Chapter 4 #2
The duchess walked past the grand columns and through the front doors to the theatre, as if she had done so a hundred times.
She likely had. Hugh had been to the opera on two occasions, and neither time had he used the front door.
He hadn’t sat in the house, either, but had gone about with some inquiry business backstage, in the warren of halls and dressing rooms. Once to arrest a stagehand, and the second time to question an actress accused of thievery.
“I would like to know more about Miss Lovejoy,” she answered him as they entered the foyer.
It was empty except for a few men sweeping the floors and polishing the handrails of the split stairwell, which branched off to the left and right to ascend to the upper level.
The men paused in their work but quickly carried on, averting their eyes, and minding their own business, as they had likely been trained to do.
The duchess came to a halt, appearing suddenly hesitant.
“What is the matter?” Hugh asked.
She bristled, her chin hitching. “Nothing at all.” A lie. The hitched chin gave it away. She strode toward the workers, probably just to turn her back on him. But he could sense discomfort and uncertainty beneath her hesitation.
The duchess was clearly not familiar or at ease with taking control of a situation, and though she put on a good front, he knew why.
Pampered and coddled, the woman had likely never had to make a weighty decision in her life.
He’d known duchesses and countesses and ladies of every peerage rank, and he’d never met one who wouldn’t lower her head in deference, or simper when she knew it was the requisite response.
Then again, flickers of a rebellious nature kept sparking up in the Duchess of Fournier’s eyes, which were, he’d noted, the color of new ferns springing from a forest floor. Either that or viperous green.
“Pardon,” the duchess was saying to the workers when he caught up to her. “I’d like to speak with the theater manager. Where might I find him?”
“Backstage, madam,” one man replied, standing his broom up. “Would you like an escort?”
Hugh moved past them. “That isn’t necessary.”
“An escort would be lovely, thank you,” she replied, louder than necessary. Hugh sighed and paused to let the worker pass. The duchess met Hugh’s eyes as she bustled by as well, one thin brow arched high.
He took up the rear, her cloaked figure soon swallowed by the darkness of a slim corridor leading backstage.
Patrons of the theatre didn’t tread here; the carpet felt like old moss beneath Hugh’s boots instead of thick pile, and the walls were papered with broadsides and newspaper clippings rather than embroidered silk.
Only a single tallow candle was lit in a crimped tin sconce.
When they entered the light, the duchess spoke to the worker.
“Sir, are you familiar with Miss Lovejoy?”
The worker slowed, his back straightening with tension. Hugh felt the same surprise. He’d thought she had only accepted the offer for an escort for arguments sake, but perhaps she’d had a keener reason.
“I am, madam. Or I was, at least,” he answered after a prolonged moment. They moved out of the light and back into the shadows.
“Was she currently performing in a production?” she asked next.
“Yes, madam.”
Hugh was accustomed to brief answers; sometimes even no acknowledgement that he’d asked a question at all.
As was the case earlier today when questioning the duke.
Whenever that happened, Hugh knew to curb his questions and try a difference tactic.
The lady walking the corridor ahead of him, however, nosed on like an eager hound, oblivious to the worker’s resistance.
“Did Miss Lovejoy have any admirers that you’re aware of—”
“Here you are, madam.” The man opened a door, flooding the corridor with bronzed light. He held out an arm, tucked his chin, and allowed the duchess to pass. As soon as Hugh fell into step behind her, the door closed, and the worker was gone.
She let out a long breath.
“You step heavily, Your Grace.” She glared at him, and Hugh raised his hands in submission. “I’m simply saying if you want answers, it will serve you well to be a fox instead of an elephant.”
Her full lips pinched. “I do not require your help nor your advice. Why have you bothered to follow me, Mr. Marsden?”
Hugh stifled the answer that leaped to his tongue: Because you’re blinded by desperation and conceit and are wading into dangerous waters. She would only tell him to go, and though it tempted him greatly, Hugh could not leave the lady alone backstage at a theatre.
He sauntered past her, into the cluttered and narrow passageways snaking off stage.
He dodged racks of costumes, furniture, and all manner of props as he followed the buzzing hum of voices.
The odor of sweat, smoke, and perfume met his nostrils, and then Hugh turned a corner and found himself in a room full of light, mirrors, and frothy, bright colors.
Men and women in half dress mingled together, casting off costumes and stage makeup.
Every eye lifted and landed upon the two intruders.
Conversation ceased. One man, tall and lanky and wearing nothing but a waistcoat and trousers, his chest and arms bare underneath, continued to whistle a tune as he wiped one side of his face with a cloth.
The garish paint streaked off, revealing badly pitted, dark brown skin.
He kept on with his whistling as he ran his eyes over Hugh and the duchess, who had gone still with shock.
Likely, he thought, from the display of so much flesh and bosom. He suppressed a smirk.
“The theatre manager,” Hugh said. “Where can we find him?”
A moment ticked by as the actors and actresses eyed one another, silently deliberating. The man with the pockmarked skin quit whistling and licked his lips.
“That way,” he answered, pointing down the corridor. He offered nothing more, and Hugh backed up. He caught a fold on the duchess’s cloak and gave it a brief tug.
She gasped in offense, and as soon as they were moving along the corridor again, lashed at him. “There is no need for you to manhandle me, Mr. Marsden.”
“I wouldn’t have put it past you to stay and stomp around the room asking your questions.”
“If I chose to do so, it would be none of your concern.”
Abruptly, Hugh’s indulgence ran dry. He stopped and turned, causing the duchess to come just short of crashing into him.
“You seem woefully ignorant of your own actions tonight, Your Grace. You might be accustomed to your world parting like the Red Sea before you, but I advise a better look at your surroundings. No one here gives a damn who you are.”
She glared, first in shock and then, as her eyes narrowed to slits, in fury. “It is not your responsibility to act as my guide, Officer Marsden. I neither asked for it nor do I want it.”
“On the contrary,” he said, his patience unraveling. “You are the wife of a murder suspect I’ve just sent before the magistrate. I would be remiss in my duties if I turned a blind eye to whatever you are currently doing to thwart my investigation.”
Twin, depthless pupils flared with new fury. Any well-heeled lady of the peerage would have turned up her nose and ignored him. Once again, the duchess deviated from her set role.
She took a step closer. In the stuffy, tapered corridor, Hugh scented the barest trace of rose water. He held himself perfectly still as she set the delicately squared edge of her jaw.
“Are you so afraid that I will succeed in thwarting your case?”
“Hardly.”
“Then I wonder why you’ve chosen to tag along with me tonight.”
“Perhaps it is because I am a gentleman,” he said through gritted teeth.
Her lips bowed into a sudden grin. “A gentleman. Why, Mr. Marsden, you should join the actors and take to the stage with a line so well delivered.”
She nudged past him, her shoulder brushing his arm. Hugh didn’t know whether to laugh or groan with frustration. The woman had gall, that much was evident. And she had the right of it: Hugh was no gentleman, not in title nor in practice.
Still, her dismissal pricked and drew up memories like beads of blood.
A face surfaced in his mind. Lady Eloisa Neatham, so young and demure and fragile.
So easily broken. The Duchess of Fournier might be young, but she was neither demure nor fragile.
At least not in any visible way. He scowled as he stayed on her heels toward a second room, aglow with lamplight.
This was the reason he avoided the elite whenever possible.
They reminded him far too much of his life before Bow Street.
The headstrong duchess whisked right through the open door, into the lit room.
It housed a cluttered desk, lamps, a number of cabinets, a few racks of clothing, and a slim bed, the bedding of which was unmade, along with a chamber pot pulled out from underneath the bedframe. It looked as if the manager lived here.
“Excuse me, sir,” she said to a rumpled-looking man in shirtsleeves behind the desk, his attention on a ledger before him. He lowered his pipe and blinked owlishly.
“My lady?” Astutely and swiftly, he’d recognized her position. He stood up and immediately reached for the jacket over the back of his chair.
“I’m sorry to bother you at this hour,” she began. Hugh noted it was the first apology she’d made that night. “However, I’m looking for some information on an actress you’ve employed.”
The manager visibly stalled as he shrugged into his jacket and extinguished his pipe. He put on a showman’s smile, filled with gracious hospitality. Hugh kept his own expression blank when the manager’s eyes skipped toward him, then away.