“No, my lady. Not wishing to embarrass the young lady, I ducked into a doorway. I intended to say hello after they parted company. I didn’t know who she was at the time, but I saw her another day here in this very building with Lord Burnley and realized, by their familial resemblance, who she was. Burnley Mining is upstairs, you know.”
She nodded. She did, in fact, know.Why had Thomas denied knowing Lady Sophia?“Is that everything?”
“Another time, your brother came by and asked me to have Mr. Bunning copy out two of our contracts, as he had an investor to whom he wished to show our business. Peculiar a thing, as we currently don’t need any outside capital.”
Adelia hoped he didn’t go into great detail, as she was already thinking about returning immediately to Newgate to question Thomas.
“Of course, I did as his lordship asked, and he went downstairs where a clarence drew up with the Burnley crest as plain as day. I saw him hand the documents to someone inside.”
“How do you know that was Lady Sophia?” Her head was beginning to pound.
“As the carriage drew away, she leaned out and waved goodbye to him. After that, I decided to follow him on any number of nights. As manager, it was within my purview to ask him if he was planning on merging with Burnley Mining or selling the business entirely. I never saw him with Lady Burnley again, and next thing, you told me he was in Newgate.”
Adelia stood at once. She couldn’t breathe in the office another second. She had to leave. And quickly!
“Naturally, I didn’t tell Lord Burnley when he asked me. He was probably in on the plan with his sister. All the same, if an officer of the law asks me…,” he trailed off.
She felt the blood drain from her face.
“Unless you ask me not to say anything, my lady. Which I am more than happy to do to protect not only our company but also your brother.” Mr. Beaumont paused, then added, “Given what you’re going through, I wonder if it wouldn’t be for the best if you allowed me to take over Lord Smythe’s duties, the ones you intended to do.”
She stared at him, comprehending his demand for more power in exchange for keeping his own counsel regarding her brother and Lady Sophia. She had no words except those that would get her away from him.
“Good day, Mr. Beaumont.”
He appeared surprised at her abrupt leave-taking, but she needed Penny to loosen her corset strings as soon as possible.
At the door, unable to wait for his response or to take her leave with any manner of civility, she dashed through it. She had her hand on the railing and her foot on the first tread of the staircase when she heard him call after her, “I hope I haven’t upset—”
The sound of her own footsteps, clacking upon the wooden stairs as she hastily descended, drowned him out.Thank goodness.
Either her brother was lying to her or, as she knew in her heart, Mr. Beaumont had just recited a massive pile of rubbish. Pure drivel. Her brother was born and bred to discretion, as, no doubt, was the late Lady Sophia. And no member of the upper class would step out onto the street in Knightsbridge or anywhere else and allow a single woman to get out of his carriage unchaperoned, in broad daylight, directly after him. In a word, balderdash!
Moreover, no lady would stick her head out of a moving carriage to say goodbye to a man for fear of losing her coiffure along with her reputation. These were obviously the imaginings of a man who didn’t know any better and who had fabricated a story with evil intent. Fiction from start to end. That much was clear.
Ever since the terrible misunderstanding that sent her brother to Newgate, Mr. Beaumont had been trying to wrest control of their company. She had temporarily thwarted him by taking back the power of signature and approval. Now, he was taking advantage of Thomas’s incarceration and, with this perfidy, threatening to send her brother to the gallows.
One thing she knew, she would not dignify or validate his ridiculous stories by agreeing to anything he asked in exchange for his silence. At that instant, all she could think of was going home, removing her corset entirely, and considering what to do. She could trust no one. Not Owen, who wanted Thomas hanged for murder, not Mr. Beaumont, who plainly was engineering the truthafterthe fact. And it seemed not Constance Moore, either, who professed to love Thomas but might be hiding the biggest lie of all.
Once home and comfortably in her dressing gown, she penned Miss Moore a note, asking her to come to Hyde Park Street on Sunday. One way or the other, Adelia was going to get to the bottom of all this perfidy. But she certainly wasn’t going to risk her life again by heading back to the East End.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
“AMiss Mooreis in the parlor, my lady. She wishes to see you. Shall I tell her you are—?”
Hurrying past Mr. Lockley, who had entered her small upstairs study, she raced down the staircase.Miss Moore was in her home in Mayfair! At last!
Rushing through the open doorway, Adelia found the young woman standing in the center of the room, eyes wide, mouth open, gaping at everything around her.
Had Miss Moore ever been in a London townhouse?Adelia doubted it.
“Are you all right?” she asked into the silence, studying her visitor who was clad in a plain but clean cotton dress.
Miss Moore, usually so loquacious, was tongue-tied. In fact, her pale, scared face and demeanor, as if she wished to shrink, were all woefully familiar. The young woman could be Adelia, herself, a month ago in any ballroom in London.
“Would you care for tea?” she offered, though she was eager to start questioning her.
If anything, Miss Moore’s eyes grew wider. Perhaps the notion of taking tea in a nobleman’s parlor frightened her.Well, there was a first time for everything.
