by P. B. Ryan
“Do you never tire of teasing me?” Nell tried once again to wrest her feet free of his grip, but it was a halfhearted effort; he was good at what he was doing, indecently good.
“I tease much less than you think, Cornelia.”
She opened her eyes, but Will wasn’t looking at her. He was leaning down to pick up one of her evening slippers, which he snugged onto her left foot. The right followed, but instead of withdrawing his hands, he wrapped them over her insteps, his thumbs massaging her through the silk.
“A few minutes ago,” Will said, “while we gentlemen were savoring our manly brandy and cigars—noxious combination, by the way, don’t ever try it—my brother Martin asked Mr. Pratt how he’d gotten that black eye, to which Pratt replied that he tripped on his front steps the other day and fell face-first into the iron railing.”
Nell sat up, suddenly alert. “But didn’t Mrs. Pratt tell us—”
“That he fell victim to a basher a few doors down from their house? Why, yes, she did.”
“Why would he tell his wife one thing and his friends another?” Nell asked.
“Watch those wanton assumptions, Cornelia. Perhaps it wasn’t Pratt who told his wife the basher story. It could have been someone else.”
“Which doesn’t explain why there are conflicting accounts being bandied about.”
“No, it does not,” Will said. “But to be honest, what’s of more pressing interest to me right now is the mysterious disappearance and reappearance of the Stonewall Jackson gun. General Jackson carried a Lefaucheux Brevete pinfire revolver—twelve millimeters, which translates to roughly forty-five calibers. If we’re to believe Orville Pratt, it was in his possession until the night of the ball, when it vanished from his study.”
“He apparently thought Mrs. Kimball stole it.”
“He would have been furious at her that night for crashing his ball. That may be the only reason he suspected her. What intrigues me is the gun’s fortuitous reappearance just two days after Mrs. Kimball was killed by a high-caliber revolver. Come.” Will stood and held his hand out.
“Where are we going?” Nell asked as he raised her to her feet.
“To Mr. Pratt’s study. It’s right in there.” He pointed to two dark, curtained windows at the rear of the house.
“I don’t know, Will...”
“Afraid to be alone with me?” he asked with a smile.
“I was once,” she said, thinking of the bitter and dissipated man he’d been when they first met. “Not anymore.”
His regarded her for a thoughtful moment. “I may yet give you reason to feel that way again.” With a gentle tug on her hand, he said, “Come.”
* * *
“You’d think he would have learned,” Nell said when she saw the big revolver lying right out in the open on top of Orville Pratt’s desk. The massive ebony writing table—ormulu-encrusted, ivory-inlaid, and topped with a thick sheet of red marble—was the centerpiece of Mr. Pratt’s elegantly masculine study. The walls were of carved oak paneling, the mantle red marble, the paintings age-crackled Old Masters. Hanging above and to either side of the imposing fireplace were racks and racks of swords and knives, shimmering malevolently in the dark: cutlasses, sabers, machetes, broadswords, daggers, knives, even a few spears and battle axes. Many of the weapons looked Oriental; several were clearly of ancient or medieval provenance.
They had closed the door, of course, and lit just one small oil lamp on the desk, but Nell still agonized over the consequences—especially as regarded her position with the Hewitts—should someone discover them poking about in Orville Pratt’s private study.
Will lifted the gun, turned it over in his hand. “This is a LeFaucheux Brevete, all right.” He held it in the light of the oil lamp and pointed to a trio of tiny initials carved in the upper part of the gun’s grip: TJJ.
“Thomas Jonathan Jackson,” Nell said.
Will looked at her and smiled, as if pleasantly surprised that she knew that. “Yes.” He swung the gun’s cylinder aside, revealing six empty chambers, and snapped it shut. “Have you ever loaded a revolver?”
“I’ve seen it done. The bullets go in the chambers...no, first the powder, then the bullets, then sometimes a little dab of lard or wax on top of each bullet, and then the firing cap last, for safety. Oh, and I’ve seen it where the bullet and the powder are wrapped up together in a piece of paper.”
“Paper soaked in potassium nitrate,” Will said, “to make it more flammable. Those are called cartridges. They can be made of metal, too.”
“Metal doesn’t burn.”
“They work very well, nonetheless. They appeared shortly before the war, but they’re just now catching on. There’s a tubular metal casing which houses the bullet, the gunpowder, and the cap. When you pull the trigger, the hammer strikes the cap, which ignites the powder, which shoots the bullet. Eh voila!”
“What happens to the casing?”
“With a revolver, it stays inside the gun. Of course, it has to be a gun especially designed for that type of cartridge.”
Handing Nell the gun, which was remarkably heavy, Will lifted the lamp and started tugging one by one on the desk’s many drawers. Those few that were unlocked received a swift but thorough search before he moved on to the next one. “Eureka.” He produced a rattling tin box, which he set on the desk and opened. It was about half full of bullets, each encased in a copper cartridge. There was a little white label on the inside of the lid.
50
LEFAUCHEUX PIN-FIRE CARTRIDGES
12 mm
Warranted best quality.
Will plucked out one of the bullets and held it in the lamplight. “See this little projection here on the bottom of the cartridge? With a pinfire gun, the hammer strikes the pin and drives it into the cap. Except for that little peculiarity, this is pretty much what a metallic cartridge looks like.”
Nell set the gun down and took the cartridge from him. The conical tip of the grayish lead bullet extended beyond the little copper tube. “Do you suppose if we were to compare this bullet to the one you found on the floor of Mrs. Kimball’s bedroom, we might be able to figure out whether they came from the same gun?”
“I don’t know, Nell. A spent bullet gets pretty distorted. I doubt we’d even be able to tell if they were the same caliber.”
“I’ll bet Samuel Watts could tell.”
“Who?”
“He’s the gunsmith who testified at the inquest. Detective Cook had nothing but praise for him.”
Will took the bullet and tucked it into his inside coat pocket, closed the box, and put it back in the drawer. “Tomorrow’s Saturday, your day off. Why don’t we pay a little call on Mr. Watts?”
She nodded. “I’d like to talk to Maximilian Thurston, too. And Detective Skinner if we have time.”
“We can visit them, as well. But first we have an eight o’clock appointment to tour Isaac Foster’s house on Acorn Street.”
“We do?”
“Given that he’s one of the men who bribed Skinner—”
“Presumably bribed—”
“Presumably bribed Skinner, I thought he’d be worth talking to. I told him I was looking for a permanent home in Boston, and that his house sounded like just the thing.”
“And I’m coming along because...?”
Will fumbled a bit for words. “He seems to think we’re...not engaged, but... Well, the presumption is that we have an...understanding.”
“Ah. Not yet formally engaged, but looking for a house together, which is as good as if I were wearing a diamond—”
There came a metallic snick as the doorknob turned; hinges squeaked.
Nell’s heart kicked.
Will shoved her against the desk and pressed himself close to her, his back to the door.
“Will!” she rasped as the door creaked open, revealing a sliver of light, a shadowy form.
Will grabbed her arms and wrapped them around him, cradled her head against his chest. “B
e still,” he whispered.
Chapter 9
Nell closed her eyes and pressed her face to the smooth, cool fabric of Will’s evening coat, inhaling new wool and Bay Rum, her arms banded around him, heart drumming against her stays.
He bent his head to hers, whispering “Shh, don’t worry,” as he stroked her hair.
“William? Is that you?” It was Orville Pratt’s voice.
St. Dismas, please, Nell silently prayed, please let nothing come of this. Please let me keep my job.
“Oh,” Pratt said as he took in the scene.
Will, still cupping Nell’s head to his chest, turned to look over his shoulder. “Sir, I’m—”
“Not at all, not at all.” Pratt sounded amused, indulgent. “I was young once, too.”
Nell opened her eyes to see the band of light from the hallway shrink and then wink out as the door click-closed.
She slumped against him, shuddering with nervous laughter.
Will chuckled; she felt it more than heard it, a comforting vibration from deep inside his chest. “You’re shivering.”
He chafed her back and arms, then just held her tight, his breath warm and ticklish on her hair, his heart thumping against her ear. She closed her eyes, relishing the sensation, all too rare for her, of being enfolded in a pair of strong arms, sheltered, cared for.
His heartbeat gathered speed, and his breathing with it. Nell felt the quickening rise and fall of his chest.
She opened her eyes and saw the room around them, saw them standing here crushed together like lovers, wrapped in each others’ arms, hearts drumming in unison. She loosened her embrace, looked up at Will.
He met her gaze, his eyes shadowed by that strong brow, his expression indecipherable. He kept his hands on her waist as he stepped back from her. When he released her, she felt bereft.
She busied herself plucking at her skirt and tidying her hair. “We should probably, um...”
“Yes, they’ll be wondering what’s become of us.”
“Not Mr. Pratt,” she said. “He knows. Or, or thinks he does.”
“Better he thinks that than suspects the truth. There’s only one problem.”
Nell glanced up to find Will appraising her as if she were a statue in a museum.
“You don’t look at all like a lady who’s just been kissed,” he said.
With feigned nonchalance, she asked, “What do ladies look like after you’ve kissed them?”
“The blood tends to rise to the surface here...” He reached out to brush his fingertips over one cheek and down along her jawline to her throat. “And here.” His touch on her throat and upper chest—lingering, airy—made Nell feel as if she’d just drunk an entire bottle of wine all by herself.
“And the lips, of course.” He stroked her bottom lip with his thumb just once, making it tingle. “They might even swell a bit...as I recall. It’s been a number of years.”
“You haven’t kissed anyone in years?”
“That surprises you.”
“Well...yes. I just assumed you...” How did one express such a thing? “I mean, I, I realize that, during those years you were smoking opium and taking morphine, you were...” They had discussed this, but in vague terms and quite some time ago.
“Lacking in fleshly desires,” he said.
She nodded. “I suppose I...just assumed, once you were no longer addicted to opiates, that your...natural inclinations would return.”
“Oh, they returned, all right,” he said with an acerbic little laugh. “They came roaring back. ‘Exploding’ would not be too strong a word. It’s as if that part of me had been dead for five years, and now it’s come back to life, but the process leaves me in a continual state of...how did you put it? Inclination? From time to time it becomes...all but unendurable.”
“Yet you haven’t even kissed anyone in all this time? It’s been what...nine months?”
Will looked down, his brow furrowed, as if composing his response. “I confess, from time to time I’ve been desperate enough to seek out...a certain type of female. But these are not women who expect to be kissed. They’re solely interested in the contents of my wallet.” He raised his gaze to hers again. “What lies in my heart remains quite untouched.”
Nell had that slightly swimmy feeling she sometimes got upon looking into Will’s eyes, as if she were about to careen into space. His gaze shifted to her mouth. She saw his throat move. He might have dipped his head just slightly, or perhaps her that was the vertigo playing tricks on her.
She parted her lips to speak, but the words she needed to say, had no choice but to say, refused to come.
“Let go of me!” It was a man’s voice, young and European-accented, from the front of the house.
Something crashed; there came shouting and the sounds of a struggle, but the young man’s furious screams rose above it all. “Get your hands off me, you bastahds! Cecilia! Make them let me go!”
“That’s got to be Felix Brudermann.” Nell lifted her skirts to sprint across the room.
“Felix who?” Will beat her to the door and held her back protectively as he opened it.
“He’s the fiancé Cecilia threw over for Harry after she found out he was, er, associating with Mrs. Kimball.”
“I’ve obviously got some catching up to do,” Will said as he peered down the central hallway at the ongoing mêlée.
Even standing on tip-toes, Nell couldn’t see over his shoulder. “Your chivalry is commendable but unnecessary,” she said as she darted around him. “Brudermann has no quarrel with me.”
She strode down the hall toward the chandelier-lit foyer, in which a clutch of men—Isaac Foster, Martin Hewitt, and two of the red-clad footmen—held the flailing intruder pinned against the front door. Harry, the two older gentlemen, and the ladies watched from several yards away. A French Provençal console table lay on its side nearby, its delicate giltwood legs splintered, the attached mirror in shards on the marble floor.
“Stubborn wench.” Will closed a hand over Nell’s arm, just a bit too firmly. “Keep your distance from him. That kind of anger knows no reason.”
Emily, swirling a brandy snifter as she leaned against the archway that led from the hall to the foyer, turned and smiled as they approached. “Act three.”
“Cecilia! She’s dead, for Christ’s sake. It vas never anything.” Felix Jaeger Ritter von Brudermann was a brawny young man of remarkable Teutonic beauty. Even red-faced and howling, his golden hair unkempt, his clothing in disarray, one could see why Cecilia, with her love of all things gorgeous, had been drawn to him.
“Why can’t you just go away?” Cecilia shrieked, her hands fisted in her foamy pink gown, her face contorted in rage and bewilderment. “Go away! What’s the matter with you? Why do you keep coming back?”
“I luf you! I vant to marry you!” Felix wailed as he grappled with the men restraining him.
Harry, holding the biggest cigar Nell had ever seen, answered for her. “Well, she doesn’t love you, so why don’t you just salvage your pride and—”
“You shut your mouth!” Felix aimed jerky if impotent punches in Harry’s direction. “I know you, I know vhat you’re about. You’re trying to steal her from me.”
“It’s a fait accompli, old man.” Harry took a puff, blew it out. “She’s just accepted my proposal of marriage.”
“Vhat?”
“With Mr. Pratt’s blessing. So you’d best just turn ‘round and—”
“You lying dog!” Felix redoubled his efforts to free himself.
“It’s true,” Cecilia spat out. “You see? You’re wasting your time, Felix. No one wants you here.”
“Then give me back my sapphires!”
“No! You gave them to me. They’re mine.”
Felix, spittle flying, limbs thrashing, spewed a vituperative stream of German mixed with English. The only phrase Nell caught was “Greedy American bitch.”
With a huffy indignation reminiscent of his father, Harry said, �
��How dare you call my fiancée—”
“I’ll kill you, Hewitt!” Felix screamed hoarsely, then came a rather long-winded battery of German.
Will chuckled; Emily snorted with laughter.
“Do you two understand what he’s saying?” Nell asked them.
Will gestured toward Emily as if to give her the floor. She said, “He’s describing various old Germanic techniques he might employ in doing away with Harry. Some of them...” She snickered as she raised the snifter to her mouth “Well, they’re novel, to say the least.”
Felix caught one of the footmen in the nose with his fist, the other in the throat. They stumbled backward, groaning and gagging. Seizing upon the commotion, the Austrian kicked and punched his way free of his captors and launched himself, snarling and wild-eyed, at Harry.
Harry dropped his cigar and turned to run, but he wasn’t quite quick enough. Felix snatched his coat by its tails and yanked, whipping Harry’s feet out from under him. Harry covered his face as he fell. “Don’t!” Felix aimed a foot at Harry’s groin, and when Harry reached down to shield it, kicked him in the head instead.
Foster and Martin both tried to get hold of Felix, but it was like trying to capture a rabid boar with one’s bare hands. They aimed punches, but Felix just shrugged them off as he circled the writhing, moaning Harry, scouting for another place to kick.
Will strolled up to the Austrian. “Gutenabend, Herr Brudermann.”
Felix looked up.
Will punched him in the head. He dropped like a marionette with its strings cut.
* * *
“There’s something I don’t understand about what happened back there at the Pratts, with Felix,” Nell said as Will’s phaeton drew up in front of Palazzo Hewitt.
Will reined in his horses and turned to look at her. It was around midnight, but mild and dry, so he had the top down. The meager moonlight pointed up the sharp planes of his face—the straight-carved nose and lofty cheekbones, that jaw that managed to look both powerful and refined at the same time.
