CHAPTER 16
The note duly written and dispatched to the earl, Charlotte made herself enter her workroom and take a seat at her desk.
Of late, she had been woefully neglectful of her art.
Ink and pigment had been shoved aside by the overwhelming demands of reality.
The move, the murders, the worries about the boys adjusting to a new life.
Her own feelings were, she admitted, still a little topsy-turvy. Hidden away in the shadows of slums, she had a certain degree of simplicity to her life, allowing her to focus all her passions and ideas through her pen. Art and commentary were her voice.
Now things were infinitely more complicated. Anonymity had been a protective cloak. With each inch that she pushed back its concealing hood, she was making herself vulnerable.
Change entailed risk.
Charlotte shifted her gaze to her open sketchbook. She had only to look at the preliminary sketches for her Man versus Machine series of prints to see that.
Taking up her pen knife, she set about preparing a fresh quill.
Mr. Fores had actually proved to be surprisingly supportive of the serious subject.
Though the prints didn’t sell quite as well as the ones ridiculing the Royal family, he took satisfaction in the fact that nearly every government department and all the leading politicians were sending messengers to purchase copies of them.
That his shop was seen as shaping public opinion was, to his canny mind, a worthwhile investment.
More than that, Charlotte was of the opinion that, at heart, Mr. Fores was a secret supporter of social reform.
The pen was now ready. There was nothing new she could—or would—say about Ashton’s death.
However, there were still myriad questions to explore about the revolution sweeping through manufacturing in England.
What place did people have in a world where machines made their efforts obsolete?
What lay ahead for those who toiled with their hands?
These were important issues. And ones fundamental to what sort of society the country envisioned for its future.
The smoothness of the shaft, the softness of the feathery filaments grazing her knuckles—Charlotte realized how much she had missed creating the images and words that challenged people to think and react.
Science and technology were important. But so was art and abstract ideas.
A quick dip loaded the point with ink. Turning to a fresh page in her sketchbook, she began to rough out a preliminary idea.
* * *
“Milord, you have a visitor who is demanding an immediate audience.”
Wrexford didn’t look up from his laboratory notes. Having abandoned his efforts with the numbers, he was using his earlier experiment to keep his mind occupied. “What can you be thinking, Riche? You know the rules about interrupting my work.”
“My thoughts, sir,” replied the butler with a sniff, “are that I would prefer to face your ire than risk having the Young Person cut out my liver with the nasty-looking knife he has clutched in his grubby fist.”
“Ah.” The earl snapped the pages shut. “I take it Master Sloane is at the door.”
Tyler, who was busy cleaning the scientific instruments on one of the work counters, let out a snicker.
“Yes, milord. May I show him in?”
“I suppose you had better do so. It would be a cursed inconvenience to have to hire a new butler.”
“Indeed it would,” quipped Tyler. “Finding someone willing to tolerate your moods would be no easy task.”
Riche padded off without comment.
“M’lady said this was urgent,” announced Raven without preamble as he hurried into the room and slapped a folded sheet of paper down on the earl’s desktop.
“Thank you.” Wrexford picked it up. “Where’s your shadow?”
“We came in through the alleyway by the mews. One of the grooms was currying a big black stallion and he said Hawk could stay and watch.” Raven looked around. “Wot’s that?” he added abruptly, his gaze fixing on the large brass apparatus Tyler was polishing.
“A microscope.” He cracked the wax seal. “Its lenses magnify things to many times their real size.”
The boy continued staring.
The note was longer than Charlotte’s usual terse missives. “Tyler, show the lad how it works while I have a look at this.”
The sound of their voices faded to an indistinct hum as Wrexford read the news of Hillhouse’s disappearance. Had they finally stumbled on to the scent of the villains? His blood quickened at the thought that the hunt was on in earnest. But he made himself hold his excitement in check.
A difficult task, as Charlotte’s very next sentences spelled out the details of Hillhouse’s youthful moral lapse. Granted, a single mistake didn’t damn a man for eternity. However, if money had proved an irresistible temptation once, it might well again.
Evidence. At least he was beginning to gather evidence, rather than just sit and spin theories.
After re-reading the note, he took his time to consider the facts and what they might mean.
Hillhouse, Kirkland . . . and Isobel Ashton?
Lost in concentration, he wasn’t sure how many minutes had ticked by when a muted exclamation pulled him from his thoughts.
“Oiy!” Raven lifted his head from the microscope’s eyepiece, a look of wonder warring with wariness. “Yer bamming me, ain’t ye?” he said to Tyler. “It’s a trick—that ain’t really the eye of a gnat?”
The valet grinned. “It is, lad.” He slid out two thin glass plates and showed the boy the tiny insect pressed between them.
“How does it work?” demanded Raven, touching a curious—and none-too-clean—finger to the gleaming metal.
Tyler winced but bit back any chiding, choosing instead to launch into an explanation of the convex and concave lenses.
The boy, noted Wrexford, asked very intelligent questions.
“Come, let me show you a drop of water,” said the valet, warming up to the subject. “You’ll be amazed at what the naked eye can’t see.”
As Wrexford rose, he saw Raven’s face fall. “Ye got a note ready fer me te take back?” he asked, reluctantly sliding down from his stool
The earl had not yet decided how to respond in writing.
Charlotte’s message seemed to confirm that he and Sheffield were pursuing a promising path, but there were many questions he wished to discuss with her.
It was all still conjecture, and with a sudden start, he realized how much he had come to value her judgment.
The boy darted a longing look back at the microscope.
Clenching his teeth in frustration, Wrexford realized that a visit was not possible at this hour. Now that she had settled in to a more respectable neighborhood, the rules had changed. He could no longer come and go without stirring malicious gossip.
“No need for you to rush off quite yet. I need to think for a bit,” he said to Raven. He turned for the door, and then added, “Tyler does have a tendency to rattle on like a loose screw, so if you’re finding him a posy bore, you are welcome to wait in the kitchens.”
“Naw, s’alright, I don’t mind,” replied Raven, exaggerating an indifferent shrug.
Once in the corridor, Wrexford headed for his study, the thump of his steps stirring the emptiness to life. Shadows uncoiled from shadows, dark, taunting shapes twisting and turning through the flickers of lamplight.
Questions, questions. And precious few solid answers.
He felt strangely uncertain.
The fading light of late afternoon had left his study shrouded in half-darkness. Leaving the lamps untouched, Wrexford poured himself a brandy and took a seat by the unlit hearth. A cold-fingered chill seemed to creep out from the black coals and wrap itself around his boots.
His was not a tender heart—not since the days of his callow youth, when the razor-sharp cut of feminine wiles had left it irreparably scarred. These days, women rarely upset his peace of mind. And yet, Isobel Ashton seemed to have gotten under his skin.
The brandy filled his mouth with a sudden heat, and burned a trail down the back of his throat.
Though he didn’t want to, he found her attractive. Alluring. Intriguing. In the beau monde world, it was de rigueur for females to be colorless pasteboard cutouts. Mere silhouettes swathed in silks and satins. No wonder the widow’s aura of self-assured individuality stood out like a blaze of fire.
Wrexford spun the glass between his palms, feeling the prickle of cold cut crystal facets. He had never met anyone quite like her. Beautiful, but with an unusual strength and intelligence giving far deeper meaning to the superficial surface.
There was Charlotte, of course. But she was different.
He frowned as he tried to find words to describe how.
Irritating? No, that was unfair. She provoked him, she challenged him.
And what man liked that?
More than that, she forced him, by the sheer strength of her own unwavering passions, to care more deeply than he wished to about such notions as right and wrong.
Another swallow of brandy. Cynicism was much more comfortable.
Forcing his thoughts away from Charlotte, the earl made himself confront the specter of Isobel Ashton—and the fact that she might be involved in her husband’s murder.
No question in his mind that she was clever enough. She had fire, but it was tempered by ice.
And that, he slowly realized, was the elemental difference between her and Charlotte. The widow, he sensed, would be capable of murder. While Charlotte’s elemental warmth would never—never—allow for such a cold-hearted act.
That he might have misjudged Isobel’s character so badly stung. After the painful lesson of his youthful folly, he thought his brain had become a less primitive organ than other parts of his anatomy. But perhaps he was mistaken.
Brooding, however, was the coward’s way out. Whatever the spell that had drawn him to Isobel, it was broken by the fact that he could think her capable of cold-blooded murder.