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“Farne House is ugly, old, draughty and expensive,” Garrick had said. “I do not care for it, Pointer. I shall not be entertaining, nor do I have a Duchess who requires a social setting. I will return to my own house in Charles Street as soon as I have set my father’s affairs in order.”
“Charles Street!” Pointer had said, as though Garrick had suggested he would be returning to the London stews. “That may have done very well for you when you were the Marquis of Northesk, your grace, but you are the Duke now. You have a dignity to uphold. Your father—” He had fallen silent as Garrick had pinned him with a very hard look.
“I,” Garrick had said, “am not my father, Pointer.”
Now he waited as Pointer retreated, outrage evident in every stiff line of his figure.
When the door had closed behind the butler, Garrick turned back to the desk and sorted methodically through the papers, making a note of the people he needed to contact and the actions he needed to take. Regardless of the dislike in which he had held his father—actually, hatred would probably be a better word—he had to give the late Duke credit for being extremely well organized. All the papers were in order, the income from the Farne estates was up-to-date and clearly notated and everything appeared to run like a smoothly oiled machine, a tribute to the late Duke’s rather vulgar grasping after every last penny that could be squeezed from his lands.
The clock on the mantel chimed twelve. Suddenly restless, Garrick got up and walked across to the dirty window. Dusty drapes shuttered the room. His mother, who might well have taken Farne House in hand, had not been to London for years. Tired of her husband’s famously indiscreet infidelities, she had become a dowager before her time and had retired to a house in Sussex. Garrick wondered vaguely how she would greet the arrival of the ungovernable Harriet on her doorstep. No doubt she would have the vapors. It was her usual mode of response to any crisis.
Outside the day was bright and clear, the sort of November morning that had slanting sunlight and scurrying white clouds. Garrick felt as though he were trapped here in this cobwebbed mausoleum. He wanted to take his stallion and ride out, not in the park among the chattering crowds, but somewhere wild and empty where he and the beast could both let go of all restraint. He had lived abroad for many years and had a taste for empty spaces and the hot blue skies of Portugal and Spain. And though he had been back in London for over a year, still the city felt cramped and cold and strangely repressive to a man who only really thrived in the open air.
Duty called him back to the pile of estate papers. He was Duke of Farne now and regardless of how disappointing he was as upholder of the family dignity, he could not escape his responsibilities. He had had that drummed into him since he was a child. He strode back to the desk. In his study in the house on Charles Street he had plenty of work waiting, too, research relating to his academic studies into seventeenth-century astronomy, documents to translate for the War Office. He had worked for Earl Bathurst, the Secretary of State for War, during his time in exile. He had also done plenty of other, less official, work for the government as well. It was one of the reasons that his father had raged against him, the heir to the Dukedom of Farne, trying and consistently failing to get himself killed in the service of his country. But what was he to do? For years he had carried the burden of taking a life, that of Stephen Fenner. He had tried to give his own in reparation, but the gods appeared uninterested in taking it.
He picked up his pen. He put it down again. What he really wanted to do, he found, was to discover the identity of the woman who had penetrated his house and his defenses, his midnight visitor, she of the vivid blue eyes and the porcelain fair skin. She had run from him like a fairy-tale Cinderella.
He wandered over to the oak bookcases that lined two walls of the study. Here he paused, the hairs on the back of his neck rising with a curious feeling of awareness. Someone else had perused these shelves, and recently. There were tiny marks in the dust, as though someone had carefully drawn out the books and replaced them without wanting to leave a trace.
He turned back to the desk. Had she been rifling through the papers here, too? If so, what could have been her purpose?
He wondered how, in the whole of London, he might find one elusive lady. There were always the inquiry agents, he supposed, though he could give them precious little to work on. A physical description, based on all the things he had found so seductive about her, would not be particularly helpful.
Shaking his head in exasperation, Garrick resumed his work, untying the red ribbon that held the next set of estate papers.
“Title to the estate of Fenners in the County of Dorset …”
Garrick felt chilled. Icy memory trickled down his spine. He had had no idea that his father had bought up the Fenner estates. He ripped the ribbon away and sifted through the papers. His father, it seemed, had purchased not only the house of Fenners but also the land and all associated coal-mining rights. He had done so ten years previously when the estate had been broken up after the last Earl had died. The mining had proved lucrative; it had brought in a sum approaching a hundred thousand pounds.
The cold hardened inside Garrick, deep and dark. His father had profited by the death of Stephen Fenner and the subsequent extinction of the Earldom. While he had been trying to atone for Fenner’s death his father had been turning it to financial advantage. How utterly typical it was of the late Duke to act with such vile cupidity. Garrick felt sick and revolted. It was intolerable to inherit an estate that had come to him through violence and bloodshed, even more so when it was blood that he himself had shed. With a sudden burst of anger he brought his hand down and scattered the deeds across the floor.
He threw himself down into his chair and tried to think. He had been back in society for fifteen months, long enough to know that the eldest of the Earl of Fenner’s daughters was the famed hostess Joanna, Lady Grant, married to the equally famous Arctic explorer Alex Grant. The middle sister, Teresa Darent, was notorious, a widow who had run through four husbands already. Naturally enough he had not met either Lady Grant or Lady Darent socially; they would scarcely invite to their balls and routs the man who had murdered their brother in a duel. Ton society might be extraordinarily flexible, but it was not that flexible. He thought there was also a third girl, the youngest, but he knew little of her. She was unmarried, reputedly a bluestocking, almost a recluse, if gossip was to be believed.
Garrick reached for pen and ink and began to write. After he had finished the letter, sealed it and addressed it, he picked up again the papers relating to the Fenner estate but after a moment he let them drift from his hand down onto the desk before him.
Stephen Fenner had been his best friend at Eton and Oxford. He had been a rake, a gamester and a noted whip. His handsome face and winning charm had allowed him to cut a swath through the bedrooms and boudoirs of a number of ton ladies. It had been amusing to be one of Stephen’s friends, part of a dazzling raffish crowd who had lived for pleasure. Garrick had been seduced by the glamour of it all. It was such a far cry from the life of service and obligation that he had been raised to embrace. But then Stephen had chosen Garrick’s bride as his latest conquest and friendship had disintegrated into betrayal and disgrace …
There was a knock at the door; Pointer, Garrick thought, had evidently overcome his disapproval sufficiently to resume his duties.
“I have ascertained that a window in the east wing has been forced, your grace,” the butler said, looking with disfavor at the scattered pile of papers. “It is possible that an intruder may have found ingress into the house that way.”
“She broke in through a window,” Garrick said. “I see. Thank you, Pointer.”
“I have made the house secure,” Pointer finished grandly, “so your grace need have no further concerns.”
“I am confident to leave the matter of household security entirely in your hands, Pointer,” Garrick said. He held out the letter. “If you would be so kind as to see this is delivered to the offices of Churchward and Churchward, the lawyers, in Holborn please?”
“Of course, your grace,” Pointer said, bowing with exquisite precision and proffering a silver tray on which Garrick could place the missive.
“And then,” Garrick said, “I would like you to find me an inquiry agent.”
Pointer’s long nose twitched with shock. “An inquiry agent, your grace?” He repeated, as though Garrick had asked for something so outrageous he had no idea how to respond.
“Your esteemed father,” he added, “would never have required such a person, your grace.”
“I know,” Garrick said, grinning. “You are going to have to get used to some changes, I fear, Pointer. If you could expedite the matter,” he added, “that would be appreciated. There is someone I need to find urgently.”
When he had found his midnight bibliophile, Garrick thought, he was going discover exactly what her business was with him. And this time he would not let her run away.
“THANK YOU FOR YOUR CUSTOM, Lord Selfridge. It was a pleasure to be able to provide you with the information you required.”
Merryn sat in a dark corner of the waiting room while her associate, Tom Bradshaw, ushered the peer toward the stairs. Selfridge barely noticed her and certainly did not recognize her. Merryn would have been astonished if he had. In her daily life, as the frightfully studious bluestocking sister of Joanna, Lady Grant, celebrated ton hostess, she was practically invisible. She seldom attended the high society events that both her sisters loved and when she did she hardly ever danced. Those people who took the trouble to engage her in conversation usually regretted it because she was only interested in erudite subjects and chose to have no small talk. Most young men were afraid of her, bored by her, or both. She was known as the Simple Ton by those society fashionables who deplored her bookishness and her lack of social graces.
Such insignificance made it far easier for her to live as she wished, pursuing an interest in all manner of scholarly activities on the one hand and working for Tom on the other. If her sisters had known that she worked for a living they would probably have had the vapors. If they had known she was employed by an inquiry agent the strongest smelling salts would not have been able to revive them. And if they discoverd that sometimes she stayed out at night to do her work and invented fictitious friends to cover for her … But then, Merryn thought, they never would find out. They would not guess because such thoughts were unthinkable.
Except … except that she had made a mistake last night. It was the sort of mistake that could lead to the unmasking of what she liked to think of as her secret life. She had committed the cardinal sin of being caught, and by Garrick Farne, of all people. If there was one time that she should have been particularly careful, it was when she was working against the man who had killed her brother and ruined her family. But it was too late now. Farne had seen her. Farne had kissed her. A little of ripple of disquiet, mixed with something more deep and disturbing, edged down her spine.
“Are you coming in or are we to talk out here?”
Tom was holding his office door open for her, his head tilted inquiringly to one side, eyes bright, a smile curling his lips. He was cocky, but Merryn liked him for it. Tom, the son of a stevedore who had worked on the Thames loading ships, still kept his offices within a stone’s throw of the river. He was one of the most successful inquiry agents in London, finding everything from missing heirs to servants who had absconded with the family silver. She had worked alongside him for the past two years.
Merryn uncurled herself from her seat and preceded Tom into the office. There was a chair but she knew from experience that it was uncomfortable so she remained standing. Tom propped himself against the edge of his desk.
“So did you find any papers relating to the duel?” Tom said. “Any servants paid off around that time, any proof of a cover-up, anything suspicious at all?”
“I’m very well, thank you, Tom,” Merryn said tartly. “How are you?”
Tom grinned, his teeth a flash of white in his face. “You know I have no manners.”
“Clearly,” Merryn said. She looked at him. No one would mistake Tom Bradshaw for anything other than what he was: the self-made son of a working man. The well-cut clothes could not conceal his innate toughness.
“No,” she said. She turned her face away. “I didn’t find anything.”
Three weeks previously Tom had come to her with some information that he had said he thought would interest her and when she had read it the shock and outrage had gripped Merryn like a vise. Tom’s information had been a tiny entry from an obscure local Dorset newspaper. He said that he had found it quite by accident when he had been working on a different case. The paper was twelve years old and there, between references to pig rustling and theft at a country fair, had been the report of an inquest into the death of Stephen Fenner.
Merryn could remember the piece word for word. She thought she would never forget it.
“The coroner at the inquest into the death of Stephen, Viscount Fenner, reported that there had been two bullets in the victim’s body, one in the shoulder and one in the back …” And then, farther down the page: “Daniel Scrope, gamekeeper on the Starcross estate, reported hearing an altercation followed by the firing of three shots …”
Merryn shook a little now as she remembered how she had frozen where she had sat, her gaze riveted to the tiny shred of news that contradicted all the official reports of her brother’s death. Before he had fled the country to escape the exigencies of the law, Garrick Farne had left a statement giving details of the duel. He had sworn that it had occurred over the elopement of his best friend, Stephen Fenner, with Kitty, Garrick’s wife of only a month. Two shots had been fired, Farne had maintained, one by Stephen, who had missed, and the other by himself, which had proved fatal. The doctor and the two men’s seconds had supported his statement. Farne’s second had even claimed that Fenner had fired early, an unforgivable piece of cowardice further blackening Stephen’s name.
The case had never gone to trial and public opinion had been very sympathetic to Garrick Farne. He and Kitty had been married for barely a month. Stephen Fenner had clearly played his best friend false, seducing Garrick’s wife, trying to entice her to run off with him and compounding his deceit by attempting to kill Garrick by firing before the flag was dropped. Besides, a duel was an affair of honor and society understood the rules that governed such cases. Garrick Farne was generally felt to have acted regrettably but understandably.
That had been appalling enough to Merryn, unforgivable, heinous, but when she had discovered that there had been three shots and two bullets in Stephen’s body, she had been consumed with grief and anger. Garrick Farne had lied, there had been no duel, only an execution, and he should have hanged for murder. She had hated Garrick before, hated what he had done, despaired over the way his actions had wrought such unhappiness and ruin on her family. Now, though, her anger was transformed. If the truth had been buried she would dig it out. She would show the world that Garrick was a liar and a criminal, and she would strip him of all honor and respect. She would find the proof that would mean his life was forfeit.
Merryn had searched like a woman possessed to find any other evidence such as the original inquest report, the findings of the doctor who had conducted it, the original witness statements of the seconds who had allegedly been present at what she now suspected was a fictitious duel. She had drawn a blank. All papers were lost. All witnesses had vanished. Merryn had been disillusioned but hardly surprised. She knew that the Dukes of Farne were rich enough and powerful enough to pay their way out of such a scandal. But she could not give up now. If there were the slightest chance that she could prove that Garrick Farne had killed her brother in cold blood then she would expose him. She wanted him to lose everything that had been built on his lie. She had lost so much when Garrick had killed Stephen. She wanted him to understand how that felt.
“You found nothing,” Tom repeated. He was looking annoyed, so irritated, in fact, that Merryn wondered if he might secretly have a client interested in her findings. It seemed unlikely but not impossible.
“You did search everywhere?” Tom persisted.
Merryn frowned. “Of course I searched everywhere. I’m not an amateur. I looked in the study, the library, the bedrooms—”
“In the bedrooms?” Tom said.
“I thought there might be papers concealed in a book,” Merryn said.
Tom gave her a quizzical look. “I repeat, in the bedrooms?”
“People read in bed,” Merryn said, a shade defensively.
“Do they?” Tom seemed surprised. “I don’t. I have more exciting things to do.”
Merryn rolled her eyes. “You and Garrick Farne both.”
Tom raised his brows. “What?”
“I was under the bed,” Merryn said, “when the Duke had a visitor. A voluptuous and eager lady called Harriet.”
Tom pursed his lips on a soundless whistle. “Harriet Knight, his late father’s ward?”
“I have no idea,” Merryn said tartly. There was a squirm of something in her belly that felt disconcertingly like … jealousy? “They were obviously beyond needing surnames,” she added.
“Poor you,” Tom said. “There’s nothing worse than voyeurism.”
“I’ll take your word for it,” Merryn said. “Fortunately he threw her out before things became too embarrassing for me.”
Tom started to laugh. “Farne threw an eager seductress out of his bedchamber?” he said. “He really has changed. I assume you were able to get away when he fell asleep?”
“No,” Merryn said. She hesitated. It probably was not wise to tell Tom of her encounter with Garrick Farne. He would be furious because she had compromised not only her own safety but also his business. If Garrick were to discover her identity somehow and start asking questions he would discover that she worked for Tom and a powerful enemy like the Duke of Farne would be very dangerous for Tom’s livelihood. Besides, she was not sure she wished to relive the encounter. The unexpected affinity she had felt for Garrick, the pleasure of their quick-fire conversation, the sweetness that had ambushed her when his lips had touched hers in that infinitely tender caress … She had not expected to feel any of those emotions. She should not.
Tom was watching her. He was quick; he’d seen her hesitation.
“Well?” he said.
“Unfortunately I sneezed,” Merryn said, “and he dragged me out from under the bed.”
Tom’s reaction was predictable. There was a moment of silence and then he exploded. “Bloody hell, Merryn—”
“I know,” Merryn said hastily. “But I didn’t tell him who I was, or what I was doing there. You don’t need to worry. He doesn’t know I work for you. No one does.”
Tom clenched his fists. “Merryn,” he said, “the work you do is supposed to be secret. The clue is in the word.”
“Of course,” Merryn said quickly. “Sorry—”
Tom made a visible effort to get himself under control. He rubbed his forehead. “I warned you it was dangerous to go there,” he said. “I told you to be careful.”
“I was,” Merryn said defensively. “It was just bad luck.”
Tom gave a sigh. “Well, you have not been hauled up in Bow Street so evidently you got away,” he said. His tone had eased a little. He even managed to give her a half smile. “Did you kick him in the balls and run away?”
“Something of the sort,” Merryn said. She wondered how she had managed to retain any shred of innocence associating with Tom Bradshaw. Her vocabulary had certainly been broadened, if nothing else.
Merryn had never been quite sure how she and Tom had come to be as close as brother and sister. She had first met him three years before when he had broken into a house where she was staying. She had found him rifling through her host’s study and had held him at sword point—there had been a medieval claymore on the wall—until he had revealed to her that the purpose of his illicit visit was to reunite the government with some very sensitive papers pertaining to the war. She had been frankly intrigued by Bradshaw’s business and had thought it would be the perfect line of work to get into. She had a passion for justice, too little money, too much time and nothing to do that remotely interested her. Being a debutante was a tedious business; all the men she met wanted blandness in a woman, a pattern-card wife. Merryn, in contrast, did not want a man at all. She had never met one she preferred to her favorite books.
Tom had laughed at first when she had sought him out at his office and proposed that she work for him. Then he had remembered the claymore. And she had pointed out that she had the entrée into houses that he had to burgle. She could attend balls and routs, speak to people that he could not approach. They had been a partnership ever since.
Tom walked across to a side table that held a dusty crystal decanter and matching glasses. He gestured to them. Merryn shook her head. She was never quite sure what was in Tom’s decanter and suspected that it was villainously bad sherry. Tom poured for himself, took a mouthful and then looked back at her.
“It might be better if you drop this whole matter,” he said abruptly. “When I first found the reference I thought that you had a right to know the truth but now—” He shrugged uncomfortably. “I think it could get us all into trouble.”
“No!” Merryn said. She felt panicked. “It was an accident, Tom. I promise to be more discreet in the future.”
Tom did not answer for a moment. He sat down, placed his glass gently on the desk and leaned forward. “I think your determination to find out the truth leads you to take risks we cannot afford because you are obsessed with exposing Garrick Farne,” he said. “It is not only dangerous.” He took a breath. “It is unhealthy, Merryn. You should let it go.”
Merryn wrapped her arms about herself. She felt chilled and her stomach lurched a little with sickness. She always felt like that when she thought about her brother Stephen and the fate Garrick Farne had meted out to him. The scandalous shadow had dogged her steps for over a decade. She had been thirteen when Stephen had died and it had felt as though the sun had gone out. Everything had changed, every keepsake of Stephen lost when the estate was sold, every link with him wiped out. Stephen had blazed across her life like a wayward star and when Garrick Farne had extinguished that light her whole life had been plunged into darkness. The grief had been like a punch, leaving her stunned with the force of the blow.
“It’s not just about Stephen’s death,” she said. She rested a hand against the window glass. It felt cold beneath her fingers. Down in the alleyway below, two ragged children were playing with a hoop. “We lost our father as well, and our home. We had nothing left. Papa went into a decline and died because he was so broken to have lost his heir.”
“Then he should have valued his daughters more,” Tom said grimly. “He was a fortunate man to have other children, yet he did not appreciate it.” He looked at her. “I do wonder, though,” he added, “if your recollection of that time is quite accurate, Merryn. You were only a child—”
“I was thirteen,” Merryn said. Her stomach did a giddy little swoop. “Old enough to remember everything.”
She turned away so that Tom could not see her face. She had known exactly what had been going on between her brother and the newly wed Kitty Farne because she was the one who had carried their clandestine messages. She was the one who had led Stephen to his death. The old guilt stirred and she shuddered sharply, slamming the door to block out the memories and the pain. It was not her fault. She had never intended it to end in murder. She had to remember that she was not the one who had pulled the trigger and taken Stephen’s life.
“You sound guilty,” Tom said, frowning at her. “Why on earth—”
“Spare me your analysis,” Merryn snapped, angry that he had been acute enough to pick up on her feelings. “I don’t feel any guilt. Why should I? Farne was the one who killed Stephen. And if he did that in cold blood rather than in a duel then he has even less honor than I had thought and he deserves everyone to know it. This isn’t just about revenge, Tom. It’s about justice …” She stopped, gasping for breath.
There was a silence in the little room. “I’m sorry,” Tom said. “I accept that Garrick Farne’s actions were far-reaching.” There was a note of impatience in his voice now. He pushed his chair back from the desk. “But I still think your feelings affect your judgment, Merryn.” He gave a quick shake of the head. “I don’t know … I suppose that I cannot stop you pursuing Farne if you choose since it is not an official case.”
“No,” Merryn said, “it is not. But I think that you have an interest in it all the same. I’ve thought so from the beginning.”
Tom looked startled. “Why do you say that?”
“Because I know you,” Merryn said. “Don’t prevaricate with me, Tom. Is there a client?”
Tom stared at her for a moment and then shook his head. “I cannot tell you anything,” he said. “Client confidentiality—”
Merryn made an exasperated sound. “Tom!”
“Oh, very well,” Tom said. He moved the files around on his desk. “There is someone who is interested,” he said. “One of Farne’s brothers. There is no love lost there.”
“One of Garrick Farne’s brothers wants to see him hanged?” Merryn pressed. She had known that Garrick was estranged from most of his family but still she was shocked. “Why on earth …”
Tom shrugged. “I don’t ask questions like that. I simply take the money. But you see …” He paused, looked at her. “That is another reason why we cannot afford for Farne to know.”
“I understand,” Merryn said.
