Chapter 28 #6
“Pay attention, then, because I’ve wasted enough time here already.
Your brother followed you to England—or at least he thought he was following you, having no idea your route would be so circuitous.
Not, I’m afraid, that his advent to the country was aboveboard.
He came in by way of a smuggler’s punt. What a singularly rough and ready pair you are, to be sure!
It’s no wonder you do so well for Devon.
” Granville’s smile twisted into a sneer.
“He came to me because I had been your escort to England and he wanted to know my version of the events surrounding your disappearance. The poor lad thought I would be sympathetic because he knew I had passed information to the Americans. I wish he hadn’t let me know he knew that.
It presented me with a very grave problem.
I could hardly let him run around England with that sort of information.
For one thing, he’s a little impetuous. He might be caught and questioned, and tough-minded as he is, he’s very young, and I have small confidence in his ability to hold out against an experienced inquisition.
Son of a gentleman or not, they’ll certainly torture him if he’s discovered; before they hang him, that is.
I’d have disposed of him quietly at once if he hadn’t been your brother. ”
Doggedly forcing herself to contain her rising panic, breathing in the untidy rhythm of desperation, she backed to the garden seat and sat down on it, holding the watch in her two hands, as though it were a delicate thing made of glass instead of gold. “What do you want me to do?”
“At five of the clock tomorrow evening there will be a black coach with the wheels picked out in red waiting at the southeastern corner of Finsbury Square. How you manage to get there is your own affair, but I imagine a chit of your ingenuity will think of something; but if you aren’t in that coach by one minute past the hour, it will leave without you, and I promise you, my pretty, you won’t have a second chance.
Be there if you want to see your brother.
Otherwise, he will cease abruptly to be of any use to me, and I’ll let him die.
You might, of course, choose to carry this story to one of your masculine protectors, which would also end his usefulness to me.
It would be something of a relief to be able to dispose of him. ”
“And of me,” she said, her gaze resting bleakly on her hands, where the watch lay softly gleaming like a golden egg.
Granville’s boot leather made a faint crinkling sound on the sandy flagstones as he joined her on the bench.
The back of his hand rested on her cheek, turning her face toward him, though she flinched from his touch.
Some of the fierce animosity had fled from the gray-green eyes, and in their depths was the dim mirage of an emotion that might once have been compassion.
“Why do you think I told you in New York that your aunt planned to take you to England? I had hopes you’d run home to your patriotic father and stay out of my net.
Much as I regret it, poppet, I can’t afford to care about your hurt.
I’m not sure whether this will comfort you, but it wouldn’t suit me to end your life.
What I need now is to negotiate some sort of peace with Devon, and without having you whole and hale and in my power, I’d find myself very thin of bargaining capital.
” He stood. “Tomorrow evening at five. Finsbury Square,” he said and strode quickly away, vanishing like a ghoul into the night’s black serum.
In another moment Raven’s hands closed on her wrists, holding them in a sustaining grip. She was standing, though she couldn’t remember having moved.
“You heard?” she murmured tensely.
“Every word. M’love, I want to stay with you now, but I can’t. I have to follow him.”
“Why? What purpose will it serve if—” Interpreting the grim set of his mouth, she cried, “Raven, you can’t kill him!”
“No? All right, lambkin. Don’t fret. I’ll only kill him a little.”
“Raven, you can’t! Didn’t you understand? He has my brother!”
Raven was a gentle man, both by nature and by disposition, but he had been reared in a hard school, and his affection did not transfer readily from Merry to her brother.
Nor did he have much faith in either the authenticity of the watch or the likelihood that Merry’s brother would still be alive if he had put himself in Granville’s orbit.
And even if the whole unlikely story were true, Raven would have unhesitatingly sacrificed the unknown brother for Merry.
But he was not proof against her sterling, honest gaze.
“As you wish it, m’dear, but I can’t stand here argufying about it, or I’ll lose him.” He cast an impatient glance over his shoulder. “I’ll just discover where he goes and then take the matter to Morgan—”
“No!”
“Well, then,” he said, releasing her hands, starting to move across the clearing, “Devon.”
“No! Raven, I don’t think so. You have to allow me time to think.”
“Hell and the devil, there’s no time for thinking! I have to go.”
She ran after him, dragging up her heavy, bouncing skirts. “Promise me that you won’t tell anyone. Promise. We’ll meet tomorrow morning and decide what to do.”
“Fine! Good-bye!”
The impenetrable vegetation stopped her, and she had to call after him, “Where?”
He returned swiftly. “Hush! Noon at St. Mary Abchurch. It’s near the Royal Exchange. And I hope to God that by then you’ll have decided to see sense.”