Chapter 20
CHAPTER TWENTY
Bow Street, London
Five days later
Marcus Stroud, one of the youngest magistrates appointed to Bow Street, sat behind his neat desk, studying the report from Hartham.
Hugh glanced at the mantel clock. How long did it take to skim the coroner’s findings? The verdict was stamped across the top of the page. Death by misadventure.
Not that Hugh believed it.
Stroud looked up. “And you have no idea why Lord Howden summoned you to the colliery at night?”
“I could list three or four possible reasons,” Hugh said. “But I rarely waste time on things I can’t prove.”
“But Lord Howden did write the summons.” Emma pointed to their open file on the desk. “If you compare it to the personal note he wrote to me, you’ll see the penmanship is the same. The magistrate in Hartham agreed.”
Airing their private business grated on him. But they’d been forced to admit to sharing a room at The George while accounting for their movements.
“Yes. A different tone, but the same weak flourish.” Stroud’s gaze moved between them. “Take me through it again from the beginning.”
Emma spoke before Hugh took a breath. Stroud had filled half a page with notes before she reached the night they met.
“And so I was right to accost him on the landing and insist he consider the facts again.” She raised a hand as if swearing an oath. “I assure you, the pistol wasn’t loaded. It was merely a device to frighten what I assumed was a devil.”
Hugh looked at her. “It wasn’t?”
“No.” She continued with the tale … the note hidden beneath the pew, not the kiss that had changed his world. “Charlotte helped me escape the Adelphi and—”
“Charlotte?” Stroud said, pen poised.
“Lady Soanes.”
A muscle ticked in Stroud’s jaw. “She’s an acquaintance?”
“Mr Stanton’s friend,” Emma corrected. “Mine too.”
“Charlotte welcomed me and several others into the demimonde when society turned its back. She understands what it means to be cast out for another person’s sins.”
Stroud gave no answer.
“Surely you know her,” Hugh pressed. Charlotte had been visibly shaken to learn Marcus Stroud was in London. “You’re from the same village near Salisbury.”
“I know her.” Stroud turned back to the notes and studied the same page for what felt like an hour.
“The magistrate in Hartham examined all the evidence,” Emma said, “and agreed that Lord Howden likely killed his father because he feared he might amend his will when Miss Carson’s child was born.”
Something didn’t sit right with Hugh, a nagging doubt he’d learnt to trust. “We were told to present the evidence so you can close the investigation into Mr Bellingham’s murder.”
Stroud straightened. “But?”
“The first murder was savage, the second calculated.” One committed in rage, the other to tidy loose ends. “I find it hard to believe a man so careful in his planning would miss an open mine shaft.”
Howden had been dead for several hours, and Dr Shadgrove could confirm they were nowhere near the colliery when it happened.
“In your notes, it says Howden hired a carriage to travel to Hartham because his coachman had taken his aunt back to Lewes.”
“We have nothing but his coachman’s word for it. And we’ve checked every livery stable. There’s no record of Howden hiring a vehicle.”
“And no sign of this hired carriage in Hartham?”
“No. Howden was left at the scene. No one summoned the coroner or reported the accident.”
“I assume the aunt will return to arrange the funeral. She may stand to inherit everything unentailed.” Stroud dipped his pen in ink and made a note. “I’ll have a constable watch Howden’s house and question her about the coachman’s account.”
“Have a constable watch the Colworths’ maid,” Hugh said. It sounded like a demand, not the cautious suggestion he’d intended. “I’m not telling you how to do your job, but the maid went to great lengths to persuade Miss Vane to return home.”
Emma took a letter from her reticule and handed it to Stroud. “I received this from Abigail within an hour of arriving home this morning. She wants me to meet her at The Lamb and Flag tonight. She says she’s found Rowton’s tricorn.”
Stroud sat back in the chair and read the note. “Rather eloquent for a maid.”
“My sister wrote it. She never could spell desperate. Which means it might be Melinda waiting at The Lamb and Flag tonight, not Abigail. I won’t rule out being drugged and waking in a house in Ripon.”
Let her try. He’d travel to the ends of the earth to find her. And when he did, he’d finally ask the question he should have asked days ago. The question he would ask tonight.
“I’m with you, Stanton,” Stroud said, straightening the papers. “Everything about this is wrong. You should go to The Lamb and Flag, Miss Vane. If it were about the hat, she could have left it at The Sentinel.”
Cold prickled across Hugh’s nape. “You expect her to walk into a rowdy tavern alone? What if Howden didn’t break his neck in a fall?”
Stroud steepled his fingers. “Not alone. Now we decide how best to protect her. All the evidence suggests she may need it.”
The Lamb and Flag
Rose Street, Covent Garden
“People often refer to this place as The Bucket of Blood.” Hugh looked from the carriage window towards the tavern. It stood down a narrow cobbled street, barely wide enough for a handcart. “They host bare-knuckle prize fights upstairs, though nothing on the same scale as Fortune’s Den.”
He’d not stopped talking for the last five minutes. Twice he’d checked the knife hidden in his boot.
“I’m grateful for the history lesson, though I’m not sure it will settle my nerves.” She smiled at his disguise. He wore a false beard, and the rough coachman’s greatcoat made his broad shoulders look bulkier.
He clasped her face in his hands. “No one will hurt you. I’ll be within arm’s reach.” His mouth came down on hers with a desperation that belied his words.
She caught his wrists. “Then stop kissing me as though you’re saying goodbye.”
“I’m not saying goodbye. I’m trying to remember why I agreed to let you out of this carriage.”
“Because we need to end this so we can live in peace.” Though Melinda would blame them for Lord Howden’s death and for ruining her plan. “Twenty people have entered the tavern. I doubt my sister will kill me at the table.”
“She could drug you at the table.”
“And you’ll be there to save me.” Yet she felt a tightening band around her ribs. Her parents’ love story had ended tragically. And here she was, risking the only thing that mattered.
“Promise me something before we leave this carriage,” he said, an unfamiliar tremor in his voice.
“Rowton would say my promises aren’t worth much.”
“Say you’ll consider marrying me when we’re done with all this. You don’t need to answer now.”
A rush swept through her, leaving her breathless, her hands shaking. Her heart hammered against her ribs. “Marry you?”
“I’m in love with you, Emma. It will only ever be you. But you’ll be taking my name, and that needs careful consideration.”
A half-sobbed laugh escaped her, and her vision swam through a sheen of tears. “Yes. Yes. A hundred times yes.”
“Yes, you’ll give it some thought?”
“Yes, I’ll marry you, you dolt.”
She wiped her tears and was about to throw her arms around him when the carriage door opened and a man climbed in.
“You could have told Montfort your disguise included a shabby beard,” the man said. “Now we resemble grotesque twins in a circus act.”
Hugh smiled. “Not quite. My coat doesn’t smell like wet dogs. And I pray that’s mud on your boots.”
The man sniffed his lapel. “I’m sure Miss Vane’s intoxicating perfume will mask any odours.”
“Mr Saint-Clair.” She couldn’t hide her delight at finally seeing the infamous fugitive. Even beneath the disguise, he possessed the easy confidence Hugh had described. “Should you even be in London, sir?”
“I heard about Howden’s death and thought you might be in need of my services. Montfort told me about The Lamb and Flag. He’s hiding in the dark somewhere.”
“Then stay here and watch the tavern for anything suspicious,” Hugh said. “I need to be inside before the maid arrives.”
“The magistrate has one man on Long Acre and another on the corner of King Street,” she said. “It’s probably best you stay hidden, even with your disguise.”
Saint-Clair grinned. “I begin to see why my friend loves you.”
Hugh gave him a warning look, then kissed Emma’s cheek. “Stay with Saint-Clair until the maid arrives.” He climbed from the carriage, walked down the narrow street and disappeared into the tavern.
She watched the door close behind him, and the fear that he had kissed her goodbye returned.
Saint-Clair studied her for a moment. “He’s in love with you.”
Despite herself, she could not seem to contain her smile.
He tilted his head. “Ah. He told you.”
“Yes, amongst other things.”
“About his father? That monstrous house?” Her expression must have answered him. “That he doesn’t wish to burden you with his name? That he has no wish to sire children?”
Her breath caught at the final question, and she cursed herself for the reaction. “He doesn’t wish to burden a wife. Why would he want to burden a child?”
She tried to hide the panic rising in her chest. Was that what Hugh offered: marriage but no children?
“I’m in love with him. I don’t need his name or his children.” Yet that wasn’t true.
Saint-Clair’s expression softened. “Then be certain he understands that. Stanton has spent too long deciding what others are better off without.”
His words left her strangely unsettled.
Saint-Clair glanced towards the tavern. “Is that the woman you’re waiting for? The wary one carrying a tricorn.”
Emma followed his gaze, relieved to see Abigail, not Melinda. “Yes, that’s the maid.”
He reached to open the door. “Be clever in your questioning. This isn’t about the hat, but I believe you know that already.”
Emma entered the crowded tavern. The air smelled of sweat rather than ale. Men and women filled the cramped room, their voices rising above the clatter of mugs and the scrape of chairs. A cackle of laughter made her flinch.
She didn’t look for Hugh. He would find her.