Chapter 23
Madrid
Don Mateo stirred. “He comes,” he said softly.
A figure appeared at the far end of the alley, moving with the careless confidence of a man who believes the world owes him nothing but pleasure.
Wickham. Even here, in this city of hunger and poverty, he wore clothes too fine, his boots shining, his hair curled as if he still expected to charm a fortune from some gullible widow.
He was humming, of all things, some bawdy tune from a London playhouse.
Fitzwilliam stepped forward. “Mr. Williams?”
Wickham stopped, frowning. He didn’t recognise the voice. “You are from London, the Morning Post?”
“If you wish. I have a message, from His Lordship.”
“Wellington, he will give me an interview?” Wickham could hardly believe his good luck. All of the newspaper correspondents in Madrid had been competing to speak to the reclusive General Lord Wellington.
“Hardly, George,” said Fitzwilliam, stepping into the light. “No, my message comes from Lord Matlock, who was rather displeased with your article in the Post.”
“Colonel Fitzwilliam,” said Wickham, with a half-bow, the sneer barely hidden beneath his polite mask. “And… Don Mateo, is it not? What an unlikely gathering.”
“You know why we’re here,” Fitzwilliam said, his voice flat. “You know what you’ve done.”
Wickham’s sneer deepened. “You take things too seriously, Fitzwilliam. I merely spoke the truth—”
“Oh, George, if only it were that simple. Let’s see—spiriting Georgiana away on the Great North Road; abducting Miss Elizabeth, Miss Lydia, and, of course, Georgiana again; collaborating with the French—a hanging offence; slander—destroying the reputations of two very fine women.”
Wickham laughed, a short, ugly sound. “Ruined? In Spain, with half the women whoring for bread and the other half for gold, you call that ruin? You’re a fool, Fitzwilliam. A sentimental fool.”
Don Mateo stepped forward, his expression cold. “In Spain, senor, we cut the tongues from men who speak so of women. Especially women who are not theirs to speak of.”
Wickham’s hand drifted to his sword, but Don Mateo’s knife was already at his throat, the blade so close that Wickham froze, sweat beading on his brow. “Now, now,” Wickham said, his voice suddenly thin. “Let us be reasonable…”
“There is no reason left for you,” Fitzwilliam said softly. “Not after what you have done.”
The alley was silent except for the distant sound of a patrol marching somewhere near the palace. Wickham looked from Fitzwilliam to Mateo. “What are you going to do?” he whispered.
Fitzwilliam stepped aside. “We’re not going to do anything, George. But there is a man here who has some business with you.”
A shape detached itself from the deeper blackness at the alley’s end. El Guapo.
“El Guapo,” Don Mateo said softly, “is a friend of Senora Isabella. He has little patience for men who disrespect her. Only the other day, a certain Colonel Dumoustier turned up dead outside a house in Burgos. Seems his appetites got the better of him—at least his appetite for beautiful women with chestnut hair.”
Wickham tried to run, but El Guapo caught him with one hand, dragging him back into the alley’s depths. Wickham screamed—a thin, animal sound—but no one came. Not in Madrid, where the night belonged to the wolves.
Fitzwilliam watched, his face ashen. He told himself this was justice, but it felt like vengeance, and he wondered if there was any difference. Don Mateo laid a hand on his arm. “It’s done,” he said. “Let us go.”
They walked away, the sounds of the city swallowing them up. Behind them, Wickham’s screams faded into the shadows, and when they finally stopped, Madrid was quiet once more.
Fitzwilliam did not look back. Maybe he would tell Darcy what became of Wickham—but not the women Wickham had wronged.
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