The Tavistock Plot

by Tracy Grant

  "My brother and I were quite different." Malcolm found he could say that now and keep his voice steady. Just barely. "He died last September."

  "I heard." Thomas's eyes warmed with genuine sympathy. "I'm very sorry."

  "We're not here to talk about me. I mention it only because I know being different doesn't lessen the loss."

  Thomas gave a tight, contained nod, and gestured towards a set of chairs by the fire. "Lewis and I rubbed along well enough going our own ways," he said when they were seated. "He always chaffed me for having my head buried in dusty books, but he was good-natured about it. I was happy he had found something to keep him occupied. I thought he was idling about less. It was only recently that Father pointed out the dangers—" He broke off.

  "You mean Miss Blanchard?" Malcolm said.

  Thomas colored slightly, hands curled round the arms of his chair. "I wasn't wholly surprised he'd taken an interest in an actress. I don't have my head in my books so much I don't realize that's likely to be some of the lure of the theatre for a young man. But I didn't realize how serious it was."

  "Until?" Malcolm asked.

  "My father brought it up." Thomas ran his fingers over a nick in the chair arm. "Asked me to see what I could learn from Lewis about Miss Blanchard. I told him I didn't think Lewis could be serious. In my experience, Lewis wasn't serious about much of anything. But I said I'd have a talk with him. Thought I could reassure Father and save us all a kerfuffle. Instead Lewis fairly bit my head off. He said I didn't know Miss Blanchard and I shouldn't presume things about her or how he felt about her. That if I cast aspersions on her character he'd have to take exception." Thomas's brows drew together. "I've never seen Lewis so intense. Truth to tell, it was rather good to see him care so much about something, but I also could see the pitfalls ahead. I told him surely he realized it would have to end sooner or later. Better now, when there was less chance of Miss Blanchard's being hurt."

  "What did your brother say?" Harry asked.

  Thomas stared across the room at a glass-fronted bookcase, his frown deepening. "He said 'why should it have to end?' I mean, surely even Lewis realized he couldn't continue the liaison indefinitely." Thomas coughed. "If there was a liaison."

  "Perhaps a liaison wasn't what he had in mind," Malcolm suggested.

  "Oh, come now, Rannoch. My brother may have been feckless and deaf to responsibilities, but I can't imagine even Russell's going so far as to actually marry an actress—"

  He broke off, perhaps at the memory that Malcolm's wife had appeared in a holiday pantomime only the month before.

  "Crispin Harleton did," Harry said. "And is quite happy."

  "Yes, of course. I've met Lady Harleton, she's charming. But—" Thomas shook his head. "Lewis hadn't seemed himself lately. I blamed it on Miss Blanchard. But in truth, I wonder if it wasn't more that group he's been hanging about with. Our family've always been Whigs, but not—"

  "Out and out Radicals?" Malcolm said.

  Thomas met Malcolm's gaze. His blue eyes seemed more focused than they had. "I may study the ancient Romans, but I don't live in the past, Rannoch. I read the parliamentary debates. I even attend them on occasion. It's quite educational to compare them to the Roman senate."

  Harry gave a short laugh. "Excellent point."

  Thomas shot a look at him, then turned back to Malcolm. "I heard you speak on capital punishment. You made a powerful case. I'm in sympathy with much of what you support, though I wouldn't go quite as far you in many cases. In truth, a few months ago I'd have said my own views were more liberal than Lewis's. To the extent Lewis had political views, which he never seemed to much at all. Then, suddenly, he was hobnobbing with Simon Tanner and his set and spouting things at the dinner table that seemed designed to set my parents' hair on end. I like Tanner, by the way. What I've read of his plays and of his political writing. I can't imagine what he'd see in Lewis."

  "Perhaps Miss Blanchard's being at the Tavistock drew your brother to the Levellers," Malcolm said.

  "One might think so. But Lewis actually met her because he was spending time at the Tavistock. My brother who never seemed particularly interested in the poor or downtrodden suddenly became a burning Radical."

  "There are degrees of everything," Malcolm said. "Simon would be the first to say more than one of the Levellers is flirting with the glamour of Radicalism and hasn't got much sense of progressive reform."

  Thomas frowned. "Perhaps."

  "Speaking from the advanced age of two-and-thirty, young people often look for some way to rebel at that age," Harry said.

  "Is that what you did?"

  Harry gave a dry smile. "No. I just buried myself in my books and then fell improbably and unsuitably in love and made a mess of my life and my wife's and my daughter's before I managed to put things to rights somehow. But then, I always was something of an oddity."

  Thomas's frown deepened. "I never felt the need to rebel either. I just sought refuge in my books. I can't say my parents were thrilled, but they didn't pay much heed. It's a gentleman's occupation after all, even if Father would rather have seen me riding to hounds. Perhaps Lewis did want to rebel. I should—" His right hand curled into a fist, the nails pressing into his palm. "I'll still find myself thinking there are things I should ask him. But the damnable thing is I'll never be able to be sure now. I suppose he'll always be a cipher."

  "It's one of the hellish legacies of unexpected death," Malcolm said. Edgar would always be a cipher. Not that he could imagine Edgar's ever explaining himself in a way Malcolm would have been able to understand if Edgar had lived. Not that, for all his opposition to violence, he could imagine conversing with his brother without giving way to the need to throttle him. The questions would have haunted him one way or another. But the void yawned more starkly with Edgar gone. "Was your father concerned about Lewis?" Malcolm asked.

  "Oh, yes. Mama too. I do think they thought at first that some of it was to provoke a reaction, but as time went on, they were concerned he was going too far—out of reach, I suppose you'd say. Damaging his prospects. Partly they were afraid Aunt Henrietta wouldn't like it. My aunt, Lady Shroppington. Lewis was her heir, you know." Thomas drew a breath.

  "So we've heard," Malcolm said. "Who is now?"

  "I don't know." Thomas sounded as though he was only considering it for the first time. "It will be up to her. Aunt Henrietta controls her own fortune. Lewis was always a favorite of hers. She indulged him." For a moment in Thomas's tone and gaze Malcolm could see a younger brother who had charmed their aunt and been able to get away with things his more sober and better-behaved elder brother wouldn't have dreamed of attempting. "But Father thought there'd be a limit to what she'd tolerate. The last time she dined with the family she was kind enough to Lewis, but after dinner she asked me a number of questions about what he'd got himself into."

  "With Miss Blanchard?" Malcolm asked. "Or with his friends at the theatre?"

  "Both. She said it had been agreeable watching Lewis grow up, but she was beginning to think it was time he started acting like an adult."

  "Naturally you were concerned on your brother's behalf," Malcolm said.

  "Yes. But it was a bit more." Thomas straightened his shoulders against the worn leather of the chair. "The family fortunes have been straitened for some time. Father made some unfortunate decisions after Waterloo with his investments. Lewis's inheritance seemed to protect not just him, but the whole family. However much he may have surprised me of late, I can't see his not making sure his sisters had adequate dowries." Thomas's brows drew together, and Malcolm could almost see the weight of his sisters' prospects settling on his shoulders.

  "Difficult being responsible for a family," Harry said. "I suppose in some ways I was fortunate to have no one but my uncle. And also that my parents left me well provided for. As the father of daughters, I'm particularly aware of how difficult the world is for young women without fortune. You must now feel the responsibility for your sisters."r />
  Thomas nodded. "I'll have to come up with dowries for them somehow. And the estate will need repairs when I come into it."

  "All of which must make your own choice of marriage partner more complicated," Harry said.

  Thomas shot a surprised look at him. Malcolm wouldn't have put it quite so bluntly, but perhaps Harry's words were just what was needed to jolt Thomas into confiding.

  "Marriage can be a matter of economics for men as well as women," Harry said. "It shouldn't be a matter of economics for anyone, but sadly all too often it is."

  Thomas drew back slightly in his chair. "I have no thoughts of marriage."

  "My dear fellow. I've seen you with Edith."

  "Edith is my friend."

  "Yes, it's always best when one can be friends with the person one is head over heels in love with."

  "Damn it, Davenport—"

  "I wouldn't push you to talk about it. God knows I understand keeping feelings quiet. But it's become part of the investigation."

  "There's no understanding between Miss Simmons and me."

  "Of course not. Whatever your brother's intentions may have been towards Miss Blanchard, you wouldn't make any declaration to a woman without being able to offer her marriage."

  Thomas drew in and released his breath. Malcolm sat back and watched. Harry's pushing had produced far more than his own more measured approach would have done. "I'd gladly live in poverty with Edith," Thomas said in a low voice. "I think I could be quite happy. I even think Edith might be happy."

  "I'm quite sure she could," Harry said quietly. "She's used to the life of a governess."

  "Yes, but I can't drag my family into poverty with me."

  "There's always the chance Lady Shroppington will make you her heir."

  Thomas gave an unexpected shout of bitter laughter. "And you think I'd have killed my brother on that chance? You haven't met my Aunt Henrietta. More to the point, you haven't seen her utter contempt for me. If my parents tolerate my scholarship, Aunt Henrietta scoffs at it. She liked Lewis's being a young man about town. She encouraged him to have a bit of dash. I imagine she'd have turned a blind eye to a liaison with an actress. She just didn't expect him to become so deeply entangled. It's barely possible she'll decide to settle her fortune on one of my sisters. But she's far more likely to look outside the Thornsby family entirely."

  "Did your brother have enemies?" Malcolm asked.

  Thomas didn't scoff at the very idea, but he did frown. "Lately I've felt I didn't know Lewis as well as I thought. But enemies? The sort who would kill? It's difficult to comprehend." He passed a hand over his face. "The whole thing is difficult to comprehend. But I suppose—" He looked from Harry to Malcolm. "How dangerous were these Levellers? Are these Levellers?"

  "Impossible to be sure," Malcom said. "But I would have said not very." He wished he were still quite so sanguine. "Do you think your brother would have become involved in anything violent?"

  Thomas was silent for a long moment. "I'd have thought not. But as I said, I'm not sure I trust my judgment anymore. I'm not sure I know—knew him anymore. At this point—" He stared at the gilded book spines behind the glass across from him. "At this point I can't say with any certainty that I think Lewis was incapable of anything."

  "Do you miss it?" Harry asked as he and Malcolm descended the steps of the Classicists' Society.

  Malcolm jammed his hands into his greatcoat pockets. The wind had whipped up, promising rain. "I believe I've admitted to you—if to no one else, including my wife—that at times I miss being an agent."

  "Yes, you're not fooling anyone there, old fellow, including Mélanie, I'm quite sure. But I didn't mean being an agent. I meant being a fire-breathing Radical."

  Malcolm shot a look at his friend. "I wasn't very fire-breathing."

  "I've read your articles. Plenty of your speeches in the House still conjure up a muse of fire."

  "I don't think that's quite what Shakespeare meant."

  "Perhaps not, but I like the allusion." They reached the pavement and turned down Baker Street. "The point stands. You're a powerful voice, but you don't have the freedom you did in your student days."

  "Who does?" Malcolm glanced up and down the street. A nurse with three young children, two ladies with shopping parcels, two gentlemen with umbrellas. A solidly English scene, of a certain sort. A crossing sweeper at the next corner, shoulders hunched against the quickening wind. That said a lot about England as well. "We didn't really plot anything. We talked, we wrote."

  "We don't know the Levellers are plotting anything," Harry said.

  Malcolm stared at a haberdasher's sign whipped by the wind for a moment. "When I first learned in Italy that Kit was a Leveller. He said he'd been afraid to tell me because I was an MP. And because I worked for Carfax. That was when I realized how far I'd gone from the ideals of my youth. Can you imagine Kit's going to work for Carfax? Or Castlereagh?"

  "Kit's older than you were when you went to work for them, and he hasn't gone through what you had. And we both know people are capable of unexpected things."

  "Even granted that."

  "You stopped working for Carfax and Castlereagh."

  "Far later than I should have done."

  "You're your own man in Parliament."

  "More or less. I suppose—" Malcolm stared at the charcoal sky. "Mel said once that the arguments in Parliament are circumscribed. That one has the illusion of debate because there are discussions, but the boundaries are defined and whole perspectives are left out."

  "Mélanie's right. MPs don't have the perspectives of well over half the population. Women, for one thing. Anyone who isn't at least nominally an Anglican. Most people who don't own property. But that's all the more reason we need people like you to push the boundaries."

  "As long as we push them, rather than smugly assuming whatever point we're making is the outside edge of what's possible."

  Harry watched him for a moment. "You're wondering what you'll do if the Levellers are plotting something and you discover it, aren't you?"

  "How could I not be? Not to mention what Mel will do if she uncovers it first and whether or not we'll be in agreement."

  Harry nodded. "It's more comfortable studying ancient Rome in a lot of ways."

  "I agree with you there." Malcolm was silent for a moment as they trudged over pavement still muddy from last night's rain. "I need to meet Roth and get to the theatre. But before I go—Thomas Thornsby strikes me as decent man. Not that I trust my judgment so very much. What did you make of the interview?"

  "Me? I'm his friend."

  "Perhaps all the more reason to get your viewpoint."

  Harry frowned across the street. "I like Thomas. I don't think he's a killer. But then, one's never the best judge of people one likes. I'm quite sure he loves Edith, more intensely than he'd admit. He makes a good point that he had more of a chance of the future he wanted if Lewis was Lady Shroppington's heir. But it sounds as though, even if Lewis had lived, he wasn't likely to continue as Lady Shroppington's heir."

  "Quite," Malcolm said. "So you think there's a chance Thomas killed Lewis before Lady Shroppington could disinherit him, in the hopes she'd make Thomas her heir?"

  "I don't like to think it," Harry said. "I don't think it's logical. But I also don't think we can ignore the possibility. Especially if Thomas knew Lewis had decided to propose to Letty Blanchard. How often have people surprised us?"

  Malcolm thought of his brother. "Quite."

  Chapter 10

  Manon Caret stared at Mélanie across her dressing room. "Mon Dieu. I can't believe I went home last night and left you to that."

  "You could hardly have known, chérie."

  "No, but I hate to think of you facing all that—and you had the children with you." Manon took the kettle off the spirit lamp on the chest before the settee in her dressing room, added some more hot water to the teapot, and then refilled Mélanie's cup as though to offer the comfort she hadn't been able
to give the night before. "I knew so many boys like Thornsby in Paris. Well, here too, but since I've been with Crispin they don't dangle after me as much. But they'd haunt the green room and crowd into one's dressing room with bouquets and tag along to cafés with the actors when they were invited. They tended to be surprisingly respectful—well, the ones like Thornsby. Of course, they could be a nuisance when they invaded rehearsal (and management never likes to send them off, because they support the theatre), and I've been known to complain once or twice about how they'd get underfoot. But honestly, right now all I can think is how poor Lewis's mother must feel."

  "I know." Mélanie took a sip of tea and felt the warmth shoot through her. Odd how once one had children, one viewed situations through the lens of a parent. She doubted Lewis's parents' reaction would have been foremost in her mind before she was a mother herself. Manon had been a mother far longer than Mélanie—she'd had two daughters in Paris before Mélanie had ever met her and now also had a baby son with her new husband. But in addition to being mothers, she and Manon were both former agents and thought like agents as well as parents. "However much of a puppy Lewis seemed, he wasn't a child. And he was involved in some very grown-up things. You don't know why he came back here last night?"

  Manon drew the folds of her flowered shawl about her shoulders. "I assume it was something to do with the Levellers. I try to stay out of their intrigues. Yes, I'm still a Republican, but God save us from amateur Radicals. Unless he was meeting Letty?"

  "She says not. She also says he asked her to marry him last night."

  Manon's brows rose. "Well, that's surprising. I suppose I shouldn't be surprised by a gentleman's proposing to an actress at this point, but somehow Thornsby didn't strike me as having the same substance as Crispin. And God knows Crispin's loving me still takes me by surprise every day. In the best way possible."

  "Thornsby's proposing to Letty surprised me too," Mélanie said. "And I suspect his family wouldn't have been happy. Which opens new avenues of suspects."