Chapter 20 #2
When the others didn’t rush to answer, Kelly spoke up. “He seemed more quiet than usual. But I don’t know if that’s because it didn’t go well or—”
“He’d asked me to meet him for lunch,” Calloway interrupted.
“It was scheduled for the day after he was killed.” His ruddy complexion had gone pale and his gaze lowered to the rug.
“He didn’t tell me why he wanted to speak to just me, but I assumed it was because I’m also married, and so perhaps I could understand his situation better.
” He looked up at Sidney and then me. “I suspected he was going to ask me whether he should file for divorce.”
I scrutinized Calloway, trying to deduce if he was telling the truth.
Because I held my doubts. Not least of all because Ardmore didn’t seem to care enough for Mrs. Harlow to actually break up their marriage.
In fact, I suspected his taking up with her in the first place had all been to some other purpose.
Perhaps keeping an eye on Lieutenant Harlow to ensure he wasn’t going to double-cross him.
But if Ardmore had asked Harlow to locate supplies like fulminate of mercury for him. If he’d done so under false pretenses and Harlow had grown suspicious. Perhaps he’d even figured out the truth. Then he might ask his friend for advice on what he should do.
However, Calloway seemed to genuinely believe that the state of Harlow’s marriage had been what consumed his friend’s thoughts.
“Do you think Mrs. Harlow knew her husband had confronted her lover?” I asked.
Calloway’s cheeks flushed red again. “I don’t know. And frankly, I don’t care. Unless she convinced Ardmore to kill her husband.”
Kelly’s voice was soft but firm. “I don’t think she did. Not as much as she loved Ben. I know the affair seems to suggest otherwise,” he continued when Faulkner opened his mouth to argue. “But it’s my belief that it was only a bid for attention.”
“That doesn’t make a lick of sense,” Faulkner retorted, finally getting his word in.
But it did. I’d sensed something similar from Mrs. Harlow during our brief conversation. She wanted to appear worldly-wise, but she wasn’t.
“Either way, I bet Harlow regretted introducing Ardmore to his wife,” Sidney remarked.
“But he didn’t,” Calloway replied. “Mrs. Harlow introduced them.”
I glanced at Sidney, curious if he recalled how Mrs. Harlow had avoided giving an answer when we’d asked her how Ardmore and her husband had met. Someway or another, she had said. “How did she know Ardmore?”
Calloway didn’t appear to know the answer to this, but Kelly did. “He purchased her father’s property in County Galway. The family was anxious to be rid of it, what with all the trouble many of the landed gentry have been having since the rebellion started. Many have decided to vacate and sell.”
“And Ardmore bought it? Do you know why?”
Ardmore’s own estate was down in County Cork.
Kelly shrugged. “Maybe he just fancied it.”
I supposed it was possible, but I doubted it. I also doubted making Mrs. Harlow’s acquaintance was the motive. There would have been far easier and cheaper ways to do so. It seemed more likely this had been a coincidence, as had his learning Lieutenant Harlow’s previous position as a quartermaster.
Whatever the truth, we needed to pay another visit to Mrs. Harlow. Something I was prepared to do immediately, but Sidney seemed to have a different idea.
Instead of heading north back toward Dublin as we departed the Calloway’s home, he turned east toward the sea.
For a moment, I thought he meant to carry on to the ferry port, but then as we passed through a wooded area, he pulled off to the side of the road.
I turned to him in confusion, but rather than answer, he rounded the motorcar to open my door.
“Sidney, where are we?” I asked him as he offered me a hand and I warily took it.
“Herbert Park.”
“Yes, but why are we here?” I pressed as he pulled me from the Pierce-Arrow and looped my arm through his.
He waited until we were nearly twenty feet down the path before answering. “Since you clearly have something you wish to discuss, but are refraining from doing so elsewhere, I thought you might feel freer to speak here.”
I halted in the middle of the path, feeling neatly cornered. Crossing my arms, I scowled at him.
But he carried on almost as if oblivious, calling over his shoulder. “Looks like there’s a lovely pond ahead.”
I had three choices. Stand in the middle of the path, refusing to move. Flounce back to the Pierce-Arrow to wait for him. Or follow and confront him.
While not my doing, I had to admit it made a certain amount of sense to conduct this dispute on neutral ground where Max and the members of our staff wouldn’t overhear.
I was concerned enough about what Ginny might have reported to the rebels, especially in light of the revelation that I was now one of the IRA’s targets.
Eventually I settled on the third option, striding after Sidney toward the pond ringed with trees, leaves crunching beneath each footstep.
But this was the last thing I was going to let him control about the situation.
After ensuring that no one was within hearing distance, I halted just behind him.
“Did you meet with Ardmore while I was being held in the Castle?”
Not waiting until he turned to face me so that I could read his face might have seemed like a poor strategy, but Sidney had always been able to regulate his expressions, almost to a maddening degree.
However, he had less control over his body’s reactions.
So when his shoulder blades twitched inward beneath his coat and his leg muscles flexed under the line of his pants, I knew the truth before he ever spoke.
“What did you agree to?” I demanded vehemently, stepping forward to meet him as he pivoted. “Sidney, what did you do?!”
His countenance was smooth other than his furrowed brow, and for a split second it seemed he was going to attempt to deny it. But then his composure melted and he turned away, ripping his trilby hat from his head as he glared angrily at the lake.
“Are you compromised?” I pressed, thinking of all the things I might have been willing to agree to, to secure Sidney’s safety. His continued silence panicked and infuriated me equally. “Tell me!”
“I didn’t agree to anything!” he rounded on me to snarl. His opposite hand plunged into his dark hair already beginning to curl as the wind combed through it, and tugged almost savagely. “That’s the problem.”
I blinked at him in confusion and then in a softer voice asked him to explain.
His shoulders bowed as if under a great weight. “He contacted me and told me he could get you out. He asked me to meet him.” His gaze cut sideways toward me. “I suppose Ryde or Bentnick mentioned I went unaccounted for one afternoon.”
I didn’t respond to this acerbic comment.