by Lynn Messina
As soon as Lady Abercrombie and the earl were a few steps away, Bea turned to the duke and said with insulted outrage, “How dare you not trust me!”
Whatever charge Kesgrave had been about to level at her, it was forgotten in his amusement at her daring to accuse him of distrust. “I’m not sure indignation is your best strategy in this situation, my dear Bea. You surrendered the high ground the moment you entered the establishment.”
But she would not be put off by his humor. “You thought I came here with Nuneaton. Despite the fact that I gave you my word. Deny it if you can.”
He could not. “What else could I possibly think when I arrive to find you alone with him in a corner having a tête-à-tête?”
“That my word is inviolate,” she suggested heatedly. “That I’m worthy of trust. That we are partners, more or less, in this investigation and if it appeared as if I’d somehow broken my word then there must be some other explanation such as Lady Abercrombie invited the gentleman.”
Although her catalog was comprehensive, it was far from reasonable and he made no attempt to hide his exasperation with her belief that it made complete sense. “Why would Lady Abercrombie invite him? As Mowbray would say, it’s dashed odd fish.”
“Because he’s on her list,” Bea said.
He sighed with aggravation. “What list?”
“Of potential suitors. The countess was a friend of my mother’s and is determined to marry me off to expiate her guilt for not saving me from Aunt Vera,” she explained impatiently. “But that’s neither here nor there. The issue is you didn’t trust me to keep my word, and I absolutely did. I specifically did not promise not to come with Lady Abercrombie because I wanted to retain the option.”
But Kesgrave was too aghast at the idea of anyone wanting to marry her, let alone a dandy who sought perfection, to hear her words. He simply stared at her as if unable to even understand the concept, which was mortifying for her, and just as she feared the embarrassment was so intense she would burst into flames, Lady Abercrombie called for her to follow.
“I must tell you, Miss Hyde-Clare,” the widow said peevishly, “your mother would be most displeased with your making me wait. She was always efficient and punctual. Now do please begin your interview of Mowbray so that I may feel as though I am mentoring you properly.”
“Yes, of course,” Bea said, turning away from Kesgrave and entering the room. Although she worried what the countess would think of her questions, she knew it would be churlish to request her assistance and then deny her access.
Flinching slightly as Kesgrave closed the door behind him, Mowbray strode back and forth in the small room, peering at them with a trapped look in his eye. As Bea watched him awkwardly steer around the green-baize table, with its set of four cushioned chairs, she became convinced of his guilt. Now all she had to do was surprise him into confessing.
After observing him a full minute in silence to increase his anxiety, she said, “Tell me about the snuffbox you gave Mr. Wilson.”
Mowbray’s agitation, however, had risen to such a high degree, he couldn’t take the suspense any longer and he spoke at the exact same time. “Deuced awkward to admit, your grace, but I don’t recall how much I owe you. I’ve racked my brain but still cannot come up with anything. Is it a very large amount? The thing is, I can’t even recall wagering against you. Was it at Musgrove’s place? You know, his hunting box in Somerset? Didn’t think you were there. I thought our third was Quorn, as he had a rather large mustache, but perhaps I consumed a little too much of Musgrove’s claret—he keeps an impeccable cellar—and mistook a stain on your upper lip for a mustache. The goose had a particularly thick sauce. Dark, too, if I’m remembering it correctly. Could the sauce be the source of the confusion?” he added softly, before mumbling softly under his breath “the sauce be the source, the source be the sauce” a few times. Then he shook his head, as if trying to banish a great conundrum. “The answer, I suppose, would depend on how slovenly you eat your dinner. But if that’s the case, then Quorn owes me several hundred pounds, as I settled the debt with the wrong person. If that was the situation, then he should not have taken the money. Or did he confuse me with someone else? I wonder if—”
“Lord Mowbray!” Bea called with some insistence, unable to bear his rambling one second more. She’d thought for sure Kesgrave would put an end to it, especially when the young man had taken to impugning his tidiness as an eater, but he seemed only amused by the nonsense. “You owe the Duke of Kesgrave nothing.”
Heartily relieved, the earl brightened at once and let out a huge sigh, only to immediately inhale sharply and resume his anxious pacing. “Oh, dear, do I owe you money? Could you have been at Musgrove’s hunting box? I truly thought that was Quorn, as the mustache, you see, was so fulsome. But I suppose you could—”
“You owe me nothing either,” Bea said firmly, fearing another pointless digression. When his eyes shifted to Lady Abercrombie, she added her ladyship’s name to the list of people to whom he was not indebted. “We are not here to hold you to account. We are merely seeking information about the snuffbox you gave Mr. Wilson.”
His cloudy eyes, already so confused, went blank. “Mr. Wilson?”
“Yes, Charles Wilson,” she reminded him. “You had dealings with him in India.”
Mowbray repeated the name under his breath several times before illumination struck. “Ah, yes, Charlie! An excellent fellow. Why are you asking? Does he have some complaint about me? I hope not, for I dealt with him with the same honesty with which I dealt with all my associates in India. I split the profits from our scheme evenly in half. After I deducted my service fee, of course,” he explained, as if the need for this surcharge were readily obvious. “And my clerical fee. Oh, and I mustn’t forget the implementation fee. But these were all minimal, I assure you, and nothing to complain about if discovered, for I’m a very honest fellow. Honest to a fault, aren’t I, your grace. Now remind me, how much do I owe you?”
Kesgrave quirked an eyebrow at Bea, as if smugly asserting that he had warned her of the hazards of interrogating an intoxicated person.
She refused to believe no useful information could be gotten from the earl. In the midst of his drunken rambles, some truths would certainly fall. In vino veritas! “Indeed, yes, Lord Mowbray, you are quite the honest gentleman. So fine and upstanding. That is why it would be such a shame if stories about your nefarious dealings in India were to circulate among the ton.”
At once, the young earl raised an outraged hand to his lips as if to shush her. “The devil you say! My dealings were perfectly respectable. Perfectly respectable. Not a hint of nefarious…nefarious…” He struggled for the right word and in his cups came close. “Nefariousity! Not a hint of nefariousity about them. Told you, I split the profit evenly with Wilson after taking various administrative fees. Entirely aboveboard, I assure you. No one would say otherwise. I’m a regular out-and-outer, you know. Bang up to the mark and a whipster as well. Might try for Four-in-Hand. Or maybe Gentleman Jackson’s instead. I haven’t quite made up my mind. What do you think, your grace? Quorn said I would never make a boxer. Too gangly by half, he said. Or was that you?”
Struggling to hold on to her patience, Bea wondered by what method could one increase the sobriety of an intoxicated lord. Would a cup of tea help clear his mind? Would stepping on his foot? Shouting loudly in his ear? Unsettling him with mention of the snuffbox failed miserably, as he’d reacted to neither reference.
“But your agreement with Mr. Wilson was not aboveboard,” she pointed out, still hopeful of unnerving him and gaining access to the truth. “He gave you secret information that you then passed off as your own to your employer.”
“Yes, precisely,” Mowbray said with a slovenly smile, “for it was my job to report any information to my boss that would enrich or benefit the company. Why do you bring this up? Is Wilson claiming I behaved dishonorably? Is he? I cannot believe he would indulge in such disreputable behavior! W
here is he? Let me talk to him. I should like to persuade him to desist with these charges. It’s unbecoming of a gentleman. Is he here? It would be the best of all things, as I must ask him about my ring, my talisman ring. I lost it moments after we met. Or days. Perhaps weeks? Regardless, it felt like an ominous turn, and yet I came into my inheritance almost immediately after so perhaps the thing wasn’t working correctly. Maybe rather than warding off bad luck it was warding off good luck. Is it possible I had a broken talisman? What do you think, your grace? To whom should I lodge my complaint?”
Kesgrave laughed at the question, and even Lady Abercrombie chuckled. Frustrated, Bea glared at both of them, indicating that their amusement was not helping the situation.
But what would help it, she wondered. Would informing Lord Mowbray of Mr. Wilson’s death cut through his dull-witted inebriation or merely confound him further? She could easily imagine him going off on a nonsensical digression about funerals in India or ask if Wilson was to be buried with his talisman ring.
Surely, nobody was that much of a fool.
Of course not, she thought, wondering for the first time if his drunken stupor was merely an act to distract her from getting the answers she sought. Could he really be that diabolical?
If so, she would deliver him a surprise he would never expect.
“Where do you get nux vomica?” she asked.
Mowbray darted an angry scowl at her, and observing the show of temper as it crossed his face, she felt a flash of satisfaction that something had finally penetrated his facade. Clearly, he’d assumed nobody would figure out the type of poison he used, and he wasn’t prepared to hear its name spoken in the Red Corner House or anywhere else in the kingdom.
Just let him try to befuddle his way out of that one, she thought.
But when Mowbray spoke, it was to accuse her of trickery. “You will not get away with that. No, you will not! Ut profluenter Latine loqui et non cadere in plures!”
Dumbfounded, Bea looked at the duke, who grinned with unrestrained glee and translated: “I speak Latin fluently and won’t fall for your tricks.”
“Tricks?” she asked, baffled.
“He thinks you made up a phrase that sounds like Latin but is in fact nonsense,” he explained.
He’s toying with me, she thought, unable to believe anyone’s thinking could be so tangled and snarled. Mowbray was a man of superior intellect pretending to be a buffoon of staggering proportion.
She appreciated the deviousness even as she seethed over the results.
Before she could accuse him of evading the truth with his intentionally idiotic responses, Lord Mowbray announced that he would tolerate no further questions. “I understand now what you hope to accomplish with this interview, and it is to humiliate me. I do not know why you would settle on such a goal, though I assume Quorn is somehow involved, for it is impossible to fully trust a man who has swindled me with sauce. Your grace, I think this scene is unworthy of you and hope you will seek more honorable company in the future. Lady Abercrombie,” he said, turning to face the countess, “I do not know why you are here, but it has been a pleasure nonetheless. You must not think for a moment that I hold you responsible for the glass of port that has failed to appear.”
At that moment, the door opened and Nuneaton swept into the room with a glass of port held aloft. “Ah, there you are, Mowbray. I did not mean to tarry, but I had a devil of a time finding the right room. Harper-Smith and Carvin are playing casino next door and objected quite strongly to the interruption. And that is nothing compared with what is going on in the room next to theirs. Spillikins,” he said with relish, “for a pound a stick.”
Mowbray received his drink and thanked the other man for procuring it. Then he bowed at the duke, bobbed at Lady Abercrombie and left.
As soon as he was gone, Nuneaton turned to Beatrice and said, “It would be futile to pretend I wasn’t listening at the door, but my sense of what is going on could be no less acute than if I’d spent the entire time playing spillikins with Hathmore, Simpson and Warnock. I truly hope, Miss Hyde-Clare, that one day you will be kind enough to explain.”
Recalling again the finely honed disinterest on display in the Lake District, she said, “Be careful, my lord, not to exert yourself too much or society will discover that your studied pose of ennui hides a curious mind. Then what will you do? Engage with people? Laugh at their sallies? Inquire after their health? Imagine the horror.”
He shuddered on cue.
Kesgrave stepped forward and reminded the viscount of his theater obligation. “The curtain has most certainly risen by now.”
“And the overture begun,” Nuneaton agreed. “I must leave, as my uncle will be wondering where I am. Kesgrave, I trust you will escort the ladies safely to their carriage.”
The duke dipped his head in response.
Despite concern for his uncle, Nuneaton stayed to receive Lady Abercrombie’s gratitude for his willingness to serve. He assured her he had been unable to resist from the moment he’d read her note. When the door was closed behind him, Bea looked at Lady Abercrombie and thanked her in turn for being so ready to lend her assistance to a worthwhile and productive cause.
“Productive?” Kesgrave said scornfully. “You did not get a single satisfying answer out of him. He was incoherent from beginning to last.” He turned to the countess and smiled with superiority. “Do note, Tilly, I tried to warn her of the limited efficacy of interviewing a man whose faculties had been impaired by drink, but she would not listen.”
“Did you now?” the widow said thoughtfully.
Although Bea bristled at the smug expression on the duke’s face, she forced herself to remain calm as she replied. “Respectfully, your grace, I disagree. I learned a tremendous amount of pertinent information, which I will now sift through. Lady Abercrombie, shall we leave or would you like to linger in the hazard room? Having obtained my goal, I’m confident I can be a more patient observer.”
“Continue to tease me, Miss Hyde-Clare, and we will return to the hazard room,” Lady Abercrombie said firmly.
Bea lowered her head in contrition.
True to his word, Kesgrave escorted them to their carriage, and as they passed through the gaming hell’s main hall, he conversed exclusively with the beautiful widow. His tone was light and flirtatious as he peppered his chatter with excessive compliments and blithe observations about people they knew. It was exactly the way he had spoken to Lady Abercrombie on the afternoon she and Beatrice first met. At that time, Bea had found his ability to effortlessly adopt the mannerisms of a Bond Street beau both intimidating and disappointing, but now she felt nothing. Her original response had been based on an anxiety about their future interactions and a fear that having seen the Duke of Kesgrave in his proper milieu—the London drawing room—she would never feel comfortable in his presence again. Now, of course, there could be no worry of future dealings, as the advent of Lady Victoria had demonstrated just how unnecessary those concerns had been. As soon as she discovered who poisoned Mr. Wilson, her association with the duke would be firmly and irrefutably at an end.
Bea realized she’d had that very thought only a few weeks before when she and Kesgrave worked together to identify Fazeley’s killer, but this time she knew it would hold. Her mistake then had been in assuming she could solicit information from him without raising his suspicions. Obviously, he was too clever for that. Going forward, she would limit their exchanges to trivial matters such as the weather and their host’s excellent choice in flowers.
Her resolution set, Bea turned her attention to the far more interesting matter of Lord Mowbray. Pondering the interrogation, she became convinced every word he had spoken had been calculated to make himself appear too stupid for consideration. From the moment she had uttered Mr. Wilson’s name, he had known her objective and devoted himself to outwitting—or, rather, underwitting—her. Kesgrave, for all his intelligence and pedantic attention to detail, had missed it entirely. He had been too
busy gloating over Mowbray’s imbecility to realize it was diabolical, not drunken.
But not she.
Oh, no, Beatrice Hyde-Clare knew true inconsequential prattle, for she had been living with one of its masters for most of her life, and his nonsense fell well short of many of Aunt Vera’s towering achievements. If anything, his rambling had been too disjointed as he jumped from one topic to another. The genuine blatherer followed a general through line, with each thought building on top of the other.
Lord Mowbray, whose connection to India had already given him an edge over the other candidates, firmly jumped to the top of the suspects list and deserved a deeper look. The next step would be to search his quarters for evidence of his guilt, such as the poison itself or a receipt for the snuffbox.
She would propose the matter to the duke tomorrow after they met with Taunton. Naturally, he would have some objection about invading the private residence of a fellow peer, but she felt confident she could either overcome his scruples or ignore them entirely.
At Lady Abercrombie’s coach, Kesgrave bid them good night. As he turned to leave Bea coughed discreetly and looked him pointedly in the eye. Her intent was to confirm their appointment for the next day, and perceiving her meaning, he nodded abruptly.
As subtle as the exchange was, the countess observed it and wasted no time in taking her protégé to task for the many falsehoods she had told her, starting with the knife. “It wasn’t a gift for your uncle at all, was it? It was the weapon that killed Fazeley. You were investigating his death just as you investigated the death of that spice trader. What was his name? Ostler? Olsen?”
“Otley,” Bea supplied.
“Otley, yes,” she said, nodding. “Until Nuneaton mentioned the Lake District, I hadn’t realized you were at Lakeview Hall when Lady Skeffington murdered her lover. That must have been quite awful for everyone involved. Most house parties are deadly enough without someone getting bashed to death with a candlestick.”