But for now…
“Miss Bennet.”
Mr. Darcy stood in front of her and held out his hand to lead her to the floor. She held out her own and felt the warmth of his through her glove.
She had worked herself up to a near-frenzy and yet, once she felt her hand in his, all her agitation fell away. It was as if a calm had rolled in after a storm.
Elizabeth smiled, thinking what a strange sensation it was. How was it so? Her feelings did not make much sense at the moment. Perhaps it was not Warpole who had gone mad, perhaps it was herself becoming irrational.
The music started up and they moved through the dance silently, the other dancers’ conversations and witty repartees swirling around them. She glanced up and regarded Mr. Darcy staring at her intently. She felt a flush spread over her cheeks and hoped it might be attributed to the exercise.
It would be her usual habit to suggest conversation. She was fairly skilled at it, having danced with many a nervous gentleman at an assembly. She might talk about the size of the room or the number of couples, both reliable subjects, but just now those topics sounded trite to her ears. Mr. Darcy seemed equally disinclined to talk.
Elizabeth began to notice that Mr. Darcy’s staring was not a passing thing. He continued to look at her with an intensity that was unsettling. Did he wish her to speak? She did not know, but as she had nothing to say, they went on in silence.
They ended as they had begun, saying nothing. Elizabeth had a sudden urge to flee, as she had done to Mr. Collins, but that could not be. Mr. Darcy would take her into supper.
Mr. Bingley’s table groaned under the assortment of dishes. Elizabeth thought it was rather remarkable, considering how little time to prepare there had been. There was white soup as promised, along with cold meats, cheeses, fruits from a hothouse, including a magnificent pineapple, rolls, cakes, tarts and trifles. A sideboard held tea, lemonade and Negus.
Elizabeth was seated next to Mr. Darcy and across from Lady Castlereagh. Mr. Bingley sat at the head of the table with Lady Castlereagh to his right and Jane to his left. Mr. Quinn and Charlotte were on the other side of Lady Castlereagh. She thought she and Mr. Darcy might go through the dinner as silently as they went through the dance, as fortunately they were surrounded by those that would talk.
Lady Castlereagh complimented Mr. Bingley on his table. Mr. Bingley appeared rather embarrassed by it. Elizabeth noted that Jane appeared embarrassed by it also though she could not understand why. The pair looked in all directions, red as apples.
Charlotte spoke of the dance, and Mr. Quinn waxed poetic on her skill as an instructress. He was sure he should never have caught on to it without her direction. Most likely, he should have never learned to dance at all without Miss Lucas to steer him right.
“Mr. Quinn,” Lady Castlereagh said, interrupting his soliloquy, “I find myself exceedingly disturbed by the idea that Warpole has done it. Logic tells me he has, but why cannot I believe it even now? I do not care for what it does to my nerves to think it so. If it were him, then might not any of my servants commit some crime against me? Who is to say I will not be murdered in my bed because my maid does not like how I have spoken to her?”
“I very much doubt you are in danger of that, my lady,” Mr. Quinn said, helping Charlotte to a trifle.
“But that is precisely what you would have said about Warpole before my jewels were stolen.”
Mr. Quinn paused, then said, “Indeed I would have, though I am confident that we shall discover a clue that tells us the why of the thing. That is what preys upon your mind, the seeming idea that there was no reason for his actions.”
“Indeed it does,” Lady Castlereagh said.
“And yet,” Mr. Quinn said, “we know it to be him by the confirmation of his hand. He could not have written the second note if he did not write the first.”
Elizabeth dropped her spoon. It clattered on Bingley’s china. An idea had bloomed in her mind with such rapidity and so wholly formed that she wondered how it had not occurred to her before.
“Miss Bennet?” Lady Castlereagh said inquiringly.
“My lady,” Elizabeth said, “you mentioned to Jenny that you would leave on your journey at five o’clock in the morning.”
“I did,” Lady Castlereagh said. “All to avoid that blasted parade.”
“It would have been dark,” Elizabeth said. “Further, you said to me that you were not familiar with Warpole’s hand until he wrote you the note about the parade and the need to leave early.”
“That is true,” Lady Castlereagh admitted.
“The handwriting matches,” Elizabeth said, “but what if Warpole never wrote the first note? Do you recall seeing him clearly that morning?”
Lady Castlereagh appeared flustered and said, “I do not. I am not in the habit of examining my coachman and…it was dark, after all.”
“And you never spoke to him?”
“I do not believe so,” Lady Castlereagh said. “It would not be my usual habit. Warpole would know where I am going and take me there without any fuss.”
“Do you mean to say, Miss Bennet,” Mr. Darcy said from her other side, “that it may not have been Warpole that drove the carriage that morning?”
“I do, Mr. Darcy. Perhaps Warpole and the two grooms never left the house at all. Perhaps they were replaced by the actual thieves. Perhaps they were tied up in the stable and are there even now?”
“That cannot be,” Lady Castlereagh said. “I share that mew with my neighbor, Lord Dunston. His own staff would have discovered them.”
Elizabeth thought hard. If it were not Warpole driving, where would Warpole be now? “Would there be any place else on the property where they might be hidden away?”
Together, Mr. Darcy, Mr. Bingley and Lady Castlereagh said, “The wine cellar!”
Chapter Eleven
Though Mr. Darcy, Mr. Bingley and Lady Castlereagh had in unison declared that Warpole and grooms might be hidden in the wine cellar, Elizabeth was not certain of it. She said, “But if they had been hidden away in a wine cellar, surely one of your servants would have heard them calling for help before they closed the house.”
Lady Castlereagh shook her head. “Doubtful, Miss Bennet. My lord built it well to keep it cool. Each wall is comprised of two layers of stone a foot apart with hay tightly packed and sealed between them. The door is the same, only made of thick slabs of wood on either side, filled with hay between them. It was all meant to keep the cold in, but as it turns out, it keeps the sound in too. We discovered the danger of it when a junior footman spent the night in it just last year. He’d gone down to get an extra bottle of port for my lord in case it was needed, and the door shut behind him as it is meant to do. Minutes later, Mrs. Wilburn turned the lock on it and went to bed none the wiser. It was only in the morning that the boy was noticed missing and a search begun. The poor fellow said he banged and shouted to no avail. Ever since, nobody is to go down there without another person holding the door open.
Mr. Darcy stood. “If you are correct, Miss Bennet, there is every possibility that Lady Castlereagh’s servants are still in the house.”
Lady Castlereagh clutched her throat. “If it is so, could they still be alive? It has been so long.”
“It is possible,” Mr. Bingley said. “They have plenty to drink. I believe one can go for quite some time without food, as long as they have drink.”
“That is true,” Lady Castlereagh said, her expression brightening.
“Even so,” Mr. Darcy said. “They will have suffered terribly. We ought to set off this instant.”
Mr. Quinn rose. “Agreed, Darcy. We cannot yet be certain that Miss Bennet’s theory is correct, but we cannot delay on the chance that it is. I will go and tell the stable boys to bring round the horses.”
“I will speak to the guards,” Mr. Darcy said. “If it is not Warpole out there somewhere, then we do not know who it is. The guards must understand that the description they have been given m
ay not stand.” He turned to Lady Castlereagh and said, “I entrust my sister to your care. The house is surrounded, you will be quite safe.”
Lady Castlereagh nodded and said, “I will give you a key, else you will be forced to break my front door down.” She paused. “Though I do not have a key for the cellar. You really will have to break that door down.”
“Indeed not,” Mr. Darcy said, “we will merely take it off the hinges.”
Mr. Bingley had risen and said, “I will go and…well I will just take care of a matter before we leave.”
Mr. Darcy turned to Elizabeth and said, “Miss Bennet, guards will continue to locate themselves in the vicinity of Longbourn.”
Elizabeth nodded, stunned by the speed with which her idea had been acted upon. Could she be right that Warpole and the grooms had not driven Lady Castlereagh? That they might be still in the house?
Mr. Quinn said, “Ought not Lucas Lodge to have a guard? I should not like to think that we leave Miss Lucas in any danger.”
“I am certain that is not necessary,” Charlotte said. “These criminals, whoever they are and whatever they want, have no reason to connect the lodge with Lady Castlereagh any more than any other house in the county. Though I appreciate your concern, Mr. Quinn.”
Mr. Quinn bowed with his usual flourishes and he and Mr. Darcy strode from the drawing room. As Elizabeth looked about, she noticed Mr. Bingley leaving a side door with Mr. Bennet. She turned to Jane with an inquiring glance, but Jane Bennet only put her head down.
Elizabeth watched for her father to return, and he did so, coming to Jane. He silently led her away. Elizabeth was certain it could only mean one thing. Mr. Bingley had asked. If only it was so! It could not be anything else.
After a half hour had passed, Elizabeth heard the clatter of hoofbeats on the drive. She rose to look out the windows to watch the gentlemen depart. Mr. Darcy stood outside of the carriage and spoke to the man in charge of the guards. The man nodded and slid back into the shadows. Mr. Darcy entered the carriage, shut the door and the carriage disappeared into the night.
Jane came to stand beside her sister. Softly, she said, “He has asked, Lizzy, and father has given his permission. I am to be married to Mr. Bingley.”
Elizabeth reached for her sister’s and squeezed it. “Of course, you are. Did not I say it would be so? Never was there a man more in love than our Mr. Bingley.”
“I only wish the same happiness for you, Lizzy,” Jane said.
“And that is my Jane,” Elizabeth said smiling. “At a moment when all the world should be gazing upon her, she wishes for another’s happiness.”
“How can I not think of it?” Jane said. “I do so wish for you to meet your match.”
Elizabeth thought she might well have already, and it would come to naught. However, she would not allow her sister to see her distress on such a day. Teasingly, she said, “You are not to give my own future another thought. I certainly shall not, for now I can rest comfortably in the idea that if I become an old spinster, my sister’s husband can well afford to keep me.”
The rest of the ball passed happily for most of the guests, though there was an air of speculation regarding why the host and his friends had suddenly departed. This appeared to be mainly of interest to the ladies, as the officers did not seem to mind it much.
Lydia and Kitty had become just as bold and careless as they usually did at a ball. Elizabeth had known it would be so, as soon as she had noted the Negus on the sideboard. She was grateful that Mr. Darcy was not there to view it.
Mrs. Bennet, once apprised of Jane’s news, was nearly overcome. However, with a large glass of Negus she was able to recover herself well enough to tell all and sundry about it.
When they had departed, Elizabeth thought that Mr. Collins had perhaps indulged in too much Negus himself, as he appeared even more unsteady on his horse than he had earlier. Elizabeth would not have been surprised to see him slide off and hit the ground, though he managed to hang on somehow. While he should have been concentrating on his riding, he spent much of the time congratulating Mr. Bennet and declaring that he was sure Lady Catherine would approve of the match. Though he did note that his illustrious patroness was unlikely to ever consider how a person of Mr. Bingley’s background got on with things, as his father had been in trade.
Finally, Elizabeth found herself alone in her bedroom. She was delighted for Jane and unhappy for herself and so she determined that she must just be happy for Jane and that would be the end of it. Despite being so determined, she watched the sun rise wide awake.
The street was quiet as Darcy, Bingley and Quinn approached Lady Castlereagh’s house. Other streets in London would be bustling by now, but this neighborhood’s residents were still abed, their servants moving quietly about the houses, lighting fires and getting the breakfast started. Even the man who made his way down the road with a cart filled with jugs of milk did so carefully and was met silently at the servants’ doors to deliver his wares.
Lady Castlereagh’s house was number 38 Grosvenor Square. Darcy and Bingley both knew it well, since Darcy let number 34 and they were so often in one another’s residences. The curtains were closed and the house did appear shut up.
Darcy leapt down from the carriage. The nightguard sat on a bench, but he’d jumped to his feet upon noting that he was stared at. According to the guard, nobody had gone in or out of Lady Castlereagh’s house since the lady had left, and her servants shortly after her.
“What about Mr. Cratchet,” Darcy asked. “He is one of Lord Castlereagh’s secretaries and would have come some time that day, only to find the house shut up.”
“I wouldn’t know ‘bout that,” the man said, “as I go home at eight and don’t come back ‘til seven of an evening.”
Darcy spotted one of Lord Dunston’s stable boys coming from the mew and called him over. He questioned him on whether he’d heard or seen anything unusual or had seen anything of Warpole, but the boy knew nothing. Darcy offered him a coin to stable the horses, which the boy appeared to find the greatest good luck. He ran and got another boy and in no time they had led the carriage into the mew.
The three men jogged up the steps to the door and Darcy used the key. As it was not his own house, he had the uncomfortable feeling of being a housebreaker.
The door opened silently on well-oiled hinges. Darcy and Bingley led the way and Mr. Quinn followed, that gentleman having no idea where the entrance to the cellars was located. They raced to the back of the house and down the stairs to the kitchens. A large wood door stood at one end.
“That is it,” Darcy said to Quinn.
Darcy and Bingley ran to the door and pressed their ears against it. “I hear nothing,” Darcy said. “Let us begin dismantling the hinges.”
“Perhaps not, Darcy,” Mr. Quinn said. He pointed to a ring of keys hanging on a hook. “Perhaps the key to the lock will be one of those?”
“Of course,” Darcy said, irritated that he’d not thought to look. There was not the slightest reason why a housekeeper would take the keys to one house to another house.
He grabbed the keys and began to try them one by one. Finally, the fourth key made a rasping sound and he heard the tumbler turn. The door creaked open inward.
As soon as the door was cracked, they heard distant calls from below.
“They are here,” Darcy said.
“And God praised,” Mr. Quinn said, “they are still alive.”
Darcy looked about the kitchen and picked up a handful of candles stacked at the end of a counter. “Blast it,” he said, looking around him.
Mr. Quinn walked around the kitchen, searching the counters. “Ah hah,” he said. “Here is flint and kindling.”
Darcy and Bingley watched as Quinn struck sparks and lit a small container of what appeared to be dried out hay. Darcy felt a wave of irritation and then dismissed it, fully aware that it was his own fault that he’d never done such a rudimentary thing. It was convenient to have servant
s to manage all sorts of mundane tasks, but perhaps it would be well if he could manage on his own when the need arose.
Quinn lit the candle in his hand and Darcy and Bingley hurried over with two more. They held the candles in front of them to light their way as they descended the stairs.
“Wait!” Quinn cried, still standing in the doorframe. “We do not dare allow the door to close behind us.”
He disappeared for some moments and returned with a chair, propping the door open.
“Good thinking, Quinn,” Bingley said. “Else we might have met the same fate as those fellows down there and not been found until somebody wished to have a bottle of wine.”
As they descended, the air became downright cold. A shiver went down Darcy’s spine. Even if the men had survived on wine, how had they survived this air? It was no better than sleeping out of doors in January.
The distant calls kept coming and Darcy realized that the men were deep inside the cellar. They were most likely at the far end where Lord Castlereagh kept his most valuable bottles.
“This way,” he said. “As they do not run toward us, I suspect they are confined in some manner.”
They moved quickly through the cavernous cellar, deeper and deeper into the rows of wines. The calls grew louder and Darcy knew they were nearing their location. If the sound of voices did not lead him in the right direction, the smell would have. He’d not considered it before, but the prisoners would not have had access to a chamber pot, nor anybody to empty it.
He turned a corner and found one man and two boys shackled. The clamps were around their ankles and had been placed so tight that the skin was rubbed raw. The chains wrapped around a column that rose from floor to ceiling. Empty wine bottles were stacked in a straw basket and Darcy could see that the men had taken those bottles from the shelves they could reach. Unfortunately, those bottles were Lord Castlereagh’s best selection of Claret, Burgundy, Madeira and Champagne.
“You are Warpole,” Mr. Quinn said, holding a candle near the man’s face.
The Lady's Jewels Page 15
