Chapter Two
Arthur Carmichael, Marquess of Bancroft, settled into an armchair at Whitehall and prepared for the familiar onslaught of praise. The past seven years had been a blur of commendations.
“Ah, Bancroft.” Admiral Fitzroy entered the room. His once forceful stride had devolved into a waddle, and his distinguished salt and pepper hair had shifted to a consistent white. He placed some papers onto the table. “Let’s get started.”
“We should wait for the prime minister,” Arthur reminded him.
“Liverpool?” Admiral Fitzroy’s bushy eyebrows soared to a higher perch, and then he shook his head. “He won’t be joining us.”
Arthur blinked.
The prime minister always attended the meetings. Usually with some gold medal to flourish over Arthur’s shoulders. At times some simpering general, relieved at having been rescued, might accompany him. No journalist ever attended the meetings: spying was a secret occupation, no matter the success rate of Arthur’s missions.
But now the dark paneled room that had always seemed majestic was nearly empty, and the heavy furniture seemed old-fashioned.
Applause sounded from an adjoining room. Likely the prime minister was giving a laudatory speech on another person’s analysis on shipping tariffs. Or filing technique.
“The war’s over, Bancroft. No need to huddle with him anymore. He has other things to concern himself with. The budget, and those returned veterans.” Admiral Fitzroy stretched. “We had a damned good run of it, didn’t we old boy?”
Arthur stiffened. “I’m not old yet. Just experienced. Very experienced.” The “very” was perhaps superfluous, but he couldn’t have the person hiring any fresher sorts for the exciting jobs.
Assuming there were still exciting jobs.
The government seemed to have settled into a permanent nonchalance, unwilling to do much besides celebratory festivities now that Bonaparte was not forcing them into action.
Arthur hesitated and tapped his fingers against his armrest. “I was thinking about being more active in the House of Lords. Lead one of the committees.”
Life was good here, even though he had a decided preference for the more dangerous regions of the world.
“Good lad,” Admiral Fitzroy said. “I was hoping you would suggest it.”
“I aim to bring you pleasure,” Arthur said casually, but his heart leaped, as if it had mistaken itself for a horse and were attempting to jump a fence.
This was good.
Something was lacking in his life. Something…wonderful.
Clearly it was a political career.
“I could see you in the cabinet,” Admiral Fitzroy mused. “Perhaps even as foreign minister. We’ve a need for you there, Bancroft. It could be your crowning glory. Or…” He winked. “A stepping stone to PM.”
Foreign minister.
Prime minister.
Arthur’s heart seemed to leap higher, as if seeking to replicate the athleticism of a prized racehorse, but he kept his expression neutral. He’d been trained to be calm, and he certainly wasn’t going to abandon that principle before the admiral.
“You think I’m qualified,” Arthur said.
“Pitt was PM at twenty-four,” the admiral reminded him. “And you have rather better social skills than he had. Politics is about personality, Bancroft.”
“He was a scholar.”
“As were you,” the admiral said. “I saw the Latin accolades next to your Cambridge diploma. Moreover—you’ve shown a clear ability to think on your feet. I’ll be honest with you, Bancroft. We need someone like you at the top. No one in government has traveled as much as you have. You’ve been privy to negotiations with all of our allies. And besides—it would make me proud to see you succeed.”
“Oh.” Arthur was taken aback.
The admiral wasn’t one for huge displays of emotion. One needed a cool head when deciding how best to defeat enemy fleets.
“But,” the admiral said. “This is all hypothetical. You did an excellent job at maintaining your wild reputation. Regaling the regent at his beastly pavilion, stealing army officers’ helmets…”
Arthur grinned. “Ah, the cartoonists adored that. They’d never drawn so many feathers before in their life.”
“People will need to think you’ve reformed. You require a wife.”
Arthur leaned back, and the leather upholstery of his chair squeaked.
Marriage.
He’d considered it once. He’d been younger. More naïve.
Arthur had no moral objections to the marital institution. Lord knew he’d been through more trying occurrences than slipping a piece of metal on his finger.
But for some reason the thought of courting somebody, of being tied to some woman forever, gave him a queasy feeling.
Nausea, no matter how feeble, was a state Arthur preferred to avoid.
The prospect of marrying somebody compelled him to think of the person whom he’d once actually desired to wed. He didn’t want to spend the rest of his life comparing his wife with the woman who’d gotten her uncle to break off their courtship.
Since then, he’d never felt the urge to marry. Life as a spy differed from that of a man who’d attained domestic bliss, and he hadn’t been tortured from images of what might have been. Thwarting Frenchmen directing épées at him rather succeeded in keeping him in the present.
“Did you have someone in mind?” Arthur’s voice sounded hoarse, and he cleared his throat.
“Perhaps you can join my family for a dinner party sometime. You might find romance there.”
Arthur’s stomach sank. The admiral had hinted at Arthur’s suitability for his niece, Miss Theodosia Fitzroy, before.
Miss Fitzroy, though charming in her fashion, had only just debuted. She’d been sheltered from hardship. Arthur had listened to her ponderings on weather patterns politely, learning of her preference for sun over rain, but she’d hardly stirred emotion in him.
No.
He shook his head.
Undoubtedly the admiral was exaggerating the necessity of marital ties. Perhaps the admiral was more prone to hyperbole now that he could not discuss saving humanity from catastrophe on a daily basis.
“I always enjoy the opportunity to meet with you,” Arthur said. “Though perhaps I should remind you that Pitt never married. You seemed quite inclined to praise him.”
Disappointment flittered across the admiral’s face. “You must keep in mind that people are less forgiving these days. They’re tired of having a regent who orders architects and city planners to create his fantasies with public funds. People are embarrassed at the regent’s indulgence in drink and his insatiable desire for sugary delights. They despair at his drunken tirades against his wife and his open taking of most unsuitable mistresses.”
“Yet Pitt was much admired.”
The admiral shook his head. “This is peace time, Bancroft. The rules are sadly different. It’s difficult to distract them with news of overseas. You’ve seen all those temperance societies running about. One has to do something to counteract the regent’s excesses. The people don’t want to think their leaders are regaling when they cannot afford bread, and the broadsheets might decide to reprint those ghastly cartoons of you tossing helmets into the harbor with a glee not seen since Bostonians tackled tea.”
“I simply have no desire to marry,” Arthur said.
The admiral frowned. “I forgot. We do have something for you to work on.”
Arthur blinked. The admiral was not the type of man to forget things.
Admiral Fitzroy seemed unconcerned with his memory lapse, and smiled. “You will even have to leave the country.”
Arthur straightened. Would they send him back to the West Indies? He had a preference for the sun, one that was becoming clearer after spending the season in London.
Admiral Fitzroy removed a pamphlet from his folder. Women in pastel colored frocks posed beside looping letters describing their attire. The admiral flicked though the pages, and Arthur blinked.
“Is that Matchmaking for Wallflowers?” Arthur asked.
“Ah, you know it. One of my wife’s favorites.”
Arthur gave a polite smile. “I thought the magazine was irrelevant after the scandal with one of the editors.”
Admiral Fitzroy flickered his hand impatiently. “There’s always a market for advice for women. The poor creatures must fill their heads with something, and they clearly aren’t capable of following scientific or political journals.”
“I wouldn’t say that—”
“Oh, don’t give me a speech, Bancroft. There’s no point advancing the cause of women. They can’t vote, and their concerns will never be that of the government.”
The admiral shoved the article toward him. “Read this.”
Matchmaking for Wallflowers
How far the great have fallen.
Today marks the fourth occasion that a French expatriate has reported a theft. This time the French ambassador’s wife is wailing about stolen jewels.
We wonder how a country that was able to avoid our troops for so long, seems to lose track of its treasures with such apparent ease.
“You want me to recover…jewels?” The word felt strange in Arthur’s mouth. He’d saved lives, halted battles. Some compilation of gems, no matter how pleasurable the arrangement, seemed unimportant.
“Not just jewels,” the admiral said. “They’re considered art.”
Arthur had the curious sensation the admiral just desired to send him away, where he could no longer make suggestions for the ministers to do actual work to help the people.
“And they have been stolen from the French.” Arthur didn’t add that he wondered whether the admiral remembered the efforts they’d undergone to halt their attacks over the continent or to remind him of the vast number of lives lost in the war.
Aiding the French seemed an unusual occupation for the British government.
“The crimes have taken place on English soil. We can’t be seen to be sanctioning it.”
Jewel thefts seemed to pale in comparison with saving humanity from itself.
“I fail to see the importance of accessories—”
“I take it you’re not a jewel connoisseur.”
“I admire them as much as the next man. The same way I might notice a potted plant.”
“Well, we want you to observe much more than that.” Admiral Fitzroy pushed a stack of papers toward Arthur. “Let me brief you. All the jewels have been stolen from French owners who had been gifted them from the French government in the last fifteen years.”
“And you think the crimes are connected?”
“Indeed. They all used to belong to a Venetian family. The Costantinis.”
“When were the jewels sold to the French government?”
The admiral’s cheeks reddened. “They were spoils of war.”
“Oh.”
“Anyway,” the admiral continued, “France is complaining that some of the art from the very loftiest families—”
“I thought France had murdered all of them,” Arthur muttered.
“Not all,” Admiral Fitzroy said. “And most of these are, ahem, newer households of venerability.”
“Then they belong to the soldiers so good at killing that they received promotions and took over the land of the banished gentry.”
Admiral Fitzroy coughed. “Technically perhaps.”
Arthur shook his head. “Then I must inform you that I cannot help.”
“Look.” Admiral Fitzroy flushed. “Perhaps this task would have been deemed unconventional a few years ago—”
“Treasonous,” Arthur corrected him.
“Most certainly,” Admiral Fitzroy admitted. “Even so, France is our ally now, and we need to keep the peace. One way we can do that is to ensure that none of our people steal from the highest officials in French government.”
“You have reason to suspect an Englishman is involved?”
Admiral Fitzroy slid him a stack of paper. “Each theft takes place during a party in which Englishmen have been present.”
“It could be a clever French art thief.”
“Then you can find proof of that. There’s nothing I would favor more.”
“There’s only one piece of jewelry in the set that hasn’t been stolen. It’s located on the Côte d’Azur. Antibes.” The admiral smiled, and Arthur nodded.
“You’ll work with your French counterpart there. A Comte Jean-Louis Beaulieu. An important local minister. His—er—wife possesses the jewels.”
Arthur nodded. “I met her at a ball before.”
“Splendid.”
“Though why am I needed?”
“To show our goodwill,” Admiral Fitzroy said, speaking more slowly, as if Arthur might struggle with comprehending his words, when it was the decision that made Arthur wonder. It seemed odd that he’d been chosen. He wasn’t an art expert, though he was glad for the admiral’s trust in him.
“Very well,” Arthur said. “I will go there.”
“Splendid. And who knows? Perhaps you can find a wife in France,” the admiral said breezily.
*
After the admiral and he had exchanged bows, Arthur left Whitehall and settled into his carriage. His driver maneuvered the coach toward the direction of St. James Square.
It was eleven o’clock, and the ton was beginning to leave their townhomes, the women armed with frilly parasols and the men with glossy canes not meant to actually assist them over the pavement.
Debutantes in delicate pastel dresses, their sheer materials as impractical as their pale color, strode by, accompanied by their chaperones.
Marriage.
The only good thing about this assignment was the chance to leave London. The capital was swarming with marriage minded mothers who seemed to view him as ideal son-in-law material, despite his frequent assertions to the contrary.
He’d considered the act. One didn’t enter a ball in London without being overwhelmed with matchmaking mamas, stating their daughters’ accomplishments with detail only equaled by carriage salesmen.
But Admiral Fitzroy was right. The war had ended, and perhaps marriage did come with certain advantages. Perhaps he should take the first woman a calculating chaperone thrust upon him.
The traffic moved slowly as additional carriages flooded into the streets. The regent had decided that London lacked good architecture, and construction workers were busy tearing down centuries-old buildings in an effort to widen streets and rebuild them in a style more clearly hearkening to classical ideals. Personally Arthur would have imagined that making provisions to the tens of thousands of out-of-work soldiers would take a greater importance than the construction of goddess perching facades.
Finally his carriage halted. He rushed up the polished stone steps, hammered on the door until his butler answered, and nearly dragged his valet from the room.
“We’re going to France,” he shouted.
His valet gave a patient nod. “Then I shall pack, my lord.”
“Splendid,” Arthur said.
His valet returned to the room and laid out two trunks. The man was accustomed to sudden bursts of travel. No valet could work for him who didn’t have a strong stomach for choppy oceans and winding Alpine roads. Arthur left his valet in peace.
He paced the corridor. His apartment at St. James Square was magnificent, but he wanted more space. The building might be new, but it sat on a row of similarly elegant buildings. Each facade matched its neighbor’s.
Arthur had spent his childhood in the former colonies. He craved open space and vistas. London was dreary in comparison. There were too many people to remind him when he didn’t behave with utter propriety, scoffing at his carefully cultivated wild reputation, even though those same people seemed eager to marry him off to their female relatives.
And though he’d sworn at the time it wouldn’t upset him, there were too many men who’d pronounced themselves war heroes, even though Arthur knew that they’d spent the greater part of the war preparing to battle in luxurious camps filled solely with officers from the best families. No one knew of what he’d done, and he tired of the negative comparisons to his older brother who’d lost his leg at Waterloo. He hadn’t been idle during the war. While his brother had been pronounced a war hero at the Battle of Waterloo, Arthur had made sure the allies won the Battle of Paris, providing crucial information on Bonaparte’s strategy. He’d lowered the tensions in the West Indies, and had thwarted attempts for a Battle of Falmouth, Battle of Genoa, and a Battle of Antwerp.
He sighed.
He needed to learn more about the significance of the jewels. Were they really worthwhile as art? Would the thief have been someone sentimentally attached to the jewels? Had some historical person perhaps owned them? Or were their settings and shape more commonplace, and he would do best to look for any common thief?
He frowned. Who did he know who could help him? Percival’s wife was an accomplished expert in all things archaeological, and no doubt she could direct him to a person who might help.
But his brother and sister-in-law were now in Italy. He frowned.
Madeline.
The name came into his head, unbidden and certainly unwanted.
Lady Mulbourne, he reminded himself. He’d used her first name in a fit of sentimentality. But that had been ages ago, before he’d started helping Whitehall, and certainly before he’d known better.
He didn’t want to call on Lady Mulbourne, even if he had noticed she was in London. If he called on her they might discuss the past. And he didn’t want to be reminded of his youthful naivety.
Perhaps he could simply learn everything himself. He was intelligent. He could manage it.
Except—
He had the vague idea that he would actually benefit from listening to any insight she had. Lady Mulbourne’s late husband had been a talented art theorist. Everyone had known it.
“How much longer?” he asked his valet.
“Two hours, my lord.”
He had just time to call on her. The visit might be dashed awkward, but personal feelings could be set aside. He’d always done so before.