“You may be right,” Brewster conceded. “The downstairs at Isherwood’s don’t know much. Young colonel lived in the house with his father, but sometimes they spent nights at the barracks. Kitchen couldn’t praise the son enough. A true gentleman, they say. Won’t miss the father much, I’m thinking.”
“Did any of them see him leave last night?” I asked.
“No, more’s the pity. Master came home after his night with the Regent and went up to bed. So all the staff toddles to bed after. Scullery maid swears she heard a door open around three in the morning, but she’s not a reliable sort. Soon as cook told her she couldn’t have heard nothing of the kind, and then the maid says, no, she didn’t.”
Which meant she might have heard the door but hadn’t been instructed in time to keep quiet about it. Or she hadn’t heard at all and the cook was correct that the scullery maid liked to invent things.
“My wife’s servants are utterly loyal to her,” I mused. “Would lie themselves blue to help her.”
“They would,” Brewster agreed. “Right pompous about it, are her ladyship’s slaveys. Not sure the colonel’s would, but they’re loyal to the son, I can see. Raised him, some of them did. His mum died when he was a wee tyke.”
I’d known that. The wife who’d accompanied Isherwood on the Peninsula had been his second, and his son hadn’t been there or even mentioned. Giles might have been at university or working on his own army career elsewhere at the time.
“If they thought they needed to protect the son, they’d lie, do you think?” I asked Brewster.
“That they would, guv. ’Tis my humble opinion.”
Were the servants, in fact, protecting young Isherwood? If Giles had followed his father and killed him, for whatever reason, he would have strong incentive to keep the murder from being generally known. But if true, why ask me to help?
“What did you learn from the upstairs?” Brewster asked as we passed the fish market. It was shut for the day, as most of its business happened in the morning, but strong odors lingered in its shadows.
“That Captain—no, Major—Forbes remembers me from Salamanca and was not pleased to see me.”
“Mmm. Not good news, I’m thinking.”
“Not really, no. I also learned that young Isherwood is indeed a gentleman and can cow Forbes easily.”
Brewster’s brows twitched. “What terrible things did you do to the major at this salamander place?”
“Salamanca,” I said. “In Spain, near the border of Portugal. We chased a French regiment about the hills there. Wellington was ready to turn for Portugal when he saw that the French lines had become scattered, and he turned and struck. Quick battle, definite victory, quite the coup for Wellington. Isherwood and Forbes were in another cavalry regiment, but we’d camped together and then stayed in Salamanca once we kicked the French out of their strongholds.”
Brewster listened in skepticism. “Did you embarrass this Forbes or Colonel Isherwood in battle or some such? Fought better than they did? No idea what goes on in the army, guv.”
He finished without apology. Brewster thought soldiering a mad game and had told me so on many occasions.
“I never saw them during the actual battle. Had my own men to look after.” What I mostly remembered was July heat, dust, noise, screaming, shouting, strength surging as I cut with my saber. I’d been a whole man then, not supporting my shattered knee with a walking stick.
“Well then?” Brewster was not going to let go of it.
“My quarrel with Isherwood was after the battle,” I said carefully. “It was a drama of army life and finished long ago.”
Brewster waited, but when I was no more forthcoming, he gave me a narrow look. “You mean both Isherwood and Forbes would cheerfully have killedyou. Can’t say I blame them. I’m sure you didsomethingto get right up their backs, and knowing you, it were something bad.” He shook his head and gazed out to the gray sea. “I truly don’t know how you’ve lived this long on your own.”
“Neither do I.” I studied the sea with him, wishing I were on it, heading back to Egypt or another exotic and warm place. “Nothing for it, Brewster. I will have to prove that I did not—or perhaps did—run Isherwood through. If I did …”
Brewster pulled me to a halt, his grip hard, and spoke in a quiet but fierce voice. “If ye did kill the man, you’llnotbe throwing yourself at the magistrate, confessing such and getting yourself strung up to dance on the wind. You’ll let His Nibs sort it out and take you off somewhere safe. Won’t do your wife and kiddies no good if you kiss the hangman.”
He was right. Donata could be ruined if it turned out she’d married a murderer, and neither would my daughters live it down. In our world, scandal stuck and could destroy entire families. Peter might survive it—he was not my true son, and he was a peer, if in his minority at the moment. Peers weathered their unfortunate relations better than the rest of us. Donata would find protection at her father’s house, and Gabriella could return to France to her mother and stepfather, but Anne would always be tainted by my misdeeds.
I sighed and resumed the walk. “If it turns out I am guilty of this crime, I will have to swallow my pride and everything I believe right, and throw myself on the mercy of His Nibs.”
Brewster gave me a dumbfounded look. “Fatherhood has changed you, guv.”
“It has. It did both times.” I thought of Anne and how she’d given me her baby smile when I’d looked in on her before I’d left this afternoon. “I wouldn’t trade that for the world.”
* * *
When we reached home,Donata appeared on the upper landing of the staircase of our rather dainty house. She wore a loose gown with her hair caught in a simple knot—I knew from experience she’d been at her evening toilette and must have exited her chamber when she’d heard me come in.
