The tears alarmed Allan. “You are crying,” he accused.
“Because I am happy, dearest heart,” she assured him.
“Oh. Very well, then. Melody, my darling, I don’t know how it is, given I am no longer a young man, but…” He lay back on his pillow, took her hand, and put it down under the sheets to prove that he had recovered from his earlier exertions. “Shall we celebrate that we are courting?”
And so they did.
*
The most importantdistraction set the time for everything else. Fortuitously, the king had returned to London, and the Duke of Dellborough had seen him yesterday, supported by the Duke of Kempbury and several other peers. They had presented the evidence collected so far and asked the king to summonthe Marquess of Teign to answer questions arising from that evidence.
Since His Majesty did not rise before noon—and that was early for him—the meeting was set for two in the afternoon, and the messenger from the king would arrive at Teign’s house at noon. The summons commanded Teign’s presence but did not give a reason.
Whether the interview would be of any use remained to be seen, but Teign would be away from his home from one in the afternoon until at least four.
The second distraction was for Farnham. They had been lucky enough to trace the agent that Madam Hera mentioned, and he was now locked up in Dellborough’s cellars.
He was being very cooperative. He had handed over all his records, and had written a letter to Farnham offering “three prime whores, well-trained but still virgins, clean and in good condition.” That letter would be delivered after Teign left to see the king.
The third distraction, a direct assault on the courtyard once Farnham was out of the way, should draw off most of the footmen and guard.
The brothers and their wives all arrived at Clara’s house at noon. At ten minutes after one, a messenger arrived to say that Teign had left his townhouse. Ten minutes later, Mel, Allan, Baldwin, and Ernest were about to go out to the carriage that was ready for them, when another messenger reported that Farnham was on his way in the direction of the agent’s warehouse.
The third distraction, the attack on the courtyard, was imminent, then. Set for thirty minutes after Farnham left, it would be active in twenty minutes, so they needed to quickly reach the Westminster Abbey grounds, where they were meeting the rest of the assault team.
They were in place with time to spare, half the team at each end of the alley where the tunnel emerged. Mel’s group comprised herself, Allan, two bodyguards—both women—and a duke’s son. Baldwin and Ernest were with Somerville, the other two bodyguards and two other earls. Three of the bodyguards were women.
Mel peered into the alley while being careful to stay mostly hidden behind the building on the corner. She could see two sentries. They had put up a brazier at the mouth of the tunnel, in front of the gate, but even so, they were marching back and forth, stomping their feet and rubbing their hands to counter the cold.
“Two men,” she said. “I don’t know if there are more in the tunnel, but if so, the distraction should move them.” She hoped.
The assault group loitered in the street, doing their best to look as if they had just stopped for a conversation. The duke’s son was keeping an eye on his watch. “Lord Kemble,” he said after several minutes, “the distraction should begin in two minutes.”
“It’s time,” Allan said to Mel, who unfastened the cloak she was wearing and handed it to Baldwin.
Beneath, she wore another of the costumes from her trunk of disguises—a gaudy but patched skirt and a patched and threadbare coat in an equally eye-watering color. She hung from Allan’s arm as they strolled into the alley, patting his chest and looking invitingly up into his eyes.
As hoped, the two sentries dismissed them as harmless. Just a whore and her client looking for a little privacy. “Oy,” shouted one. “Move along. You can’t do that here.”
“I know a place,” Allan said to Mel. “This way, sweetie.” He led her closer to the tunnel.
One of the sentries stepped into their path and held his arms out. “Go round,” he demanded. “You can’t come through here.”
“Give us a break, mate,” Allan begged. “The long way round’ll take too long. I can’t be late back to work, and Grace here won’t wait till I’m off.”
“Too cold after dark,” Mel grumbled. “Too cold now.”
“Tell you what,” said the other sentry. “We’ll let you through if she does us, too.”
The suggestion had the first sentry stepping out of the way so she and Allan could move another few paces. The second man stepped out into the alley, trapping them, as he thought, directly outside the entrance to the tunnel.
It had turned out even better than Mel hoped. They were close enough now to see into the tunnel. If there were more men on the other side of the grill, they were in the darkness beyond where the light reached.
At that moment, they heard a cacophony rising from somewhere not far away. Clanging, banging, shouting, explosions, a scream. The sound was coming through the tunnels as well as over the buildings.
The two sentries turned to look in the direction of the noise, and at that moment, Mel and Allan moved. In seconds, Mel had hers trapped with a dagger against his neck and Allan had knocked the other unconscious. The rest of the assault team, in two groups, converged on them from each end of the alley, and took over tying and gagging the two sentries while Allan fished in his pouch for the key and opened the gate to the tunnel.
“We do not know whether there are sentries on the hidden door to the lower tower,” Allan warned. “Be careful. But fast.”
