A Perilous Undertaking

by DEANNA RAYBOURN

  “What do you want of me, Your Royal Highness?”

  As if sensing my mood, she leaned forward, clasping her hands together. “I am desperate, Miss Speedwell. And I have no one else to whom I can turn.”

  “What is the trouble?”

  She spread her hands. “I hardly know where to begin.”

  I said nothing. I might have encouraged her, coaxed the story from her, at least at the beginning, but I was conscious of a curious resentment and I held my tongue, forcing her to tell the story of her own accord.

  “One of my dearest friends is dead,” she managed finally.

  “I am sorry for your loss—” I began.

  She fluttered her hands impatiently. “I am reconciled to her death. It is not on her behalf that I have come.” She paused, fixing me with a steady gaze. “Are you familiar with the Ramsforth case?”

  Whatever I had expected of her, it was not this. The Ramsforth case had dominated the news for some months. The facts were simple, but the salacious details had ensured that the affair was splashed across the newspapers.

  “I know a little,” I told her.

  “Then let me fill in the gaps. Miles Ramsforth was accused of murdering his mistress, an artist by the name of Artemisia.”

  “Your friend?” I hazarded.

  Her lips trembled, but she brought the show of emotion under control immediately. “Yes. She was a brilliant painter, and Mr. Ramsforth engaged her to create a mural at his home, Littledown, in Surrey. They were already acquainted before the commission, but during the time she spent at his home, they became lovers, and in due course, Artemisia conceived his child. She was four or five months gone when she finished the mural.”

  She paused a moment as if to gather her courage to finish the story. “To unveil the piece, Mr. Ramsforth hosted an entertainment at Littledown to which many people in the artistic community, including me, were invited. During the party, Artemisia was murdered. Mr. Ramsforth discovered her, and unfortunately for him, he was found in his bedchamber with her dead body in his arms, his clothes soaked in her blood. She had been dead a very little time—perhaps half an hour. He could provide no alibi, and that fact, coupled with Artemisia’s pregnancy, suggested to the police that he must have taken her life.”

  “For what reason?” I asked, curious in spite of myself.

  “Mr. Ramsforth is married,” she returned coldly. “The police believe he wanted to rid himself of her and her child before his wife discovered the state of affairs. His defense was naturally hampered by his inability to explain his whereabouts during the time of the murder, and he was found guilty and sentenced to death. He will hang next week.”

  I pursed my lips. “An intriguing tale, to be certain, Your Royal Highness, but I fail to see what part I am to play.”

  “Miles Ramsforth did not murder Artemisia!” she burst out, her iron control deserting her. She twisted her fingers together, the diamonds cutting into her flesh.

  “How do you know?”

  “I cannot say,” she replied with a mulish set to her mouth. “Lives would be ruined if I came forward.”

  “What is that against a man’s very existence?” I asked.

  “I will not be the subject of impertinent questions, Miss Speedwell,” she told me. “I am the best judge of what must be done.”

  “And what must be done?”

  “You must find the murderer.”

  I gaped at her, wondering for one moment which of us had gone mad. “You cannot be serious.”

  “I am. A man’s life—an innocent man’s life—rests in your hands.”

  “It most certainly does not,” I returned stoutly. “If he has an alibi, let him explain himself. If he is truly innocent, then whatever horrors the truth will unleash, they cannot be worse than his death.”

  “You would not say that if you knew,” she told me, sudden tears filling her eyes. I might have stood then and taken my leave of her, walking out of that room and her life as easily as I had come. I might have forgot what she asked of me and never thought of her again. But for those tears. Her training, her royal blood, her position—all had failed her, and in that moment she was merely a woman who suffered. She stood on the edge of some unnameable abyss, and that I could understand. I had seen the abyss myself.

  “Then tell me,” I urged.

  “I cannot,” she said, shaking her head. “Miss Speedwell, I know I have gone about this quite badly. But you must understand, I want justice for them both. Artemisia was my friend, as is Miles. She was no encumbrance to him—he loved her! But he would go to his grave rather than speak the truth and ruin more lives, and I must honor that. Can you not see the nobility in his sacrifice?”

  “I see the stupidity in it,” I said, but my resolve was weakening. She must have sensed it, for she leaned forward suddenly, covering my hands with her own. They were strong, those sculptress’s hands, and warm, too, and as I stared down at them, I realized that for the first time within my memory, I was being touched by a woman of my own blood. I realized, too, that she understood exactly what she was doing and that she meant to play upon my isolation, my otherness. They would never accept me as one of them, but she would dangle the possibility in front of me, as enticing as a lure to a rising carp. And possibly as fatal.

  “Miss Speedwell—Veronica,” she said softly, “please do this for me. I have no right to command, so I beg instead. Sir Hugo will not listen to me. He knows the investigation was badly handled. It would be an embarrassment for the Metropolitan Police to admit they were wrong. He is satisfied that Miles should hang for this, but if he does, an injustice will happen—a terrible injustice that you have the power to mend. Could you live with yourself if you did not even try?”

  I hesitated, and with the unerring instinct of a hunter, she went for the kill. “I will not insult you by speaking of money. Sir Hugo told me of your pride, and I understand it. But I do have something to offer you for your services.”

  “What?” I demanded.

  The grip on my hands tightened. “Your father.”

  I pulled my hands away sharply. “I require nothing from the Prince of Wales.”

  “I know,” she said, her voice gentle, coaxing, insidious even. “But are you not curious? Would you not like to meet him face-to-face? I can arrange it. He will do it for me. Think of it—a chance to sit and talk to him, the father you have never known. And for nothing more than asking a few questions. It is a fair bargain, I think.”

  I gave her a long, searching look. I would do as she asked; we both knew that. She thought she persuaded me with her talk of family feeling and my father, but that was not why I helped her. Hatred, as it happens, can be as strong an inducement as the gentler emotions.

  So I gave her a smile that hid a thousand things and settled back in my chair. “Very well. Tell me more.”

  Princess Louise paused a moment, her relief a palpable thing between us. Now that I had indicated I would act as her puppet, she dropped much of her pretense, speaking candidly. “I have always endeavored to do my duty to my family and to my country,” she began slowly. “But as you have observed, I am an artist. As such, I have insisted upon the freedom to make friends amongst like-minded people. The cage in which I have lived my life may be gilt, but it is nonetheless a cage,” she said, her lips twisting into a thin, humorless smile. “And I have beat myself bloody against the bars. Over time, I have won certain concessions, my work and my friends among them. Artemisia was one of the dearest of these friends.”

  “It is a curious name.”

  Her expression was touched with nostalgia. “An affectation. Her real name was Maud Eresby. She thought it too prosaic for an artist, so she chose another. Are you familiar with the work of Artemisia Gentileschi?”

  “I am not.”

  She shrugged. “Few people are, and more is the pity. She was a painter of the Italian Bar
oque school, and she counted Michelangelo among her admirers. She often chose women for the subjects of her paintings—Judith, Bathsheba, Delilah. Her paintings are unflinching and powerful. My Artemisia aspired to the same, so she took the name.”

  “How did you meet her?”

  “I presume you know the name Sir Frederick Havelock?” There was hardly a soul in England who didn’t. He was the most accomplished artist of the age, lionized for his exquisite compositions and lavish and unexpected use of color. He had founded a new school of art, one that was decidedly English and distinctly modern, with influences of Aestheticism and Neoclassicism. He was notoriously bad-tempered and reclusive, preferring the company of a handful of chosen acolytes who lived with him in the Holland Park mansion of his own design. Seldom seen in public, he had matured from the enfant terrible who once tried to drown Dante Gabriel Rossetti to an eccentric legend bent on creating his own utopia.

  “He is almost as famous as your mother,” I remarked rudely.

  Princess Louise overlooked the comment and went on. “Artemisia was one of Sir Frederick’s protégées. She lived at Havelock House and she met Miles Ramsforth at one of Sir Frederick’s entertainments. The gentlemen are brothers-in-law, and Miles has always relied upon Sir Frederick to provide him with introductions to artists to whom he might offer patronage.”

  “How exactly are the gentlemen connected?”

  “Sir Frederick was married to Augusta Troyon, who died some years ago. Miles is married to her younger sister, Ottilie. They are still quite close to Sir Frederick, even after Augusta Havelock’s death.”

  “And it is because of his marriage to this Ottilie that the police believe Miles was driven to kill Artemisia?”

  She waved an impatient hand. “And that is where they have the wrong of it! Ottilie and Miles have a very sensible arrangement. Theirs is a friendship, a partnership of sorts. They married because Miles had an estate falling down about his ears and a bloodline that stretches back eight hundred years. Ottilie brought him a biscuit-manufacturing fortune that her uncle made. They have used her money and his connections to rebuild Littledown and travel the world, collecting art and antiquities. They have had a very pleasant life together, and Ottilie Ramsforth is far too reasonable a person to care about the occasional peccadillo in her husband’s private life.”

  “Occasional peccadillo?” I lifted my brows in inquiry. “So there have been others?”

  A fleeting smile touched her lips. “Have you seen a photograph of Miles? No? Just as well, the newspapers do not do him justice. He is a very charming fellow—not precisely handsome, you understand. His features are not nearly regular enough for that. I should never dream of sculpting him,” she added with a frown. “There is something elusive about his expressions, they are so changeable. But he is a good friend. He listens, you see. And so few men know how.”

  Her gaze slid from mine and her expression took on a faraway, slightly disgruntled look. I wondered if she were thinking of her husband. By all accounts, the Marquess of Lorne was not the most attentive of husbands.

  “And Ottilie Ramsforth didn’t mind,” I prodded.

  Princess Louise roused herself, turning her attention back to me. “Of course not. She did what all of us do—she redecorated her house or bought a new hat or took a trip to Baden. She knew better than to take it seriously, but of course you cannot explain these things to the authorities. The investigators of the Metropolitan Police suffer from a want of imagination. They assume a man like Miles Ramsforth would wish to hide Artemisia and her pregnancy from his wife, and it made a tidy story for them. They did not trouble to look further. The verdict was precisely the one they expected.” She paused, and when she spoke again, it was with real bitterness. “I spoke to Sir Hugo—at least I tried. But he believes artists are all vagabonds and wastrels. He could not say as much, not to me, but his attitude was plain. He had no wish to expend his resources upon searching for the murderer of one insignificant girl when he has the whole of the Empire under his care and a viable suspect ready to hang.” That was stretching the truth a bit, I reflected. Sir Hugo was merely the head of the special department within the Metropolitan Police that handled matters touching the royal family. But it required little imagination to believe he saw his own role as much larger.

  “Did he suggest you bring your problem to me?” I asked.

  She shook her head slowly. “Not at first. He tried to dissuade me. But I knew of your . . . efforts . . . this past summer to uncover the truth in the matter of your own identity. And I knew that Sir Hugo considered you beholden to us.”

  “Beholden!” I bridled.

  “Obliged,” she said, gentling her tone. “He told me if I insisted upon pursuing this matter, I could not retain a private inquiry agent. It was too dangerous. But he agreed that you would understand the need for discretion—perhaps better than anyone.”

  “Sir Hugo has a more refined sense of humor than I would have guessed,” I replied. I considered all she had told me for a long moment, and the silence stretched between us, punctuated only by the snapping of the fire and the low ticking of the mantel clock. I thought of my mother, the beautiful actress who had married in secret and borne a love child, only to have her sweet prince marry another—a woman of his own class who would fill his royal nursery with pedigreed babies while his firstborn grew up motherless. And I thought of the desperation my mother must have felt when she realized she had been left all alone with me, of the black despair that must have driven her final, fatal act.

  “Very well,” I said as I rose. “I will be in touch when I have discovered what I can.”

  Her expression was one of stunned surprise. “But we have not discussed terms,” she protested.

  “Terms? My terms are these: I will work with my associate, Stoker. You may find him in Debrett’s under the heading ‘the Honourable Revelstoke Templeton-Vane, third son of the sixth Viscount Templeton-Vane.’ We will bring no one else into our confidence. We will do everything in our power to bring these matters to resolution.”

  “I do not like it,” she said, “but I suppose I have little choice in the matter.”

  “None whatsoever,” I agreed.

  She lifted her head and looked coolly down her nose at me. I returned the stare, and it pleased me when she looked away first. When she spoke her voice was marginally warmer. “You must not think me ungrateful. I realize I am asking something quite unorthodox and possibly dangerous of you.”

  I shrugged. “I am no stranger to either. In fact, some would say I actively seek the dangerous and unorthodox.”

  The princess looked me over slowly. “I cannot make you out, Miss Speedwell.”

  “Do not try, Your Royal Highness,” I advised.

  CHAPTER

  4

  The princess ended our interview by scribbling instructions on how to contact her when we had learnt anything of interest. “I think it best if we do not meet more than we can possibly help,” she told me.

  “My thoughts exactly.”

  “I will dine tonight with Sir Frederick and Ottilie. I shall explain to them that I have asked you to make inquiries.”

  “You did not ask them prior to speaking with me?” I was a little surprised at her temerity, but I ought not to have been. She eyed me with hauteur.

  “I am not accustomed to asking permission before I take action,” she informed me. “A few times each month, Sir Frederick hosts entertainments at Havelock House to introduce the public to his ‘pets.’ The next is tomorrow evening. I suggest you begin your investigations there. He and Ottilie will be expecting you, and I have no doubt you will enjoy their full cooperation.”

  “You will not attend?”

  She flinched but hid it well. “I think it best if I keep my distance publicly.”

  I went to the door, but her voice, imperious as an empress’s, called.

  “Miss Sp
eedwell?”

  I turned. “Yes, Your Royal Highness?”

  “If you are not successful, Miles Ramsforth will hang in one week. Do not forget that.”

  I did not curtsy, and I think she had learned in our short acquaintance not to expect it of me. I merely inclined my head and took my leave.

  I found Lady Cordelia perched on an armchair outside the room, her expression one of faint chagrin. She rose at the sight of me. “Should I apologize? That was rather an ambush.”

  “But an intriguing one.” I grinned to show her I bore her no ill will.

  We descended the stairs, and I heard the pleasant hum of conversation from the large parlor. There was the rattle of crockery punctuated with laughter. Two women were arguing fiercely over the best fixatives for photographs, but apart from that it was a decidedly cozy environment.

  The portress brought our things and when we had settled ourselves into the Beauclerk carriage, I turned to Lady Cordelia. “Do you know why she wanted to speak to me?”

  She shrugged. “Royalty are eccentric, and Princess Louise is more eccentric than most. She is not an easy woman to understand. I suppose she was interested in you after our conversation.”

  “You spoke to her about me?”

  “Yesterday. She told me she had heard of my brother’s plans to organize his collections and asked me about the experts we had engaged. I told her about you and about Stoker.”

  Little wonder Her Royal Highness had not balked at the mention of his name. Lady Cordelia would have been fulsome in her praise of him for they were friends of long standing.

  Lady C. went on. “She asked many questions about you, and my replies only seemed to kindle her interest further. She pressed me to bring you along today for an introduction but was quite adamant that I not disclose to you her identity. She wanted to meet you incognita.”

  “Did she tell you why?”

  Lady C. waved a dismissive hand. “She often moves anonymously amongst her artist friends. A pointless affectation, really. Everyone ends up discovering who she is in the end, and those who don’t—well, if she isn’t treated with deference, she can be quite peremptory.”