Chapter 2

Wide, brown eyes stared up at Anthony with a mixture of curiosity and wariness. These were the same eyes he had caught for the briefest of moments on his way into the village. The young woman’s brows were now arched, her soft, pink lips parted in surprise.

Upon entering the inn, he had noticed her fiddling with something beneath the table. What had she been doing with her hands under the table? Anthony’s jaw tightened at the unwelcome possibility that presented itself to him, and his gaze flitted to the reticule hanging over her wrist. A sagging, heavy reticule.

His gaze darted back to her, and the wary look in her eyes gave way to something more mulish.

“If you please, sir,” she said roughly, tugging her arms back and bringing to his awareness just how tightly he was holding them.

He released her, and his gaze slipped back to the reticule. Of course, it was possible it was nothing but a fan and a mirror weighing it down. A particularly heavy mirror. He could hardly ask her what it contained, though.

“Excuse me,” he said brusquely, pushing past her and to the table. The maid bid the young woman a hasty goodbye and followed him.

“I have a table near the window, sir,” she said. “The bench is more comfortable, and there is more?—”

“I want this one,” he said, taking a seat. When the maid lingered, he looked up at her. “Refreshment, if you please.”

She nodded, then, after a brief hesitation, disappeared.

When he was satisfied no one was watching, he slid his hands under the table, feeling for the spot where Harris had told him he would conceal the diary. His fingers made contact with something, and he breathed out his relief.

It was short-lived.

He pulled what was decidedly a paper rather than a diary toward him and onto his lap, his chest tightening with misgiving.

He unfolded the paper and found himself looking at a painting. No, a drawing.

It was both, really. It reminded him of the caricatures that often appeared in the windows of London print shops, but this one was a bit less refined and more vibrant in color. It portrayed a woman surrounded by dogs and men. Mrs. Gattenby, if he was not mistaken.

He lowered his head until he could see under the table, then reached a hand toward the place he had expected to see the diary. But both his eyes and his hands told him precisely what he had been afraid of: there was nothing more there.

He swore under his breath and hurried up from his seat, going over to the window. His eyes searched for the young woman who had been here just before him. What had she been doing with her hands under the table? And what had been in that overly burdened reticule?

It was no use, though. The window was crowded with people staring at the sole piece of paper hanging from it—one very similar to the one Anthony held in his hand.

He slammed a fist against the wall in frustration, and a few people nearby startled. He stalked back toward the table, stopping the maid with his hand on her arm as she appeared in the large doorway with his refreshment on a tray.

“Who was the young woman sitting at that table before me?” he asked.

The maid hesitated, her gaze shifting to the paper in his hand. She swallowed and said nothing.

Anthony’s grip tightened as a sort of panic began to take hold. Without that diary, how could he save his brother? Fate couldn’t serve him such a trick—it wouldn’t, surely.

“Her name,” he said. “What is her name?”

“Is there a problem, Mr. Yorke?” Mr. Digby came up behind the maid, his mouth arranged in a smile and his tone attempting a lightness belied by the intent curiosity in his gaze.

Anthony’s jaw clenched. He despised Digby, and he would never have chosen to come to The Crown and Castle of his own volition. It had once been his custom to break his journey here when he came to London, but the inn had recently garnered a reputation for attracting Society’s biggest gossips. It was Harris who had chosen the inn, though, not Anthony. Confound the man’s insistence on doing things in the most inconvenient and secretive way.

Digby’s eyes roamed, and Anthony shifted the folded paper out of sight. Why was everyone at this inn so blasted inquisitive? “I wish to know the name of the young woman sitting at that table when I arrived.”

“Ah, that would be Miss Mandeville, sir,” Digby replied, happy to be of help.

Mandeville. Anthony committed the name to memory.

“A frequent guest of yours?” Anthony needed more than just a name if he was to follow the path of his suspicions. If she had merely been passing through, he needed to know her destination.

Digby chuckled. “Not quite, sir. Her family lives just down the lane”—he gestured with a thrust of his chin, making the skin beneath it jiggle like a turkey’s neck—“at Bellevue House.”

The maid clenched her eyes shut and turned her head away. Why the chagrin? What did it matter to her if Anthony knew the young lady’s name or where she lived?

The whole thing smelled highly suspicious. What he wished to do was to stalk straight to the Mandeville house, but it would be terribly awkward if his suspicions were incorrect.

Perhaps Harris—the man Anthony had hired to help him clear his brother Silas’s name—had misinformed him of where to look, or even run out of time to place the diary where he had said he would. Or perhaps Harris had put the caricature there instead of the diary by mistake. Anthony would have no trouble believing something of the strange man.

He would need to verify things with Harris before taking any action against Miss Mandeville.

“Thank you, Digby,” Anthony said, walking around both the innkeeper and the maid.

“Will you not stay, sir?” Digby asked, scurrying after him.

“Not today,” Anthony said. Or ever, if he could help it. The last thing he needed was to catch the attention of those fueling the talk of the ton.

His errand required the utmost secrecy—his brother’s future depended upon it. And that diary was the key to it all.

Anthony brushed a petal from the shoulder of his tailcoat and glanced up at the magnolia tree currently offering him shade. The grass below was littered with its pink petals, and this was the third that had fallen on his person.

He pulled out his pocket watch and gritted his teeth at the sight of the time. He had intentionally set the meeting for the hour before Hyde Park was inundated with every member of the ton, all wishing to be seen now that London was filling with the beau-monde.

A rustling brought him whirling around in time to see Harris’s head emerging from the bushes.

“What the devil?” Anthony said as Harris motioned for him to approach.

The man wore a serviceable if somewhat threadbare brown coat and an equally well-used gray top hat. His gaze shifted warily around the surrounding area.

“For heaven’s sake,” Anthony said. “Come out of those plants, Harris.”

He shook his head, still eyeing the environs with mistrust. “Don’t like meeting in public. Told you that. Too many roving eyes.”

“And no wonder if you insist on acting like a dashed loose screw.” Anthony took hold of the man’s arm and pulled him from the bushes. He relied on Harris, but heaven help him, the man had a head full of as much conspiracy as common sense. “Where is it?”

“Where is what?”

“The diary, man,” Anthony said impatiently. “It was not at The Crown and Castle.”

Harris drew back, affronted. “It was. I saw it with my own eyes. Put it there with my own hands—under the round table in the corner. Perhaps you went to the wrong one.”

Anthony’s jaw clenched. “I assure you, I did nothing so dunderheaded.” He pulled something from the inner pocket of his coat. “Perhaps you put the wrong thing there, as this was the only thing under that table.”

Harris frowned and took the paper, unfolding it. He tilted his head as he surveyed the drawing until his eyes lit with recognition. His wide gaze shifted to Anthony’s. “How’d you get your hands on this?”

Anthony pulled it out of his grasp, his patience wearing thin. “I just told you that. It was under the table.”

Harris’s gaze fixed on the paper again. “That’s one of those caricatures, that is.”

“Your powers of deduction are astounding.”

Harris’s fingers reached slowly for the paper, his eyes suddenly hungry. “Could I have it, sir?”

Anthony shifted the paper out of reach. “You may not. I need it to track down that blasted diary. If you had simply handed it over in person as I asked you to do, we wouldn’t be in this predicament. Instead, you insisted on a ridiculous and unnecessary game of hide and seek, all while my brother is forced to bide his time in France for a murder he did not commit.”

Harris’s lips turned down at the sides. “I’ve used that hiding place a dozen times, sir. No one knows it but me.”

“You and the eleven other people you’ve left things for, I surmise, not to mention the person who left the caricature,” Anthony said dryly. “You could hardly have chosen a more well-frequented inn.”

“Sometimes the best hiding place”—he tapped his temple and smiled—“is right under people’s noses.”

“Evidently not in this case,” Anthony said. But there was little use dwelling on the mistake. The only thing it accomplished was to waste precious time. It had been nearly five months since the fateful night Silas had been obliged to flee England, and the diary was the nearest Anthony had come to finding a way to exonerate his brother of blame—something that would not have been necessary if only Anthony had accompanied Silas to the meeting as he had promised to do.

“Do you know who is responsible for these caricatures?” Anthony asked.

If anyone knew, Harris would. He made it his business to snivel out every bit of useful—and useless—information that might put a shilling in his pocket.

Harris shook his head. “No one does.”

“Someone does,” Anthony muttered as he looked at the drawing again. The face of the young woman at the inn flashed across his mind again. He couldn’t help but believe she was the key to this particular question, though what a young woman like that had to do with the diary or the caricature, he had no idea, for she was obviously well-bred.

Whether Miss Mandeville had taken the diary for herself or handed it off to someone, she was the one Anthony needed to speak with. “Do you know the Mandevilles, Harris?”

“Mandevilles ...” Harris’s eyes narrowed. “Stoneleigh folk?”

“Yes. Bellevue House.”

He nodded. “Family of daughters—pretty ones too. None too plump in the pocket, though.”

“Oh?” Anthony said with interest. If that was the case, Miss Mandeville’s tongue might be loosened with a bit of money. And a bit was all Anthony currently had, for he had not only lost his brother Silas that dreadful night—he had lost the money he had invested in Lord Drayton’s business. His jaw clenched at the mere thought of Drayton.

Anthony folded the caricature and put it in his pocket again, ignoring the way Harris’s hungry gaze followed his every move. “Given that it is your fault that I find myself without the pivotal piece of evidence I require, I must insist you work to discover more information about the Mandevilles as well as seeking other possible avenues to exonerate my brother.”

Harris’s gaze widened. “But, Mr. Yorke, sir. You haven’t yet paid me for the diary.”

“Neither shall I until it is in my hands. What good is it to me otherwise? Perhaps next time you will listen when I request you to hand it to me directly.”

He was coming to accept that Silas’s exoneration would cost a small fortune. Of course, he couldn’t complain. Not when it was his fault Silas required exonerating in the first place. He had let Silas and their business partner Langdon go without him to the meeting with Drayton—and all so Anthony could pursue a pretty face. It made him sick every time he thought on it.

“I shall do my best, sir,” Mr. Harris said, “but ...”

“But what?” Anthony asked when the thought remained unfinished.

“I was only thinking, sir, that Drayton is a powerful man, and we would stand a better chance against him if we had your brothers to?—”

“No.” Silas had begged Anthony not to confront Drayton, nor to involve anyone else, least of all his family. As one of the wealthiest peers in the country, Drayton was simply too powerful and too dangerous a man to confront. He had killed Langdon in cold blood, then framed Silas for it without a second thought, knowing well that the public was aware of Silas and Langdon’s disagreements.

Even when Anthony had tried to broach the subject of Silas’s innocence with William and Frederick, it had quickly become clear they believed him guilty. Silas’s strained relationship with and suspicions of Langdon, Drayton’s assertions of what had happened that night, and Silas’s escape to France had been enough to convince them. Anthony’s defense of the brother he had always indulged meant little, particularly when he had not been there to witness the night’s events.

“As you wish,” Harris said, his wide eyes on something behind Anthony. “I shall send word when I have anything.”

Before Anthony could follow the direction of his gaze or respond, the man disappeared into the bushes again, leaving Anthony blinking.

“Is that my dear nevvy?” a woman’s voice called.

Anthony clenched his eyes shut and swore before turning to face his Aunt Eugenia. She wore a smart riding habit of jonquil hue, with a matching hat set at a jaunty angle on a head of graying hair. She sat alone in an enormous barouche Anthony had never before seen—undoubtedly a new purchase, as he had seen her just a month ago. She was as close to a mother as he or his brothers had possessed, as their mother had died shortly after Frederick’s birth, and their father two years ago.

“Aunt Eugenia,” he said, walking over. “What a pleasant surprise.”

“None of your fiddle-faddle now, Anthony. You never could manage to school your expressions.” She leaned forward and patted the seat in front of her. “Come. Sit up beside me as though you were pleased to see me.”

Anthony obeyed, motioning the coachman away from helping him in. Normally, he wouldn’t mind seeing his aunt. He simply couldn’t find it in himself to be glad she had seen him when he was in company with Harris.

“Who was that you were talking to?” Aunt Eugenia asked as she placed an extra fur rug over Anthony’s legs as if it were December rather than April, and he a quivering invalid. “He looked to be a seedy sort of fellow. Not in a scrape, are you?”

“No, Aunt.”

The carriage lurched forward as the horses began their forced stroll around the park. Meanwhile, the woman’s gaze surveyed him intently. “Good. We’ve had enough scandal in this family.”

Anthony forced his muscles to unclench, just as he had to do anytime someone referenced Silas’s plight. One of these days, he would inevitably snap when someone spoke of him as ignorantly as they all did. They all thought him a bad apple, and it grated Anthony to no end that it had to remain that way for the time being.

If only he could get his hands on that diary, then the end of his silence—and Silas’s unmerited ignominy—would be within sight. He would be able to prove what no one seemed willing to believe. Heaven knew Silas’s suffering had lasted long enough. The few letters Anthony had received from France had contained an air of forced nonchalance and resignation. But the last one had nearly broken Anthony.

“Do you think it is safe for me to return to England? Not home, of course, but perhaps somewhere up north. Scotland, even.”

Aunt Eugenia cleared her throat, and Anthony’s gaze flew to hers.

One of her brows was cocked. “What a very dark brow you have. It did not use to be so. Unhappy thoughts?”

Anthony relaxed his expression. “I have a tendency to look forbidding without wishing to do so.”

Her gaze rested on him searchingly. “Better than a face hiding unsavory thoughts behind simpering smiles. I like you, Anthony. But I wish you would settle down.”

“I assure you, Aunt, I am very much settled.”

“Enough of your impudence, boy. You know what I mean. Find a wife, for heaven’s sake. Or does every last one of my nephews intend to die a bachelor?”

“I think it unlikely in the extreme.” Though, for Anthony’s part, he couldn’t imagine marrying. Women had only ever brought him trouble. Not just to him, either. Silas’s hopeless situation was a direct result of the problems women had brought Anthony.

“Well,” Aunt Eugenia said, rearranging her skirts more prettily upon her carriage bench, “I surely hope not. I refuse to settle my fortune on any of my nephews if they refuse to show the smallest bit of initiative.”

“On the contrary, there is a great deal of initiative amongst us. William is shaping up to be the most unimpeachable and boring eldest son in all of England. Frederick’s political aspirations grow stronger by the day and are on track to rival Napoleon’s by Michaelmas.”

Silas, too, had plenty of ambition before he was forced to flee England—investments in various businesses that would have stood him in good stead if everything hadn’t gone to shambles so abruptly. But Anthony knew better than to bring up Silas in front of Aunt Eugenia.

She waved an impatient hand. “As eldest, William needs no fortune. As for you and Frederick”—she leaned forward slightly, pegging him with her gaze—“between the two of us, I would rather settle my fortune on you.” She sat back, cocking a brow. “But if you are carrying on with peculiar figures like that man back there and refuse to give any woman the time of day ...”

Anthony frowned. “Are you trying to bribe me to marry, Aunt Eugenia?”

“Of course I am. I want no more scandal in this family, Anthony.” Her brows drew together suspiciously. “What are you smiling about?”

“Nothing.”

Her lips pinched together. “Out with it, boy.”

Anthony chuckled softly. “It is just that you yourself are not exactly the pattern card of propriety you seem to wish me to be.”

Her mouth twitched at the side, but she controlled it. “My reputation was spotless.”

“Was being the operative word.”

She jabbed a finger at him. “I served my time, young man. I kept my reputation unblemished, made a good match, and now I benefit from the freedom it has afforded me. You do the same, and there may be a pretty fortune in it for you.”

Anthony clasped his hands in his lap and met her intent gaze. “Forgive my frankness, Aunt, but you are not precisely at death’s door.”

She threw her head back and let out a cackle of laughter. “Not an imminent enough reward for you, is it?”

Contrary to what his aunt seemed to think, Anthony had no desire for her to meet an early demise. He liked her a great deal. But the prospect of receiving a fortune in thirty years’ time was not a powerful enough one to send Anthony to the altar.

“Fair enough,” she said. “What if we liven things up a bit, then, hm? Say, five hundred pounds to the first of you to marry?”

Anthony’s smile flickered. Five hundred pounds?

His aunt smiled knowingly, and Anthony composed himself. He had no intention of getting tangled up with any woman while Silas’s affairs were in such a state. Besides, he had the devil’s own luck choosing women.

It was a shame, for he could certainly use Aunt Eugenia’s money to expedite Silas’s return to England. How many fists could be greased, how many tongues loosed with such a sum?

“Do you know the Mandevilles, Aunt?” Anthony asked, his mind returning to his most pressing errand. He couldn’t allow himself to be distracted by his aunt’s games, however lucrative they might be. He owed his full and complete attention to Silas.

Aunt Eugenia’s brow furrowed. “The name is vaguely familiar. Why?”

He shook his head. “No reason.”

His aunt gave him another one of her knowing looks, which he promptly chose to ignore. Miss Mandeville was hardly a prospect for marriage.

He banged on the side of the barouche, and the coachman slowed the horses just before the Park gate. “I must take my leave of you here, dear aunt.” He reached for her gloved hand and kissed the back of it before stepping down to the dirt path.

“See?” she said as he closed the door. “Very pretty manners when you choose to use them. Plenty of women would faint with a kiss like that to their glove.”

“My concern precisely,” he said dryly as he nodded at the coachman.

“Remember the arrangement, Anthony,” she called out. “And don’t forget my party next week!”

He watched the carriage pull away, then took long, quick strides toward the Park’s exit. If he hurried, he could make it to Stoneleigh with enough time to pay a visit to Miss Mandeville.