“What sort of ship would I be looking for?” Eli asked. “Where would it be registered?”
“It wouldn’t,” one officer laughed. “No name, no flag, sail on moonless nights.”
“Or the opposite,” Danny said. “Rich man’s yacht on a private dock. Who would search it?”
“Why wud a nob do that?” a rugged-looking officer asked.
“Same as a street thief: greed. Maybe less need but no less greed,” Danny said.
“Where can I find out about traffic from that sort of dock?” Eli asked.
“If you got lucky—really lucky—th’harbor master might know. Some of ’em travel in and out like that. It would be worth some questions, wouldn’t it?” Danny looked from face to face. His men nodded. “Not the London or East India docks so much. Out toward the sea, on past Greenwich, maybe. Where are these girls being grabbed?”
“A few in London. That’s one reason I’m here. You might keep your eyes and ears open. More up north. Lincolnshire. Manchester. No docks there.”
“No,” one of the men, a rail-thin fellow a good head taller than Eli, said. “You might try Liverpool. Or even Beaumaris.”
An hour later, the rail-thin policemen, who called himself Benny, led Eli on a tour of some of the seedier riverside taverns along the Isle of Dogs and across to Greenwich and the Surry docks. Nothing of specific use came up, but Eli counted himself well educated.
Long past dark, he returned to Caulfield House and asked for bathwater. The Stilsons brought him warm stew and tea while the water heated. If he didn’t know better, he might have thought they had worried.
He soaked in the bath and thought of Fanny. She’d promised him she would remain home that day. He had given her every incentive to do that. “You must miss writing,” he had said. “Lucy has been distracting you.”
That should have done the trick!He sank deeper into the warm water, grinning widely.
*
Fanny set herpen on the blotter and reread the last words she’d written.
“The sound of footsteps blundering through the woods alerted Cassiopeia to hide. She sank behind the briars, breathing heavily.”
Her heroine, having survived an attempted abduction and learned to repent her vanity, hid in a croft in the Highlands, living on what she could find in the forest.
How on earth is my hero going to find her?Rob might have a suggestion.
Fanny quickly dismissed that notion. She could never bring herself to lay out the plot of her current novel about the enigmatic earl and the granddaughter of a brilliant but impractical scholar. Too many family details had crept into it since she’d first traveled to confront the earl.
What would a hero do? Charge off after her, tracking her movements?Perhaps that is him blundering through the forest now. Not in this case. He didn’t know she ran to evade the clutches of his evil cousin. Said cousin has poured poison in the earl’s ears about her disreputable behavior, claiming she ran off with another. She bit her lip.Have I boxed myself in? What would Eli think?
She had even less inclination to find that out. The wretch had already snooped on her desk in the old house. Still, he hadn’t run away in horror. His survey of publishers amused her, and she believed none of that would hurt. Research might help her sell her work. All that business wouldn’t get the books written, however. Only she could do that.
She tapped one finger on the table, lost in thought. What had he called himself? Her business adviser. She wasn’t certain she wanted one. She wasn’t clear on how one would help. She was sure about one thing, however. Eli Benson’s presence—and his touch—complicated her work.
Every time she tried to write about the hero as she had described him—tall, blond, granite-jawed, and masterful—she kept seeing brown hair, kind eyes with laughter lurking in them, and quiet competence. She kept seeing Eli. He made her heart race.
She sighed, picked up the pen, and wrote,Chapter Fourteen. A man came into view…
Light filtering into her bedroom window began to fail before a gentle knock at her door and Lucy’s voice brought her back to reality. She called to her to enter and set her pen down. Lucy carried a tray with a plate covered by linen. Susan followed with a pot of tea, and a footman brought up the rear. He set up a folding table and took his leave.
“When you didn’t come to tea, we thought tea should come to you lest you wilt away,” Lucy said with a teasing grin. She sobered too quickly for Fanny’s taste and softened her voice. “Are you well, truly? Are you still brooding over Grimsley’s behavior on Friday? Or did Eli say something to upset you?”
“No, not at all,” Fanny said.Drat the man, anyway.His gaze had been so heated when they’d paused at the river, sheltered among the viburnum, Reilly a discreet distance away. She’d thought he would kiss her. He had not.
“I can see I disturbed you by bringing it up.” Lucy arranged the tea things on the little table, her face darkened with concern, while Susan lit candles. Lucy dismissed the maid and sat on one side. “Tell me how my brother-in-law has distressed you.”
Fanny shook her head and joined her at the table. “Eli Benson is a perfect gentleman.”
A gleam lit in Lucy’s eyes. “Is that what you’re unhappy about? You hoped he’d let his gentlemanly instincts slip a bit as the moon rose?”
