs. Scrope-Nevins is his contact but he must know who sent it.”

  “And he is to supply the location of the British Fleet to… Whom? The Americans? Certainly they can’t mean to attack us here. It sounds as though the peace negotiations have begun.”

  “Who else would want to know where the fleet is?” Maddie speculated.

  “The French, if they were planning anything. But they’ve surrendered. Napoleon has been shipped off to Elba with an honor guard of a thousand troops. Too good a treatment for him if you ask me.”

  “But what is to prevent his men from overpowering his guard and leaving?”

  “It is an island,” Leighton reminded her.

  “Which could be why they want to know where the fleet is.”

  Leighton froze and looked at her. “You are giving me cold chills.”

  “When they say back the enterprise, they must mean are you going to supply the money.”

  “There are enough idle vessels in Bristol to transport a thousand men. Though the captains might not be willing once they knew their destination. But once docked at Elba…”

  “Now, where would they go,” she asked. “Mexico? France has interests there.”

  “Not Napoleon. He would go back to France. It seems preposterous and yet…”

  “How can we find out?”

  Leighton inclined his head. “By asking Patience if she sent the packet. She never could lie worth a damn. If she is lying, we will know.”

  Maddie swallowed and took a deep breath. “When?”

  Tomorrow and not in the Pump Room. In her drawing room. I plan to invite us to tea there.”

  The back door was flung open and Lucy appeared. Leighton and Maddie leaped apart as though they had been doing something wrong.

  “There you are. I have been practicing my piece. Do you want to hear it?”

  “Of course,” Leighton said. “We were just coming.”

  * * * * *

  Leighton pronounced Lucy’s piano solo nearly ready except for one or two parts that he demonstrated for her. He laid out the program for the whole evening, an ambitious enterprise for just the three of them but the songs should not give the girls much trouble. The guests at Lady Haddon’s musicale were unlikely to be interested in anything but the refreshments.

  He switched their rehearsal time to morning on the morrow. When he got back to the hotel he sent a note round to Maddie’s sister asking if they might call. Then he asked Raymond, the footman, to find out if there were any other Stones registered at the hotel.

  He had been so busy he had forgotten his aching ribs and need for sleep. His goal, to expose Patience Carter, was not a noble one and he sincerely hoped he was wrong in suspecting her on all points.

  To his surprise he received a note before dinner that she expected him and Maddie for tea. It bothered him that she’d played into their hands. In his experience, that meant she was planning something he had not even taken into account. He scrutinized her handwriting but it was nothing like
the block printing on the now missing envelope.

  The doctor ran into him in the lobby and asked if he could join him for dinner. Leighton agreed.

  “I have not seen Lieutenant Reid lately,” he said as they took seats in the hotel dining room.

  “He had to leave town on an errand.”

  Leighton nodded, desperately wanting to satisfy his curiosity but if he suspected the doctor, then the reverse might be true and it did not pay to be inquisitive unless you already knew the answers to the questions you were going to pose.

  “This musicale will be quite an event,” the doctor said. “The salons should be full.”

  “Full?”

  “Yes, Lady Haddon has invited half of Bath. They will open all the rooms on that floor of the house. I heard her say they are renting chairs.”

  “Now why would any mother do that to her daughter?”

  “Because she cannot conceive of failure.”

  “Well, I can. Vividly. You be in the front row and applaud passionately no matter what happens.”

  Once again the jovial doctor insisted on paying for Leighton’s meal. Try as he might to cast him in the role of villain, Leighton could not make it stick.

  As he lay in bed later trying to sleep, Leighton wondered what motive Murray could have for betraying his country. Well, he was Flemish, so England wasn’t his country. But he seemed to have plenty of money and enjoyed the social life of Bath. On the other hand, as a doctor, he could fit in anywhere.

  Reid might have a motive, being placed on inactive duty since the war was over. He had endured much pain for his country but he didn’t need money either. He had an estate and title in his future. At least he said he had.

  Gifford? No too stupid even if he did need money. He would never endanger his future with Lucy by selling out his country. It had to be someone else, whoever hid in Patience’s salon. Just as he drifted off to sleep, the scent of tobacco came back to him vividly the way only scents can. There was a connection between Patience and the message, though a tenuous one. Perhaps he would discuss it with Maddie tomorrow but carefully, very carefully.

  Chapter Eighteen