Too Hot to Handel

by Sheri Cobb South

  “Do you mean to tell me,” demanded Pickett, “that all this time you’ve been pocketing finders’ fees, you’ve been the one stealing those jewels?”

  “Not doing the actual deed, no,” the elder Runner was quick to demur. “I lack your particular gifts in that area. But mine was certainly the brain that devised the scheme. I had a—let’s say a friend—working at the Theatre Royal in Drury Lane, whose task it was to relieve those ladies burdened down with baubles. This friend delivered the goods to Mr. Baumgarten’s establishment, where I redeemed them for a fraction of their worth, brought them to Bow Street, and saw that they were returned to their rightful owners. The ladies had their trinkets back, I collected a finder’s fee—from which I was able to reward my associates and still pocket a tidy profit—and everyone was happy.”

  “Everyone but Mr. Colquhoun,” Pickett said.

  It seemed to Julia that he was growing weaker before her eyes. He was swaying on his feet, his pistol arm drooping lower and lower. As she watched, he edged sideways away from the doorway to stand with his back against the wall—leaning against it to support himself, she was certain. And if she recognized the reason for that subtle movement, she had no doubt Mr. Foote did as well.

  “As you say, everyone but Mr. Colquhoun.” Foote’s huff of annoyance was hot and fetid against her ear. “The old man wasn’t content with merely returning the valuables to their rightful owners. He wanted an arrest, and when he conceived of his grand scheme, I knew the game was up. I couldn’t stop the theft that night—the plans were already in place, and I had no chance to warn my associate—so the best I could do was to steal them myself before he could do it, and make sure someone else took the blame. Fortunately for me, I knew just the person—someone whose own neck should have been stretched years ago.”

  “But all this has nothing to do with her ladyship,” Pickett pointed out. “Let her go. You have my word that she will go straight back to her own home—no, my lady, I insist,” he added, when she made a small sound of protest.

  “The word of a pickpocket and a thief,” Foote sneered. “Forgive me for not leaping at such a suggestion, Mr. Pickett, but aside from the likelihood that she would run straight to Bow Street in spite of any promises you might make, I have a certain grudge against her ladyship as well. Those damned opera glasses,” he explained, seeing his quarry’s puzzled expression. “I knew that if I stayed to the rear of the box, I would be invisible to all the Bow Street force except you, and you were stationed all the way across the theatre—able to see a man at the back of the box, but not to identify him, given the width of the building and the distance between us. And then I saw you peering at the royals through a pair of opera glasses. Knowing you for the thorn you’ve been in my side over the last decade, I knew it was too much to hope that you would fail to recognize me, or to realize what my presence meant.”

  “I knew you shouldn’t have been there,” Pickett said. “I remembered Mr. Colquhoun leaving the Bow Street office in your charge.”

  “Mr. Foote, was it you who urged the royal party to leave the theatre?” asked Julia in coaxing tones. “You must know that the Russians consider you quite a hero. In fact, the Princess Olga has the fixed intention of asking the Prince of Wales to reward you for your efforts on their behalf. Surely you would not wish to do anything now that might compromise their good opinion of you.”

  “Thank you for the warning, your ladyship, but I am convinced that eradicating vermin will always be seen in a positive light. Besides, the princess might be less impressed with my heroic efforts if she knew that it was I who started the fire in the first place.”

  “You put almost four thousand people’s lives at risk, all for the sake of a diamond necklace?” demanded Pickett, indignation lending a temporary burst of strength.

  Foote gave a short bark of laughter. “No, something far more valuable than that—I put almost four thousand people’s lives at risk for the sake of saving my own skin. I’ll admit it was a rough-and-ready plan, but keep in mind that my original and much neater scheme had already been shot to perdition. I had no doubt that if my associate was caught with the diamonds in his possession, he wouldn’t hesitate to name me, so I did what I had to do. To my mind, you were the weak link, the one most likely to be able to identify me, and since I couldn’t afford to leave any witnesses, you had to be eliminated. I made sure you would be trapped in your box—and a good thing, too, as I discovered when I saw you with those opera glasses—and then set the fire on my way back to warn the royals. It took hold quickly enough, given the number of candles and the abundance of velvet curtains and varnished woodwork, and in the confusion of their exit, no one noticed when I plucked the diamonds right off the lady’s neck.”

  Pickett’s lips twisted in a travesty of a smile. “Welcome to the brotherhood of pickpockets and thieves, Mr. Foote. But you’ve far surpassed me, you know. Even at my worst, I never tried to kill anyone.”

  “Believe me, I took no particular pleasure in the thought that other people might have to die—except, of course, where you were concerned. But then, you’d had it coming to you for a decade or more.”

  “And her ladyship? She was in the box when you locked me in, you know.”

  “Not ‘locked,’ Mr. Pickett. I merely wedged a small piece of wood in the door, and the heat from the fire did the rest. As for putting her ladyship in danger, well, her sins may have been minor compared to yours, but such is the price of keeping low company.”

  Julia’s eyes met Pickett’s, and she gave him a reassuring little smile. “He sounds so very much like George, doesn’t he? What a pity we can’t introduce them! They should have got along—if you will pardon the expression!—like a house on fire.”

  “My lady,” breathed Pickett, “you are a marvel.”

  “Very touching, I’m sure,” said Foote, perhaps justifiably annoyed at being reduced to a mere spectator in this scene of his own orchestration. “But it’s time now to say goodbye to your high-born whore.”

  Pickett’s nostrils flared at this insult to his lady’s honor, and he raised his left hand to help support the pistol in his right.

  Foote had the effrontery to laugh. “By all means, shoot, Mr. Pickett, if you are sure you can hit me and not her ladyship.”

  They stood there at an impasse, Pickett struggling to keep his pistol trained on Foote, while Foote held his own weapon to Julia’s head.

  “I—I can’t—I’m sorry—my lady—”

  “Do what you must, John,” she said softly. “If you should happen to shoot me by mistake, know that you are already forgiven.” She gave him a rather tremulous smile. “If I am going to be killed in any case, I had much rather die at your hand than his.”

  “And you will not be left to mourn for long,” put in Foote, “for you will follow her ladyship very shortly afterward. So shortly, in fact, that it seems almost a pity I can’t prolong your suffering, but I dare not delay.”

  “You’ll still have to answer for it, you know,” Pickett said. “My landlady is downstairs. At the first sound of a gunshot, she’ll be pounding on the door.”

  “And what will she find? Why, that you became violent when confronted with your crimes. I was obliged to shoot you in self-defense, while your own shot went wide and tragically struck her ladyship, who had been pleading with you to go quietly. So, Mr. Pickett, which is it to be? Will you shoot first, or shall I?”

  Suddenly there was a loud report, and Julia felt Mr. Foote jerk convulsively at her back. In the next instant she found herself freed, while her erstwhile captor lay twitching upon the floor in a pool of blood. She whirled about and saw Mr. Colquhoun framed in the doorway, a curl of white smoke rising from the barrel of the pistol in his hand.

  “Thank you, sir,” rasped Pickett, and slid slowly down the wall, to land in a heap on the floor.

  “I can’t let you do this, my lady,” Pickett insisted.

  Almost three hours had passed since Mr. Colquhoun’s timely arrival, during whi
ch interval the coroner had been sent for and had borne Foote’s body away; Mrs. Catchpole had cleaned the bloodstains from the bare wooden floor, complaining all the while (having come running up the stairs at the sound of gunfire, just as Pickett had predicted she would); and Mr. Colquhoun had lifted Pickett bodily off the floor where he had fallen and put him back in bed. He was awake again now, and was seated at the small scarred table between his magistrate and the lady who was his wife.

  “Tell her, Mr. Colquhoun,” he appealed to the magistrate. “Tell her she can’t throw her life away like this.” Clad in shirtsleeves and breeches, he was painfully thin, but looked rather the better for having washed, shaved, and tied his hair back with a ribbon.

  Julia, too, looked more presentable after dressing her hair and trading her blood-spattered wrapper for a morning gown of primrose yellow. She now presided over Pickett’s table, dispensing tea into chipped and mismatched cups with a grace and elegance that would not have shamed the hundred-year-old Fieldhurst silver tea service.

  Mr. Colquhoun, receiving his cup from her hand, shook his head. “I’m sorry, John, but I’m afraid I can’t tell her anything of the kind. In fact, I dare not. As I understand it, the last man to cross her was driven from the premises at the point of a knife.”

  “I beg your pardon?” said Pickett, baffled.

  “I shall explain later,” Julia promised, chiding the magistrate with a reproachful look. “Will you not have another scone, John? You have had nothing to eat in days, and I refuse to have anyone say that marriage to me has caused you to waste away.”

  “It seems to me,” put in the magistrate, picking up the thread of the conversation that Pickett’s protests had interrupted, “that Lord Fieldhurst might well attempt to challenge the marriage in court. Since there have been cases where irregular marriages such as yours were overturned, I would suggest the pair of you circumvent any such legal action by doing the thing properly in church.”

  “An excellent notion,” agreed Julia.

  “The annulment comes before the ecclesiastical court in less than two weeks,” Pickett objected. “It would take three weeks just to post the banns.”

  “Precisely,” said Mr. Colquhoun, nodding. “That is why I strongly urge you to purchase a special license, so you may have the ceremony whenever and wherever you please. What do you think of a se’ennight hence? My Janet will have returned by that time, and she and I would be delighted to host the wedding breakfast.”

  “I can’t afford a special license,” Pickett protested. “And I refuse to let my wife buy her own marriage license. That is,” he added hastily, “I would refuse, if I were really marrying her ladyship.” The fact that they were even discussing such a thing, let alone the fact that the two people he loved most in all the world had apparently set aside their differences and were now allied against him, only proved that the world had turned upside-down while he’d lain unconscious.

  “I’m sure your scruples do you credit, John,” the magistrate said. “That is why I intend to pay for the special license myself. You may consider it a wedding gift. I would do no less for my own son,” he added, anticipating Pickett’s objections.

  “But, sir, I’m not your son,” said Pickett, pointing out the obvious.

  “No, but by God you should have been, so let’s have no more argufication, if you please!”

  “Thank you, Mr. Colquhoun, that is very kind of you,” said Julia, reaching across the table to give his hand a squeeze. “And I hope you will let us entertain you and Mrs. Colquhoun to dinner, once we are settled. After all, sharing a basket from Grillon’s while John slept through the meal can hardly be said to count.”

  “My lady,” said Pickett, interrupting these rosy plans for his future, “I am overwhelmed by the honor you do me, but it will not serve. All the plans are in place for the annulment, even the letter from the physician. I think we should—I know we should—we must go through with it,” he concluded miserably.

  “There will be no annulment, John.” Julia blushed scarlet, but she spoke in a voice that brooked no argument. “There can’t be.”

  Pickett stared at her with an arrested expression. It was Mr. Colquhoun who broke the uncomfortable silence by pushing back his chair and heaving himself to his feet. “Well, well, look at the time,” he said, even though there was no clock, or indeed any timepiece, in evidence. “I’d best be going. If you will accompany me as far as the door, John?”

  Pickett, correctly interpreting this as a command instead of a request, rose and followed his magistrate rather numbly to the landing just outside the door. Once outside, Mr. Colquhoun shook him warmly by the hand.

  “My boy, back in Scotland, when I informed you that you and Lady Fieldhurst had unwittingly contracted a valid marriage, I wished you happy with tongue planted firmly in cheek. I do so again now, but with the utmost sincerity. God’s richest blessings upon you both.”

  “Thank you, sir, but—but we’re not married, not really.”

  “Oho!” exclaimed the magistrate, chuckling. “If her ladyship meant what I think she meant, then you are very much married indeed!”

  Pickett flushed crimson. “But I didn’t—we haven’t—at least, I don’t think—”

  “If you will heed a word of advice, John, every married man learns that there is a time to put one’s foot down, and a time to nod and say ‘yes, dear.’ ” He patted Pickett’s shoulder. “I think it’s time for you to start nodding.”

  “But sir, she’s a viscountess!” protested the befuddled bridegroom, his voice rising on a note of panic. “She could have had anyone!”

  “Yes, and she chose you.” Seeing his protégé was not convinced, he added, “Don’t take it so much to heart, son. I daresay most happily married men feel unworthy of their wives at one time or another. Let yourself be happy. You’ve earned the right as much as any man I know.”

  Pickett sighed. “Thank you, sir.”

  “And now,” said Mr. Colquhoun, glancing at the door, “unless I miss my guess, you and your lady wife will have a great deal to say to one another, so I shall leave you to it. Oh, and don’t hurry back to Bow Street, mind you! Aside from being a long way from fully recovered, you are, after all, on your honeymoon.”

  With this Parthian shot the magistrate turned and headed down the stairs, leaving Pickett to face the woman he’d managed to trap in an accidental marriage in spite of all his good intentions. He found her still sitting at the table, regarding him with a quizzical little smile.

  “Well, John?”

  “What did you mean, there can’t be an annulment?” demanded Pickett, taking the bull by the horns. “Do you mean to say that I—that you—that we—”

  “Do you truly not remember?” asked Julia. “Really, I hardly know whether to be amused or insulted.”

  Pickett frowned thoughtfully, recalling the particularly vivid dream he’d had the previous night. “I remember a little. I thought I must have dreamed it. It wouldn’t have been the first time,” he confessed sheepishly.

  “No, my dear, it was quite real.”

  He collapsed onto his chair, planted his elbows on the table, and dropped his head into his hands. “Oh, my lady,” he groaned. “I am so sorry!”

  Her smile faltered. “Are you, indeed? And here I flattered myself that you were pleased.”

  “I’m not sorry on my own account,” he said hastily. “How could I regret the best thing that ever happened to me? But I thought I was going to die. I knew only what I wanted; I had no thought for what I knew I had to do. My lady, why didn’t you stop me?” A new and horrifying possibility occurred to him. “I didn’t—I never forced myself on you?”

  “Not at all,” she assured him. “In fact, you were quite gallant, and gave me every opportunity to change my mind. As for your forcing yourself on me, why, you are incapable of such a thing.”

  Her choice of words was perhaps unfortunate, given the doubts recently cast upon his manhood by the annulment proceedings.

 
; “ ‘Incapable,’ my lady?”

  His earlier horror gave way to an almost comical dismay, and she realized the demands of the annulment, combined with his own lack of experience, had left him with a profound lack of confidence where conjugal relations were concerned. It would be her duty and privilege to reassure him on that head.

  “I only meant that you are incapable of the sort of brutality that would force itself upon any woman against her will. As for the mechanics, I can assure you that all your parts are in good working order, and will no doubt perform quite delightfully with practice.” As he considered the implications of this revelation, she added in a more serious tone, “Unless—John, have your sentiments undergone a change?”

  “No!” he exclaimed, appalled at the very suggestion. “How can you think such a thing? You must know that life could hold no greater happiness for me than to have you for my wife! But from the moment I was informed of our marriage, I was determined not to hold you to a union that you could not—cannot possibly want!”

  “Can I not? You do yourself less than justice, my dear.”

  He took a deep breath. “My lady, there are things you don’t know about me—things quite aside from the obvious difference in our stations. Foote called me a pickpocket and a thief, and he spoke no less than the truth.”

  “Oh, I know all about that,” said her ladyship, dismissing Pickett’s disreputable history with a wave of her hand.

  “You do?”

  “I’ve watched you pick locks with a hairpin,” she reminded him. “I thought it unlikely that you should have learned such a skill from Mr. Colquhoun. In fact, it was he who told me, oh, months ago, while we were in Scotland. I must confess, however, that I am less interested in your past than I am in your future.”