“What is the meaning of all this?” Alexandra asked, looking from the old man to his son, who was still breathing hard, still holding his hand to his head. “Who are you, sir?”
“Ah, my lady. So you are Douglas Sherbrooke’s wife.” He gave her a slight bow. “Your husband is a cocky bastard I greatly admire. He is a genius at strategy and has proved it many times over the years. I suppose my son here brought you along as leverage against Helen?”
“Yes, I did,” said Gerard, pushing off the wall and finally managing to stand straight. “And it will work. Helen is fond of her. They are great friends. I have but to point my gun at the countess’s head and Helen will take us to the magic lamp. She already said she would, once I threatened her friend here.”
“A lamp,” Sir John said, marveling at his son. “You actually believe that foolishness that is all over London? Are you an utter fool? There is no magic lamp. It is all fiction, an interesting tale invented in Helen’s fertile imagination. Everyone is enjoying gossiping about it. It means nothing. Don’t you realize that if there were something that important, some ancient relic with strange powers, no one would know about it? It would be kept a close secret.”
Helen looked at him and smiled inwardly. Spenser had been exactly right. How could anyone possibly believe in something purportedly magic when everyone knew about it?
Alexandra went to stand by Helen, making Sir John laugh. “Just look at the two of you together. You are a giant, Helen, an oddity, a freak.”
She grinned over at him. “At least I am not so old that my skin is spotted and hanging off my body and my teeth are all rotted.”
He took a step toward her, raised his hand, then slowly lowered it. He looked down at his hand for a moment. “You were not so impertinent when you were eighteen,” he said slowly.
“And you were not so openly rude—though you were older than death even back then. I remember as well how you looked at me and how you did not want your precious son to marry me.”
Sir John shrugged. “I knew you wouldn’t hold him. I knew you wouldn’t give him a child immediately, as he claimed you would.”
“What do you mean, I wouldn’t hold him?”
“Even then, my worthless son was already searching out ways to make more money. I bought him the commission, hoping, praying he would change. He could have followed in my footsteps. But he didn’t. He got an excellent dowry from your father, but it was gone in a month. And what did you do? Nothing. You believed every ridiculous lie he told you. But I knew you would change. I knew there was grit in you, a strong will, but you just didn’t change quickly enough to be of any use to me. Yes, I was right. Just look at what you’ve become.”
“No, Father,” Gerard said. “Her dowry lasted two months. It would have lasted much longer, but I was cheated. It was Jason Fleming, Lord Crowley, who cheated me. I wanted to kill him, but then he left to go hunting in Scotland, the conniving bastard, and I could do nothing. And Helen refused to get pregnant.” Gerard gave his wife a malignant look. “All I wanted from you was a child, nothing more, nothing less, at least after your dowry was gone. But you wouldn’t give me one.”
“I am very pleased about that,” Helen said. “Incidentally,” she said to his father, “I was only eighteen. If I had been as smart then as I am now, do you believe I would ever have attached myself to your toad of a son? Not very likely, sir. He turned out badly enough. I cringe to think if he had, instead, turned out like you.”
Gerard, unlike his father, did not have much self-control. “Don’t you insult my father, you worthless woman!” He was on her in an instant, his arm drawn back to strike her. Helen just shook her head as she raised her knee, struck him hard in the groin, then sent her fist into his neck.
Gerard howled, clutched himself, and fell to the floor, hitting the wall. He didn’t know whether to rub his crotch or his neck, both hurt so badly. He kept swallowing and moaning as he rocked back and forth. Finally he whispered, “Father, look what she did to me. Kill her. No—just wound her. You can kill her later, after I have the lamp—but maybe not. She is my wife, after all. I will think about this. Also, if she knows you will kill her, there is no reason for her to take me to the lamp. And I swear to you, there is a magic lamp and she knows where the lamp is. She finally admitted to me that she has it. I want that lamp. She said there is no power in it, that if there were, she would have struck me dead with it.
“But she is just a woman, she doesn’t know anything, except how to lie. Oh, God, I will die now.” He was gasping, leaning over, holding himself.
“I don’t know how you can talk with that blow to the throat,” Helen said, not moving, just watching the effects of her handiwork. “Much less talk so we can understand you.”
“Thems were fearsome blows ye planted on ’im,” said the skinny little man in such an admiring voice that Alexandra stepped forward, shook her fist at him, and said, “Would you like to be next, you little sot?”
“Sich words from a countess. It be a disgrace.”
“Be quiet. Hold your place, my lady. Now, what is your name?”
“Alexandra Sherbrooke.”
“No, not you, I know who you are. Him, the little villain.”
“Me name’s Bernie Ricketts. Yer son wot’s lying agin’ the wall over there moaning give me money to get them ladies. I knows locks, and I twists them and kisses them until the doors open like a dream, I did, and in yer son goes, all free like, into both them bloody mansions. Then I keeps the watch so nobody can come and nab us. I did everything right, I did. Yer bloody son, that one didn’t give me enuf money. The big ’un there, all blond and beautiful she be, but at the core o’ things, she’s a killer.”
“Yes, I can see that she is,” said Sir John Yorke. He looked bemused at the outpouring of all Mr. Ricketts’s confidences. He shook his head. “Now, all of this has been amusing, but I have much to accomplish before the new day breaks.”
“The new day has already broken,” Gerard said, trying to straighten, trying to speak above a whisper, because now his throat hurt very badly. “What do you mean?”
Sir John looked his son over, his eyes dark and very tired. “You know, I tried to kill you once, Gerard, and I failed.”
“No,” Gerard said, “no, that’s impossible. You may be sinister and no one really knows what you do or who you are, and I know that you beat my mother to death, but you’re still my father. You wouldn’t kill me, would you? Surely that isn’t right.”
“I didn’t beat your mother to death, you idiot. She fell from the balcony of our house, nothing more than that. As for you, you were my son and I had hopes that you would make something of yourself, but you didn’t. You are a wastrel. You are utterly worthless. You became a traitor to your country. There is nothing lower than a traitor.
“Naturally I would not let you ruin our family’s name, but you managed to survive the ship’s exploding and somehow get to shore.”
“But you didn’t make the ship sink. Even you couldn’t manage that, Father.”
“No, I hired one of the sailors to hit you on the head and throw you overboard, quickly and quietly. Then it would have been over, and your reputation of being a hero would be safe. The family would have been saved from disgrace.
“It was all arranged, but then there was the accident aboard your ship and it exploded before the sailor could find you. And then you were safe with your masters and I couldn’t get to you.”
Helen and Alexandra looked at each other. Sir John had fully planned to have his own son killed?
Helen said, “You honestly wanted to kill him because you discovered he was a traitor?”
“Yes, Helen. Gerard wanted money, and so he got it the only way he could. He betrayed his country. He went willingly and quickly over to the French. I don’t know how many secrets he sold to them, for he had the run of the Admiralty, as you can imagine, since he was my son. I discovered what he was quite by accident. The idiot left some papers he had stolen in his jacket pocket. His valet found the papers and brought them to me. I had no choice in the matter.
“I did my best by him. I puffed up the dispatches, had him made a hero, and then when I learned what he really was, I planned to kill him. There would be no dishonor for anyone. But he survived.
“Now, tell me, Gerard, was it indeed just the money that made you a traitor to all your family, to all that your father holds dear?”
Gerard remained on the floor. He didn’t look at his father. He looked at Helen, and there was murder in his eyes. “It was just a few ridiculous battle plans, the location of some troops and ships, names of towns where there were supply lines stored, that I sold to them, nothing of much importance. I gave them some names of men who were spying for England. Nothing much, again, I had to do very little.
“Of course I needed money. I had a wife. I had to support her. I had to pretend to want her after her dowry was gone. If I had only gotten her pregnant, then you would have given me half my inheritance. That is what you promised me.”
Helen looked at her husband and wanted more than anything to have his damnable throat between her hands. “Are you saying that that was the only reason you wanted a child? To get money from your father?”
“It was a great deal of money—ten thousand pounds.”
Helen just stared down at him, so much pain filling her, all of it pain for the innocent girl she had been. “But my dowry was ten thousand pounds. You spent that in two months. What was another ten thousand? Nothing much at all. You pathetic worm.” She raised her leg to kick him, then stopped. “I only wish your father had come to me when he realized you were a traitor. I would have helped him destroy you. I would have knocked you overboard myself.”
“You couldn’t have,” Gerard said. “You are a woman. They would not allow a woman on board ship.”
“Your mind,” Alexandra said slowly to Helen’s husband, “astounds me.”
Gerard preened.
Sir John gave Helen a look then that she didn’t understand. Was it admiration? No, surely not. He said slowly, “All of that was true, Gerard, but Helen is barren. And then because you have no honor, you became a traitor. Now, why did you write to Helen after eight years?”
“Dammit, I had to have money. When I heard about this lamp business, I decided to wait until she found it. Everyone in that stupid provincial town she lives in—Court Hammering—everyone speaks freely of it. Everyone believes she will find it, and very soon. I believe she has already found it.
“She had Lord Beecham with her and they went to this cave and came out with this strange iron chest. I knew the lamp was inside it, it had to be. They kept it close. They were secretive. Then Lord Beecham hared off to London. I knew they had found the lamp.”
“Listen, you idiot, if I had found the lamp and the lamp was magic,” Helen said very precisely, “I would have made you disappear with a mere snap of my fingers,” which she then did, right in front of his face. “But I didn’t make you disappear, did I? I couldn’t, unfortunately. Listen to me carefully, Gerard.
There is no magic lamp.
”
“You told me there was,” Gerard said. “You told me not above an hour ago that you would take me to it.”
“I lied.”
Sir John said then, “Enough about this ridiculous lamp. Of course she lied to you, Gerard. She wanted to escape you, and she would have if I hadn’t come.
“It is daylight now. I must hurry. Helen, I am sorry, as strange as that may sound, but you and your friend here must die. I wanted only to kill Gerard, once and for all, but I was unable to catch him alone.”
“You would kill three people?” Alexandra said, her voice incredulous. “Only a monster would do that, a monster who was truly evil, all the way to his soul. And to kill your own son? To prattle on about your honor? You are unspeakable, sir. You deserve to rot in hell.”
“I say, guv, the lady’s right. Ye ain’t much of a pa, and these purty littil pullets—well, ye shouldn’t pop them, guv.”
“Shut up, Ricketts. Now let me think. How will I do this?”
Alexandra moaned, clutched her belly, and fell to the floor in a dead faint. No one moved for a split second, then Helen cried out, and went down to her knees beside her friend. “Oh, God, Alexandra. What is wrong? You must wake up, please.”
“That was quite well done. You can get up now, Alexandra.”
Sir John closed his eyes for a brief moment, then slowly turned to see the earl of Northcliffe and Viscount Beecham and two men he didn’t know, standing behind them in the open doorway.
“I thought you were keeping a watch, Ricketts,” Sir John said through his teeth, so furious he almost choked on his own bile.
“No, guv, not since ye came along and caused all the ruckus.”
“Helen, are you all right?”
“Yes, but come here quickly. Douglas, she grabbed her stomach, then fainted. What is wrong with her?”
“Nothing at all,” Alexandra said, got to her feet and gave her husband a big smile. She swept him a curtsey. “Welcome, my lord. As always, your timing leaves me breathless.”
“Well done, Alex, well done indeed. You gave us the distraction we needed. I’m proud of you. Now, don’t move while we see to these villains.”
Douglas walked up to Sir John Yorke and twisted the gun out of his hand. He then held out his hand to Ricketts, and the little man, cursing under his breath, gave it up. “The knife as well,” Douglas said.
“Ye knows too much, ye does.”
Douglas handed both guns and the knife to Spenser.
“Go hug your wife, Douglas. These marvelous specimens aren’t going anywhere at all.”
Sir John said to his son, who looked both relieved to be alive and terrified because now he had been caught, “I should have just hired someone to shoot you. Now look at what you have done, you incompetent little sot. You couldn’t even kidnap the women without having the men on you in an instant.”
“Actually,” Lord Beecham said easily to Gerard, “your father is right. We were on you in an instant.” He added to the father, “We held back once we saw you following your son. We wanted to find out what was going on.”