The Black Mask

by Cynthia Bailey Pratt

  Three blows later—two to the belly, one to the jaw—Wapton went over like a felled oak. His eyelids fluttered and his feet and arms still moved restlessly, but for the rest, he had lost all consciousness.

  Niles shook his right hand as if moving it very fast would keep the pain from finding him. Judging by his grimace, he didn’t succeed.

  Rose flew across the room to him. “Niles. Are you hurt?”

  “It feels good,” he said, smiling at her. “It feels right.”

  The warmth and tenderness he showed brought unaccountable tears into her eyes. “I was so afraid.”

  “You? I’ve never seen you show fear.”

  “You weren’t looking at me. And it’s a good thing, as it turns out.”

  Niles laid his bruised right hand along her cheek. Rose nestled her face against his palm, her eyes closing in delight. “What are you going to do with the colonel?” she asked.

  “What colonel?” Niles tilted her face up, eager to claim openly what he’d only stolen before. Yet no sooner had he dipped his head down to taste her lips than Rose gently moved his hand away and stepped back. “Rose?” Niles said, disappointed.

  “I have something to show you first,” she said. “What did I ...” She hurried over to the “secret” panel, really no more than an easy access way to the butler’s pantry. She snatched up something dark from the floor. Turning her back, she put her hand to her face. When she spun around, her eyes were shaded by the mask that covered her from cheek to brow.

  “I’m afraid your man gave the show away,” she said. “You see, I know the colonel was right about you. You are the Black Mask.”

  “Yes. I am.” He moved around the table to reach for his shirt.

  “Why this game, Niles? I think I have a right to know, and not only because you decoyed me out of my room tonight so you could steal the colonel’s papers.” She laughed a little. “And I thought I was being so clever, enticing you to come to me by using the Malikzadi.”

  “Oh, that reminds me.” He reached into his dressing gown’s pocket and put the world’s ugliest ruby ring into the center of his desk. It clashed horribly with the greenish color of his desk blotter.

  “You did steal it? Why?”

  “So you would think I only took the satchel as an afterthought.” He took up the ring, held it in his hand a moment, then placed it again on the desk.

  Rose came a little closer. “That’s not my ring.”

  “No. I had that one made a few weeks ago. It’s not fit for a queen, but perhaps a bride?” Rose could never have imagined that the arrogant Sir Niles, who had just decommissioned a man twice his size, could look so humble and nervous.

  She reached out and took up the ring. Like the Malikzadi, the center stone was a ruby. This one, however, flashed with a passionate red flame, surrounded by brilliants. She slipped it onto the third ringer of her left hand. “It fits.”

  Taking off the mask, she put it in the spot the ring had been. “I don’t know yet if I can do what you ask me, Niles. I have guessed some of what you were doing, but not everything. Tell me everything.”

  “It seems my mask was wearing thin.”

  “A trifle.” Searching his expression for a clue to his feelings was unprofitable. “I don’t understand why...”

  “Why the meticulous Sir Niles Alardyce would do so quixotic a thing as-become a thief by night?” He sat down on a deeply buttoned leather sofa a few feet away from where Colonel Wapton slumbered with noisy breaths. Rose came over to sit beside him. Though it was forward of her, she look his hand and held it comfortingly between her own, the ruby ring on top.

  “You remember my telling you about Christian?”

  “Your cousin.”

  “Yes. How we both entered the army?”

  “That’s right. He died?”

  “Yes, but not honorably on the field. He died in prison, clapped up for the crime of selling guns to the enemy.”

  “He was innocent!”

  Niles smiled at her, but there was pain behind his eyes. He sighed. “No. He wasn’t. He definitely had a hand in the crime. But even the authorities couldn’t swallow the idea that Christian had planned and executed the series of misdirection, inventory swapping, and painstaking deliveries that took place, despite the fact someone had very carefully falsified documents to show he was the principal criminal.”

  “Wapton, Beringer, and Curtman?” Rose looked with loathing at the snoring man at her feet.

  “Exactly. Christian’s commanding officer believed it, too, but there was no evidence. That’s why Christian wasn’t hanged outright but put in prison.”

  “How did he die?”

  “Typhoid broke out. Bad air and appalling conditions will let that happen. Christian worked as a nurse in the prison, caught it himself, and died. They buried him with the other prisoners instead of letting me bring him home.” He stared into the fire as if seeing evil visions in the flames.

  “I swore I’d ferret out the other three and expose them. I didn’t realize what else they’d been doing in the years since then. Wapton changed regiments but stayed in the service, rising in rank year by year. Beringer and Curtman left the service with several thousand pounds waiting for them in England, but they couldn’t rest like honest men. Mr. Crenshaw helped me track them down through the ports, the banks, and his own band of cronies down at the Inns of Court.”

  Thinking of the ruminative attorney, Rose could smile; despite her tears. “I suppose your part was to search various houses of ill-repute, thus gaining a renewed reputation as a rake. Did you find out very much about these men that way?”

  “If I say ‘yes,’ will you believe me?”

  Rose couldn’t withstand such a searching glance and looked away.

  “You know,” he said, the tension slipping from him, “you have a charming little dimple in your left cheek that I see only when you are trying not to smile. I always want to kiss you then.”

  Rose hid that information in her heart to examine later. “But why all this mummery of the Black Mask? Why couldn’t you just expose them for what they had already done?”

  “There was still no evidence I could take to a judge. I had to find it. But how could I search their houses or offices?” He laughed a little, reminiscently. “I remember how horrified Crenshaw was when I first put forward the suggestion that I turn thief. He was so certain I’d be shot or run through by some enterprising householder.”

  “What confused me most was that you are so good at housebreaking. That trick with the window at my aunt’s home, how did you think of that? There are no books, surely, that tell you how to rob people.”

  “No books needed when you have a Baxter.”

  “A Baxter? Your man?”

  “A reformed thief, if you please. Known until an unfortunate choice of victim as Beau Blade for his fancy waistcoats, charm of speech, and swordplay. I almost wish Wapton there had gone for a sword. It was a shame to waste Baxter’s training.”

  “Who was his last victim?” Rose asked though she felt she already knew.

  “I found him rifling my box of pretties early one afternoon when I returned unexpectedly. Finding his talents to be precisely what I required, I dismissed my former man and learned all I could from Baxter while teaching him the finer points of valeting. I promised him once the three were dealt with, I’d write him a sterling recommendation for his next employer. He’s fallen in love with respectability, poor man.”

  “And you, I suppose, have fallen in love with reckless danger.”

  “No, my dear. With you.” His arm slipped down from the back of the sofa to pull her tightly against him. “I’ve been going slowly mad for weeks, torn between what I had to finish and what I so longed to begin. Tell me the truth, Rose. I’ve mistreated you, I know. Can you forgive me?”

  “Mistreated? When have you ever mistreated me?”

  “At Mrs. Yarborough’s party.”

  “I knew that was you! It’s nice to know I’m not a complete fo
ol.”

  “Is that all you have to say to me?” He settled her a little more closely against his body. Tilting up her face, he kissed her with restraint. When she sighed against his mouth and let go of his hand to touch his neck, he tore away and laid his cheek against hers. “You are the fulfillment of every wish, Rose. I never dreamed I’d find such a wonder.”

  “Let’s finish what we owe to Christian,” Rose said, as Wapton groaned and stirred, “before we think about ourselves.”

  Wapton rolled over onto his side and pushed up onto his elbow. He ran his fingers into his hairline, blinking as if his eyes didn’t want to focus correctly. “Christian? Who’s talking about that fool?”

  “Fool, was he?” Niles was on his feet, standing over his enemy.

  “Yes.” His tongue moved around his mouth, causing strange bulges and rolling movements. His voice sounded thick. “My teeth feel loose. What did you hit me with, a brick?”

  “No, just my fist. I’m willing to do it again, too.”

  Tasting the blood on his lip, Wapton dabbed at it with the side of his fist. “I know your kind, Alardyce; you won’t hit me again. I’m beaten and I know it.” He rolled a little more, propping himself up on both elbows, his long legs stretched out before him. He moved his jaw around experimentally. “No one’s ever put me down before,” he said mildly, his voice recovering. “I’d like to know how you did it.”

  “I’m damned if I know,” Niles said. “I simply wanted to more than I wanted anything else, I suppose.”

  Wapton nodded. “Pure heart, clean living. Just like they tell you at school. I suppose you want to know about Christian.”

  “I have the papers, Wapton. You don’t need to tell me anything.”

  “You know he was guilty? Just as guilty as we were, maybe more so because we weren’t fools. He trusted us, especially Beringer. We were his friends, his comrades in that dirty business. He really believed in honor among thieves.”

  “And it killed him.”

  “He should have known better than to nurse the scum of the prison yard. It’s better to be alive than dead, no matter what the circumstances.”

  Rose shook her head at this true cynicism. “What are you going to do with him?” she asked.

  “Going to call in the Runners, Alardyce? I’ll spill all your nasty family secrets if you do. What will her parents say to the news that you’ve got a gaolbird in the family tree?”

  “They won’t care,” Rose said defiantly, though she knew her father would hate it and her mother would never forget it for an instant.

  Niles picked up Wapton’s coat and threw it into the man’s lap. “You’re leaving the country, I take it.”

  “I have a chaise waiting. I was only stopping to pick up my satchel from Miss Spenser and to ask her ... well, never mind.”

  “I never would have gone with you,” Rose said. “I don’t like you.”

  Niles had to help Wapton to his feet. The man put his hand to his ribs and groaned if he turned or twisted even the slightest amount. “Damn you, I think you’ve broken one of my ribs.”

  “Get out,” Niles said. “Go to the Continent or the devil. I’ll give you thirty-six hours to leave the country and that only because you were somewhat concerned for Rose when you confronted me earlier. If it were not for that, I would turn you over to the Runners or your own commanding officer no matter what threats you made.”

  Wapton sneered, his open good looks destroyed now that the essential littleness of his soul stood revealed. “You’ll never dare give those papers to anyone. They condemn Christian just as much as they do the rest of us.”

  “With this difference,” Niles said. “He’s dead and has nothing left to lose.”

  Rose linked her arm with Niles’s as Wapton cast a glance around. “You’d better hurry,” she said. “Your thirty-six hours started two minutes ago.”

  Niles softly closed and locked the door behind him.

  “So good riddance to all bad rubbish,” he said. “And now, Miss Spenser...”

  “And now, Sir Niles?”

  “Now we begin.”

  Epilogue

  The roads in Ireland were no worse than the roads In England, just appalling in a different way. Mud instead of dust, sheep in the road instead of cows, and long distances between habitations at least enriched the adventure. Rose, however, didn’t mind the dirt, the ruts, or the enforced slowness of the drive. She had her baby girl in the coach with her.

  She and Niles could spend long hours jouncing Melinda Jane on their knees, gazing into her cornflower blue eyes, or just holding her close as she slept. At home the ruler of the nursery had decreed Melinda should live in the nursery where mothers and fathers were a treat, not an all-day event.

  “We’ll arrive there today,” Niles said, early on the last morning, putting his foot on the coach step and looking at the sky. “Barring accidents like the wheel falling off again.”

  “Couldn’t we miss the turning and continue right on around the whole perimeter of the country?” Rose asked, only half teasing.

  “I’m in favor of it, but I think Paige and Augustus would be disappointed. They haven’t seen Melinda yet.”

  ‘You’re right, but these days have been so sweet. I hate to see them end.” Rose watched out the coach window as the nursemaid appeared, carrying Melinda bundled in her arms. The majestic nurse, Mrs. Jarricks, walked alone and in state. Even while staying in the sometimes primitive inns, her vast bonnet of tucked and frilled white lawn was thoroughly starched, ironed, and as upstanding as a windmill.

  “I’ll take the baby, Nancy,” Rose called. Mrs. Jarricks’s mouth tightened like the drawstring on a reticule.

  “I can h’only say h’again that it h’would be better, my lady, to h’allow Miss Melinda to travel with those trained to look h’after her.” Mrs. Jarricks never dropped an “h,” but she was a great collector of them.

  Niles intercepted the nursemaid. “Give her to me.”

  Little Melinda might be only six months old, but she definitely knew when her father held out his arms to her, she wanted to go. She kicked and gurgled in delight, her toothless smile enchanting.

  “Sir Niles, I can h’only remind you that a constant routine is h’essential for h’any child.”

  “So you’ve said repeatedly, Mrs. Jarricks, and I quite agree with you. So far on this journey, Melinda has ridden every day with us. That, therefore, is her routine.”

  Mrs. Jarricks sniffed. If anything, her mouth pursed even more tightly. “Ireland is not my choice for a holiday,” she said awfully as she strode across the cracked surface of the yard in the direction of the second traveling coach, this one piled high with luggage. “Come, Nancy.”

  The maid dipped a hasty curtsy and raced after Mrs. Jarricks. Lucy and Baxter, who had retracted his notice as soon as he met Lucy, were already inside and waiting.

  Niles handed the baby to Rose, then climbed in himself. “Drive on, Burrows.”

  The coachman touched his hat brim with the handle of his whip and ordered the ostler to “stand away from their heads.” A few minutes later, the second coach followed, leaving the landlord mourning the early departure of such open-fisted guests.

  “You’re planning to dismiss her when we go home,” Niles said, holding out his finger to Melinda. He was always delighted that she’d hold on so tightly with her little baby fist.

  “I won’t have to,” Rose said. “I feel certain she’ll give her notice the moment we sight the dome of St. Paul’s.”

  “I still don’t see how you came to hire such a despot.”

  “You interviewed her, too,” Rose reminded him. “You said you wanted firmness.”

  “Well, she’s firm, all right, but she should draw the line at making me feel like a probationary first-year at a particularly Gothic public school.”

  Rose laughed. “I doubt we are what she had in mind when she applied for a position in gentleman’s household.”

  “We are a ragtag group, and I
wouldn’t have it any other way.” He slid his arm around his wife’s back. “Do you mind not having a more regular household?”

  Rose gazed at Melinda, her eyes distant. For a moment, she didn’t answer.

  “Rose, do you mind?”

  She pulled out of her abstraction at the urgent note in his voice, and smiled at him. “How can you ask? What would I do with servants equal to my consequence? I can scarcely move about the house as it is.”

  “What were you thinking of just then?”

  Rose cuddled Melinda a little, though the baby was more interested in reaching out toward the large buttons on Rose’s traveling costume. “I was thinking perhaps I shall ask Nancy to stay on as nurse once Mrs. Jarricks is gone. She might not have the experience, but I feel as though she truly loves Melinda which is more than I can say for Mrs. Jarricks.”

  “It’s a fine idea,” Niles said, “so long as you can persuade her to stop bobbing up and down whenever I look at her. She makes me more seasick than even when we crossed from England.”

  They arrived at Sir Augustus O’Banyon’s white and lemon-colored house just in good time for tea. A pause to change Melinda’s nappies and dress, and the Alardyce family were escorted through and out the rear of the graciously proportioned three-story house.

  At a table set outside, but complete with napery and silver, Paige sat gazing over a peaceful view of gently moving river and tumbledown castle half in, half above the water on the other side. Hearing their approach, she turned and began to rise. There was something ungainly about her once slim figure.

  Handing Melinda to Niles, Rose hurried down the sloping lawn. “Why didn’t you write to me?” she demanded, embracing her.

  “Oh, I didn’t know how to tell you. I don’t know what your parents are going to say. Having one’s first child at the same time one’s brother is having grandchildren is a little strange.”

  “Not at: all. What does Augustus say?”

  “He pretends he expected this all along. But he struts about like a peacock.”