Chapter 5
“Why are the three of you looking so fagged?” asked Eddy, after taking a seat at the breakfast table and fixing her fellow Weasels with a gimlet gaze. “Don’t tell me you ventured out on some adventure without alerting me!”
“Nah,” answered Raven through a mouthful of porridge. “Hawk was feeling awfully blue-deviled about Mr. Campbell, so Falcon and I decided to teach him how to play vingt-un.”
“I’m so sorry about your friend,” said Eddy, fixing Hawk with a sympathetic look.
A loud sniff acknowledged her words, as he looked down at his plate and began buttering a fresh-baked sultana muffin.
“We stayed up far later than we should have,” added Peregrine in a conspiratorial whisper. “So please don’t mention it when Wrex and m’lady join us.”
For a long moment, the only sound around the table was the muted chink of silverware and porcelain.
“What’s vingt-un?” she demanded. “And why didn’t you ask me to join you?”
“It’s a card game that Mr. Sheffield taught me,” answered Raven. “Gentlemen play it—usually in gambling hells, where they are wont to squander a great of money thinking they can outwit Lady Luck.”
“We use nails rather than coins,” volunteered Peregrine. He grimaced. “Which is a good thing. Otherwise I would be a pauper this morning.”
“Sounds like great fun.” Eddy scowled. “So I’ll ask again— why wasn’t I invited?”
“Ladies aren’t supposed to know how to play,” answered Raven. “It’s considered a vice.”
Eddy grumbled a very bad word. “I wouldn’t have told anyone.”
“Sorry.” Raven wolfed down the last bite of his toast. “I didn’t think Wrex would like it.”
“Ha, as if you feel constrained by what Wrex likes or doesn’t like.”
Pushing back his plate, Raven rose. “I need to finish some mathematical calculations for Mrs. Sheffield. I promised them for this morning, and I don’t wish to be late.”
Eddy watched him hurry off, then put down her fork and glowered at Hawk and Peregrine. “What aren’t you telling me?”
“Nuffink,” mumbled Hawk as he reached for another muffin.
Charlotte paused by the doorway on hearing “Nuffink.” The garbling of consonants is not a good omen, she mused, especially given the speed with which Raven had disappeared into the side corridor. After hesitating for a moment, she turned and headed for Wrexford’s workroom.
As she suspected, the door was just about to click shut behind Raven. Quickening her pace, she grabbed the latch and followed him inside.
The earl looked up from reading the morning paper and put down his mug of coffee with an undisguised grimace. “Now what?”
She didn’t blame him for sounding irritated. He was never at his best before he had eaten his breakfast.
“You’re not going to like it,” warned Raven, and without further preamble he launched into a detailed recount of what had occurred during the night.
Willing herself to maintain a semblance of calm, Charlotte closed her eyes for an instant, trying to put all the shocking facts into some sort of order before she reacted.
The earl, too, appeared in no hurry to speak. He leaned back in his chair, his expression unreadable.
“We didn’t go out looking to stir up a viper’s nest, sir,” said Raven. “We were simply asking the local urchins whether they had seen anything suspicious on the night of the murder.”
“And the boy named Toad actually witnessed the murder?” pressed Charlotte.
A nod.
“And this Toad then showed you an item he had filched from the murderer’s coat?” asked Wrexford.
Raven wordlessly took something out of his pocket and placed it on the desk.
The earl unwound the twist of grimy rag, revealing a large and intricate brass key.
“There are no markings on it,” said Raven. “Peregrine and I examined it with his special magnifying lens.”
After holding it up to the light of his Argand lamp for a brief moment, Wrexford opened the top drawer of his desk and put it inside.
“You were right to alert me of this without delay. However …” He leaned forward.
“I must now ask for your solemn promise not to pursue any further investigation into Campbell’s murder without my explicit permission. ”
One, two … Charlotte silently counted off three heartbeats before Raven replied with a reluctant “Oiy.”
“Just to be clear, there is absolutely no room to wiggle in interpreting ‘explicit permission,’” she said.
“I understand,” he conceded.
“It’s for your own protection,” she stressed. “Ye gods, the three of you were within a hair’s breadth of a horrible death.”
“Speaking of protection …” Raven’s chin angled up to a martial tilt. “I think I should be allowed to have a pistol of my own—something small that would fit in my pocket.” He squared his shoulders. “For self-defense—and for keeping the others safe from harm.”
“What did you do with the one that you took from your assailant?” asked the earl.
“I tossed it into a pile of rubbish once we were in the stews of Seven Dials. I didn’t think it was wise to keep it.”
“Excellent thinking,” conceded Wrexford. He pondered the request for several moments. “I will consider it.”
Raven shifted from foot to foot and shot a pleading look at Charlotte, which she pretended not to see. The earl had also caught her eye with an unspoken message …
She cleared her throat and frowned at Raven.
“Didn’t you mention at breakfast that you promised to help Cordelia with a mathematical project for Mr. Ricardo this morning?
It would be rude to keep her waiting.” Before he could reply, she added, “Besides, I have a matter that I wish to discuss with Wrex in private.”
A spark of rebellion flashed in Raven’s eyes. However, prudence overcame pique, and he reluctantly left them alone.
Wrexford waited until the sound of footsteps had died away in the corridor before heaving a sigh.
“In their defense, the Weasels pursued a very reasonable objective of gathering information from their urchin friends—” began Charlotte.
“Yes, yes, I don’t find fault with their choice.
” He expelled another harried breath. “Indeed, they may have unintentionally stumbled upon evidence that Baz’s surmise might be right and that the murder of Campbell is far more insidious than a robbery gone wrong.
I shall have to alert Griffin right away about the complications. ”
The earl shifted uncomfortably in his chair. “So for the moment, the crime and its ramifications are out of our hands. However …”
A pause. “Raven’s question about being allowed to have a pistol triggered a related conundrum.”
She waited for him to continue.
“Eddy has been plaguing me for a pistol ever since the … er … incident this past June. She has complained to me—ad infinitum—about how unfairly constricting the rules of society are for ladies. A fact, of course, of which I am well aware. So, it has occurred to me that if I offered to give her a pistol for her upcoming birthday, it might make her feel that … I am listening and willing to bend the rules on occasion.”
Wrexford finally looked up. “What is your opinion on whether a young lady of tender years should be allowed to possess a firearm?”
Charlotte raised her brows. “First of all, if by ‘incident,’ you are referring to the night that Eddy and Raven saved your life, my opinion is that both of them showed great maturity and resourcefulness by quickly analyzing the situation and drawing up a bold plan of action before it was too late.”
Wrexford compressed his lips to still the telltale twitch at the corners of his mouth. “Be that as it may … you don’t think they’re dangerous enough without weapons?”
“I think they have shown that they’re capable of making the right decisions under difficult circumstances. So perhaps they should be permitted to prove it was no fluke.”
Charlotte took a moment more to consider the question. “As for whether a girl should possess a pistol … my father, who was a stick-in-the-mud about a great many things, thought it prudent for a female to know how to shoot a pistol, and so I had one at Eddy’s age.”
A smile. “If you decide to allow the two of them to have one, you will, of course, draw up a list of strict rules …”