The Water Nymph: The Arboretti Family Saga - Book Two

by Michele Jaffe

  “You were right,” Basil admitted without hesitation, gripping the hilt of the weapon. “My alibi is false. I was not with my step-mother.”

  “Either time? Either the morning your father was killed or the night Richard Tottle was killed?”

  “Either time. But that does not make me guilty. I did not kill either of them. And it is not my alibi you should be worried about.”

  “I will leave that worrying to you,” Crispin said nobly. “And I thank you for this lovely talk.”

  “You are not going,” Basil said. Crispin decided to take it as a question.

  “Yes, I am Lord Grosgrain. Good day.”

  “Going back to that murderous hussy Sophie Champion, are you?” Basil’s voice was mean. “What about her alibi? Why are you protecting her? She is a murderess, I tell you, and I—”

  Basil was forced to stop speaking by the rapid constriction of his throat when Crispin grabbed him by it and slammed him against one of the handy walls. “That is no way to talk about a lady,” Crispin advised Basil with their noses less than an inch apart.

  “She is no lady. She is a murderess. And I can prove it to you.”

  Crispin had not imagined that Basil was so cruel, or so desperate. “Tell me. Prove it,” he challenged, releasing his grip on Basil’s throat. “What makes you so sure?”

  Basil massaged his neck. “She has done it before. Murdered.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Last week, after my father died, I hired a man to investigate your Sophie Champion. And I learned some very interesting things. To begin with, she was not my father’s goddaughter at all. He did not even meet her until she was almost sixteen. And already running from the site of her first murder.”

  Crispin ignored the latter part of the statement. “How did they meet?”

  “Does that matter? What is important is that my father, the fool, took her under his wing. And somehow she managed to ingratiate herself so much that he left her the entire business.”

  Crispin was tempted to tell Basil what he had learned the night before from Sophie’s own lips, tempted to tell Basil that it was only by the kindness of the woman he was slandering that he even possessed an allowance, but he respected the secret. Instead he asked, “Did you ever hear your father say anything about Sophie’s involvement in the business?”

  “Sophie? In business?” Basil sniggered. “The only business she is in is spending money and entangling men.”

  “Entangling men?” Crispin raised an eyebrow. He could not deny that Sophie was alluring and enticing, but he doubted very much that she went out of her way to execute entanglements. “I see. Setting snares and such. Is that how she caught her first murder victim?”

  “Keep laughing, Sandal. Just you wait. She did not have to set any traps for her first victims. She killed them in their beds. Her mother and father.”

  “Her mother and father died in a house fire,” Crispin said before he realized how much he was admitting.

  “Ah, so she has told you about this. Did she also tell you that she set that fire? That she lit it herself? On purpose? To murder them? No, I can tell by your face that she did not.”

  If Crispin’s face showed anything, it was incredulity at the depths to which Basil was sinking. “I have to say, Basil, this is not very convincing. Do you have anything like proof?”

  “You do not believe me? Then explain why she would need to change her name if she had nothing to hide.”

  “She changed her name?” Crispin asked with only the barest interest. He was now quite sure that Basil was making things up.

  “Yes. Sophie Champion does not exist. Her real name is Diana Goldhawk. Look.” He held up a small gold medal depicting the goddess Diana seated next to a hawk. “She used this to bribe one of the guards at the prison, and my man got it.”

  “Diana Goldhawk,” Crispin repeated, in a voice that made it clear he thought Basil had fabricated the whole thing. “Not terribly original, using the name of an Olympian goddess. I suppose she has a raft of siblings with names like Venus and Minerva and Zeus and Apollo?”

  Basil tried to sneer at Crispin. “Not Apollo. But she does have a brother named Damon.”

  “Has?” Crispin asked. “Didn’t she burn him to a crisp as well?”

  “Apparently he was not at home the night of the fire.”

  “How convenient.” Crispin’s tone was dry but light. “I don’t suppose I could meet with him, you know, just to get the particulars from his own lips.”

  “I do not know where he is. But you can accept this as true. You have my word on it.”

  “Your word,” Crispin exclaimed admiringly. “That is a handsome guarantee. I thank you for it and for your generous explanation of your alibi. Or lack thereof. Now, if you do not mind, I should like to be going.”

  “You are a fool if you don’t believe me. That woman is dangerous. She will entangle you in her snares and not let you go. She is a murderess—” was the last thing Crispin heard as he came upon the mouth of the alley.

  He turned from the passage into the Strand, his eyes not ready for the brightness of the street after the dim shadows of the alley. No one watching him as he moved toward Sandal Hall would have been able to perceive any difference in his face or bearing. He looked exactly as he had when he entered the alley, unperturbed and imperturbable.

  But the base of his spine had begun to tingle.

  With two words, Basil had demolished the foundations upon which Crispin had built all of his plans, had based all of his ideas. “Diana Goldhawk” was not just a name; it was the name of the sister of a man Crispin had killed. A man who was one of the primary parties to the counterfeiting enterprise he had demolished during his first mission as the Phoenix.

  Crispin had recognized the gold disk Basil showed him as the one he had found in Sophie’s shoe the first night they met. It certainly seemed to suggest that she was Diana Goldhawk. And if Sophie Champion was actually Diana Goldhawk, wasn’t it possible, completely possible, that she had been using him all along? That she was out for revenge, to revenge her brother’s death. Or, worse, that she was the actual head of the counterfeiting operation, the person angling for the Phoenix’s destruction.

  Crispin’s mind balked. It could not be true, he told himself. He would have sensed it. After all, there was no way for her to know he was the Phoenix. And even if she suspected it, she would have had to make some effort to find out, would have attempted to question him or devise some test to make him reveal his identity. Which Crispin knew had not happened—his suspicions would have been aroused the first moment she tried to cadge information from him. Indeed, if anything, what was notable was the small amount of information she had tried to gather from him during their investigation. Even the night they played the dice game in his private garden, when she could have asked anything without risking suspicion. Of course, she had not had much of a chance, with the way she kept losing—

  The half smile that had begun to form on the edges of Crispin’s mouth at the memory vanished. Suddenly, he saw that he had been tested, completely and brilliantly. That night by the pond Sophie had casually fed him information about her godfather and his alchemical lab, information that would only have been provocative to someone already interested in counterfeiting. Someone like the Phoenix. All she had to do afterward was wait to see how he would react to having his identity confirmed. By letting the information seem to come out naturally, in the course of her losses during their dice game, she avoided arousing his suspicions. Only there was nothing natural about their game, or rather, about the dice with which they were playing. Because they were Don Alfonso’s dice. The dice Sophie had been playing with at the Unicorn the first night they met. The dice she had weighted to lose when she rolled them a certain way.

  But only when she rolled them a certain way, Crispi
n rushed to put in. How did he know that she had not rolled them normally that night in his garden? How did he know that Diana Goldhawk was not simply a figment of Basil’s imagination? How did he even know—

  Without realizing it, Crispin had broken into a run. He had to ask her, had to learn the truth, right then. He entered Sandal Hall through the stable door, stomped up the stairs, and jerked the door to his library open so hard that it left a dent when it struck the wall.

  He glowered fiercely around the room until his eyes fell on Thurston, hovering on the threshold. “Where is she?” he demanded.

  “I assume Your Lordship is referring to Miss Champion. She left half an hour ago in response to your summons.”

  “My what?”

  “Your message requiring her presence at the offices of Richard Tottle. It arrived just after you left. Miss Champion seemed rather excited when I helped her with the mustache.”

  “But that is impossible. Let me see it,” Crispin demanded, extending his hand.

  Thurston looked pained. “I am afraid Miss Champion took it with her. I made a copy of the note—”

  “That won’t help,” Crispin said, running a hand through his hair. “It is not the words but the paper, the writing that I need. Did it look like it came from me?”

  “Yes, sir. I did not suspect anything amiss.”

  “Odious slugs,” Crispin muttered. He was at an impasse. If she was really just Sophie Champion, if she was really the woman she seemed to be, the woman who said, “I love you,” the woman he had asked to marry him that morning, then she was walking into a trap and he should mount Fortuna and ride to Richard Tottle’s as quickly as possible. But if she was Diana Goldhawk, if she was Damon Goldhawk’s sister, ruthlessly cunning and out for blood, or out for the Phoenix, then he would be rushing right into a trap himself. He might have wasted four seconds before deciding to go and rescue Sophie, come what may, if Thurston had not cleared his throat.

  “There was another message, sir. Earlier today. From Pickering Hall. The boy who delivered it said it was important. It is the message I was trying to deliver to you just after the search.”

  Crispin scowled at Thurston, then at the packet that Thurston was holding out to him. He took it unenthusiastically and ripped it open. It was brief, but in the face of its evidence he was left no choice about what to believe, or what to do.

  My Lord—

  Elwood just brought me this, and I thought you should know. The reward for identifying the Phoenix is being handed out by those prude bastards you were asking about, Loundes and Wainscot. And it is being paid from the account of one Sophie Champion.

  Are you sure she is worthy of your trust?

  LP

  The tingling at the base of Crispin’s spine became an ache.

  Sophie’s heart was racing as she ascended the stairs. When the note from Crispin arrived, telling her that he had an important clue and she should meet him at Richard Tottle’s, she had wasted no time setting out. “I have found what we were looking for” the note said tantalizingly, and Sophie knew the end of the investigation was near. Her enthusiasm stemmed as much from that as from the thrill of working with Crispin, working together with him not against him, the thrill of collaborating.

  She had been so excited by the note and its implications that she did not notice the various men who followed her through the convoluted byways and twisted streets to her destination. She did not pay attention to the old woman settling herself outside of Tottle’s shop as, following the directions, Sophie pried open a side window and entered through the ink room. She was not aware of the tall young man who lurked in a window opposite, counting how many steps she had to be taking, calculating how long she should need to ascend, and holding his breath until he saw her head framed in the window of the pink chamber.

  He could not see her expression as she entered, but he could imagine it. It had to be one of shock.

  She stood at the threshold, her hand glued to the door pull for a few moments before she found words. “Constantia. What are you doing here?” she finally managed to stammer.

  Constantia patted a place on the pink silk bed next to her. “Sit down, Sophie. I have been waiting for you.”

  Sophie was suddenly on her guard. “Waiting for me? How did you know I would be here? Where is Crispin?”

  “There is nothing to be afraid of. I did not bring the constables. I was sent by a friend of yours. A friend of ours.”

  “Who?” Sophie was still cautious.

  “Please, just trust me.” Constantia smiled her lovely, guileless smile, and Sophie finally sat down. “I do not know how long we shall be left unmolested, so I will not waste time. Sophie, dearest, we have always been friends, haven’t we?”

  “Of course.”

  “May I talk to you like a friend? Like a sister?” When Sophie nodded, Constantia went on. “Sophie, I did not love your godfather.”

  Sophie tried to sound soothing. “That does not matter. You were kind and good to him. And many people do not love their spouses.”

  “Of course. And I do not reproach myself for that. But I did not love him because I was in love with someone else. With Crispin.”

  Sophie called upon the worldliness she had learned the previous night. “Congratulations. He is a fine choice. Then it was Crispin in your dressing room with you the other night.”

  “The other night?” Constantia looked confused. “Crispin was in my dressing room, yes. But how did you know?”

  “It does not matter. I am very happy for you. I take it, then, that he loves you back?”

  “Yes. And that is just the problem.”

  Sophie smiled suavely. “There is no problem. He is yours, of course. I want nothing from him.”

  “You do not understand. It is not like that. It is much, much worse.”

  Sophie could not imagine anything worse than what she was hearing, but she soon found that Constantia had not exaggerated.

  “Crispin proposed to me first when I was sixteen,” Constantia began. “Although I loved him, I had to turn him down. My mother forced me to marry someone else, someone older, a wealthy older nobleman who had recently been widowed.”

  Sophie nodded, completely numb.

  “Almost three years ago he died. Mysteriously. At the time I thought nothing of it, nor did I find it suspicious that Crispin had arrived in the countryside just days before he passed away. I lost myself in the joy of being with Crispin, being in his arms, listening as he called me tesoro.” Tears glistened in Constantia’s sapphire eyes, but Sophie was too numb with horror to cry.

  Constantia swallowed hard, her graceful white throat quivering, and then resumed. “Crispin and I were about to become betrothed when he was sent away by the Queen. I loved him and I longed to go with him, but I had my reputation, my future to consider. Then every broadside printed seemed to speak of his exploits on the continent, and finally I decided I could wait for him no longer. When Milton, your godfather, offered for me, I accepted.”

  Sophie did not know why she was being made to listen to this, but she found that she could not leave. She felt as though someone was dragging her stomach out of her living body, someone was beating a tattoo in her head, like someone was grinding her up inside.

  “Two days after Crispin returned to London, Milton died. Again, I thought nothing of it, just thought of the pleasure I would feel to be once again in my lover’s arms, once again having him make love to me in his private garden. But he did not come right away. Indeed, he did not come for over a week. And I soon discovered why.”

  Constantia had been looking at her slim hands as she spoke, but she now turned her eyes on Sophie.

  “Me,” Sophie whispered. “Was it because of me? Oh, Constantia, I am so sorry—”

  “There is no need for an apology, Sophie my love. We are
not to blame. The blame lies entirely with Crispin. With the murderer.”

  “Crispin?” Sophie’s incredulity transcended her numbness. “Are you saying that Crispin killed Lord Grosgrain?” Lord Grosgrain’s words, “unless the Phoenix gets me first” flooded back to her. “But what about the Phoenix?”

  “Crispin is the Phoenix,” Constantia told her succinctly. “And yes, he did. He took Milton from me. And he killed two others.”

  “Tottle and Sweetson,” Sophie faltered. “Then Crispin is the one who tried to make me look guilty.”

  “Yes.” Constantia took her friend’s hand. “I am terribly sorry to be the person to tell you this. I did not know myself, until this afternoon when our friend told me, did not know that the man I loved, the man we both loved was a—a—a monster.” Unable to contain her emotion any longer, Constantia burst into tears.

  Sophie hugged her to her chest. As the other woman sobbed uncontrollably, Sophie lost herself in her own deadening misery. The way she felt was worse than anything she could have imagined, anything she ever experienced in a nightmare. Fear was nothing compared to the utter horror of knowing that she had been duped, completely and utterly taken in, had fallen for Crispin’s charm, his beauty, his stock words. What Sophie had seen in Constantia’s dressing room rose up before her eyes again now, and she wondered how she could have believed his denials so easily. It was because she had wanted to believe him, she knew. “Tesoro,” he had called her, and she had melted for him then, banished all further thoughts of resistance. “Tesoro,” he had said, and she had said back, “I love you.”

  A tremor went over Sophie’s body, and Constantia sat up, sniffing into her light blue handkerchief. “Sophie, I apologize again. It is just so dreadful to think that he killed Milton to revenge himself on me.”

  “I understand why he would kill your husband, Lord Grosgrain, but why did he kill Tottle and Sweetson?”