Where Serpents Sleep sscm-4 Page 13

  “How is Stephanie doing on the Marriage Mart, by the way?” he asked. “Any bidders yet?”

  Amanda also watched her daughter. “Don’t be vulgar.”

  “I wouldn’t go with Ivins if I were you. He’s rather too fond of faro.”

  “We have hopes for Smallbone.”

  “Has he come up to scratch yet?” Sebastian watched his niece throw a provocative, laughing gaze up at the admiring Lord Ivins. Stephanie not only looked like the errant Countess, Sebastian realized, but she acted like her, as well.

  “Not yet.”

  “Best hope he does so soon,” said Sebastian. “My niece looks dangerously fond of Ivins.”

  The dance was ending. Sebastian watched Tristan Ramsey lead his glowing sister back to a matronly woman in puce, then disappear toward the supper room. “Excuse me,” said Sebastian, and left Amanda glaring after him with icy dislike.

  He came upon Ramsey in the supper room. The tables were spread with the usual Almack’s fare, which was simply thinly sliced bread and butter, plain cakes, lemonade, and tea. Ramsey had passed up the tea in favor of a glass of lemonade, but the bread and cakes didn’t appear to tempt him. He stood turned half away, the glass of lemonade seemingly forgotten in one hand, the fingers of his other hand sliding up and down his watch chain as he stared into space.

  Sebastian’s acquaintance with the man was slight. They might belong to the same clubs and at times frequent the same routs and balls, but they were separated by some four or five years and by a world of interests. Yet when Sebastian entered the supper room, Ramsey left the table and walked right up to him. “The woman whose body you showed Cedric Fairchild . . .” Ramsey threw a quick glance around and lowered his voice. “You’re quite certain it was Rachel?”

  “Fairly certain, yes.”

  Ramsey swallowed hard, his face going slack. He had even features and a pleasant enough face only slightly marred by a weak chin.

  Sebastian said, “You knew she was missing?”

  Ramsey nodded. From the ballroom came the beginning strains of a Scottish reel.

  “Then you also know, presumably, why she ran away.”

  “No.” The man’s gaze had wandered, but he now brought it back to Sebastian’s face. “I went to Curzon Street one day, planning to take her for a drive in the park, and Lady Fairchild told me Rachel was ill. They kept fobbing me off with one tale or another. Then they said she’d gone to Northamptonshire to recuperate.”

  “So how did you realize she wasn’t there?”

  “She never wrote to me. I finally went up to Fairchild Hall myself.” His lips flattened into a straight line. “When the servants told me they hadn’t seen her since shortly after Christmas, I drove straight back to Curzon Street and demanded the truth.”

  “And?”

  “Lord Fairchild admitted she’d run away.”

  “You had quarreled?”

  Ramsey’s eyes widened, his jaw sagging in denial. “No. Never.”

  “Then how do you explain her behavior?”

  “I don’t know. I looked for her everywhere. It was as if she just . . . disappeared.”

  Sebastian studied the other man’s ashen face. He had not, obviously, thought to search the alleyways and brothels of Covent Garden. But then, who would?

  Ramsey dropped his voice even lower. “Cedric says you’ve involved yourself in this at the request of a woman who survived the fire.”

  “That’s right.”

  “One of the whores?”

  “I’d rather not say.”

  For some reason, the answer seemed to trouble Ramsey. He stood with the glass of lemonade still untasted, the fingers of his free hand fiddling now with the gold locket he wore at the end of his watch chain. Sebastian said, “People typically run away because they’re angry, or because they’re miserable, or because they’re afraid. Was Rachel afraid of marriage?”

  A hint of color touched the other man’s pale cheeks. “Of course not. She couldn’t wait to be married.”

  “She was anxious to get away from her stepmother? The new Lady Fairchild?”

  Ramsey gave a surprised laugh. “Don’t be ridiculous. The woman’s a cipher, a shadow.”

  “What about her father? How did Rachel get along with him?”

  “Lord Fairchild?” Ramsey shrugged. “I don’t think she saw much of him, frankly. From what I understand he’s pretty much devoted himself to affairs of state. At least, since his first wife’s death.”

  Sebastian studied the other man’s pale, haggard face. “It’s curious, don’t you think, that a gently born woman would flee her home and seek refuge in Covent Garden, only to run away again in fear less than a year later?”

  “What makes you think she ran away in fear?”

  It struck Sebastian as a curious question. “Can you think of another reason she would run away? Twice?”

  “I told you. I don’t know.” His gaze drifted back to the ballroom. “Now you’ll have to excuse me. I promised my sister this lemonade,” he said, and brushed past Sebastian into the ballroom without a backward glance.

  Chapter 25

  It was when Sebastian was leaving Almack’s Assembly Rooms that he fell in with a small party that included Mr. Spencer Perceval, the Prime Minister. “Devlin,” said the Prime Minister, excusing himself from his party. “Walk with me a ways. I’ve been wanting to speak to you.”

  The night was cold and clear, the bells of the city’s churches chiming the hour as the two men turned their steps toward St. James’s. In his fiftieth year, the Prime Minister was a small, slender man with a thin, smiling mouth, protuberant light eyes, and a rapidly receding hairline. “I’m concerned about your father,” he said. “He doesn’t look well these days.”

  “Hendon eats too much, drinks too much, and smokes too much,” said Sebastian, wondering how many times in one day he could have this same conversation.

  Perceval laughed. “Don’t we all.”

  Sebastian kept his peace, although in truth, Spencer Perceval was a temperate family man who spent whatever free time the affairs of state left him either playing games with his children or searching the Bible for prophecies that he then wrote up and published in a series of religious pamphlets. “And how is Lady Perceval? And the children?” Sebastian asked, deliberately changing the subject.

  “Lady Perceval is well, thank you. And as for the children . . . well, they’re growing up too fast,” said the Prime Minister with that special smile that always lit his face when he spoke of his six sons and six daughters. “My eldest son will be heading off for Trinity College in the autumn.”

  Sebastian eyed the tattered hackney carriage that had pulled in close to the curb ahead of them. A man wearing an evening cloak stepped down, but the hackney didn’t move on and the man stayed in the shadows. “I remember when Spence was off to Harrow.”

  The Prime Minister smiled. “Makes one feel one’s age, does it not?” The smile faded, and he worked his square jaw back and forth in a way that reminded Sebastian of Hendon. “My Jane tells me I’m worse than a nosy old woman, but here it is. I don’t know what’s happened between you and Hendon, but I do know it grieves him. Grieves him badly. There. That’s all I’ve got to say on the matter. Just thought you ought to know. Before it’s too late.”

  Sebastian swallowed a spurt of annoyance and said evenly, “I understand you dined with Sir William Hadley on Monday.”

  “That’s right. At Long’s,” said the Prime Minister with a rush of heartiness, as if this time he were thankful for the shift in topic. “The food was appalling. I’ve a good mind to quit going there.”

  “What time did the evening break up?”

  “Not until midnight at least. You know how it is. A roomful of men with a steady supply of port and a dozen different opinions as to why the country is going to rack and ruin.”

  “Ah. I thought I saw Sir William that evening at Covent Garden, but I must have been mistaken.”

  “I don’t know about th
at,” said Perceval. “You might have. Sir William arrived late—close on to nine o’clock, if I remember correctly. Said something about—” He broke off as a man lurched toward them from out of the shadow of the waiting hackney.

  “There you are!” said the gentleman, planting himself in the center of the footpath with his hands clenched into fists at his side, the light from the nearest streetlamp limning the side of his face. “Thought to avoid me again, did you?”

  A spasm of embarrassment passed over the Prime Minister’s features. Like all well-bred Englishmen, Perceval found public scenes mortifying. “Mr. Bellingham, I did not attend Almack’s Assembly in an effort to avoid you.”

  The man was small and dark haired, with a long face that looked prematurely aged. He might have been fifty or sixty, but the blackness of his hair suggested an age nearer to forty. “All I demand is what is the birthright and privilege of every English-man,” said Bellingham, shoving his face up against Perceval’s. “How would your wife and family feel if you were torn from them for years? Robbed of all your property and everything that makes life valuable?”

  Perceval drew back, putting distance between them again. “You still have your wife and family, sir. And that is what makes life valuable.”

  “Easy for you to say,” sneered Bellingham, pivoting as Perceval brushed past him. “You haven’t been robbed of your liberty for years. Years!”

  “My good man.” Perceval swung to face him again. “I am sorry for your predicament. But it is not the place of the government to compensate you. Bring suit against this Israelite if you will, but your business with me is done.”

  Perceval turned on his heel and continued walking, Sebastian at his side. Bellingham shouted after them, “You think you can shelter behind the imagined security of your status, but you can’t. Do you hear me? You can’t!”

  Perceval kept walking, his lips pressed into a tight line, the click of their bootheels on the flagstones sounding unnaturally loud in the sudden stillness of the night.

  Sebastian said, “Who the devil was that?”

  “John Bellingham.” Perceval drew his handkerchief and pressed the neatly folded cloth against his upper lip with a hand that was not quite steady. “The poor man was imprisoned for years under the most dreadful conditions in Archangel. He had accused a shyster by the name of Solomon Van Brieman of insurance fraud over a scuttled ship, and Van Brieman retaliated by scheming to have the Russians ruin him. Truly, the poor man has been most grievously wronged, but he seems to think he’s entitled to a hundred thousand pounds’ compensation from His Majesty’s government, and that he is not.”

  “He sounds mad.”

  “He may very well be. I fear his sufferings have turned his mind.”

  “You would do well to be careful,” said Sebastian.

  Perceval huffed a laugh. “Of Bellingham? I deal with his ilk most every day.”

  Sebastian threw a glance over his shoulder. Bellingham still stood in the center of the footpath, his small body rigid with rage and frustration, his dark head thrown back against the soft glow of the nearest oil lamp. “He might attempt to do you harm.”

  “What would you have me do? Surround myself with body-guards? Never venture forth in public or mingle with the people? What sort of leader would I be then?”

  “A live one?” suggested Sebastian.

  But Perceval only laughed again and shook his head.

  Chapter 26

  Hero’s plans to pay a call on Rachel Fairchild’s older sister, Lady Sewell, were frustrated by Lady Jarvis, who insisted upon her daughter’s company on a protracted shopping expedition that afternoon. As this was followed by an early departure for a dinner party being held that evening at the country house of one of Lady Jarvis’s childhood friends, Hero resigned herself to putting off the visit to the next day.

  The estate of Sally, the Duchess of Laleham, lay only on the outskirts of Richmond, but Lord Jarvis insisted that both the footmen and the coachman be armed since they were traveling outside of London. At the end of the evening, as the carriage started on the long drive back to Berkeley Square shortly after midnight, Hero found herself unusually grateful for her father’s precautions.

  “It’s the arsenic powder,” Lady Jarvis was saying as mother and daughter sat side by side, gently rocking with the motion of the carriage. “Or so I’ve heard. It utterly ruined her health. Which is a pity, because Sally was quite lovely when she was young. But vain.”

  “Hence the too-liberal use of the arsenic powder,” said Hero.

  “Yes.” Lady Jarvis settled more comfortably against the plush seat and sighed. In contrast to her daughter’s Junoesque proportions, Lady Jarvis was a tiny woman, small of bone, with a head of once golden curls now fading gently to gray. “Yes,” she said again. “But there’s no denying it does give one the whitest skin. Sally was so lovely when she was young.”

  It was one of Lady Jarvis’s more irritating habits, this tendency to repeat nuggets of her conversation. Or at least, it irritated her husband, Charles, Lord Jarvis, to the point he could rarely tolerate her company. But Hero remembered a time when her mother had been different, when Lady Jarvis had been high-strung and emotional but not half mad and childlike.

  The light thrown by the carriage lamps bounced and swayed with the action of the horses and the bowling dips of the well-sprung chaise. Through the window, Hero caught a glimpse of a copse of birch trees, a flash of white trunks and darkly massed leaves against a black sky. The crisp evening air was heavy with the scent of plowed fields and damp grass and the lush fecundity of the countryside. Normally this was a journey Hero enjoyed. But tonight she found herself scanning the shadows and listening to the drumming of the horses’ hooves on the deserted road. An inexplicable shiver coursed up her spine.

  “Are you cold, dear?” asked Lady Jarvis, leaning forward solicitously. “Would you like the rug?”

  “No. Thank you,” said Hero, annoyed with herself. The road might be deserted, but she was not one to imagine highwaymen behind every wall or stand of trees. “I’m fine.”

  “The cream silk was a good choice,” said Lady Jarvis, casting an approving eye over Hero’s gown. “Better, I think, than the white I wanted you to wear.”

  “Cream is always a better choice than white,” said Hero with a light laugh, her gaze still scanning the horizon. “White makes me look like a cadaver.”

  Her mother shuddered. “Hero! The things you say! But you do look lovely tonight. You should crimp your hair more often.”

  Hero swung her head to look at her mother and smile. “If you had any maternal feelings at all, you would have found some way to ensure that your daughter inherited all your lovely curls.”

  Lady Jarvis looked troubled for a moment. Then her brow cleared. “Oh. You’re funning me. As if I had anything to say about it!”

  Hero felt a pain pull across her chest and turned her head to stare out the window again. She loved her mother dearly, but there were times when the contrast between the way Lady Jarvis was now and the way Hero remembered her was enough to bring the sting of tears to her eyes.

  The carriage lurched and swayed down a long hill, hemmed in on both sides by stands of dark trees undergrown with shrubs and gorse that pressed so close Hero fancied she could reach out and touch their branches. She became aware of the carriage slowing as the horses dropped down to a trot, then came to a shuddering halt as Coachman John reined in hard.

  “Why are we stopping?” demanded Lady Jarvis, sitting upright.

  Hero peered out the window at the horse and gig slewed across the road. “There appears to be a carriage in the way.” A man stood at the horse’s head, his voice a gentle murmur as he stroked the animal’s neck and said soothingly, “Easy, girl. Easy.”

  “What’s the trouble there?” shouted Coachman John.

  “A broken trace,” said the man, walking toward the carriage. By the pale light of the carriage lamps, Hero could see him quite clearly. He looked to be somewhere
in his midthirties, rawboned and darkened as if from years under a tropical sun. But his accent was good, and he wore a neat round hat and a gentleman’s driving cape, which swirled around a fine pair of high-topped boots.

  As he paused near the box, she became aware of the sound of hoofbeats coming down the hill behind them. One horse, ridden fast. Her gaze traveled from the man in the road to the double-barreled carriage pistol in a holster beside the door.

  The gentleman in the cape said, “If one of your footmen could help me move the gig out of the road, you can be on your way.”