The Hanover Square Affair

Chapter Thirteen

I stopped short and looked down at her in astonishment. A squat man stumbled into me, then pushed past me with a curse.

"Why didn't you say so?" I demanded.

"You never asked. You were pleased to go on about your Janes and Lilies and Charlottes."

"Where is he?"

"Keep your trousers on, Captain. Or rather, no. I bet you're handsome in your skin."

"If you are going to babble nonsense, I'll go home and keep my shillings."

Nancy clung to my arm. "Wait a minute. I'm only teasing yer. I did it just like yer said. I hung about watching the nobs come to the theatre. I asked and asked about people called Carstairs until I found their coach. But the coachman was new. Only been coachin' for the Carstairs for a couple weeks. Last coachman gave notice, you see, and went off."

"Damn."

She laughed and squeezed my arm. "Don't fret, Captain. I kept plaguing him until he told me where the last coachman had gone. He drives for some cove called Barnstable or some such name. But I found him. This Barnstable goes to the opera, too. We're fine pals now, Jemmy and me."

"Jemmy is the coachman?"

"Well, it ain't Mr. Barnstable, is it?" She snorted a laugh. "So I found him for ya. Where's my two shillings?"

"I wanted him to pay a call on me."

"Well, Jemmy don't want to. Why would the likes of him be going to a gentleman's rooms? No, I got him tucked away in a public 'ouse. Said I'd come and fetch you."

"All right, then. I'll give you your money when I've spoken to him."

"You're a mean one. Come on, then. It ain't far."

She led me back toward Covent Garden market, closed now, through the square and to another narrow street. A pub with the sign of a rearing stallion stood halfway down the curved and aged lane, and Nancy took me inside.

The pub was crowded, with a stream of people coming and going. Burly lads in household livery were obviously footmen who'd stepped in for a pint while their masters and mistresses sat in the theatre watching plays or operas. They risked their places doing so-the master or mistress might want them at a moment's notice-but they seemed content to take the chance.

Men and women of the working and servant classes lingered contentedly, talking loudly with friends, laughing at anecdotes. In the snug, a barmaid led a rousing song. Nance took me to a highbacked settle with a table drawn up to it. She smiled at the man sitting there before snuggling in beside him and plopping a kiss on his cheek.

"This is Jemmy. I brought the captain to yer."

I slid onto the bench across from them. Jemmy was not a big man; he'd be perhaps a half-head taller than Nance when standing, but his black coat, shiny with wear, stretched over wide shoulders and tight muscles. His brown hair was greasy and fell lankly over his forehead. His wide face split into a grin at Nancy, showing canine teeth filed to points.

Jemmy raised a hand, washing the smell of sweat and ale over me. "Well, here I am, Cap'n. What do you want of me?"

A plump barmaid plopped a warm tankard of beer in front of me. She smiled at me, revealing two missing teeth, ignored the coachman and Nance, and sailed away.

"Bitch," Jemmy muttered.

"Aw, Jemmy, you don't need her. You got me." Nance wriggled herself under his arm. He encircled her shoulders with it, letting his fingers rest an inch from her bosom.

I had planned to question Jemmy subtly, but I was very bad at anything but blatant truths. Plus, the way he touched Nance sent flickers of irritation through me.

"You used to coach for the Carstairs family," I said without preliminary.

"Yeah. What of it?"

"You once drove to the Strand and retrieved Miss Jane Thornton and her maid for an afternoon of shopping with young Miss Carstairs."

He hesitated for a long moment. "Who told you that?"

"I know it. Many people know it."

Alarm flickered in his eyes. "They sent me on all kinds of errands for the spoiled little chit. Don't remember all of them. I'd give her the back of me 'and, she was mine."

I went on ruthlessly. "On that particular day you went to fetch Miss Thornton and her maid, but when you reached the Carstairs' house, they were gone."

His eyes went wary. "I know that. They got in, but there wasn't a sign of 'em when I opened the door at the house in Henrietta Street. Could have knocked me down with a feather."

"You never saw her get out of the carriage."

"Saw who?" The corners of his mouth had gone white.

"Miss Thornton."

"Oh, her. You ever driven a coach, Cap'n? You got to drive the team and watch out for other coaches and wagons who have no business being on the streets. They lock your wheels, you're done for. I don't got time to look out what my passengers do."

"Or perhaps the passengers never got into the coach in the first place."

His mouth hardened. "Who's been telling you things? It's a pack of lies."

I leaned toward him, the stale steam from my beer engulfing me. I was making guesses, pieced together from what Aimee and the orange girl in the Strand had told me, but I had to try. "Someone paid you to look the other way that day. To drive to the Strand, wait a few minutes, then drive away again. You were to go back to Henrietta Street and claim you didn't know what happened. Perhaps later that night you were paid to return, to fetch the young ladies in earnest this time and drive them to Hanover Square."

"I never. It's lies, that is."

"If it is not the truth, it is very close to it."

Jemmy shoved his glass away from him. Ale slopped onto the pitted and stained tabletop. "Who says it is? You going to take me to the beaks? And tell them what? No one is left to prove it."

"No," I mused. "Horne is dead; Miss Thornton is gone. Did Mr. Carstairs ask you to go? I wager he did not like the questions people asked when Miss Thornton disappeared. Or perhaps your real employer decided you should quit the house before anyone became suspicious."

"Don't know what you're talking about. I'm a coachman. I drive coaches for gentry."

"It must be lucrative," I said steadily, "but difficult, to work for Mr. Denis."

Jemmy flushed a sudden, sharp red, and his eyes held fear and hate. "Is that why you came, to throw lies in my face? Is that why you got your whore to chum to me?" He shoved Nance from him. "Get out. I don't want you."

"Aw, Jemmy-"

"Get out. I don't want to see you, understand?"

Nance's lip trembled. "Jemmy, I didn't know."

"Go on. And take your flat with you."

Nance stared at him in hurt dismay. I rose and took her arm, gently getting her to her feet and leading her away. The red-faced barmaid grinned at me, and I tossed her coins for the ale. She winked and tucked the money into her bodice.

I led the dejected Nance out of the pub and into the dark streets.

"Don't mourn him, Nance. I am just as glad you're away from him. I don't like the way he put his hands on you."

She brightened, though tears glittered on her face. "Are you jealous?"

"Disgusted, rather."

She stopped. "You think I am disgusting?"

"I did not say that."

"You do think so. That's why you always put me off." Another tear rolled down her nose.

I took her arm and pulled her to the brick wall of a house, out of the way of traffic. "I'll thank you not to put words in my mouth. I found your coachman disgusting. I do not find you so, and I am happy that you are away from him."

"Oh." She gave me a long look from under her lashes. "I took a bath. Washed meself all over."

"Did you?" I asked, bemused.

"Because you likes girls as bathe themselves. It wasn't fancy soap, but I smell clean. Don't I?"

She shoved her hand under my nose. I moved it away. "Nance."

"You don't have to give me money for it. Or for finding Jemmy, because he turned out a bad 'un." She drew her finger down my lapel. "I fancies ya, yer know. That's why I'm always teasing yer."

I would never make her understand. Her world was not my world, even if the edges collided from time to time. "We had a bargain. Two shillings when you found the coachman for me. Here." I pressed coins into her hand. "Take yourself home for the rest of the night."

"And get knocked about by me dad for coming back too early? But you don't care tuppence for that."

"I do."

"If you did, you'd take me as your own."

Her brown gaze measured mine. I held it, wishing I could help her-not in the way she wanted, but in a way that would keep her from harm. But a man without money in London is powerless. I looked away.

"Not tuppence," she said. "I don't care that for your airs. Yer no better than the rest of them. And you lost me Jemmy, too." She squirmed from my grasp and ran off.

"Wait."

I could take Nancy to Louisa. Louisa was no fainting flower. She could do something for her, train her, give her a character, find her employment.

Nance ignored me and kept running. I started after her. A rumbling cart, driven by a madman, swept between us. By the time it had gone, Nance was far from me, darting in and out of clumps of hurrying people. I would never catch her. With my lame leg, I was no match for a young, healthy girl.

I went home. I'd see her again. Nance's regular haunts were Covent Garden market and the streets around it; our paths would cross soon.

If I had known then under what circumstance we'd meet again, I'd have gone after her then and there, damn my leg and the London streets. But one does not expect life to be so capricious.