“This won’t fool them if they
really
come looking, you know,” the valet pointed out.
“A single candle, a dying fire in the hearth. Some gentle snoring wouldn’t come amiss. Mailer’s a lazy sot, he won’t do more than poke his head in here to assure himself I’m asleep. Just make certain that nightcap doesn’t slip off your shiny, betraying head.”
Ignoring Piffkin’s next grumble, Valentine stealthily made his way downstairs and exited the house via the French doors in the library. Mailer probably hadn’t seen the library, or the inside of any book, in decades.
Now it was off to the servant entrance.
This time he was careful to hide behind one of the overgrown shrubberies. He grabbed Daisy at the elbow as soon as she’d pulled the door shut behind her, and turned her around so swiftly they were chest-to-chest, with her breath all but knocked out of her.
Sometimes it was better when she couldn’t talk, Valentine had decided. He took advantage of the moment to press a quick, hard, not at all satisfying kiss against her mouth, then took her hand and broke into a run that didn’t end until they were inside the first line of tall, concealing trees.
“All right,” he said, letting go of her hand. “You may feel free to berate me now. Only please keep it to a whisper.”
“I wouldn’t know where to begin,” she told him, still attempting to catch her breath as she adjusted her spectacles. He saved her the effort by removing them for her and shoving them in his pocket.
Tonight the spectacles, tomorrow the bun. All good things come to the patient man. Shame I’ve never quite mastered patience....
“Moonlight reflects off flat, shiny surfaces,” he told her. It was as good a reason as any, since saying he longed to see her without the damnable things would only add to her “I wouldn’t know where to begin” budget of complaints.
“How did you know I’d be... Oh, never mind. Of course you knew I couldn’t stay away.”
“So no credit forthcoming for brilliant deduction, I imagine. Very well, then I won’t mention the
Ivmperpetuum
Calendar
showing both tonight’s full moon and the time of sunset, the journal you’ve promised me and, last but certainly not least, your unnatural interest in my interests.”
“
Calendar Ivmperpetuum.
You said it the wrong way round. As to the rest,” she said, reaching into the pocket of her drab cloak, “here is the journal. You’ll recall your sworn promise not to look at anything that comes before the place I inserted the marker.”
“Sworn promise? I swore? Really?”
“Don’t attempt to make light of this in order to ease my apprehension, if you please. You’re not amusing.”
“Good thing I brought my sword stick. Excuse me now whilst I step behind yon tree and throw myself on it.”
“Valentine?”
His smile faded immediately. This was serious business. He knew it, she knew it. He just bloody well wished he knew why she was so adamant in remaining in such a dangerous situation.
“Yes, Daisy?”
“Do shut up, please,” she said rather kindly. “I don’t need to be coddled.”
She knew what he’d been doing? How could she know? That was unsettling. “Good for you. But maybe I do. Please, Daisy, go back to your room. I know what I have to do, and I’d much rather not have to worry about you while I’m about it.”
“You really think they’re gathering tonight at the stones? Even with you in residence? Why would they do that?”
And there it was. The question he’d been dreading. “I think they’re voting me up or down, and perhaps another
guest
who arrived today. You know, Romans, the Colosseum, thumbs. That sort of thing.”
Daisy put her hand on his arm. “Voting you up or down for what?” Then her eyes widened. “For
membership?
Oh, my God, Valentine.
You?
That’s why you’re here? To...to become one of
them?
And they believe you?”
He smiled slightly. “You don’t have to sound as if that’s so incredulous. However, after carefully building myself up as an interested
parti,
I’m here to infiltrate the Society and learn the names of the members. We can’t stop what we don’t know, Daisy. It’s only logical.”
“Is that what they call themselves? The Society? I thought you said they were a hellfire club, or organization, or whatever they call themselves. Not a coven, that’s for witches. And you came here to
join
them.” She put a hand to her head and turned about in a full circle, just to glare at him again through the darkness. “Downing Street,” she said, accused, actually. “That’s the
we
you just spoke of? Valentine, I will give you precisely three seconds to tell me everything, or I may just scream, and put paid to this entire venture.”
“You wouldn’t do that. You’re whispering. Harshly, but careful to keep your voice low. You’d never scream, because then you’d never know what it is you feel this overweening need to know...and I wouldn’t know what the devil you’re still hiding.”
Daisy exaggeratingly rolled her huge, marvelous blue eyes. “He chooses
now
to be logical?”
Valentine brushed at his left shoulder, hoping to dislodge Cupid—or at least some sort of small, interfering imp—who seemed to have taken up residence there at this most inopportune time.
The sky was getting darker, and the shadows cast by the full moon made it possible for him to see a path off to his right. “Does that lead to the standing stones?”
“Yes. It’s how I take the children up there, and how I—”
This time he picked her up, so there’d be only one pair of feet swiftly but silently moving through the undergrowth, and didn’t stop until he’d settled her on the ground a good twenty yards away, going down on his haunches beside her behind a concealing bramble bush.
“You think they’re really coming, don’t you? And they’ll use the path?”
“She chooses
now
to point out the obvious?” Valentine responded. “Keep your head down, it’s less than an hour until midnight.”
“How do you know they’ll come at midnight?”
“I don’t. But as they most probably aren’t here yet, it’s either that, or they aren’t coming at all. Can you please not ask any more questions right now?”
There was complete if rather injured silence for the next quarter hour, save for unanswered whispers coming from Daisy every few minutes.
“I suppose I should feel confident that you don’t
really
wish to be one of them.”
And within a minute:
“You don’t, do you?”
Followed a few minutes later by:
“That very improper kiss was meant to keep me from screaming, wasn’t it?”
And, lastly:
“Will they slaughter another chicken? Only men would think that the height of demonstrating their power. It isn’t as if the chicken could take up arms and fight back. Did you just laugh, Valentine Redgrave? The strangest things amuse you.”
Finally, and not a moment too soon for Valentine, a light appeared in the distance. He felt certain he was seeing a smuggler’s lantern, shuttered on three sides, so that only the path in front of the man carrying it was exposed. Those following the man were like a small herd of pachyderms, holding on to the back of the cloak of the man in front of him, as elephants held on to each other’s tails with their trunks.
Only there were no elephants here. Only cloaked monsters whose exaggeratedly large heads bore the faint outlines of horns, false, strawlike hair, grotesque features that could be mimicking goats, lions, bulls and more. Valentine thought first of his
Calendar Ivmperpetuum
and the Zodiac signs on its face.
There was a sharp intake of breath from Daisy, quickly cut off as she clapped a hand to her mouth.
Once the last cloaked figure disappeared from view—Valentine had counted six in all—she attempted to get to her feet. He pulled her back down. “What? We are going to follow them, aren’t we?”
“In a few minutes,” Valentine whispered back to her. “We already know Mailer is among them. I could smell his sweat and brandy from here. He was carrying the lantern, probably because he knows the grounds best. I’ll give you my perpetual calendar if one of the others isn’t the so lately indisposed Harold Charfield, the superior of the unsuspecting fool I met at dinner tonight. Charfield. Burn. It fits as one of the bizarre code names we’ve already discovered via that journal we found. Miner, Bird, Webber, Urban and Cot and some others are dead. Post we discovered, and perhaps now, Burn. Hammer still unknown, and then we’re at the end of our code, with God knows how many more to locate.”
“I’m convinced you know just what you’re talking to yourself about, if you’ll pardon my poor grammar at such a trying time as this. And, again, you keep saying
we.
Since
we
isn’t you and me, I need to know more. If you and I both manage to live out this night, I expect a full explanation tomorrow, complete with time reserved for questions afterward.”
“You’re more annoyingly curious than my sister, and twice as logical, which is no great help to me right now.” Valentine got to his feet, helping Daisy rise, as well. “You won’t do the sensible thing and remain here? No, of course not. Just keep in the forefront of your mind the sure knowledge that I will push you facedown in the dirt if you attempt to utter another word between now and when those bastards ahead of us are gone back under the rocks they came from.”
“There’s no need to get prickly, or profane,” Daisy said in her best governess tone, but then she shut her mouth with a snap when he growled under his breath.
She was terrified, and for whatever reason, she seemed to need to talk when she was nervous. Valentine knew that as much as he knew she wouldn’t back down, step away, even if he held a pistol to her head. The journal was burning a figurative hole in his pocket; he couldn’t wait to read what she couldn’t seem able to simply tell him.
Whatever that
it
was, he only knew he was going to fix it for her. He wasn’t really a knight in shining armor, but he was a determined man. Kate would say this was her brother’s natural response to a damsel in distress, but he disagreed. This was his response to a prickly, independent, annoying, headstrong young woman who not only refused to be impressed by him, but who had also clearly decided he was not the sharpest arrow in the quiver.
He had to get a handle of sorts on his reactions to Daisy Marchant. His family would pillory him otherwise, for one thing, and he was beginning to feel like the fourteen-year-old Valentine who used to stand on his head to impress the Redgrave cook’s young daughter. What did he think he was doing, allowing her to come along with him tonight? It was the action of a man who could tell himself he knew she would simply follow him, anyway...while a small part of him whispered:
Show-off. How far will you go just to hear her finally say,
Oh, Valentine, you’re wonderful
?
“All right, we’ve given them enough time. Let’s go,” he said at last, figuratively pushing both the imp and his conscience into a mental cupboard and locking the door. “You stay behind me, walk when I walk, step where I step, stop when I stop. We’re here to observe, nothing more.”
“And if we’re detected?”
“You should have asked yourself that question before leaving your room. It’s too late now, because I can’t have you out here alone.”
She didn’t seem to have a response for that.
Finally!
He took her hand and they began the at-least two-hundred-yard slow climb to the clearing in front of the cliff.
CHAPTER SEVEN
D
AISY
BEGAN
TO
hear the dull, repetitious chanting when she and Valentine were perhaps halfway along in their slow, careful climb through the trees. It was a sound designed to make one’s skin crawl.
They were only men in silly costumes. That’s all. They weren’t really beasts, or anything in the least mythical or unnaturally powerful or possessed by the devil.
They were just men.
Six of them.
Valentine was one man...and she was a distraction.
She shouldn’t have come.
What if she coughed? What if she sneezed? What if she stubbed her toe in the dark and said
Ouch
before she could stop herself?
Valentine must be out of his mind, to allow her to put him in such danger. She ought to tell him...no, gesture to him. Point back the way they’d come, show him she was leaving. Her need to know what happened to Rose had clouded her judgment. The need to assure herself Valentine was safe had convinced her she could somehow protect him, be of use to him.
She’d have to think more about that latter reason tomorrow...if they lived to see tomorrow.
Valentine gestured, pointing to himself, pointing up toward the still unseen standing stones. Pointing to her, pointing to the ground. Making an almost ridiculously fierce face that told her he’d brook no argument from her.
This was it; there was no turning back now.
She nodded her agreement, and he turned about on his haunches, getting ready to rise to a crouch, she supposed, and move forward. Would she ever see him again? She took his hand in both of hers and he turned back to her, frustration in his eyes.
She kissed the back of his hand, hoping he understood what she meant:
Be safe. Come back.
Strange. She’d always thought she was rather proficient when she and her charges played at charades, but this time she’d clearly missed the mark. Or so she thought when Valentine pulled her close and captured her untutored mouth with his own clearly much more experienced one.
His arms went around her, his tongue played havoc with her lips and tongue, and she was dizzy and near to breathless when he at last broke the kiss to whisper close beside her ear.
“We who are about to die salute you.”
“That...wasn’t helpful. Please be careful,” she whispered back rather shakily, and then he was gone.
Daisy waited a full minute—she silently counted off the seconds—before she realized she wasn’t going to be able to talk herself out of following him. No one had ever kissed her before, Lord knew if she’d ever be kissed again...so she was not about to let this silly, brave man get himself killed!
First checking to be certain her sharp sewing scissors were still safely tucked into her pocket, she began her slow move forward, staying just to the right of the line Valentine had taken.
Her heart seemed to be beating in time with the chants coming from above her. She could make out a few of the words now, and they were ridiculous. Pompous. Self-aggrandizing. Clearly meant to build up their courage and convince themselves of their great, devil-blessed power.
Full of sound and fury and signifying nothing.
If she didn’t know what she now knew, she would think them overgrown boys playing at something they didn’t understand, and who’d probably turn tail and run if their governess saw them and demanded to know what they were doing.
If only she could see them, but that would be more than useless—it would be unnecessarily dangerous.
The chanting stopped. There was nothing now but silence, and the sound of Daisy’s breathing, which seemed unnaturally loud to her.
“All right, then, that’s done. I’m sweating like a pig. I’m taking this damned thing off.”
“Leave it, Post, you know the rules,” another voice ordered.
Daisy strained forward, as if this might help her hear better. But she was already fairly certain the first voice belonged to Lord Charles Mailer. Mailer? Post? Ah, so that’s what Valentine had been nattering to himself about—some sort of code names. Leave it to men to think up such nonsense and believe it brilliant.
Mailer spoke again. “What? Now you’re taking on the job of that useless old idiot Miner?
I am the Keeper. There are rules.
What a bloody bore, may the traitor burn forever in our Unholy Master’s deepest pit of Hell.”
Someone laughed, then said, “Started him off flaming here, didn’t we, to help him on his way? Him and his ladywife both. Shame about her, though. The things she’d do, and gladly. Never saw a woman so appreciative of my—”
“That will suffice. We’re here to discuss this month’s applicants, not indulge your fantasies about the size of your cock, which is largely wishful thinking in any case.”
Daisy squeezed her eyes shut, wishing she could squeeze her ears shut, as well. Had that been a woman’s voice? It had been, yes, even as the mask probably distorted the sound. One of the monsters was a
woman!
“Sorry. Didn’t mean to bring that up. Know we’re not supposed to talk about it. So sorry.”
Now the silence coming from the circle was tense, nearly deadly.
At last Mailer—Post—spoke again. “Mine’s getting restless and keeps saying he’s going to leave.”
“I’d leave, too, if I was quartered with you,” someone said. One of the men; Daisy couldn’t really sort out their voices too well. Again, it must be the masks.
“He’s sincere, Post? I wonder if this isn’t all too convenient.” The woman again.
“If you thought that, why did you have me go after him?” Mailer asked peevishly.
“We’re still waiting, Post.”
“All right, all right. He’s seems genuine enough to me. Always going on about his brother. The earl, you know. How he’s kept him on a leash and a poor pittance of an allowance, how he’s just as much a Redgrave as him, how it’s our own monarchy that keeps its foot on his neck with outdated rules, entails, entitlements and the like—on and on. He’s more than hinted about his admiration of Napoleon and downright hatred of the Hanovers. Even some drivel about being descended from the Stuarts, as if that means a jot these days.”
And again, it was the woman who responded. To Daisy, it was clear she was the one in control. “That’s good, but hardly enough. Anyone can talk. We need to own him.”
“I spoke with the madam at the brothel we visited one night. Redgrave put three of her best out of action. He’s got unnatural ways, that’s what the madam told me. She’s had him barred from the place even though she said he tossed fifty quid at her feet, to pay for what he said were
damages.
And then there was the boy.”
Daisy had both hands clamped to her mouth now, her eyes wide as saucers.
Valentine? They were talking about Valentine?
“What about the boy?” one of the other men asked. “You can’t stop there.”
“We were walking back from my club,” Mailer went on. “I turned down one of those scraggly beggar boys that come up on the quality all the time—you know the sort. Next thing I know, there’s howls from the alleyway and Redgrave goes trotting off to investigate, God knows why.”
“God knows nothing. Satan knows all.”
“Yes, Burn, of course, just as you say, all hail to the king of the bottomless pit. I’m sure Post didn’t mean anything by it,” the woman said rather wearily. “Is there any way you can shorten this, Post? We still have the other to discuss.” Oh, yes, the woman was clearly in charge.
“I was almost done. The beggar boy’s master was caning him, for having failed, I suppose, and Redgrave put a stop to it, flashed a small purse and asked the master if he could have him. The beggar boy, you understand. His coach had been following us along the street for protection, and Redgrave had the boy lifted up next to the coachman, then bid his goodnights to me. I told him, I said ‘Redgrave, you’re a soft-hearted fool.’ And he winked at me and said he wasn’t, that he was a man with
appetites.
Left me standing there on the street with my jaw at half-mast, so eager was he to get home.”
“Hmmm,”
the woman said, and Daisy could almost imagine her nodding her head, considering. “We don’t need him ruining our women and pleasures, or that of our other invited guests. Do please keep that in mind.”
“It was only the once, and I didn’t actually
mean
to—”
“My comment wasn’t confined just to you, Post. I was speaking to all of you. Our supply is not unlimited. We’ll consider the latter then, for Redgrave. We’ve used a boy before, to great effect. Unless anyone has an argument to the contrary, Redgrave is approved. Burn, find me a boy before tomorrow night.”
“How in bloody hell—cursed heaven—am I supposed to—”
“Do I have to think for all of you? You’ve had enough boys of your own, Burn, find a way. Now, tell me about this man of yours. Frappton, is it? Redgrave will come in handy thanks to his brother’s estate. Why would we want your man?”
“You don’t, I do.” Daisy could now tell that the man named Burn was the one speaking. “I think I may have tipped my hand a bit with that last diverted shipment of boots. With City being so stupid as to walk in front of a dray wagon, we’ll never know if he was about to take the blame for that one, or me.”
“Then it really was an accident? You mean we didn’t do that?” Mailer sounded relieved, almost joyful. “I mean, not that we would have had any reason to... That is...um, do go on, Burn.”
“As I was doing before you interrupted, you mean? You’re an ass, Post. If it weren’t for this being the perfect place for the altar—”
The woman all but shouted his name. “Burn! You were asked to share your reason with us so that judgment can be passed.”
“Yes, sorry, Exalted One. Anyway, the way I’ve figured the thing, I need Frappton to willingly put
his
hand to the next set of orders and forge my name at the bottom. He’ll of course be caught out, thus effectively clearing me of all suspicion, as I’ll be shocked past all bearing by this act of treachery and treason. Not that he’s to know that part.”
“Clever. So it’s to be the usual test of loyalty after a night of unmingled pleasure he’ll be hot to experience again, and then he conveniently puts a period to his existence, since you can only use him the once. He couldn’t live to expose any of us.”
“I thought a midnight leap into the Thames wouldn’t come amiss for such a disgraced man,” Burn said jovially.
“Then we’re agreed. You may bring him tomorrow night. How best do we accommodate his tastes?” the woman asked just as if, Daisy’s spinning mind suggested, she was inquiring into this Frappton person’s wine preference.
Burn laughed. “Tastes? I wouldn’t put it past him to be a virgin.”
That statement was followed by snickers and general laughter, and then the sound of clapped hands, followed by immediate silence until the woman spoke again.
“I have disturbing news. There’s good reason many of us are not in attendance this night, as they are of necessity occupied elsewhere. We are now informed Weaver did indeed fail. He’s either dead or gone to ground, knowing the punishment for failure.”
“And our shipment? The opium we requested?”
“Gone, disappeared. Hammer has been put in charge of those of us burdened with recouping our losses. That we know anything at all is that one of our French contacts managed to escape the attack. It took him some time to find his way to us, and we had to dispatch him, of course, once we had his news. We couldn’t be certain he hadn’t been followed, and preservation of the Society trumps all.”
“Understandable. Can’t have any of these fellows roaming the countryside, speaking their Froggie tongue,” Post agreed. “Was he able to tell us what happened? Revenue officers? A storm?”
“Neither. He swore it was pirates, attacking both on land and at sea when the schooner attempted to run.
Pirates.
Clearly the man was both a coward and a fool. Still, fearing for his life, he actually jumped from the schooner and somehow made his way to shore, which is the only reason we know anything at all.”
Burn asked: “And what do we know?”
Now the woman’s voice became hard, her words quick and clipped. “Bonaparte foolishly extends his honeymoon even as his mistress gives birth, but should return to Paris soon. We know
Masséna assumed command in Portugal, and have it on good authority that the next move is to successfully end the siege at Ciudad Roderigo in order to target key fortresses along the lines of Torres-Vedras. Viscount Wellington is rapidly gathering an Anglo-Portuguese army to confront Masséna, so that it is imperative we continue our efforts to disrupt supply lines and slow Wellington’s progress. We can afford no more failures, as our credibility with the new emperor rests on our successes.”
“You said we lost the shipment,” another voice asked. “Can we take that to mean the gold heading for Bonaparte is included in that loss?”
“It does. Along with our schooner and landing parties. Sad to say, it was a complete rout. I need not tell you this is a crushing blow. We’ve barely any time before the new moon to gather enough gold coin, which will be difficult thanks to the loss of the opium, and with no real way to alert our French friends not to land in the usual place. We were foolish to keep our knowledge of his connections to the French limited to Weaver. Turning Redgrave our way or blackmailing him with the boy alive to point a finger at him so that he hangs as a sodomite—the method doesn’t matter, understood, as long as it leads to success. We need access to that beach one last time, and we have no reason to trust this Redgrave fellow but your assessment, Post. It isn’t necessary, I hope, to tell you the consequences if you allowed yourself to be hoodwinked.”