Chapter 27
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
“Are we meant to put on a play?” Laurence asked, frowning down at the tattered, faded, gray newsy cap Solomon had pushed into his hands.
“You can think of it like that,” Solomon said, drawing a battered jacket over a well-worn, white layman’s shirt.
“We certainly need to put on an act. Blue has invited me to his master’s house to partake of some well-refined brandy we could not dare find at a place like Scraper’s Tavern.
We need to appear as two common folks excited to try the finer things in life that our new friend Blue has so generously offered. ”
Laurence wrinkled his nose, but drew the cap on over his head.
It smelled of sweat, and another man’s musk, and he immediately hated it.
Still, Solomon’s plan could work, needed to work.
Not only that, but he needed a distraction.
His last interaction with Ellen had consumed him with lustful desire and he needed it to stop so he could focus.
It was the only way he would go along. He had to play his part the best he could, so they could finally put an end to the entire charade that was now their lives.
Both men finished getting dressed in the empty alley beside Scraper’s Tavern, and when Solomon finished, he spread his arms wide.
“What do you think, boss?” Solomon asked, his accent suddenly cockney.
Laurence raised a brow.
“I think I cannot mimic your talent,” he answered dryly.
Solomon shrugged as he adjusted his fingerless olive-green wool gloves.
“Let me do the talking then,” he replied in the same cockney accent. “I will keep Blue distracted once we get to the house and you sneak off and find the evidence we need.”
Laurence took a long look over Solomon’s clothing, then did the same over his own.
“If Blue is a valet in a Mayfair house, are we not dressed a bit…below standards? We look as if we work on the docks,” Laurence questioned.
“That is the point,” Solomon countered, still in character. “In this situation, Blue believes that he is better than us. We are mere laborers, but he is a servant in a grand house. We fluff his ego by acting as if he is the one who is of higher class.”
Laurence raised his brows, surprised at how much thought Solomon had put into his character and the scene about to be performed.
“How much consideration have you put into this?” he asked.
Solomon grinned as he shrugged his shoulders.
“In another life, perhaps I would have tried my hand at being in a theater troupe,” he replied, then his tone grew serious as he said, “Now come on, we are wasting time. The sooner we get into Benedict’s house, the sooner we have proof, and we can be done with this entire thing.”
As suggested, Laurence played his silent part once they found Blue in the bar.
He was further impressed by Solomon’s plan as the night wore on, and Benedict’s valet played perfectly into their hands.
Solomon bided his time wisely, keeping Blue laughing and drinking just past two, when the house would no doubt be asleep; then Solomon played his part well by casually mentioning the brandy Blue had once baited him with.
Drunk and comfortable with his new friend, Blue’s hazy eyes lit up at the mention, and he extended the invitation for a drink, just as Solomon said he would.
As they walked to the house, Laurence trailing a little behind, he could not help but be further impressed by Solomon’s devotion to the act.
The way he swaggered next to Blue. The way he kept the man laughing with jokes just dirty enough to make the valet laugh but not offend.
It was a skilled dance, and Solomon was performing it well.
“Right now, lads, we must keep quiet,” Blue whispered as they approached the servants’ entrance to Perminton Manor.
“Quiet as church mice, we’ll be,” Solomon whispered back, nudging Blue playfully with his elbow.
A cold chill moved down Laurence’s spine as he entered the house that was once Ellen’s home. He peered up at the family portraits as they walked through the dark, empty halls, wondering if there was anything about the manor Ellen missed.
He could picture her wandering through these halls, smiling and adjusting vases and knick-knacks. Could picture her saying pleasant hellos to the servants that worked there. How comfortable she had once been living there with her father.
His curiosity turned to anger the longer he thought about how it was no longer her home.
How her cousin, who she’d said had once been so kind and gentle, had swooped in and taken it from her.
Not just the manor, but the joy she had once felt living within it.
She had, after all, chosen to leave such a home, rather than stay and marry Benedict.
“Right, lads,” Blue whispered as he opened the study door. “The brandy is in here. I can offer you a tipple, but then you best be on your way. I do not want to risk my master finding strangers in his home. He’d skin me alive if he caught us.”
In the darkness, Laurence cast Solomon a tense look. How was he supposed to go through Benedict’s files if they were only going to be in the room for a few minutes? And chaperoned?
Solomon only winked as Blue opened the door and waved them in with a flourish.
Inside, Blue lit two oil lamps, then walked to the drink cart.
With his back turned to him, Laurence took the brief opportunity to take in the desk and the shelves that surrounded it.
It was surprisingly neat. Not a single paper or pen was left on the desk’s gleaming dark wood surface, and furthermore, not a single book was out of place among the shelves.
Upon closer inspection, he even noticed that they were arranged in alphabetical order.
So the devil has a penchant for organization, Laurence silently mused. That would help him when he searched. If he’d still get the opportunity to search. He glanced back at Solomon once more, becoming anxious as he feared they’d gotten so close for nothing.
Perhaps Solomon’s plan was not so well thought out after all.
“Take a drink of this, boys, and tell me what you think,” Blue said quietly, extending two small glasses toward Laurence and Solomon.
Laurence murmured his thanks as he accepted the glass, and downed the sweet liquor. Too sweet, in his opinion, and not properly aged. Still, he and Solomon made a show of being impressed, and Blue, obviously feeling smug and high up in his steps, so graciously offered them another pour.
“My lord has cases of this in the cellar,” he explained. “I will switch out the bottle, and he will never be the wiser.
“Cheeky scoundrel,” Solomon chuckled. “I admire how bold you are.”
Blue grinned proudly, his cheeks flushed with drink.
“I wonder, though, if perhaps we should do more to cover our tracks?” Solomon asked.
Blue’s grin faded a little.
“What do you mean?” he asked.
“The devil is in the details, my friend,” Solomon answered, holding up the now dirty glass. “Perhaps you and I should go clean these in the kitchen, and go and fetch a fresh bottle now. That way you won’t forget, or have to worry about it in the morrow.”
Blue’s eyes lit with realization, and his grin returned.
“Excellent idea! I did not even think of the glasses! Yes, yes, we should attend to those now,” he agreed, holding his hand out for them.
Laurence sat his glass in the man’s palm as Solomon draped an arm over Blue’s shoulders, chatting to him quietly as he steered Blue toward the door.
Laurence remained perfectly still, hoping the man was still drunk enough not to realize that they were leaving a man behind, and only when Solomon and Blue made it out of the study did he expel his held breath.
Wasting no time, he rounded Benedict’s desk and opened the drawers. He placed the neatly stacked files atop the desk and began to go through them, his frown etching deeper into his face as he found nothing but legitimate accounts.
When the drawers revealed nothing, he moved to the bookshelves, flipping through each tome quickly to see if he could find anything of note hidden within the pages.
Nothing. There was nothing in those books.
Laurence grumbled a curse as he stepped back from the shelves and fisted the cap atop his head in agitation. He had to be missing something. A hidden drawer. A false back to the shelf.
His eyes landed on the window seat to the left of Benedict’s desk. It was just like the one he had in his office in Blackford. Which meant…
Laurence hurried to the seat, swiped off the pillows, and pulled at the lip of the ledge.
Sure enough, the seat swung up. Hope flitted through his chest as he picked up one of the oil lamps and peered down into the hiding place.
There, in a neat row with the spines facing up, were at least a dozen brown leatherbound books with no titles.
Laurence cast a furtive glance toward the open door, straining his ears to listen for any incoming footsteps. When he saw and heard nothing, he reached down and grabbed the book furthest to the left and opened it. His brows rose as he found not printed words, but handwritten cursive.
Diaries. These were Benedict’s personal diaries. The one in his hand dated back ten years. Laurence began flipping through the pages, looking for the word auction, but his gaze snagged on a different word instead.
Not a word. A name.
I visited cousin Ellen today. My sweet Ellie. She is no longer a child. At fifteen, she is on the lovely cusp of womanhood. A beautiful flower ready to bloom. A flower I so badly want to pluck and have for my own…
Laurence’s brows furrowed as his stomach twisted. He turned through more pages, now looking not for a word anymore, but for his wife’s name. He found several more entries with the same sort of strange obsessive structure, then picked up the next journal.
I expressed my desire to marry sweet Ellie to Mother and Father today. Though I predicted they would balk a little at my intention, I had not expected the beratement they both laid upon me. They called me obsessed. Wrong. But they don’t understand. Sweet Ellie is mine. She was made to be mine.
One by one, he went through them all, finding no evidence of Benedict’s involvement with the auction, but something else entirely.
An obsession with Ellen, dating back to when they were children.
The last entry he read in the journal, dated two years ago, proved to be the most upsetting one, however.
I cannot bear this any longer. Even with Father and Mother no longer alive to stand in my way, I still face one last blockade.
Uncle Robert. He despises me despite my best efforts to prove that I am good, good enough for my sweet Ellie.
He will not allow my visits to her anymore, and her absence fills me with agony.
I have no choice but to end this torture by whatever means necessary.
If he will not give her to me, I shall have to take her from him.
It was the last entry of that book, but as he closed it and made to pick up the next one, he heard footsteps approaching from outside. Laurence hurriedly shoved the diary back into place, closed the hatch, and put the pillows back atop the seat.
“Oh, you,” Blue said, blinking in surprise as he and Solomon walked back into the study, “I had forgotten about you.”
Laurence bowed his head, as if bashful.
“He’s so quiet that one,” Solomon remarked, patting Blue on the back. “It’s easy to forget him. Mark my words, though, he won’t forget you or the kindness you paid to him tonight. Neither of us will.”
Laurence gave a nod, and Blue smiled proudly.
“You lot could work in a house like this one day,” he said, as if trying to be inspirational. “You just got to refine yourselves a bit.”
Laurence almost broke character and laughed. If he was not so disturbed by what he’d discovered, he probably would have.
“Right you are, old boy,” Solomon agreed. “Well, we don’t want to take advantage of your kindness any more than we already have. Suppose we’d best get on our way. Thank you, again, for the brandy.”
“Did you find anything?” Solomon asked once he and Laurence were alone on the street.
“Yes,” Laurence curtly replied, his blood thrumming with worry and rage as they walked briskly toward their waiting carriage two streets over.
“About the auction?” Solomon asked excitedly.
Laurence shook his head as his hands clenched into fists. From his peripheral vision, he caught Solomon’s hopeful expression droop into confusion.
“Well…what did you find then?” Solomon asked.
For a moment, Laurence did not answer. He knew Solomon would not say anything to anyone if he told the truth. He was a bigger man than that. Still, he couldn’t bring himself to speak on what he’d discovered, as if to do so would invade Ellen’s personal boundaries somehow.
“I will tell you later,” Laurence said as Geoff opened the carriage door for them as they approached it. “For now, I just want to get home.”
Though he did not say it aloud, for fear that Solomon would read far too much into it, he silently added to my wife.