Why Mermaids Sing

Chapter 20

TUESDAY, 17 SEPTEMBER 1811

Early the next morning, Sebastian received an unexpected visit from a furtive little man with sun-darkened skin and an accent that could change from Geordie to Cockney or from French to Spanish to Italian and back again in an instant. His name was Emmanuel Jones, and he had once worked for Sebastian in the Army. Now he was working for Sebastian again in an entirely different capacity. He was searching for Sebastian’s mother.

“That ship you was askin’ about,” said Jones. “The San Remo? You were right. It didn’t sink seventeen years ago. It made port at the Hague, then worked its way along the coast in slow stages, through the straights of Gibraltar and around the toe of Italy, to Venice.”

Sebastian rested his elbows on his library’s broad desktop and studied the enigmatic features of the man who stood before him. “And the Englishwoman who was on it?”

“She calls herself Lady Sophia Sedlow now.”

Sebastian nodded. Sedlow had been his mother’s maiden name. “And?”

“She lived for a time in Venice, with a poet. He died. Nine years ago.”

“Where is she now?”

“She left Italy in the company of a Frenchman, sometime around 1803. One of Napoleon’s generals.”

“Which one?”

“Becnel.”

Sebastian stood from behind his desk and went to fiddle with the inlaid Moroccan box he kept on a shelf near the hearth. It was a moment before he trusted himself to speak. “She’s in France now?”

“Yes. But I don’t know exactly where.”

Sebastian swung to look at him. “Then why are you here?”

Something flickered across the man’s normally impassive face. “I’m not messing with Becnel.”

Crossing to his desk, Sebastian opened a drawer and drew forth an envelope from which he counted a stack of banknotes. “Speak of this to anyone,” he said, shoving the notes across the desk, “and I’ll kill you. It’s as simple as that.”

Jones folded the money out of sight with a sniff. “I know how to keep me mouth shut.”

After he had gone, Sebastian went to stand, again, beside the empty hearth, his gaze fixed unseeingly on the cold, empty grate. He would need to find another agent, someone both trustworthy and unafraid to venture into the heart of Napoleon’s France.

It wouldn’t be easy. But it could be done.

He spent much of what was left of the morning interviewing applicants for the position of valet.

“We come highly recommended,” said one of the applicants, a softly rounded man named Flint who affected a thin black mustache and punctuated his words with soft flutterings of his flawlessly manicured white hands. “Highly recommended, indeed.”

Sebastian glanced through the valet’s glowing credentials and felt a spurt of cautious optimism. In a field of applicants distinguished by nothing so much as mediocrity, the man looked promising. “So I see. You take considerable pride in your work, I understand.”

“We consider our work more than a vocation,” said Flint, sitting painfully upright in a chair on the opposite side of Sebastian’s desk. “For us, taking care of our gentleman is akin to a calling. No measure is too extreme to achieve the best presentation. If a gentleman is a bit thin in the calf, we add padding to the stockings. If a gentleman grows corpulent in his advancing years, we are conversant with the discreet use of the corset. And for that unfortunate tendency displayed by some gentlemen to grow hair on the backs of the fingers, we are well versed in the art of hot waxing.”

Something of Sebastian’s reaction to this speech must have shown on his face, for the valet hastened to add, “Not that your lordship requires any of these extreme measures.”

“Thank God for that.”

The valet tilted his head, subjecting Sebastian to an intense scrutiny that made him feel like a nag being offered for sale at Tattersall’s. “We would, of course, press for a bit more precision in the presentation. Sporting gentlemen can sometimes be a tad too careless in their dressing, if you know what we mean? A few extra hours spent at the toilette each morning can make such a difference.”

“A few extra hours?”

Flint nodded. “No more than two or three.”

Sebastian leaned back in his chair and pressed his fingertips together. “I’m something of an eccentric creature, I fear. There are times when I find it expedient to dress in the type of garments one customarily sees for sale in places such as Rosemary Lane. I trust you would have no difficulty with that?”

Flint gave a nervous titter. “Your lordship is…most droll.”

“On the contrary, I am entirely serious.”

The valet’s pained smile fell, just as Tom came catapulting into the room, bringing with him the scent of sunbaked streets, hot boy, and the pervasive, earthy odor of the stables.

“I’ve a message from Sir ’Enry,” said the tiger, breathing hard. “’E’s discovered another murder ’e thinks might be linked to the two young gentlemen what snuffed it here in London. Seems they found a body in a churchyard down in Kent, way last April. Gutted like a bleedin’ fish, ’e was—”

“Merciful heavens,” said the valet, pressing a snowy handkerchief to his lips.

“—and Sir ’Enry,” continued Tom, casting the valet a curious glance, “’e wants to know if’n you’d be interested in drivin’ down there with ’im this mornin’.”

Sebastian pushed back his chair and turned to the valet. “If you’ll excuse me, Mr. Flint—”

But the little man with the neat black mustache and soft white hands was already gone.

“The boy’s name was Thornton,” said Sir Henry Lovejoy, one hand held up to anchor his round hat more firmly to his bald head, the other hand gripping the edge of the seat beside him. “Mr. Nicholas Thornton.”

Lovejoy was beginning to regret his decision to make the journey down to the Kentish town of Avery in Viscount Devlin’s curricle, with that irreclaimable pickpocket Tom ensconced on the tiger’s perch in the back. Lovejoy did not have a fondness for horseflesh; nor did he share his lordship’s obvious delight in speed. Lord Devlin feathered a turn, his horses’ flashing hooves eating up the miles. Lovejoy closed his eyes.

“How old was he?” asked the Viscount.

Lovejoy forced himself to open his eyes. There was no denying that the Viscount seemed to have his horses under perfect control. Lovejoy loosened his hold on the seat and drew in a deep breath. “Just nineteen. He was a divinity student up at Cambridge. Studying to enter the church, like his father.”

“The church?” said Devlin in surprise.

Lovejoy nodded. “The boy’s father is the rector at St. Andrews. The Reverend William Thornton.”

“What makes you think there’s a connection between his death and the London murders?”

Lovejoy himself found the similarities in the deaths difficult to comprehend. A rector, while considerably more distinguished than a vicar or a mere curate, was of a social rank far different from that enjoyed by either Stanton or Carmichael. “As I understand it, the boy’s body was hacked open and his organs removed. I know little beyond that. I’m afraid young Mr. Thornton’s killing attracted considerably less attention than the recent murders in London. Avery is, after all, some distance from Town.”

“And the boy’s father was only a clergyman,” said the Viscount.

Lovejoy kept his face wooden. “Just so.”

The white gate of a toll appeared up ahead. The urchin Tom blew a blast on his yard of tin as Devlin drew up and waited for the keeper to amble out of his cottage.

“You say the boy was killed last April?” said Devlin, after the toll was cleared.

“When he came down for the Easter holiday. Took a pole and went out fishing sometime in the late afternoon.”

“By himself?”

“So it would appear. They later found his pole beside a stream that runs behind the vicarage.”

“And the body?”

“Wasn’t discovered until the next morning at dawn. The killer left the boy in the rector’s own churchyard, lying atop one of the tombs.”