Dicing With the Dangerous Lord

by Margaret McPhee

  Knight put his arm around her and began to steer her away. ‘Come, Marianne.’ She was weeping in earnest now.

  The two men’s eyes met across the cell.

  Rafe Knight bowed his head in a gesture of acknowledgement. ‘I will look after her, always.’

  Linwood gave a nod. ‘There is none who could do it better.’ He knew that absolutely; the knowledge drove him on, even now. And even when the heavy iron door slammed shut behind them to leave him here alone once more.

  * * *

  In the theatre that afternoon Venetia watched the rehearsal with her understudy playing her part. She could hear Mr Kemble’s voice talking about the play, about the delivery of her lines, about stage directions, about the audience, all the things that made up Venetia’s life. All the things that had been so important to her. Except that now they did not seem so very important at all. She felt shallow, trivial, disconnected.

  ‘Venetia?’

  She blinked and realised that Mr Kemble was talking to her.

  ‘Mr Kemble?’ she said, the ghost of the self-assured woman she had once been.

  ‘Are you sure you should be here?’

  ‘Where else should I be?’ The theatre had been her home, her family for as long as she could remember. If she were not here, she was afraid of where she would be, of what she would be doing. She had been afraid of that her whole life.

  ‘The understudy can finish the run.’

  ‘On the contrary, I will finish the run, Mr Kemble.’ She had to. It was what she did. It was who she was. Wasn’t it?

  ‘Glad to hear it.’ Mr Kemble smiled and lowered the volume of his voice. ‘The place has been half-empty with Miss Bolton in the role. You know they only come to see you.’

  She said nothing.

  ‘I’ll get the word out today that you’re back on the bill on Friday night.’

  She nodded.

  ‘We’re running a bit late for Miss Bolton’s performance tonight. Go home, Venetia. Get some rest.’

  Home. She did not have a home any more.

  ‘I want you rested and at your best for Friday.’ Then he hurried off to speak to her understudy, Miss Bolton.

  Everything moved on around her, while she stood there forgotten. She turned and walked away.

  On the coach ride back to the house she looked out of the window at a courting couple strolling along the pavement arm in arm. They were poor, she could tell from their clothes, but they looked at one another with shyness and excitement and affection. She turned her face away, but through the other window in an open-top carriage just across the road were Hawick and a young woman who looked both beautiful and happy. She remembered the night Linwood had saved her from the duke and she felt more miserable than ever.

  * * *

  At Alice’s she made her way into the drawing room, peeling off her gloves and untying her bonnet.

  Alice and Razeby were standing wrapped in each other’s arms before the fireplace. They jumped apart as she entered the room.

  ‘Forgive me.’ She felt her cheeks warm. ‘I did not realise...’

  ‘Wait, Venetia,’ Alice said, but Venetia was already walking across the room to escape. ‘Razeby has come from visiting Linwood in Newgate.’

  She stopped in her tracks. Stood there a moment and then, unable to help herself, turned slowly around. She tried to keep her face impassive, but her eyes met Razeby’s and inside her chest she could feel the thud of her heart so hard and heavy that she wondered that he did not hear it.

  ‘How is he?’

  ‘As well as can be expected under the circumstances.’

  Inside she felt a little more of her soul shrivel and die. She let her gaze drop to the floor and stared at the pattern on the Turkey rug, at the intricate intertwining of the gold wool with the blue. There was nothing she could say.

  In the silence a piece of coal cracked and hissed.

  ‘Miss Fox,’ Razeby said.

  She glanced up.

  ‘He denies burning your house, but will say not one word on the rest of the charges.’ Razeby paused before continuing, ‘He means to offer no defence over Rotherham.’

  ‘Oh, God help him! They will hang him!’ She closed her eyes and clutched a hand to her mouth, afraid of what she had betrayed. Her blood ran cold, the tingle of it through her body making her shiver.

  She saw Alice and Razeby exchange a look.

  ‘Venetia...’ Alice started to say.

  ‘Please do excuse me.’

  Alice made to follow her, but Venetia shook her head and fled from the room.

  Chapter Fifteen

  ‘They have found Rotherham’s missing pistol, Francis.’

  Linwood’s father sat across the small table from him. ‘Washed up on a mud bank of the Thames.’ His father’s brow was creased with concern. He had grown older and more haggard than the last time Linwood had seen him. There were bags beneath his eyes as if he had not slept in a long time. ‘The evidence mounts against you.’

  Linwood made no comment.

  ‘Our own newspapers are handling the reporting of the story with sensitivity; the rest of them...well, you can imagine.’

  ‘I can, indeed,’ said Linwood.

  There was a small silence before his father said, ‘I have spoken to all that might hold sway over the case for when it comes to trial, called in every last favour, but...’

  ‘Rotherham was a duke. And not all of the money or connections in the world can make the murder of a duke go away. An example must be made. A villain caught.’

  ‘There is a way it might be done.’ His father looked at him. ‘Miss Fox’s evidence is the linchpin in the case. Everything else can be explained away. But not that. If she were to disappear...’

  ‘Do not dare touch her!’

  ‘I meant money, a bribe. You always think the worst of me.’

  ‘I wonder why.’

  His father glanced away uneasily. ‘I will give her every penny I have if that is what it takes.’

  ‘I am warning you. Stay away from her.’

  ‘Do you honestly think I am going to just sit back and watch you hang because of that whore?’

  ‘She is not a whore, whatever you may think. And if I hang...well, some things are worth dying for, aren’t they?’

  His father closed his eyes and massaged his fingers against his forehead. ‘Why the hell did you tell her?’

  ‘We played a dangerous game together, Miss Fox and I. I took a gamble and I lost.’

  ‘Do not think that she holds you or your plight in any regard. She returns to Covent Garden tomorrow night. The seats were selling for twice their normal price and there is not a one left to be had.’

  ‘Promise me she will be safe,’ Linwood said.

  ‘I will not harm her,’ his father said, but still Linwood was not persuaded.

  ‘Swear it, on Marianne’s life.’

  He saw the pain in his father’s eyes before he closed them. ‘I swear,’ he said with resignation and only then was Linwood convinced of Venetia’s safety.

  They looked at one another across the table.

  ‘My dark deeds come back to haunt me, first with my daughter and now with my son.’

  There was a silence.

  ‘I should have been the one that killed Rotherham,’ his father said.

  Another silence.

  ‘There is so much I never told you, Francis, so much that I regret in how I treated you through the years. My father raised me hard. And I did the same to you. I thought I was doing the right thing. I thought it would make you strong to deal with the toughness of life. But I was cruel and too critical. For that I am sorry.’

  Linwood looked at his father.

  ‘I have made so many mistakes in the past, Francis. I have been a selfish, cruel and ruthless man, but know that I would give my life to rectify all that hurt Marianne...and you. I cannot change what happened with Rotherham. But I can tell you that I love you, that I was always proud to have you as my boy. I shoul
d have told you that a long time ago.’

  The silence echoed between them.

  Misbourne reached across and clapped a hand against Linwood’s shoulder. ‘Son.’ He gave a gruff nod, then got to his feet. ‘I will come again tomorrow morning, and every morning after that, until the trial.’ Then he walked to the locked door and knocked upon it to be released.

  ‘Thank you,’ Linwood whispered, and could not bring the rest of the words in his chest to his mouth, lest they unmanned him.

  * * *

  Alice and Venetia sat opposite one another at the breakfast table the next morning, Alice with her pretty pink negligé showing from beneath her dressing gown, her legs bare beneath her skirts, Venetia wearing her new plain dove-grey day dress, her hair caught tight back, her face devoid of all artifice. The butler sat the large silver salver, piled high with letters, on the table before Venetia.

  ‘Why don’t you put them aside? Read them later when you’re feeling better.’ Alice’s eyes were filled with concern.

  Venetia shook her head. ‘I should deal with them now. And I am fine, really, I am.’

  ‘You don’t look fine. You look like you haven’t slept in days.’

  Venetia smiled, but it was a smile that held nothing of happiness. She stared at her coffee cup. ‘I can’t stop thinking of him.’

  ‘Little wonder after all you’ve been through. But you can’t doubt that you did the right thing.’

  ‘Can’t I?’ She glanced up at her friend. ‘He will make no defence...’ She winced. ‘Without a defence there is no hope that he can escape a guilty verdict. That they will sentence him to hang is a certainty. Why would he do such a thing? It makes no sense.’

  Alice gave a shrug of her shoulders. ‘Maybe he’s had an attack of conscience and intends to take what he deserves, but can’t bring himself to make the admission.’

  ‘I cannot rid myself of the conviction that there is something I am missing, that I have got this all wrong. It gnaws at me night and day.’ She glanced down at her hands. ‘That and the guilt.’

  ‘You’ve got nothing to feel guilty over.’

  ‘No?’ She stared at her friend. ‘My part in this is written in black and white for all London to read. I cannot hide from it. I was the one who went to the police to repeat the words he told me. Along with the rest of it.’

  ‘Venetia, he tried to kill you! You’d no choice but to go to the police.’

  She shook her head and thought again of the look on Linwood’s face after he had rescued her from the fire. It was not that of a man who had just tried to kill her. What she had seen in his eyes reflected that which was in her own heart—hurt and disbelief and love. ‘Alice,’ she gave voice to the little quiet question that whispered in her ear through the long hours of the night, ‘what if he is innocent?’

  There was a stunned silence.

  ‘How can you think him innocent? He’s guilty as sin. With every day that passes they find more evidence against him. An innocent man would deny the crime, Venetia. He would stand up, hand on heart, and say he didn’t kill Rotherham. But Linwood doesn’t.’

  And had the shoe been on the other foot, Venetia would have been saying the same thing to her friend. It was the logical explanation. It was what all London thought. But all London did not know the extent of what had been between her and Linwood.

  ‘He has to be guilty.’ Venetia could say the words easily enough, but they changed nothing of what she felt in her heart and in the very marrow of her bones.

  She leafed through the stack of letters without opening them, knowing they would be yet more offers from newspapers for her side of the story, more offers from gentlemen eager to make her their mistress. And then her eye was caught by one letter different from the others. The top right-hand side was neatly printed with the mark that excused it payment of delivery. She pulled it out, discarded the others and turned it over to break the seal. There, printed on the reverse, was the name of the sender written in a neat hand—The Old Bailey Courthouse.

  Her heart stuttered.

  Her stomach turned over.

  Her fingers stumbled as she broke the seal and unfolded the sheet to read the letter. The shock of the words penned there was so strong she felt physically sick.

  ‘What’s wrong, Venetia? You’ve gone chalk white.’

  ‘The date for Linwood’s trial has been set for two weeks’ time.’ Her lips felt stiff and cold.

  ‘Better for you to get it out the way sooner rather than later.’

  ‘I am called to attend and testify as the chief witness for the prosecution.’ The piece of paper in her hand began to tremble. She laid it down on the table.

  ‘They’ll not let you out of it.’

  To stand up and face him across a courtroom and speak the words that would tie a noose around his neck. She closed her eyes.

  ‘You know that, don’t you, Venetia?’

  She opened her eyes and met Alice’s gaze. ‘Yes, I know.’ And it seemed to Venetia that the words fell like shards of ice into the silence. She felt bloodless, chilled. And the pain in her chest was so bad that it made her want to gasp.

  She swallowed and let her eyes move back to the letter. Then she folded it as if she were perfectly in control of herself and got to her feet.

  ‘You’ve not eaten anything.’

  ‘I am due at the theatre. I will get something there.’

  Alice gave a nod. ‘Tonight’s performance sold out within an hour of the tickets going on sale.’

  ‘So I heard.’

  She walked to the door.

  ‘Venetia?’

  She stopped and glanced back at her friend.

  ‘Are you going to be all right?’ Alice asked.

  She forced herself to smile, but it felt like it was tearing her lips apart. ‘I will be fine,’ she said. ‘I always am, am I not?’

  Alice nodded.

  * * *

  Venetia threw herself into the rehearsal at the theatre that afternoon, forced her mind to focus on the play, on the script, anything other than Linwood. She became Rosina and that was a lot easier than being Venetia. Everything was busy, everything rushed, urgent, demanding, intense, just as it was on every night of a performance except more so because everyone knew that every seat in the theatre would be filled, that every eye would be fixed on Venetia, every newspaper man ready to rush out and write up his report of Rosina’s leading lady. Venetia let herself be engulfed by it, swallowed up by it. It was what she knew, what she felt comfortable with.

  She was fine all of the day and all of the evening, fine as they laced her into the old-fashioned dress of Rosina with its tight bodice that clung to her natural waist line. Fine as they untied the rags from her hair and unwound the wraps of hair so that they shimmered in a long mass of soft curls. Fine as they milled around her, painting her face, and touching her lips and cheeks with rouge.

  There were only fifteen minutes to curtain up when they left her alone in the little dressing room to compose herself. But once she was alone she could no longer pretend that the spectre of Linwood was not haunting her. She sat at the little dressing table, very calm and very still, and felt the ache that had not left her chest since she had spoken to the Bow Street officer. She did not let herself look in the peering glass, just glanced at the notes she had written about Rosina, trying, and failing, to focus herself on the part she was about to play.

  A sudden flurry of fast, light footsteps pattered outside in the corridor. Venetia glanced up just as the door was thrown open and a small dark-cloaked figure burst in. A finely manicured hand wrenched the cloak’s deep hood back to reveal its wearer—Linwood’s sister, Lady Marianne. The girl’s eyes were dark and glittering and wild. Her cheeks were as pink as her lips. Some of her pins had been dislodged and half of her long fair curls had escaped to muss around her face.

  ‘Miss Venetia Fox, how very happy you must be with yourself!’ Fury rolled off her in great waves. ‘Your name is on every tongue in London, emblazon
ed across every newspaper! You have filled the entire theatre!’

  Venetia rose to her feet, standing almost a head taller than Marianne. ‘I understand that you are upset, Lady Marianne, but you should leave now.’

  ‘Why? Because the truth does not make for comfortable hearing?’

  ‘It would not serve you well if we were to be seen together. And I am due on stage shortly.’

  ‘And that is all that matters to you, is it not?’

  ‘I am sorry about your brother, truly I am.’ The words sounded pathetic, even to Venetia’s own ears.

  ‘Sorry?’ Lady Marianne stared at her as if she were the very devil. ‘How can you be sorry, when it is your words that will hang him?’ she demanded with a fierceness of which Venetia had not thought her capable.

  The truth cut through all the pretence that Venetia had woven about herself to get through this day.

  ‘How could you do it?’ Marianne shouted. ‘You were his lover! You shared his bed!’

  ‘Lady Marianne—’

  ‘You promised me that you would not hurt him! I thought that you loved him, fool that I am—but you have no care for anyone other than yourself!’

  Venetia caught her breath. ‘He set fire to my home,’ she said, trying to make Marianne understand. ‘He lied—’

  ‘Never!’ Marianne came right up to her, staring up into Venetia’s face so that Venetia could see how much the girl was trembling with the force of emotion surging through her. ‘My brother would never hurt you! And as for lying—he would rather say nothing than offer a lie! Anything he has done has only ever been to—’

  ‘Marianne!’ The tall, dark figure of Rafe Knight appeared in the doorway. In one swift smooth swoop he had his wife away from Venetia and in his arms. He stared down into Lady Marianne’s face. ‘This is not the way,’ he said carefully, his eyes holding his wife’s, and Venetia saw the urgent message that passed between Knight and Marianne. There was a fierce protectiveness in that gaze that would have razed all in its path.

  Lady Marianne was breathing hard, but she calmed herself and gave a small nod to her husband.

  Knight turned his eyes to Venetia and she felt herself quail at the hardness that appeared in them. ‘You will forgive my wife, Miss Fox. She is naturally distressed at her brother’s situation.’ His voice was soft and polite enough, but she had no doubt that his words were warning her.