“It concerns an old friend of yours,” Solomon said optimistically.
“I don’t have any old friends. Precious few new ones, come to that.”
“A lady,” Solomon added.
“Idefinitelyhave none of those.”
“Perhaps not,” Solomon said, “but I had hoped the lady might.”
Madly, who had been nuzzling the girl’s neck, raised his head and regarded Solomon with a very steely gaze.
“Damn you,” he said between his teeth. “You have five minutes. Less, if I get bored.”
He abandoned the girl, snatched up his bottle and glass, and strode off toward the back of the room, so Solomon and David followed him to a solitary corner, where he threw himself ontothe only comfortable chair with an air of insolence, leaving them to sit on the hard benches against the wall.
Madly was looking from one to the other. “Have I had too much brandy? Am I seeing double?”
“No,” Solomon said. “We’re twins.”
“Twin whats? Peelers? Footmen? Lawyers?”
Solomon lifted one brow. “Brothers,” he said gently. “We want to talk about Jacintha.”
“Never heard of her.” Madly poured himself a large brandy and swirled the liquid around the glass.
“We think someone is trying to hurt her,” Solomon persevered.
“Whoever she is, it isn’t me.”
Solomon held Madly’s gaze, which seemed to surprise him, for he lowered the glass from his lips.
“Actually, it probably is you,” Solomon said. “One way or another. We think someone is blackmailing the lady about an elopement twenty years ago.”
Madly knocked back his brandy with a quick, fierce jerk. “Nothing I can do about that. I’ve told you, I don’t know who you’re talking about, and I will never say anything different.”
It took Solomon a moment to recognize that for what it was. Honor. Thin, and perhaps hanging by a thread behind many years of selfish, hedonistic, and probably brutal behavior, but it was there, and its presence felt curiously warming.
“I need to know who else was aware of this elopement,” Solomon said carefully. “Because this blackmailer has already caused a great deal of damage and probably committed murder. The lady and her children could be in great danger.”
“Surely the lady has a husband,” Madly drawled. “Or…are you his servants?”
“No, and he can’t help her, being dead.”
Madly’s gaze flew back to Solomon’s. He jerked his head around to a man who was approaching their table.
“Bugger off!” he growled, and the man slunk away.
“Who did you tell?” Solomon asked steadily.
“No one. How could I when I don’t know what you’re talking about?”
It could have been evasion. He’d had years to practice such arts, but for some reason Solomon believed Madly’s honor had stretched to silence both then and now.
“Did she tell?”
“Women always blab, don’t they?”
“Who to? Her mother?”
