“What is that, my lord?”
“He is clever, very clever indeed. And certainly very dangerous. Everyone seems to have been fooled by him.”
“Don’t you suspect anyone of hiding anything?” asked Benjamin.
“No, I don’t. This man managed to hoodwink the king himself, for God’s sake! How can I doubt anyone else when they say they were utterly taken in by him?”
The duke did not mention that he himself had been taken in by Sir Anthony. The thought that he had actually recruited the man as a spy, had financed his journey to Rome, had even no doubt paid for the wine that the devious bastard had quaffed with the Pretender’s son while they had laughed at the gullibility of the Hanoverian spymaster, enraged him beyond belief. He downed the brandy in one and handed the glass back to his clerk.
“Of Elizabeth Cunningham we know a great deal more, of course,” he continued. “We have an excellent description of her. Lord Daniel claims that her mother was a Jacobite whore, in which case it’s possible she is colluding with the man, but we have no proof of that at present, and young Highbury hates her so much for rejecting him that his word alone is not to be trusted. It is possible she has been abducted by the man Anthony, even murdered, perhaps. Certainly that is what her female cousins seem to think. Hopefully her brother will come up with some more information with regard to this.”
“What about the servants?” asked Benjamin, refilling the glass and wondering whether he dare ask if he could partake too. He glanced slyly at the duke’s angry countenance and decided against it.
“Anthony’s servants have all disappeared with him, by which I assume they are implicated. Anthony or whatever his name is, has quite rightly assumed that the aristocracy take no account of menials. All I know is that he was partial to employing Scots, which leads me to the conclusion that he was certainly a spy rather than a confidence trickster. One of them is called Jim, another, who was once surprised in a half-naked state by Isabella Cunningham, was called Aber-something. And his cook had red hair and very small feet, with a corn on her little toe. Yes, you can have one.”
Benjamin looked round.
“A brandy. Help yourself. To a small one. The last night Anthony was seen, his cook came to the house in a terrible state, barefoot, presumably to tell him he’d been discovered. Mrs Cunningham was concerned about the state of her feet. No, I don’t think they’re holding anything back, not when they take such great pains to divulge pointless details like that. He’s covered his tracks really well. Even his wigmaker doesn’t know the colour of the man’s hair. Apparently Sir Anthony found it too tiresome to have his head measured and instead sent an old, but snug-fitting wig for the maker to use as a pattern. I can only hope that Elizabeth’s servants, or rather ex-servants, were more observant. Optimist that I am, I hold out some hope that Miss Browne, who I am to interview in ten minutes, will be more enlightening. She is my last hope.”
His last hope appeared on the dot at half-past ten, which pleased the duke, who was a stickler for punctuality. She was soberly dressed and clean, and what was even more pleasing, appeared very frightened at being summoned by such a great man. Terrified, in fact. She was white, and the hands holding her tiny reticule were trembling. He decided not to attempt to put her at her ease. Not yet, at any rate.
“Ah, Miss Browne,” he said, carefully scrutinising a paper in front of him on which was written his desired menu for that night’s dinner, which he had forgotten to give to his housekeeper before leaving home that morning. “Sarah Browne.”
“Yes, my lord,” she said in a small voice, curtseying.
Newcastle looked at the paper again, as though it contained a wealth of incriminating information about her.
“You are the proprietor of a small hairdressing establishment, which I believe was funded entirely by your mistress, when she married.” He looked sternly up at her.
“Yes, my lord,” she said again. She made no attempt to look at the paper in front of him, which probably meant she could not read. Which was just as well. Roast beef, potatoes, carrots. A milk pudding…
“Do you know the whereabouts of your mistress at this moment?” he asked.
“No, my lord,” the girl said faintly. She looked as though she were about to swoon.
“Sit down,” the duke conceded curtly, pointing to a chair. “Now, I take it from your countenance that you know why I have called you here.”
“Yes, my lord,” she said. “At least I think so, my lord.”
“I need to know as much as possible about the man you knew as Sir Anthony Peters. Are you prepared to co-operate fully with me? It will go ill with you if you are not.”
“Yes, my lord,” she replied submissively.
“Good. As you are no doubt aware, this man disappeared from his house on the eleventh of this month. We now know that he is not Sir Anthony Peters, and that such a person does not exist. We believe he may be a Jacobite spy, and a very dangerous and ruthless individual. What can you tell me about this man?”
At least she couldn’t answer yes or no to this question.
“I don’t know, my lord,” she said, setting the duke’s teeth on edge. “He was always very kind to me, a real gentleman.”
“Yes, I’m sure he was. Tell me what he looked like.”
She thought for a moment, and the duke, assuming she was trying to recollect the man rather than wondering how little she could get away with divulging, allowed her the time.
“He was quite tall, and he had well-shaped legs,” she began after a minute. “He always wore violet cologne, and his clothes…”
“Yes, yes, I know all about his clothes,” interrupted Newcastle impatiently. “What about his hair, his facial features? How old was he?”
“I’m sure he never told me how old he was, my lord,” she said. “I never saw his hair because he always wore a wig, but he had blue eyes, my lord.”
And a dimple at the side of his mouth, high cheekbones, a long straight nose and a strong chin. His mouth curves up at the corners as though he’s always about to smile. He’s probably very handsome, under all the paint. Murdo is probably related to him, and Jim almost certainly is.
“That’s all, my lord,” she said demurely. “I really didn’t know him very well. I left Miss Elizabeth’s employment when she married.”
“Ah, yes, I will come to that. When she married, she set you up in your own business, did she not?”
“Yes, my lord.”
“Why did she do that? It is not normal for a servant to be so generously dealt with.”
“I don’t know, my lord. Miss Elizabeth was always very generous. I suppose she thought I was a good maid to her. Maybe she was grateful to me.”
Aha. The duke leaned forward eagerly.
“Grateful to you? For what?”
The girl seemed to relax a little. She took on the sly self-important air insignificant people do when they’re about to divulge a great secret.
“Well, when Lord Daniel, that’s the Earl of Highbury’s son, my lord, when he proposed to Miss Elizabeth, she refused him.”
“Yes, I know that,” said the duke. “What’s that got to do with it?”
“He didn’t take very kindly to it, my lord, and he tried to force her to marry him. I was with her in the coach when he took her. He threw me out and I ran home to tell Sir Anthony, so he could rescue her. I’m sure she was very grateful for that, my lord, because she didn’t want to marry Lord Daniel, and he threatened to cut her fingers off if she wouldn’t! She told me so herself, my lord, when she got home.”
The girl sat back smugly. The duke sighed audibly. All this stupid chit was doing was casting doubt on Lord Daniel’s character, and therefore the veracity of his evidence. There was clearly no point in pursuing this line. He changed tack.
“What about Sir Anthony’s servants?” he said. “Do you remember anything about them?”
The girl’s brow furrowed.
“No, not really, my lord. I never went to the h
ouse, you understand, not once I left Miss Elizabeth’s service. They wouldn’t invite me to any of their evenings, them being so grand, and me just a servant.”
“But they did visit your establishment, did they not, from time to time?”
“Oh, yes, my lord, both Sir Anthony and his wife honoured me with regular visits.”
“Well, then, did they not have a coachman?”
“Yes, I suppose so, my lord. He stayed with the coach.”
God, this was tiring.
“Do you remember anything about him, anything at all? His name, what he looked like, anything?”
Sarah screwed up her face, thinking hard, of Murdo, the last time he had visited her, what he had said and done. If she closed her eyes, she could picture every detail of him, could feel his dark hair soft under her fingers, could smell the clean male smell of him, could hear his soft deep Scottish voice, full of sadness as he said goodbye to her.
She did not close her eyes.
“No, my lord. I’m sorry, my lord. I never really saw him, my lord.”
Five minutes after the Browne girl had left, Benjamin poked his head tentatively round the door.
“Do not call me ‘my lord’,” warned the duke. “I’ve been my lorded enough in the last half hour to last me a lifetime.”
Benjamin, who had been about to do just that, amended his opening sentence.
“Did the girl have anything useful to say?”
“No. Our man has well-shaped legs. She knows nothing about the servants. She is genuinely fond of Elizabeth Cunningham, and was absolutely horrified both at the thought that her mistress might have been abducted and killed by the man, and at the thought that she might have gone willingly with him. She was very eager to please, but useless, just like everyone else.”
“Did you mention the reward, my l…?” faltered the clerk.
“Yes. I thought she might be brought by greed to remember something. A thousand pounds is a lot of money to someone like her. She thought for a good few minutes after that, and then told me that Sir Anthony sometimes used lavender cologne, when he could not obtain violet.”
“What do we do now?”
“Hope that Richard Cunningham can come up with something. And if not, then wait for the man to make a slip, or for Elizabeth Cunningham to surface, if she’s not already dead. There’s no more we can do.”
* * *
“The bastard!” raged Edwin, pacing the drawing room. “How could he? He was supposed to be my friend!”
“For God’s sake, Edwin, calm down,” Caroline said. She was sitting on a chair, Freddie on her knee. The child was watching his father’s progress up and down the room with some alarm. In a minute his face would pucker, and in another minute he would no doubt start to cry. “You’re frightening Freddie,” she said.
Edwin looked at his son, and his face softened slightly. He sat down on the edge of the chair.
“How can you sit there so calmly when my whole career is in jeopardy?” he asked.
“I don’t believe it is in jeopardy, that’s why,” replied Caroline. “You didn’t know about Anthony. No one did. You can hardly be accused of doing so.”
“No, but I can be accused of being too stupid to see that the man was an impostor! Nobody wants a gullible politician representing them.”
“No one wants a gullible king ruling them, either. Or a gullible prince commanding the army. He fooled everyone, Edwin. They can’t accuse you of being stupid without accusing everyone else, from the king down, and they’re not going to do that.”
Sometimes his wife’s logic was infuriating. But it was comforting too. Edwin sat back in the chair.
“Maybe you’re right,” he admitted grudgingly. “But I feel stupid, all the same. How could he have pretended to be a friend when all the time he knew that the only reason he was interested in me was for what I could tell him? For over three years he’s been laughing at us! It’s unbearable!”
“I don’t think he has,” Caroline said unexpectedly.
“What?” cried Edwin, still volatile. Freddie’s lip trembled. “Are you telling me you don’t think Anthony’s a spy?”
“No, I’m not telling you that at all,” said Caroline, standing up and dropping Freddie in his father’s lap, in the hope that this would render Edwin calmer. “I’m saying I don’t think he was laughing at us. I’ve been thinking about it a lot since the bombshell dropped. Nearly all the time, in fact. I don’t have the diversion of parliamentary business like you do. I think Anthony probably was a spy, and a brilliant one, too. Everyone thought they knew him well, but when it came down to it, no one did. He was incredibly well informed, even though he appeared not to be. He encouraged confidence. He cultivated the king and pumped him mercilessly for information. It’s entirely possible that part of the rebels’ dramatic victory at Prestonpans, which the newspapers are playing down so much, is due to Anthony’s detailed information about General Cope’s force, which he wheedled out of the king.”
“Well then,” said Edwin. “How can you say he wasn’t laughing at us?”
“Edwin, think about it. I know you told him things on occasion, but did he ever actively try to get information out of you? Don’t answer me straight away, think for a minute.”
Edwin thought, for more than a minute, casting his mind back over the last four years.
“No,” he said finally. “No, I can’t recall that he did. But the man’s so damn clever he might have been doing it without me realising.”
“Oh come on, give yourself a little credit,” Caroline said. “He didn’t. I believe that he did think of us as friends. I think he knew that when all this came out we would hate him, and that upset him. I think that’s why he embraced me that last night and told me he loved us. He didn’t do that to anyone else, because he didn’t care what they thought. I don’t like what he’s done, Edwin, and I’ve given all the information I could think of to Newcastle, but I don’t think he was laughing at us all that time. I’m sure of it, in fact.”
“What about Beth? Do you think he might have killed her, like they’re saying?”
Caroline snorted in a most unladylike fashion.
“No, I don’t think that for a minute. Do you?”
“I don’t know what to think at the moment, Caro. I’m upset, I’ll admit it. I thought a hell of a lot of Anthony.”
“I believe she knew what he was. She must have done. She’s intelligent. And she loves him, very much. And what’s more, he loves her, too. No, whatever he’s up to, they’re in it together.”
“Did you tell Newcastle that?”
“No, I didn’t,” Caroline admitted. “I didn’t like his attitude, to be honest. He treated me like an inferior just because I chose my own husband. I think he’s been talking to Francis.”
Edwin looked at his wife in silence. After a moment she reddened slightly and looked away.
“My God, Caro, you can’t still like the man! He’s a traitor, for God’s sake!”
“Not like, exactly. But I’ll admit to you, and to no one else, I admire him for his audacity, and Beth too. I’m not hurt like you by what he’s done, because I’m not taking it personally. I’m not about to tell Newcastle I think Beth’s a traitor too, because I might be wrong, and if they find her I don’t want them to treat her badly because of my unfounded suspicions. And they are more likely to find her because they know exactly what she looks like.”
“You don’t want them to find him, do you?” said Edwin, shocked.
Caroline smiled.
“The logical, loyal part of me wants Newcastle to find him very much,” she said. “But the rest of me doesn’t, no, not at all. It’s wild, and romantic, and exciting.”
“And dangerous,” added Edwin.
“Yes. And out of our hands. They’re gone. We’ve told all we know. They can’t hurt us now, wherever they are.”
“Maybe. But I still think it’d be a good idea to distance ourselves from the Cunninghams for a while, and anyone else Ant
hony and Beth were on close terms with.”
“I think that’s an excellent idea,” said Caroline, who not only had no affection for the Cunninghams but was bored to tears by the endless exclamations of horror and speculations as to where Anthony might have gone, and what he might have done to Beth, and what he might have done to them if the amazing Lord Daniel hadn’t unearthed all that information about him. Caroline found herself fighting the continuous urge, when in his company, to smack the amazing Lord Daniel’s smug face until his ears rang. If he’d done this out of loyalty to the crown, she’d have admired him. But he’d done it out of pure vindictiveness. She would like nothing better than not to have to see him again, or anyone else associated with Anthony and Beth.
So she thought, until the next day, when the footman announced that Miss Sarah Browne requested the privilege of a few minutes of my lady’s time, if it was convenient.
After a moment’s deliberation Caroline decided it was, and the visitor was shown into the sitting room, where she stood hesitantly until asked to sit down.
“I wasn’t sure that you’d agree to see me,” she said. “The footman was very nosy. I told him I had a new hair rinse that you’d shown an interest in, and I wanted to show it to you. I’ve brought it with me, so if anyone asks you can tell them that and no one will be suspicious.”
“Why should anyone be suspicious?” asked Caroline.
“I don’t know. Everyone seems suspicious of everything, since Sir Anthony disappeared.”
“I take it then that you’re here because of Anthony and Beth?” Caroline asked.
“In a way, yes,” Sarah said. “I need to do something, but I can’t do it myself and I don’t know who else to ask. If you want me to go, tell me now and I will. You can have the hair rinse. It’s really very good.”
The Storm Breaks (The Jacobite Chronicles Book 4) Page 8
