London Gambit

by Tracy Grant

  "He was dancing with Sylvie St. Ives." Lucinda wrinkled her nose. "Very correctly, but I still don't like to see it, for Bel's sake. Even though Bel would tell me not to be silly. I think they went into the card room."

  Malcolm found Oliver in the card room, now circulating on his own. Oliver greeted Malcolm with one of his easy smiles. Malcolm would have sworn those smiles were genuine. That Oliver had a mistress was not a shock. A disappointment, perhaps, but not far from the realm of what he imagined. That Oliver's mistress, and perhaps Oliver himself, might be involved in a conspiracy was another matter entirely. He had a clear vision of the four of them—him, Oliver, David, Simon—sitting round a scarred table in the Cup & Rose in Oxford after a rehearsal, debating whether Hotspur or Hal would be more effective in Parliament. He'd sat back in his chair, taken a sip of wine, looked at his friends' faces bathed in the oil lamplight, and for the first time in a long time felt he belonged.

  "Never have enough chances to talk to one's friends when one's hosting," Oliver said. "Have you been talking politics?"

  "Actually, I've been busy with the investigation." Malcolm turned, his back to the room and directed his voice to Oliver's ears alone. "When we spoke at Brooks's, you neglected to tell me that your mistress had an interest in it."

  "My what?" One would swear the shock in Oliver's gaze was genuine.

  "At least, she broke into the Brook Street house last night which I assume is connected. Couldn't she simply have asked you to retrieve whatever she was looking for?"

  Oliver stared at him. He was a good actor. He'd made a very convincing Hotspur and an ardent Orlando. But he wasn't a trained agent. Malcolm could read the shock in his eyes but also a wariness that said he was not as stunned as his expression would lead one to believe. "Malcolm—who the devil are you talking about? And do you mean to say you know who broke into the Brook Street house? I thought—"

  "We know. Now. And we know Maria Monreal is your mistress."

  Malcolm was prepared for more denials. Instead Oliver spun away. "God, what a farce."

  "For what it's worth," Malcolm said, "Bel knows. She's the one who told Suzanne about you and Maria."

  "She—" Oliver spun back to him, this time his gaze filled with sick horror.

  "Wives tend to notice these things," Malcolm said.

  Oliver stared at Malcolm a moment longer, then jerked his head towards the door behind him. Without further speech, he and Malcolm went through the door into an empty antechamber bright with candlelight and a bouquet of blue larkspur.

  Oliver strode across the room as though he wished it were an open field, then turned to face Malcolm, gripping a gilded chair back. "I should have realized—I should have known with you investigating it would come to this. I do know Maria. She is not my mistress. She's never been my mistress."

  "You didn't tell her David would be out late last night? That he'd tell the staff not to wait up?"

  Oliver hesitated. "Maria's not my mistress, but she's a friend. I know what all of you think of me, but I'm not—Whatever I offered Bel, I took my vows seriously."

  Oddly, that had the ring of truth. Malcolm folded his arms across his chest and regarded his friend. "Go on."

  "We met at an Exhibition at Somerset House. A gentleman was making himself disagreeable to her. Taking advantage of an émigrée and a woman alone. I intervened. Maria was having some legal difficulties. I did my best to help her out. I didn't mention our friendship to anyone because I knew precisely what assumptions people would make."

  "And her breaking into Brook Street?"

  "I don't know. But—" He drew a breath. "From something she said, I think she may have been entangled with Craven. Perhaps she'd written to him and wanted to retrieve any letters."

  "She didn't ask for your help?"

  "We're friends, but she'd hardly ask me to break into my brother-in-law's house." Oliver drew a breath. "I may have mentioned the opening at the Tavistock. I think at one point I did say David was considerate of his servants."

  "And the warehouse?"

  "What about the warehouse?"

  "Were you looking for papers for her when you called on Eustace Whateley?"

  "Of course not. I was there to talk about Louisa's marriage portion. As I told you. Why would anyone think Craven had hidden love letters in the warehouse?"

  Why indeed? It was another reason to doubt the stories Maria Monreal and Oliver were giving. "Oliver, are you asking me to believe two different people broke into the warehouse of Craven's company and Craven's home two nights apart, for two different reasons?"

  "I don't know. You're the investigator."

  Malcolm stared at his friend, seeing Oliver's open gaze when he confided his love for Sylvie de Fancot, the hesitation in his eyes when he asked Malcolm about Simon and David. "I am. And I can tell you're lying, Oliver."

  "I'm not—"

  "Damn it, Oliver." For once, Malcolm could scarcely contain the anger in his voice. Anger at far more than Oliver's refusal to talk. Anger at something being smashed that went back over a decade.

  Oliver folded his arms across his chest. "You can't pretend you tell me everything. I don't see why you should be so convinced I should confide in you."

  "Because we're in the midst of an investigation. That concerns your family."

  Oliver glanced away. "You know I wouldn't—"

  "You can't possibly know that, Oliver. In an investigation one can never know what piece of information will connect to what other piece."

  Oliver spun away, strode the narrow length of the room, then turned back to face Malcolm. "Christ, Malcolm, you always do this. Act as though you know what's right, as though everything's your responsibility, as though you can fix it. I know your capabilities. But you can't fix everything."

  "I can't fix anything if I don't know what's going on." Malcolm studied his friend, picking his way through the fog of anger. "Oliver, if you're in trouble—"

  "We aren't boys anymore, Malcolm." Oliver sounded winded, as he might after a hard-fought game of tennis. Or a bout with rapiers. "Nothing's as simple as it was at Oxford."

  "I don't know that it was simple then."

  "But we thought it was. We thought we had the answers."

  "Oliver." Malcolm held the gaze of the man he'd trusted for so long. One could never really know another person. But he'd swear he knew something of Oliver's compassion. "A man died in the Whateley & Company break-in."

  Oliver's head jerked up. "I know. But that's not—"

  "He'd fought in the Peninsula and at Waterloo and been wounded in the service of his country. He has a son, a two-year-old. Not so different from our children. A woman I think he loved in his way. He lost the chance to see his son grow up. To try to get the woman he loved out of a brothel. His son lost his father. You may not care about Craven or Eustace, but we owe it to this man to learn the truth."

  For a moment, he thought Oliver was about to speak. Then Oliver's gaze closed over. "I can't help you, Malcolm."

  "Can't or won't?"

  Oliver's mouth twisted, with a bitterness that might have been directed at himself. "Does it matter?"

  Malcolm stepped into the ballroom. He had to force his hands not to curl into fists at his sides. His temples throbbed with unvoiced questions and unexpressed anger. He drew a harsh breath. He'd got through the revelation of his wife's betrayal. Of his father's. If he could get through that, he could get through this. He could get through anything.

  Oddly, it was the sight of his wife that steadied him. He saw her across the ballroom with Crispin and Manon. The sight of her familiar profile, the pendant he had given her six weeks ago and the pearls he had given her after their wedding gleaming round her throat, steadied him. And he needed steadying. Far more than he would admit to anyone.

  Suzanne met his gaze as though aware of his regard. She murmured something to Crispin and Manon and moved across the ballroom towards him. Malcolm met her and took her arm, managing a quick smile. The sort he used to
tamp down feelings. "Last I saw, the music room was empty," he murmured.

  He glanced round the ballroom again and saw Harry, leaning against the wall. Davenport wasn't alone as he would have been a few years ago but was talking with Rupert and Bertrand. Like Suzanne, he met Malcolm's gaze, excused himself, and fell into step beside Malcolm and Suzanne.

  Of one accord, they made their way through the crowd, out into the passage, and to the music room. Malcolm opened the door to find it thankfully still empty, though candles burned on the mantel and the table and beside the pianoforte. Malcolm crossed to the pianoforte and launched into the Waldstein Sonata. For cover. But as the anger rippled through his fingers and into the torrent of notes, he knew that wasn't all.

  "Darling?" Suzanne leaned across the pianoforte and scanned his face, as she did when she was looking for injuries. "What did Oliver say?"

  Malcolm began to pick out a more plaintive Bach sarabande. "He says Maria wasn't his mistress. That they were friends." Malcolm ran his fingers over the keys. "That she was Craven's mistress and may have broken into the Brook Street house to recover letters she'd written to him. But he denies helping her. Or having anything to do with the Whateley & Company break-in."

  "And you don't believe him." Harry joined Suzanne at the pianoforte.

  Malcolm lifted his hands from the keys and rested his arms on the piano. "Oddly enough, his protestations about not being her lover have the ring of truth. He reminded me—"

  "Of the way you sounded when you denied being Tatiana's lover in Vienna?" Suzanne asked.

  Malcolm met his wife's gaze in the candlelight. He might now know she'd been spying on him in Vienna, but the pain she had felt over thinking Tatiana Kirsanova had been his mistress had been real. And he'd never forgive himself for causing it. "Yes, actually."

  "What he said fits with Maria's story, more or less," Harry said.

  "Enough to convince me they planned it together," Malcolm said. His fingers tensed on the polished rosewood of the piano. "I'm quite sure Oliver was lying about not knowing more about either break-in. When I accused him of as much he didn't really try to deny it. Merely told me I couldn't fix everything."

  "That sounds rather like the end of my conversation with Maria," Harry said.

  Malcolm met his friend's gaze. "Quite."

  Suzanne frowned. "What on earth could Oliver and Maria Monreal want that Craven had? Something to do with politics? Craven was a Tory and Oliver is in the Opposition. Could Oliver have made some sort of alliance with Carfax? Is that what he's afraid to admit to you?"

  "Difficult to see how," Malcolm said.

  "What if Oliver invested secretly in Whateley & Company?" Suzanne said. "Or—"

  "Maria had worked for Carfax," Harry said. "Lydgate is his son-in-law. Craven was both his son-in-law and his agent. And Whateley & Company was Carfax's front essentially. Could Carfax have tasked Maria and Lydgate to recover something he thought Craven had, either at Whateley & Company or in Brook Street?"

  Malcolm frowned, trying to see his university friend with objective eyes. "Carfax accepted Oliver as his son's friend. I don't think Oliver was the match he wanted for Bel, but at that point Bel had been out a few seasons, and he wasn't going to stand in the way of her marrying. And if she was going to marry a lawyer's son with Radical politics, he at least wanted him to be an M.P., so he made sure Bel's marriage portion was enough to stake Oliver's political career. He might have turned to Oliver for help with family matters, but it's hard for me to imagine him turning to Oliver for something involving his agents. Not to mention the company he was using as a cover for illicit business."

  "Suppose Oliver had got wind of what Carfax was doing at Whateley & Company and wanted to learn more?" Suzanne suggested. "If he really had become friends with Maria, he might have turned to her for assistance knowing she'd been an agent."

  "Instead of me?" Malcolm said.

  "He might have wanted to be sure first. And he knows you worked for Carfax—"

  "Suzette, first you thought Fitzroy might think I'd protect Carfax and now you're suggesting Oliver might think I'd do so?"

  "I'm suggesting Oliver might wonder if you would, darling. Not that you'd actually do so."

  Malcolm frowned at the music stand. "All right. Possibly. But then surely he'd have told me just now."

  Harry clapped a hand on Malcolm's shoulder. "It's not easy. Having a friend, especially such an old friend, lie to one."

  "I'm an agent," Malcolm said. "You'd think I'd be used to it."

  "From fellow agents. Not from someone you've known since university." Harry hesitated. "To you, if not to Cordy, I can confess that Maria's lying to me stings more than a bit. And I'd hardly have said I trusted her as you trusted Lydgate."

  Malcolm met his friend's gaze for a moment. Almost, he was afraid that if he said more it would undo him. So he sought refuge in the details of the investigation. "And aside from the question of what Oliver and Maria Monreal might have been after, there's the question of what it could be that this unknown friend of Fitzroy's wanted as well. Unless we have two different groups of people after two different things at Whateley & Company, and that continues to strain credulity." Malcolm ran his fingers down the keys in a glissando. "I'm quite sure Oliver called on Eustace Whateley two weeks ago to do some early reconnaissance at the warehouse. Whether or not Oliver is also the one who broke into the warehouse and killed Coventry remains open to question."

  He felt the combined pressure of Harry's and Suzanne's gazes. It was Harry who spoke first. "You don't really believe Lydgate is a killer."

  "No," Malcolm said, "God help me. But until tonight, I didn't think he'd lie to me either."

  Chapter 28

  Oliver closed the library doors. As was their custom, he and Isobel had repaired to this room after seeing the last of their guests from the house. Malcolm's contained, cold-eyed smile and Suzanne's brilliant, armored one upon leaving lingered in his memory. As did his last, troubling exchange with his father-in-law, who had stayed with Lady Carfax and Lucinda after most of the guests left. "Congratulations," he said to his wife. "It was a great success."

  Isobel gave a tight smile and dropped down on the sofa. "It does seem to have gone rather well. Thank you."

  "I did little enough." He held up the decanter, an ornate cut-glass one that had been a wedding present from her parents, and at her nod poured her a glass of brandy as well as one for himself.

  "You're so good at circulating. Much better than I am." Isobel tilted her head back and rubbed her neck.

  Oliver put a glass of brandy in his wife's hand and moved behind the sofa to rub her shoulders. "Did you have a chance to talk to Malcolm and Suzanne?"

  He felt the slightest tremor run through her, but her voice was even. "A bit." She took a sip of brandy. "One never seems to have much chance to talk to one's friends when entertaining. And they're busy with their investigation."

  Oliver lifted his hands from his wife's shoulders lest she feel the tension roiling through him. "Bel." He picked up his own brandy and moved round the sofa to face her. "It didn't occur to you to ask me?"

  "Ask you?" Isobel looked genuinely puzzled.

  "If Maria Monreal is my mistress."

  Isobel went still. The perfect, well-bred expression that he had so seldom seen waver, even since she had been his wife—perhaps especially since she had been his wife—cracked open. "Suzanne—"

  "Didn't keep your confidence. I imagine she would have done, if Maria weren't tangled in the investigation into the break-ins."

  Isobel's pale face went several shades paler. "I didn't realize—"

  "No reason you should have done. But that doesn't explain why you didn't ask me."

  Isobel took a drink of brandy. "Oliver, you can't seriously imagine I'd ask—" She tightened her grip on her glass. "It's all right. I told you when I agreed to marry you—"

  "I know. You as good as gave me permission to be unfaithful in advance. Permission I never asked for
."

  Bel flushed. "It seemed easier—"

  Oliver stood watching her, remembering that night in the Carfax House conservatory. Part of him wanted nothing more than to take her in his arms, but that wouldn't resolve any of this.

  Bel drew a breath. "There was no sense in pretending—"

  "I didn't have a lot to offer you. I never pretended otherwise. But what I had to offer included fidelity."

  The flush drained from his wife's cheeks. "You were in love with someone else."

  "Who was married to another man. I've never been Sylvie's lover. I'm not Maria's lover."

  "Oliver—" Bel took a drink of brandy and set her glass carefully on the table beside her. "You wanted to stand for Parliament. You needed a wife with money or you wouldn't have been able to do so. There's no sense in either of us pretending otherwise."

  Oliver controlled his inwards flinch. "I don't deny it. It doesn't mean I didn't care for you."

  Isobel's dry smile somehow slashed right through to his heart. "Would you have married me if I'd been penniless?"

  Oliver passed a hand over his face, remembering Bel as he'd first seen her when David brought him down from Oxford to Carfax Court. The house, twice the size of the squire's house in his parents' village, had gleamed white and unattainable against a blue sky. And Bel had sat on the lawn, laughing, a cluster of puppies leaving muddy paw prints on her white muslin dress. He'd liked her at once. Later that night, he'd seen a flash of pain in her eyes at a careless comment from her sister Mary. He'd wanted to protect her. But he couldn't claim it had been romantic love.

  Isobel tossed down a swallow of brandy. "I thought not."

  "I wasn't going to let myself pine for Sylvie," Oliver said. "But I didn't think I'd love again. Not in that way. But I always cared for you."

  "Like a sister."

  "Of course not." He dragged a shield-back chair over and sat facing his wife "We can't have such different interpretations of what's been between us all these years. You're the mother of my children. I can't imagine life without you."