Chapter 18
It was still snowing when Sebastian reached Covent Garden, big, soft flakes that drifted lazily down on the city.
This was a part of London he’d known well as a young man just down from Oxford, when he’d fallen hopelessly in love with a brilliant, unknown young actress named Kat Boleyn. At the time he had expected to spend the rest of his life with her—have children with her, grow old with her. Then a series of well-intentioned lies tore them apart and very nearly destroyed him.
It had been a dark period in his life, one he didn’t like to remember. But in time he’d learned that a powerful and enriching love can come into a man’s life more than once. And gradually his affection for Kat had shifted from something passionate and desperate to something warm and good, as if she were indeed the half sister he’d once believed her to be.
Now the most acclaimed actress of London’s stage, Kat was currently starring in the title role of Queen Boudica at Covent Garden Theater. And it was there that he found her, sorting through a motley collection of dusty stage props in the warren of frigid rooms below the stairs. She was in her mid-twenties now, a beautiful woman with rich auburn hair, her father’s vivid blue eyes, and a wide mouth that curled into a welcoming smile when she turned and spotted him picking his way toward her through piles of battered shields and wooden swords jumbled together with papier-mâché horse heads and a stuffed raven.
“I was wondering when I’d be seeing you,” she said.
“Oh? Are you becoming prescient?”
“I’ve no need to be. No one in the theater can talk of anything other than Jane Ambrose’s death and your interest in it.” She set aside the elaborate headpiece of beads, tarnished wire, and feathers she’d been trying to straighten. “So it’s true? Was she murdered?”
“It was either murder or manslaughter.” He tripped over a crate of masks and collided with a rusty suit of armor. “Did you know her?”
Kat reached out to steady the rocking armor. “I did, but not well. I’ve no idea who could have killed her, if that’s what you’re asking.”
He found himself next to a big old wooden chest and promptly sat on it. It was cold enough down here that he could see his breath. “What about her husband, Edward Ambrose? Do you know him?”
“Ambrose? Of course. His plays and operas are brilliant. I’ve been in half a dozen or more of them over the years.”
“What about the man himself? What do you think of him?”
She took her time in answering. It was one of the things she had in common with her natural father, the Earl of Hendon—this tendency to think carefully and weigh her words before speaking. “He’s well liked in the theater—which is unusual, because not many writers are. He has a reputation for being affable and easygoing.”
“You say that as if you disagree with the general consensus.”
“Oh, I won’t deny he comes across as quite pleasant. But I’ve never been entirely convinced it’s genuine.”
“Any particular reason?”
“I don’t know if I could point to any one thing. It’s probably more a feeling I’ve had.” She shivered and clutched the thin shawl she wore tighter around her shoulders. “You think he killed his own wife?”
“He’s certainly on my list. There’s a rumor he has a mistress—possibly an actress or an opera dancer. Do you know if that’s true?”
“I’ve heard whispers. But I don’t know for certain, no.”
“Could you find out?”
“I can try.” Another shiver racked her frame, chattering her teeth together.
He shrugged off his greatcoat and dropped it around her shoulders. “How about if we continue this conversation over a nice hot cup of tea?”
She laughed. “I think that’s a wonderful idea.”
They sought refuge in a nearby coffeehouse with a roaring fire and the welcoming aroma of freshly baked scones. She was on her second scone when she said casually without looking up, “There’s something else you wanted to ask me about, isn’t there?”
He smiled, because she had always known him so well. Dropping his voice, he leaned in closer over the table. “I need to talk to a smuggler familiar with Rothschild’s operation in the Channel. I don’t mean one of his confederates, but a competitor—someone who would be willing to tell me what I need to know.”
The request might have struck a casual listener as beyond bizarre. But then, few in London knew that as a fierce Irish patriot, Kat had once passed information to the French, or that she was the widow of a flamboyant ex-privateer who’d dabbled in smuggling himself.
“You think Rothschild could be involved in her death?”
“It’s possible. Can you find someone?”
A flicker of something unidentifiable crossed her features. But all she said was “Give me a few days.”
After that, they talked for a time of Simon’s coming birthday and Hendon’s recent attack of the gout. Then Kat fell silent, her face thoughtful.
“What?”
“I was remembering one of the reasons why I’d come to doubt Edward Ambrose’s reputation as a genial man. About a year or so ago, when we were doing his Fool’s Paradise, his wife was at the theater helping organize the costumes. He got into a disagreement with her over something, and I saw him take hold of her wrist and twist it hard enough that she gave a small gasp.”
“It was deliberate?”
“Oh, yes. And what made it particularly chilling is that he was smiling all the time he did it.”
“Lovely.”
She nodded. “I saw him do something similar just a few days ago.”
“When?”
“Tuesday evening. I was walking past the Opera and noticed them standing at the top of the steps, beneath the portico. It was raining, and I wasn’t near enough to hear what they were saying, but it was obvious the conversation was tense. He grabbed her by both arms and shook her—quite hard. And then she pulled from his grasp and ran away. It was beginning to get dark, but I could see her face well enough as she passed to know that she was crying.”
“Bloody hell,” said Sebastian.
Kat met his gaze, her features solemn. “If he did kill her, I hope you can prove it.”
Sebastian took a swallow of his tea, found it cold, and pushed the cup aside. “Believe me, I’m trying.”
Sebastian turned his steps once more toward Soho Square. The snow was falling now in windblown swirls, a billowing curtain of white lit by a strange light that seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere.
It was only midday, but he found himself walking through nearly deserted streets, the ice stinging his cheeks, his breath a frozen mist that hovered around him. Where did they all go? he found himself wondering—the tradesmen and cart drivers, costermongers and paupers whose voices normally echoed through the narrow, canyon-like streets of the city? For how long could they continue to seek refuge from a winter too brutal to be borne before they began to starve, go mad, die?
He walked on, his shoulders hunched against the driven snow as he tried to put together the puzzle of Jane Ambrose’s death with three-quarters of its pieces still missing. In the last forty-eight hours his grasp of the woman she once was had begun to strengthen, the reality of her life and the way she’d lived it emerging like a shadowy form still half hidden by a storm. He saw a talented musician denied the brilliant career that could have been hers had she only been born male, and a devout, loving mother, faithfully honoring her religion by enduring an unhappy marriage only to then be devastated by the loss of both her children.
How could such a woman come to terms with that blow? he wondered. Impossible to do, surely, without questioning every assumption, every platitude by which she had always sought to live. Jane’s brother swore she’d taken her marriage vows too seriously to ever think of leaving her husband or taking a lover. But had that remained true? Would Christian Somerset know if it did not?
Jane’s husband had made a practice of hitting her. Hurting her. What would a man such as Edward Ambrose do if he discovered his wife’s infidelity—or suspected it? Hit her in the face? Rape her?
Kill her?