Where Shadows Dance

Chapter 28

Sebastian was raising his fist to knock on Gibson’s door when it opened to emit Mrs. Federico. She came bustling out, her shawl pulled up over her head against the cool breeze that had kicked up after dusk. Her habitual scowl was, if anything, fiercer than ever.

“The goings-on we’ve had here today!” she exclaimed, glaring at him. “I meant to be out of here hours ago, and more’s the pity that I wasn’t. Havy cavy, that’s what I call them people. Havy cavy!” She tied the ends of her shawl in a knot and stomped off down the hill without looking back.

Letting himself in, Sebastian found Gibson sprawled in one of the ancient cracked-leather armchairs beside the parlor hearth, a brandy in one hand, the stump of his bad leg propped up on a stool.

“No, don’t get up,” Sebastian said when his friend struggled to do so.

Gibson sat back with a grunt. “Is that god-awful woman finally gone?”

“She is.” Sebastian went to pour himself a glass of wine from the carafe near the window. “What havy-cavy ‘goings-on’ have you been subjecting poor Mrs. Federico to now?”

“Poor Mrs. Federico, indeed,” said Gibson. “I’ve had Jumpin’ Jack here today, is all.”

“Came to collect the body, did he?”

“Uh . . . no.”

Sebastian swung to face him. “No?”

“There’s a wee catch, you see. Someone has set a guard over their loved one’s new grave in St. George’s burial ground.”

Sebastian came to sit in the chair on the opposite side of the empty fireplace. “Well, that’s the devil’s own luck.” He thought for a moment, then said, “Can we bribe the guard? I mean, it’s not like we’re wanting to steal—”

Gibson shook his head. “Jumpin’ Jack looked into that. Seems the fellow’s a high stickler. Some old Quaker or some such thing.” He sighed. “The irony is, we came so close. The girl’s body was held for more than two weeks in a funerary chapel before interment, which means it’s so far gone, there’s not much danger of anyone stealing it at this point. They’ve only paid the guard for two nights, and tonight is the last night.”

“So what’s the problem? The exhumation isn’t scheduled until Monday.”

“Jumpin’ Jack leaves for Brighton tomorrow. It’s his annual holiday.”

Sebastian choked on his wine. “What the hell? He can’t delay his departure for one more day?”

“Monday is his daughter Sarah’s birthday. He says they always spend her birthday at the seashore, and he’s not going to disappoint her.”

“Not even for two hundred pounds?”

“I offered him three hundred. He says he wouldn’t do it even for a thousand pounds.” Gibson drained his glass. “Do you have any idea how much money a good resurrection man can pull in over the course of a year? I wouldn’t be surprised if Jumpin’ Jack is worth considerably more than Dr. Astley ʹHave You Read My Article?’ Cooper.”

“Bloody hell,” said Sebastian, pushing up to refill their glasses.

“He did offer to find someone to go along with him tonight and kosh the guard over the head,” Gibson said. “He wasn’t willing to do it personally, mind—not being a violent man himself. But he figured he could look the other way while someone else did it.”

Sebastian glanced up from his task, his eyes narrowed with amusement. “He didn’t actually say that?”

“He did. But when I told him I couldn’t condone that sort of damage to one of my fellow men, he said there was nothing for it. If I was that particular about getting Ross back into his tomb, then I was just going to have to do it myself.” Gibson’s chest shook with his soft laughter.

Sebastian stared at him.

Gibson stared back, his smile fading. “Oh, no. Don’t even think about it.”

“Why not?’

“Why not? You can’t be serious.”

Sebastian poured a healthy measure of wine into their glasses. “Can you think of another way?”

The Irishman was silent a moment. “We-ell, I know some other sack-’em-up boys. But none I’d trust to actually do the deed. Doesn’t do us any good to pay someone to put Ross back in his grave, only to have them tip the bits into the Thames.”

“You did get all the bits back, didn’t you?”

“Most of them.”

“Most of them?”

“I’m working on it.”

Sebastian handed his friend the refreshed drink. “We’ll just have to put back what we have. If he’s arranged artfully in his casket and Lovejoy sends the lot to you, there’s no need for anyone to be the wiser.”

Gibson stared up at him. “You can’t seriously mean to do this?”

“If we’ve any hope of bringing Ross’s murderer to justice, the authorities are going to need his body.” Sebastian sank back into his chair. “I even have some experience in the resurrection trade, remember? I went with Jumpin’ Jack last year.”

“But you were stealing a body that time. This is going to be a wee bit different.”

“How much different can it be?”

Gibson drained his glass again in one long pull. “I don’t suppose you’ve forgotten that you’re getting married in just a few days’ time?”

Sebastian had forgotten, of course. But all he said was, “As long as we don’t get taken up by the watch, that shouldn’t be a problem.”

That evening, Charles, Lord Jarvis, returned from a productive session with the Prince, Castlereagh, and Foley to find Hero seated beside the empty drawing room hearth, an open book lying neglected in her lap, her gaze lost in the distance.

“What’s this?” he asked, pausing in the doorway. “No balls or routs? No boring but improving lecture at some learned society? No intellectually uplifting evening of rational conversation in the salon of a dreadfully unfashionable bluestocking?”

“No, just a quiet evening at home.”

He went to take the seat opposite her, his gaze hard on her face. “You’ve been looking tired lately.”

“Have I?” She gave him an affectionate smile. “What a dreadfully unflattering thing to say.”

She wore a sprigged muslin gown with puffed sleeves and a simple scoop neckline filled with a fine fichu. But it was the bluestone and silver triskelion pendant around her neck that drew and held his attention. Said to have been worn by the Druid priestesses of Wales, the piece had a long, troubled history that included a mistress of the last Stewart king of England and a bizarre legend to which Jarvis gave no credence whatsoever.

He had given it to her on a whim, some twelve months before. Once, the necklace had belonged to the errant Countess of Hendon, Viscount Devlin’s mother. But Hero didn’t know that. And it struck Jarvis now, looking at her, that if he were a superstitious man he would find the pendant’s history unsettling.

He frowned. “Why are you wearing that?”

She touched her fingertips to the bluestone disk. “I like it,” she said simply. “Why?”

He shook his head. “Are you still determined to wed Devlin?”

“Of course. Why do you ask?”

There were things he could tell her, about Devlin’s birth and about the errant Countess of Hendon; things that even Devlin himself did not know. But Jarvis had learned long ago that knowledge could be power, and he understood his daughter well enough to realize that none of these old, ugly secrets would have the effect of dissuading her if her mind was made up.

He said, “You almost—almost, mind you—make me wish I’d encouraged your scheme to travel the world.”

She rose to her feet with a soft laugh, her book clasped in one hand, and kissed his cheek. “Good night, Papa.”

He watched her walk away, his frown deepening.

He was feared from one end of the country to the other, his network of spies and the eerie omniscience it gave him legendary. Yet there was something going on here, something that involved his own daughter, and somehow the truth of its nature eluded him.

Pushing to his feet, he went to yank the bellpull beside the fireplace.

“Yes, my lord?” said Grisham, appearing in the doorway.

“As soon as she is free, send Miss Jarvis’s abigail to me.”