The Viscount's Dangerous Liaison: Regency romantic mystery (Dangerous Deceptions Book 3)

by Louise Allen

  ‘But – ’

  ‘We’ll talk about it when we get back to the Grange.’

  ‘You – ’

  ‘What have you been drinking?’ he asked as the breeze blew her breath back to him.

  ‘Something Jed gave me. Goodness, you allowed me to finish a sentence, I feel quite faint.’

  One strong arm lashed around her midriff as Theo urged the horse into a canter. ‘I worry about you. No lady should have to see sights like that.’

  ‘No-one should have to,’ she said with a shudder and let her head drop back against his shoulder. ‘He was murdered, wasn’t he? Killed and covered up and left in the dark.’

  ‘I’m not certain. Wait until we can all discuss it together. This may be more complicated than we think.’

  Theo told himself not to fuss, not to over-protect Laura. She told him she’d fret herself to flinders if she was sent off to bed while the men discussed their grisly find – not, she assured him, that she’d allow herself to be sent in any case. He had to accept that she knew what was best for her, even though it ran exactly counter to his desire to wrap her up in cotton wool and put his body between hers and the entire hostile world. And kiss her until that look of horror was replaced by something else. Something he had no right to put there.

  He and Perry were down first after bathing. They suggested to Mrs Bishop that a very light luncheon might be all anyone could face and then found themselves in wary confrontation in the drawing room.

  ‘I appear to have allowed my feelings to become apparent,’ Theo said when it seemed that Perry was not immediately going to punch him in the face.

  ’Yes, you have, rather,’ Perry agreed, with an amiability that could only be false and dangerous.

  ‘Naturally Laura’s state of shock accounts for the fact that she did not repulse my… attentions.’ Hell, but this was difficult. And why was Perry being so confoundedly calm about it?

  ‘I doubt it.’ Perry strolled over to the decanters. ‘A dry sherry?’

  ‘The devil with sherry! Manners, I am trying to tell you that I seem to have developed… feelings for your intended and that I can only apologise and if you wish me to leave, I will of course do so, although under the circumstances – ’

  ‘Laura is not my intended. She is an old friend, one I care about deeply and if you break her heart, or cause her pain in any way, then I’ll remove your toenails by way of your nostrils, but otherwise, for what it’s worth, you have my blessing. If and when you do sort out exactly what you feel for her.’ He stood, decanter in hand and demanded, ‘Now, do you want a sherry or not?’

  ‘Yes.’ He sat down in an inelegant sprawl on the sofa. ‘Damn it, I don’t want to fall for a woman, any woman. I have just got myself betrothed.’

  ‘You’ve what? And you haven’t said anything? To whom?’

  ‘Lady Penelope Haddon, Prestwich’s eldest daughter.’

  ‘Good match. Well done.’

  ‘Is it? I’m just getting to terms with being a viscount and all that involves and I’ve not the slightest idea how to be a husband. With my history, I wouldn’t have blamed her father for turning me down, but he seemed pleased with the match.’

  ‘He would be,’ Perry said drily. ‘You’ve a title, money and have shown every sign of being a reformed character. And I heard something – she was involved with an artillery officer – or was it a naval lieutenant? – anyway, father put a stop to it on the grounds of no family and no money, so you’ll be a gift from the gods to a harassed parent. But you’ll know all about that, of course.’

  ‘No.’ Theo shook his head. ‘I didn’t trouble to look into her life much. Good family, healthy dowry, pleasant young woman.’ He grimaced. ‘I should have cared more, shouldn’t I?’

  ‘If you intend to spend the rest of your life with her, yes.’

  ‘There’s nothing I can do about it now. I’ve just got to stop thinking about Laura in that way.’ Like turning over the page in a book? Erasing a line of writing in black ink? So easy to say…

  ‘Are you in love with her?’ Perry dropped onto the other end of the sofa. ‘You positively growled at me back in the churchyard.’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Theo confessed. ‘I’ve never been in love, I daren’t think about it with Laura. I know I want to protect her. And kiss her… More than kiss her. I know I shouldn’t even notice another woman now I’m betrothed, but I want her. I like her, damn it.’

  ‘Has it occurred to you that you made a serious error in proposing to Lady Penelope?’

  ‘Of course it has. And there is nothing I can do about it except try my best to be a decent husband to her.’

  ‘How does Laura feel about you?’ Perry asked.

  ‘How would I know? I can hardly ask, can I? I’m not that much of a blackguard. But I know perfectly well that she could care passionately about me and it still shouldn’t make any difference.’

  ‘It shouldn’t, but I think it would. You don’t want me to ask her then?’ Perry ducked as Theo hurled a cushion at him.

  ‘This is not a laughing matter. Listen – they’re coming.’

  The sound of Laura and Will bickering gently over who should be supporting who, was audible through the half-open door. Theo got to his feet and went to open it wider as the two came in.

  Will had changed his clothes and was looking pale and anxious. Laura, in a simple sprigged cotton day dress, had some of her colour back, but her smile seemed forced to Theo. My guilty conscience, he told himself, trying not to look at the way her hair curled damply around her ears. He reached out a hand to touch it and then snatched it back.

  Without asking, Perry gave them both sherry and they all sat down in a silence that Will finally broke.

  ‘We must inform Sir Walter that his uncle has been found so that a funeral can be held as soon as possible. The Rector must be decently buried.’

  ‘He’s been in the crypt for eighteen years,’ Theo objected. ‘On holy ground. I do not think we should tell anyone about this until we have some idea what happened.’

  ‘It was murder, surely?’ Laura said.

  ‘Not necessarily.’ Perry unfolded a handkerchief to reveal four short metal rods that he placed on the low table that stood between them. ‘He had these in his pocket. I tried them as we closed the tomb. It took two of us to open it when we first discovered how it worked. But with these he could have opened it by himself. They are not some makeshift, they seem to have been cut to length specifically for the purpose, so he must have entered the tomb knowing how it worked.’

  ‘And he must have been involved in its construction,’ Will said slowly. ‘When I saw the crypt from the inside it was evident there was no reason why it should have been blocked up and that could not have been done without the knowledge of the Rector.’

  ‘So he was a smuggling parson and made an elaborate store for the contraband. They are common enough from what one hears,’ Laura said. ‘The church has always been on the smugglers’ route inland. It still does not mean he died by accident.’

  ‘We examined the body. A bit.’ Perry took a reviving gulp of sherry, got up and brought the decanter over to top up all the glasses. ‘Too early for brandy I suppose.’ He sat down again, cleared his throat. ‘Anyway, the ladder that was pushed to the side next to the body had a break in one of the uprights and it looked natural. There was a large knot in the wood that must have weakened it. There was no sign that the ladder had been interfered with.’

  ‘But he was a tall man,’ Laura protested. ‘At least, he seemed to have been…’ Her voice trailed away and she gave a little shiver. ‘Surely he could have improvised something?’

  ‘Not with a badly broken leg,’ Theo said. ‘That was apparent even without having to move the, er, remains. It looks as though he entered the crypt alone, closing the tomb behind him, the ladder collapsed causing him to fall and break his leg and perhaps creating other injuries. He could not get out, no-one knew he was there. If this happened early in the week he coul
d have lain there for days before the church was opened for the next service, by which time he was either dead or too weak to make his voice heard.’

  ‘Poor man. All alone in the dark waiting for a rescue that never came.’ Theo heard the shake in Laura’s voice but Will took her hand in his and she turned to him, not the other way towards Theo.

  As if it matters, so long as she is comforted, he told himself. And I am the one recounting all the ghastly details. Why would she turn to me?

  ‘But we have not thought this through,’ Perry said. ‘He cannot have been the only person who knew about the crypt and the tomb. The sole reason for having such a large secret storage space is for a considerable amount of contraband – casks and bales of stuff. He could not possibly have managed that by himself.’

  ‘And we are not the first people to find him,’ Laura said, her voice strengthening. She let go of Will’s hand and sat up straighter. ‘Someone covered the body with that tarpaulin.’

  ‘There would have been a gang of smugglers working with Swinburn,’ Theo said, working it out as he went along. ‘They used the crypt, but the day he disappeared he must have gone there alone for some reason. He had the accident and was trapped. A hue and cry was sent up and the area must have been swarming with searchers looking for him, so the gang would have lain low, not knowing he was there. Even if they had casks down in the crypt that was not the time to be shifting them. By the time it felt safe to open the tomb it was already too late and they found him dead.’

  ‘So they took away their goods, closed the tomb and stayed clear. Without the connivance of the Rector it would be risky to keep using the crypt and the Reverend Gilpin who succeeded him was no supporter of free trade. I would guess they found alternative hiding places,’ Perry mused. ‘There are barns further inland along that track on Swinburn land.’

  ‘So we have solved the mystery of the tomb, but we still do not know why anyone should have attacked Will,’ Laura said. ‘If no-one is using the crypt for illegal purposes nowadays then why should whoever it is fear some antiquarian research?’

  ‘It is the Swinburns and they do not want a scandal about the Rector, their relative?’ Perry suggested.

  ‘If they knew about his body being there then I would have expected them to take the initiative and remove it one dark night,’ Will said as he leant forward to set his empty glass on the table. ‘Then, whatever is found down there, nothing links it to the family. And anyway, an old scandal like that is surely not reason for murder?’

  The door opened behind them. ‘Excuse me, my lord.’ It was Pitkin holding something wrapped in handkerchief. ‘I thought this might be important. I was brushing the, er, garments Miss Darke used this morning and I found this in one pocket of the coat.’ He walked forward and, with rather more theatre than Theo would have expected of him, set the cloth on the table, just where a shaft of sunlight hit it

  Pitkin flipped back the cloth and there was a collective gasp as they stared at the disc of bright gold nestling in the linen.

  Chapter Twelve

  ‘Laura?’

  She realised that they were all staring at her. Where had that coin come from? Then she realised. ‘It was on the floor of the cut under the tomb. I landed on it when I fell in. I was groping around and my fingers found that just after I felt what I thought was a human bone with my other hand. I must have pushed it into my pocket while I was flapping about panicking.’

  ‘A profitable business, smuggling,’ Perry remarked as Theo picked up the gleaming object.

  ‘I am sure it is.’ Theo brushed away a crumb of dirt and lifted the coin to eye level. ‘But this cannot be part of the Reverend Swinburn’s ill-gotten gains. This is a fifty franc Napoléon minted in the Revolutionary year An 12, which, if memory serves me right, is more or less equivalent to 1803. That is eight years after Swinburn died.’

  He passed the coin to Laura and she bent over it. On one side was the profile of a young Napoleon with the words Bonaparte Premier Consol. On the other side, a laurel wreath with 50 Francs inside, surrounded by Republique Français, An. 12, a tiny cockerel and the letter A.

  ‘That is the mint mark for Paris,’ Will said when she passed it to him. ‘There was an article about the French currency in the Gentleman’s Magazine a while ago.’

  Finally Perry put the coin back on the table. ‘So the crypt has been used since at least 1803.’

  ‘Wait a moment.’ Theo got to his feet and began to pace. ‘This is all wrong. Smugglers are importing goods into this country, yes? We no longer smuggle goods out, the days of illegal, untaxed wool exports is long past – ’ He stopped and stared at them expectantly. ‘Yes?’ When they nodded he began to pace again. ‘So the smugglers would be buying things in France – brandy, lace, tobacco and so forth, spending English money. That is one of the objections to smuggling – the flow of English gold into France, into the pockets of the regime we are at war with. So in that case, what is a high-denomination French coin doing over here?’

  ‘Picked up as a souvenir and dropped?’ Will hazarded.

  ‘Fifty francs? In gold? That is not going to change anyone’s life, but I’d be irritated if I lost it and a working man is going to be downright annoyed. He’d search for it, I’d have thought,’ Theo said.

  ‘So either he could not go back to look for it or whoever dropped it had so many that they did not notice one lost,’ Laura said. ‘But many French francs, in gold? Here? Someone has been selling something valuable to the enemy if that is the case.’

  ‘And that’s a wonderful motive for attempted murder,’ Perry said triumphantly.

  ‘What a relief to know why I was attacked,’ Will said faintly. ‘I feel quite relaxed about it now.’

  ‘Sorry,’ Perry said ruefully.

  ‘But all we need to do to make you safe is to announce our find,’ Theo said, coming to a sudden halt in front of the fireplace. ‘We tell the Swinburns and make certain the news is passed far and wide, even if they want to keep it quiet to save the family reputation. We don’t tell anyone about the coin. As far as we are concerned the story ends with the Rector’s death.’

  ‘So it wasn’t necessarily Sir Walter or Giles who tried to kill Will?’ Perry looked as though he was finding it hard to keep up.

  ‘If we could work out the secret of the tomb – and doesn’t that sound like the title of a truly gruesome Gothick novel? – then anyone else could have done so at any point between the Rector’s death and now,’ Theo pointed out. ‘It might be local smugglers who started using it again and the coin was just accidentally dropped by someone who had it in their pocket. Or it could be treason or something we haven’t thought of yet.’

  There was a depressed silence. Perry absent-mindedly poured himself another glass of sherry and tossed it back in one. Will closed his eyes as though in prayer, Theo scuffed the hearthrug with his toe and Laura stared at her worn shoes and tried very hard not to think about the horror that lay in the crypt.

  ‘I want to go to Norwich,’ she said, startling the men. Perry dropped the stopper of the decanter with a crack.

  ‘You think the answer is there?’ Theo asked.

  ‘You want to consult the Bishop?’ Will suggested.

  ‘I want to go shopping. I’ve got two gowns to my name, both of them looking the worse for wear. I’ve one pair of shoes…’ To say nothing of only two changes of linen. She was too tactful to mention underwear in front of the men. ‘And I am tired of being inside here all the time.’

  ‘You went out this morning,’ Perry pointed out.

  ‘Yes, wasn’t that a delightful outing? No, I intend to go to Norwich.’

  ‘You might be recognised,’ Theo objected.

  ‘I am certain Mrs Bishop has a suitably voluminous veil I can borrow. There is no need for any of you to disturb yourselves, if I may borrow Edward or Terence, Perry.’

  ‘What would disturb me would be for you to be in Norwich when we have no idea of who, or what, we are dealing with,’ Theo s
napped. ‘Other than the fact that they are a killer, that is.’

  ‘Are you forbidding me to go?’ This was the man who had held her as she reeled from the shock of seeing that gruesome body, the man in whose arms she had dreamt of being… And, now I come to think about it, the man who tosses me onto his horse like Lochinvar without a by-your leave, orders me about, doesn’t let me finish a sentence. Oh yes, and the man with a fiancée in London. Never forget that. ‘You have no right whatsoever.’

  Theo looked at her, lips compressed, brows drawn together and she scowled back. Then he gave huff of laughter and looked across at Perry. ‘You see? I have absolutely no idea.’

  ‘No idea about what?’ she demanded.

  ‘It doesn’t matter. Would you allow me to escort you to Norwich, Miss Darke?’

  It was a flag of truce. ‘Very well. If you can spare the time. Thank you.’ And that was not very gracious, but it was the best she could do with her hackles still up. And why did Perry look as though he was about to choke on suppressed mirth? She switched the glower to him and he subsided.

  ‘I ought to come too,’ Will said, emerging from his long silence. ‘I really should speak to the Bishop.’

  ‘Before we break the news about their relative to the Swinburns?’ Theo queried.

  ‘We opened a tomb in a churchyard without authority,’ Will said, looking miserable. ‘And we have no absolute proof that that is the Reverend Swinburn down there.’

  ‘But it was not a genuine tomb,’ Theo protested. ‘And we did absolutely no digging, nor did we damage the tomb itself. In fact we discovered the secret catches by accident while we were studying the thing. He cannot blame you.’

  ‘And how many missing clergymen have there been in this area in the past fifty years?’ Perry added. ‘It has to be Swinburn.’

  ‘It is not a question of my behaviour,’ Will began.

  ‘I think it is a good idea,’ Laura said, cutting across him. ‘If we tell the Bishop first then there will have to be a proper, official, investigation and the re-opening of the crypt. If my uncle, or anyone else, has an illicit interest in it then they will have less chance of covering up any evidence that we have not yet found.’