What Angels Fear

Chapter 43

Sir Henry Lovejoy sat in the empty pit of the Stein and watched Hugh Gordon, decked out as Hamlet, rehearse his climatic sword fight with a significantly overweight Laertes.

The discovery of Mary Grant’s ravaged body should have removed whatever lingering doubts the magistrate might have had about Lord Devlin’s guilt. Lovejoy himself had interviewed their witness, Mrs. Charles Lavery, and he’d found her a solid, no-nonsense woman. If Mrs. Lavery said she’d seen Lord Devlin leaving the lodging house, then Lovejoy was inclined to believe the man had been there. And yet. . .

And yet, the doctor who examined Mary Grant’s body had given it as his opinion that she’d been killed earlier in the day, perhaps before noon. And while most people didn’t put much stock in such things, Lovejoy had too much respect for the scientific method to ignore the doctor’s report. Except that if Devlin hadn’t killed Mary Grant, then what was he doing there at her rooms? Why was he still in London at all?

Lovejoy shifted uncomfortably in his seat, remembering his interview with Charles, Lord Jarvis. If Henry’s wife, Julia, were still alive, she’d tell him he was being a stubborn fool, trying to understand Sebastian St. Cyr rather than simply concentrating on capturing him. And Henry, he’d tell her that he was doing everything in his power to bring the Viscount in. He just needed to tie up one or two loose ends, for his own satisfaction.

And then Lovejoy realized what he was doing, and heaved a soft sigh. His Julia had been gone from him for almost ten years now, but he still had these little conversations with her, imagining what she would say, what he would say in response.

A thump followed by a bustle of movement and laughing chatter drew his attention back to the stage. The scene had ended. Still wiping his hot face with a towel, Hugh Gordon ran lightly down the steps, to the pit.

“You wanted to speak with me?” he said. He was smiling, but Lovejoy noticed the wariness in his dark eyes, that cautious kind of watchfulness one saw often in the face of a man confronting a magistrate.

“That’s right.” Stiff with the cold, Lovejoy pushed to his feet. “I understand you and Rachel York were once . . .” He hesitated, searching for an expression that wouldn’t offend his moral sensibilities. But any irregular sexual liaison of that sort outraged Lovejoy’s strict Evangelical principles. He finally settled on the word, “involved.”

Gordon’s nostrils flared with a quickly indrawn breath. “Everyone knows who killed her. It’s that viscount, Lord Devlin. He did Rachel, and yesterday he got that other one over in Bloomsbury. So why are you here talking to me?”

The aggressiveness of the man’s tone took Lovejoy by surprise. “We’ve been doing some checking into your background, Mr. Gordon, and we’ve discovered a few things which disturbed us.”

“Such as?”

“Does the name Adelaide Hunt mean anything to you?”

The man hesitated, his jaw clenched as he considered his response. “You obviously know it does. I haven’t seen the woman in years. What’s she to do with anything?”

“I understand you cut her up once, quite badly. In fact, you almost killed her.”

“She tell you that?”

Lovejoy said nothing, just looked at the man expectantly.

A muscle bunched along the actor’s jaw. “I was defending myself. The bloody woman came at me with a bed warmer. Did she tell you that?”

“As I understand it, you flew into a rage when she attempted to break off the relationship. She wielded the bed warmer to defend herself.”

“No charges were ever pressed, now were they?”

Lovejoy drew in a deep breath scented with greasepaint and the faint, lingering tang of orange peels. “Some men make it a habit of cutting up women who try to break off with them. I understand you were particularly angry with Rachel York when she left you for another man.”

A faint flush darkened the actor’s lean, handsome face. “So? That was almost two years ago now. What is it with you people? I explained all this to that other fellow.”

“What other fellow?”

“The one who came around a couple of times, asking questions about Rachel. First he claimed to be her Cousin Simon Taylor from Worcestershire, then he said he was a Bow Street Runner.”

“What? What did this man look like?”

Gordon shrugged. “Tall, lean, dark. Younger than he was trying to make himself look. Dressed rather scruffy.”

Lovejoy felt a quickening of interest verging on excitement. See, Julia, he thought; this stubborn fool is onto something after all.

For the description fit almost perfectly with that of the man seen leaving Mary Grant’s lodgings. The man identified by Mrs. Charles Lavery as Viscount Devlin.

Edward Maitland was coming down the Public Office’s front steps when Sir Henry Lovejoy made it back to Queen Square.

“I want you to set a couple of men to watching Hugh Gordon. Both at the theater, and at home,” said Lovejoy.

The constable drew up in surprise. “What? You don’t seriously think Gordon is our man?”

Lovejoy hadn’t entirely discounted the possibility, but he wasn’t about to go into all that with Maitland. “No, I don’t. But Devlin seems to have developed an interest in him. He’s already approached Gordon twice, and he may try to do so again. I want us to be ready for him.”