twenty-three

“There is, of course, only one reason why I would have rushed out into the garden without waiting to tell you what had occurred, Lavinia,” Joan said wearily. “I received a message informing me that my daughter’s life was in danger and that I must meet the messenger at the garden monument at once for further details. I fear I succumbed to panic.”

“It never occurred to you the message was a lure meant to get you away from the safety of the ballroom?” Tobias asked.

Lavinia, seated on the velvet cushions opposite, gave him a look he recognized immediately. He ignored it. He knew very well his tone had been harsh, but he did not care a jot if he had offended Joan’s sensibilities.

He was not in a good mood. When he had walked into the Colchester ballroom with Anthony a short time ago and discovered that both Joan and Lavinia had disappeared, he had been ready to tear the house apart. It was Emeline who had prevented him from creating a truly memorable scene. She had been watching for signs of Lavinia and Joan from the balcony and had just spotted the pair slinking back through the gardens.

Tobias had whisked all of them away at once, commandeering Joan’s elegant carriage without a by-your-leave. Joan had made no protest as he had bundled her, together with Lavinia, Emeline, Anthony, and himself, into the vehicle.

It was only after they were all secure inside the cab that Lavinia had given him a crisply rendered version of events in the ballroom and the garden. The cold satisfaction he had experienced upon finding the letter in Neville’s wardrobe had immediately evaporated.

All he could think about at that moment was that Joan had not only placed herself at risk in the night-shrouded garden, she had caused Lavinia to rush into grave peril too.

Absently he flexed his hand on his thigh, seeking to ease the dull ache. Joan’s elegant, well-sprung carriage was considerably more comfortable than the hackney Anthony had secured earlier to pluck him off the street, but the soft cushions did nothing to assuage his temper.

“I am not a stupid woman, Mr. March.” Joan looked out the carriage window. “I realized the message might be bait. But it implied a threat to my daughter. I had no choice but to obey the summons. I was really quite frantic.”

“A perfectly understandable response,” Lavinia said bracingly. “Any parent would have done the same. And not just any parent, I might add.” She shot a meaningful look at Tobias. “What would you have done, sir, if you had received a message indicating Anthony was in great danger?”

Anthony made an odd sound that might have been a smothered snort of laughter.

Tobias swallowed an oath. The answer to her question was obvious to all of them. What would he have done had he received a message indicating Lavinia was in jeopardy? He knew the answer to that question too.

There was no point in continuing this line of argument, he thought. Lavinia was firmly on the side of her client.

“It seems quite clear,” Lavinia said, moving decisively to change the subject, “that Neville set the stage for all of the events this evening. I would not be surprised to learn that he even provoked Pomfrey into making the apology to Emeline because he wanted to create a distraction.”

Emeline’s brows drew together in a considering look. “Do you think he arranged to have a message delivered to himself as well as to Mrs. Dove?”

“It appears that way, does it not? It gave him the perfect excuse to leave the ballroom. If anyone inquires, there will no doubt be a number of people who can testify to the fact that he received a summons and was obliged to leave.”

“But he left the house through the front door,” Anthony said.

“Which meant one of the footmen would have brought him his greatcoat and hat,” Lavinia said softly. “It also allowed him to go to his carriage to collect the poker or whatever it was he carried as a weapon.”

Emeline nodded. “Yes, that makes sense. It would have been simple enough for him to make his way back into the Colchester gardens unseen. The grounds are quite extensive. There must be any number of places where one could go over the wall.”

“When my body was eventually discovered, there would have been nothing to link Neville to the crime of murder,” Joan said softly.

Tobias saw Lavinia give a small but distinct shudder.

“It all fits,” Anthony said. “Neville tried to kill you tonight, just as he killed those other women. Perhaps he intended to dump your body into the river too. He could have hauled it there in his carriage easily enough.”

Joan gave him an odd look. “Such a vivid imagination you have, sir.”

Anthony grimaced with embarrassment. “Sorry.”

Joan’s mouth twisted wryly. “One cannot help but wonder if he intended to give his private artist a commission to create a death mask of me. Just imagine, my features might well have wound up on one of those erotic statues in Huggett’s Museum.”

For a moment no one spoke.

Joan turned to Tobias, her eyes grim and somber. “It would seem that you and Lavinia are correct in your analysis of this matter, sir. I am forced to conclude that Neville is indeed a murderer and quite possibly a member of this Blue Chamber you described. I can scarcely credit that my husband was the master of a criminal organization, but nothing else makes any sense. Evidently, Neville thinks I know too much and he wishes to silence me.”

Lavinia sat down behind her desk a short while later. Anthony crouched in front of the hearth to light the fire. Emeline took one of the reading chairs. Tobias opened the sherry cabinet.

Lavinia watched him pour two glasses of sherry. Something about the way he moved told her his leg was aching badly. Little wonder. He had given it a great deal of exercise tonight.

“Do you think Joan Dove is telling the truth when she claims she never knew her husband was Azure?” Anthony asked of no one in particular.

“Who can say?” Tobias put a glass down on the desk in front of Lavinia and took a swallow of sherry from his own. “Gentlemen in the ton rarely discuss any of their affairs, financial or otherwise, with their wives. As Lavinia said, widows are often the last to become acquainted with details of the family assets. It would certainly have been possible for Dove to keep his wife in the dark concerning his criminal activities.”

“She knew,” Lavinia said softly.

There was a startled pause. Everyone looked at her.

She shrugged. “She is a very intelligent woman. She loved him deeply and theirs was clearly a very close bond. She had to know, or at least suspect, that Fielding Dove was Azure.”

Emeline nodded. “I agree.”

“Whatever the case may be, she will certainly never admit it,” Tobias said.

“One can hardly blame her,” Lavinia said. “In her place, I would do anything I could to conceal the truth.”

“For fear of gossip?” Tobias asked with mild interest.

“No,” Lavinia said. “Mrs. Dove is perfectly capable of withstanding a storm of gossip.”

“You are right,” Tobias said.

“There are other reasons why a woman would do whatever was necessary to protect her husband’s good name,” Lavinia said.

Tobias elevated one brow. “Such as?”

“Love. Devotion.” She studied the sherry in the glass in front of her. “That sort of thing.”

Tobias watched the flames. “Yes, of course. That sort of thing.”

There was another lengthy silence. This time Emeline broke it.

“You have not told us what you discovered in Neville’s mansion tonight, Mr. March,” she said.

He lounged against the mantel. “I found a letter that links Neville to Bennett Ruckland’s death. It appears he paid Carlisle a large sum of money to see to it that Ruckland was murdered in Rome.”

Anthony whistled softly. “So it is finished at last.”

“Almost.” Tobias downed more sherry.

Lavinia frowned. “What do you mean? What is going on here?”

Tobias looked at her. “The time has come to give you a bit more background on this matter.”

She narrowed her eyes. “Proceed, sir.”

“Bennett Ruckland was an explorer and a student of antiquities. During the war, he spent a good deal of time in Spain and Italy. His profession occasionally put him in the way of being able to acquire information that was useful to the Crown.”

“What sort of information?”

Tobias swirled the sherry in his glass. “In the course of his work, he sometimes learned the details of French shipping routes, heard rumors concerning the movement of military supplies and troops. That sort of thing.”

Emeline looked intrigued. “In other words, he served as a spy?”

“Yes.” Tobias paused a beat. “His contact in England, the man to whom he reported this information, was Lord Neville.”

Lavinia went very still. “Oh my.”

“The information Ruckland supplied to Neville via a chain of couriers was supposedly turned over to the proper authorities. And, indeed, much of it was.”

“But not all of it?”

“No. But Ruckland did not discover the truth until after the war. About a year ago he went back to Italy to continue his scholarly research. While he was there, one of his old informants told him of some rumors concerning the fate of a particular shipment of goods that had been sent from Spain by the French late in the war. The intended destination was Paris. Ruckland had obtained details of the secret route and had reported them to Neville at the time.”

“Military supplies?” Emeline asked.

Tobias shook his head. “Antiquities. Napoleon was very keen on such things. When he invaded Egypt, for example, he brought along a host of scholars to study the artifacts and temples there.”

“Everyone knows that. The Rosetta stone was among those artifacts, after all, and we have it now, safe and sound,” Anthony said.

“Continue with your tale,” Lavinia said. “What sort of antiquities were included in this shipment you mentioned?”

“Many valuable things. Among them was a collection of ancient jeweled objects that Napoleon’s men had discovered concealed in a convent in Spain.”

“What happened?”

“The shipment of jewels and antiquities vanished en route to Paris,” Tobias said. “Ruckland assumed that Neville had arranged to have the shipment intercepted and taken to England. And, in a way, that is precisely what happened.”

Lavinia frowned. “What do you mean?”

“The antiquities certainly disappeared on schedule,” Tobias said. “But after talking to his old informant in Italy last year, Ruckland began to suspect that Neville had stolen the shipment for himself. He began to make inquiries. One question led to another.”

Lavinia exhaled slowly. “Ruckland uncovered information about the Blue Chamber, didn’t he?”

“Yes. Do not forget that he had had a great deal of experience as a spy. He knew how to conduct an investigation. He also had a network of old informants left over from the war. He started turning over stones and found snakes.”

She took a quick sip of sherry. “One of which was named Lord Neville?”

“Ruckland learned that not only had Neville stolen any number of valuable cargos during the war, he had also betrayed his country on several occasions by selling British military information to France.”

“Neville was a traitor?”

“Yes. And well connected to the criminal class because of his association with the Blue Chamber. He too had informants. A few months ago he learned that Ruckland was investigating his activities and getting close to the truth. He made arrangements with the other surviving member of the Blue Chamber, Carlisle, to get rid of Ruckland.” Tobias’s jaw tightened. “The business cost Neville ten thousand pounds.”

Lavinia’s mouth fell open. “Ten thousand pounds? To kill a man? But that’s a fortune. We both know there are any number of footpads in any city in Europe, including Rome, who would have committed murder for a handful of coins.”

“The ten thousand was not intended to cover the cost of murder,” Tobias said evenly. “It was a premium charged because of Neville’s delicate position. Carlisle knew Neville would pay any price for silence.”

“Yes, of course,” Lavinia muttered. “One criminal blackmailing another. There is a sort of irony in that, is there not?”

“Perhaps,” Tobias said. “In any event, Neville must have been greatly relieved when the matter was settled. With Ruckland dead, he could proceed with his plans to take control of what was left of the Blue Chamber organization here in England.”

Anthony looked at Lavinia. “But what Neville did not know was that Ruckland had already reported his suspicions to certain highly placed gentlemen. When he was murdered in Rome, they immediately knew it had likely not been a random killing.”

“Hah.” Lavinia slammed both palms flat on the desk and looked grimly at Tobias. “I knew it. I knew there was more to this than you had told me. Neville never really was your client, was he?”

Tobias exhaled slowly. “Well, it depends on your view of the situation.”

She leveled a finger at him. “Don’t even think of trying to wriggle out of the truth here. Who hired you to look into Ruckland’s death?”

“A man named Crackenburne.”

Lavinia turned to Emeline. “I told you Mr. March was playing a deep game, did I not?”

Emeline smiled. “Yes, Aunt Lavinia. You did say something of the kind.”

Lavinia switched back to Tobias. “How did your connection with Neville come about?”

“When rumors of the valet’s diary began to circulate soon after Carlisle’s death, I saw a chance to tighten the web around Neville. I approached him in my capacity as a man of business and an opportunist and told him of the dangerous gossip. I offered my services to locate it.”

“Neville was desperate to find the diary,” Anthony explained. “He had no way of knowing exactly what was in it, but he feared it could expose him.”

“I suspect that shortly after he employed me to find the diary, Neville himself received one of Holton Felix’s little blackmail notes,” Tobias said. “He tracked Felix to his rooms, just as you and I did, Lavinia, but he got to him first, murdered him, and took the diary.”

“He could hardly explain that to you, however, so he allowed you to continue your inquiries, and when he judged the time was right, he arranged for you to find the thing burned to cinders,” Lavinia concluded.

“Yes.”

She met his eyes. “Tobias, when Lord Neville returns home tonight, he will learn there was an intruder in his house. That guard you fought with will inform him.”

“No doubt.”

“He will suspect you. He might well decide you know too much. You must end this thing now. Immediately. Tonight.”

“Odd you should bring up the subject.” He finished the last of the sherry and put down the glass. “I intend to do precisely that.”