by Regina Darcy
The second son had died at age ten when a pernicious fever took his young life. The first son, who had inherited the title when George was serving on the Ville de Paris under Admiral Collingwood, ended up in debtor’s prison.
George had come home from the war to find his family home plundered, his brother in disgrace, and his father dead.
He had, though the youngest of the sons, been obliged to do some swift negotiating to get his brother Edward out of Newgate with the stern injunction that he was to serve honourably as the Earl.
Edward, grateful for the reprieve from the vile prison, had done his best. But he had inherited their mother’s weak lungs. His health, never good after prison, failed and he too died. So it was that at age twenty-seven, George Devon was the Earl of Gilberton and a bachelor.
“I do not intend to seek a bride at this very minute, Aunt Elspeth, I have after all just returned from the continent,” George declared, signalling to the footman that it was time to refill his wine.
Great-Aunt Elspeth glared disapprovingly as the ruby hues of wine filled the precious heirloom Gilberton glass.
“Imbibing has been the downfall of the gentlemen in this family,” she declared gloomily. “I was a mere child when my Uncle Hereford fell victim to it.”
“I thought it was Cousin Martin who was undone by too much brandy.”
George, familiar with the dire family history, which his Great Aunt Elspeth preached to him whenever he strayed from the path of decorum, recalled the names from a litany of relatives who had fallen from grace.
“He drank,” Great Aunt Elspeth acknowledged, pursing her lips, “but he died from falling off his horse.”
“Was he drunk?” George asked hopefully.
He’d thought he had all the family legends memorised.
“Possibly. Probably. It is of no importance — George, do not distract me. We were speaking of marriage.”
“You were speaking of marriage, dear Aunt. I am merely trying to make certain that I know which portrait I can connect with when I am next at Gilberton Hall in the Portrait Gallery.”
It was a shrewd dodge. Great Aunt Elspeth was usually quick to rise to the bait of the ancestral Gilberton home and the need for renovations. George, who when he was in England was usually in London, where he could be, when the need arose, easily found, was well aware that the Hall needed repairs. But it was not a priority at the moment. Distracting his Great Aunt from her lamentation on his bachelorhood was more important.
“George,” said his indomitable relative, “you will take a bride to Gilberton Hall one day soon, I pray. Before I die, I should hope. You will need to wed an heiress in order to be able to live there in dignity.”
Drat! The gambit had failed. His reference to the Hall had only broadened Great Aunt Elspeth’s web of threads, each tied to marriage.
“I’m sure that you have a list drawn up of heiresses, Aunt Elspeth,” George told her. “But I am home now and not inclined to marry just yet. I wish to enjoy my solitude.”
“It is your own fault that you have delayed what a dutiful young man accepts as his rightful course. Traipsing off to all the unhallowed places on the Continent, engaged in God only knows what sort of foolery—I thought that the navy would cure you of your whimsical trait. Your Great-Great-Grandfather Gilberton had that very same trait, you know, and he supported the Duke of Monmouth.”
“Then he was not whimsical, he was a fool,” George replied. “After all, only a fool would engage in treason. I hope you do not think me a fool.”
“He was whimsical,” Great Aunt Elspeth said firmly. “As are you.”
“I am loyal to the King, mad though he may be,” George said. “I’m loyal to the Prince Regent as well.”
Great Aunt Elspeth’s lips thinned. In her opinion, the Prince Regent was a wastrel, extremely debauched, extravagant and vain. There was nothing good to say about him, or about the fact that her great-nephew was no stranger to the Carlton House set.
“Naturally,” she said, “you are loyal to the monarch and the monarch’s family. But George, really, must you emulate him?”
“Aunt Elspeth! I am dismayed by your comments.”
George, who had perhaps imbibed more wine than he ought to have done, rose to his feet. Standing against the wall, ready to serve the courses of the meal, the servants watched in astonishment as their master took on a dramatic pose. “I assure you, Aunt Elspeth, that there is no corset beneath this coat.”
“Oh, George, sit down,” his great aunt told him in irritation. “If I want a performance, I shall go to Drury Lane.”
George sat down abruptly, wondering how it could be that the chair beneath him had risen so quickly. He was well able to hold his liquor—his peculiar talents, as the Prince Regent described them—required that he have an immense capacity for drinking with an even greater ability to avoid its effects.
The servants, signalled by Hawkins the butler, moved forward to serve the next course. Great Aunt Elspeth had ordered a very splendid meal for her great-nephew’s homecoming; her only regret was that his letter informing her that he was returning had strictly forbidden her to invite any guests. So it was that he and his great-aunt were dining as magnificently as if they were hosting an assembly.
But the food was first-rate and far better than the noxious dishes he had consumed while attending to the Prince Regent’s business, so George had no intention of complaining. “The turbot is excellent,” he commented. “Upton, pray give my compliments to Mrs Dudley.”
“Mrs Dudley has retired to Swansea,” Great Aunt Elspeth told him. “I hired a new cook. I trust that you approve.”
“Undoubtedly,” George said. “What is her name?”
“It is easier to simply call her Mrs Dudley,” his great aunt told him, as if a servant’s name was of no great importance. “I believe she calls herself Mrs Mandelette, but that is rather ostentatious. She has agreed to be referred to as Mrs Dudley.”
George stared at his great aunt in disbelief.
“You did not allow her to retain her name?”
“She will cook the same whether she is Mrs Dudley or Mrs Mandelette. Really, George, that whimsical streak of yours is a matter of concern. It will lead you into trouble if you are not careful.”
If Great Aunt Elspeth only knew, George thought.
She had no idea that what she, and most of London, were convinced was the boisterous escapades of a bachelor were far less capricious and grimmer in purpose. For George Devon, Earl of Gilberton had been the royal family’s most astute and resourceful spy ever since he had returned from the Royal Navy.
“Aunt—”
The knock on the door brought Hawkins the butler to attention. Bowing soberly to the Earl and his great aunt, Hawkins left the dining room to answer the caller. He returned shortly.
“My Lord,” Hawkins said, “you are required at Carlton House.”
“But you’ve only just returned home!” Great Aunt Elspeth lamented. “We haven’t discussed the ball, or the guest list, or the renovations that must be done to the ballroom. Look,” she said, handing him a swatch of fabric that she had apparently been withholding until the correct moment came to reveal it. “I must have your thoughts on this.”
“Very well, Aunt,” he told her as he stood up and shoved the fabric in his pocket. “I shall consider its merits with all due attention, but first, the Prince Regent awaits.”
“You’ve only just returned home, George,” his great aunt chided him. “I would have thought that you could remain at home for this one night.”
“The carriage is waiting, my lord,” Hawkins informed him pointedly.
“The Prince Regent’s carriage?” George inquired with a raised eyebrow. Was Prinny actually going to reward him for solving the unpleasant business of blackmail that had threatened his reputation? It was always a tricky business, angling to get the Prince Regent to pay for the services rendered, but if he had sent his personal carriage, then perhaps there was hope of remu
neration.
“No, my lord,” Hawkins said regretfully. “It is a hired carriage.”
Of course.
The Prince Regent would not wish to advertise his presence, lest word leak out of what George regarded as ‘the footman’s affair’. Trust the Prince Regent to be so careless in his unkempt private life that he should fall prey to a footman with a larcenous partner.
“Very good, then,” George bent down to give his great aunt a peck on the cheek. “Hawkins, no need to wait up for me. I’ll let myself in.”
The carriage driver divulged no information as he opened the door while George got in. When the carriage arrived at Carlton House, George was ushered into one of the anterooms, where he waited for approximately a quarter of an hour. When the door opened, it was not to admit an attendant of the Prince Regent or even the Prince Regent himself. Instead, an ordinary-looking gentleman stepped forward, followed by another man.
“I am sent from Newgate Prison, in an official capacity,” the man said with an expectant look. Clearly he was awaiting the customary surprise, quickly followed by aversion that the average citizen would have to such an introduction.
But George was not the average citizen. He stared at the men.
“What the devil do you want with me?”
“You are accused of the murder of Lord Dalton,” the prison official informed him.
George flinched, startled by the statement.
Murder? Lord Dalton?
“I see the name is not unfamiliar to you,” The man muttered looking smug.
“Neither is the name of the Prince Regent. I hope you are not accusing me of murdering him,” George snapped. Lord Dalton was certainly known to him, again because of George’s covert vocation for uncovering crimes, which threatened the reputation of the royal household.
Lord Dalton had been an accomplice to Lord Walcott Overton, an adversary who had stood against George in his efforts to uncover blackmail. Overton had also been integral to the circuitous web of conspiracy that had forced the Viscount of Randstand out of England and sent him to the United States.
“You are also accused of thievery,” the official went on with a smile, clearly enjoying his duty. “You have stolen a priceless Egyptian artefact. You have bribed a servant to be complicit in your crimes.”
The accusations were so outrages that for one moment George stared at the man dumbfounded. He had come to receive his just reward, not to be accused of some accursed crime.
“The devil I have,” George responded. His voice was like steel covered in velvet. “It’s no secret that Dalton and I are not comrades. We differ in everything from our politics to our taste in antiquities. I suppose that since English law has not yet having been abolished by Parliament, I might be told what proof exists of these nefarious deeds?”
“There is a witness. And the weapon, belonging to you, which was left at the scene of the crime. Covered with Lord Dalton’s blood.”
“I should hate to think that I would be so careless, were I a murderer, as to leave the weapon where it could be found by any Tom, Dick or Francis who could claim eyesight,” George said. “I may have had an enemy in Lord Dalton, but I find that having enemies who are alive and breathing is vastly preferable to dead ones. I did not kill Dalton. Therefore, someone else did, and it would seem that you knaves are intent on arresting an innocent man. I am bereft to think that Great Britain has fallen so far that Newgate Prison would prefer to house an innocent man whilst the guilty culprit goes free. However, if it is to be, I must submit to your will.”
He bowed his head, the very image of the submission he had evoked. The officials came closer in order to arrest him.
“You’re a peer of the realm,” said the first one. “Therefore, we’ll trust you to come along without fuss so that we don’t have to manacle you. We’ll just tie your hands so that you don’t get any notions about running off. There’s nowhere to run, you see.”
“That’s very good of you,” George said, putting his hands in front of him. The official approached him with the rope in hand. Suddenly, George’s inertia disappeared, to be replaced by a vigorous defence as he grabbed the rope from the first official and brought it to his neck while the second man gaped. But not for long, because as George’s hands gripped the rope around the neck of the official who had been so foolish as to try to restrain him, his leg had made swift, punishing contact with the crotch of the second official, who screamed and fell to the floor.
“Now, my good man,” George said, slightly breathless from his exertions but otherwise entirely composed, “I think that I may require a hostage and you will do just as well as—”
“Good God, George, what are you doing?” a voice cried out, sounding decidedly annoyed.
George looked up and at the sight of his sovereign; he stopped dead in his tracks.
Of course he is here. Just my rotten luck!
“You’ll pardon me for not bowing, Your Majesty, but it seems that I am under arrest and such circumstances take precedence over the usual niceties.”
The Prince Regent, dressed as usual in his extravagant formalwear, looked from the official writhing on the floor to the one who had a rope around his neck.
“Now, George . . . you really must desist,” he said with a frown.
“Must I? If you were given a choice between Newgate Prison and proving your innocence, which would you choose? I detested Dalton but I never laid a hand on the pompous bastard.” George’s level gaze met the Prince’s uneasy stare. “I have a fondness for some pompous bastards,” George went on in a conversational manner. “They often have the most diverting secrets. But it’s not worth killing them for it.”
“I don’t believe a bit of it,” the Prince Regent declared finally with a sigh. “That’s why I have come here to your defence. You have only to prove your innocence by investigating the names on this list that I have brought for you, unmask the person who has marked you as the murderer, and thus prove your innocence.”
“I am innocent now, my guilt has yet to be proven,” George replied drily.
“Quite, quite,” agreed the Prince Regent. “But you must prove yourself to be innocent; surely you can understand how very intricate this matter is. I know you to be a man of honour and loyalty. But I cannot simply say so without evidence. You must procure the evidence.”
“Dear me,” George said. “I seem to be doing rather a lot of that lately. Procuring the evidence, I mean,” he said, as the Prince Regent coloured beneath the rouge on his cheeks.
“I’ve only just arrived home, expecting to enjoy a bit of peace and quiet and here I am, obliged to defend myself against a charge of murder, theft, and bribery.” He tightened his grip slightly on the official he was holding. The man moaned.
“Point one: I only kill in the service of the crown, and not for my own pleasure, if murder can be so described.
Point two: I am not an aficionado of Egyptian antiquities and would not steal one. Do you not know that there are curses on items taken from a pharaoh’s tomb? I have enough bad luck in my life without luring the ill will of Osiris and Horus to haunt me.
Point three: I don’t bribe, because I must work with the funds that are provided for me and I seem to have spendthrift employers who expect me to use my charms to bend others to do my will, Your Majesty.”
“My dear George, surely you understand my position. I am presented with this evidence and it is well known that I am one of your most fond advocates. I cannot defy the law when the evidence points to your guilt. Indeed, I have put myself in a precarious position merely by giving you this list of suspects.”
“And you are doing so in the presence of these two men who will undoubtedly swear that such a list never existed.”
“Oh, well, I don’t think we need to go into all of that,” the Prince Regent said hurriedly. “You’ve only to find the real murderer and then you may return to your ... er . . . other pursuits.”
“I see.”
Behind George’s unpertu
rbed demeanour, his brain was circling like an industrial machine, rounding the various facts as he understood them and turning around the likely obstacles that he would face.
He could not trust the Prince Regent, despite the service he had rendered him in all matters, including royal indiscretions and assassinations.
The two Newgate officials would parrot whatever they were told to say and could not be relied upon to support his protestations of innocence.
An enemy was dead and George was being put forth as the murderer.
There was a witness to the murder, which merely meant that someone had been bribed to lie.
He handed the Prince Regent the ends of the rope which was tugging at the Newgate official’s neck.
“As you wish,” he said. “The list of suspects please.”
Only the certainty that the two officials were physically incapable of apprehending him, allowed George to turn his back to the men as he walked out of the anteroom and out the doors of Carlton House.
As he took the list and put it into his pocket for safekeeping, his fingers brushed the piece of fabric that Great Aunt Elspeth had given him. To think that only hours ago his greatest problem was an overbearing relative.
Disgusted, George took the cloth and dropped it on a pile of droppings left by a horse-drawn carriage.
Matrimony. What hogwash!
He was in a fight to keep a noose away from his neck. The noose of matrimony that Great Aunt Elspeth wanted to see placed there was simply going to have to be postponed while he fought for his life.
TWO
“And as I said to the man, it’s not worth sixpence, let alone six pounds six, and I won’t pay such a price. The rise in prices is abominable. Six pounds six, I said, that is common robbery and you, sir, are daft to think that I would pay such a price. I did not acquire my wealth by being deluded by every merchant and shopkeeper in London, I said. It is not to be borne, this calamitous larceny practiced by the tradesmen. I blame Napoleon.”
“Napoleon is in exile,” Lady Frederica Beecham felt obliged to interject. She had been in danger of falling asleep, so deadly dull was her fiancé’s conversation. Only the reference to Bonaparte brought her back to something approaching alertness.