Reckless Rules (Brambridge Novel 4) (17 page)

“But Madame…”

“I need to make an impression today. I am going to visit Mr. Durnish and call his bluff—”

From the expression on Chantelle’s face, Victoria could discern that the maid did not understand the need for the finery.

“—and then I am going to call on Lord Lassiter.”

Chantelle’s eyebrows reappeared from above her hairline. “Oh.”

“What do you mean, oh?”

“My lady, he is so very handsome, I am not surprised that you wish to make an impression.” Chantelle clasped her hands to her bosom and mimed a swooning look.

Victoria frowned. Lord Lassiter must have charmed Chantelle more than she thought. “He obviously made quite an impression on you at Francesco’s.”

“Of course. You might think that Lord Lassiter was distracting me with his
bon mots
but it was obvious that Mr. Standish wished to disrobe you at the table and feast…”

Victoria covered her ears. “Enough, Chantelle!” Really. She wished she had not bounded out of bed that morning. Or that she had a French maid with such a Gallic attitude to base desires. Cautiously she glanced at Chantelle and removed her hands away from her head.

“I don’t know what Madame is so worried about,” Chantelle said plaintively, unhooking the unwanted day dress from the Chinese screen. “I see the same look in Carruthers’ eye whenever he’s off to see my sister Isabelle.”

“Carruthers is a fine upstanding man with good intentions.”

“Bah. Boring.”

“What?”

“Isabelle says she wishes he would get along with it. All zees notion of propriety is all very well for those people of your station, Madame, who wish to marry for appearance not love. Those who want a bit of fire and passion need to try before they buy
n’est-ce pas
?”

Victoria sucked in some air. Poor Carruthers. She rather wished she hadn’t heard Isabelle’s thoughts on the affair, having assumed that Carruthers would be able to woo Isabelle in the traditional way and she would obviously see his charms and accept his hand in marriage.

“Speaking of Carruthers, please could you bring in the dress with the shells and then send him up. I need to discuss some of today with him.”

“I’m not sure he needs to hear about your meeting with Mr. Standish,” Chantelle said cheekily, bustling to the door.

Victoria glared at the maid’s retreating back, and let out a laugh. It was true. She did discuss many things with Carruthers, but Mr. Standish was not going to be one of them. Especially not a detailed account of the treatment that she was receiving at his hands. She would file that under doctor patient confidentiality.

Carruthers was aghast at her plans. “But you can’t visit him. He doesn’t know you are involved in the investigation.” Carruthers paced up and down the carpet outside the Chinese screen as Chantelle helped Victoria into her dress.

“Oh don’t be silly, Carruthers. I’ve faced worse before.”

“Pardon me, my lady, but I don’t think you have.”

“What about the time when I shut down that meeting of the Heracles Club just by turning up unannounced?” Colchester hadn’t disclosed what the club was up to but he had seemed to think that it was something fishy.

Victoria could hear Carruthers had stopped pacing. His voice floated over the top of the screen. “Pardon me for saying but you were younger then and your husband had just died. You needed waking from your stupor. Doing things like that proved to you that you were alive.”

Victoria gasped as Chantelle pulled the hooks closed down the back of her dress. “Not so tight, Chantelle, I won’t be able to deal with Durnish if I can’t breathe.” She raised her voice slightly. “You seem to forget, Carruthers, that my husband is still dead and nothing has changed.”

“But, but…”

Victoria stood and glided out from behind the screen. “Lord Colchester died five years ago. In that time my financial, marital and social status have not changed. What have I that I will jeopardize in doing this?”

“But my lady, it is not a question of what you shall jeopardize, it is the damage to yourself I am worried about.” Carruthers shut his mouth with a snap. “I’m sorry. Forget I said that. I am your butler. I should support everything that you do.”

“I agree,” Chantelle said, emerging from the gloom of the corner with Victoria’s nightdress and hair brushes.

“There you are then,” Victoria said.

“No. I agree with Carruthers, we do not like to see you in harm’s way. Although we follow where you tread, it is better to lose a foot soldier than the queen.”

“You’ve been listening to Earl Harding again, haven’t you, Chantelle?” Victoria said accusingly. “Losing a foot soldier than the queen indeed. No one cares where I go or what I do.”

“Mr. Standish does.” Carruthers picked at his fingers and refused to meet her gaze.

“I beg your pardon?” Not Carruthers too.

“He recognized me when I left Francesco’s. Didn’t say a word about me being there. Told me I was a good man to look after you so well.”

“Oh.”

“And that if I ever needed a job as a butler then he had an immediate post available in Brambridge that had just become vacant.”

“Ah.” That didn’t sound very much like concern for Victoria as far as she could understand. That sounded like the classic flattery followed by favor maneuver. “Going back to Mr. Durnish. He is very much aware that I am part of the investigation. He gave me a wink as he walked out of the door.”

“He did what?” Carruthers gazed at her in horror. “Even more reason that you shouldn’t visit him.”

Victoria ignored Carruthers’ indignation. “Did you notice anything different about Mr. Durnish?”

“No, why?”

“He didn’t seem just that little bit too young to you?”

“He did seem a very youthful sixty something.”

“Hmm. Please ready my barouche. I wish to visit Mr. Durnish this morning at his new house.”

“My lady.” Despondently, Carruthers left the room. Chantelle re-entered and carefully looped Victoria’s hair onto her head, pinning the golden hanks into glorious swirls with brass pins. As her curls were squared away, Victoria could feel the persona of the haughty Lady Colchester fall back upon her shoulders. With the last long strand captured, she stood effortlessly and glided to the door, in complete contrast to the way in which she had bounded out of bed. As if she could mark the change, Chantelle held back and waited for her lady’s instructions.

“Chantelle, I will not be back until late this evening.” Seeing the small smirk that was about to reappear on Chantelle’s face, Victoria waved a finger. “Remember rule number eight.”

“I hate bloody rule number eight.” Chantelle flung her hands in the air. “
Be patient
. Poof, I
detest
all of the bloody rules.”

Laughing Victoria closed the door to the bedroom, the smile falling off her face as she regained the hall. Chantelle wasn’t the only one who hated the rules. But they worked. They kept Victoria’s life together.

The white barouche waited outside. Oswald, the coachman handed her in and set the horses off on a smart trot to Kensington. Mr. Durnish’s house was a newly built large affair in white stucco, with a flight of steps leading up to the front door. A butler with a large moustache opened the front door, and without blinking an eyelid, closed it again after Victoria had announced herself.

It was the first time as Lady Colchester that Victoria had been left to wait outside the front door, rather in the hall as was customary. She narrowed her eyes. Perhaps the man was a new acquisition. The owners of the pauper farms had described how Mr. Durnish was looking for many new staff.

However, the door opened quickly again, and the butler ushered her in to a small back room decorated entirely in brown. A small fireplace lay dormant, overflowing with grey coal soot and ashes. An oversize top hat lay on a low table, and a large rotund figure occupied a chair in the corner.

“Good morning, Lady Colchester, or should I say Victoria?”

“I beg your pardon? Lady Colchester is the correct form of address Mr.… err?”

“Mr. Durnish at your service, Victoria.” The rotund figure stood up from the shadows of the corner of the room and bent over her hand to kiss it. “As you will become aware, we have more than one reason to become familiar.”

Victoria settled her face into an expressionless glance, whilst fighting the disbelief within. The differences were subtle, but there all the same. This man had white hair, the same colored eyes, even the same clothes as the person who had appeared in Francesco’s. But in contrast, there were tiny wrinkles around the man’s eyes, and his eyeballs were slightly yellow with age. He was definitely not the same man.

“I regret to not being able to reciprocate the familiarity, Mr. Durnish.” Victoria pulled her hand back from the man’s tense grasp.

“Why else would you not have come to see me if you weren’t interested?” Mr. Durnish smiled knowingly. “I am glad you have come to see me, however. Reports of your beauty did not do you justice.” Mr. Durnish moved back to his chair and sat back down, grabbing a sparkling object from the table next to him.

“I’m sure your
associate
was able to report back accurately.” Victoria returned Mr. Durnish’s blank look.

“I have no associates,” Mr. Durnish said flatly, his hands fluttering around the sparkling object in his hand.

Victoria looked away and searched for a place to sit. If Mr. Durnish was going to deny the meeting she was not going to discuss it. Seeing no help from him, she selected one of the brown hessian-covered chairs and sat on its edge. “I really feel you should sit down, Mr. Durnish, for what I will tell you. You may find it upsetting.”

Mr. Durnish raised his lips and showed his teeth in what must have passed as his attempt to smile. He backed away into the corner and sat back in the chair he had vacated. Shoving the sparkling item in his pocket, he steepled his fingers in front of him and nodded. “Please tell me what you have found out.”

Victoria pursed her lips. “Firstly, might I confirm that your real name is not Durnish?”

Mr. Durnish nodded. “Hated the name Butterworth. Changed it early when I entered the navy. Got a lot of flack for the surname. Durnish seemed boring enough to be going along with.”

“And your first name is?”

“You tell me.”

“I believe it to be Paul.”

Mr. Durnish showed his teeth again. “Very good. You have been doing your homework.”

Victoria was suddenly overwhelmed. This man seemed very much like a jackal. Why did Eustacia’s story of how people’s belongings disappeared resurface now? The quicker she was in and out the better. “I have a reputation to uphold.”

“I’m sure you do,” he muttered.

“I regret to inform you, Mr. Durnish, that your brother died shortly after you left for the navy. I understand you even came back for the funeral.”

“I don’t believe it.”

“An associate of mine has had sight of his death record. Unfortunately your brother was killed by a gunshot to the head and the killer was never found.”      

“I still don’t believe it.”

Victoria pulled at her dress slightly. “Mr. Durnish, if you do not believe in the facts that I am telling you then perhaps you should engage for another investigation to take place. I however will not be free to investigate it.” She stood and swept towards the door. “And one other thing, I would get your maids to sweep the grate. Unburnt ashes can get trodden into the carpet so easily.”

“I don’t have any maids. Just footmen. I haven’t yet managed to look for any maids. I might not do. The footmen work twice as hard as the women.”

Victoria stopped to open the brown room’s door. He still didn’t have any maids? But he had been touring the orphanages for that very thing, staff for his new house in Kensington. She gasped as hot breath blew in her ear.

“What is rule number six?”

She froze. She had heard that voice before. She had heard that question before. She must be dreaming.

“What are you going to do now,
Victoria?
Rule number three or four? Keep up appearances… act like nothing has happened?”

“I am not sure what you are talking about.” Thrusting her hand out, Victoria managed to connect with the door handle the first time and yanked hard at the wood. The door jerked open and slammed against the shoulder of the man breathing in her ear. “But I’m sure I could give you a rule if you asked for it.” Rule number thirteen, which Victoria was about to invent. “
Beware the woman with the brass hair pin.”

Before she had finished her sentence, she pulled one of the pins from her head and stabbed in the general direction of the man’s shoulder. With a loud cry, Mr. Durnish fell back, clutching at his neck. What a shame, she had miscalculated. The door must have pushed him back further into the room than she realized.

“I do not think we will be meeting each other for a while, Mr. Durnish. You or your younger impersonator. Make sure you stay out of my way. Or you will find that I am just as dangerous as your… your…” Victoria couldn’t finish. He hadn’t threatened her. He hadn’t even touched her. He had just made her feel extremely uncomfortable. And invaded her personal space. And he knew about the
rules.
She formed the words again. “You will find I am as dangerous as you.”

Without a backward glance, she hurried into the hall, pushing past the butler as she did so. Another gentleman stood waiting in the hall. As she bore down on him, he tried to pull his hat low on his head, but his tall cravat pushed the flesh up on his chin, giving him the uncanny appearance of a frog. He was instantly recognizable.

“Mr. Cryne.” Victoria nodded and swept past. She didn’t want to spend any longer than was necessary in the house. Even though it was new, already it seemed to have taken on an atmosphere of menace.

CHAPTER 16

The back room to Lord Lassiter’s mansion was the only room in the house not filled with antiques.

“It’s all junk, Freddie, I’m telling you, I don’t even understand why you’ve got me polishing this armor.” Bill was saddle-sore and weary. He had taken leave of the Unusual Oddities, pleading a need to see his sweetheart. They had been reluctant to let him go, but when he had pointed out that he had fixed every cart, shod every horse and done many more things besides, they had made a few jokes about his lady love and set him on his way.