Who Buries the Dead

Chapter 32

That evening, Sebastian and Hero were sitting down to dinner when a peal sounded at the front door.

His gaze met hers. “Expecting anyone?”

“No,” she said, just as Morey appeared in the doorway with a bow.

“Lord Sidmouth to see you, my lord. I have taken the liberty of showing his lordship into the library.”

Sebastian found the Home Secretary pacing back and forth before the fire, his hands clasped behind his back, his chin sunk into the folds of his snowy white cravat. He wore the silk knee breeches, white silk stockings, and buckled evening shoes of a man dressed for a formal dinner or a ball. But when he turned toward Sebastian, his face was pinched and pale.

“My lord,” said Sebastian. “May I offer you some wine? A brandy?”

“Thank you, but no; I won’t keep you long. My apologies for interrupting your evening.”

“Please, have a seat.”

Sidmouth drew up with his back to the fireplace and shook his head. “I looked into the incident in Portugal you told me about-the one involving the convent.” He sucked in a quick, jerky breath. “My God. How could anyone do something like that?”

Sebastian had never had much respect for Sidmouth. He was typical of the sycophants who hung around the court: ambitious, venal, and opportunistic. Yet it said something for the man that he still recoiled in horror from an act of such calculated cynicism.

Sebastian walked over to splash brandy into two glasses and held one out to the Home Secretary, who took it without comment and downed half the contents in one long, shaky pull.

Sebastian said, “Tell me what happened between Oliphant and Stanley Preston.”

Sidmouth brought up a hand to rub his eyes with one splayed thumb and forefinger. “Most colonial governors find ways to use their positions for personal gain. It’s virtually expected, actually. But some. . some go too far.”

“Bribery? Corruption?”

The Home Secretary nodded and blew out a long, harsh breath. “I began hearing about the problems between James Preston-Stanley’s son-and the new governor almost as soon as Oliphant arrived in Jamaica. It seemed as if every other week brought a different complaint from Stanley. For the most part I ignored them-you know what Stanley was like. But then, things became more serious. Oliphant confiscated a valuable stretch of the Prestons’ largest plantation. He claimed the land was needed to build a public road, although everyone knew the road was solely for the benefit of one individual-a large landowner who paid Oliphant handsomely for his efforts.”

“When was this?”

“Last spring.”

Sidmouth paused to take another gulp of his brandy. “By that point we’d started receiving complaints from other prominent colonial figures. It was obvious that something needed to be done. But Oliphant has some powerful backers, which limited my ability to act. I told Stanley that if he wanted Oliphant recalled, he needed to find something else-something less personal and more injurious to the interests of the Crown.”

“That’s when Preston went out to Jamaica himself?”

“Yes. He was determined to dig up something he could use.”

“And he found it?”

“He did. To be frank, I could scarcely believe it at first. I mean, bribery and corruption are one thing. But flaunting the laws against the slave trade is something else entirely.”

“You’re saying Oliphant was involved in slave running?”

Sidmouth nodded. “It’s become extraordinarily lucrative, now that the slave trade has been shut down.”

Sebastian doubted a slave owner like Stanley Preston would have had any personal moral objections to such activities. But the discovery would have served his purposes very well.

“The evidence was damning enough that Oliphant agreed to return to London,” Sidmouth was saying. “That should have satisfied Stanley-it would have any normal man. But not my cousin. He was determined to see formal charges brought against Oliphant. Except then. .” Sidmouth’s voice trailed off.

“Yes?” prompted Sebastian.

“Last Saturday-the day before Stanley was killed-I ran into him in St. James’s Street. Frankly, I was rather chagrined to see him, since he’d taken to seizing every opportunity-however inappropriate-to pester me about Oliphant. But to my surprise, he said he was dropping the entire affair. I was stunned.”

“Did he say why?”

“No. But he was behaving most peculiarly-very unlike himself.”

“In what sense?”

“I think he was frightened. Which puzzled me, because Stanley Preston was not a man who frightened easily. But he was afraid that day, and I think he was afraid of Lord Oliphant.”

Sebastian studied the Home Secretary’s strained features. “Have you ever heard of a man named Diggory Flynn?”

“Who?”

“Diggory Flynn-a rather disheveled individual with an oddly lopsided face. I could be wrong, but I believe he works for Sinclair Oliphant.”

Sidmouth’s heavy jaw went oddly slack. “A lopsided face, you say?”

“That’s right. Have you seen him?”

“No.” Sidmouth shook his head. “No. No.”

But Sebastian noticed his hand was far from steady as he brought his brandy to his lips and drained the glass.

Sinclair, Lord Oliphant, was standing beside the E.O. table in a gaming hell near Portland Square when Sebastian came up to him.

“We need to talk,” said Sebastian. “Walk outside with me for a moment.”

Oliphant kept his gaze on the spinning ball before him. “I think not. Whatever you have to say to me can be said here.”

“You might change your mind when you hear that the topic of conversation is slave running.” The E.O. ball fell into one of the bar slots, and Sebastian said, “You lose anyway.”

“Actually, I’ve yet to place a bet.” Oliphant’s habitual, faint smile never slipped. But his blue eyes narrowed and hardened, and he turned to walk out of the gaming hell’s dim, smoky atmosphere into the startlingly clear, crisp night.

“Now, what is this about?” he demanded as they descended the front steps.

“I’ve just been listening to an interesting tale-about how you used your position as governor of Jamaica to cheat Stanley Preston out of a valuable section of his land. He swore to make you pay, and he did-by discovering that in addition to the usual bribery and corruption so common amongst Britain’s colonial governors, you were also dabbling in the slave trade.”

“The accusations were baseless,” Oliphant said calmly as the two men turned their steps toward the square, “which is why no charges were ever filed.”

“Yet you did return to London.”

Oliphant shrugged. “The islands have a certain appeal, I’ll not deny. But after a time, ennui sets in. I was more than ready to return to England.”

“And Preston had nothing to do with it? Is that what you’re saying?”

“That’s right.”

Sebastian shook his head. “I think Preston wasn’t content with having you quietly removed from the governorship. I think he was determined to see you publicly disgraced, and that’s why you killed him.”

Oliphant gave a brittle laugh and swung to face him. “Do you seriously think I would allow some upstart merchant’s grandson to drive me from a post I wished to retain? Me? An Oliphant of Calgary Hall? Hardly. I tell you, the charges were unproven.”

“Perhaps. Yet Preston could conceivably have found the proof he needed to make them stick.”

“I’m afraid your information is sadly inaccurate, Devlin. Stanley Preston and I had a nice little chat the Friday before he died. And the very next day, he formally retracted his allegations.”

“Threatened him, did you? With what? Did you suggest that something vile might befall his daughter, if he continued?”

“Does it matter? The point is, I had no reason to kill him. In fact, I had every reason not to-particularly in such a spectacularly gruesome fashion that could only serve to attract attention to the very falsehoods I wished to quiet.”

“He could have changed his mind.”

Oliphant gave a low laugh. “The man wasn’t that stupid.” He started to brush past Sebastian, heading back toward the gaming house.

“Tell me about Diggory Flynn,” said Sebastian.

Oliphant hesitated for the briefest instant-so briefly that Sebastian afterward wondered if he might have imagined it. Then he quickly mounted the steps, rapped sharply on the gaming house door, and disappeared inside.

That night, Sebastian dreamt of blood-soaked orange blossoms and a laughing man with mismatched eyes in a strangely lopsided face.

He left his bed just before dawn, when the air was tangy and crisp, the dark streets below empty and quiet. He was standing at the window and watching the first hint of light spread across the sky when Hero came to wrap her arms around his waist and press her warm, soft body against his naked back.

She said, “Troublesome dreams?”

He rested his hands on hers. “Yes.”

She laid her cheek against his shoulder. “I owe you an apology. I thought you were wrong, you know-that you were allowing your own past with Oliphant to influence your thinking about Stanley Preston’s killer. But revenge and fear are powerful motives, and Oliphant obviously possessed both.”

Sebastian kept his gaze on the lightening sky above the rooftops. “I could still be wrong. Sometimes I think I keep trying to prove that Oliphant is the murderer just so that I can kill him.” He paused as a chorus of morning birdsong filled the air, sweet and bright and achingly clear. “But I’m still missing something-something vitally important. And I’m afraid more people are going to die because of it.”

“Perhaps you’ll find some hint of what it is at Windsor this morning,” she said.

“Perhaps,” he said, and turned to take her in his arms.