He made a "ha!" noise as the air whooshed from his lungs, and he lay still a moment, like an insect on its back. I sprinted the distance to the horse. I knew I'd never mount without assistance, so I snatched my walking stick from the saddle.
I yanked the sword from my cane just as two huge arms closed around me from behind and the lad half lifted me from my feet. I swung my sword behind me in an arc and slapped him hard on the leg.
He yelped. I slapped again. His hold loosened. I pulled my elbow close to my body and slammed it backward.
"Oop-" he gasped.
I slid from his slack grip, whirled, and faced him, my sword level with his heart.
"Odd place for a robbery, here on an open green in the middle of the day."
He did not answer. His mouth opened and closed a few times, his face red with his returning breath. His eyes held no belligerence, only surprise, as though he had not counted on a victim who would fight back.
The youth stared at my sword a moment then whirled and fled, straight for the horse.
"Damnation." I limped after him as fast as I could. The horse, as I'd said, was an even-tempered beast who did not fear humans. She shied a little as the big lad approached but allowed herself to be caught. Instead of mounting, the boy dug into the saddlebag, pulled out the lacquer box, released the horse, and ran from me across the green.
I cursed again, running and hobbling after him, my knee spreading white-hot pain up my spine. I had told Mrs. Beauchamp I'd take care of the letters, and now they moved farther and farther away in the beefy hands of an unknown boy.
"Lacey!"
I turned and saw Grenville cantering toward me on his bay horse. "What happened? Did you take a fall?"
"Go after him." I pointed at the silhouette of the lad fast disappearing into the mist and rain. "Hurry. Get the box from him."
Grenville nodded curtly, wheeled his mount, and galloped away.
I caught my horse and led her in Grenville's wake. Dividing my weight between the walking stick and the mare, I was able to hobble along without hurting myself too badly, although the horse tried to take a bite out of my jacket from time to time.
I reached the top of a small rise and looked down the slope that slid smoothly to a gray pond, dull under the rain. The lad made for it, Grenville only a few strides behind.
A small black object arced from the young man's hands and landed with a silent splash in the water. The lad leapt from the bank into the water, and Grenville's mount danced backward from the fountain that erupted from the impact. The boy swam the narrow distance to the other bank, pulled himself quickly out, and ran on.
"Grenville!" I shouted through cupped hands. "Get the box!"
Grenville slid from his horse, then stopped among the reeds, his hands on his hips. I ran forward, dropping my horse's reins. The box bobbed in the still water, not yet saturated enough to sink. I slipped in the mud on the bank, and caught myself in time from falling in.
"What the devil happened?" Grenville demanded. "Who was that?"
"I don't know."
I leaned out over the pond, extending my cane. The box floated just beyond my reach. "Hold on to me."
"Blast you, Lacey, you'll go in, and then I'll have to fish you out."
"Do it!"
Grenville looked at me in exasperation but nodded.
I lowered myself to my stomach in the mud. Grenville grasped my ankles while I inched toward the water. The box floated, half-submerged and bobbing on the gray surface. I thrust my walking stick toward it. The handle slapped the water, and the box danced away. I slithered forward, praying Grenville had a good grip on my legs, and reached again.
I touched the box. The end of the cane shook as I gingerly hooked the gold head of the stick on the edge. I raked the box toward me. It came, dragging on the surface, its top glistening with water. When the box bumped the bank, I tossed my walking stick to the ground beside me, plunged my hands into the chill water, and dragged the box out.
Water poured from the seams. I rolled over, dislodging Grenville's hold, and squirmed to a sitting position on firmer ground. I sat holding that damned box, my coat and breeches plastered with mud. I turned the box around in my hands, depressed the catch that opened it, and stared in dismay at the sodden mess inside.
"Anything salvageable?" Grenville asked.
"I have no idea." I lifted a paper, gently separating it from the others. Peeling off his muddy gloves, Grenville reached a long-fingered hand into the box and pried out another paper. I related the tale of the young man's surprise attack and his theft of the box.
Grenville frowned. "Notice that he threw the box into the pond."
I glared up from the wet paper in my hand. "Yes, I had noticed."
"I mean that if he were simply afraid of being caught, he could have flung the box down and fled, or thrown it across the pond to pick up when he reached the other side. But he deliberately chose to send it into the water. As though he wanted to destroy the letters rather than risk you getting them back."
"Or he thought we'd stop and try to retrieve it, giving him time to run away. What would he want with Charlotte Morrison's letters?"
"What indeed?"
I glanced at him, but he had bent to the task at hand again.
Grenville caught the horses while I patted the papers with my handkerchief and folded them carefully back into the box, now lined with Grenville's handkerchief. Grenville boosted me onto my horse, tucked the box back into the saddlebag, then mounted his own horse. I couldn't help looking warily into the scrub that lined the road as we turned onto it.
"I doubt he'll be back," Grenville said. "He expected to pluck his pigeon easily, not be pummeled by you and chased by me." He chuckled. "I am sorry I missed the first part."
I didn't bother to answer. I was cold and muddy and annoyed and my leg hurt like fury. Grenville, on the other hand, even in the rain, looked dry and elegant and ready to step into a drawing room.
We parted again at the crossroads, me to ride on to the Beauchamps, Grenville to continue to Lord Sommerville's.
I had to explain to Mrs. Beauchamp what had happened to the letters. She hugged the box to her chest as she listened, her brown eyes round.
"Whoever would want to steal Charlotte's letters?"
"He may not have known the letters were inside," I said. "He saw a pretty box and thought it would contain something valuable."
I knew that was untrue. The box had been out of sight, in the saddlebag. The lad had deliberately looked for it.
"I am so sorry, Captain. Thank you for rescuing them."
"I ought to have taken better care of them."
"You cannot blame yourself."
She wanted to be generous. She gave me some hot tea laced with port and let me dry out near her fire. She chatted to me of life in Hampstead and of Charlotte and their life together.
Her husband waylaid me as I made my departure. On the walk in front of the house, Beauchamp seized my arm and looked up into my face, his dark eyes glinting. "Did the letters help?"
"That remains to be seen," I said. "You may be right that she is dead."
"If you find her-" His voice caught. He cleared his throat. "Please bring her home to us."
"I will."
Beauchamp did not offer to shake hands, nor did he bid me farewell. I turned back to my horse, let his footman boost me aboard, and rode back to the public house to await Grenville's return.
The drive back to London was quieter and wetter than the journey out had been. For the first part of it, I told Grenville what had been in Charlotte's letters, and he described his visit with Lord Sommerville. Grenville had managed to bring up the death of the kitchen maid. Lord Sommerville, as the local magistrate, and also distressed that one of his staff should come to such an end, had made an inquiry, but it had turned up nothing. The young man she customarily walked out with had been in London on the night in question, visiting his brother and nephews. According to servants' gossip, the maid Mati
lda, had apparently been cuckolding the young man with a new suitor, but Lord Sommerville did not know who the new suitor was. In the end, the death was put down to Matilda's having met a footpad in the woods.
After Grenville's recounting I dozed, still tired from my adventure. Grenville remained pensive and talked little. He mostly read newspapers, which each gave a lurid account of the murder of Josiah Horne. The Times speculated whether the brutal killing would reintroduce the question of creating a regular police force in England, such as they had in France.
Grenville gave me no explanation of why he'd disappeared from the inn the night before, and I did not ask him about it. His coachman left me at the top of Grimpen Lane, and I walked home. Again my neighbors streamed out to ogle Grenville's coach and fine horses. Mrs. Beltan handed me a stack of letters that had arrived for me in my absence. I bought one of her yeasty, buttery buns and retired upstairs to read my correspondence.
Among the constrained and polite invitations to social gatherings was a letter from Louisa Brandon, telling me that she was doing what she could for the Thorntons. She also mentioned that she would host a supper party on the weekend, making it plain that she wanted me to attend. I tucked the letter aside, my mind turning over what excuses I'd come up with for refusing her invitation.
Another letter, which I lingered over for a time, was from Mr. Denis himself, setting an appointment with me for two days hence at his house in Curzon Street. The tone of the letter conveyed that Horne's dying was only an inconvenience and should not stop a transaction of business. I wrote out a reply that I'd come.
The last of the post was a folded square of paper with my name on it in capitals. Unfolded, the note read: "I arrested the butler. Magistrate made short work of him. Pomeroy."
Chapter Twelve
I flung down the letter. I'd washed my hands of Horne's household and his death, but I did not think Bremer had killed his master. I'd left them to Pomeroy's mercy, and he had been his usual ruthless self.
After shaving and downing the bun, I walked to Bow Street and the magistrate's court. Inside the drab halls, the dregs of the night's arrests lay about waiting to appear before the magistrate. The smell of unwashed bodies and boredom smote me. For some reason, I scanned their ranks for Nance, but I didn't see her. Most game girls bribed the watch to look the other way, but occasionally, one chose to pick the wrong gentleman's pocket or got caught in a brawl.
The pale-faced bailiff accosted me and demanded my business. I sent him looking for Pomeroy. While I waited, a small man with wiry hair latched his fingers on to my cuff and began a barely intelligible, one-sided conversation, washing me in gin-soaked breath.
"Get on with you," Pomeroy boomed. He cuffed the little man, who howled and ran back to the wall. "Captain. Good news. I arrested the butler. He goes to trial in five days."
There was no privacy to be had in that hall. I motioned Pomeroy away from the crowd, but still had to raise my voice to be heard. "Why Bremer?"
"Stands to reason, doesn't it? He's the last one to see his master. He stabs him, cuts off his bollocks, sticks the knife back in the wound, leaves the room, and tells everyone the master asked not to be disturbed. You turn up later and won't go away, so he legs it upstairs and 'discovers' the body. Nothing mysterious about it."
"But why should Bremer kill Horne?"
"Because by all accounts that cove Horne was a right bastard. Jury won't be sympathetic, though. Be wondering if their own manservants will get the idea to cut off their bollocks."
I stood my ground. "Horne paid very high wages. Surely Bremer would put up with a difficult master for that. Or give notice if he truly disliked the man."
Pomeroy shrugged. "No doubt he'll confess his motives at the trial."
"And why mutilate Horne? Why not stop at simply killing him?"
"Damned if I know, Captain. I didn't ask him."
"What did he tell the magistrate?" I asked.
"Not much. Kept babbling that he didn't do it. Magistrate asked him then who did? But he couldn't answer. Just gibbered."
I shook my head. "Think, Pomeroy. Whoever killed Horne had to best him. Horne was younger and stronger than Bremer. It couldn't have been easy to stab him."
"Even the weak and frightened can do damage when they're riled enough." Pomeroy gave me a patient look. "Magistrate wanted a culprit. I gave him one."
"Horne had another visitor that day. No one saw Horne after the visitor left, not even the butler."
"Oh, yes? Who was that then?"
"Mr. James Denis."
Pomeroy snorted. "And it ain't likely I'm going to run 'round and arrest him, sir, is it? He's a toff that no one's going to touch, least of all the likes of me. What would he kill Horne for anyway?"
"Perhaps Horne owed him money, and Denis was angry that he hadn't been paid. Perhaps Horne slighted him. Perhaps Horne knew something that Mr. Denis didn't want put about."
Pomeroy considered this. "All those things could have happened. All the same, I'm not arresting the man. And you'd do best to let him alone, Captain. He's a one what likes his privacy. Pretend he never went to that house, and you know nothing about it."
"I already have an appointment to speak to Mr. Denis."
Pomeroy looked me up and down then spoke in a slow voice. "You know, Captain, when we were on the line, opinion in the ranks was that you were one of the bravest officers in the King's army. The bravest and the best. But sometimes, we thought you went too far. You were so crazy-brave, you expected all the rest of us to be, too. Like charging a hill loaded with artillery. We thought we should truss you up and toss you in the baggage carts. Meaning no disrespect, sir."
I looked him in the eye. "We won that hill, Sergeant. Which allowed our infantry to move through."
"It didn't make you any less insane. This is another case you ought to be trussed up, sir. Don't have nothing to do with Mr. Denis. You'll regret it something powerful. Let Bremer be the culprit. Easiest on everyone."
Except Bremer, I thought. I changed the subject. "What do you know about the murder of a young woman in Hampstead?"
Pomeroy's eyes gleamed. "Someone else has been murdered?"
"The body was found about a week or so ago, in the woods. A young woman. She'd been there a while."
"Hmm, I think I remember hearing about it. A maid or some such?"
"A kitchen maid for Lord Sommerville. Her name is Matilda. I'd like to know her surname, and also the name of her brother who traveled to Hampstead to identify her body."
"What do you want to know for?"
"I'm interested. Also, any information on a woman called Charlotte Morrison, who disappeared about the same time the girl was killed."
"Oh-ho. You think the two are connected."
"They might be. I have no idea. Have you had any leads regarding Jane Thornton?"
"Not heard a word, but I've got an ear out. I saw your notices. I wouldn't mind ten guineas meself. You giving out rewards for information on the other two?"
"Not as yet. When you hear anything at all, send word to me." I started to walk away.
"I ain't your sergeant anymore, Captain. I don't take orders from you, you know."
I swung around. "But I'm mad, remember? You never know what I might take into my head to do."
I left him then, muttering not quite under his breath about right-bastard officers who liked to make a hell of everyone's lives.
I went back to the Thorntons' house in the Strand. The one person who had been present for Horne's murder was Aimee. I'd wanted to leave her alone, to let her turn her back on Horne and his house, but Bremer's fate might depend on her answers to my questions.
Alice greeted me and informed me that Mr. Thornton was still alive. He had come 'round the day before, but now lay asleep again, dosed with laudanum. I was encouraged, but did not give in to hope. He still could so easily slip away.
I asked to see Aimee. Alice looked surprised, then told me that she'd gone to stay with her aunt, a woman ca
lled Josette Martin. She gave me the direction, and I headed east in a hackney through the Strand and Fleet Street and into the City, to a small boardinghouse near St. Paul's Churchyard.
"Captain." Josette Martin met me in the middle of a neat, though shabby drawing room and shook my hand. Threads of gray laced her brown hair, which was braided and looped in neat coils. Her face was square and her nose snub, but her eyes were large and wide, framed with long black lashes.
"Mrs. Martin."
"You are the gentleman who brought Aimee home?" She spoke flawless English, but with a fluid French accent.
I acknowledged that I was.
She motioned to me to sit in an armchair then perched on a sofa a little way from me. "It was very good of you to help her. How did you come to find her? She remembers very little."
Even as she expressed gratitude, her look was wary. She must have wondered what I'd been doing in the house where her niece had been held captive.
"Will she live with you now?" I asked.
She nodded, candlelight catching in the gloss of her hair. "I raised Aimee after her parents died in France. I trained her to be a lady's maid, as I was. But I believe we will not stay in England. We will return to France when she is well."
"How is she?"
"You are kind to ask. Aimee will recover, in body at least. He was very cruel to her. The man is dead?"
"Most definitely dead."
Josette's eyes hardened. "Good. Then God has taken his vengeance. Do you think that wicked of me?"
"To be happy that the monster who hurt your niece is dead? I feel the same."
That seemed to satisfy her. "I thought at first you'd come from the magistrate. To question her."
I kept my voice gentle, though impatience pricked me. "I do want to ask her a few questions if she is well enough to speak to me. I am trying to find what became of her mistress."
"Miss Thornton? I am worried for her as well. The Thorntons are poor. Aimee did the duties of upstairs maid and looked after both Miss Thornton and her mother, but they were all kind to her. It was a good place."
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