After a small tap sounded at the door, Lydia, her maid Jane, and Mrs. Bellingham joined them. Lydia spoke so quickly, her breath came in short gasps. “I never thought I would meet someone who knew more than I do about trim. Mrs. Bellingham is the queen of re-inventing simple gowns with nothing more than buttons, ribbons, a bit of lace here, a bit of lace there…
In a lower voice to Sophie, she added, “Papa will be over the moon when he gets the bill for my dress.” She half-covered her mouth as if sharing an on dit. “I chose one of the abandoned gowns, and Mrs. Bellingham suggested changes to the trim and buttons so no one will suspect it’s the same dress.”
“Please, call me Honore, now that we know each other’s wardrobe tricks and secrets.” Her face glowed with excitement. “I haven’t had so much fun at the modiste since Arnaud’s older sister came out.”
They drank tea and nibbled at small sandwiches in a long silence before Lydia announced, “I have an idea.”
“Oh, no,” Sophie groaned and placed her delicate cup back on the thin saucer covered with painted violets.
“But you haven’t heard my idea yet.”
“Whenever you have an idea, things never end well for either one of us.” Sophie sighed and took another long draught of tea.
“But you’re the one who’s always looking for inspiration for your poems. What could be better than a visit to the British Museum? It’s not far from here by carriage. We could be in and out in less than an hour and see…” She stretched out the moment before adding, “the Rosetta Stone.”
Sophie’s stomach dropped. She could not be sure, but she suspected Lydia was up to some sort of mischief. For the last few minutes her friend had been so excited and animated, the wispy blonde curls trailing from her upswept coif had escaped. She’d craned her neck at each side hallway in the museum, peering from side to side, as if looking for something. Never a good sign.
The gentleman they’d encountered near the entrance to the museum had given Captain Bellingham precise directions to the Rosetta Stone, and that was where they were headed. “In and out,” Lydia had said. Inspiration for Sophie’s poems. Pah.
She couldn’t be sure, but she feared her friend was determined to see where the infamous Elgin Marbles were being displayed. Lydia had talked of nothing else in private after she’d overheard her grandmother’s shocked tones while discussing the exhibit with Lord Howick.
Sophie’s unconventional life with her father had prepared her for exactly what the marbles would represent. In fact, her father had sketched some of the scenes from the marbles when he’d visited them shortly before his death. Lydia, who had led a sheltered life, had conjectured endlessly about what the stone carvings Lord Elgin had retrieved from the Parthenon might display. Sophie had kept her own counsel, merely nodding at whatever outlandish imagining Lydia uttered.
“Lydia,” Sophie ventured, “what are you looking for?”
“Nothing.” Lydia’s answer ended on a nervous high note.
“Then please stop bouncing about.” Sophie sneaked a backward, surreptitious look at Captain Bellingham who seemed to ignore Lydia’s erratic behavior. He walked slowly, in muted conversation with his mother.
Sophie leaned toward Lydia and, in a lowered voice sheltered behind her gloved hand, warned, “I know you’re looking for the marbles, but you have to stop. They’re not in the museum. They’re stored in an outbuilding.” She paused to let that bit of news sink into her friend’s obstinate skull. “Young ladies are not allowed to see them.”
Lydia stopped so suddenly, Captain Bellingham and his mother had to side-step to avoid her.
“You mean we’ve been walking through all these musty exhibits for no good reason?” Lydia planted her hands on her hips and wouldn’t budge from the center of the aisle, forcing a crowd of late-day museum-goers to funnel around them.
Honore gave Lydia a knowing smile and wrapped an arm around the young woman’s shoulders. “I believe the Rosetta Stone is directly ahead. If we don’t linger, we can leave the museum within a short time and not be late for tea with your grandmother.”
Sophie hurried ahead, eager to see the mysterious stone. She pulled a stubby pencil and scrap of paper from a pocket inside her skirts and moistened the point with her tongue.
She pressed her way through the crowd aligned around the large gray stone so that she could get close enough to sketch some of the hieroglyphs in the low light. She noticed a young man nearby shouldering through museum-goers. His threadbare coat and well-worn cravat skewed about his neck along with a crudely trimmed beard gave her a moment’s pause, but she ignored him to get the sketch just right before she rejoined her friends.
“Woman—come home now,” the mysterious young man muttered behind her in a sharp tone and grasped Sophie’s wrist in a tight grip, jerking her along behind him toward the museum exit. “Please, no,” Sophie cried and pulled hard back against him. Several exhibit goers gave her odd looks before turning away, but no one came to her assistance.
He towed her against the tide of the crowd streaming toward the exhibits. They were packed so closely, she had to struggle to move her free hand toward the pin holding her now skewed hat in place. Just as her fingers closed over the cool glass orb at the end of the pin, the odious man let go of her other hand so abruptly, she nearly fell.
Captain Bellingham now had such a firm grip on her would-be captor’s neck, the man gasped and his eyes bulged like a fish flopping out of water. While her rescuer duck-walked the other man to the exit, Mrs. Bellingham and Lydia closed around her, each grasping one of her arms, and rushed her out of the museum.
Once outside, Sophie trembled so, her hatpin fell to the ground, and she didn’t argue when Lydia insisted she sit on one of the stone benches in the museum garden.
Peripherally, she saw Captain Bellingham hand off the brute who’d tried to drag her away. But not easily. It looked as though the captain’s companions were actually trying to restrain him in the process of wrestling the wretch into a waiting hack.
His strapping ship’s surgeon, Dr. MacCloud, pried the captain’s hands from the mysterious kidnapper’s neck so he could give the man a rough shove into a carriage before climbing in behind him. Two other well-muscled young men she’d not met followed the surgeon into the carriage. She wondered at how Dr. MacCloud and the others had happened to be nearby, but she suspected their presence was an indication of how thoroughly Captain Bellingham had prepared for her safety.
Arnaud shook his head hard and took several deep breaths while waiting for his vision to clear after Cullen pried his hand from the neck of the idiot who had dared snatch Miss Brancelli from the damned museum.
“Don’t kill him, man,” his surgeon had shouted through the red haze clouding Arnaud’s vision. “We’ll make him tell what he knows. Then you can kill him, and I’ll sharpen the sword you run him through with.” After that, Cullen had shoved the miscreant through the carriage door, with Captain Neville and Lieutenant Bourne jumping aboard from where they’d been patrolling from their following carriage in case Arnaud and Cullen needed help.
Arnaud could not remember a fury this overwhelming since Algiers where he’d fought back-to-back with these very fellow shipmates, the decks slick with the blood of their downed comrades. Nor could he remember the sequence of events from the time he eyed Sophie being dragged away from the other side of the damned Egyptian rock they’d come to see. He’d moved and acted instinctively. She could not be taken. The possibility of failure had not entered his head.
Arnaud would see the young women and his mother back to Howick House before having a serious talk with Lord Howick about security around and within the mansion.
After he slammed shut the carriage door behind his men, he turned and strode back to the young women waiting with Honore.
“Miss Brancelli, what were you thinking?” he thundered at her and then immediately regretted his words. His mother gave him a withering glance and Miss Howick’s mouth dropped open. Miss Bra
ncelli stuck out her chin in an attempt at a brave rebuke, but her quivering lips betrayed her.
“You’ve saved my reputation and very life twice now,” she murmured between sniffs. “Don’t you think you could call me by my Christian name, Sophia?”
He dropped to the ground at her feet and peeled back her left glove as well as his own to feel the arm the bastard had gripped while dragging her away from the museum. A dark bluish bruise already spread from her wrist. “Sophia,” he said, with a soft emphasis on her name, “you must also without fail cry out ‘Arnaud’ whenever you’re about to be seized by villains from now on.”
“I’m so s-sorry.” Unshed tears pooled in her eyes. Nonetheless, a tiny smile crooked at the corners of her mouth. “You expect me to anticipate villains in every shadowed corner and under every solitary bush?”
“Yes, I do, and you owe no one an apology,” Arnaud growled a bit, but returned her smile. He stood without another word, pulled her to his side, and wrapped a protective arm around her waist. His mother had alerted her footman to have the carriage brought around, and Arnaud motioned the groom and driver to come through the brick turnaround. Honore’s outriders waited on Great Russell Street and joined them when the carriage turned toward Howick House.
After the events at the museum, Sophie’s entire body hummed and tingled as if a cloud of bees surrounded her, but the pain wrought on her wrist in the kidnap attempt was nothing compared to the heat generated by Arnaud’s touch.
When he’d held her arm to look for injuries, his hands had trembled a bit as if he feared he might shatter her, like a rare vase in the museum. But when he’d pulled her close to accompany her to his mother’s carriage, she knew. He’d burned as much at her touch as she did at his.
Outside the coach windows, the early morning snow melted in the afternoon sun while they rocked on homeward to Howick House. The outriders now pressed closer to the carriage on Arnaud’s orders. He rode on one of the carriage horses in order to keep a sharper lookout on the way back, he’d told them.
Across from her, Lydia stared back, her eyes huge in the semi-darkened carriage. Mrs. Bellingham sat close to Sophie, her arm enclosing her in warmth. In addition, she’d had the coachmen produce a warm woolen blanket which Sophie now had wrapped around her shoulders and lap. Her feet were perched on the warm brazier on the floor.
“What are we going to do now?” Lydia asked. “How can you have your Season with kidnappers lurking everywhere?”
“Nonsense,” Honore said. “Arnaud and his fellow squadron officers are determined to increase the level of protection. You saw those lads with Arnaud. No one disagrees with them without threat of severe bodily harm.”
“But how?” Lydia began again.
“Arnaud is going to discuss his plans with your father when we return to Howick House, and I will reassure your grandmother.” After a thoughtful pause, Honore added, “This will affect her deeply. She was worried about you two even before the unfortunate events of this afternoon.”
Chapter Ten
Arnaud paced across the carpet in front of Lord Howick’s desk in the third-floor library at Howick House. When he’d criss-crossed the room at least a dozen times, Lord Howick rose and turned to the tantalus next to his desk. Without a word, he filled a rummer glass from a decanter of deep amber brandy and extended the glass to Arnaud. Arnaud shook his head, but Lord Howick grasped his arm in a firm grip and made him take the drink.
Howick returned to the tantalus and poured two more glasses for Cullen and himself. After settling into an overstuffed chair by the fire, he stared back at Arnaud and Cullen and commanded, “Sit.” When Arnaud demurred, he insisted again in a tone of voice that brooked no argument.
Arnaud complied and exchanged glances with his surgeon.
“Now, Captain, I appreciate your frustration with the incident at the museum, but we cannot lose sight of our main goal here. We need to get my daughter and Miss Brancelli through the Season so that Sophia can fulfill the terms of her grandmother’s will.”
“How can I protect them when someone is offering a reward on the streets of this city for the abduction of Miss Brancelli?” Arnaud shoved to the edge of his chair and downed the last of his brandy. “No matter what I do, I’m thwarted at every turn by whoever is behind this diabolical plot to ruin her. I fear even your daughter or my mother might be injured if more of these incidents occur. I’m used to facing the enemy in the open, not some blackguard skulking about in the dark.”
Lord Howick waved a calming hand in Arnaud’s direction. “I fully understand your frustration, but we cannot give in to villainy.”
Cullen leaned forward and placed his drink on a side table. “We’re going about this all wrong. What we need is a map.”
“A map?” Arnaud had forgotten how dense and stubborn his surgeon could be. Of course he had been right a lot of the time too. “We’re looking for ideas here, and you want a description of the geography?”
“Exactly. If we track where the attacks have taken place, and we can predict where Miss Brancelli will be throughout this blasted ‘Season’ you Englishmen seem to need for courtship, then we should know where and when to plan for guard duty. Ye have three hulking fellow officers with the hardest heads ever to collide in a harbor-front tavern.”
Lord Howick set down his brandy glass and stroked his beard. “You’re right, Dr. MacCloud. And the area in which the Season takes place is not that large. After all, we’re not talking about the whole of England. Mayfair is but a small corner of London. Also, there is one other important thing I believe you should consider, Captain Bellingham.”
“And that is?”
“I hope you will not dispute or react to my observation, but considering your behavior today, do you not think perhaps your feelings for the woman you’ve sworn to protect may have compromised the proper detachment required?
Arnaud jumped from his chair, sloshing his refilled brandy glass which was saved only by Dr. MacCloud’s deft intervention. Before Arnaud could charge around Lord Howick’s desk, his surgeon’s iron grip saved him from a fatal blunder and lowered him back into his chair.
Lord Howick leaned forward and observed Arnaud over his spectacles. “Just as I thought, Dr. MacCloud. You are in agreement of course?”
“Ne’er seen him this worked up over a lass. This swab has always been a cold one when it comes to women.” A wide grin spread over Cullen’s face.
Arnaud threw his surgeon a dark look which would have terrified most of their other shipmates. Fortunately, Cullen had been through the worst a man could endure with his old friend and ignored the signs of wrath.
Lord Howick interrupted Arnaud’s silent war of glares with his surgeon and asked, “Now about the other two men you’ve dragooned into guard duty. What do I need to know about those gentlemen? I would prefer to avoid any surprises.”
Cullen launched into the details. “Marine Captain George Neville is…
“A good, solid man to have in a fight,” Arnaud interrupted.
His surgeon threw him a glare and continued. “His father is a country squire in Doddinghurst in Essex, not far from the sea. Captain Neville is the middle of nine brothers, so he followed the drum. He was with our marines in Algiers with Admiral Pellew.” Cullen stopped for a moment, his face pale. “That was a hell of a fight. Don’t see how we’re all still alive.”
Arnaud picked up where Cullen left off. “First Lieutenant Richard Bourne. He’s George’s second in command. Damned fine fighter. Irish, from an old Protestant, landed family in Westmeath.”
Lord Howick waved a hand in his direction. “Say no more.” He sipped from his glass for a moment and then said, “Captain Bellingham, I have a question. Could you please explain why you are unable to marry Sophia?” The older man gave Arnaud a long, thoughtful look and took another sip of brandy.
A deep silence filled the room. Arnaud gripped the chair arm so tightly, his knuckles turned white. “I would never take to wife a woman like Miss Bran
celli and leave her alone for months or years at a time.”
“Have you asked her what she would like?” Lord Howick’s stare held Arnaud in a relentless grip.
“I would never broach such a question without your permission, my lord. But if I may be frank,” Arnaud continued, “the pain I would have to bear would probably be much worse than hers. Having come to know Sophia as I have, if I pledged to love and protect her, I could never sail away and leave her.”
After a long pause, Lord Howick said, “I understand and admire your devotion to our country’s service. I simply wanted to make sure you are committed to Sophia finding a husband who will cherish her as well as meet the requirements of her grandmother’s estate. And that man will not be you? On that we are now clear?”
Arnaud’s heart rolled over and nearly knocked out of his chest at his denial of any possible suit for Sophia, but he ignored the fickle instrument and nodded his assent.
“I will make inquiries tomorrow to discover who might have reason to cause her harm.” Lord Howick gave an impatient wave to indicate their discussion was over. After Arnaud and Cullen finished their brandy and headed for the door, Lord Howick had already sharpened his writing quill and pulled sheets of vellum from his desk drawer.
Teddy walked through the outside door of Lord Jameson’s game room and found a dark corner among the hedges of ornamental shrubbery enclosing the estate’s gardens.
He shivered and let out a long breath of relief after holding his water throughout an ugly card game that, frankly, had not been in his best interest. But he couldn’t let his fellow rakehells know how hard the losses would hit him. What he was planning required a certain amount of acting on his part. Before his scheme came to fruition he would be as good as any actor who ever trod the boards at Covent Garden. The night air was so bitter cold, clouds of steam blew out of his mouth and he hastened to re-button his trousers. When he whirled to return to his gaming accomplices, he slammed into a solid mass blocking his way.
Pride Of Honor: Men of the Squadron Series, Book 1 Page 9
