The Hanover Square Affair

Chapter Eighteen

I said calmly, "I have always been bad at lying."

Denis sat back and rested his hands, palms down, on the desk. "Yes, your skills are remarkably ill developed. What is it you truly came here to discuss?"

I looked him straight in the eye. "Miss Jane Thornton. And her maid."

Nothing, not even a flicker of recognition. "Who are they and what have they to do with me?"

My pulse beat faster. "You procured them for Mr. Horne. The late Mr. Horne."

"I did read in the newspaper of Mr. Horne's unfortunate death. London is a dark and violent city, Captain."

"You destroyed an entire family, damn you. For his paltry fee."

Denis's smooth fingers tightened the barest bit. "If I had done what you accuse me of, the fee would not have been paltry, I assure you."

I no longer tried to rein in my temper. I'd had enough of people caring nothing for the missing Jane, and for Aimee, frightened and destroyed. I rose. "You procured her, and you sold her, just as you sold the painting to Grenville and his friend."

I sensed a movement beyond my right shoulder. The man at the window, no longer looking half-asleep, had come alert.

Denis gave him a small, subduing gesture. "Gentlemen sometimes ask me to obtain for them things that others cannot. It is expensive. One needs planning, the right contacts. I can do what they can't. That is all."

"You cloak it in vague words, but you sold her the same as you would a prostitute to a nunnery."

Faint color touched his cheeks. "If you have come here to crusade, I suggest you rethink your position. I know you've questioned my coachman, and you questioned Horne and Grenville. But I warn you, Captain. Do not interfere in my business. You do not have the power or wealth to do so with impunity. And do not think to hide behind your friend Grenville. His greatest quality is his discretion. He will not help you."

"Do you expect me to turn my back as you ruin young women and their families?"

"You must do as you please, of course."

I rested my fists on his desk. "Horne didn't pay you for it either, did he? That's why you went to see him the day he died."

Denis steepled his fingers and regarded me quietly over them. "My financial arrangements are my own affair."

"I know Horne owed you money. That fact has not been hidden. Did you murder him, then? Because he would not pay?"

"How foolish for me to kill a man who owed me money. I prefer to have money in my coffers than blood on my hands."

"And you wouldn't be able to pursue his heir for it, because you would have to explain the business transaction," I said. "I doubt you keep any records. I suppose I will have to satisfy myself with the fact that you will never see tuppence for Jane Thornton's ruin."

Denis regarded me through another long silence before he unclasped his hands. "I admire your bravery, Captain. Very few men would think to enter my house and make such accusations to my face. Or perhaps you simply do not know your danger."

"I was warned." Grenville had told me not to come here alone. Pomeroy had told me I was insane. I was beginning to think they were both right.

"And you came anyway?" Denis asked. "I must say, you have astonished me." He rose. "I bid you good day, Captain."

My breath came fast, and I did not take his outstretched hand. "I can't say I wish you good health."

The corners of his mouth twitched the slightest bit. "You are refreshingly blunt, Captain. But have a care. Do nothing more to inquire into my business. It is not worth it."

His eyes, again, held no menace, but I sensed a cold ruthlessness behind them. That coldness no doubt inspired fear in those who became acquainted with him.

I had lost my fear long ago.

I did not say good-bye. I simply turned and left him.

I returned to my rooms, enraged and no further forward. Yesterday, I had believed that Denis murdered Horne, but after meeting him, I changed my conclusion. I believed Denis when he said he would have gotten more out of Horne if the man had remained alive. Denis must have been in a fair temper with Horne in order to pay him a personal visit.

I toyed with the idea that Denis had told the brute of a man who'd stood guard in Denis's study to physically frighten Horne, and said brute had accidentally killed him, but I discarded that idea as well. Denis was too careful. The brute would not have made a mistake. And Denis certainly would not have murdered a man when he'd been publicly seen paying a call on him.

But no one else had called on Horne that day. I was back to nothing. Perhaps the wretched Bremer had murdered his master after all. Or the cook had, because Horne hadn't sufficiently appreciated her sweetmeats. Or Hetty had in a fit of zealous righteousness. Or the frail Aimee had, then tied herself up and locked herself in the cupboard from the outside, all the while managing not to get a drop of blood on herself.

I seized my notes from the writing table and flung them into the fire. All my efforts had produced nothing. Grenville was still pursuing the question of Charlotte Morrison in Somerset, while I blundered about London to no avail. My leg ached, I'd spent a fortune on hackney coaches, and I'd done nothing useful.

No, Janet had found me useful. She'd amused herself with me while waiting to run off to Surrey with her new protector.

I realized suddenly that Marianne, of all people, had been right. Janet had always latched herself on to those who could help her most. She'd fixed her hold on me when she'd been reduced to promising her favors to the winner of a card game. She'd fixed on her sister's neighbor, Mr. Clarke, after her sister had died. She had fixed on Foster now that he was in a position to make her comfortable once more.

My anger spun around and settled deep inside me. For the first time in my life, I contemplated killing a man in cold blood. James Denis would never be touched by conventional justice. He was too careful, and even the Bow Street Runners were afraid of him. Pomeroy had compared my bearding Denis in his den to charging a hill full of artillery. Perhaps he'd been right.

I'd charged that hill because if I hadn't, the battle would have been lost and many would have died. The French had gambled all on that battery of guns. My sergeants had almost refused to give the order, but I had bullied them down. And I'd been right. The guns were trained to blast the squares of infantrymen and rifles below; they'd not anticipated a cavalry charge on their flank. Straight up that hill we'd gone, and captured the guns before they'd been able to turn them around.

Would not killing James Denis be the same thing? I could make another appointment with him, take a primed pistol in my coat, and shoot him across that empty desk of his. Or I could wait until he was returning home from an outing, open the carriage door, and shoot him then and there. Jane Thornton would be avenged, and London rid of a cold-blooded menace.

I would no doubt lose my own life in the process. I had noted the alertness of Denis's bodyguards and knew they were well paid to stop hotheads like me. But what did I have to lose? The society I lived in viewed any physical blemish with horror, and here I was, a lame man half out of my mind with melancholia, trying to be accepted as a gentleman on that society's terms. I never would or could. I saw for myself days and nights spent in melancholia, or in trying to forget I had no life to speak of. Who would regret my leaving it?

Louisa might.

Louisa. I repeated her name silently, clinging to it to bring me back from black despair. Louisa cared. Her caring had been the only thing that had kept me alive after her husband had done his best to kill me. I needed to see her.

I'd received another letter from her today about her damned supper party with the admonition that I attend. I would have to disappoint her. I was in no mood to make inane small talk at a gathering that would include her husband. I contemplated rushing out and shooting Denis at once, so as to have an excuse to avoid Louisa's dinner.

The joke relieved neither black humor nor my need to speak to her. I left my rooms and walked to Covent Garden theatre on the chance Louisa had attended tonight, but I did not see the Brandon carriage among those milling nearby. I did not see Nance either. I cringed at the thought of journeying to the Brandon house in Mayfair and refused to dash about town looking for her.

In the end, I paid a visit to the Thorntons, and I found Louisa there.

"I thought you'd be deep in whist at Lady Aline's," I said, sitting down in the Thorntons' bare front parlor. Alice returned to a footstool before Mrs. Thornton, pale and worn, who was nodding off over a skein of wool.

"I wasn't in the mood for cards tonight," Louisa answered.

The red and blue and gold wool she was winding made bright splashes on her brown cotton gown. Her gray eyes and the thin bandeau winding through her hair were her only adornments tonight.

"How is Mr. Thornton?" I asked.

Alice glanced at me. "The same, sir."

I knew then I should not have come. Looking at them only made my heart harder. I caught Louisa's cool hand.

"Talk to me."

She looked up, frowning, but what she saw in my face made her still. She'd known me for a long time, and she knew what I was capable of.

She gently pushed my hand away, and then she began to talk of things small and unimportant. I closed my eyes and let her voice trickle through my anger, dissolving my despair, loosening the knot in my heart. I remained there while she and Alice spoke of the small things that made up everyday life, until I was able to trust myself to return alone to my rooms and so to bed.

I felt slightly better the next morning. The post brought me a letter from Grenville saying he was starting home at once and that Somerset had proved interesting. He did not elaborate.

I tossed his letter aside and opened my reply from Master Philip Preston of number 23, Hanover Square. I'd written him the previous day before I'd set out for Denis's, asking formally for an appointment. He'd answered:

Dear Captain Lacey: I received your letter and thought it frightfully decent of you to write. I've been laid up since the end of Michaelmas term, and they let me see no one, but if you'd call at one o'clock today, I will ensure that you are admitted. I know you have been investigating the murder next door, because I've watched you out the window. You also faced the cavalrymen who quelled the rioters, by yourself, which I thought very brave. I'd much like to meet you and talk about the murder. Your respectful servant, Philip Preston.

The slanted juvenile handwriting and the scattered ink blots made me smile a little. I tucked the letter into my pocket.

At one, I emerged from a hackney in Hanover Square. The weather had turned, and a hint of May and warmer spring lay on the breeze that broke the clouds. May would also bring the wedding of the Prince Regent's daughter, Charlotte, to her Prince Leopold. The festivities were already the talk of London. After that, June would arrive with its long days of light. I looked forward to summer, though I knew it would be gone all too soon. The dreariness of most of the year did my melancholia little good.

I knocked at number 23, managing to avoid looking at number 22. A butler, who might have been cast from the same mold as that of number 21, answered the door. He began to tell me that Mr. Preston was out, but I handed him my card and told him my appointment was with the young master.

An indulgent look touched his face that made him almost human. "Of course, sir. Please follow me."