by Liz Carlyle
“Eet eez not needed, madame.” The butler smiled almost patronizingly. “Monsieur Kemble has been expecting you.”
Rance and Anisha exchanged curious glances, then followed the man to a set of six French windows that opened onto a terrace. Here, a second flight of steps some thirty feet wide descended into a lush, formal garden. At the back, along the rear wall, Anisha could see a man in a dark coat atop a narrow ladder, snipping away at a climbing rose that was almost over the wall. A taller, silver-haired man was gingerly picking up the cuttings and dropping them into a wicker basket.
“Monsieur Kemble eez up there, madame,” he said, pointing at the ladder.
But the man had already noted their approach and descended, whereupon the tall gentleman spun him around to brush off his coat with short, impatient motions.
“ . . . never spare a thought, George, for the effort that goes . . .” Tart snippets carried on the breeze. “Five hundred stitches . . . just in that sleeve!”
But the dark man pushed past him, looking fixedly at Anisha as he stepped from the greenery and onto the stone path. She caught his gaze, and he smiled almost predatorily.
“Good Lord!” she murmured. “The man from the theater?”
Rance glanced down. “What man?”
But it was too late. Mr. Kemble had floated like a wraith across the last parterre. “Lady Anisha Stafford!” he murmured, bowing gracefully over her hand. “What an unlooked-for pleasure!”
“B-But your butler,” Anisha uttered, “—he said you were expecting us.”
“Lazonby,” Rance interjected, along with his hand. “At your service, sir.”
Mr. Kemble looked him up and down, his lips quirking a little. “Well, at last we meet,” he murmured. “Or perhaps I should say, at last we are introduced?”
Rance’s brow furrowed. “Have we met, sir?”
Kemble waved dismissively. “Oh, I used to see you round Town,” he said, “back before they hanged you.”
Just then the taller man cleared his throat. “George, really.”
Mr. Kemble urged him forward and introduced him as his friend, Maurice Giroux. Anisha recognized him as the second man seated in the Duke of Gravenel’s box at the Royal Opera House.
Giroux bowed over her hand. “I should put the kettle on,” he said with perhaps a hint of a Continental accent. “George, take them into the orangery. It’s private.”
“A lovely notion,” Kemble murmured, motioning them along the garden wall.
Anisha followed, taking his measure. He was a lithe, slender man—and a wealthy one, apparently, for his attire looked expensive and classically à la mode. Moving with a silky, catlike grace, he led them through the garden, politely remarking upon various features of the garden, casting breezy gestures this way and that.
Hyacinth. Hellebore. Hawthorne. A trio of rare Asian lilies whose name Anisha couldn’t pronounce. All of it was lush and lovely, but rather than focus upon it, Anisha found herself wondering at Mr. Kemble’s udaya lagna. He was a water sign, almost certainly. Karkata—Cancer—most probably, for unless she missed her guess, Mr. Kemble had exquisite taste and a flair for the dramatic.
He was also many decades past his youth, for, though his skin bore few wrinkles, his temples were generously touched with silver, and there was an air of ennui about him.
A few yards along, the garden wall cornered left and became a sunny fruit wall espaliered with pear and plum. In the center a glass house jutted out, connected to the manor house by a long, vine-covered pergola. Here, their host threw open the door to a room filled with potted citrus trees and flowering shrubs, in the center of which sat a gurgling fountain, surrounded by an assortment of rattan furniture arranged upon a flagstone circle.
With the heavy weight of Rance’s hand at the small of her back, Anisha waded into the lush greenery, feeling instantly at home in the moist, delicious heat. “How lovely,” she murmured.
Mr. Kemble offered them the small wicker sofa. As soon as they were settled, he sat and turned the whole of his attention to her.
“So now you must tell me, Lady Anisha,” he said with an airy gesture, “how did you find Les Huguenots? Was it all you had hoped for?”
“I thought it marvelous. And you?”
Mr. Kemble sniffed. “Well, I’d seen the premier in Paris a dozen years ago, but Maurice is a great friend of Madame Dorus-Gras”—he dropped his voice—“who, frankly, has no business still playing Marguerite. My God, poor Julie’s forty if she’s a day—and working on a second chin!”
“Oh,” said Anisha. “I don’t think I could see that from my seat.”
“For my part,” Kemble continued, lifting one eyebrow, “I was more interested in dropping by your box.”
“You knew who I was?”
“My dear girl, I know who everyone is.” He paused to pluck a small, green thorn from his coat sleeve. “Besides, Anaïs had suggested the two of you might be by—which left me most intrigued, a thing sadly rare nowadays. But just as I began to contemplate the pleasure of your company, cheered as I was by the imminent departure of he-who-we-probably-oughtn’t-mention”—here, he shot her a saucy wink—“that buffoon Sir Wilfred turned up.”
“Sir Wilfred?” Rance interjected. “Sir Wilfred Leeton?”
“Oh, the very same, my lord,” said Kemble, rather too cheerfully. “I believe you have a passing acquaintance with the gentleman?”
But Rance was not looking at Kemble. He had turned to glower at Anisha. “I don’t like the sound of this,” he said grimly. “What, exactly, have you been up to?”
Anisha lifted both hands, palms out. “I just went to the theater.”
“With he-who-we-probably-oughtn’t-mention,” Kemble added, leaning in conspiratorially.
Rance’s glower expanded. “I am aware, sir, in whose company she went to the theater,” he snapped. “What I don’t understand is how Leeton came to be involved in it. And I’ll say again: I do not like the sound of it.”
“Heavens, my lord!” Mr. Kemble set his fingertips together. “Sir Wilfred is a pillar of our community. Surely you do not doubt his good character?”
After a heartbeat, Rance eased back against the sofa, his wide shoulders relaxing. “I’ve no quarrel with the fellow,” he answered. “But I know exactly what he is.”
At that, Kemble laughed, and Anisha wasn’t sure why. Moreover, Rance’s expression had not entirely relented.
“What, pray, was I to do?” She set a hand on his sleeve and felt his muscle flex beneath. “Send him away? The man seemed well-acquainted with Napier and—”
“Oops!” chirped Kemble. “There’s that unmentionable name!”
Rance shot Kemble a nasty look. “What, sir, is your point?”
Kemble looked positively waggish now. “Why, nothing at all!” Then his voice fell to a more serious tone. “But the two of you have not come all this way merely to gossip, I think?”
The room fell silent. “You understand, then, why we are here?” Rance finally said, his voice edged with reluctance.
“Oh, yes.” Kemble opened his hands expansively. “And I am but a happy tool of the Home Office.”
“And just why is that?” said Rance suspiciously.
Kemble made a vague motion. “Well, if I must confess, I’ve grown a little fond of de Vendenheim over the years,” he said. “Besides, when it comes to my business affairs, the Home Office has been looking the other way so long their necks are cricked.”
“Royden Napier works for the Home Office,” Rance pointed out.
“Not your half,” Kemble countered.
“I don’t have so much as a sliver,” Rance grumbled, “let alone half.”
Kemble laughed. “Oh, surely I need not explain the breadth of Fraternitas influence to you,” he chortled. “You’ve as good as got Napier’s . . . er . . . leash in hand now.”
Anisha’s eyes widened. The Fraternitas? Beyond the brotherhood, she’d never heard the name tossed casually out. Rance, however,
didn’t flinch.
“Because Lady Bessett’s father is the Vicomte de Vendenheim?”
“Yes, Lord Lazonby,” said Mr. Kemble sardonically. “It is called politics—the game of kings—and one at which I, too, am most adept. So, shall we play?”
Anisha leaned intently forward. “We just need information—”
“Of which I am a veritable font,” said Kemble, expanding his hands.
“Fine, then,” said Rance grimly. “Tell us what your role was in London’s underworld.”
Kemble drew back, fingertips pressed to his chest. “But underworld is such a vile word,” he said. “It makes one think of . . . why, trolls. Or earthworms. I should rather refer to it as a sort of tertiary economic system—political bribery, of course, being second.”
“Fine,” said Rance tightly. “And your roll?”
Mr. Kemble admired his own manicure for a moment. “Well, I used to make quite a nice living in—well, let us call it brokering life’s fineries,” he finally said. “Art, jewels, antiquities. That sort of thing.”
“You kept a shop?”
“Sometimes,” he said coyly.
“You were a thief?”
“Lazonby!” Anisha chided.
“Oh, heavens no!” Mr. Kemble set a hand over his heart. “Nothing so tawdry! I was a fence.”
“A fence?” Anisha turned to Rance.
“A receiver,” he said quietly. “Of stolen property.”
“Not all of it was stolen,” Kemble advised. “Some was willingly surrendered. Desperate young gentlemen were my stock-in-trade.”
“By desperate you mean gamesters?” said Rance quietly.
“Well, I was on speaking terms with the managers of every hell in Town, and a few of the better clubs,” he said. “Players who’d beggared themselves came to me, and oftentimes, I went to them. You see, it was occasionally—well, let us call it prudent—for an astute businessman to call in his debt whilst the player in question was still within his establishment, particularly if fellow in question wasn’t quite a gentleman and hadn’t a name to protect.”
“You mean he’d run too high a loss and they were afraid his IOU would be hard to collect,” said Rance.
“I see you perfectly understand.” Kemble beamed as if he’d discovered a prodigy.
“Desperate men, indeed,” said Rance. “And desperate men can be dangerous.”
Kemble’s smile turned faintly malicious. “Oh, I never worried overmuch,” he said. “I have a finely honed grasp of how to—oh, let us call it motivate people. So a hell might summon me to help relieve the fellow of his emerald cravat pin or his watch chain or his gold-chased snuffbox. In the height of such emotion, it was best to call upon someone impartial.”
Rance looked at him flatly. “And that would be you.”
“Well, I’m nothing if not honest,” said Kemble.
As if sent by God, a horrific crack of lightning rent the air, followed by an ominous roll of thunder. “Damnation!” Rance muttered, casting his gaze up.
“Oh, good!” Kemble clapped his hands. “It’s going to rain on my roses. And look! Here’s the tea.”
Monsieur Giroux did not reappear but had sent a servant with the tray. Kemble dismissed him at once and began to pour himself, which Anisha thought a little odd.
“This is Shui Xian, Lady Anisha, from the Wuyi Mountains,” said Kemble, tipping out a bloodred stream. It swirled cleverly round the inside of an Imari tea bowl so thin one could see his fingers. “And of the very best grade,” he continued, “for it’s been roasted, then aged ten years. You’ll find it rather different from your assams and darjeelings.”
“Ten years?” she said as he passed her the dainty bowl.
“Yes, and I counsel you strongly against the English habit of tainting it,” he said, waving his hand over the milk and sugar, “but there, if you must! I shall simply turn my head from the carnage.”
“Why, I wouldn’t think of it,” she murmured.
As he continued to pour, Anisha glanced up to see the sky darkening ominously. There was a chill settling over the glass house now, and with it a vague sense of unease. Worse, she could feel the press of time—and the heat of Rance’s thigh along hers. Both were disconcerting. Janet had been right; if they lingered much longer, or if the storm broke, she and Rance would not make it home tonight.
She tried to steer the conversation forward. “Mr. Kemble, it certainly sounds as if you had intimate knowledge of the gaming salons,” she said. “And because of those salons, Lord Lazonby was falsely accused of a heinous crime, so—”
“—so coming right to the point, you wish to know who shivved old Percy?” he said, putting the pot down with a clunk.
Anisha and Rance exchanged glances. “Heavens, have you some idea?” she asked.
Kemble relaxed into his chair. “My dear child, everything in the world is motivated by one of two things,” he said, fanning out his fingers, much like a magician about to pull a scarf from his coat sleeve. “One has only to winkle out which in order to know who.”
Anisha gave a little shake of her head, attempting to clear it. “And those things would be . . . ?”
“Firstly, money, which equates to power,” he said, “and secondly, that age-old delight, sexual intercourse.”
“Good God, man!” Rance cut a protective glance at Anisha. “Gentlemen don’t speak of—”
“Money, yes, I know.” Kemble had the audacity to wink again. “But it’s been suggested I’m only half a gentleman. The other half being . . . well, French.”
Anisha set a restraining hand to Rance’s sleeve. “But this murder,” she said stridently, “and Lazonby’s false conviction—it cannot have been done without collusion. Can it?”
“Well, dead men tell no tales,” said Kemble, taking up his tea with an elegantly crooked finger, “but I wonder if anyone ever looked closely at Hanging Nick Napier? Now there was a fellow who lived well—a little too well, if you ask me.”
“At last, something we can agree on,” Rance growled.
Anisha ignored him. “I got the impression there was some money in the family,” she mused, remembering Napier’s theater box and Sir Wilfred Leeton’s odd comments.
“None old Nick got a taste of,” said Kemble. “He was disowned for marrying down. Napier was his wife’s name.”
“But Englishmen sometimes take their wives’ names,” Anisha countered.
“Only for money, my dear!” Kemble sagely advised. “And the late Mrs. Napier was descended from nothing more than a long line of government toadies. Yet Mr. Napier managed very well indeed—in Eaton Square, no less, in a house acquired just after Royden’s birth.”
“Aye,” said Rance pensively, “and he didn’t buy that on a government salary, did he?”
“Oh, I fancy not.” Kemble sipped delicately at his tea. “And we now realize Royden maintains a friendship with Sir Wilfred Leeton, the sort of man who should have been the bane of his father’s existence.”
“But Leeton is upstanding now,” said Rance. “And the Crown forced him to testify at my trial—not that he had much to say.”
“No, I’ll just bet he didn’t,” said Kemble. “By the time Leeton was finished tweaking his tale, the judge likely believed he was running a charity hospital out of that house in Berwick Street and simply found you and poor Peveril hiding in his pantry with a pack of cards in hand.”
“Well, it wasn’t even a gaming hell, was it?” Anisha glanced at Rance.
“Oh, heavens no!” trilled Kemble. “It was ever so genteel. Gentlemen dropped cards on a silver salver as if they were calling on the Duchess of Devonshire. And Leeton never touched money; if one owed the house, one was ‘invited’ to leave it in a little dish on the sideboard or some such nonsense. Quite honestly, the veteran hell owners laughed at him.”
“Oh, my,” Anisha murmured.
“Nonetheless, one did need nerves of steel to play at Leeton’s,” Kemble added almost admiringly. “Cards only, an
d play was devilish deep. But despite Leeton’s façade of gentility, every gaming salon in Town paid off someone, even if it was just a couple of shillings to the local constable.”
“Aye, you’re right about that,” Rance grudgingly admitted.
“So we are back to the sex and the money,” Kemble continued, “for I can assure you they drive mankind’s every breath, though they may wear the guise of something else—revenge and jealousy, most often.”
“Fine, then,” Rance snapped. “Which applied to Lord Percy Peveril?”
“Oh, heavens, money!” said Kemble, shuddering. “No one wanted to sleep with Percy. Did you ever look closely at the fellow?”
“Not in that precise light,” Rance returned.
“Well, he had a curious gap between his teeth, Percy,” said Kemble airily. “Worse, he laughed through his nose. Why, I once saw him spew a vintage eau de vie halfway across a roulette table.”
“Never noticed any of it,” said Rance dismissively. “What about Sir Arthur Colburne turning up his toes?”
Here, Mr. Kemble hesitated. “Incidental, I’d guess,” he finally answered. “Indeed, prior to poor Percy’s coming up to scratch over Miss Colburne—a matter in which you were used, Lord Lazonby, in case you were unaware—it was widely rumored Arthur would either try to marry money himself or flee his creditors by going to France, or perhaps his sister in Canada.”
“Canada?” said Anisha.
“Well, it might have been Connecticut.” Kemble made a dismissive gesture. “In any case, Miss Colburne was horrified, and old Percy fast became the lesser of three evils—the first being a stepmamma, the second being a life of grinding poverty in Pawcatuck or Manitoba or some equally unpronounceable backwater. But at worst, someone wanted him gone, not dead. He may have been vain, gutless, and venal, but Artie was harmless and everyone knew it.”
Anisha leaned into the conversation. “So, who made money, Mr. Kemble, by having Rance accused of murder?”
Kemble reached out and gave her hand an avuncular pat. “The better question, dear girl, is, who stopped losing money? And the answer is, every gaming salon and hell-hole from Westminster to Wapping. Your boon companion here was bleeding them like a jar of leeches. Slowly—but deadly if it goes on long enough.”
