Minnie waited with what patience she could summon for the necessary ceremony of pouring: the administration of three sugar lumps—Lady Buford had very few teeth left, and no wonder—a large dollop of cream, and the acquisition of exactly two ginger biscuits. Finally restored, Lady Buford patted her lips, stifled a soft belch, and sat up straight, ready for business.
“There’s tremendous talk about it, of course,” she said. “It’s not even four months since the countess’s death. And while I’m sure his mother is not planning to appear at this affair, choosing to celebrate her birthday is…audacious, but audacious without committing open scandal.”
“I should think the…er…his lordship has had quite enough of that,” Minnie murmured. “Um…what do you mean by ‘audacious,’ though?”
Lady Buford looked pleased; she enjoyed displaying her skills.
“Well. When someone—especially a man—does something unusual, you must always ask what it was they intended by the action. Whether or not that effect is achieved, the intent usually explains much.
“And in this instance,” she said, plucking another biscuit delicately from the plate and dunking it into her tea to soften, “I think that his lordship means to put himself on display, in order to prove to society at large that he is not insane—whatever else he might be,” she added thoughtfully.
Minnie wasn’t so sure about Lord Melton’s mental state but nodded obligingly.
“You see…” Lady Buford paused to nibble the edge of her softened biscuit, made an approving face, and swallowed. “You see, were he simply to host a rout or ball of the normal sort, he would seem light-minded and frivolous at best, cold and unfeeling at worst. He would also expose himself to considerable risk that no one would accept an invitation.”
“But as it is?” Minnie prompted.
“Well, there’s the factor of curiosity, which can never be overlooked.” Lady Buford’s rather pointed tongue darted out to capture a stray crumb, which was whisked out of sight. “But by making the occasion in honor of his mother, he more or less commands the loyalty of her friends—who are many—and also those who were friends of his late father but who couldn’t openly support him. And,” she added, leaning forward portentously, “there are the Armstrongs.”
“Who?” Minnie asked blankly. By this time she had quite an extensive social index of London but recognized no prominent person therein named Armstrong.
“The duke’s mother is an Armstrong by birth,” Lady Buford explained, “though her mother was English. But the Armstrongs are a very powerful Scottish family, from the Borders. And the rumor is that Lord Fairbairn—that’s the duke’s maternal grandfather, only a baron but very rich—is in London and will attend the…er…function.”
Minnie was beginning to think tea inadequate to the occasion and rose to fetch the decanter of Madeira from the sideboard. Lady Buford made no demur.
“Of course you must go,” Lady Buford said, having downed half a glassful at one gulp.
“Really?” Minnie was experiencing that sudden visceral emptiness that attends excitement, anticipation, and panic.
“Yes,” Lady Buford said, with determination, and downed the rest, setting her glass down with a thump. “Almost all of your choicest prospects will be there, and there is nothing like competition to make a gentleman declare himself.”
Now the sensation was one of unalloyed panic. What with one thing and another, Minnie had quite forgotten that she was meant to be husband-hunting. Just last week, she’d had two proposals, though luckily from fairly undistinguished suitors, and Lady Buford hadn’t objected to her refusing them.
She finished her own Madeira and poured another for them both.
“All right,” she said, feeling a slight spinning sensation. “What do you think I should wear?”
“Your very best, my dear.” Lady Buford raised her refilled glass in a sort of toast. “Lord Fairbairn is a widower.”
15
BURGLARY AND OTHER DIVERSIONS
THE CARTE D’INVITATION ARRIVED by messenger two days later, addressed to her simply as Mademoiselle Wilhelmina Rennie. Seeing her name—even a mistaken version of her assumed name—in black and white gave her a slight rippling sensation down the back. If she should be caught…
“Think about it, girl,” said her father’s logical voice, affectionate and slightly impatient. “What if you are caught? Don’t be afraid of unimagined possibilities; imagine the possibilities and then imagine what you’ll do about them.”
Her father was, as usual, right. She wrote down every possibility she could think of, from being refused admittance to Argus House, to being recognized at the ball by one of the clients she’d met this week, to being detected by a servant while returning the letters. And then she summoned the O’Higginses and told them what she wanted.
SHE’D COME LATE, smoothly inserting herself into a group of several giggly young women and their chaperones, avoiding the notice paid to guests who arrived singly and were announced to the crowd. The dancing had started; it was simple to find a place among the wallflowers, where she could watch without being seen.
She’d learned from Lady Buford the art of drawing men’s eyes. She’d already known the art of avoiding them. Despite having worn her best—the soft river-green eau-de-nil gown—so long as she kept her head modestly lowered, hung about on the edge of a group, and didn’t speak, she was unlikely to get a second glance.
Her eyes, though, knew just where to look. There were a number of soldiers in lavish uniform, but she saw Lord Melton instantly, as though there was no other man in the room. He stood by the enormous hearth, absorbed in conversation with a few other men; with no sense of surprise, she recognized Prince Frederick, bulging and amiable in puce satin, and Harry Quarry, fine in his own uniform. A small, fierce-looking man with an iron-gray wig and the features of a shrike stood at Melton’s elbow—that must be Lord Fairbairn, she thought.
She sensed someone behind her and turned to see the Duke of Beaufort beaming down at her. He swept her a deep bow.
“Miss Rennie! Your most humble servant, I do assure you!”
“Charmed, as always, Your Grace.” She batted her eyes at him over her fan. She’d known she was likely to meet people she knew—and she’d decided what to do about it. To wit, nothing special. She knew how to flirt and disengage, moving skillfully from one partner to another without causing offense. So she gave Sir Robert her hand, joined him for two dances, sent him for an ice, and disappeared to the ladies’ retiring room for a quarter of an hour—long enough for him to have given up and sought another partner.
When she came back, moving cautiously, her eyes went at once to the hearth and discovered that Lord Melton and his companions had vanished. A group of bankers and stockbrokers, many of whom she knew, had replaced them by the fire, deep in financial conversation by the look of them.
She drifted inconspicuously around the room, watching, but Hal—Lord Melton, she corrected herself firmly—was nowhere to be found. Nor was the prince, Harry Quarry, or the ferocious Scottish grandfather. Clearly the conversation had reached a stage where privacy was required.
Well enough. But she couldn’t get on with her own job until the bloody man came back into sight. If he was having private discussions, chances were good that he was doing it in the library; she daren’t risk walking in on him.
“Miss Rennie! What a vision you are! Come and dance with me, I insist!”
She smiled and raised her fan.
“Of course, Sir Robert. Charmed!”
It was more than half an hour before the men came back. The prince reappeared first, strolling to one of the refreshment tables with a look of pleased accomplishment on his face. Then Lord Fairbairn, who popped out of a door on the far side of the ballroom and stood against the wall, looking on with as amiable an expression as his forbidding features could manage.
And then Lord Melton and Harry emerged from the door that opened into the main hallway, chatting to each other with
a casualness that failed entirely to cover their excitement. So, whatever Hal’s business was with the prince, it had come to a successful conclusion.
Good. He’d stay here, then, celebrating.
She put down the half-finished glass of champagne and faded discreetly away in the direction of the retiring room.
She’d noted what she could—the locations of doors, mostly, and the quickest path should she need to get out fast. The library was down a side corridor, second door on the right.
The door stood open; the room warm and inviting, a good fire lit in the hearth and candles blazing, softly upholstered furniture in blue and pink against a wallpaper of wine-striped damask. She breathed deep, burped slightly, and felt the bubbles of champagne rise up the back of her nose, and, with a quick look up and down the hallway, stepped into the library and quietly closed the door behind her.
The desk was on the left side of the hearth, just as Mick had told her.
THE METAL WAS warm from being carried in her bosom, and her hands were trembling. She’d dropped the picks twice already.
“It’s dead easy,” Rafe had told her, handing over the two little brass instruments. “Just don’t let yourself be hurried. Locks don’t care for haste, and they’ll defy and obstruct ye if ye try to rush them.”
“Like women,” Mick put in, grinning at her.
Under the O’Higginses’ patient tutelage, she’d succeeded in unlocking the drawer of her own desk with the picks, several times. She’d felt confident then, but it was a lot less easy to feel confident when you were committing burglary—well, reverse burglary, but that was even worse—in a duke’s private library, with said duke and two hundred carousing witnesses no more than a stone’s throw away.
Theoretically, this desk had the same type of lock. It was bigger, though, a solid brass plate with a beveled edge surrounding a keyhole that looked to her as big as a gun barrel at the moment. She took a deep breath, pushed the tension pick into the hole, and, as instructed, turned it to the left.
Then insert the feeler and pull it out gently, listening to the lock. The roar of the ballroom was muffled by the intervening walls, but music thrummed in her head, making it hard to hear. She sank to her knees, pressing her ear almost to the brass of the lock as she pulled out the pick. Nothing.
She’d been holding her breath and the blood was pounding in her ears, making it even harder to hear. She sat back on her heels, making herself breathe. Had she got it wrong?
Again. She put in the tension pick and turned it to the right. As slowly as she could, she slid the feeler in. She thought she felt something, but…She licked her lips and pulled the feeler gently out. Yes! A tiny ripple of sound as the pins dropped.
“Don’t…bloody…rush,” she whispered, and, wiping her hand on her skirt, took up the feeler again.
On the third try, she’d nearly got it—she could feel that there were five pins, and she had three, each making its soft little click—and then the doorknob turned behind her, with a much louder click!
She sprang to her feet with a stifled shriek, startling the footman who’d come in nearly as badly as he’d startled her. He said, “Oh!” and dropped the tray he was carrying, which struck the marble floor with a loud clang and spun like a top, clattering finally to a stop.
Minnie and the footman stared at each other, equally aghast.
“I—I beg your pardon, madam,” he said, and squatted, fumbling with the tray. “I didn’t know anyone was in here.”
“That’s…quite all right,” she said, and paused to swallow. “I—I—felt a bit faint. Thought I’d just…sit…down for a moment. Out of—of the—the crowd.”
Both picks were sticking out of the lock. She took a step backward and put one hand on the desk, to support herself. It wasn’t pretense; her knees had gone to water, and cold sweat was chilling the back of her neck. But the footman couldn’t see the lock, screened as it was by her eau-de-nil skirts.
“Oh. Of course, madam.” With his tray now held to his chest like a shield, the footman was regaining his composure. “May I bring you an ice? A glass of water?”
Jesus Lord, no!
But then she saw the small table at the far side of the hearth, flanked by two armchairs and holding a plate of savories, several glasses, and three or four decanters—one of these plainly filled with water.
“Oh,” she said faintly, and gestured toward the table. “Perhaps…a little water?”
The instant he turned his back, she reached behind her and jerked the picks out of the lock. With trembling knees, she crossed the hearth and sank into one of the chairs, pushing the picks down beside the cushion, under cover of her skirts.
“Would you like me to fetch someone for you, ma’am?” The footman, having solicitously poured her water, was swiftly tidying away the decanters of spirit and what she now saw were used glasses onto his tray. Of course—this was where the duke had been having his meeting.
“No, no. Thank you. I’ll be quite all right.”
The footman glanced at her, then at the plate of savories, and, with a tiny shrug, left it on the table, bowed, and went out, pulling the door gently to behind him.
She sat quite still, forcing herself to breathe evenly. It was all right. Everything would be all right. She could smell the little savories—things wrapped in bacon, bits of anchovy and cheese. Her stomach rumbled; ought she to eat something, to steady her nerves, her hands?
No. She was still safe, but there was no time to waste. She wiped her hands on the arms of the chair, stood up, and marched back to the desk.
Tension pick. Right turn. Feeler to be sure of the pins. Probe. Raise the pins one by one, listening for each tiny metal tink! A pull. No. No, dammit! Try again.
Twice she had to get up, go drink water, and walk clockwise round the room—another of the O’Higginses’ bits of advice—to calm herself before trying again.
But then…a sudden decisive metal choonk and it was done. Her hands were shaking so badly that she could barely get the three parcels out of her pockets, but get them she did. She yanked out the drawer and flung them in, then slammed the drawer with an exclamation of triumph.
“What the devil are you doing?” said a curious voice behind her. She shrieked and whirled round to find the Duke of Pardloe standing in the doorway and, behind him, Harry Quarry and another soldier.
“I say—” Harry began, plainly aghast.
“What’s all this, then?” said the other man, peering curiously past Harry’s shoulder.
“Don’t trouble yourselves,” the duke said, not looking back at them. His eyes were fixed on hers, intent. “I’ll take care of it.” Without turning round, he grasped the edge of the door and pushed it shut in their staring faces.
For the first time, she heard the ticking of the little enamel clock on the mantelpiece and the hiss of the fire. She couldn’t move.
He walked across the room to her, eyes still fixed on hers. The sweat on her body had chilled to snow and she shivered once, convulsively.
He took her carefully by the elbow and moved her to one side, then stood staring at the closed drawer and the picklocks sticking out of it, brassily accusing.
“What the devil have you been doing?” he said, and turned his head sharply to look at her. She barely heard him for the pounding of the blood in her ears.
“I—I—robbing you, Your Grace,” she blurted. Finding that she could speak after all was a relief, and she gulped air. “So much must be obvious, surely?”
“Obvious,” he repeated, with a faint tone of incredulity. “What on earth is there to steal in a library?”
This from a man whose shelves included at least half a dozen books worth a thousand pounds each; she could see them from here. Still, he had a point.
“The drawer was locked,” she said. “Why would it be locked if there wasn’t something valuable in it?”
He glanced instantly at the drawer and his face changed like lightning. Oh, bloody hell! she thought. He’d for
gotten the letters were there. Or maybe not…
He turned on her then, and the air of slightly puzzled inquiry had vanished. He didn’t seem to move but was suddenly much closer to her; she could smell the starch in his uniform and the faint odor of his sweat.
“Tell me who you are, ‘Lady Bedelia,’ ” he said, “and exactly why you’re here.”
“I’m just a thief, Your Grace. I’m sorry.” No chance of making it to the door, let alone out of the house.
“I don’t believe that for an instant.” He saw her glance and grasped her arm. “And you’re not going anywhere until you tell me what you’re here for.”
She was light-headed with fear, but the faint implication that she might go somewhere seemed to offer at least the possibility that he wouldn’t immediately summon a constable and have her arrested. On the other hand…
He wasn’t waiting for her to make up her mind or a story. He tightened his grasp on her arm.
“Edward Twelvetrees,” he said, and his voice was nearly a whisper, his face deadly white. “Did he send you?”
“No!” she said, but her heart nearly leapt out of her bodice at the name. He stared hard at her, then his eyes dropped, running the length of her shimmering green skirts.
“If I were to search you, madam—what would I find, I wonder?”
“An unclean handkerchief and a little bottle of scent,” she said truthfully. Then added boldly, “If you want to search me, go ahead.”
His nostrils flared a bit, and he pulled her aside.
“Stand there,” he said shortly, then let go of her and yanked the picklocks from the drawer. He dipped a finger into the small pocket on his waistcoat and came out with a key, with which he unlocked the drawer and pulled it out.
Minnie’s heart had changed its rhythm when he suggested searching her—no slower, but different—but now sped up to such a rate that she saw white spots at the corners of her eyes.
She hadn’t put the letters back in their correct places; she couldn’t—Mick hadn’t taken notice. He’d know. She closed her eyes.