The Duke's Gambit

by Tracy Grant

  "No, she wouldn't." Malcolm leaned forwards. "Tommy wasn't with her?"

  Andrew shook his head. "That would have taken explaining. All Gelly said was that she needed a necklace Lady Frances had given Judith that used to belong to Lady Arabella. Diamonds and amethysts in white gold."

  "I remember Judith wearing it," Cordelia said. "It's a beautiful piece."

  Malcolm nodded. "Aunt Frances gave it to Judith just before her wedding."

  "Judith said she was surprised, but she assumed Gisèle had her reasons." Andrew said. "She gave the necklace to Gelly. Gelly stayed to swallow a cup of tea and hug the baby and then left, promising to explain later." Andrew gripped his hands together. "She's obviously trying to find the rest of the papers Lady Arabella hid in her jewels. I think it's fairly plain now she's trying to help Belmont."

  "Nothing is plain in this family." Malcolm stretched out a hand. "Andrew—"

  Andrew jerked back. "Don't, Malcolm. I won't pretend it doesn't hurt like the devil, but I'm not the first man to lose his wife. I'll survive. We know she isn't being coerced. You know Gelly. She could have sought refuge with Judith. At the very least, she could have sent a message through Judith that would let you know she was in trouble. She certainly could have run with Mélanie instead of away from her. She wants to be with Belmont. She wants to assist him." He ran a hand over his hair. "I'd gladly give her a divorce if that's what she wants, but she seems to be bound up in the Elsinore League intrigues. And I'd hate to see her tie herself to a man such as you've described Belmont."

  "I'm all for facing possibilities, Andrew," Malcolm said. "But they're still just that, possibilities. It's also possible Gelly's working against Belmont and the League."

  "Charlotte thinks so," Raoul said, "and she has a keen understanding."

  Hope shot through Andrew's gaze, only to be ruthlessly suppressed. "Why in God's name wouldn't she tell us?"

  "Probably because she knew we'd try to stop her," Malcolm said.

  "From going undercover with a secret group who are known to kill? By God, yes," Andrew said. "I'd try to stop you from doing so as well, though I'm not sure I'd succeed."

  "Point proved, I think," Harry said.

  "Malcolm's an agent," Andrew said. "Gelly isn't."

  Mélanie spread her fingers in her lap, those few moments at Sam's etched in her memory. "I saw Gelly jump through a window without hesitation yesterday, Andrew," she said.

  Andrew's gaze swung to her. "What are you suggesting? That Gelly's been spying for years? From Scotland? That someone—what—recruited her and trained her?"

  "Charlotte apparently thinks I did," Raoul said in a steady voice. "But I didn't. I wouldn't."

  Andrew stared at Raoul. "What if Belmont did?"

  "But then she'd be working for the League," Cordelia said.

  Andrew scraped a hand over his hair. "We don't know that she isn't. All you have are this Charlotte Leblanc's suspicions. Or she could have changed her mind and decided to work against them."

  "That sounds more possible," Malcolm said.

  Andrew's fingers tightened on his scalp. "Just a few weeks, and I don't feel I know her anymore. If—"

  He broke off as the door opened again, this time to admit Valentin. "I'm sorry to interrupt," Valentin said, "but this just came for Mr. Rannoch. It seems important."

  Malcolm took the letter Valentin was holding out and slit it open. "It's from Mrs. Hartley," he said. "Miranda Spencer's supposed brother has surfaced at the Barque of Frailty."

  Gerald Lumley scrubbed his hands over his face. "I can still scarcely believe she's gone. I didn't even see—not that I'd have wanted to see her like that, but—"

  "It can help, in an odd way," Harry said. "Seeing a person after they're dead. One can't avoid the reality. I know it was like that for my wife when her sister was killed."

  They were once again in the white-painted sitting room at the Barque of Frailty. After some debate in Berkeley Square, Malcolm and Harry had gone to see Lumley alone, as they had already established a degree of trust with Mrs. Hartley. Mrs. Hartley had greeted them with relief and left them alone in the sitting room with the shocked Gerald Lumley.

  Lumley met Harry's gaze. "I'd known her since we were children. That is—"

  "We were already quite sure you weren't Mrs. Spencer's brother," Malcolm said.

  Lumley flushed. "I wasn't. We were friends." He stared at Harry and Malcolm, his dark hair falling over his face "Oh, God. They don't know, do they? Her family?"

  "I don't think anyone knew their names to inform them," Malcolm said. He held Lumley's gaze with his own. "What name was Mrs. Spencer born with?"

  Lumley drew a breath, then went still, eyes wide with uncertainty.

  "I know," Malcolm said. "You've been protecting her, and that's very commendable in you. But she doesn't need protecting now. She needs justice. And we need to know the facts of her life if we're to learn who killed her."

  "You think she was killed because of who she was before she came here?" Lumley asked in shock.

  "I think it's a possibility. And we have to explore every conceivable possibility."

  Lumley drew another hard breath and nodded. "My father was—is—the vicar near her father's estate. In Surrey. Her father's name is Dormer. She was born Miranda Dormer."

  "Her father is Sir George Dormer, isn't he?" Malcolm said. Sir George was an avid hunter, not often to be found in town. Not overly political. Not a member of the Elsinore League. At least, his name wasn't on the list. His elder daughter had almost married Malcolm's friend Kit Montagu. And his estate was not far from Beverston's. So Beverston may have been telling the truth about having known Miranda Spencer—Dormer—as a girl. Though not about her father being a vicar.

  "Yes, Sir George is her father," Lumley confirmed. "Miranda is—was"—he shuddered—"his younger daughter. Always a bit of a rebel. Nothing too wild, but Sir George is the sort who likes ladies to be ladies, if you know what I mean."

  Malcolm exchanged a look with Harry, thinking of their wives. "Quite," Harry said.

  "Lady Dormer too. Also, she's not the sort to disagree with her husband. Miranda was over a decade my junior, but she played with my sisters, and I thought of her as almost another sister. I studied law and set up a practice in the village so I was about a good deal. Three and a half years ago I spent some time in Cornwall on a case. I returned to find Miranda gone. Her parents wouldn't talk about her. My parents wouldn't either. But my younger sister said the story was Miranda had run off to London with a man. Sir George went after her, then came back and said they weren't to speak of her again."

  For a moment Malcolm saw his sister's face. Different circumstances, but—"How did you find her?" he asked.

  "I didn't. Not right away. I couldn't think where to begin looking. I had to go back to my practice and—I suppose I was a coward."

  "You had little to go on," Malcolm said. "And no authority to ask questions where Miss Dormer was concerned."

  "I've often wondered if only I'd found her sooner—" Lumley's face twisted with the pain of unanswered questions. "As it was, it was over a year and then only because I was in London and saw her walking in Green Park. She looked away at first, went on walking, but when I ran after her, she turned round. She seemed glad to see me."

  "I'm sure she was pleased to see someone from her old life," Harry said.

  "Yes, I think so, only she said we couldn't talk in public. She told me to meet her at a coffeehouse, to let her go in first and she'd be at a table in the back. I half thought she wouldn't be there, but she was. She was working at Mrs. Hartley's by then. Admitted it straight out. Said she was fortunate in many ways."

  "Did she talk to you about her life before she came to Mrs. Hartley's?" Malcolm asked.

  "Very little." Lumley shifted in his chair. "She made me promise not to tell anyone where she was."

  "You mean her family?" Harry asked.

  "I think she was worried about them discovering her, yes," Lu
mley said. "But I also think she believed they had disowned her no matter what. She was chiefly worried about the man she had run off with. I gather he had been—not kind."

  His tone gave the words added weight. "She was afraid of him?" Malcolm asked.

  Lumley nodded. "He was a cad, of course, to have done what he did and not married her. But it went beyond that. She never quite said so, but I believe he was violent. I can't imagine her being so afraid of him otherwise."

  Images of Diana Smythe's distant gaze and the ironic turn of her mouth shot into Malcolm's memory. Married to her abuser, she hadn't even had a way to run. He wondered for a moment which was worse. "I begin to see why she found the Barque of Frailty a haven," he said.

  "Yes," Lumley sat forwards in his chair. "She never came right out and said so, but I had the sense her being there had been arranged."

  "Arranged?" Harry asked. "Daisy Singleton said they had a chance encounter in Covent Garden."

  "Yes, Daisy said that to me as well," Lumley said. "And I think Daisy believed it was chance. But I had the sense someone else had set up their meeting. That perhaps Mrs. Hartley knew about Miranda in advance."

  Malcolm and Harry exchanged a quick look. This might explain why Mrs. Hartley had taken in a girl she didn't know, without a known history, but it added a whole new layer of questions.

  "Miss Dormer knew Mrs. Hartley before she came here?" Harry asked.

  "I'm not sure. She's not—that is, I can't imagine she'd have met her before she left her family. But I don't know about her life in the year after she ran off."

  Malcolm sat forwards in his chair. "Her former lover whom she feared. Do you think he might have found her here?"

  Lumley's eyes widened. "You think he got in somehow and killed her?"

  "She feared him and she ended up dead," Malcolm said. "It's an obvious possibility. Though if Mrs. Hartley knew of Miss Dormer's past, I imagine she'd have been on her guard against this man."

  Lumley frowned. "Miranda was panicked about seeing him when I first found her. In all the years I've known her, I don't think I'd ever seen such fear in her eyes. But lately she actually seemed a bit less worried. She even suggested we go out for a walk once or twice when I visited, and to a coffeehouse just a fortnight ago—" He drew a harsh breath, the reality of that being one of the last times he'd seen her sinking in.

  "Miss Dormer had a jade pendant she wore a great deal," Malcolm said.

  "Yes, it had been a gift from her parents on her seventeenth birthday. Do you know what's become of it?"

  "No. Apparently it disappeared the night she died."

  Lumely frowned. "And that makes you think her former lover might have killed her?"

  "It suggests whoever killed her may be someone who knew her real identity. Had she said anything to suggest to you she'd seen anyone from her old life?"

  "No, nothing at all. Truly. As I said she'd seemed less concerned about encountering her former lover in recent months."

  "Miss Singleton accidentally overheard Miss Dormer say something to you about being 'sorry it happened' and that she 'wouldn't say more,'" Harry said.

  "Oh that," Lumley glanced away. "Miranda ran into someone I was at Oxford with. At the—here. She recognized the name and was afraid she'd betrayed to him that it was familiar. She didn't want to create any awkwardness for me. I wasn't worried—my only concern was that it be awkward for her or somehow betray where she living, but she didn't seem concerned."

  It was a plausible story and Lumley told it well, but something about the way he chose his words made Malcolm suspect it wasn't the truth. At least not all of it. "Did Miss Dormer ever talk about Lord Beverston?" Malcolm asked.

  Lumley shook his head. "No. She rarely mentioned anyone by name. Not the—people she knew here. Some of the other girls, that is, but not—"

  "I understand," Malcolm said. "Did she ever talk about where she went when she was away from the Barque of Frailty?"

  Lumley shook his head. "As I said, until recently, she tried to avoid going out as much as possible. Except to visit—" He drew in his breath again.

  "She knew someone else in London?" Malcolm asked. "Someone from her past? Or a man she loved?"

  "No. It's not what you think—" Lumley's mouth tightened as though against the press of confidences.

  "Anyone she knew may have information relating to her death," Harry said. "Even if that person doesn't realize the information could be important."

  Lumley looked at Harry, looked at Malcolm, glanced away. "Miranda didn't tell me until over a year after I found her. And then she swore me to secrecy. She has a son. He's almost three."

  Chapter 21

  Manon Caret Harleton looked up from the tiny bundle in her arms. "I heard rumors you were back, but I put them down to idle talk. I scarcely let myself believe you could really be here."

  "I'm sorry." Mélanie met Manon's gaze across the satinwood table. Laura, Cordy, and the children had come to Manon's with her, but they had gone into the nursery with Manon's daughters to admire Christmas presents so Mélanie and Manon could talk. "I'd have sent word, but we're trying to keep a very low profile."

  "I quite understand. I've told myself that if—when—I saw you again it would probably be much like this."

  Mélanie moved from her chair to the settee where Manon sat and bent over the bundle in Manon's arms. A small face peeped out of a pale green blanket that Mélanie had sent from Italy. His father's thick brown hair and his mother's long lashes, closed against sleep-flushed cheeks. "He's beautiful," Mélanie said.

  "I confess I'm inclined to think so, though I own to a distinct bias." Manon rocked her baby. "Crispin is besotted."

  "You look distinctly besotted yourself."

  A faint smile played about Manon's ironic mouth. "Perhaps. There's something about those early months after one gives birth that can turn the most sensible woman into a doting imbecile. I remember it being the same with the girls."

  "You still dote on the girls. You just don't admit it." Mélanie held out her arms. "May I?"

  Manon smiled and put the baby into Mélanie's arms.

  "It seems like yesterday that Jessica was this size," Mélanie said, settling baby Roderick against her. "And suddenly she's such a little person."

  Manon cupped her hand round her baby's head. "You're not back for good, are you?"

  "We can't get back to Italy soon enough to keep Malcolm happy."

  "Are you here because of Lord Carfax? I wouldn't have thought the news would travel quite this quickly."

  "No. Though now we're here we've been drawn into it. Malcolm's sister's run off."

  "His sister in Scotland?" Manon asked in surprise. "Doesn't she have—"

  "A nine-month-old." Mélanie looked down at Roderick.

  "New motherhood doesn't make every woman besotted," Manon said.

  "No. Though I'd swear she loves her child. And though she left with a man, it's more than a simple love affair."

  "'More than?'"

  "It may not be a love affair at all. I can't be sure. But she's been drawn into a tangle that would challenge a seasoned agent." Mélanie studied Manon in the soft light of the lamp. They were in an elegant room in Manon's new husband's house, but they were still the women they'd been when they spoke by the light of a spirit lamp in Manon's dressing room. "Have you heard anything about Julien lately?"

  "Good God, he's not the man Malcolm's sister ran off with?"

  "No. It's not quite that bad." Though Tommy could only be called slightly less dangerous than Julien.

  "But Julien's mixed up in this?"

  "He seems to be. I'm not quite sure how. Raoul just saw him at the Chat Gris and tried to draw him out but couldn't get far." Somehow Mélanie couldn't bring herself to share her suspicions about Raoul. If Manon knew anything, she was confident her friend would tell her. Unless Manon was working with Raoul. In which case, confiding in her would do no good save to set Raoul more on his guard in whatever he was doing.


  Manon's gaze showed no particular surprise. "The wonder would be if even Raoul could draw Julien out. The last I heard of Julien was when you told me he was here last summer. I've been on my guard ever since, and quite relieved not to see him."

  "We saw him in Italy in September. Or rather, I did. He seemed to be an ally then. As much as one can ever tell with Julien. But the Elsinore League were trying to hire him to kill Raoul."

  "Good God. Why? I mean, not that Raoul isn't formidable, but—"

  "Why now? Precisely what Raoul says. He claims the League really want to engage Julien's services for other reasons and refuses to take the threat seriously."

  Manon snorted. "That sounds very like him. I hope Laura's knocked some sense into him. He's going to be a father."

  "And he is taking it seriously." Mélanie thought back to their conversation just before they decided to leave Scotland. "But he's still—Raoul."

  "And always will be." Manon reached out to stroke Roderick's hair. "Which, in this changing world, is both comforting and rather terrifying."

  "Quite."

  Manon smiled down at the baby for a moment as he stirred in his sleep, then looked back at Mélanie. "It's odd. Here I am married to the father of my third child, and if not precisely accepted by society, accepted more places than I ever thought to be. And Laura—If anyone can face down society, I imagine she can. But she was born into it. Or at least on the edges of it. That must make it harder to be an outcast."

  "Laura's remarkably matter-of-fact. It's Raoul who worries."

  "That's both very surprising and not surprising at all. In the strangest way, he's always been overprotective."

  "That's remarkably perceptive. I'm not sure I ever had perspective where Raoul's concerned." And she still wasn't. Mélanie tucked the blanket folds more closely about Roderick. "Have you heard of the Wanderer?"

  Manon frowned in seemingly genuine puzzlement. "No. And I thought I was familiar with most code names, even if I didn't know whom they referred to."

  "This isn't a regular code name. In fact, it may be a what, not a who."