“Me?” Ben wiped his face of water once more.
“They knew you were on your way,” Rhys added. “They’re waiting in the library.”
“Who are they?”
“The second was not introduced to me. The first says he is Detective Inspector Geraldson, of the Coventry Police Station.”
“Do you know him?” Ben asked, for between the two of them, they knew nearly every police officer in London. Sooner or later, every bobby and detective arrived at their offices, to finalize court cases and go through their testimony.
“You don’t?” Rhys asked. His expression grew wary. He stepped closer. “Then he is not here on a matter of law.”
“Come in with me, then,” Ben said. He ruffled his hair, spraying drops everywhere.
Rhys shook his head. “They were insistent upon speaking with you alone. I’ll be right outside the door, though.”
“Thank you.” Ben worked his way across the entrance to the library doors, moving carefully, for the damp foot of the cane was slippery on the marble floor.
“It’s good to see you home,” Rhys said, from behind him.
“I’d say it’s good to be home, but for this matter, whatever it is,” Ben replied. With a deep breath, he opened the door and limped inside.
The two men who rose to their feet were strangers. The blond one looked barely old enough to shave, with pink cheeks and a notebook and pencil in his hand. The more senior of the two had gray sideburns, a square chin with a dimple, and faded brown eyes. His teeth, when he spoke, flashed crooked.
“Mister Hedley?”
“I am,” Ben said. He didn’t offer to shake hands. It didn’t feel like that sort of meeting. “You wanted to speak to me? Alone?” he added.
He studied the man, for there was a growing sense of familiarity about his face.
“On a matter of some sensitivity,” the detective replied. “I am Detective Inspector Ronald Geraldson, of the Coventry Police Station. I understand you are a solicitor?”
“I am also a barrister. As is my father, to whom you’ve already spoken. Should I ask him to step in?”
“It might be better if you hear me out, first,” Geraldson said.
Ben kept his face empty of expression. “I’m listening.”
Geraldson dug a finger inside his collar and stretched the collar, adjusting how it sat around his neck with a grimace.
He was uneasy about what he was about to say.
Braced, Ben waited.
“It’s about the Duke of Wakefield,” Geraldson said at last. “You’re acquainted with the Duke.”
“We’re related by marriage,” Ben corrected.
“Really?” Geraldson didn’t show surprise. “You are an orphan, are you not?”
“The Davies adopted my sister and I when I was ten,” Ben said. “Get on with it, Geraldson.” His back ached from the exercise of walking and standing.
“I need to clarify your relationship with the Duke,” Geraldson said, with an apologetic tone. “You describe him as a member of your family. Is there a familial relationship the law recognizes?”
Ben’s heart raced. He recognized what Geraldson was doing. He was establishing Ben’s exact relationship with Wakefield so that later on, any evidence Ben might provide could not be dismissed as tainted or prejudiced. Wakefield was their focus, then. “By legal definition, you are correct,” Ben said. “There is no familial relationship as the law defines it.”
Geraldson nodded, happy at last. “Then I can proceed. There is an investigation underway and we are looking for reliable witnesses.”
“To speak against Wakefield?” Ben asked, his alarm driving the question, when he should have remained silent.
“Then you’re aware of his crimes?” Geraldson asked, leaping upon the opening.
“Crimes?” Ben replied, stunned. “You’re talking about the Duke of Wakefield. He’s beyond reproach.”
Geraldson shook his head. “We have already established that is not the case. It is just a matter of collecting evidence of reliable foundation.”
Ben shifted his weight as his knee throbbed. The movement made his back protest. He understood what Geraldson was not saying. They already had a witness whose claims they believed, only the witness was weak or disreputable and would be dismantled as unreliable by the opposing council. They wanted someone with a reputation that would convince the jury of their probity.
Worry and fear mixed in his gut, roiling there. “What, exactly, do you think you have against the Duke?” Ben asked.
Geraldson twisted his bowler hat brim in his fingers. “It has come to our attention that the Duke of Wakefield has conspired and incited persons to commit unnatural offences.”
Ben stared at him, his heart slamming against his chest.
“In other words,” Geraldson said primly, his mouth turning down with distaste, “the Duke has, for many years, indulged in unnatural sexual acts with other men.”
Chapter Eighteen
Ben couldn’t bear standing a moment longer. He worked his way over to the desk and sat on the front of it. That eased the weight on his knee and the strain on his back, yet it did nothing to relieve the tight band of pressure about his chest, or the hard knot in his throat.
To give himself a moment, he looked at Geraldson with as pitiful an expression as he could manage. “Would you mind pouring me a brandy?” He nodded toward the tray on the table next to the wing chairs, where the decanter and glass sat.
Geraldson rolled his eyes. The younger detective said nothing as Geraldson stalked over to the table, slopped three inches of brandy into the glass, jammed the stopper back in and carried the glass to Ben.
Ben sipped it appreciatively. It had been a pretext, yet he needed the drink anyway.
Dane Wakefield preferred men.
Ben didn’t wonder if the claim was true. It fit too neatly into the puzzle that was Dane Wakefield. It answered too many questions. Dane was thirty-five, according to Burke’s. He’d avoided marrying for this long. He’d probably been forced to marriage by the need to produce an heir. Once married, he could not bring himself to the act that would create an heir. That was why, despite two years of marriage, Sharla still slept alone.
And was lonely and aching for love and a tender word.
Ben shoved the sly thought aside. He had to concentrate, now.
He had represented more than one lord accused of homosexuality and was familiar with the laws. The death penalty for buggery had been abolished only two years ago, yet the commuted sentence was life imprisonment…or transportation.
Ben’s silence had extended for too long. Geraldson cleared his throat. “You seem surprised,” he said, probing.
“I’m stunned,” Ben said. “I’ve seen no evidence of such crimes. Wakefield is a perfect gentleman and his wife is my cousin. My honorary cousin,” he added as Geraldson opened his mouth to dispute the relationship. “I am not the man to be your witness. I know nothing about this.”
“If you know the Duke so well, then you can speak to the anomalies. The hidden side of his life. A man like that…they’re secretive.”
“You’ve known many homosexuals, then?” Ben asked crisply.
Geraldson turned a deep red.
Ben put the brandy glass aside. “You’re wrong,” he said. “Wakefield is perfectly normal and I won’t swear otherwise.”
Geraldson’s color was returning to normal. “Now, that might be a mistake.”
“I assure you, it is no mistake.”
“You would stand in court and swear that?”
“Yes.”
“We’re pursuing many avenues of enquiry. You are not the only possible witness. The evidence we’re uncovering is convincing. If you perjure yourself, the overwhelming evidence to the contrary will expose your lies.”
“They won’t be lies,” Ben said, his jaw clenched.
Geraldson changed tactics. Ben could see him mentally shift his stance. “I told you we were pursuing multiple avenues of e
nquiry. One of them has uncovered a reprehensible illicit organization of boxing matches, along with all the gambling and drinking that goes with it.”
Ben saw where Geraldson was going. His stomach squeezed. This time, though, he kept his mouth shut and let Geraldson spell it out.
“It has come to our attention that you participate in those matches,” Geraldson said.
“Boxing is harmless, Inspector. The judge would toss you out on your ear for trying to prosecute a man for that. You’d have to arrest everyone living in the East End of London, just to begin.”
“It’s not harmless, when honest men’s money is stolen from them by fraud,” Geraldson replied. He pointed to the other detective, who flipped through pages of his notebook. “Hunter, here, has it on record that you colluded with others to pre-arrange the outcome of matches, for money.”
Ben pointed at Geraldson. “Now I remember you! You were there! At the matches. I remember your bent nose!”
Geraldson’s jaw snapped taut. “That is neither here nor there,” he said. “The fact is, you took a fall, which cost a lot of people a lot of money.”
Ben raised his brow. “I think you need to check again, Inspector. When I was boxing, I never lost a fight.”
Geraldson looked him in the eye. “I saw you take a fall, myself. I lost ten shillings on that match.”
Ben’s chest squeezed tighter. He considered and discarded lines of reason. “That’s the way it is to be, is it?”
Geraldson went on as if Ben hadn’t spoken. “The warrant is being drawn up tomorrow, for your arrest. We’ll be back then to take you to the station. Or…we might see fit to put aside what amounts to a minor crime in comparison to a much greater social threat.”
“All I have to do is tell the court, the jury and everyone who will listen that Wakefield is a deviant,” Ben finished, his tone sour.
“He is a criminal,” Geraldson said, his tone savage. Wash had picked the perfect man for the job. Geraldson was not troubled by extorting Ben into lying about Wakefield. The detective believed such men were little more than animals in disguise and deserved to be locked up, where they could do no more harm.
Geraldson drew in a heavy breath and let it out with a gusty sigh, running his hand through his hair. He also knew he had spoken too freely. He indicated the lad, Hunter, once more. “You likely didn’t notice Hunter loitering about the Wakefield house these last few days. He can go unnoticed by most people.”
“I believe that,” Ben said. No one would notice a dewy, fresh faced lad with nothing to do but watch the world go by.
“Hunter knows you’ve been a guest of the Wakefield’s. The view through the first floor windows from the street is clear and the Duchess often fails to draw the curtains.” Geraldson smiled. The smile was nasty. “She spent an inordinate amount of time in your room. Sitting on your bed, if you please.”
Anger gripped his throat. “That was because I was convalescing, you imbecile.”
“As you say. Let me point out, though, that if Wakefield is found guilty and put away, then the Duchess will be all alone, won’t she?”
Ben stared at the Inspector, with his bent nose and dull eyes, fury boiling in his veins. For a moment, he hated the man.
Geraldson rubbed his hands together. “What’s it to be, Mister Hedley? Whose name should I put at the top of the arrest warrant?”
Chapter Nineteen
Wakefield’s curtly worded note was waiting for Ben the next morning, next to his breakfast plate.
Come at once. W.
The copperplate lettering beneath the family shield spoke of discipline and control. It was the complete opposite of Sharla’s scrawled, blotchy hand.
When Ben looked up from the note, he saw Rhys was watching him. His father’s expression was subdued. Worry etched his brow. Ben had refused to tell him what had happened, when he had emerged from the library last night. “You’ll know, one way or another, sometime tomorrow,” Ben told him. “Until then, I won’t ruin your appetite.”
Rhys wasn’t eating, anyway.
Ben sighed and put his napkin on the table. “I must go.” He got to his feet and reached for the cane.
“Go where?” his mother demanded, her blue eyes wide. “It is barely seven in the morning, Ben! Who on earth receives visitors this early?”
“I’ve been summoned.” He handed her the note. “Wakefield,” he added, to his father. “It sounds urgent.”
Rhys cleared his throat. His gaze went to Annalies and came back to Ben. “Related to last night?” he asked.
“I believe it might be.”
Annalies looked up, her senses alerted. “What about last night?” she said quickly. “Rhys?”
Ben was glad he had an excuse to escape the room. He hurried away. Rather than wait for the family carriage to be readied, he limped along the street until a hack came along.
There was no traffic. The hack made good time to the Wakefield house.
Even the Wakefield butler was caught off guard by the earliness of the hour. Ben had to rattle the door knocker before the door was answered. Ben stated his business twice to the confused man.
“It’s fine, Mayerick” Wakefield said from the dining room door. He had a napkin in his hand, held in a tight wad. “Show him to the library, please. I’ll come along in a moment.”
Sharla appeared, standing behind Wakefield, her eyes wide. She didn’t speak.
Ben made himself look away from her and follow Mayerick into the library. It wouldn’t be possible for him to stand politely until Wakefield arrived. He thumped his way over to the small chair in front of the desk and dropped into it and rubbed his knee.
The library door was opened and shut with an authoritative thud.
Ben turned in the chair to look at Wakefield and winced at the lateral movement.
“Sit still. It bothers me to see you grimace in that way,” Wakefield told him. He strode around the desk and sat in the tall chair behind it and put his hands on the leather top of the desk. “When were you going to tell me, Ben?”
Caution flooded Ben. “Tell you what?”
Wakefield made a disgusted sound. “You are not a fool. Did it not occur to you that after all these years, I would not have set up ways to learn of approaching storm clouds? Did you not think I would hear about the impending arrest even before you did?”
Ben considered him, his mind racing. It would pay a man like Wakefield to have systems in place to warn him of trouble brewing, so he could deal with it before anything was finalized. A letter here, a conversation there, could dissipate the problem. A murmur in the right ear would resolve it, too. Wakefield would certainly have access to the right ears.
“What have you done?” Ben asked curiously.
It was Wakefield’s turn to stare. “No questions, Ben? No demands for the truth?”
Ben shrugged. “They are about to arrest me. What could I possibly ask you that would avoid that?”
Wakefield slapped the desk. “I am not a fool, either! I know why they will arrest you. I know exactly how it might have gone if you were one whit less honorable than you are.”
Ben’s heart stuttered along. He swallowed. “You know all of it?”
“I have friends in strange places,” Wakefield said. “I was not exaggerating when I said I learned of the warrants before you did. I had the information in hand before you arrived home yesterday afternoon. I waited all night for you to arrive here. I expected you would come demanding answers.”
Ben shook his head. “What a man does in private is none of my business. It should be no one’s business.”
“Nevertheless, you should have come to me. You are in this bind because of my actions. I admit I underestimated Wash.”
“Then we agree that Wash is at the bottom of this,” Ben said. “Geraldson, the Inspector he sent to do his dirty work, is as bent as Wash. He is a regular at the fights. Only, it will be my word against his I didn’t throw that damned match. No one keeps records. It’s all under th
e counter, business done with a wink and a nod. If I produce anyone who swears I won the fight fair and square, Geraldson will say it was a different match I deliberately lost.”
“The only way you can get around it is to not have the warrant sworn out at all,” Wakefield said.
Ben laughed. “You have the means for magic, Wakefield?”
Wakefield didn’t laugh with him. He didn’t smile, either.
Ben sobered. “You do?”
“A very old type of magic, yes,” Wakefield said. “But before I wave my wand, I wanted to…” His jaw flexed. “I wanted to speak with you.” Conversely, he fell silent.
Ben waited him out. In the last few minutes he had learned to not attempt to anticipate Wakefield. The man’s mind was too convoluted for that.
Then Ben amended himself. The man had spent too many years navigating the treacherous halls of secrecy, strategizing to avoid personal and social disaster. This sort of battle would be nothing to him.
“You could have let me be arrested,” Wakefield said. “It would have cleared the way for you.”
Ben held in his surprise, riding it hard so he gave nothing away.
“I wanted you to know I knew that,” Wakefield added. His gaze met Ben’s.
Ben’s heart work hard. His head throbbed in time with it. “You said something about a magic wand,” he replied, his voice rough.
Wakefield bent to pull something from the drawer next to his knee. He got to his feet, holding a small, rectangular leather pouch, fastened with cord. “Come with me,” he told Ben.
Ben followed as fast as he could. Wakefield slowed his pace so he could keep up. They passed the opening to the dining room and Ben couldn’t help looking inside. The room was empty.
Wakefield opened one of the service doors and held it aside. Ben stepped through and Wakefield moved ahead, through a long corridor. The rooms on either side were full of the sounds of industry. Ben heard the rattle of china and caught the drift of delicious cooking aromas. Starch-ladened heat issued from another. That would be the laundry room.
Then, the service entrance to the house. The door was closed. One of Wakefield’s footmen stood in front of it, his arms crossed. He nodded at Wakefield as they passed.
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