The eyes closed again, but the lips moved.“Tres.It’s Tres … Tell them…”
“I’ll tell them,” Nicholas promised, then made a guess.“The embassy?”
Richard smiled slightly, gasped, and died.
Nicholas felt grief and rage wash over him.Death was so absolute.A moment ago there had been a man, now there was only a corpse.Richard Anstable had been a stranger, really, but a pleasant young man with the gift of enjoying life.Nicholas wished he knew who had taken that life away, ruthlessly shot him twice in the chest.And why.
The least he could do was to take his message to the embassy.Tres.Was Richard speaking French?In French, tres meant very.Or was it a name?Perhaps someone would know, and perhaps there would be something he could do to the people who had killed Richard Anstable.
Chapter 2
The next morning there were few places in London where Lord Stainbridge wanted to be less than Derby Square, where Lionel Chivenham had his moldering house.That, however, was where his footsteps had taken him.His unease and suspicions about the events of the previous night pricked at him.He must know more.
There were no gentry about so early in the morning, but servants could be seen cleaning steps, polishing brass, and making purchases from passing hawkers.None of this activity, however, illuminated the dreamlike events of the previous night.Chivenham had put him in a hackney, and once home his valet had seen him safely to his bed.He scarcely recollected any of it.He had awakened quite early with a sour dryness in his mouth but without an alcoholic hangover.Almost against his will he had been drawn back to this house.
He stood for a while, leaning against the wrought iron railings of the small garden in the center of the square, worrying his chin with his silver-headed cane.He gazed at Chivenham’s tall, narrow house as if it could give him some answers to his bewilderment, partly convinced that what he remembered of the night before must be a dream produced by drugs.He knew there were some people who had a fondness for, even an addiction to, opium.
But there was that jade horse that he had found by his bed, placed there by his valet…
It was only idly that he noticed a cloaked figure slip out of the basement of Chivenham’s house and hurry down the street past his watching post.Something about her caught his attention—a frantic quality to her movements that was reflected in her eyes as she glanced back at Chivenham’s house.
Could this be…?Doubtless it was only a servant up to no good, but having no hope of enlightenment from the house he followed the dark-cloaked figure.
She walked briskly for about fifteen minutes and then turned into Saint James’ Park and sat upon a wall.Lord Stainbridge began to feel foolish.He had failed to obtain a clear look at the female, but she was very shabbily dressed.Surely it was merely a servant taking a little fresh air or meeting a lover on her day off.
He was about to turn to go when she suddenly jumped up, her movements so awkward he felt compelled to follow her.She hurried down Great George’s Street in the direction of the river and Westminster Bridge.At the last minute she began to run.He was almost too late.She was clambering onto the parapet of the bridge when he caught her and pulled her roughly from danger.
“Leave me alone, for God’s sake!”she cried wildly, but when she saw who her rescuer was she collapsed in a dead faint.
Frantically, Lord Stainbridge loosened the buttons of her high collar and fanned her with his hat.He was thankful there were no passersby, for he dreaded to think what she might say when she recovered.Her reaction to his face told him she was the woman involved in the previous night’s affair.She was older than he had thought and surprisingly well-spoken, but still he had no doubt as to her identity.
He had suspected there was more to the matter than was apparent.Could it be a marriage trap?It all made little sense…
If only Nicholas were here to handle this.When the woman regained consciousness there was likely to be a scene of the kind Lord Stainbridge most disliked.
Her reaction, however, surprised him.When she came to and saw him she closed her eyes again and lay still.He might have thought she had fainted again except for the tension that replaced the flaccidity of her body.Then she struggled to a sitting position and spoke with the deadly calm of despair.“I can only suppose my brother sent you.Very well, let us return.”
Lord Stainbridge suppressed an instinctive denial.His principal desire was to get her away from this place to a private one, where he could discover the extent of the plot.As she seemed docile, he raised her to her feet and supported her back toward Parliament Street, where they found a cab.He pushed her in, told the driver to wander a little, then climbed in after her.
In the grimy interior, the woman looked like a wax statue—pale, still, and blank of face.He could see, however, that she was handsome, with fine, even features and rich auburn hair.He only remembered the hair.When she closed her eyes, as she did for a moment, she could almost be beautiful.When she opened them the expression there dissolved the effect.The expression was a clear reminder of the night before.
“Who are you?”he asked.
She turned to him then, and for a moment there was a touch of grim amusement in her expression, but she didn’t answer.Instead she posed a question of her own.“Where are you taking me?”
“Where do you wish to go?”He was strangely wary of her composure.
“Back to the river,” was her simple reply.
After a small, helpless pause he asked her why, and she replied, gazing out the window, “Well, the alternatives are worse, you see.”
“And what are they?”
“Marriage to a man I loathe or poverty and disgrace.”
He could not stand the grain of uncertainty, or hope, any longer.“You are the woman who was … introduced to pleasure last night.Who are you?”
She turned clear, blue, affronted eyes on him.“I am Eleanor Chivenham, and let us be precise.I am the woman you raped.I do recognize you.And besides, my brother was kind enough to tell me who had … who was given the honor of my despoiling, Lord Stainbridge.”
