Page 23 of An Enchantress for an Earl

“Between that, and letting the moneylenders know what to look for, I am sure that we’ll get the evidence needed. I’ve never been one for drastic action unless it is truly necessary.”

“Nor have I. Drastic action is usually far too messy and visible for my liking. And it’s part of a spymaster’s job to keep his people from being revealed. If at all possible, we get the criminals to expose themselves. Do commend Lady Violet for her quick thinking in obtaining this note, when next you see her. There are times when I’ve thought that I should recruit that whole family as spies – they all have a talent for noticing the most useful things.”

“I am loath to admit it, as my wife is part of that family, but you are correct. Perhaps… we should consider a far more structured approach to what I do for you, in terms of maintaining a watch on what goes on amongst the ton?”

Setford laughed.

“Perhaps we should…”

>>>

Arryn was tidying his papers away, in preparation for going upstairs to ready himself for the evening’s Ball, when a tap came at his study door.

“Enter.”

The footman who came in was carrying the correspondence tray, and Arryn raised an eyebrow at the sight. This late in the day, the arrival of messages was unusual. He lifted the missive from the tray when it was proffered, and ice ran through his veins at the sight of the writing upon it.

It was the same strange hand as that which had addressed the blackmail note. It seemed that his unknown enemy had wasted no time in expressing his opinion of their non-compliance with his directives.

Arryn waved the footman away, and dropped back into his chair, staring at the letter in his hands as if it were a spider, or some other dangerous beast. It sat there, the plain red wax sealing it, the uneven hand addressing it, and threatened by its mere presence.

He felt shaky, as if his world had, somehow, spun out of his grasp. He did not like this continuous flow of the unexpected, of things which he could not control, or manage in any reasonable way. From the moment that his inability to simply accept the promulgation of untruths had driven him to argue with Professor Whimpferhim, things had become steadily more chaotic.

The odd way in which Lady Violet Gardenbrook destabilised his world was one thing – this horror filled conflict between what was right, and what threatened his family was another entirely.

He stared at the thing, breathing slowly and steadily, and steeled himself to open it. He had no choice – at the very least, he needed to know what the enemy intended, before he ventured into society this evening.

The coarse paper crackled as he broke the seal and unfolded it, flattening it out onto the surface of his desk. It lay there, such a small thing, a scatter of words on a page, and yet it tore him apart. He could not lie, could not encourage his father to lie, yet he could not knowingly allow harm to come to his sister. But the words before him demanded that he do one or the other of those things.

‘It is obvious that you are a fool Merryfield. But so be it. Clearly, you do not value your reputation – but let us see if your attitude changes when it is your sister whose reputation suffers. If you want her to ever have any chance at making a decent marriage, then you had best make sure that the committee finds that they have been dealt an impossible task, which must be abandoned.’

He wanted to crush the thing, to throw it into the fire, and watch it burn, but he did neither. At the moment, the two notes were the only clues he had to the identity of this unknown enemy.

He studied for a while longer, then locked it away in his desk with the previous note. Tonight, he would listen most assiduously to every damned piece of gossip he could detect. He would watch who spoke to whom, and he would, again, attempt to think of any possible reason that any person there might have to hate him.

He needed to uncover who was doing this, and put a stop to it. But he felt, as he had all along, that it was a task at which he was unlikely to succeed.