17

RED WAX AND EVERYTHING

HAL STRODE OUT OF Sir William Yonge’s office, boot heels brisk on the marble tiles and head held high. He nodded cordially to the soldier outside the door and made it down the stairs, along the hall, and out into the street, dignity intact. Harry was waiting across the street, anxious.

He saw Harry’s face break into an enormous grin at sight of him, and then Harry threw back his head and howled like a wolf, to the startlement of Lord Pitt and two companions, who were coming along the pavement at the moment. Hal just managed to bow to them and then was across the street, hammering Harry’s back and shoulders in joy. One-handed, because the other hand was clutching the precious certificate of commission to his bosom.

“God! We did it!”

“You did it!”

“No,” Hal insisted, and shoved Harry in exhilaration. “Us. We did it. Look!” He waved the document, covered and sealed with red wax, under Harry’s nose. “King’s signature and everything! Shall I read it to you?”

“Yes, every word—but not out here.” Harry gripped his elbow and hailed a passing cab. “Come on—we’ll go to the Beefsteak; we can get a drink there.”

Mr. Bodley, the club’s steward, viewed them benignly as they tumbled into the club, calling for champagne and steak and more champagne, and within moments they were installed in the deserted dining room—it being eleven o’clock in the morning—with a cold bottle to hand and steak ordered to follow.

“…commissioned this day by His Royal Majesty, by the grace of God, George the second…oh, my God, I can’t breathe…such a-a-thing…”

Hal laughed at that. His own chest had felt as though it were in a vise all the time he’d been in Sir William’s office—but the vise had burst when he’d seen the certificate, with its unmistakable royal seal at the bottom, and now he breathed as freely as a newborn babe.

“Isn’t it, though?” He could barely stand to have the certificate out of his hand and now reached out to trace the king’s signature with a possessive forefinger. “I was sure when I went in there that it was all up, that Sir William would give me some cock-and-bull story for refusal, all the time eyeing me in that way people do when they think you’re off your head and might just pick up an ax and brain them unexpectedly. Not that I haven’t often felt that way,” he added judiciously, and drained his glass. “Drink up, Harry!”

Harry did, coughed, and poured more.

“So what did happen? Was Yonge friendly, matter-of-fact…what did he say?”

Hal frowned, absently enjoying the fresh burst of dry bubbles on his tongue.

“Friendly enough…though I don’t think I could tell quite what his manner was. Not nervous at all. And not that wary way politicals often are with me when they’re thinking of Father.”

Harry made a low noise in this throat, indicating complete understanding and sympathy—he’d been by Hal’s side through his father’s suicide and all the bloody mess that came afterward. Hal smiled at his friend and half-lifted his glass in silent acknowledgment.

“As to what he said, he greeted me very affably, asked me to sit, and offered me a currant biscuit.”

Harry whistled.

“My God, you are honored. I hear he only gives biscuits to the king and the first minister. Though I imagine he’d give one to the queen, too, should she choose to visit his lair.”

“I think the contingency is remote.” Hal emptied the bottle and turned to call for another, but Mr. Bodley’s tray was already at his elbow. “Oh, thank you, Mr. Bodley.” He stifled a belch and realized that his head, while not swimming, was showing a slight disposition to float. “Do you think the steak will be long in coming?”

Mr. Bodley tilted his head from side to side in equivocation.

“A little time, my lord. But the cook has some wonderful small eel pies, just out of the oven—perhaps I could tempt you with a pair while you’re waiting?”

Harry sniffed the fragrant air drifting in from the kitchen and closed his eyes in anticipatory bliss. The Beefsteak made their eel pies with the usual onion, butter, and parsley but also with nutmeg and dry sherry.

“Oh, God, yes.”

Hal’s mouth watered a bit at the thought—but the thought also brought a tightening of his body. Harry opened his eyes and looked surprised.

“What’s the matter, old man?”

“Matter? Nothing.” Mr. Bodley had freed the cork from its lead seal and now loosed it deftly with a soft burp and a hiss of rising bubbles. “Thank you, Mr. Bodley. Yes, eel pies by all means!

“Eel pies,” he repeated, as Mr. Bodley faded discreetly toward the kitchen. “The mention just reminded me of Kettrick’s…and that young woman.”

The thought of her—God damn it, why had he not even thought to make her tell him her real name? Lady Bedelia Houghton, for God’s sake—caused its usual frisson of mixed emotions. Lust, curiosity, annoyance…longing? He didn’t know if he’d put it that strongly, but he did have an intense desire to see her again, if only to find out what the devil she’d actually been doing. A desire now greatly intensified by his meeting with the secretary.

“Kettrick’s?” Harry said, looking blank. “Kettrick’s Eel-Pye House, you mean? And what young woman?”

Hal caught something in Harry’s voice and gave his friend a sharp look.

“The girl I caught magicking the drawer of my desk, the night of the ball.”

“Oh, that girl,” Harry murmured, and buried his nose in his glass.

Hal looked harder at Harry. He hadn’t told Harry everything—not by a long chalk, by God—but he had told him that he was satisfied with what she’d told him (actually, a long way from satisfied, but…) and that he’d sent her home in a coach and requested her address, which she’d given.

Only to discover that said address didn’t exist, and when he’d tracked down the coach driver, an Irish rapscallion, the man had told him that the girl had professed to be starving—she was; he’d heard her stomach growling when he…oh, Jesus—and had asked him to put her down for a moment at Kettrick’s. He had, and the girl had promptly walked through the house, out the back, and legged it down an alley, never to be seen again.

Which, Hal thought, was a sufficiently interesting story as to have stuck in Harry’s mind. To say nothing of the fact that he’d several times mentioned the girl, as well as his efforts to find her, to Harry.

“Hmph,” he said, drank more, and shook his head to clear it. “Well, regardless…there was a bit of cordial conversation, quite cordial, though all through it there was something…odd…in Sir William’s manner. Rather grave—that’s why I thought he was working up to a refusal—but then…sympathetic.”

“Really?” Harry’s thick brows shot up. “Why, do you suppose?”

Hal shook his head again, baffled.

“I don’t know. Only…at the end, when he’d given me the certificate and congratulated me, he shook my hand and held on to it for a moment, and…he gave me a brief word of condolence on my…my loss.” He’d thought he had his emotions well in check, but the pang was sharp as ever and he was obliged to clear his throat.

“Only being decent, surely,” Harry said gruffly. Hal saw, to his fascination, that the blood was rising up Harry’s neck and into his cheeks.

“Yes,” he said, and leaned back, casual, glass in hand, but an eye on Harry. “At the time, I was so elated that I wouldn’t have cared if he’d told me that a crocodile had hold of my foot, but with more-sober thought…”

Harry hooted slightly at that but then settled into his glass, eyes on the tablecloth. The flush had spread to his nose, now faintly glowing.

“I wondered—actually, just now—whether perhaps it was some sort of oblique reference to that bloody petition. You know, the one Reginald Twelvetrees brought, claiming that I’d assassinated his brother while off my head.”

“He—didn’t actually mention the petition?”

Hal shook his head. “No.”

The eel pies arrived at this moment, smoking and savory, and no more was said for a bit.

Hal wiped the last bit of juice out of the dish with a sop of bread, chewed blissfully, swallowed, then opened his eyes and gave Harry a straight look.

“What the devil do you know about that petition, Harry?”

He’d known Harry Quarry since Harry was two and himself five. Harry could lie, if given warning and enough time to prepare, but he couldn’t lie to Hal and knew it.

Harry sighed, closed his eyes, and thought for a bit, then opened one eye cautiously. Hal raised both brows and laid his hands flat on the table, in demonstration of the fact that he wasn’t about to either hit Harry or strangle him. Harry looked down and bit his lip.

“Harry,” Hal said softly. “Whatever you did, I forgive you. Just bloody tell me, all right?”

Harry looked up, nodded, drew a deep breath, and did.

“Irrumabo,” Hal said, more in astonishment than anger. “But you told her not to take the letters, you say….”

“Yes. I swear I did, Hal.” The flush had diffused and was beginning to fade. “I mean—I knew what you felt—about—”

“I believe you.” Hal was feeling a bit flushed himself and looked away. Mr. Bodley was approaching with fresh plates and silver, followed by one of the club’s waiters, ceremoniously carrying a sizzling platter.

They sat quietly while the steak—accompanied by a heap of wild mushrooms, garnished with tiny boiled onions and glistening with butter—was served. Hal watched, smelled, made the appropriate noises of appreciation to Mr. Bodley, and asked for a bottle of good Bordeaux. All this was purely automatic, though; his mind was in the library, on the night of the ball.

“I didn’t want you to be hurt.” He could still see the look on her face when she’d said it, and he believed her now just as much as he had then, the firelight glowing in her eyes, on her skin, in the folds of her green dress. “Shall I prove it?”

And she had, after all, proved it. A violent shiver ran through him at the memory.

“Are you all right, old man?” Harry was looking at him anxiously, a forkful of steak halfway to his mouth.

“I—yes,” he said abruptly. “But she wasn’t stealing Esmé’s—I mean—the letters from my desk; she was putting them back. I know she was; I saw her close the drawer before she saw me. So she didn’t send them to Sir William, I’m sure of that.”

Harry nodded slowly. “I…don’t like to suggest such a thing,” he said, looking unhappy. “I mean—I trusted her, foolish as that likely was. But could she…copies, perhaps? Because the way you describe Yonge’s manner…”

Hal shook his head.

“I’d swear not. The way she…No. I’m sure not. If nothing else…” He hesitated, but it was, after all, Harry. He swallowed and went on, eyes fixed on his plate but his voice steady. “If Sir William had seen those letters, he couldn’t have looked me in the face, let alone have behaved as he did. No. Something convinced him that I had cause to challenge Twelvetrees, I’m sure of that—but God alone knows what it was. Perhaps the—the girl—did find someone who…knew about the affair…” Blood burned in his cheeks, and the pattern on the fork was digging into his palm where he clutched it. “If someone of good character swore to it…”

Harry let out a breath, nodding.

“You’re right. And—that was what I’d asked her to do. Er…ask about discreetly, I mean. Um…sorry.”

Hal nodded but couldn’t speak. He did forgive Harry, but the thought that someone—someone unknown to him—had known…He had a brief, vivid urge to seize a candle from the sconce and set his head on fire in order to obliterate the thought, but instead he closed his eyes and breathed deeply for a few moments. The tightness in his chest began to loosen.

Well. Nothing to be done about it now. And the regiment was all right. He felt a bit of his earlier euphoria return and opened his eyes. Yes, by God, it was. There was the certificate, red wax seal and all, right there on the linen cloth.

He unclenched the fork, made himself pick up the knife, and cut into his steak. Hot red juice ran out, and he saw in memory the small bloodstain on the white hearthrug. Heat washed over him as though he had set his hair on fire.

“One thing you could do, Harry—if you’re of a mind…”

“Anything you like, old man.”

“Help me find her.”

Harry stopped, fork halfway to his half-opened mouth.

“Of course,” he said slowly, and lowered the fork. “But—” But, his face said, they’d both been looking for the past three weeks. Miss Rennie had vanished as surely as though she’d gone up in smoke.

Hal suddenly laughed. Mr. Bodley had materialized with the Bordeaux, and a brimming glass sat by his elbow.

“Confusion to all Twelvetrees!” Harry said, hoisting his own glass. Hal returned the salute and drank deep. It was a gorgeous wine, deep, strong, and smelling of cherries and buttered toast. Another bottle of this—well, maybe two—and he might just feel able to deal with things.

“One thing my father always said to me, Harry: ‘They can’t beat you if you don’t give up.’ And”—he lifted the glass to his friend—“I don’t.”

Harry’s face cleared and he gave Hal a lopsided smile, returning the toast. “No,” he said. “God help us all, you don’t.”