“By the month or the year?’’ the agent inquired.
‘‘The year,’’ Deirdre said.
“I’ll just look it up for you,’’ the man said and went to his file cupboard. Deirdre’s heart beat faster as she sat, willing him to bring the file to the counter, but he only opened it where he was and began riffling through it. She was forced to another shift and advanced to the cupboard.
“Would it be possible to get a glass of water? I feel rather faint,” she said, fanning herself with a handkerchief.
“Why didn’t you tell me, Miss Gower?’’ Pronto exclaimed, trotting after her. She glared at him for using her own name, but the agent hadn’t appeared to notice.
“Have a seat. I’ll get some water at once,’’ he said and left.
She quickly picked up the file of the McLean house and took it to her chair. The very top item in it was a letter from Lady Gilham, addressed from the Redstone Hotel in London and dated in late August. Beneath the letter was a copy of her rental agreement. She had taken possession on the first of September. Deirdre felt as though she had won the Derby.
The agent returned with the water. Deirdre gulped hastily and said, “We’ll think about the house and be back later.”
“But I haven’t told you the price by the year,” he pointed out.
“That’s all right,” Pronto said helpfully. “We’ll take it.”
“I’m not at all sure Lady Gilham will be vacating it. I have a much better place…”
“No, no, we want Gilham’s place. Thankee very kindly,” Pronto said, pressing a half crown into the astonished agent’s hand as he and Deirdre fled to the waiting carriage.
“What did you find out?” he asked eagerly.
“She’s only been there since September. Pretty fast work! She must have scraped an acquaintance with the prince the first week she landed. Her first letter from him was dated the first week of September, Dick said.”
“That business of her possibly having to run off on short notice was havey-cavey as well,” he pointed out.
“She’s certainly up to something,” Deirdre agreed. “Furthermore, she didn’t come from Cornwall at all. The address was a London hotel.”
“She could have stopped at London along the way,” he said thoughtfully.
“London isn’t on the way from Cornwall to Brighton.”
“Oh. Never been to Cornwall myself,” he explained, so she wouldn’t take him for an idiot. He was so busy noticing the little dimple in her cheek when she smiled that he didn’t wonder why she was smiling.
“You are a noodle, Pronto,” she said, patting his arm.
“We make a pretty good team, if you ask me,” he answered fondly. “Of course, so do you and Dick,” he added scrupulously. “Would you like to go back to the library? I might just pick up another book,” he added suavely.
“I’d better go home. Auntie will be wondering what has kept us.”
“No, she won’t. She’ll be playing cards, fleecing the servants. I’ll tell you what we’ll do. We’ll stop off at a tea shop and have a cup of hot cocoa. You can tell your aunt you was thirsty. She won’t know you just had a glass of water at the real estate place.”
“You mustn’t tell her we were there! She would dislike it very much. It’s our little secret from her, Pronto,” she said, thinking his simple mind would enjoy having a secret. She was rewarded with a doting smile.
“I’ll tell her I was thirsty. I insisted on stopping for cocoa, and if she cuts up stiff, you just sic her on me,” he said gallantly and signaled the driver to stop at the first tea shop they came to.
Jaunting around a seaside resort in the off season with an extremely unattractive gentleman might not have been high entertainment to an ordinary young lady, but, for Deirdre, it was excitement of a high order. Everything about her dull life had been enlivened since meeting Dick. She thought of him most of the time. And if Dick thought she was hopping to Auntie’s tune, this day’s work would prove him wrong. He’d see she could be very helpful to him in his work.
She was smiling and talking some nonsense to Pronto as they went toward the little tea shop. Her cheeks were rosy from the cold wind and her gray eyes sparkled with pleasure. She formed a very attractive picture for Mr. Smythe, who sat at a window table, regarding her from inside the tea shop. It was great kick for him that she was accompanied by that funny fellow he’d met at the Old Ship. He could get himself presented.
“It’s Mr. Pilgrim, isn’t it?” he said, rising as they came near his table.
“By Jove, if it ain’t Mr. Smythe,” Pronto said, peering around to see if Dick was still with him. “It’s Mr. Smythe,” he said to Deirdre with a significant lift of his eyebrows and a wink. “Speak of the devil.”
“I hope your friend hasn’t been speaking ill of me behind my back.” Mr. Smythe laughed. He cast an admiring look at Miss Gower.
“We haven’t been talking about you at all,” Pronto told him, offended.
“My mistake. I was sure I was the devil you referred to. I don’t believe I have the honor of the lady’s acquaintance,” he added, returning his gaze to Deirdre.
“This is Belami’s fiancée,” Pronto told him severely.
“Miss Gower,” Deirdre added, a good deal less severely.
“What a coincidence! I had lunch with Lord Belami not two hours ago. Brighton is a small town after all. Won’t you join me?” he added, looking from one to the other.
“How very nice of you. We’d be delighted,” Deirdre said at once. She couldn’t take her eyes from Mr. Smythe’s face. It wasn’t his beauty that held her gaze, though he was handsome. Tall and well-formed, with a reddish-brown lock of hair falling boyishly over a wide forehead, he had bright blue eyes, full of mischief, a Roman nose, and a strong jaw. But what held her eyes was a search for any resemblance to the Prince Regent. She could find none. If there had ever been any, it was long since buried under the sagging flesh and fading eyes of the older man.
“Now that’s what I call a coincidence,” Pronto said two or three times. He knew from Belami’s lessons that a coincidence was always suspect, but, try as he might, he could discover no evil in this one.
“What brings all you fashionable folks to Brighton out of season?” Smythe asked. “I had thought I’d have it to myself.”
Deirdre sought about wildly for some coherent reason. “We came to look over Belami’s summer home. My aunt was particularly interested,” she said, knowing it for a paltry excuse.
“I always taggle along with Belami,” Pronto said.
“I expect you’ll be darting back to London now that you’ve seen the house,” Smythe said. There was no suspicion on his face, but the eyes were sharp and alert.
“Perhaps we’ll stay a while,” Deirdre said. ‘‘My aunt will want to rest a little before returning. And Brighton is nice, even in winter. Mr. Pilgrim has just taken me to the library. Have you been there yet, Mr. Smythe, or are you a newcomer to town?” She listened sharply for any word that might betray him or his origins.
“I’ve been here a few months, but I haven’t been to the library. I was in London when I first came from America.”
“Mr. Smythe comes from America,” Pronto inserted, since pretending to an ignorance about him was apparently the route being taken by Deirdre.
This unusual fact was discussed till the cocoa was ordered and arrived. It was interesting to hear from his own lips that he had gone to America a quarter of a century ago as an orphan, but the information was hardly new. They knew this was his story.
“What part of America are you from?” Deirdre asked.
“My father had a small tobacco plantation in Virginia,” he said briefly.
“Had? Your father is dead, is he?” Pronto asked.
“Yes, he passed away a year ago. I returned to England with some notion of setting up a hop farm, but I found my money didn’t go far. The trip was expensive, of course, and being an innocent, I managed to lose a fair bit in London with card sharks.”
“You want to stay away from Captain Stack,” Pronto cautioned.
“I know it well. I’ve had a few hands with him. He’s too sharp for me. What I must do before I’m completely in the basket is find myself a position. Farming is so expensive when all one’s help has to be paid,” he added. “My father had slaves in America to do the hard labor. It’s unconscionable, of course.”
“You won’t find a position in Brighton,” Pronto told him. “London is where the positions are. All the MPs hire secretaries. Lords as well.”
“I don’t feel at home in a large city. I hope to find a place as a bailiff or steward on some gentleman’s farm. The trouble is, my experience is all in tobacco and of course it isn’t grown hereabouts. But I shall find something,” he said cheerfully.
This innocent talk certainly didn’t make it sound as if he planned to palm himself off as the Prince Regent’s legal son and heir.
“Have you met many people in Brighton?” Deirdre asked artfully to lure him into more revealing conversation.
“You’ll find it hard to believe, Miss Gower,” he told her frankly, “but I have been to the Royal Pavilion and met the Prince Regent. Pretty good for a young colonial! They won’t believe it when I write the story home to my friends in Virginia. He’s a famous fellow, the prince, but a bit of a queer nabs.”
“It’s the drink,” Pronto said knowingly.
‘‘He does drink a good deal. I was invited one evening for a game of cards, and His Highness took a liking to me. I expect it was the novelty of my being from America.”
Mr. Smythe was a good talker. The conversation never flagged for a minute, but when they parted half an hour later, nothing of any significance had been learned.
“Auntie will be wondering what happened to us,” Deirdre said. She felt a twinge of guilt at how long she had been away.
“I’ll just drop you at the door,” Pronto told her, his gallantry forgotten in the face of the formidable duchess. ‘‘Run along to the inn and read my book. Looking forward to it,’’ he mumbled as she descended from the carriage.
“Don’t forget our little secret,’’ she reminded him. “Don’t tell Auntie we’ve been house hunting,” she said with a bantering smile. “And thank you for a perfectly wonderful afternoon, Pronto.”
He blushed up to his ears and stammered himself back to the carriage.
Chapter Six
“Dick, you’re back already!” Deirdre exclaimed in surprise when she entered the saloon.
He had been enduring the duchess’s indifferent company for over an hour and had become edgy. “Already? I’ve been waiting an age for you. You were so impatient for my company that I made special effort to be home in time to drive out with you this afternoon.”
“Ring a good peal over her, Belami. It will save me the bother of doing it,” the duchess said, also in a huff. “Did you get my book?” she demanded, turning to Deirdre.
“Of course I did,” Deirdre said, handing it over and tossing an apologetic smile at both her accusers. Between the smile and disliking to be in league with the duchess on anything, Dick was persuaded to forgive her.
“
The Necromancer of the Black Forest
again! I have read this stupid thing a dozen times,” the duchess said with an annoyed tsk and put it on her lap, where she was soon browsing through it again.
Belami led his fiancée to the farthest sofa, pretending to point out to her the mist rising from the ocean, but of course wanting privacy to learn what she had been up to. He mistrusted that sparkle in her eyes and the unusually bright flush on her cheeks.
“Let’s hear it. You didn’t keep Pronto happy in a library for over two hours. Where were you?” he asked.
With a peek across the room to confirm that her aunt was engrossed in her book, she answered in a low voice, “I have information for you. Pronto and I followed Lady Gilham’s trail.” She went on to open her budget of all its secrets in that regard.
“I’m delighted with your findings, but in future I would prefer that you let me know first what you’re up to. And what would folks think if they heard you were house hunting with Pronto?”
“We’re not flats! We didn’t give our own names,” she said, piqued. “I think it looks very suspicious that Lady Gilham was living in London, don’t you?”
“You mentioned a hotel was the address. It looks as though she went there for a holiday en route from Cornwall. It’s not far out of the way and would be a major attraction. Of more interest is that the shy and wilting violet cast herself in Prinney’s path—and to such good avail!—within a week of landing here.”
“If she claims poverty, why wouldn’t she stay with Sir John’s sister on Upper Grosvenor Square when she was visiting London?” she asked with an odious air of having outthought her mentor.
“Because ten to one there is no Mrs. Lehman. That monthly lease looks as though she’s poised for flight—it would have been cheaper by the year. You haven’t asked what I accomplished,” he said. His manner indicated that he, too, had had some success.
“I see you are about to tell me all the same.”
“If you insist,” he said with a dashing smile that made her heart rush. “I had lunch with George Smythe. He claims to come from Virginia, but was reluctant to pinpoint his home more closely.”
“Tobacco-growing country, I believe,” she said with a nonchalant nod. “That’s what he told me, in any case.”
“You! You mean you met up with that rattle!”
“We met him at Lipson’s Tea Shop when we stopped for a cup of cocoa. It was unplanned,” she said, smiling complacently. “Luck is important in this sort of work, is it not?”
A quick gasp of shock came from the sofa, causing conversation to halt, but the duchess only turned a page and continued reading.
“An amateur must count on luck. I make my own luck,” he said, burned to the quick that his accomplices had prospered without him.
“What did you learn from him?” she asked.
“A few items of interest. He offered me a sample of snuff, purportedly from his papa’s plantation. It was Spanish Bran, the most common sort. It comes from Spain, as the name suggests. To compound the offense, he had drenched it with scent to freshen it. A man who knew anything about snuff or tobacco wouldn’t have done so. In short, I don’t believe Mr. Smythe has ever been in Virginia.”
“He spoke of it a good deal,” she said, harking back to the conversation.