Tasha Alexander - A Crimson Warning

That would only leave me more vulnerable to exposure. Just like Polly Sanders and Lady Merton. And Mr. Dillman.

The thought of what happened to him terrifies me. I’ll do anything to avoid a similar fate. I wonder if the Musgraves and Riddingtons feel the same way.

Hating to sit around and feel useless while Colin was working, I decided to call on Lady Glover. As a society outsider, Lady Glover was bound to have an interesting perspective on this spate of vandalism, and it was entirely possible she’d have an insight that could prove useful to our investigation. Once finished with breakfast, I sent a note to Jeremy Sheffield, the Duke of Bainbridge, begging him to accompany me on my visit that afternoon. He acquiesced at once, which came as no surprise. I knew that long ago, he and Lady Glover had been quite close. So far as I could tell, they had remained friends in the following years.

Jeremy had been one of my closest friends from the time we were children, and it was this fact that had kept me immune to his dashing good looks and occasionally irresistible charms. We’d grown up on neighboring estates, and spent many a fine morning playing together when we were young. More often than not he was chasing me with frogs, or we were climbing trees or pretending to lay siege to castles, always having a grand time. Our friendship had remained close into adulthood, the only bump coming when, after I was engaged to Colin, Jeremy confessed to being in love with me. We bungled our way through the ensuing awkwardness, and eventually returned to our old easiness with each other.

Protest the observation though he might, Jeremy had never really been in love with anyone. Pretending to be enamored of me provided him an excuse for being unable to commit to marrying any among the slew of debutantes desperate to win his affections.

As one would expect on a brilliant summer day, the pavement was a crush of people when Jeremy collected me. Fashions had gone more radical. Some ladies had taken to wearing fuller skirts again, and we all feared a return to the days of the crinoline, although what alarmed me more were the wide sleeves one saw everywhere. They made me feel as if I were walking through an ocean of bright-colored balloons.

“So, have you and your much-esteemed husband learned anything interesting in your quest for answers about our overzealous painter?” my friend asked as we walked along Park Lane the short distance to the Glovers’ house.

“Not so far,” I said.

“It’s a delicious business,” Jeremy said. “I can hardly wait to see what madness descends upon me when I awaken to paint on my house. I’ve so many dark secrets. How could anyone limit himself to exposing only one?”

“You’re not half so bad as you like to think. And you’re hardly subtle in your wantonness—your goal of being the most useless man in England is far from a well-kept secret. If society were going to be scandalized by you, it would have happened years ago.”

“That’s beyond disappointing. I’m wholly disheartened.”

“You torment the mother of every debutante in London by refusing to marry,” I said. “Can’t you take comfort in that?”

“I could if I weren’t so greedy.” We’d reached the Glovers’ house, and were admitted without delay to a plush drawing room, full of bright sunlight bouncing off the hefty silver vases, candlesticks, and ornaments that adorned the chamber. Lady Glover did not rise upon our entrance, but gestured for us to sit across from her and poured us tea without asking if we wanted any.

“I prefer China tea. You’ll find it’s much better without milk,” she said, handing us each a cup. “I must say I’m surprised to see you, Lady Emily. I’m not much used to grand ladies of society calling on me.”

“Do I get no kudos for my devotion?” Jeremy asked.

“None at all,” she said. “You, Jeremy, are here far too often to be interesting, and, anyway, gentlemen are an entirely different matter. They have a tendency to forgiveness while we ladies are more prone to jealousy, don’t you think?”

“You’re hard on your sex,” I said.

“You style yourself something of an outlier,” she said. “Yet you’ve never faced being ostracized on an ongoing basis. That makes little rebellions, like calling on me, much easier.”

“I’m fortunate that by accident of birth I’m in a position to pursue my own interests without too much interference,” I said. “That does not mean I don’t sometimes face the unkind judgments of others. You’d be hard-pressed to find anyone in the ton who approves of ladies studying Greek.”

“True, true,” Lady Glover said. “But the accident of my own birth left me in a much different state. I had to earn my living—and you are, no doubt, aware of the limited options for us women in such circumstances. My good fortune came from having a beautiful face. It won me my husband and the admiration of his friends and colleagues.”

“Yet not their wives,” I said, knowing how brutally she’d been cut by the ladies of decent society. “You intimidate them.”

“They don’t pause for a moment before choosing each other’s husbands as lovers, yet they worry their husbands might choose me. Simply because I was not born one of them.”

A young maid entered the room with a tray of beautifully decorated tea cakes and set them down on the table in front of her mistress. She bobbed a curtsy and silently headed to the door.

“Not so fast,” Lady Glover said, calling her back. “Has your young friend proposed to you?”

“No, madam.”

“I’ll have a word with him tomorrow,” Lady Glover said. “This is the right marriage for both of you.” The maid nodded, and continued out of the room. “I feel such a responsibility for all of them, you know. My staff suffers from my reputation. It’s difficult for them to find other posts should they ever leave my employ. I like to make sure their lives are well organized.”

“I suppose I should think that’s generous,” I said.

“You don’t approve?” Lady Glover asked.

“Not entirely,” I said. “I admire both your concern for her well-being and the fact that you don’t treat your staff as furniture. That’s an affectation I find reprehensible. But the girl should decide who to marry.”

“Girls, my dear, are not always inclined to act in their own self-interest.” Lady Glover fingered the heavy ropes of pearls around her neck. “I help them as much as I’m able. But enough of this. What brings you to me today, other than wanting an excuse to have our divine duke escort you?”

“Merely the desire to form a closer acquaintance,” I said. “I’m rather fond of your zebras.”

“Should I be suspect of your motives?” she asked.

“I’d hardly try to steal them,” I said. “I will, however, admit to being curious about your thoughts on this red-paint business.”

“I like it,” she said. “Why should people be allowed to hide all their sins? I much prefer to know what they’re really made of. You learn far more about character from people’s secrets than you do their public acts.”

“And more still about the characters of those around them by studying their reactions to the secrets revealed.” I sipped my rich, golden tea. “So tell me, who do you think is our culprit? Who is behind all this revelation?”

“I wish I knew,” she said. “I’d host a ball in his honor. You can judge me as you like, but I’m taking no small pleasure in seeing high society squirm when they’ve taken such delight in cutting me. At least my sins were those of necessity. Theirs are nothing more than bad judgment and immorality.”

“You think ill of Lady Merton?” I asked.

“Not in the least,” Lady Glover said. “She’s as human as the rest of us. But I do think ill of a society that refuses to let women find love in marriage.”

“It doesn’t refuse altogether,” I said. “I found a husband I adore.”

“I seem to recall your mother once wanted you to marry our friend, the duke,” Lady Glover said, nodding her head to Jeremy. “Had you not wealth of your own, you would never have been able to go against her wishes. Once again, the accident of your birth has come to your aid.”

“I don’t deny the truth of it,” I said. “Nor the inherent injustice of it.”

“It’s a tragedy, I tell you, that’s what it is,” Jeremy said. “I blame the bloody Married Women’s Property Act. If you’d not been left so well settled after your first husband died, your mother would have been my greatest ally.”

“It’s clear you don’t have even a bare understanding of the Married Women’s Property Act,” I said. “And at any rate, you’d despise being married to me, Jeremy. I’d make you read Latin.”

“I’d divorce you,” he said.

We stayed another quarter of an hour, during which time I twice tried to bring the conversation back to the red paint, but Lady Glover would discuss it no further, changing the subject before I could gain any traction with it. I left the house wishing she’d said more.

“Lady Glover certainly bears a grudge against society,” Jeremy said once we’d stepped back into Park Lane and turned towards my house. “Do you think she could be our villain?”

“I like her for it,” I said. “She’s got the right sort of spirit, though I can’t imagine her murdering Mr. Dillman.”

“If it is her, I’ll be even more angry if I don’t get some red of my own,” he said. “I’d never forgive her.”

“It’s not funny, Jeremy,” I said. “My heart breaks for Polly, and Lady Merton—I’ve heard her husband has refused to speak to her ever again—but aren’t these situations to be expected in our kind of society?”

“Indeed they are. We value discretion above all else and—” He stopped. Cordelia Dalton, her hair flowing wildly down her back, was running up my front steps and banging on the door.

I started toward her.

She could hardly catch her breath. Davis opened the door, his countenance not altering in the slightest at the sight he beheld. Tears soaked Cordelia’s face and the sleeve of her dress was torn. He looked straight past her to me.

“Welcome home, madam,” he said, not missing a beat. “Port in the library?”

“Dear Davis, what would I do without you?” I said, putting my arm around Cordelia and ushering her inside.

Jeremy hung back on the front steps. “I’d best leave you to it, Em,” he said. “I don’t do well with crying ladies.” He tipped his hat, gave me an uncomfortable half smile, and took his leave.

“Tell me what’s happened,” I said, once I’d installed Cordelia in the library’s most comfortable chair.

“They think I have something, and I don’t—I swear I don’t … I don’t even know where to look. But I can’t convince them. They’ll never believe me. I don’t know a thing about Michael’s work. How could they think I would?”

“Slow now, Cordelia. I need to know more,” I said. “Who are ‘they’?”

“The ones who sent the letter.” With a shaking hand, she pulled a crumpled envelope from her reticule.

My dear Miss Dalton,

We are well aware of the sensitive nature of the information passed to you by your late fiancé. Be a good girl and hand it over to us so that nothing more need happen. Bring it wrapped in a plain paper parcel to the statue of Achilles in Hyde Park tomorrow at half eleven in the evening. You will receive further instructions there. Or, if you prefer, do nothing and suffer a fate worse than that of Mr. Dillman.

A friend.

I read the missive twice, then inspected the envelope, but found no features on either that might identify the sender. “Have you any idea to what this letter refers?” I asked.

“None at all,” Cordelia said.

Davis entered with port and two glasses. “Is my husband home?” I asked.

“He is, madam. Working chess problems in his study.”

“Bring him to us, Davis. And his whisky as well.”

“Do your parents know you’ve come to us?” I asked. Cordelia, still too upset to speak coherently, shook her head. I rose and went to my desk, pulled out a sheet of paper, and started to write a note to the girl’s parents. “You can’t hide this from them,” I said, scribbling words across the page before shoving it in an envelope and ringing for Davis to have it delivered. Cordelia sunk lower in her chair and sobbed.

“What’s all this?” Colin asked, entering the room. I handed him the letter. He read it and then, his face grave, he sat next to Cordelia.

“You’re quite certain you’ve no idea what these people want, Miss Dalton?” he asked.