Mistress of Scandal

by Sara Bennett

  “She’s the poisoner!” Louisa said, all but jumping up and down. She looked as excited as a child at a birthday party.

  “Polly, go out there and tell everyone to go back to work,” Sebastian said impatiently, moving her toward the door with a hand around her plump arm. “And say nothing about what’s happened, do you hear me?”

  He seemed very much at home, Francesca thought, almost as if he’d been here many times before. And then she realized what name he had called Louisa.

  “Polly?”

  “That’s me.” Louisa curtsied an acknowledgment with a glint in her eyes.

  “Out,” Sebastian said. She gave an exaggerated sigh and vanished outside.

  “Is that Pretty Polly?” She took a step, felt her knees buckling, and hastily sat down.

  “I’m sorry,” Sebastian said. He looked sorry, too, but she wasn’t sure what he was sorry about: Polly being here with him, or the lies he had told her? Either way, Sebastian could wait, she thought, her gaze sliding to Maeve. There were more important matters to deal with.

  “Was it really Maeve?” she asked Dobson. “Did she really poison my mother’s coffee?”

  “That’s what we need to find out,” Sebastian answered for him. He came over to where Maeve was huddled in Dobson’s arms, her face hidden against his red coat. “What did you give her, Maeve?” he said almost gently. “What was it? Help us.”

  Maeve’s breathing grew louder. “They made me,” she said in a muffled voice. “My life has never been my own, not since I was nine years old. I was sold to her and she’s owned me ever since.” She shook violently, clinging to Dobson. “That’s why I was put to work here. So I could watch Madame, and then tell her what I heard and saw.”

  “Who do you mean by ‘her,’ Maeve?”

  Maeve gave a bitter laugh. “You already know,” she whispered. “It was her paid the apothecary’s boy to bring me the medicine, who told me what to do. I was to give her small doses, she said. To make it look natural.”

  “Maeve, what did you give Aphrodite?” Dobson asked her, the urgency plain in his gruff voice. “What you’ve done is very wrong, but you can help us now. You can make up for it. Please, tell us.”

  But Maeve heaved a deep sigh. “It’ll be too late anyway,” she said painfully. “You won’t believe me, but I tried to make it last as long as I could. I tried to keep her alive as long as I dared. But she knew, she always knows, and she sent me a message to say I was to get it over and done with.”

  “Goddamn it, tell me!”

  “Arsenic. I gave her arsenic.”

  Dobson went still, shock wiping his face blank, and then he was gone, the door slamming hard behind him. Francesca could hear him shouting for someone to go and fetch the doctor at once, and to tell him that Madame had been poisoned with arsenic.

  Without Dobson to support her, Maeve stumbled and fell against a chair, clutching at the back of it to keep herself upright.

  “Who told you to do this?” Francesca stared up at her, wanting only a name so that she could find this woman and punish her for the tragedy she’d caused. “Tell me her name.”

  “Don’t you know?” Maeve replied bitterly. “Didn’t he tell you?” with a nod at Sebastian.

  “Was it Mrs. March?” she asked, but that didn’t seem right, and she could tell from Maeve’s expression that the housekeeper wasn’t the one.

  “Mrs. March?” Sebastian repeated, puzzled.

  “My uncle’s housekeeper in Wensted Square. I saw Maeve speaking to Mrs. March,” she went on. “They were together in one of the rooms, and it was obvious Mrs. March didn’t want me to see who it was she was with. I didn’t realize it was Maeve then, not really, but now I know it was she.”

  “Why did you go to see Mrs. March?” he said, moving closer to Maeve, his voice threatening. “Was she owned by Mrs. Slater, too?”

  Francesca felt the room begin to spin around her. Mrs. Slater. Oh dear God, was that what it was about?

  Maeve made a choking noise, half laugh and half sob. “You’ll have to ask Mrs. March that, Mr. Thorne. I’ve said enough to get myself hanged and I’m not saying any more.”

  “I need to know.”

  “Why do you need to know?” Maeve shouted. “For Madame’s sake? Or for her?” pointing at Francesca.

  His brows drew together.

  “This is all your fault,” she wailed to Sebastian. “If you hadn’t come nosin’ around then I wouldn’t have had to…to…” Her voice failed her. She slid down onto the floor, and her sobbing was the only sound in the room.

  “We need to pay Mrs. March a visit.”

  Francesca saw that he was watching her. He’d lied to her, kept things from her, made her believe they were having an adventure when all the time he’d been twisting the truth. She thought she knew him, but now she realized she didn’t know him at all.

  “You want me to explain,” he went on, “and I will. I’ll talk on the way to Wensted Square. Will you come with me?”

  “I feel as if I’m dreaming,” she managed.

  “I’m sorry, it isn’t a dream. Mrs. Slater is alive and as dangerous as ever.”

  “When I think of her I think of a childhood monster. An ogress with long teeth and sharp claws. She isn’t human. She isn’t real.” She shuddered, then glanced at Maeve as she continued to weep. “What about…?”

  Sebastian went to open the door. “Polly!” he shouted. In a moment Pretty Polly was there, smiling expectantly. “Take Maeve somewhere safe and watch her. If she escapes it’ll be on your head.”

  Polly hauled Maeve to her feet, not ungently, and led her away.

  “She said arsenic,” Francesca whispered, when they were alone again.

  “Yes.”

  “She poisoned my mother, and yet she was sitting here with me and saying how much she loved her. How kind my mother had been to her.” Francesca was appalled by such duplicity.

  “Some people can justify anything. I’ve been in the shadows for so long that there isn’t much that shocks me. I’m more surprised when I find something good. Perhaps that’s why I want you, Francesca. I think if I bury myself in you, then some of your goodness will rub off on me.” He smiled and held out his hand. “Come on,” he said gently.

  She looked at it for a moment, and then she deliberately folded her arms tightly and walked past him with her head held high.

  With a sigh, Sebastian followed after her.

  Chapter 22

  “You lied to me.” It was the first thing she said as they sat in the dark and musty interior of the cab, bowling through the never sleeping streets of London. “You told me to trust you, and all the time you were lying.”

  “Yes. I’m sorry, but I had no choice. I was specifically asked not to tell you what I was doing in Yorkshire, and I had to abide by that person’s wishes.”

  “By ‘that person’ you mean my mother. She hired you, didn’t she?” Francesca’s voice was accusatory.

  “Yes, she did.”

  Francesca fell silent. A sudden shower of rain swept across the street in front of them, driving many of the pedestrians into shelter.

  “Let me explain,” he said, when it was clear she wasn’t going to ask him to. “Your mother wanted to find Mrs. Slater and her associates. She wanted you and your sisters to be safe; she was also tired of being afraid. I think she even knew that she was being watched. She was certainly aware that she was in danger. When she hired me, she accepted that the danger to her would increase, but she was willing to take that risk, Francesca. She wanted justice. She is a courageous woman.”

  “I see.” Francesca cleared her throat. “So when you were in Yorkshire it was because you were looking for Mrs. Slater?”

  “Yes. I met Hal, and he told me he knew someone who was a friend of hers. I believed him. But it was a trap, and I nearly died. If it hadn’t been for you…”

  “Then you went after Hal again?”

  “And this time it was Jed who tried to kill us both. But Hal
told me enough for me to be able to find one of Mrs. Slater’s houses in Mallory Street. The very same one from which you saved Rosie. That’s why I was so concerned for your safety, Francesca.”

  “I see that now.” She watched a hackney go rushing by, the driver standing up in his coat of many capes. “Why are we going to see Mrs. March? How can she be involved in all of this?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “She hates me,” Francesca added thoughtfully. “From the first moment we met, I’ve felt as if she resents me for being here. I thought it was because she’s in love with my uncle, or with what he stands for.”

  “We’ll find out the truth,” he promised her.

  “Why did Dobson want me to sit with Maeve? Why did you send Polly in while I was there?”

  “That was my idea,” he apologized. “I thought you could draw Maeve out, make her comfortable, perhaps even make her feel guilty. You being there was almost like Aphrodite being there, reminding her of what she’d done.”

  Francesca nodded. “Sebastian, did you know your father?”

  The change in subject was surprising, but he answered her anyway. “Yes, I did.”

  “Aphrodite told me tonight that my father is dead. So I will never get to meet him or know what he was like. I didn’t think I wanted to, I told myself I didn’t want to, but now that the choice has been taken away from me…She said he wrote a letter about me and all the things he was planning for me. His name was Tommy.”

  He took her in his arms, but she sat there stiff and unyielding.

  “You and I were a mistake. By following my heart I’ve only made everything worse. I have to stop it.”

  “Francesca, my darling girl…”

  “No.” She pushed him away.

  They said nothing more until the cab reached Wensted Square and drew up outside the Tremaine house. Sebastian helped her down, asking the driver to wait, and then went to sound the knocker.

  There was a delay before anyone answered, and when the door was finally opened the servant looked half asleep. “Fetch Mrs. March,” Sebastian said, before Francesca could speak.

  The girl looked uneasy. “She’s in bed, sir. She don’t like to be woken once she’s in bed.”

  “Fetch her anyway. And fetch Mr. Tremaine while you’re at it.”

  She looked surprised, but Francesca nodded for her to do as she was told, and she hurried away. Francesca led him into a masculine-looking library, where the shelves were full of leather-bound books, and there was a large portrait hanging over the mantel. It seemed to capture her attention, because she went to look up at it.

  “I’d forgotten this was here,” she said. “It’s my uncle and his brother when they were boys.”

  Sebastian cast a glance over it. They were both dark-haired, both pale-eyed, but whereas one of them was smiling and open-faced, the other was solemn and serious.

  Just then there were footsteps behind them, and a chilly voice said, “What is the meaning of this?”

  Mrs. March in her night attire and a shawl was thin and tall, with a haughty expression. And Francesca was right, he thought, as he watched the woman’s gaze fix on her. The housekeeper did resent her.

  “I want to ask you some questions, Mrs. March,” Sebastian said in a level voice, and was glad when her eyes moved on to him and away from Francesca.

  “And you are?” she said imperiously.

  “My name is Sebastian Thorne.”

  Recognition flickered in her eyes before she could stop it, and something else besides. Was it fear? Plenty of people were afraid of him, and often for no other reason than that they’d heard of him and what he did. Or was it anger? Was Mrs. March simply angry with him and Francesca for waking her up in the middle of the night?

  “I’ll go and get Mr. Tremaine,” she said, half turning to leave.

  “He’s already been called,” Francesca told her. “He should be down any moment.”

  “Besides,” Sebastian said smoothly, “you may prefer to answer my questions in private.”

  She hesitated, and he could see a sharp mind at work. “Very well.” She shrugged. “What is it you want to ask me, Mr. Thorne?”

  She thought she was superior to him. She believed she could outwit him. He could read it in her eyes, in the way she held herself. He’d met people like her before.

  “Madame Aphrodite has been poisoned with arsenic,” he said baldly, hoping to shock her into some sort of admission.

  But she was ready for him. “Oh? Well, a woman in her profession must make a great many enemies. Jealous wives, disappointed lovers. What can one expect? I hope you don’t think I can help you capture the culprit?”

  “No, Mrs. March, you misunderstand. We already have the poisoner in our custody.”

  She was rattled, and she grew wary. “Then I suppose it is an ex-lover or a disgruntled client?”

  “No, it is a protégée of Aphrodite’s called Maeve.”

  Mrs. March said nothing, waiting, but her eyes were watchful.

  Sebastian might have waited, too, played her along a little longer, but Francesca wasn’t used to the game. She was too impatient for the truth.

  “I know you know who Maeve is, Mrs. March,” she said, angry and upset. “I saw her here. With you. Why are you pretending not to know her? What was she doing in this house? You must tell us immediately!”

  “I don’t have to tell you anything,” Mrs. March retorted, leaning forward so that her face was very close to Francesca’s. She seemed to tremble with malevolence. “What are you but a whore’s daughter? A bastard!”

  Francesca stared back at her, and Sebastian could see she was shocked.

  But her lack of response only made Mrs. March more volatile. Her voice went on and on, and she didn’t seem able to stop. “Why are you given such privileges? Why do we have to do as you say? ‘Yes, miss,’ ‘no, miss.’ It’s not as if you’re any better than the rest of us. Why should you have money to spend on new clothes and pretty things? It isn’t fair!”

  “You have overstepped the mark,” Francesca whispered, pale and trembling with emotion.

  “Oh dear, have I?” she mocked. “But it’s the truth, isn’t it? Your mother is a high-class whore and your father—” but as if realizing at last that she really had gone too far, Mrs. March closed her mouth.

  But it was too late. “What do you know of my father?” Francesca demanded.

  “Nothing. I know nothing about him.”

  She was lying. Sebastian smelled it, and her fear. Her hatred of Francesca had led her to say far too much, and now she was frightened.

  “Is it true, Mrs. March,” he said, “that you’re one of Mrs. Slater’s girls?”

  A tremor seemed to run through her, under her skin.

  Francesca was too shocked to notice. “Mrs. Slater! How could you be associated with that dreadful woman? How could anyone?”

  “What dreadful woman is this?” asked a male voice.

  Mrs. March gave a faint cry of relief and turned, almost stumbling in her eagerness to reach his side. “Mr. Tremaine, sir,” she babbled. “I’m so glad you’re here.” And she cast a look back over her shoulder toward Sebastian, a look that told him that she was saved and now everything would be all right.

  Chapter 23

  “Uncle William.”

  Francesca didn’t move, watching him warily. After their earlier clash in the doorway to this very room, she was not eager to welcome his arrival on the scene. Certainly not as eager as Mrs. March.

  “Mr. Tremaine,” Mrs. March said with all the delight of a school tattletale, “this man is trying to make out I have done something wrong. Tell him to leave. I won’t be questioned in this way, I won’t!”

  “Hush, Mrs. March,” William said with a frown. “I can’t say I’m particularly happy at being woken at this hour. What is this all about? Francesca?”

  “Why are you asking her?” Mrs. March burst out.

  William looked at her. She seemed to recollect herself, falli
ng silent.

  “Uncle William,” Francesca said, “this is Mr. Thorne.”

  William gave Sebastian the full force of his disapproving stare. “Oh? And who is Mr. Thorne? What are you doing here at this time of night with my niece? Explain yourself, sir!”

  If Uncle William thought to intimidate Sebastian as he did others, then he was mistaken. Francesca watched with enjoyment as Sebastian smiled and answered confidently. “Oh, I intend to, Mr. Tremaine. I have been hired by Madame Aphrodite to find the woman who kidnapped her daughters.”

  William gave a grunt of amusement. “Have you now? Bit late for that, isn’t it?” His gaze strayed to Mrs. March and back again. “What are you doing here? Shouldn’t you be out looking?”

  Mrs. March gave a dutiful laugh, but her heart wasn’t really in it.

  “I’m here because I think it possible that Mrs. March can help us in our search.”

  William looked surprised. “My housekeeper is connected to Mrs. Slater? I hardly think—”

  “There has been a spy in Aphrodite’s Club, informing Mrs. Slater of what goes on there. I suppose Mrs. Slater was always aware that one day Aphrodite would begin to search, and she wanted to be sure she knew in advance. We have captured that spy, Mr. Tremaine.”

  “Well, then, if you have her, what do you want here?”

  “Because the spy—Maeve—has been seen visiting Mrs. March. Now, you’d have to agree that it would make sense for Mrs. Slater to have a spy in your household as well as the club, in case there was any news about your sister and her family that needed to be passed on.”

  William flared up. “What you are saying is preposterous! Mrs. March is a honest and diligent woman. I have no doubt as to her loyalty to me and my family.”

  Mrs. March glowed. “Thank you, sir,” she murmured.

  “Then tell us why Maeve was here?” Francesca cried. “If it means nothing, if this is all a mistake, tell us!”

  “I didn’t know her name,” Mrs. March retorted. “She came and told me she had a message from my mother and I let her in, but it was a lie. She didn’t know my mother. So I sent her on her way and never saw her again.”