“I startled you,” he said, in a low voice. “I did not mean to, but it is hard to catch up with someone in these rooms.”
He had worn his tricorn and his cloak. As he moved nearer, she saw that part of his face was covered by a mask.
“I saw this doorway. It seemed a perfect place to wait.” Nervousness made her fiddle with her hands. They were so very alone in this small, dark space.
“It is—or was—the night stairwell to the monks’ dorter. You are in the old South transept. The monks tried to make it easier on themselves to perform their nightly rituals. Hence, this staircase directly into the church.”
She wondered how he could possibly know. “You studied the history of these ruins?”
“As much as I was able. They have always fascinated me. Visiting abbeys that are still intact on the Continent was a big help.”
“How I envy you that travel—but,” she reminded herself aloud, “you did not come here to hear about my frustrated wishes, my lord.”
“No . . . but I will be happy to wish them for you. So tell me,” he said, with abruptness in his tone, “what have you discovered, my very dear friend.”
She knew . . . perfectly well . . . that his expression was a reflection of the importance of anyone’s friendship in a crisis like this, but she blushed just the same. “Unfortunately, your cousin Harrowby has no mark where your father might have wounded his assailant. Philippe is very certain. I am sorry, my lord.”
Gideon was glad she hadn’t beat about the bush. He had been frustrated by the lack of news from every quarter.
The news-sheets from London told him nothing. It was as if they all conspired to keep him in the dark. Little news from London or Westminster was reported, nothing about the political situation, although news from the Continent was copious. Only one item had caught his eye this week. Lord Peterborough had been forbidden the Court, which meant that the King’s hostility to the Tories continued unabated. As long as that situation held true, he had no prayer of regaining his own, unless he proved the identity of his father’s murderer.
“So,” he said, with a sigh—surprisingly one of relief. “Harrowby is innocent.”
“It would seem so, my lord. Are you not disappointed?”
“Actually, no. It is something of a relief to discover that my judgement in men is not more flawed than I had begun to believe it. I cannot blame Harrowby for what he has done. I don’t know of two people who would have refused what the Crown and Parliament offered him.”
He continued with more than a touch of chagrin, “Nor can I blame him for marrying your cousin. Not when she and her mother were both determined to have him.”
“He might have had a little more consideration for your feelings,” Mrs. Kean protested, and he was grateful for her bitter note on his behalf.
“Harrowby? No, Mrs. Kean. My poor cousin Harrowby has always been ignorant and shallow. Nothing can be expected of him, and nothing will ever be got.”
She did not refer to Isabella’s defection. No doubt she was trying to spare him the pain of recalling it. And he must not forget that Isabella was her cousin, and therefore, a person with a claim on her affections much greater than his own. It would be completely unfair to let her know how dramatically his opinion of her cousin had changed, but he was surprised by how strong his desire to tell her was.
He changed the subject. “Did you get a chance to meet James Henry, Mrs. Kean?”
Although she had, she could not tell him conclusively whether she suspected James Henry or not. Something in her attitude, however, gave him the impression that she had found his brother more likeable than she had expected to.
As he listened to her soft, reasonable voice, coming towards him through the dark, an unpleasant feeling—a feeling that couldn’t be, yet it seemed amazingly akin to jealousy—made him frown at her description of his brother’s evidently sterling character.
He tried to reason his resentment away. Mrs. Kean had been his only supporter in the society he had left. He quite naturally would not want to share her friendship any more than he had wanted to share his father’s love. It was silly to care if she liked James, but the feeling still rankled as she continued.
“I must tell you, my lord, that I believe your coachman recognized your horse.”
“Did he?”
Damn!
“I should have thought of that myself. He could recognize Penny as well as I could.”
“You may be surprised to know that he described her as a bronze-coloured gelding with a pair of white boots.”
It took a moment before her words sank in, but when they did he laughed, and some of the despair that had weighed him down since his meeting with the Duke seemed to lift. “Then, bless Old Peter!” he said. “I hope you agreed with him, Mrs. Kean, although Penny may never forgive you for it. She is a vain little creature.”
“I made it as clear as I could that I could never contradict your cousin, who is my employer, and given that circumstance, I should have to contradict his coachman.”
Gideon, who was coming to know the intricacies of her mind, immediately understood what she had done. “Did ye now?” he said, grinning in the dark. “Then I shall tell Penny that the truth was forced from you against your will.” He wished he could see the sparkle he suspected would be in her eye.
Her mood sobered, though. “I do think I managed to convince Mr. Henry that the highwayman was not you, my lord, but I believe he was very suspicious of the possibility. The blue satin cloak intrigued him very much. Could he have known it was yours?”
Gideon grunted. “He might have, although the money for that garment came from my own income, not from my father’s money. He approves every expenditure in this house, but does not approve all of mine. He wouldn’t know about it unless Philippe raved about what a
formidable
garment he had commissioned for me. And knowing Philippe, that is very possible.
“Did James inform Harrowby of his suspicions?”
“No, my lord. Not that I know of.”
“I wonder if he will?” He left that uneasy question for another day, and said, “If you would, Mrs. Kean, can you tell Philippe to say the cloak was sold or given away if he is ever asked about it? Chances are, he will not be.”
“I have already warned him, my lord. He said he will say that you instructed him to give it to a beggar and he did.”
Gideon was struck almost speechless by her foresight. She had done so much—
thought
of so much. “Thank you,” was all he could say.
“And have you discovered anything to help you, my lord?”
He told her about his meeting with the Duke and his reluctant conclusion that his Grace had not had a logical reason to kill his father.
When she had heard the Duke’s arguments, she agreed. “What now, then, my lord?”
“I don’t know.”
His bleak response was interrupted by a bird which flew out of its nest behind her, fluttering its wings about her head.
“Oh!” She started, falling forward, and he caught her, trapping her shoulders with his hands.
She smelled very sweet, like wild spring grass. He remembered, in Mrs. Mayfield’s parlour, thinking that she smelled very good.
When she pulled backwards, apologizing for her clumsiness, he helped her back onto her feet. “This isn’t the perfect place to talk,” he said, to cover her shyness. His voice came out a bit hoarse, and he hoped she wouldn’t know why.
He did not want to frighten her. She had been very brave to meet him alone at night, and it was wrong of him to think of the pleasures he was thinking of now.
“Let’s move outside. There’s a low wall in the lavatorium you can sit on.”
When they moved out into the night air, the stars and moon were shining. Gideon took her elbow to help her step through the maze of stones. He knew his way unerringly, having spent his boyhood amongst these buildings, but they could trip someone new to their groupings.
“Have you nothing else to go on, my lord?” Mrs. Kean asked, after he had settled her on the wall.
“I’ve been reading over the letters I told you about. And there is just one possibility.”
“What is that?”
“Two of them refer to the Pretender’s need for money to pay for troops. They both hint at the existence of a man who might be persuaded to join the cause if an inducement can be given. Neither the man’s name nor the nature of the inducement is mentioned.”
“Didn’t the conspirators have money of their own?”
“Yes, but mounting an invasion takes more wealth than even these men could have raised. They were afraid to commit their own funds until they knew the Pretender could raise an army in France, in which case they would need their own money to pay for their troops here. They were looking for someone willing to send funds to the Chevalier before he landed—in exchange for something he wanted.”
“What could that have been?”
Gideon found her naivety amusing. “An earldom or a dukedom is generally thought to be pleasing.”
“But only the King can grant those.”
“Precisely. But they may be
promised
to as many people as the Pretender can convince, and he loses nothing in making such promises. You would be surprised to know how many men are willing to risk their lives and their families for the hope of riches they may never see.”
“I believe I
would
be surprised. It seems quite foolish to me.”
He couldn’t help laughing, but the truth of what he had explained to her sobered him quickly enough. “I want to find out just who this financier was. What if he only pretended to join their cause? He might have been a spy for the Crown. Or he might have considered joining them and changed his mind. He could have panicked and killed my father when he tried to back out. His name does not appear, either on a list or in a signature. If he did commit murder, none of the papers I found would implicate him in their plot.”
“But how will you go about finding this out?”
“The Duke of Bournemouth may know. I shall write to ask him.”
“Will he tell you?”
“I don’t know.”
“Is there nothing more?”
Gideon sighed. “Just one more thing . . . and I don’t see how it fits, but it might.”
She waited for him to go on, and tired of standing, he sat down beside her.
“There was a Jacobite medal, rolled up inside my father’s papers.” He described it for her, explaining its symbolism and telling her the reasons why it was sometimes bestowed.
“I do not believe it was intended for my father, for he was not a superstitious man, and he had seen the Pretender too many times not to know him.”
“Could it have been for the man they hoped would supply them with money?”
“Possibly. But it might just as easily have been for someone else. For someone who needed the reassurance that James Stuart does exist.”
Mrs. Kean sighed. “I’m afraid I see nothing in all this that I can help you with, my lord.”
“No,” he agreed. He became aware that he had prolonged their conversation longer than he ought. But he had always enjoyed being with her and, right now, he craved the companionship she gave. “I do not think there is anything else you can do for me, but I thank you for all you have done.”
He could just make out the lines of her slender body in the dark. She sat very straight with her hands folded on her lap as if they sat in a drawing room instead of beneath the stars.
He tried to ignore a temptation to thank her in a way that would be more satisfying for him. Mrs. Kean was not that sort of a woman, and he would not insult her by treating her like one. She had not given him a reason to make him think she would welcome that kind of attention, and he mustn’t abuse her friendship. She had started by trying to help him understand her cousin. Now Isabella was gone, and she was simply his friend.
He stood and held out a hand to help her rise. “I must permit you to go. You won’t want to be discovered coming in so late.”
“Yes . . . Oh!” Her voice was light. “I meant to tell you that you have become a figure of terror in these parts—not as yourself, of course, but as a highwayman, known as Blue Satan. Your cousin has a very romantic turn of mind. He named you himself.”
“Ye gods! And what am I supposed to be capable of? Raping the dairymaids and making off with the butter?”
“At the very least, I should think. And he cannot forgive you for owning that cloak. Since we met you on the road, I believe he has mentioned it with regret some twenty times a day.”
“Poor Harrowby! But I am happy to hear there is still something he envies me. I shall have to make certain that Blue Satan is seen again, so I can wallow in his envy.”
She grabbed quickly for his sleeve, then dropped her hand, flustered. “I hope you will not take any unnecessary chances, my lord.”
He had heard a tiny catch in her breath. Mrs. Kean should be warned that there was something very arousing in the sound of a woman’s gasp in the dark.
He drew closer to her. “I will endeavour to be very prudent in my rides, if only to please you, dear lady.”
She did not flirt back at him, but said, “Well,
if
you undertake to rob any more coaches, I hope you will take measures to disguise your beautiful horse.
Or
to hide her, although I do believe a disguise would be more serviceable. I know of a very good shoe-blacking that can be obtained in London. If you would like to try making her into a brindle mare, I should be happy to send a tin of it to the address you gave me.”
She said it in the same tone of voice with which a physician might prescribe a poultice for his chest, as if she found nothing injudicious in recommending highway robbery to her friends.
He chuckled, and had to smother a deeper laugh. “Never a brindle, Mrs. Kean! You cannot imagine how insulted Penny would be. She has the blood of princes in her veins.”
“So do you, my lord, if the Fitz in your name is anything to go by. Yet
you
wear a disguise.”
“An interesting comparison. I will be certain to bring it up with Penny. Fortunately, should I ever take to the King’s highway again, the job of altering her looks will fall to Tom and not to me.”
He had led her to a sheltered spot beneath some trees within sight of the house. Low light from one of the rooms where a fire had been lit would provide her with a beacon as she crossed the lawn. “I hope your absence has not been noticed. I have kept you rather long.”