Chapter Twenty-two
She found the letter in the morning.
My dearest Lily,
I can only imagine your reaction when you find this. You will wish you had made good on your threat last night and tied me to the bed. I rather wish it, too.
Dear, darling Lily. Where do I begin?
I have an enemy. Ever since Leo’s death, I have suspected that attack was meant for me. I explained to you yesterday how, as a youth, I became privy to sensitive information at the coffeehouse. Although my attempt to place a wager on that horse race went disastrously wrong, I eventually found other ways to use the information to my material advantage. And if I were ever brought to a reckoning in those cases, neither the law nor the truth would be on my side.
These past six months, I’ve feared someone had discovered my true identity, finally connected Julian Bellamy with the deaf-mute errand boy. I thought this unknown person had tried to silence me permanently that night of the boxing match.
Lily, you must believe how ardently I hoped my suspicions were wrong. For a while, I managed to convince myself that you were right, and Leo’s death was nothing but a random, senseless tragedy. Then yesterday, both my brightest hopes and my worst fears were realized. You blessed me with the news of our child, and within the same hour I received incontrovertible proof that I am a marked man. My life is in danger—and, as long as I remain near you, so is yours.
I cannot risk harm to you or the babe, nor can I live with the specter of fear overshadowing our joy. I ride out this morning with Morland and Ashworth, with plans to confront Leo’s killers and hopes of identifying my enemy. From there, I will do whatever I must to protect you and our child.
Believe this: I will do my damnedest to fix this and come home to you. However, I cannot ignore the possibility that I may not return. If I fail to come back, look for my solicitor to discreetly make contact. There are funds set aside. You will never want for anything.
Lily, by leaving you like this, I break a promise. And thus, I behave in a manner completely unworthy of you. The plain truth of it is, I have always been unworthy of you. You don’t know the half of what I’ve done. But no matter the shame in my past, these weeks with you have been the happiest and proudest of my life. Had we shared only one night together, it would be worth all this and more to have called you “wife” just once and to wear your ring to my grave. I could cover this paper with “I love you”s, and still they wouldn’t be enough.
I love you.
There, kindly read that a thousand times over. Then pause to take tea, and read it a thousand times more. Daily, if you will.
Be faithful to those vows you made last night. You must never doubt my love for you, and no matter what occurs, you must find a way to carry on. The irony is not lost on me, that even as I break my own promises, I’m insisting you must keep yours. Unfair of me, but true to form. I’m a bastard, a scoundrel, and as you’ve said, an unmitigated ass. Even the damned bird knows it’s true. But above all these, I remain
Yours, always,
—J.
“No!” Lily shouted, stepping back from the letter where it lay on her dressing table. “No, no, no! How could you?”
She pressed a hand to the thin lawn of her shift. They’d spent a magical night together. Had she somehow dreamed it all? No. The supper tray was still there, not even yet cleared. He’d made love to her so sweetly, all night through, scarcely allowing her to rest between bouts of passion. She’d thought his exuberant ardor meant he’d finally moved past all his fears and reservations.
But no. It meant he’d been saying good-bye. Making love to her as if last night could be their last night, ever. And now he’d rushed out to meet some unknown danger, leaving her behind to helplessly fret.
Damn him. Damn him. Lily seldom swore, but if ever there was an occasion to merit blasphemy, this was it. He must have been planning this. Hadn’t he said so yesterday in the gallery? The three gentlemen had made plans to go riding.
“Damn you, Julian,” she said aloud. “And damn your noble words. I’ll be damned if you’ll leave me like this.”
She looked to the clock. Already half nine. Damn, damn, damn. Who could say how long he’d been gone?
Her lady’s maid came rushing in, no doubt drawn by the angry shouting.
“I want a traveling habit, and a warm cloak,” Lily told her. “And I want them now. Don’t bother with pressing.”
While the maid was still curtsying her agreement, Lily rushed past her and wrenched open the door, sticking head and shoulders into the corridor. “Swift!” she bellowed, putting her whole body into the effort.
Within moments, the butler’s silver head appeared at the top of the stairs.
“The carriage, Swift. I want it readied immediately.”
Without even waiting for his acknowledgment, Lily slammed the door shut and went to the washstand, swabbing herself with tepid water and yanking a brush through her love-tangled hair. By the time her maid appeared with a fresh chemise, stays, and petticoat, Lily was read to don them. She grabbed the stockings and garters for herself. “Get the dress,” she told the maid.
The stockings were uncooperative, and the garters were downright incorrigible. “Damnable stockings,” she grumbled, perversely wishing she did swear more often, so she would have a broader repertoire of profanity to draw from. “Damnable garters.”
As the clock ticked toward ten, she was fully dressed and simply coiffed. Presentable, if not a picture of elegance. She took one last glance in the mirror, smoothing her damp palms over the pleated amethyst superfine.
“Gloves,” she called. “I need gloves.”
Her maid was right there beside her, holding a pair in either hand for her selection.
Lily took the buff doeskin gloves and ran with them, working her fingers into their tight sheaths as she hurried down the stairs. “Is the carriage ready, Swift?”
“Nearly, my lady.”
“Tell the driver to pull around front. I’ll wait on the steps.” Honestly, Lily had no idea where she intended to go. She just knew she had to go somewhere. She could not sit in this house, poring over ledgers and alphabetizing books while Julian was out in the world, courting danger.
She went to the front door and grabbed hold of the handle. Amelia, she thought. She would start with Amelia and Meredith. Since all three men had gone out together, perhaps the other ladies would have some clue where they’d headed.
Lily wrenched open the door and bolted through it, only to pull up short on the threshold. Amelia and Meredith themselves stood on the front stoop. Amelia’s hand was arrested midair, as though she’d been preparing to ring the bell.
“Good morning.” She smiled brightly. “That was speedy of you. Did you see us coming up the walk?”
Lily shook her head. “No.”
Meredith said, “We thought with the men gone out for their ride, we ladies deserved some amusement of our own. What do you say to a stroll in the park?”
“Damn the park. That’s what I say to it.”
Both ladies blinked with surprise.
“I’m so sorry,” Lily said. “But come in, come in. I’ll explain.” She ushered her stunned friends through the door and shut it behind them. “Our husbands haven’t gone out for a leisurely ride. They’ve gone out to confront Leo’s killers.”
Amelia and Meredith looked to one another.
“You must believe me,” Lily said. “Julian left me a letter this morning.”
“We do believe you, dear.” Amelia put a hand on Lily’s arm. “We already knew.”
“You … You knew?”
Meredith nodded. “Our husbands told us. But Mr. Bellamy asked us not to say anything to you. I gather he didn’t want to raise your hopes or anxieties until it was all over.”
Lily went numb with anger and disbelief. She didn’t know what to think. Her husband, her friends, her friends’ husbands … Was the whole world conspiring to deceive her?
Amelia tightened her grip on Lily’s arm, guiding her into the drawing room and helping her into a chair.
Sitting down across from her, Amelia said, “There’s nothing to fear. Let me explain. Through the work of an investigator, Mr. Bellamy was able to find the two men believed to have attacked dear Leo. They’ve been imprisoned these six months for another crime, and they’re due to be released today. The men have gone to meet them, bring them to London, and swear out a new charge of murder. There is no danger, and it will all be over soon.”
“But … but that makes no sense.”
If there was no danger, why would Julian leave a letter saying he might not return? He said he’d received a threat on his life yesterday. Lily’s memory flashed back to that moment on the street, when she’d been shoved against the windowpane. Could that have been the incident? It would certainly explain Julian’s behavior of the subsequent half-hour, carrying her more than a mile home before collapsing with relief.
She reached for Amelia’s hand and clutched it tight. “I believe you, Amelia. I believe that as recently as yesterday, their plan was as you describe it. But something changed. That’s why Julian wrote me that letter. He spoke of not only confronting Leo’s killers, but identifying an unknown enemy. He spoke of violence, and the possibility he will not return. I believe our husbands may be in true peril. Or at the very least, mine is. We must do something. Do you have any idea where they’ve gone?”
Amelia and Meredith exchanged guarded looks.
“Lady Lily,” Meredith began, “I know you are anxious. But even if there is danger, our husbands are better equipped to handle it than most men.”
Lily ignored her. “If they went to meet prisoners being released … How many prisons are there? The Fleet? Newgate? Bridewell? And so many more, just in London alone. Oh, but a London jail makes no sense. Why would they ride out on horseback? It must be somewhere further away.”
Amelia touched her wrist, then waited for her attention. “Lily, my dear—”
Lily cut her off. “I know what you’re going to say, Amelia. That our husbands have the situation in hand, and we can only make a muddle of things by interfering. But I know you’re wrong. I can’t tell you how I know, but I know. Julian would not have left me that letter if there was no reason to fear.” She took a deep breath. “Now, the two of you can either help me find him … or you can leave, and I’ll do it myself.”
Meredith sighed. “Rhys gave me no details about their destination. He said only that they were riding into the country.”
“I’m afraid I don’t know any more than that,” Amelia said. “I confess, when Spencer’s talk turns to horses and riding, I don’t always listen so closely as I ought.”
“We need a list,” Lily said. “A list of prisons and jails within easy riding distance.”
“Even if we obtain such a list,” Amelia asked, “what will you do with it? We can’t possibly go searching in every direction at once.”
Lily dropped her gaze and blinked back the tears of frustration stinging her eyes. Crying wouldn’t help matters.
Her attention was jerked upward by a flurry of rainbow-hued feathers. Tartuffe swooped the length of the drawing room, circling back to perch on the chandelier.
“Damnable bird,” she cursed up at him. “How did you escape your cage?”
Amelia clapped with astonishment. “Is he yours?”
Lily nodded.
“He’s lovely,” said Meredith. “And he seems to share your distress over Mr. Bellamy’s fate. He keeps singing his name. ‘Oh, Julian,’ he says. Over and over. ‘Oh, Julian.’” She chuckled. “And now, ‘Guilty, guilty.’”
“He belonged to a barrister once,” Lily explained. “And yes, he has quite a fondness for Julian’s name.”
Something pecked at her memory. A line from Julian’s horrible, heartbreaking letter.
I’m a bastard, a scoundrel, and as you’ve said, an unmitigated ass. Even the damned bird knows it’s true.
Just what did this damned bird know about Julian? Guilty, guilty indeed.
“Don’t … you … move,” she warned the parrot, slowly backing away. Once she’d reached the room’s exit, she darted into the corridor and found two footmen standing there.
She snapped her fingers at the first. “You—bring quill and paper.” She swung her gaze on the second. “Run and ask Cook for a dish of minced fruit and nutmeats. And both of you, be quick.”
They dispersed as ordered, and Lily returned to the drawing room. It was a wild, likely futile idea, but it was the only idea she had.
“Amelia,” she said, retaking her seat and keeping her eyes trained on the feathered menace overhead, “I know you are a duchess, and this task is horribly beneath your station in life. But I must ask you to do it anyway.”
“Whatever can you mean?”
The footman arrived with paper and quill, and Lily waved him toward Amelia, saying, “I must ask you to take dictation from a bird.”
“What time are they set to be released?” Ashworth asked.
Extricating his boots from the squelching marsh, Julian climbed a small ridge and squinted toward the Thames. In the deep center of the river, the prison hulks floated at anchor—skeletal, rotting corpses of ships, stripped of masts and sails. Retired from their work as sailing vessels, now serving as overflow prisons for convicted felons.
“After the day’s work,” he answered. “This time of year, labor ends at four o’clock.”
“Odd, isn’t it?” Ashworth mused. “That they put convicts to work around all those weapons and guns?”
“I reckon the officers watch them close.”
Longboats ferried the prisoners back and forth from the shore, where they spent their days laboring in the Woolwich Warren, England’s largest armory. To the south of where they stood now, a large wall rose up from the marshland, enclosing the Warren—a maze of shipyards, weapon foundries, powder magazines, and more.
“Four o’clock?” Morland consulted his timepiece. “It’s not yet noon. We have plenty of time, then. Let’s take a meal at the inn beforehand.”
They’d ridden out from Town before dawn, tracing the Thames some distance on its journey toward the sea. Around daybreak, they’d come within sight of Woolwich and the fleet of hulks. They’d stabled the horses at a nearby inn and set out on foot to scout the area.
“Let’s go over the plan again,” Julian said.
“Again?” Ashworth groaned.
“It’s not as though it’s complicated,” the duke said. “We enter the Warren. Before the two brutes can be released, we’ll intervene. Explain matters to the officer, take them into our custody. We arrange for transport to Newgate, where I see them charged with murder. End of plan.”
“Wrong,” Julian said. “The plan has changed.”
“Oh, really?” Ashworth asked. “How so?”
“We have to enter the armory on false pretenses. Then let them be released. I’ll follow them for a bit before taking them into custody. My custody.” He opened a satchel at his side and removed a pistol, a horn of powder, and a pouch of lead shot.
“Your custody? At gunpoint? Why?”
“Because I need to know who hired them.”
In matter-of-fact terms, Julian told them about the shoving incident in the street yesterday, and the card pressed into his hand. He didn’t repeat the words of the message, only the gist.
“It was a warning,” he said. “‘Don’t interfere, or you’ll be silenced.’” He paused for a moment, concentrating as he measured black powder. “It’s just as I’ve always suspected. That attack on Leo and Faraday was meant for me. If these two brutes go to the gallows, I’ll never know who put them up to it. Lily will never be safe. My only chance is to capture them and force them to lead me to their employer.”
“And you propose to do that alone?” the duke asked.
“It’s kidnapping,” Julian said. “And torture, if they need some convincing to talk. I wouldn’t ask you to be a part of that.”
Ashworth said, “You’ve asked me to do worse.”
“That was in the past. You both have wives now, responsibilities. Morland here has a child on the way.”
Morland countered, “And what about you?”
A swift pang caught him in the chest. He ached for Lily. Would she be awake yet, he wondered? Was she already cursing his name, ruing the day they wed?
“Just leave,” Julian told the others, “I’ll go it alone.”
Ashworth and Morland exchanged glances. Neither man moved to depart.
“We’re not going to leave you alone, man.” The duke kicked at a loose stone. “We think too highly of your wife, for one.”
“And we both owe you our assistance,” Ashworth added.
Julian shook his head. “Forget the Stud Club. It was nothing more than a joke on Leo’s part. I only puffed up that honor and fraternity and ‘Code of Good Breeding’ nonsense to prod you into action when he died. Neither of you owes me anything.”
Ashworth snorted. “I owe you my life. Or don’t you remember?”
Julian tilted his head, considering. Well, he supposed there was that. He’d hauled Ashworth up from a cliff in Cornwall. At the time, however, the man hadn’t treated it like a favor.
The duke added, “And I seem to recall your assistance in a midnight search for my runaway ward.”
“That hardly counts. I didn’t want to help.”
“For God’s sake, you stood up for me at my wedding,” Ashworth said. “We’re friends, Bellamy. And you’re stuck with us, whatever fool plan you’ve cooked up.”
“But at least give us some explanation first,” Morland said. “Why the devil does someone want so badly to kill you?”
Julian hesitated, unsure whether to tell them. Were they friends, truly? He looked from the stern, aristocratic duke to the formidable, battle-scarred warrior. Well, he supposed, these were two men he would rather have as friends than enemies.
“I know things,” he said. “Things I was never meant to know. I overheard secrets as a youth, working at a coffeehouse. I was an errand boy. My mother worked in the kitchen.”
“And your father …?” Ashworth prompted.
“Not in the picture,” he said tightly. Julian couldn’t imagine that news would come as a shock to either man.
It didn’t.
Morland frowned. “What do you mean, ‘you know things’? Such as …?”
“Such as that horse you’re so fond of? Osiris? You know, the reason for this whole club?” At Morland’s nod, Julian continued, “I happen to know the first race he ever won was fixed.”
Morland’s chin jerked in surprise. “His first win? That would have been …”
“At Doncaster. He was a three-year-old colt. His jockey had been purposely holding him back all year. The gaming lords kept increasing the odds. By Doncaster, they were twelve-to-one, and all bets were on—”
“Mariner,” Ashworth finished. “He’d been running strong all year. I remember it well, the general shock when he ran third.”
“Not everyone was shocked. There were ten members of the Jockey Club in on the plan. I heard them discussing it myself, at the coffeehouse where my mother worked. I didn’t know their names at the time, but I remembered their voices. Repeated them over and over to myself, so I wouldn’t forget. Over the next few years, I learned their identities, and then … And then I blackmailed them, each and every one.”
There was an awed silence in response to this. Julian found himself enjoying it a bit. Even he could hardly believe he’d possessed the stones to do it.
Once he’d learned the identities of each conspirator, he’d posed as—well, as himself, as those men knew him. A deaf-mute ruffian. Through gestures and written cards, he’d demanded a private audience with each man in turn. In each interview, he’d handed over a block-lettered note. It was the first missive he’d ever penned, each word collected separately over a span of weeks; the whole copied and recopied with painstaking care.
Give one hundred guineas to the deaf-mute, and send him back forthwith. If both guineas and boy do not arrive by sunset, tomorrow’s papers will blaze the truth of Doncaster.
They might have shot him where he stood, and no one would ever have been the wiser. There would be no one left to tell the newspapers the truth. Even if Julian had gone to the scandal sheets himself, it was unlikely they would have believed his tale.
But with his mother gone, he’d had nothing to lose. So he played this bluff ten times in all, and in each instance it worked. Almost sad, how none of the men even thought to suspect him. They saw that deaf errand boy from the coffeehouse, and they assumed him to be a simpleton. Ten times, he’d walked away with his heart pounding in his throat and a hundred guineas testing the seams of his pockets. He could have asked for more money; he knew that now. As a youth, he simply hadn’t been able to conceive of a greater sum. A thousand guineas, all told. From it, he’d purchased new shoes and a proper suit of clothes. And then he’d gone about building a fortune.
Years later, when Osiris was retired to stud and Leo started the Stud Club … ah, the irony had been too sweet. At last, he was one of the ten. Not the boy scraping mud from their boots.
“Blackmail.” Ashworth whistled low through his teeth. “And you think someone’s recognized you?”
Julian nodded. “I’m sure of it.”
“But I don’t follow,” Ashworth said. “It was just a horse race, and years ago now. Why would they kill to protect that secret?”
“It wasn’t just a horse race,” the duke said. “Fortunes were gambled and lost. Men were ruined. If the plot were ever known, the conspirators would be permanently barred from not only the Jockey Club, but most of polite society.”
“So they’d commission a murder just to save face?” Ashworth shrugged. “I suppose men have killed for less.”
“It could be something else,” Julian said. “This coffeehouse where I learned of this race-fixing scheme … gentlemen came there every day to discuss their secrets. Political secrets, business secrets, affaires of the heart. If someone has recognized me, who knows what else he thinks I might have overheard. That’s why it’s impossible for me to identify my attacker. I need Stone and Macleod.”
“That’s assuming Stone and Macleod are actually the men who killed Leo. Shouldn’t we at least have Faraday identify them first?”
Julian leveled his pistol toward the riverbank, checking the sight. “We leave Faraday out of this. I’m not sure he can be trusted.”