Chapter Five
Neville approached The Royal Theater, Covent Garden, moving in and out of shadows generated by the light pouring out from the theater’s large rectangular windows and emanating from the lamps resting atop the iron fence posts.
Tonight, however, thrill-seeking theatergoers did not need a private tour to appreciate the more obvious of Smirke’s Classical Orders.
Simply passing beneath the soaring portico’s giant columns, a replica of the Grecian temple of Minerva, was enough to give anyone an increased sense of consequence, or at the very least, a feeling of awe.
Neville cast his gaze up over the crowd, admiring the statue of the Goddess of Wisdom, and vaguely wishing she could bestow on him her gift.
He was on his way, in disguise, to meet a woman of dubious reputation.
He needed all the discernment he could muster.
And yet, his mind repeatedly strayed to another lady… one presumably safely at home.
His thoughts, he feared, were no longer rational at all.
At some point in Harbury’s library, he’d had an Idea about himself and Millicent Wainwright. His Idea, though formless substance at first, had thickened with Millicent’s challenge to be torrid, only to be further condensed by Harbury’s not-so-subtle hints.
Now Neville’s Idea squatted, fat and heavy, in his mind.
What if “Millie and he” were possible?
Not just an aspiration or a dream, but something on which to concentrate his efforts when this nightmare with John finally ended?
Could he make a future with Millie? Or was his Idea a curiosity best ignored?
A curiosity, most certainly.
A curiosity deserving of as much derision as the Prince’s Bomb, the Cádiz Memorial unveiled on the Prince’s birthday. Mortar stolen from the French had been fired and shaped into the statue. But what was to have been a grand monument had since become an object of humor and ridicule.
Just as he would become if he approached Millicent with an offer of courtship.
He shook his head. He had to purge himself of the Idea, at least for the present.
Tonight had a single purpose.
Step by careful step, he drew ever closer to the theater’s impressively imposing facade. He was only steps away from crossing Bow Street when, at his elbow, a young female interrupted his journey, offering him his choice of her small collection of miserable-looking fruit.
From the produce’s shape and color, Neville could not discern if the shriveled spheres were oranges, lemons, or limes. Without sampling her wares, he paid the poor thing a trifle and then waved her away.
Then, suddenly, spurred by a tingling sense, he brought his hand roughly down.
“Oi!” The squeak of a young boy.
Or, at the very least, an urchin dressed as a boy. Between the dim light and the dirt on the child’s face, Neville could hardly tell.
Keeping a firm grip on the greasy mop of hair belonging to the squirming mass, he scooped up the urchin’s hat. Thank goodness he’d worn buff-colored gloves instead of his usual pure white. Even so, they’d likely need to be tossed.
He winced as the boy uttered a stream of verbal filth almost as abhorrent as the dirt caked and cracking on his cheeks. Men and women alike, either fearful of being kicked or revolted by the smell, gave him and the pickpocket a widening berth.
“Stop squirming, thief!” Neville ordered.
“Get yer fam off me strummel, you—you Rustyguts! Ain’t no coney-catcher!”
Neville looked down in consternation, attempting to translate the unintelligible. His understanding of cant was limited. Then, a feminine presence stole up to Neville’s side.
“Right then, Tommy,” the woman said in a thick accent. “Be off—this flat belongs to me.”
“Take the clinker! Don’t want ‘im anymore.”
Neville looked down into the boy’s wide eyes, all bluff and bravado. He thought of John and let go of the boy’s hair.
“I’d pike on the bene, too, if I was you! Just look at ‘em.” The boy warned the woman just before he disappeared back into the crowd.
Sensing the show was over, the people around Neville began to move. He turned toward the woman and found himself looking down into the eyes of his witness, Mrs. Cartwright.
Or, at least, Mrs. Cartwright was the name she’d given him.
She beamed up at him, an approving expression that left him slightly ill. Were it not for the fleeting thought of John, he would have turned the boy over to the watch. Even in her case, he might have notified the watch of a suspected Paphian’s presence, had he not needed her help.
He assessed Mrs. Cartwright anew.
Though she would not pass for a lady of the first stare, just like last time they met, she was sharply and tastefully dressed.
Not in the vulgar cut and color of a common streetwalker—someone who might ply her trade quickly, and under the stars—but like a struggling but dignified woman who’d fallen on hard times.
Perhaps that was all Mrs. Cartwright was, after all.
Perhaps she had even purchased her dress at the same rag-and-bone shop Neville’s man had collected the clothes he currently wore.
She slipped her arm beneath his.
“You found me,” he said, somewhat stupidly.
She was to have met him by the second lamp to the left of the portico. Instead, she’d located him in the crowd. He wondered what might have given him away. His—or, rather the rustygut’s—five-caped greatcoat in distinctive Spanish fly green?
Well, he’d intended for people to notice the coat and ignore the man, had he not?
“In my profession,” she answered, “one learns to recognize a man by his stride.” Her heavy accent had disappeared behind the lilt of a lady gently bred. “You won’t call the watch on the boy, will you? Tommy don’t—does not—mean any harm.”
“He’d have taken my timepiece.” Neville muddied his own vowels as much as he could without equal practice.
“Nah,” she replied, giving herself away again. “Tom never nicks more than coin…and that of the most insignificant amount.”
“No need for me to tattle, then.” Or, for that matter, invite further questions. “No real harm done, was there?”
“You’re a good one, Mr. Mann.”
He smiled down at her, even though he wasn’t. Not really.
Oh, he’d thought he’d been. He’d tried to be. But Millicent’s dressing down left him wondering if he’d confused right and righteous with rigid and intransigent.
Although he could hardly be described as the former now.
Mrs. Cartwright had just called him Mr. Mann, the same name the missing woman fabricated for John, and the name Neville had borrowed as his disguise.
To Mrs. Cartwright, and anyone else Neville met while making inquiries, he was known as Mr. Mann, the fugitive boy’s father, seeking to make reparation to the young lady.
At least the latter part was true.
And if, indeed, he discovered “Temperence” was in peril, he intended to do what he could for the girl. His ready coin ran low, but he had plenty of ways to raise blunt, as his balance sheets were solid. And if he was able to be of some help, he might lessen some of his guilt.
“Have you any new news?” he asked, as if speaking only of trivialities, in case someone was intentionally listening. “What’s the latest on dit?”
“Ah, my friend,” she answered equally lightly. “You are always so droll. Yes! Our mutual acquaintances have provided plenty of fodder for funning. As a matter of fact…”
She leaned in close to his ear.
“I’ve discovered the exact location of the house party. I’ve written down the direction. There’s more, but nothing I would dare say in public. I put everything in the note.”
He drew back and forced a chuckle he did not feel. “That I cannot believe.”
“Well, I might have embellished just a bit.” She held up her fingers, leaving a hair’s breadth between them.
“Oh, look!” She focused on his chest and frowned. “That despicable child mussed your coat!”
She made a show of brushing his lapel. He had to keep himself from flinching. He didn’t like to be touched that way. Not by her, at least. A second later, he realized she’d managed to slip something between his buttons.
“Ah,” he said, in a slightly louder voice. “The little wretch has undone my button.”
As he refastened his coat, he made sure to settle the paper she’d given him securely inside an inner waistcoat pocket.
“Much better now,” she said approvingly.
“Shall we?” Again, he gave her his arm.
“I trust I will be pleased,” he said.
“With the play?” she falsely questioned. “Oh, certainly. I have seen this very ensemble in another performance. I am well acquainted with lines. I might even recognize lesser cast members.”
“You will, I trust, recognize the principal ones.”
“Yes! Of course.” She gave him a pointed glance. “I’ve a good eye and an excellent memory, too.”
Soon, he would know for certain whether Willard was the man Mrs. Cartwright had seen with “Temperence” at that disreputable party outside Brighton. Not only that, but he’d also have the exact location of said party. More witnesses would surely follow. And then…
Well, then, very little could keep him from demanding satisfaction.
He grimaced.
He’d much rather have had Mrs. Cartwright identify Willard in a less public manner. But he hadn’t been able to think of a better way. He had to be present when she named the viscount. What better place for her to study the son of a peer than the one location the aristocracy came to see and be seen?
The crowds around Neville grew thicker as they made their way into the main hall. Hat low, and head angled, he presented his tickets to the ticket taker and then proceeded to the separate pit entrance. Only when they had finally reached their seats did he breathe easy once again.
Even without his hat, he was unlikely to be identified at a distance. The unfashionably high points of his collar concealed the angle of his chin. And, as with the other times he’d met with possible witnesses, he had sought help to further conceal his identity.