Chapter 12
I hid my impatience as I escorted Lady Aline to her seat in the box as the act onstage—a man and woman singing popular songs—finished and retired to applause.
Marianne was looking particularly well. Her gown of russet silk was nowhere near matronly, but neither was Lady Aline’s deep green velvet.
It was not the clothes that changed Marianne, I decided, studying her, it was her countenance. Raging good health, Grenville had said. Marianne’s face bore a soft flush, and the lines about her eyes had relaxed.
Dared I believe that Marianne Simmons, former actress of the Drury Lane company and impoverished fellow inmate of my old lodgings, looked happy?
The main entertainment, an opera, began. It was Marriage of Figaro, a lively piece I enjoyed. I preferred comic operas to tragic ones, as I had seen far too much of life to want to sit through the more morose operas and plays. Those had been written for kings and queens who’d known only softness. But no sooner had the overture faded than Lady Aline planted a large elbow in my ribs.
“The Prince Regent is here,” she said, peering at a box above the stage. “Look how he glares at you, Grenville. Jealousy, no more. Ungrateful wretch—after all you and Captain Lacey did for him. He’s with the awful Lady Conyngham. Trumped up commoner, can’t speak below a screech. The man can barely move—I can’t think what they can possibly get up to.”
Grenville’s lorgnette came up, but he pointedly did not train it on the Regent. While on the stage, Suzanna tried on her bridal gear and Figaro measured his chamber for his wedding bed, Grenville and Lady Aline dissected the audience. Marianne ignored them and watched the action on the stage with a critical eye.
“Had a chat today with Pierce Egan,” Grenville said presently, as he lowered the glass. “You remember him, Lacey—met him at Astley Close during the regimental affair.”
Of course, I remembered. I’d met Donata for the first time at the house of Lord Fortescue in Kent. I’d liked Mr. Egan, who’d come to write about the exhibition fight of a Mr. Sharpe, famous pugilist of the day.
I’d knocked Donata’s husband on his backside at that match. A thoroughly satisfying afternoon.
“Indeed,” was my only reply.
“Egan has stories about Jack Finch in his pugilist days,” Grenville continued. “Finch was brutal, he said. Men had to be carried away, half dead, when he finished with him.”
I nodded. “From what I have learned of Finch, I am hardly astonished.”
“Indeed, Egan was quite disgusted with him, and he admires almost every fighting man. But he did tell me a story which I thought might interest you.”
The audience burst into laughter at various characters onstage hiding behind pieces of furniture. I glanced at the antics but Grenville had caught my attention. “Go on.”
“Egan was invited to a house in Kent last autumn—a gentleman’s estate on the coast. While there, a pugilist match was got up among the convicts from hulks at Sheppey.”
“Good Lord.” Laughter surged below when the count, with a loud bellow, leapt out from hiding. “This gentleman took Mr. Egan to the hulks?”
There was a naval shipyard on the Isle of Sheppey, at the mouth of the Thames. I could not imagine the officers in charge letting in a party of pleasure-seeking gentry to gape at the convicts. Such things were done in prisons on land—in fact, in some places, gentlemen paid to watch women stripped to the waist and caned—but hulks were full of hard villains, and few wanted to risk their escape.
“Not at all,” Grenville said. “The prisoners were brought to the gentleman’s house for the fight and then went right back—overseen by the hulks’ governor or some of the guards—Egan didn’t know which. In the garden of this gentleman’s home, they did battle with each other for the entertainment of the gentlemen and ladies. For the wagering on as well. Lengthy bouts, with one poor fellow nearly dying. He was whisked away and out of sight before Egan could speak to him. Egan said that when these fighters were led away, all had had at least one bone broken, and they were so bruised and battered he could scarce tell one from the other.”
I listened in growing disquiet, and Marianne spoke before I could.
“Like trained dogs,” she said, her lip curling. “That’s the gentry for you.”
Lady Aline fanned herself, her repugnance evident. “You’d be horrified at what some folks get up to, my dear. All in the name of enjoyment.”
“Exactly,” Grenville said. “Cock fighting—that’s how Egan put it. Some of the prisoners were all for it, but he could see that others had been dragged into the fights against their will. But what could they do? The gentleman of the house saw nothing wrong with it. After all, they were only criminals who’d escaped the noose.”
I remembered Pomeroy’s words from this afternoon when he expressed no worry about a man being hanged for a crime he didn’t commit—They’re paying for something else as bad they done in the past.
“Did Egan report this when he returned?” I asked.
Grenville nodded. “They swore him to secrecy, but Egan is a journalist first and foremost. He did write about it, but the newspapers that usually print his pieces refused the story. He also sent a letter to a magistrate regarding the bouts, and the next day was waylaid by toughs and barely escaped. He’s gone back to writing his books, he said, keeping his head down. This happened a sixmonth ago, but when I asked him about Jack Finch, it reminded him, and he told me the curious tale. And now I’ve told you.”
I sat back, chilled. Gentlemen staging exhibition matches for the entertainment of guests was not unusual, but I’d not heard of convicted men brought out of prison for sport. I knew that it was not uncommon for people to pay to gape at the madmen of Bedlam hospital, or the detained prisoners in Coldbath Fields or Milbank, including the aforementioned chance to observe women being flogged.
As distasteful as I found the act of watching human misery for diversion, the prisons themselves admitted the watchers, controlled them, and collected the fee for the upkeep of the place. The gentleman who’d hired out the men from the hulks must be very sure of himself to bring the prisoners to his home.
I was surprised he’d let Egan in on the secret, but then, Egan had been warned off when he’d tried to reveal all, hadn’t he?
“Hell,” I said.
“Quite.” Grenville nodded.
I wondered if Pomeroy knew about these goings on, and if he’d shrug and say it was the prisoner’s just deserts.
Quimby had said he’d head to Sheppey and investigate Finch’s past and how he might have returned to the country. I wondered if he’d already gone, or if I had time to put a word in his ear about the fights.
Were this any other case, I’d itch to go to Sheppey myself, but I had other worries crowding out my thoughts, hence my journey here tonight.
Music surged and the beauty of the voices onstage drew attention. Grenville turned away with Marianne to listen and watch.
Lady Aline creaked to her feet. “Come and pour me a glass of sherry, Lacey.”
Grenville politely rose with me, but remained with Marianne while I escorted Lady Aline into the sitting room behind the box.
This tiny chamber, as sumptuously decorated as the house in South Audley Street, was a space in which one could take wine or even dinner during the intervals, or rest from the exhaustion of watching the performance.
In this jewel box of a room, I’d kissed Donata for the first time.
I poured sherry from a decanter on the marble-topped console table with lion feet and a brandy for myself. The strains of Mozart floated through the closed doors.
“I’ve held on to my patience,” I said as Lady Aline settled herself in an armchair and took a large sip of sherry. I remained standing. “Now you must pay up.”
“Of course, dear boy.” Lady Aline inclined her head, feathers dancing. “I must beg your pardon, but your wife swore me to silence, and I have known the dear gel since she was in leading strings.”
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p; My lips twitched against my wishes. “Her orders outrank mine, you mean.”
“They do. But I have also decided that you should not suffer. I wish Donata to be happy, and happiness in marriage generally means placating the male side of things. I do not know precisely where Donata is, I am sorry to say, but I do know why she went.”
“Because Stanton St. John wants to get his claws on Peter.”
“Indeed, yes, and he does not care who knows it.” Lady Aline’s blue eyes snapped with rage. “He’s hired a nasty solicitor to take his side—wants to prove Donata an incompetent mother and you an upstart who only wishes to lay hands on the family fortune.”
“A popular opinion, in the case of myself,” I said, tamping down my fury. Stanton was an odious pig to accuse Donata of neglecting her children. She doted on them and didn’t care who knew it.
“Only to those who do not know you well, my dear fellow. I admit this leaves much of the world to speculate on your motives. A marriage for the pleasure of it is a puzzling notion to most. Small wonder romantic novels are the rage—marrying for love and friendship is regarded by many as the stuff of fiction.”
“Cousin Stanton has much fuel,” I observed. “So many are angry at me for coercing Donata into my clutches, Donata’s cousins on her family’s side most of all. Do they truly believe she’d have thrown in her lot with them if I hadn’t happened along?”
“They do, though you and I both know she would not have. Donata knows her own mind.”
“That she does,” I said feelingly.
“Anyway, Cousin Stanton came ’round to this box and tried to speak to her that night,” Lady Aline went on. “As soon as you departed. He must have been waiting for you to go. They did have a conversation, but the performance onstage was loud, and I could not hear all they said. By the look of it, he was threatening her. Finally Stanton storms off, and Donata, quite upset, asks to go home with me—I mean to my house, not her own.
“Once there, she paced and fretted for hours, refusing any food or drink, until finally she sent one of my footmen off to find your man, Brewster. He came, she closeted herself with him, then off she went with him in a hired coach. The last I saw of her. I know she has taken Peter to a place she believes is safe.” She gave me an inquiring look, as though begging me to confirm her speculation.
“Brewster won’t reveal the location, blast him.” I began to pace as Donata had, the thump of my walking stick muffled on the carpet.
“Donata’s orders to him outrank yours as well?” Aline asked.
“Apparently they do. Damnation.”
Brewster had promised me that Donata and Peter had the best protection he could arrange, which he could not have done without Denis’s permission. Which meant Denis knew where my wife was, and I did not.
I vented my feelings a bit longer. I could not deny, however, that if Denis had a hand in this—which he assuredly did—then Donata and Peter were safe.
I had realized some time ago why Denis’s men trusted him. The lot of them were ruffians, some killers, who could rise up and crush him any time they wished.
But Denis held them because he was fair. He paid high wages—Brewster had not lied when he’d said he wasn’t destitute. Denis made sure they had every reason to stay in his employ.
He also was not arbitrarily cruel—he did not torture a man who disobeyed him, or string out his punishment. He was far more direct. If a man endangered him or one of his other men, that man was dealt with, swiftly. I’d seen that in my very first encounter with him.
“Damnation,” I said again.
“I agree.” Aline set aside her empty glass. “I expect you to send me word the moment she returns. Now, shall we have more opera?”
As much as I liked Figaro, I could not concentrate on it and soon made my apologies and took my leave. Aline said she would depart with Grenville and Marianne, moving on with them to another entertainment at the interval.
I had Hagen take me home. I briefly toyed with the idea of seeking out Denis and pummeling Donata’s whereabouts from him, but I knew such a thing would be useless. His men would simply carry me out and deposit me in the street.
I did write a note to Denis that I would like to meet with him, and I sent a similar missive to Pierce Egan. I wanted to know more about this pugilist match in Kent. Last, I wrote to Sir Montague, telling him the tale of the convicts forced to fight at a gentleman’s pleasure—leaving Egan’s name out of it, and suggesting he give this information to Mr. Quimby, if he had not already departed.
Before I retired for the night, I went upstairs to look in on Anne—simply watching her sleep in her cot made me feel better. The nurse snored in a bed next to her, ready to assist any time the babe awoke.
I retired for the night, hoping Donata would return while I slept and greet me in the morning. I’d rush to her boudoir to find her seated on her chaise, a silken dressing gown flowing over her legs, her hair wrapped in a bandeau. She’d give me a calm look over the rim of her coffee cup and ask why I was tearing about so.
So strongly did this vision seize me that when I woke, I slid on my dressing gown and stepped quickly through the chamber between our bedrooms. Disappointment hit me hard when I found the boudoir beyond quiet and empty.
Bartholomew meanwhile had entered my chamber to fill my bath and shave me. He was the only bright note in the gloom of the morning, with his light-colored hair, crisp blue suit, and enduring vivacity. I stepped into the hot water and gave myself to his ministrations.
“We did find where Mr. Finch took his lodgings, Captain,” Bartholomew said as he pulled the blade across my face in a series of precise strokes. “With a lady, a fairly young one, and quite pretty. Didn’t want to talk to me and Matthias, though.” A fleeting look of moroseness crossed his face.
I’d started when he’d made the announcement, and Bartholomew pulled the blade away so he would not cut me. I forced myself to calm.
“Immune to your charms?” I asked, keeping my voice light. “Or afraid?”
“Not easy to say.” Bartholomew continued the shave. “Matthias spoke to her—he was the one who pried her whereabouts out of the landlord of the nearest tavern.” He set aside the razor and covered my face with a hot towel. “Landlord didn’t want to talk about Finch, no one did, but Jeremy the footman is his sister’s lad, and so landlord told us about the lady on the quiet. Didn’t want to get into no trouble, he said. But at least we found the rooms.”
“Excellent.” My spirits at last lifted. I set aside the towel and rose with haste, soap and water splashing all over the floor. “You have succeeded where Brewster and a very competent Runner have failed.”
Bartholomew shrugged, attempting to look modest. “It was just asking questions and talking about family. Jeremy’s kin are proud of him working for such a distinguished lady.”
Bartholomew did not have much more to relate. He and his brother had heard plenty about the evils of Finchie, as he was known, but not much about what he’d been up to since he’d arrived in London. No one had wanted to know.
I planned to breakfast quickly and return to St. Giles to question this young lady. My meal and perusal of newspapers was interrupted, however, by a commotion in the foyer.
Before I could leave the table to discover what was amiss, Stanton St. John barreled into the dining room, Bartholomew and another footman unable to restrain him.
I rose to meet Stanton as he charged around the table, and I brought up my walking stick to fend him off.
“Where the devil is he?” Stanton bellowed at me. “What have you done with Peter? I’ll have the law on you, damn me if I don’t!”
Chapter 13
I withdrew the sword partway from my cane as I faced Stanton, but I kept my voice chilly.
“Young Lord Breckenridge is well,” I said. “And safe from you.”
I realized at that moment that I truly believed my words. Donata, Brewster, and Denis would make certain Peter was well.
“You admit yo
u’ve abducted him?” Flecks of spittle stained Stanton’s lips. “He’s not yours to do with what you please. He’s a St. John, not a Lacey.” He spat the name. “Peter belongs to me.”
“He belongs with his mother,” I said, my cool tone worthy of Grenville or Denis. “What is your sudden interest in him, by the bye? Breckenridge has been dead nearly three years, and I’ve been married to his mother for a little over one. Why are you only coming to us now?”
Stanton’s face reddened to tell me I’d scored a hit. I’d been trying to throw him off balance, but I’d succeeded too well.
Which made me wonder—what had happened to generate Stanton’s interest?
“I’ll have you for abduction,” Stanton spluttered. “I wager I can make more disgusting charges stick. You are by all accounts very fond of the boy.”
“As a father,” I said in a hard voice. “And as a father, I am certainly not about to turn Peter over to you.”
“But you are not his father. Never can be. You can never get sons of your own on Donata, so I hear, now that you’ve made her barren.”
Behind him, Bartholomew stifled a noise of outrage. The open doorway and hall outside had filled with the rest of the servants, male and female, led by Barnstable, who was half choking in fury.
I caught Stanton by the lapel of his finely tailored coat, letting my sword come all the way out of the walking stick.
“Do not think to insult my wife in her own house,” I said in a tight snarl. “Do not think to insult her—ever. Do not even dare to speak her name.”
Stanton sneered even as he eyed my sword. “I see she has you tamed. Does she put you on a lead when you go out?”
I shoved him at Bartholomew and rested the tip of my sword on his throat. “I will be kind and not call you out,” I said. “But if you appear here again, I will ask you to name your seconds.”
Murder in St. Giles Page 10