The Enigma of a Widow

by Linda Rae Sande

  The Enigma of a Widow

  Linda Rae Sande

  This is a work of fiction. The events and characters described herein are imaginary and are not intended to refer to specific places or living persons. The opinions expressed in this manuscript are solely the opinions of the author and do not represent the opinions or thoughts of the publisher. The author has represented and warranted full ownership and/or legal right to publish all the materials in this book.

  The Enigma of a Widow

  ISBN: 978-1-946271-05-1

  All Rights Reserved.

  Copyright © 2016 Linda Rae Sande

  V1.2

  Cover photograph © Period Images.com

  All rights reserved - used with permission.

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient.

  In memory of my grandmother—she would have made an excellent spy

  Contents

  Also by Linda Rae Sande

  Prologue

  1. A Visit to the Museum

  2. A Protector Arrives

  3. Pillow Talk

  4. A Nocturnal Visitation

  5. On the Topic of Spies

  6. Two Colleagues Renew an Acquaintance

  7. A Garden Party Begets an Introduction

  8. A Brother Reports for Dinner with a Sister

  9. An Agent Reports for Duty

  10. An Intruder is Discovered

  11. Pondering an Enigma

  12. A Brother-in-Law Isn’t Convinced

  13. A Former Lover Pays a Visit

  14. A Ride in the Park

  15. Deductive Reasoning Returns

  16. A Summons is Received

  17. A Visit to Whitehall

  18. A Night of Discovery

  19. A Puzzle Proves Puzzling

  20. Paying Calls

  21. A Solution Begets Another Puzzle

  22. In the Still of the Night

  23. A Kerfuffle in the Coach

  24. A Night at the Theatre

  25. Another Intruder

  26. Coming to Terms with a Stubborn Man

  27. A Conversation in the Middle of the Night

  28. Adonis Gets His Wish

  29. Epilogue

  Excerpt

  Also by Linda Rae Sande

  About the Author

  Also by Linda Rae Sande

  The Daughters of the Aristocracy

  The Kiss of a Viscount

  The Grace of a Duke

  The Seduction of an Earl

  The Sons of the Aristocracy

  Tuesday Nights

  The Widowed Countess

  My Fair Groom

  The Sisters of the Aristocracy

  The Story of a Baron

  The Passion of a Marquess

  The Desire of a Lady

  The Brothers of the Aristocracy

  The Love of a Rake

  The Caress of a Commander

  The Epiphany of an Explorer

  The Widows of the Aristocracy

  The Gossip of an Earl

  The Enigma of a Widow

  The Secrets of a Viscount

  The Widowers of the Aristocracy

  The Dream of a Duchess

  The Vision of a Viscountess

  The Conundrum of a Clerk

  * * *

  The Cousins of the Aristocracy

  The Promise of a Gentleman

  The Pride of a Gentleman

  The Holidays of the Aristocracy

  The Christmas of a Countess

  Prologue

  June 15, 1816 (The Year of No Summer)

  A snowflake danced about in the chill, its twisted path to the ground made so by the man who blew air between his lips each time it seemed determined to continue its descent. With the man’s next breath, the crystalline structure twirled about and then suddenly disappeared.

  The man frowned and stared at where the snowflake should have been. He continued staring until the shout of a nearby costermonger had him giving a start. His cane, a silver-topped length of mahogany polished to a high shine, nearly fell from his right hand before he steadied it with the other.

  Dammit.

  Adonis Truscott took a steadying breath and grimaced when another snowflake passed in front of his face, its path downward nearly straight. Glancing about, as if to ascertain his whereabouts, he wondered at how long he had allowed the falling snow to capture his attention. How long he had stared at the space where the snowflake had disappeared. How long he had stood on the pavement next to the haberdashery in Old Bond Street.

  In the effort to view his chronometer, he found his gloved hands so stiff, they could barely grasp the metallic disk, let alone press the button that would open the lid.

  “You won’t find a hackney this time of the day,” a male voice said from behind him.

  Turning to discover the owner of the voice, Adonis regarded the rather tall man and gave a nod. “No, I don’t suppose so,” he agreed with a sigh, realizing he was speaking to the owner of the haberdashery. He had been in the shop earlier to purchase the red woolen scarf that was now wrapped around his neck and dusted with snowflakes. At that moment, he couldn’t recall how he had made his way to Old Bond Street. He thought he had ridden his horse, but it was possible he had arrived in a hackney. Or perhaps a town coach.

  “Come back into the shop. You must be freezing.”

  Adonis nodded. “Just for a moment,” he agreed as he turned to follow the proprietor. He was nearly through the green gloss painted door when a female voice called out.

  “Donald!”

  Stiffening where he stood, Adonis suddenly remembered exactly how he had arrived in Old Bond Street. “Seems my ride has remembered where she left me,” he said to the shop owner. He gave the man a short bow and leaned on his cane as he turned and directed his attention to the town coach that was now parked in front of the haberdashery. The matched greys in front of the equipage snorted clouds of white as they stomped their impatience. Given the chill in the air, Adonis found he couldn’t blame them.

  Despite how his leg protested climbing into the town coach, Adonis was able to negotiate the high step and take a seat in the stiff squabs. Although several hot coals glowed in a brazier between the seats, the inside of the coach wasn’t much warmer than outside, that is, until the driver could get the door shut.

  “Where have you been?” Persephone Craven demanded from beneath the quilt that covered most of her body. “Mr. James has driven in circles for nearly an hour.”

  Adonis allowed an expression of apology. “I was in the haberdashery.” He indicated the new scarf. “Took Mr. Turner quite some time to find this in the back. Seems he put away all the winter clothing a few months ago thinking it wouldn’t be needed until next winter.”

  Persephone rolled her eyes. “I can’t say I blame him,” she replied. “There’s not a muff to be found in town,” she complained. “Nor a decent fur coat. I certainly didn’t expect to have to wear a coat to a ball this time of the year,” she added in disgust.

  Adonis listened to his sister’s rant and finally angled his head. “Just what is the date today?” he asked.

  Sighing, Persephone stared at her brother for several moments. “You really have lost your faculties, haven’t you?” she whispered. When Adonis merely stared back at her, she finally replied, “Fifteenth of June, eighteen-sixteen.” She stated the date as if she had already said it several times that day.

  Blinking, Adonis was about to argue that he hadn’t lost his faculties—the weather was certainly the one to have lost its mind—but he thought better of i
t. There was no arguing with an older sister, after all.

  Chapter 1

  A Visit to the Museum

  June 17, 1816

  Lydia regarded the south side of the British Museum, rather surprised to find there wasn’t already a line of people in queue for the Monday morning’s ten o’clock opening. Montagu House, the building purchased by the Board of Trustees of the museum to house its collections, featured a series of steps leading up to a portico and a set of double doors.

  “On a lovely day such as this, the museum is never very crowded, my lady.”

  Turning to find the driver of her coach-and-four standing at the curb, Lydia nodded. The clear blue sky was dotted with white puffy clouds. The air actually held a hint of warmth, unlike the other spring days that had come before. With no rain in sight—a rare occurrence this particular year—most Londoners who weren’t laboring at their jobs would be spending the beautiful day out-of-doors. “Then I shall have the place all to myself,” Lydia responded with a grin.

  She headed through the museum’s front doors, nodding to the driver when he hurried up to open the door for her. “Good day, sir. I shall see you in three hours,” she said, allowing her eyes to adjust to the dim interior before making her way into the lobby.

  Although she hadn’t decided on a particular reason for visiting the museum on this day, Lydia found she had free time to do whatever she pleased. A widow for—had it already been a year?—she paid visits to a lending library as well as The Temple of the Muses to acquire the books she read in the late afternoons, she occasionally hosted others in her home for morning tea, she had a private box at the Royal Theatre, and she attended the few evening events for which she received invitations.

  Married to a titled man—her husband had been a viscount—Lydia had herself grown up in a family of aristocrats and had always been a lady. As the daughter of the ton, she enjoyed some freedoms other widows might not. As the widow of an officer, she collected a meager pension on top of the small fortune she had inherited upon his death.

  The news of Viscount Jasper Barrymore’s death hadn’t been unexpected. Every day during the Peninsular Wars, Londoners received reports from the Continent of British soldiers having died in battle, and if not in battle, then because they perished in the cold or from some horrible wound or disease.

  She supposed she should have been surprised at how long her husband managed to survive given his penchant for leading his men from the back of a Friesian. An easy target for a bullet, she was sure, although there was a thought that Jasper had died by the thrust of a bayonet through his mid-section. At least, that’s what someone from the War Office had suggested. The clerk claimed they didn’t know for sure. She never saw his body prior to the graveside service that had him buried in his family’s small plot in Kent.

  Given his real occupation as a spy, she couldn’t even be sure of anything she’d been told.

  Lydia Grandby Barrymore was, by all accounts, living the life of an independent woman, although a lonely one these days. A brief affaire with one of Jasper’s colleagues had ended when he announced he was to be married in a month to a much younger debutante—by necessity, he had assured her. No doubt because he needed her dowry. That had been just three weeks ago.

  Not particularly saddened at the loss of the occasional lover, Lydia merely continued life on the fringes of the ton. She didn’t employ a companion or force her lady’s maid to accompany her on these frequent sojourns from her townhouse in Bruton Street.

  If she had any hope of returning to her own occupation once her mourning period was over, she needed to keep her instincts sharp. Hone her skills at observation and listening. And above all, remain as unnoticeable as possible.

  Widow’s weeds certainly helped in that regard, she considered as she glanced down at her dull black bombazine gown and pelisse. Then she did a visual sweep of the lobby, looking for clues as to what might have changed since her last visit. A rectangular space on one wall, slightly outlined by a darkening of the wallpaper, suggested a painting had been recently removed. The brighter circle in the marble floor told her a display stand had recently been positioned there. Given the high traffic in this part of the museum, it had probably been moved to prevent an artifact from taking a tumble should a patron accidentally brush against it.

  She thought of climbing to the upper floor to see the displays of fossils, minerals, and seashells, but decided instead to start in the Gallery. Townley’s collection of statues, as well as other Greek, Roman, and Egyptian antiquities, were located there.

  The thought of viewing artwork created more than a millennia ago excited her. That someone had the skills to cut and carve marble into such detailed works of art meant the ancestors of humanity weren’t the barbaric creatures she had been warned of whilst still in the schoolroom in Merriweather Manor.

  For every Spartan, there had been an Athenian, after all.

  Viewing statues of mostly naked men would have been nearly impossible if there were too many others with her in the Gallery. On a day such as this, she had the room to herself.

  She didn’t exactly study the statues, but surreptitiously surveyed them as she slowly walked around each one. She found them intriguing. Men nowadays weren’t so very different from those of two- or three-thousand years ago, she decided, although she only had experience with the two from current times. Perhaps the Greeks were more beautiful. Youthful, mayhap. Or perhaps they only depicted younger subjects because it was difficult to carve wrinkles into marble.

  The reclining man before her was definitely youthful, his body barely muscled, his face relaxed as if he were sleeping. She could almost feel his soft breaths as he lay there, one arm raised above his head and angled so its hand was atop his curly hair whilst the other was bent with its hand resting beneath his chin. He wasn’t entirely naked but wore a cape tossed over one shoulder, and the folds of a skirt were strewn about his mid-section. His feet sported sandals with leather ties wrapped about his thick ankles.

  Awareness of another’s presence in the gallery had the hairs on the back of her neck reacting.

  The sensation of a soft breath wafted over her shoulder again, this time bearing the slightest hint of sandalwood and spice cologne. Stiffening where she stood, Lydia realized someone was standing directly behind and to her left. A man, no doubt, given the scent of his cologne. She was about to put voice to a complaint, but he put voice to a most audacious claim before she had a chance.

  “I’ve been told I look exactly like him,” the male voice whispered, almost in her ear.

  Lydia carefully stepped to the right and turned slightly, amazed to see that, yes, the intruder did indeed look exactly like Adonis. Or Endymion sleeping on Mount Latmos, if one remembered the label mounted next to the block of marble. He was also impeccably dressed in a superfine navy topcoat, an elaborately embroidered waistcoat in red and gold, and buckskin breeches that, at the moment, left absolutely nothing to the imagination as far as his muscular thighs and the bit of anatomy that was located just above them. A quick glance at his tasseled boots, and Lydia was sure she could see her reflection. One of his gloved hands was pressed onto the top of a cane handle decorated in ornately-patterned silver plate while the other held what appeared to be a sketchpad.

  “You do, in fact,” she murmured, her gaze darting back and forth between the statue and his living twin. “Are you related, perhaps?” she asked with an arched eyebrow.

  “My mother must have thought so. She named me Adonis,” he replied with an equally arched eyebrow.

  Lydia turned completely to face the man, taking a step back when she realized just how close he had been standing. “Did she now?” she replied, not exactly sure how to respond to such an odd claim.

  Now that she could see his entire face—he really did look like the youth depicted in the statue—she realized he was older. At least ten years older than the Adonis carved in the statue. The planes of his face were sharper, perhaps, and a slight scar ruined his otherw
ise perfect face just below his right cheekbone. If he had ever attended any ton events, she couldn’t remember having seen him at them. Probably because he would have been surrounded by debutantes hoping to gain a dance—or his hand in marriage.

  The man was positively beautiful.

  “It’s been my downfall, actually. Whoever takes a gentleman seriously when his name is that of history’s most beautiful man?”

  Not exactly sure how she was supposed to respond to such a rhetorical question, Lydia merely replied with, “Who, indeed?”

  His brows suddenly furrowed. “You, I hope.”

  Lydia blinked and then quickly glanced around, wondering if anyone was paying heed to their conversation. If a gossip should spy them speaking to one another as they were, she could only imagine the stories that might be heard in parlors up and down Park Lane. “I’m quite sure we’ve never been introduced,” she whispered hoarsely, and then moved to the next statue. Another one from Greece, which meant the man was naked. Why did the Greeks depict their heroes naked when the Romans carved them with their clothes on? she wondered, realizing her cheeks were probably bright red. Of course her attention went directly to the statue’s genitals. At least they were on the small side, and not carved in too much detail.

  She wondered if the man who claimed his name was Adonis would follow her, hoping on the one hand he would not, and then, on the other, hoping he would.