“Yer Grace,” the boyish girl muttered when she neared. “You wanted t’ see me t’night, if’n I remembers aright.”
Val ignored her as he lit his sealing wax and dripped hot wax over the folded edge of his letter. He blew out the sealing wax, set it down, and chose his seal: a crowing rooster. It was a personal jest: the rooster was a symbol of the god Hermes, whom Val had taken as his own patron god. Hermes was the god of travel and of commerce.
He was also the god of thieves and trickery.
Val bit his lip. Too, the base pun on rooster was so obvious that even the most unintelligent should be able to parse it.
He turned to Alf.
She was standing hip cocked, weight on one leg, wearing, as far as Val could tell, the same clothes that she’d been wearing for years: a too-large coat and waistcoat, both an indeterminate dark color, much patched and frayed, baggy breeches, mud-stained stockings, enormous buckle shoes the exact color of dried horse dung, and a wide-brimmed floppy hat. Beneath the hat her dark hair was untidily clubbed back and one cheekbone was darkened by either dirt or a bruise.
Val briefly wondered what Alf did with the money he paid her—for he paid her rather well, considering—and then he dismissed the thought from his mind.
He thrust the letter at her. “Take this to Mr. Copernicus Shrugg”—he recited the address—“and make sure you hand it to him personally—no one else, mind.”
Alf took the letter, but wrinkled her nose. “It’s th’ middle o’ th’ night, you do know that, don’t you?”
“And what of it? A man roused from bed is even more prone to fear and excitement, I find. Oh, and tell Attwell and the boy they can quit the inn they’ve been staying at and attend me here.” He glanced over as the door to the library was once more opened and a troop of footmen carried in his bath. “Now off with you, imp. I’ve the dust of weeks in those damnable walls to wash away.”
The girl hesitated, eyeing him speculatively. “Then yer out o’ yer ’idey-’oles, are you?” She tilted her head with significance at the servants, now pouring the bathwater before the fireplace.
“Out and soon to be restored to my rightful place in society,” Val said. “Run along.”
He turned to his bath without waiting to see if she obeyed his command. Few people had the nerve to refuse his orders. Ah, but he was forgetting the winsome Mrs. Crumb. What was her Christian name anyway? He must demand it of her at the first opportunity. Not only had his housekeeper attempted to steal from him, but she’d refused to answer his questions, and—he surveyed the servants sent to wait upon him—if he wasn’t mistaken she’d made sure to hide away the comeliest of his maids and footmen. Did she think him a satyr?
Well, perhaps she wasn’t entirely mistaken in her judgment…
Val smirked as he shed his banyan—the only article of clothing he wore—and sauntered nude to the bath. He crooked a finger at the eldest and most worldly-looking of the footmen. If Mrs. Crumb thought to curtail his bedsport, she was going to be sadly disappointed.
HUGH FITZROY, THE Duke of Kyle, yawned widely as he followed a linkboy’s wavering lantern through a darkened courtyard at the back of St James’s Palace. It was near four of the clock—too early yet for a servant to be awake and too late for all but the most determined revelers to be still abroad. That left him, newly roused from his warm slumbers by an urgent royal summons, and the poor linkboy, who would guide night travelers with his lantern until dawn.
Both bound by the needs of their masters.
Hugh smiled wryly to himself. Master in his case wasn’t quite correct, but it was close enough.
He and the linkboy neared an obscure rear entrance and a guard came to attention. Hugh paid the linkboy off and then turned to the guard to give his name.
The guard shot him a curious glance as he let him in. This was an odd entrance for a duke.
But then Hugh was rather an odd duke.
Inside he was met with a footman who had apparently been waiting for his arrival. “This way, if you please, Your Grace.”
Hugh followed the man down a service passage. Unlike the front of the palace, the hallway was uncarpeted, the walls simply painted.
The footman opened a door at the end of the hall and bowed him into an office, murmuring, “The Duke of Kyle.”
A bandy-legged man wearing scarlet breeches, a dark-blue banyan, and a soft cap swung around from where he’d been pacing before a fire. “Damn me, Kyle, it took you long enough!”
Hugh arched an eyebrow. “I came as soon as I got your note, Shrugg.” He glanced back at the footman. “Bring coffee and tea, will you? And something to eat.”
The footman hurried away.
“Forgive me, Your Grace.” Copernicus Shrugg shook his head. He was a man of middling years, but he’d always looked like an old man. His ears protruded from his skull on either side like the handles of a jug, and his head was round, wrinkled, and bald, and sat almost squarely on his shoulders without benefit of a neck. He stared at Hugh with bloodshot eyes the color of cornflowers. “It’s this damnable matter. I had to wake him up over it and you know he never likes that.”
They both glanced reflexively at the ceiling, where the royal apartments resided somewhere above them.
Hugh dropped his gaze to Shrugg again. “How is the King?” Technically the man in question was also Hugh’s father, though no one ever made mention of that fact.
“Talking in French,” Shrugg replied. “He’s quite beside himself. Thank God you’re back in London—I don’t know who else I would have summoned.”
Hugh raised an eyebrow.
Shrugg’s face darkened. “Though, of course, the circumstance of your return from the Continent is naturally a sad one. I was sorry to hear of the death of your duchess.”
Hugh tightened his jaw and nodded once. “Is it the prince?” The Prince of Wales—whom Hugh had met only once—and the King loathed each other.
“Not this time,” Shrugg said grimly. He held out a letter.
Hugh took it and walked over to the desk, where several candles burned. He tilted the piece of paper to the candle and read:
Dear Mr. Shrugg,
I trust that you have had a restful night up until this point because I doubt it will be so hereafter. Let me at once get to the point: certain letters have come into my possession concerning W which, if they were made public, would bring great embarrassment to—and possibly the Downfall of—the Gentleman you serve. I, of course, am most anxious that this occurrence not come about. To prevent this Terrible Event I have merely one request: that I be Acknowledged in Hyde Park at a time mutually agreed upon.
So simple, really.
I am, your servant, & et cetera, et cetera,
M
Hugh read the letter once quickly and then again more slowly.
When he looked up again, a steaming cup of coffee had been placed on the desk in front of him.
“Thank you.” He took a sip. “‘M’?”
“The Duke of Montgomery,” Shrugg said.
“He made sure not to sign his name.” Hugh’s mouth twisted wryly. “A blackmailer who knows to be circumspect in letters. ‘W’ is Prince William.” Prince William, the Duke of Cumberland, was the King’s second living legitimate son. Hugh had never met the boy.
“Undoubtedly.” Shrugg sank heavily into the chair behind the desk with his own teacup. “He’s never caused us problems before. Well”—he waved a hand dismissively—“mistresses and the like, but nothing out of the ordinary for a lad his age. Now this.”
Hugh frowned. “How old is he now?”
“Twenty, and just bought a commission as colonel of the First Regiment of Foot Guards,” Shrugg said. “He’s always liked everything martial.”
Hugh looked at him intently. “Then you have no idea what it could be about?”
Shrugg was silent a moment, twisting his teacup in his hands. “There were rumors—only rumors, mind. About a secret society.”
Hugh snorted and
stood, stretching. “Tell me you didn’t drag me out of bed for a bloody secret society, Shrugg. Every boy who ever went to Cambridge or Oxford—or any London coffeehouse, for that matter—is a member of what he thinks is a secret society.”
But Shrugg’s old lined face was grave. “No, Your Grace. This was different. The members were older. They called themselves the Lords of Chaos. It’s said that each member actually had a tattoo of a dolphin somewhere on their person and the things they did…” He grimaced, looking away.
“What?”
Shrugg turned back to him. “Children. There were children involved.”
For a moment Hugh didn’t say anything. Kit and Peter were safely in their beds, somewhere at home, Kit with his foot hanging out of the covers and little Peter clutching a kerchief that had belonged to his mother.
He took a breath, making sure his voice was flat and matter-of-fact. “You’re saying Prince William might’ve done something with these Lords of Chaos. Something with children?”
“I don’t know,” Shrugg said. “That’s why I asked you to come. We need you to find what Montgomery has. To find it and take it and make sure it’s destroyed. Permanently.”
Chapter Two
When this king was born the royal physician peered into his eyes and mouth and ears and pronounced them all good, but when he laid his head upon the baby’s tiny breast he heard… nothing.…
—From King Heartless
Bridget’s chatelaine jingled at her waist as she strode into the kitchens a little after ten o’ clock the next morning. The servants had been up since five of the clock and the entire lower floor was cleaned and aired. In fact most of the staff were just finishing their morning tea.
“Good morning, Mrs. Bram,” she greeted the cook, a sensible woman of middling years with graying frizzy hair.
“Mrs. Crumb.” The cook glanced up alertly. “I understand His Grace is in residence.”
“Indeed he is,” Bridget said briskly, ignoring the slight twinge of anxiety even his name caused. “I trust you’ll be able to prepare both his meals today even on such short notice?”
“I’ll have no problem,” Mrs. Bram replied. “Got a lovely roast in just this morning that’ll do for supper and I’ve a fish pie in the oven for his luncheon, should he call for it.”
“Excellent.” Bridget nodded her approval, though she’d never doubted Mrs. Bram. She’d seldom worked with such a competent cook.
Bridget crossed the kitchen as the maids and footmen rose to resume their duties. By the back door to the kitchen was a table and on it was a tin plate with another inverted over it. Bridget picked it up without pausing and opened the back door, stepping outside and closing the door behind her.
She felt her shoulders relax just the tiniest bit.
She stood in a small, square bricked well, for the kitchen was naturally below ground. A short flight of stairs led up to the garden and a path and thence to the mews behind Hermes House, but that wasn’t what interested Bridget at the moment.
A small brownish-gray terrier had been sitting on the brick, but he hopped to his feet as soon as he saw Bridget and gave one sharp emphatic bark.
“Now hush,” she said to him—not that he seemed to care. She set the tin plate down and uncovered it, revealing the scraps that Mrs. Bram had saved for her.
The terrier immediately began gobbling the food as if he was starving which, sadly, he might be.
“You’ll choke,” Bridget said sternly. The terrier didn’t listen. He never did, no matter how businesslike she made her voice. Grown men—footmen—might jump to obey her, but this scrawny waif defied her.
Bridget bit her lip. If she was forced to leave Hermes House, who would feed the terrier? Mrs. Bram might—if she remembered to do so—but the cook was a busy woman with other matters on her mind.
The dog finished his meal and licked the plate so enthusiastically that he overturned it with a clatter.
Bridget tutted and bent to pick it up.
The dog thrust his short snout under her hand as she did so and she found herself stroking his head. His fur was wiry rather than silky, almost greasy, but the dog had liquid brown eyes and seemed to smile as his mouth hung open, tongue lolling out. He was very, very sweet. She’d never been allowed a pet dog as a child. Her foster father was a shepherd and had considered dogs farm animals. A pet dog wasn’t even to be thought of, especially for her, the cuckoo.
Housekeepers, and indeed servants of any kind, weren’t allowed pets. Sometimes a cat might be kept to catch mice in the kitchens, but it was a working animal. Dogs were dirty things and required food and space that, technically, she didn’t own.
Bridget stood and frowned down at the dog. “Shoo now.”
The dog sat and slowly wagged his tail, sweeping the bricks. One of his triangular ears stood up while the other lay down.
She wished—
Behind her someone opened the door to the kitchens. “Mrs. Crumb?”
She turned at once. “Yes, I’m coming.”
Bridget hurried into the kitchen without a glance back.
Bob, one of the footmen, was staring at her anxiously. “’E wants a word with you.”
Was he summoning her to dismiss her in the light of morning?
Bridget straightened, smoothing down her apron.
“His Grace wants a word with me,” she gently corrected. She never let the servants in her command descend into disrespectful language toward their employer or employers, even belowstairs.
“His Grace.” Bob blushed violently. Though well over six feet, he couldn’t be more than twenty years of age and was fresh from the country. “But ma’am… that is…”
“Yes?”
“Well, the duke isn’t alone.”
“Ah.” So that was what had the boy so bothered. Poor lad. He’d soon enough become inured to the carnal excesses of the aristocracy. “I know, dear.”
Behind them came a snort and Bridget whirled.
Cal, the most handsome of the footmen—and thus one who hadn’t been sent up with the bath the night before—had his upper lip curled. “He’s a rutting devil, born and bred.”
“That’s enough.” Bridget didn’t raise her voice, but then she didn’t have to—the entire kitchen had gone quiet at her reprimand. “The duke is our master and we will speak of him respectfully. Anyone who does not is most welcome to seek employment elsewhere. Is that clear?”
She glanced about the kitchen, meeting everyone’s gaze for a second.
Then she nodded once and swiftly exited the kitchen. That might have been her last command as housekeeper, but she wouldn’t leave a house with the servants in disorder.
Not even his house.
Bridget made her way through a back hall and up the servants’ stairs to the upper floor, aware, vaguely, that her hands were trembling. She didn’t like change. Didn’t like always having to find another place to call home—though none, of course, were truly her home—but that was the nature of her work. She’d chosen this life and she was proud of what she’d accomplished. How far she’d come. The position she’d achieved.
There. Her hands had stopped shaking.
And really, had Bob thought she wasn’t aware that George, one of the older footmen, had procured a pair of courtesans for the duke’s entertainment last night? A good housekeeper—and Bridget considered herself the best—knew everything that happened within her domain.
No matter how sordid.
The duke’s bedroom door was shut so she tapped once before entering. “Good morning, Your Grace.”
The duke was sprawled, entirely naked, as far as she could see, between two equally bare women. Well, one woman was visible at least. A petite blonde broke off her embrace of the duke and glanced curiously at Bridget in the doorway. The other—a thin brunette—soon emerged from under the sumptuous sky-blue velvet coverlet, wiping her mouth discreetly.
“Pardon,” the brunette murmured, as if she’d belched at the dinner table.
Bridget took no note. It wasn’t the courtesan’s fault that Bridget was witnessing her dishabille.
His Grace slowly opened his azure eyes. The bedroom overlooked the back gardens and a previous servant had already drawn the curtains. In the morning sunlight, reddish-gold stubble glinting on his chin, and the curling hair about his shoulders, he really was quite beautiful. Like an ancient Greek god taking his leisure. One almost felt he deserved his wealth, his status, and all the things he’d accrued, merely by the accident of his birth.
Almost.
“Mrs. Crumb,” he purred, “What a lovely day, don’t you think?”
“Indeed, Your Grace.”
“And with such lovely companions,” he continued, slinging his arms about his bedfellows.
She hoped she needn’t comment on that statement—although one never knew. She’d once been invited in rather crude terms to join an elderly baronet and one of the maids in his bed. She’d declined with the vigorous application of a bed warmer and packed her bags before the next morning.
It’d been one of her shorter positions of employment.
“I was told you had need of me, Your Grace,” she reminded him, folding her hands at her waist to hide the trembling that had begun again. She’d been in demand before this position. Duchesses and lionesses of society had wanted her.
“So practical,” he mused, tilting his golden head back to gaze, presumably, at the gaudy sky-blue velvet canopy of his bed. She’d always thought it rather vulgar, actually. “I suppose that would be considered a good thing in a housekeeper.”
“It’s generally considered so, Your Grace.”
“And yet, I find it somewhat…”—he raised his naked arm straight up above his head and twirled his hand as he thought—“irksome.”
“I am sorry, Your Grace,” Bridget said as pleasantly as she could, which, sadly, was not very.
“Oh, don’t be,” the duke murmured silkily. “One can’t help one’s nature, no matter how irritating it is to others.”