She bobbed a small nod. “Several months ago, Benedict and I began to notice small irregularities in Eli’s study and in his workshop. Tiny things, but to our eyes, items were out of place, as if someone had been riffling through papers and examining prototypes. When we mentioned it to Eli, he shrugged it off, but we noticed that he became more careful about locking up drawings and the parts to his new engine. We did as well.”
Octavia brushed an errant curl from her face. “It was then that we also noticed Lord Kirkland had come for a stay at his father’s estate and was making frequent visits to the Ashton residence. Benedict noted that he started loitering around the textile mill as well.”
“That was unusual?” asked Jeremy.
“Very,” answered Octavia. “Kirkland very rarely paid a visit to Blackstone Abbey. And when he did, word was he only came to rusticate from creditors and wheedle more money out of the marquess. He certainly never showed any interest in Eli’s mill—other than to see how many guineas he could squeeze from his father’s profits.”
“His father was a primary investor in Ashton’s business,” mused the earl. “Did Kirkland not own an interest in the company, too?”
“No. In fact, Benedict often heard Lord Blackstone speak disparagingly about his son’s intelligence and his inability to understand the fine points of finance,” answered Octavia.
Charlotte considered the information. “You implied to me earlier that you and Mr. Hillhouse suspected that Kirkland’s growing interest in Ashton’s affairs was personal.”
“We did.” Octavia’s expression turned grim. “Eli was spending more and more time with Benedict in the workshop, which is located in an outbuilding on the grounds. As my work was in the study, I was more aware of the comings and goings within the main house. Kirkland began appearing almost daily to take tea with Mrs. Ashton.” Her expression turned sardonic. “That is, tea was delivered to the parlor. What took place behind the closed doors I cannot say.”
“But you can venture a guess?” asked Wrexford.
“It’s not that I have a sordid mind, sir,” replied Octavia somewhat defensively. “But Eli was like a father to me, and knowing how much he loved his wife, I worried that he might be crushed by a betrayal.” She drew in an unsteady breath. “So Benedict and I began making some inquiries. And the secret we discovered chilled us to the very marrow.”
Charlotte slanted a glance at Wrexford. His expression remained unchanged. Jeremy, on the other hand, was looking increasingly uncomfortable.
Secrets. No matter how deeply buried, they had a way of slithering their way back up to the light of day.
“In her youth,” continued Octavia, “Mrs. Ashton faced a time when she was in dire financial straits. Her father had lost his business, and on his death she was faced with being thrown into the streets. However, despite her lack of money, she did have two very valuable assets—her striking looks and her ability to bewitch men. She used them both to attract a wealthy protector.”
“Lord Kirkland?” guessed Charlotte.
“Lord Kirkland,” confirmed Octavia.
“You have proof of this?” demanded Wrexford.
“I’ll get to that in a moment, milord,” answered Octavia. “We also discovered that Kirkland had taken to playing cards with Neville McKinlock at a gaming hell in London that caters to deep play.”
Wrexford’s expression turned grim. “The owner of Locke and Wharton?”
“Precisely, sir.”
“Locke and Wharton is Ashton’s main competitor,” explained the earl to the others. “Their steam engines are very good, but if Ashton had come up with a way to make his models more powerful, then McKinlock’s company would be left in the dust.”
“Exactly,” said Octavia, her voice rising in urgency. “So when we learned that Kirkland owed McKinlock a veritable fortune in gaming debts, we began to see how it all began to fit together.”
“Conjecture,” murmured Wrexford.
“We realized that, sir,” countered Octavia. “We knew we had to assemble proof to convince Eli that he was being doubly betrayed.”
“What you’re saying is that his wife and Kirkland were conspiring to steal Ashton’s invention,” intoned Jeremy.
“Yes! Giving it to McKinlock would allow him, not Eli, to file for the patent. Locke and Wharton is skilled in steam power. It would have been nigh on impossible to contest their filing.” She lifted her shoulders. “The legal precedent is, the victor is always the one who files first—and to him go the spoils.”
“A riveting tale,” drawled the earl. “But again, have you proof of this?”
A spasm of emotion flitted across Octavia’s face, but it passed too quickly for Charlotte to tell what it was.
“We put together the story through conversations with trustworthy people, but we’re not naïve, Lord Wrexford,” responded Octavia. “We began gathering actual evidence to corroborate what we had heard. However . . .” Her voice faltered for a moment. “However, Eli was murdered—”
“And then Hollis,” interjected Wrexford.
“That only added urgency to the task,” said Octavia. “To put a fine point to it, Benedict was worried that we might be in danger if Kirkland or the widow got wind of what we were doing.”
Charlotte couldn’t help but wonder about one thing. “What about Ashton’s drawings? How did you know they were in the rooster?”
“We put them there for safekeeping.” A wry grimace. “We were aware that our things were being searched, and knowing Mrs. Ashton disliked the bird, we thought it a clever place in which to conceal the papers.”
“Too clever,” murmured Charlotte.
“Yes, you can imagine my chagrin when she made a gift of it to you.” Octavia sighed. “I’m not sure whether it was high drama or high farce.”
“Perhaps,” she mused, “it turned out for the best.”
“Let us return to Benedict and his disappearance,” urged Jeremy. “Or was that merely an act to throw us off the scent?”
Octavia looked stricken. “No!” she exclaimed. “I swear it! Benedict was making a visit to the toolmaker’s shop but after that, he was going to meet with a former maidservant at Mrs. Ashton’s love nest, who said she had some letters written by Lord Kirkland to his paramour. However . . .” She swallowed hard, struggling to keep her voice from cracking. “However, he never returned.”
Her gaze turned to Jeremy, who was looked as if he might be ill. “As I told you, I fear something terrible has happened. Benedict would never simply slink off and leave me.”
“You seem very sure of that,” said Charlotte softly. But knowing what she did about the young man’s past, a very ugly thought leaped to mind.
“I am.” Octavia hesitated. “You see, we’ve made no announcement of it yet on account of the troubles, but we’re engaged to be married.”
“Love.” Wrexford chuffed an exasperated snort. “As if we haven’t enough youthful follies to plague our patience.”
Charlotte shot him a warning frown.
Glowering, he fell silent.
No one seemed anxious to speak. Jeremy rose and moved to the window. The draperies tremored as he leaned in and pressed his forehead to the fog-misted glass.
Her heart ached for him. It looked as though bile was churning, hot and acid, in his belly. She guessed that he, too, was thinking the same thing she was.
Octavia watched him, her gaze turning troubled. “Lord Sterling? Is something wrong?”
For a long moment, it seemed Jeremy hadn’t heard her. He held himself so still that his form slowly faded into the surrounding shadows.
If only it were that easy to escape from fears that threaten all we hold dear.
Jeremy finally tore himself away from his own inner demons and turned to face them. “Miss Merton, much as it pains me to do so, I must ask you how much Benedict has told you about his past.”
A tiny muscle jumped at the base of Octavia’s throat as she swallowed hard. “You are, I presume, refe
rring to a misunderstanding he had at Oxford concerning a friend’s missing purse.”
A look of anguish flooded Jeremy’s eyes.
Octavia saw it and stiffened in alarm. “It was a mistake,” she said. “Benedict had picked up his friend’s coat, thinking the man had left it in the lane, and was accused of—”
“It was no mistake,” interrupted Jeremy. “Benedict was driven by a desperate need of blunt for his books, and made a bad choice. It was I who helped extricate him from the affair and see to it that he was not charged with the crime.”
“No,” she whispered. “I don’t believe it. Benedict doesn’t have an evil bone in his body.”
“Nonetheless it is true,” replied Jeremy tersely. “He is a dear friend—do you imagine I take any pleasure in digging up old scandal?” He pressed his fingertips to his temples. “I don’t think one mistake damns a man forever. I’ve always believed in Benedict’s integrity. But I have to accept that I may be wrong. We can’t turn a blind eye to the fact that money once lured him to set aside his scruples.”
“And if he has done it once,” intoned Wrexford, “the odds are, he would do it again.”
“I don’t believe it,” repeated Octavia, keeping her chin up even though she looked white as a corpse.
Charlotte found herself liking the young woman for not throwing Benedict to the wolves. And yet . . .
“We must consider the possibility that Mr. Hillhouse has succumbed to the temptation of money and is in some way connected to Mr. Ashton’s murder,” she said. “But we must be equally open to the fact that he may have poked a stick into a nest of vipers.”
“In which case,” said Octavia with tightly-wound calm, “Benedict is likely dead.”
“Not necessarily,” countered Charlotte. “He may have been forced into hiding, or he may be a prisoner.”
“Held deep in a dungeon by supernatural forces?” muttered Wrexford sarcastically. “Come, if we all chime in, I’m sure we can write a horrid novel that will outsell The Mysteries of Udolpho.”
“As you are so fond of pointing out, sir, we would be wrong to assume the man’s guilt without any tangible proof,” replied Charlotte. “I’m simply saying we must keep an open mind to all scenarios.”
Wrexford gave a grudging nod. He began to pace in slow, measured steps around the perimeter of the room, past the boys, who had moved to a spot behind the sofa in hopes of going unnoticed, past the bookshelves, and past the slivers of pottery scattered on the dark-grained floor.
“An open mind,” he murmured. As he spoke, he stopped abruptly and hefted one of the swords. A winking of light danced along the length of its blade. “Instead of flinging wild conjectures willy-nilly, let us employ the scientific method and start using reason and logic to guide us as to what next steps to take.”
The boys shifted, watching as the earl stared meditatively at the blunt tip of the weapon and waggled it up and down. He held its weight easily, observed Charlotte, exuding an aura of command. She found herself mesmerized by the flickering sparks reflecting off the smooth steel.
“What good will mere thinking do?” asked Jeremy. “Mrs. Ashton is insisting to Bow Street that her husband’s death was not the result of a random robbery. She wants a culprit caught—and we now can imagine why.” His hands clenched at his sides. “Once Benedict’s secret comes to life, Bow Street will be frothing at the mouth to see him swing for murder.”
“Oh, ye of little faith,” murmured Wrexford. “If what Miss Merton says is true, there will be a way to prove it.”
“And you are willing to help us do so?” challenged Octavia.
“I am willing to see that justice is done,” corrected the earl. “Whether that is the same thing remains to be seen.”
A very Wrexford response, thought Charlotte, a faint smile momentarily touching her lips. His mercurial moods could be maddening, but when it came to intellectual conundrums, he was able to detach his emotions and become a stickler for precision. She hoped that would work to their advantage.
The sword cut back and forth, setting off more quicksilver flashes of light. And with a start, Charlotte realized how much she wanted to prove Benedict Hillhouse innocent of any crime. Her first impression of Octavia hadn’t been a positive one. The young woman had struck her as evasive and untrustworthy—understandably so, based on what she now knew. But the young woman’s daredevil disregard for her own safety and tigerish defense of the man she loved had won a grudging respect.
“What can we do te help?” piped up Raven from his spot in the shadows.
“Nothing at the moment,” replied Charlotte quickly, suddenly conscious of the fact that they had overheard more than she would have liked. “You and Hawk should return to your beds.”
“Not quite yet,” said Wrexford, earning two grateful grins. “They might as well stay and hear us out. I may have a task for them.”
Charlotte wasn’t quite sure she liked the sound of that. The last time the earl had enlisted the boys in one of his investigations, they would have been transported to the penal colonies half a world away had they been caught.
“That might not be possible,” she replied tersely. “Their lessons with Mr. Linsley demand a great deal of time and study.”
Raven uttered a word that Charlotte pretended not to hear.
The sword angled to point at a spot on the sofa. “Do me the favor of hearing me out before you decide to cut out my liver with your pen knife.”
Reading each other’s thoughts was a skill that cut both ways, acknowledged Charlotte to herself as she took a seat. “Very well, sir.”
“It seems to me we have three avenues to pursue,” said the earl without further preamble. “Firstly, there are our two main suspects.” He resumed his pacing. “We need to learn more about Lord Kirkland and Mrs. Ashton—their past history and if they are indeed conspiring together. And of course, we’ll need to consider McKinlock, too.”
“How—” began Jeremy, but was cut off by a swoosh of steel.
“As it happens, I’ve already asked my good friend Kit Sheffield to dig around for information on Kirkland,” replied the earl. “The gaming hells should be fertile ground for whatever dirt there is.”
“Is Sheffield trustworthy?” demanded Octavia.
“Absolutely,” answered Charlotte.
The answer seemed to satisfy the young woman. She sat back without further protest.
“It’s also imperative to gather proof of any perfidy,” continued Wrexford. “To whit, it would be helpful to get our hands on the love letters that Mr. Hillhouse was seeking. And knowing the pair’s daily movements—who they are meeting, where they are going, especially if it involves McKinlock—could be a key in confirming our suspicions.”
Wrexford had circled around to Charlotte. “Mrs. Sloane, I’ll leave the love letters to you and your network.”
Octavia once again edged forward on her seat. “How—”
“Never mind,” murmured Jeremy. “But be assured they can run rings around any Bow Street Runner.”
“Weasels, you play a part in this too,” went on the earl. “Can you recruit your reliable raggle-taggles for surveillance duty?” The boys had a trusted circle of smart, savvy street urchins who had proved extremely helpful in solving the Holworthy murder case.
“O’ course,” replied Raven. “Skinny, One-Eyed Harry, Alice the Eel Girl, Pudge—”
“I leave it to you to assemble the group,” interjected Wrexford. “I’ll inform you of the assignments by the end of tomorrow.”
Octavia was looking more and more mystified but she kept any further queries to herself.
“Then there is the question of finding Mr. Hillhouse.” Wrexford shifted his stance to face Jeremy. “You know him well. As, it appears, does Miss Merton. The two of you are tasked with thinking of where he might have gone to ground if he were in trouble.”
“He would have come back to the house,” insisted Octavia.
The earl looked down his long nose at her
. “And lead whatever danger was pursuing him straight to you?”
“Oh,” she said in a small voice.
“I’ve some ideas,” said Jeremy. “I’m sure Miss Merton will too, once she’s thought about it.
“Do any inquiries discreetly, Sterling,” cautioned the earl. Swoosh, swoosh. He was moving again. “Given your background, I assume you can manage that.”
“If you’re asking whether I can manage not to trip over my aristocratic feet, yes I think I can manage that,” came the cool reply.
“I can search Mrs. Ashton’s parlor and private quarters when she is occupied elsewhere,” suggested Octavia.
“No,” said Charlotte firmly. “You must promise to do nothing. As you’ve discovered, clandestine activities are not quite so easy as you might think. Alerting the widow that she’s under suspicion could be disastrous. The element of surprise is key if we are to catch them red-handed.”
Octavia looked unhappy, but as Charlotte had hoped, her innate good sense prevailed. “I understand.”
The list was already daunting, but the earl had mentioned three avenues of pursuit. “And what, sir,” asked Charlotte, “is the last thing?”
CHAPTER 19
Wrexford’s peregrination around the room had brought him back to the doorway, where the other sword stood propped up against the wall. “We can’t ignore the possibility that the real villain is someone else entirely. Our suspects aren’t the only ones who would reap enormous profits if they possessed Ashton’s invention. And as a man of science, I’ve learned one must consider all factors when one is conducting an experiment.”
He slowly set his weapon next to its mate. “Else you risk having it blow up in your face.”
“Yes, but . . . where do we begin?” mused Charlotte. “With Mr. Hillhouse in God knows what difficulty, time is of the essence.”
“The answer is actually very simple. We—or rather, I—start at the Royal Institution, where all the latest gossip concerning the world of science echoes through its august corridors before it ever reaches the public.” Wrexford allowed a cynical smile. “Men tend to be even more loose-lipped than the drawing room tabbies. If McKinlock’s company has any new projects in the works, one of the Institution’s members will have heard rumors about it.”
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