Fencing for Ladies (The Archer Family Regency Romances #5) (17 page)

No. Not him. He was too controlled. And yet he always seemed so mild, so unassuming, despite the intelligence in his eyes. He seemed to be constantly weighing them and their words. If they made any mistakes or contradicted themselves, he’d recognize it and remember.

A shiver ran down her back that had nothing to do with the open front door. Even innocent people forgot or grew confused. It was so easy to blurt out the wrong thing because of nerves. She gripped the soft blue merino wool she’d draped over her shoulders as a shield against the February drafts that seemed to spill through unseen cracks and drift through the townhouse at random.

Fear slid icy fingers down her neck. Despite his meek demeanor, she was afraid of Mr. Greenfield and what he might be thinking. He revealed so little. He could be on the verge of arresting her.

She’d be tried and hung. The note and the button would surely damn her.

Her gaze followed him as Lord Milbourn quietly murmured goodbye to her brother.

What was in Mr. Grantham’s journal? Had he said anything about Wraysbury? About Mr. Underwood? Or about her? She could not imagine why he would have written anything about her, but one never knew what thoughts ran through another’s mind.

Her own diary contained entries about Cynthia Denholm that she would hate to have revealed. But at times, she’d been so frustrated with her forthright and undeniably tactless childhood friend. Cynthia was not always an easy person to be around.

And Cynthia would be shocked, perhaps even hurt by Olivia’s words, if she ever read them.

No wonder Mr. Grantham had used abbreviations. One never knew if one’s journal would fall into another person’s hands, or what damage it might do.

I should burn my old journals and start a new one, just using abbreviations.
And what would Farmer think if she should walk in while Olivia was burning her diaries? Or if she found the ashes in the fireplace? She would undoubtedly see such an action as a guilty one, and she might feel compelled to report it to Mr. Greenfield.

You should have fired her
. Her brother’s voice floated through her mind.

Olivia pulled her shawl closer around her shoulders and hugged herself.
Concentrate.
Her diaries were not her most pressing concern, Mr. Grantham’s journal was. She needed to read through it and discover if anyone in the Archer family, including herself, had anything to fear from it.

Had Mr. Grantham seen anything shocking in her insistence on learning to fence along with her brothers? At that time, Lord Milbourn had been Mr. Alexander Bron, her brothers’ dashing fencing master, and she would have done anything to provoke him to look at her with something other than laughter in his dark eyes. But slowly, she’d grown to love the fencing, itself. Had Mr. Grantham made assumptions about the two of them that were simply not true?

How could he? Lord Milbourn had always behaved impeccably and with complete propriety.

But Mr. Grantham would not know that. He hadn’t been there to see her frustration with Mr. Bron’s amused, distant air. He was the epitome of the cold indifference aspired to by students of the Spanish Style of fencing. Haughty and implacable. A dangerous man to face when armed with a sword.

But if not that, then what could Mr. Grantham possibly have written about her or Lord Milbourn?

Her pulse quickened as her fingers tightened against her waist under the fringe of her shawl. She had at least a partial answer already. Lord Milbourn’s wife had died violently in a way that cast suspicion upon him. That much was clear from his comments in the sitting room. What had Mr. Grantham written about that tragedy? Had he accused him of murder?

If he had, Mr. Greenfield might believe the two men had argued, and that Lord Milbourn had killed Mr. Grantham.

But if he had, he would have admitted it. He would never have allowed suspicion to fall on her or other members of the Archer family. Her heart told her that much was true.

So if not Lord Milbourn, then who? Mr. Underwood? It always came back to Mr. Underwood, no matter who else she tried to place in the role of murderer.

As for the foolish and puppyish Mr. Belcher, well, he was a bit of a coxcomb and undoubtedly admired quite a few ladies, but that was hardly scandalous. Many men openly flaunted their mistresses. A lady simply smiled graciously and pretended not to notice while coldly snubbing the woman. Anything Mr. Grantham wrote along those lines would be unimportant.

Of course, it could well be that the journal shed no light upon Mr. Grantham’s death at all.

If only I could obtain that journal. Just to be sure.
She straightened her shoulders. Now was not the time for sighs, it was the time for action.

“Please wait, Lord Milbourn. I wish to go for a walk,” she said as he brushed past her. She tore off her shawl and held it out to Latimore, gesturing for her pelisse and bonnet.

“Lady Olivia, perhaps Lord Milbourn has other matters to attend to.” Edward frowned at her.

Latimore, holding her deep blue pelisse and matching bonnet in his hands, looked from him to her. She grabbed her coat and turned her back on her brother while holding out the garment, forcing Edward to help her don it out of sheer politeness.

“I will not be long,” she said.

Lord Milbourn was watching the progress of Mr. Belcher and Mr. Greenfield down the walkway.

“Lord Milbourn?” she asked.

He turned to her with an amused expression on his face. “Yes?”

“It is unimportant, Milbourn,” Edward said. “My coat, Latimore. If you wish to stumble along in the dark, I shall be more than happy to accompany you, Lady Olivia.”

Olivia felt her smile slip as she glanced from Lord Milbourn to her brother.

“Good night,
mi niña bonita.
Take care.” He tapped the crown of his hat to seat it more firmly, smiled at her, and walked away, following Mr. Belcher and Mr. Greenfield.

“Well, Lady Olivia?” Edward moved to stand on the stoop and offer his elbow to her.

She took a deep breath of frustration. This was not going precisely as she imagined, but she couldn’t forget that pocket sagging at Mr. Greenfield’s side, with its bulky burden. She needed to read the journal — she simply had to.

How hard could it be to pick a pocket? Children on the streets of London seemed to do it quite regularly with near impunity, and it was dreadfully dark, despite the lamplighters’ efforts to light the streetlamps. The shadows would hide her actions if she could get close enough to the inquiry agent.

Edward seemed to want to walk at a sedate pace, but Olivia tugged him along faster. Ahead of them, she could see Lord Milbourn’s tall, broad-shouldered form, and a block further ahead, the hats of Mr. Greenfield and Mr. Belcher bobbed past other pedestrians. As she pulled her brother to trot more quickly through the alternating pools of shadow and golden lamplight, she saw Lord Milbourn’s long legs eat up the intervening distance between him and the other men.

She jumped up a few inches to see around another pair of men. Lord Milbourn paused to slap Greenfield on the back and joined him and Mr. Belcher.

“Come on, Edward. Can you not walk at least a bit faster?”

“I will not run, Lady Olivia,” Edward said in a low, angry voice. “What is the matter with you?”

“I want to catch up with the others. I — I forgot to tell Mr. Greenfield something.”

“You can tell him tomorrow. I refuse to chase them down the street. It is unbecoming in a lady, as you well know.”

“I rarely indulge in
becoming
exercises, as
you
well know.” She dragged him with her, running a few steps, walking a few, and then running again.

The three men turned the corner ahead of them. Fearing to lose them, she let go of Edward’s arm and dashed forward. As she rounded the corner, she was brought up short by a small crowd. A horse was snorting and rearing back with white-rimmed eyes, rattling a fragile, yellow-wheeled gig. One man was trying to grab the reins near the bit, while others, including Lord Milbourn and Mr. Greenfield, were bending over something in the street. Mr. Belcher stood a short distance away, watching them.

“Dead,” Lord Milbourn said. The single word sounded harsh and stark in the shifting shadows. He lifted a small form from the road and set it carefully on the walkway. “Does anyone know this child? Who he was?”

Several people in the crowd shook their heads and took a few steps back as if afraid of being held responsible.

A well-dressed man descended from the gig, his face white in the golden light from the streetlamp on the corner. “I never saw him — could not stop. He ran out right in front of my gig. I could not stop.”

“Did any of you witness the accident?” Mr. Greenfield straightened and looked around the crowd as he pulled out his small notebook.

A burly man stepped forward and yanked a tattered cloth cap off his head. “I seen it, sir. It were an accident — I seen it. No way to avoid it, poor lad.”

“What is your name?” Mr. Greenfield asked.

“Tom Willow, sir.” The big man shifted from one foot to the other.

“Can any of you others confirm this?” Mr. Greenfield revolved slowly, writing down murmured statements and names.

Several of the passersby at the edges of the crowd started drifting away into the darkness, having seen enough of the sad accident and unwilling to be dragged forward as possible witnesses. No one knew the child, and from the look of his tattered, ill-fitting clothing and dirty face, he appeared to be one of the impoverished, anonymous urchins trying to survive as best they could on whatever they could glean from the streets.

“Poor little mite, it’ll be a pauper’s grave for him, I fear,” Mr. Greenfield commented as he closed his notebook and slipped it into a pocket under his lapel.

The man in the gig frowned and dug around under his overcoat, drawing out a small leather coin purse. He plucked out a few coins and handed them to Mr. Greenfield. “At least give him a decent burial. And a name. Mine is Todd — give him that, if nothing else.”

“That is good of you, Mr. Todd,” Mr. Greenfield slipped the money into his pocket. “I shall certainly do as you ask. He shall get a proper grave under a stone with a name.”

The crowd had mostly dispersed, though the men who had provided Mr. Greenfield with names and statements remained. Olivia edged closer to the inquiry agent. A flash of red caught her attention.

She glanced around to see Cynthia Denholm and the Misses Peterson standing nearby. The red cloak draping Cynthia’s tall figure stood out vibrantly in the golden glow of the streetlamp. As Olivia watched, Cynthia strode forward, her cloak flapping around her in a swirl of crimson.

What was she doing here?

“Good thing I happened to be passing. You are obviously in need of assistance and a bit of common sense.” Cynthia’s voice boomed, startling everyone into silence. “Men.…” She shook her head. “Don’t know a child’s head from its feet.” She thrust past Greenfield to kneel next to the lad, oblivious to the mud and grimy patches of melting snow. She ripped off a glove and held it over the child’s nose and mouth for a minute. “Dead.” Sighing, she struggled to her feet and brushed the mud off her knees. “Not that you did him any good, standing around him like a lot of henless chicks.”

“I am sorry.” Mr. Greenfield ask, his voice rising in polite enquiry, “Miss?”

“Denholm. Cynthia Denholm.” Hands on her broad hips, Cynthia studied him. “Are you that Greenfield chap? The one annoying Lady Olivia about that other murder?”

The corners of Greenfield’s mouth twitched in a hastily hidden smile. “Yes. I am afraid so, Miss Denholm.” A somber expression slipped over his face. “And I am sorry, but I must attend to the matter of this poor child’s accident.”

“Death. He is clearly dead. No need for mealy-mouthed sentiment.” She sighed and glanced around. When her forceful gaze landed on the spectators, the men shuffled their feet, flushed, and more often than not, stumbled away on some other urgent business. “Well, carry on, then, though I don’t see what you can do for him now, Mr. Greenfield.” As she strode past him, she slapped him on the back before rejoining the two ladies standing with linked arms at the corner.

Olivia studied them fleetingly. How had they happened to be passing? True, the Peterson family lived nearby, and as they were friends of Cynthia’s, it was not beyond the realm of possibility that they were simply taking a walk before dining. The fashion-conscious Petersons would never have supper before nine, so they could well be passing the time before returning to their townhouse in ample time to change.

Perhaps there was nothing very unusual about their presence on this street, after all.

Once again, the large man, clutching and twisting his cap between large, reddened hands, spoke up. “I’ll fetch the undertaker, sir. He be my brother-in-law.”

“Very well.” Mr. Greenfield glanced around and almost bumped into Olivia. His eyes widened in surprise, and he nodded abruptly.

His left hand patted his coat pocket, and he stilled. Shock rippled over his face, and he patted more vigorously. Then he slipped his hand into his pocket and pulled out…nothing. Jerking his head around, he stared at Lord Milbourn, Mr. Belcher, Edward, and finally, Olivia.