“Grenville is all a gentleman should be.” Donata raised her head, her faraway smile one that would have made me mad with jealousy before I came to understand her. “He is a reason I turned my rage from you to Mr. Denis and Mr. Creasey. He put forth a logical argument that you were coerced by both gentlemen, even one that reached through my worst fears.”
“I owe him much, then,” I said.
“You can thank him when we are back in Gloucestershire. His house is quite cozy. We’ll leave tomorrow.”
The commanding woman had returned. “Will you give me time to find Eden again? I want to locate Warrilow’s killer, and I am certain Eden can tell me much more than he is saying.”
“Perhaps one more day,” Donata said. “I can do some shopping.”
She’d give me no more, I knew. I gathered her against me, my lips in her hair, and we rejoiced that Peter was safe and well.
ISLEPT A LONG TIME,all through the night and into the next morning. Peter was curled up on a cot at the foot of my bed, the boy worn out. I’d feared he’d have trouble sleeping or experience nightmares once he did, but Peter had dropped off quickly and was still asleep when I rose. I bade a footman watch over him while I went down to find a meal.
Grenville, who had accepted Donata’s invitation to be a guest here so he would not have to open his own house, had gone out, Barnstable informed me.
“Mr. Grenville slept only a little,” Barnstable said as he served me coffee and a light breakfast in the dining room. “He is a most energetic gentleman. He said he had things to see to this morning.”
I ate hungrily, agreeing with Barnstable. Grenville suffered only one malady, motion sickness, but he quickly recovered from it once he was on his feet again. I admired him for bringing Donata from Gloucestershire in one go. He must have been in a bad way on that journey.
I’d have little time in London, and I must make the most of it. I would find Eden and shake out of him what he was keeping from me. It might have nothing to do with Warrilow’s murder, but I had a feeling it had everything to do with it.
Now that the threat of Creasey had been removed—even if he’d survived the blast, he would not likely be in position to retaliate right away—I had time to think about Eden’s conundrum.
I called for pen and paper and listed out my thoughts as I ate.
My theory was that Warrilow knew about the smuggling—both the guns and Fitzgerald’s artworks. He was apt to dig into everyone’s business and upbraid them for it. I suspected he tried to blackmail both Laybourne and whoever had killed him. If Warrilow had been an upright man, he’d have gone straight to the Thames River Police or a magistrate or the customs men with his knowledge. Instead, he’d hidden the gun and admitted a late-night visitor to his rooms, getting himself murdered for his pains.
I had thought the carbine a key to the murder when Brewster found it, but there was another possibility. The gun had been in pieces, well hidden. The killer obviously hadn’t known it was under the floorboards, or he would have taken it away with him. In that case, perhaps Warrilow had been struck down because he’d known about theart.
I could imagine Fitzgerald, smiling and agreeable, calling on Warrilow, perhaps making an appointment to meet him that night. Warrilow would not be on his guard with Fitzgerald, as he sneered that he knew all about Fitzgerald’s smuggling. I could also imagine Fitzgerald, a large and strong man, silencing Warrilow with one blow of the washbasin’s heavy pitcher. There had been no blood on the pitcher that Mrs. Beadle had noticed, but perhaps he’d cleaned it and replaced it carefully before he’d gone.
Fitzgerald would have no need to search the room for the missing carbine, because he was only interested in smuggling his artworks. He’d have gone, dusting off his hands.
Why then, would he have killed Laybourne? I made another note.
For the same reason, I imagined. Perhaps Laybourne, while offloading his contraband weapons, had found Fitzgerald’s pieces. Laybourne had been waxing nostalgic about returning to the affluent spa town at the edge of the Dales. Had the threadbare man been paid handsomely by Fitzgerald to look the other way? And Fitzgerald, fearing Laybourne would not keep silent, killed him.
Whose carts had the fisherman seen surreptitiously take away a few loads? Fitzgerald’s I wagered.
It must have been unnerving for both Fitzgerald and Laybourne when the customs agents were crawling all over the ship, randomly seizing goods. The customs men had already been alerted about missing cargos and were carefully examining everything.
Then there were the Kingstons. Harry, the boy from Warrilow’s lodgings, had said he’d seen Mr. Kingston attempt to visit Warrilow, and Kingston had admitted he’d been there. His story that he hoped Warrilow had made an appointment with him so Kingston could save his soul was thin. Harry had again seen Mr. Kingston outside later that night, and then the next day near Laybourne’s, though Kingston had denied that.
Then again,Mrs.Kingston was tall, though not as slender. I had noted that their heights were not too far apart. If she dressed in her husband’s clothes, she might pass for him in the darkness.
I drew another sheet of paper to me and wrote a note to Sir Montague Harris, suggesting that he investigate a man and wife by the name of Kingston, recently returned from Antigua, missionaries from Lambeth. Brewster was correct that missionaries could easily move about the world, in a prime position to smuggle goods. Port authorities and customs officials might dismiss them as unthreatening. Or, when the Kingstons began to preach at them, wave them through to be rid of them.
I’d sent this letter off with one of our footmen and was finishing my breakfast when Grenville returned.
He was flushed, agitated. “Excellent, you are awake.” Grenville slid out of the greatcoat Barnstable reached to take from him. “I called in at Brooks’s to see if Major Eden might be there. I agree we need to speak to him most pressingly. He’d anticipated my arrival and left this.”
Grenville shoved a folded paper at me. Barnstable slid out a chair, trying to coax Grenville to sit, but he remained standing, leaning his fists on the table.
I opened the paper and read.
Mr. Grenville,
Forgive my rudeness, but please pass word to Lacey to meet me at once at Number 25 Wellclose Square. I fear much and need his help.
