“Your order is ready, Your Grace,” the modiste said. “Have you decided on another set?”
“I have three,” she said while standing, “I also have one more request, I need a ballgown—” she winced “— in two weeks’ time. I know it's short notice, and I will happily compensate you for the rush.”
“Thank goodness,” Clara sighed.
Modiste Redmonde did not look flustered. “I’d be happy to. If you would step into the cloth room with me and choose a fabric and a style, I’ll be happy to get it done.”
Stepping into his home, Cedric headed straight to Leander’s rooms.
Gesturing to Hunt, he said, “Let’s start with the obvious places. His office and his bedroom. He may not have left any clues as to where he was going, as he had not been here since the wedding, but find anything else that might give us a clue.”
“Tear the place apart,” he directed his men, who immediately headed to the bedroom down the hall while Cedric, for Leander’s office.
“Anything in particular we’re looking for?” A footman asked
“It always comes down to money and contacts,” Cedric said.
A quick rummage through each of the drawers revealed that there was nothing out of the ordinary within. Jaw tight, he surveyed the room.
If I were my idiot brother, where would I hide my secrets?
His eyes landed on the large portraits hanging on the wall opposite the desk. There was one for a phaeton, a portrait of their late father, and one of the young Prince Regent. Running his hands along the edges of the heavy frames, he found noobvious mechanisms, no hidden cache behind the paintings to open.
“Did I really think Leander would be that clever?” He grunted to himself.
Heading to the bookcase, he pulled books away and flipped through the pages before replacing the book and removing another. Once again, he questioned himself on why Leander would keep his secrets in a book.
Heading to the desk, he tugged open four drawers, and when he got to the last, he tugged on the handle, but it didn’t budge. He knelt beside it and held the candle up, examining the lock.
“Where are the lock picks, Hunt?”
After being handed the kit, he slid the picks in and could feel the resistance; soon, the lock clicked, and he pulled the drawer out. A metal box squatted at the bottom.
He pulled it out and faced a small padlock attaching the lid to the base. Sighing, he used the picks again, and with three clicks of the lock and several minutes later, Cedric was able to open the box. Taking out the folios inside, he spun through them.
“Foreign bank accounts, foreign land holdings, investments on a steamboat,” he tossed the folio on the table. “The usual suspects a lord has.”
“These foreign land holdings,” Hunt took the folio up, “They are in America.”
“That’s where he is going with a fortune in hand,” Cedric said, “And with those investments, he will make a good life on those shores. One thing about Leander, he might be a scallywag, but he is a smart scallywag. He’ll find every opportunity in America to flourish.”
“Do you plan on letting him go?”
Cedric paused, “Yes. At this point, I wonder if I need any answers from him again.”
A footman came to the door, “Your Grace, Her Grace is home.”
“Thank you,” he said. “Tell her, I will be with her shortly.”
“Shall we still intercept Lord Moreland tonight?” The footman asked.
“No,” Cedric said while gathering Leander’s folios, meaning to take them back to his study to go through them. “But station men at every port in case he is shipping off. We’ll take him then.”
As he went off to his study, he dropped the books off before heading off to find Emily. He hated losing so much time with his daughter.
He stepped into Emily’s room to see her governess ushering Emily from her bathing room to her bed, clad in her muslin nightgown and her hair up in a cap.
“Papa!” Emily called out happily, running to hug him around his legs. “I am glad you’re here. I want to show you something.”
