What Angels Fear

Chapter 6

Sometimes, dreams of the war still came to him. Dreams haunted by dying children, dark eyes filled with pain and fear and bewilderment, and golden-skinned women, swollen pregnant bellies ripped open by soldiers’ bayonets. Once it had mattered to him which soldiers’ bayonets, French or English? It had mattered desperately. That had been before he’d understood it was irrelevant, that it was only a factor of time and geography, that soldiers of all nations did these things. Once, he’d thought England a nation anointed by God, a favored land blessed and divinely protected, a force of good, battling enemies who must therefore be the forces of evil. Once, he had believed that there were such things as just wars and righteous causes. Once.

Sebastian opened his eyes, his breath coming short and fast, his clenched hands clammy with sweat. The gloom of his velvet-shrouded bedchamber gave no indication of time, and it was a moment before he remembered where he was, and why. He hadn’t meant to sleep, had only intended to rest. Slowly, he squeezed his eyes shut, then opened them again. But the memory of the images remained, dark and haunting and indelible.

Sir Henry Lovejoy decided to take Senior Constable Edward Maitland with him to Brook Street, along with another, younger constable named Simplot, whom Maitland suggested. It wasn’t that Lovejoy expected a man of Devlin’s position in Society to resist arrest. But Lovejoy had to admit to a certain, secret fear that, minus the two constables’ weighty presence, the Viscount might not take Lovejoy seriously. One heard tales of this viscount, of his irreverent, unconventional ways. Lovejoy could imagine such a man simply laughing in the face of an arresting magistrate. Perhaps if Lovejoy had stood taller than four-foot-eleven in his boots, he’d have felt more confident. At any rate, he was quietly pleased to discover that Simplot was even taller than Maitland, and satisfyingly broad shouldered.

“Wait for us,” Lovejoy told the driver of their hackney as they drew up before Devlin’s Mayfair residence. The townhouse was an elegant structure with a neat bay window and beautifully proportioned ionic portico, but it couldn’t begin to compare with St. Cyr House, that massive granite pile on Grosvenor Square that would someday belong to Devlin along with his father’s titles, the estates in Cornwall and Devon and Lincolnshire, the interests in mining and shipping and banking. Lovejoy stared up at the townhouse’s neat, stuccoed façade, and wondered what it said about relations between the Earl of Hendon and his only son and heir, that Devlin chose to reside here, in Brook Street, rather than beneath that palatial paternal roof.

“His lordship’ll be finding the lodgings at Newgate a far cry from this,” Maitland said in a quiet aside as a stony-faced majordomo bowed them into the hall. “A far cry indeed,” he added, his handsome blond head craning this way and that in an attempt to glimpse more of that gleaming expanse of black and white marble, the procession of gilt-framed paintings marching up the sweeping staircase that curved out of sight to the first floor.

“You move ahead of the courts, Constable,” hissed Lovejoy as the majordomo’s discreet knock upon the library door elicited the Viscount’s permission to enter.

“My lord,” said the majordomo. “The persons who were here to see you this morning have returned. With another.”

Viscount Devlin stood with one buckskin-clad hip resting on the edge of his desk, a shade of annoyance crossing his finely chiseled features as he glanced up from the sheaf of papers he held in his hands. He was built long and lean, with dark hair and a high forehead across which something—or someone—had recently left a nasty gash. “Yes?” he said. “What is it?”

Lovejoy waited for the majordomo to withdraw, then executed a neat bow and said, “I am Sir Henry Lovejoy, chief magistrate at Queen Square. A warrant has been issued in your name, my lord. For the murder of Rachel York.”

Lovejoy couldn’t have said what sort of reaction he’d been expecting: a flush of guilt, perhaps, or a passionate protestation of innocence. At the very least one might have anticipated expressions of shock and sorrow over the death of a beautiful woman Devlin must surely have admired. But the young man’s face remained impassive, unmoved by any emotion except for a faint quiver of what looked very much like boredom.

He set aside the papers. “What is this? Some sort of jest?”

“No jest, my lord. You have been implicated both by evidence found at the scene of Miss York’s death and by the testimony of witnesses.”

The Viscount crossed his arms at his chest and shifted his weight so that he could thrust his long legs out in front of him. “Really? That’s interesting. What evidence? And who are these witnesses?”

Lovejoy returned the younger man’s stare. He had uncanny eyes, as hard and yellow as a noonday sun. It was with effort that Lovejoy kept his voice steady. “I must ask you, first of all, if you can account for your whereabouts between the hours of five and eight yesterday evening?”

The Viscount blinked. “I was out.”

“Out?” said Edward Maitland, his jaw thrust aggressively forward. “Out? Out where?”

The Viscount swung his head to subject the senior constable to a long, cool stare. “Out . . . walking.”

An angry flush darkened Maitland’s cheeks. It had been a miscalculation after all, Lovejoy now realized, to bring the constables. Maitland was far too pugnacious and aggressive, too abrasive and hotheaded, to deal well with a man of Devlin’s ilk. Lovejoy cast his subordinate a warning look and said quietly, “You forget yourself, Constable.” To Devlin he said, “Can anyone vouch for you, my lord?”

The Viscount brought his gaze back to Lovejoy. They were inhuman, really, those eyes. Wild and feral, like something one might see gleaming out of the darkness of a wolves’ den. “No.”

Lovejoy knew a flicker of disappointment. How much simpler it would have been for them all if the Viscount had spent those fatal hours dining with friends, or at a pugilistic match. “Then I fear I must request you to accompany us to Queen Square, my lord.”

Those disconcerting yellow eyes narrowed. “I wonder, am I allowed to send a servant to fetch a greatcoat and other foul-weather accouterments? I understand it can be rather chilly this time of year in”—he swung to fix Edward Maitland with a bland, ironic gaze—“Newgate, didn’t you say?”

Lovejoy felt a quick shiver run up his spine. There was no way the Viscount could have heard the senior constable’s whispered remark, earlier, in the hall. It was impossible. And yet . . . Lovejoy remembered hearing tales, near-legendary accounts he had always dismissed, of this young man’s disconcertingly acute eyesight and hearing, of lethal reflexes and a catlike ability to see in the dark. Invaluable abilities he’d exercised to such deadly effect against the French in the Peninsula before he’d come home for reasons shrouded in rumor and innuendo.

“You may, of course, fortify yourself against the cold with whatever vestments you require,” Lovejoy said hastily.

An unexpected gleam of amusement flared in those terrible yellow eyes, then died. “Thank you,” said Viscount Devlin. And for the second time that day, Sir Henry Lovejoy was left with the perplexing impression that, beneath the surface, all was not precisely as it seemed.