CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
Ash was a wonderful dancer. I suppose it shouldn’t have been a surprise, given the grace with which he always moved, but being held close in his arms and spun effortlessly around the dance floor was a very different experience to my previous endeavours in the ballroom. Now, I could certainly see the appeal of being pressed almost scandalously close against a tall, well-muscled body, of the intimacy in the way his hand lingered on my waist. The way I could tip my face and look up into his, close enough to see the way his pupils dilated when he looked back at me.
I should have been feeling nothing but happy as I spun, safe in Ash’s arms, knowing that Laing had been thwarted. And yet I couldn’t shake the feeling that we had missed something.
“There’s one thing I still don’t understand,” I said as we danced, and Ash gazed soulfully down at me. “Why did Laing plant the bomb in the card room? It doesn’t make any sense.”
“Who knows what goes on in the mind of an unhinged criminal.” Ash shrugged. “I’m much more interested in how you manage to look so lovely, even when your feathers keep tickling my nose.”
I laughed. “I’m sorry,” I said. “I promise after tonight I’ll never wear the things again.”
The music we were dancing to came to an end, and Ash’s hand went to the small of my back. He leaned over me as we walked through the crowd, and I could feel the warmth of his body curved around me, could smell that delicious spicy smell that I knew clung to his skin.
“The ballroom is a far more effective target,” I blurted, unable to help myself. “They could have taken out the prince and princess as well as half the aristocracy.”
“Well, maybe he—”
“Frederick?”
Ash’s words were cut short by the exclamation. Standing in front of us was Lord Archer.
“Father.” Ash frowned. “What are you doing here?”
“Me?” Lord Archer demanded. “What are you doing here?”
“Ash?” Another voice joined the chorus of confusion, and I saw Horatio Peabody appear beside Lord Archer, looking dapper but anxious. “How do you… Did you say Father ?”
“You’re acquainted with my son?” Archer sounded disgruntled. “The new Baron Ely.”
Horatio’s face was a picture of bewilderment. “Baron Ely, but I thought…”
“I forgot that you were going to be here, Horatio,” Ash said smoothly. “Your daughter is being presented, isn’t she?”
“Yes, yes,” Horatio said, recovering. “My Sadie. She’s here and pretty as a picture.”
I was trying to blend as unobtrusively into the background as my foolish dress and feathered headband would allow. The last thing we needed was for Horatio to recognize me as the masked lady who had beaten him at cards. Still, seeing Horatio again tugged at something in my memory. Hadn’t I seen him when I was in Cambridge?
“Psst.” I turned in the direction of the noise, to find Maud, dressed in a maid’s uniform, hovering nearby. “I have a note for you from Mrs Finch,” she said, surreptitiously passing me the folded paper. “It means nothing to me, but she said you’d understand.”
“Thank you,” I said, opening the note and scanning the words.
The world fell away. For a moment there was no sound but the rapid beating of my heart. The puzzle pieces slid effortlessly, devastatingly into place.
“Mr Peabody, did you go to Cambridge to see Lord Archer?” I asked, breaking unceremoniously into Ash’s conversation. He followed my wide gaze to Horatio, who turned red and then white in quick succession.
“Well, I – yes, I did. To offer my condolences.”
“I don’t think that was it,” I said. “I think you went there to persuade Lord Archer to attend this ball.”
“How did you… I don’t know what… Mrs Williams? Is that you?” This flustered response was all I needed.
“What is she talking about, Peabody?” Lord Archer demanded.
“Did Mr Peabody suggest you attend tonight?” I said, fixing my gaze firmly on his, while Peabody spluttered beside us.
“Well, yes – he did suggest it. I wasn’t keen; these things are dashed expensive and there’s all the fuss. But he said he had a business opportunity to discuss and it would be worth making the journey because he had someone important to introduce me to. But why—”
“Get Sylla,” I said to Maud, who was watching me with careful attention. “It isn’t over yet.”
As Maud took to her heels, I dragged Ash away from his father and Peabody to the now-empty card room. There was no sign of Max’s men or the disarmed device, but they clearly hadn’t started letting people return in here yet.
“What’s going on?” he asked, looking at me with concern. “You’re pale as a ghost.”
I handed him the note, and he read it aloud, a frown pinching between his eyes.
“ Thomas Reeves, lately of Cambridge, is the son of Margaret Reeves, deceased. Margaret was a maid at Ely Hall. Shortly after Thomas was born, she committed suicide. Margaret was sixteen. Unmarried. No father is listed .” Ash looked at me. “I don’t understand. Who is Thomas Reeves?”
I closed my eyes, swallowing back the fear that threatened to overwhelm me. “Thomas Reeves is Edward Laing.”
Ash’s entire body took on a preternatural stillness. “And his mother was a maid at Ely Hall,” he said slowly. “ No father is listed . She … killed herself.” He read the note again, and I saw him come to the same horrible conclusion that I had reached. The words, when they came, fell like a blow. “Edward Laing … is my father’s son.”
“Which would make him your brother,” I said.
Ash shook his head. “I’m not Archer’s son by blood. Everyone knows that. Laing and I are no relation at all.”
“When we were in Cambridge, I asked him why he disliked you so much,” I remembered. “He said he didn’t care for people trying to take what was rightly his … I thought he meant me.”
Dazed, Ash seemed to be working through the problem. “He meant the viscountcy. If anything, he has a greater claim to the title and the estate than I do.”
“He has no claim at all,” I said. “Not as an illegitimate son.”
“All the more reason to hate me,” Ash pointed out. “He cannot inherit. The truth is that I’m also illegitimate, but the hypocrisy of our society means that, as I was raised as a viscount’s son, I’m the heir. I get everything.”
“He also said that his greatest personal achievement was to happen soon,” I said, and the words were breathless. “Ash, all this business with the anarchists was a smokescreen. He had Peabody bring your father here. I saw Horatio when we were in Cambridge but I didn’t think … Laing lured you here. He planned to assassinate you both, under the guise of an anarchist plot.”
“Putting an end to the line, once and for all,” Ash said, and his tone was distant. “You … think he got rid of Perry too?”
“I would guess so. I don’t quite know how, but I wager it’s something to do with this anarchist group who was paying Perry.”
“And so that means… What does it mean?” Ash looked bewildered.
“It means that the threat remains,” I said stiffly.
“But we found—”
“No.” I shook my head. “We found the anarchists’ device. When Laing left the ballroom, he looked pleased. He knew we’d found the bomb and he didn’t care. He’s too clever. We should have known he had a backup plan. There was plenty of material in that warehouse for another bomb.”
“All right,” Ash said steadily. “Say that’s true – where is it?”
“I don’t know,” I said, frustrated. “Max’s men have been over the building with a fine toothcomb. There’s nowhere it could be.”
Ash thought for a moment. “Did you see anything in the warehouse that would give us a clue?”
I screwed up my face in concentration. “There was nothing,” I said. “Just the equipment. Izzy said she saw some bolts of fabric left over from the factory, there were some old crates… It could be anywhere!”
Ash made a thoughtful noise. “Hold on. Peabody was trying to take my father to the card room – under Laing’s instructions, we can assume. I suppose the card room is a likely place for me to be, because I enjoy gaming as long as it’s not at the Penny … but my father and I rarely even acknowledge one another. I prefer to be as far away from him as possible. So how could he possibly bet on us being together?”
“That’s true,” I said. “Think! If you weren’t tempted to talk to your father, where could Laing be certain you’d go?”
Ash ran a hand through his hair. “The ballroom?” he said. “I don’t know. I’d be wherever you were.”
His words hit me like a punch to the solar plexus.
“Oh God,” I whispered, my knees threatening to go from underneath me. “If you weren’t in the card room, you’d go wherever I was. Of course. It’s me .”
“What’s you?” Ash was already stepping forward, apprehension in his face, but I held my hand out to stop him.
“The fabric in the warehouse,” I said dully. “Mother said there was a problem with my gown and it had to be altered.”
“What are you talking about?” Ash took another step towards me, and again I kept him at bay. “I don’t understand. You look frightened. Will you tell me what the hell is going on?”
“It’s me,” I said. “I’m the second bomb.”