Chapter 29

CHAPTER 29

L ionel pushed himself to his feet but Cecilia's hand caught him, holding onto his. His head swung from Blackwood to his stricken wife. She looked wan and weak, her grip was like the roots of a plant clinging to inches of soil on a cliff face. One good tug would pull it free. But that weak grip anchored him in place like a double-strand chain.

"I must see him. He has been sending me urgent messages since before we left Thornhill."

"The gentleman is most agitating, fair wearing a groove in the marble of the hall with his pacing," Blackwood commented.

"Tell him I will be with him momentarily," Lionel commanded without looking away from his wife.

He saw the wound that those words caused and it cut deep. He knelt on the bed and tried to lift her hand to his lips but she pulled it away, face firming.

"I must hear what he has to say," he reiterated. "He has been working hard on my behalf."

"You said you would remain by my side," she murmured back.

"You would not hold me to that when we are safe within our own walls."

"Yes, I would," she responded, languidly pushing herself to her elbows.

"Why?" he frowned, brows furrowing.

He could not understand her resistance. The argument that revenge would consume him was one he understood of course. He was not so lacking in empathy or emotional intelligence that he did not see the monomania that he had developed over the years. And how that monomania must have worried anyone who cared for him. Not that there were many of those beyond Thornhill. But, in those days, he'd had nothing else in his life.

No passion. No great love and no pastimes.

Only the grief of losing a brother, for Arthur had been more of a brother than a friend. The grief of losing a woman he had convinced himself he loved, being betrayed in his time of need. And the anger at an inexplicable act of callous hatred by a despicable individual who he now knew to be his half-brother.

His life was very different now. The grief and anger which had been raw, bleeding wounds, were now healthy. The scar tissue was thin, prone to breaking open—but healed. And he had the greatest of passions in his life. The purest and most powerful form of love… for that's what it was.

Cecilia was a light that shrank the appeal of revenge, making it appear small and petty by contrast. Lionel did not think there was any danger of his becoming obsessed as he had once been. Of his being consumed, driven to madness or death by the need for vengeance. Cecilia prevented that.

"I merely wish to speak to him. To find out what he has discovered in my service. I owe the man that much, he has given over his entire life to my service these last five years," Lionel said earnestly.

"So, you will listen to what he has to say and then terminate his employment?" Cecilia asked.

Lionel hesitated. "I cannot think of anything he might say that would prompt me to send him out to probe further. Short of a signed confession."

"Then I will come with you to this meeting," Cecilia decided, swinging her legs from the bed.

But she could not stand. As soon as she tried to push herself into a standing position, she fell back, clutching her head and retching loudly. Lionel hurried for the chamber pot but was not much faster than Blackwood.

"That is my job, Your Grace," he said gruffly. "Your job is to speak to the gentleman downstairs. Over here, girl!"

This last part was directed to the maid who had brought in the tea. Blackwood instructed her to secure her mistress' hair while he held the chamber pot and draped linen over his arm for Cecilia to wipe her mouth on.

Cecilia tried to protest. Tried to stand or speak. But the sickness had her firmly in its grasp. She could not straighten long enough to form words before her body was convulsing once more. Lionel resolved to leave her to the tender ministrations of the servants. He told himself he would be back to tend to her himself in mere moments. Whatever Lennox had to tell him would not be so urgent as her sickness. Even if the sickness was a good thing, a symptom of a wonderful condition.

He strode from the room and made his way downstairs, to find Lennox pacing as Blackwood had told him.

The Scotsman held his bowler hat in his gloved hands, turning it by the brim, round and round. He wore his overcoat, a thick, dark hide that was his garment in spring, summer, and winter. Dark eyes turned to Lionel as he approached, darkened by bunched, stormy eyebrows.

"At last! And where have you been hiding, Your Grace?" Lennox blurted.

"I will allow that from you and similar from Blackwood but have a care, Lennox," Lionel grumbled, irritated, "my indulgence will only go so far."

"Forgive me, Your Grace. But when I wrote my first message to you, I had presumed you would come running. As it is, we might already be too late! Come, we must head for the Blackwall Reach without delay."

Lionel held up a hand. "Wait, wait. Slow down. The Blackwall Reach? That is a stretch of the river is it not?"

"Aye, it is. In the east by Poplar and the East India Company docks. Your Grace, you employed me to find out about Lord Thorpe and then find the weakness in his business affairs. A weakness that could be exploited for an arrow in a chink of his armor. Well, I have it, but it will not be there for long!"

Lionel had never seen Lennox so animated. He thought of the conversation with the man about his Marie, whom he had lost. And how his life had orbited back to his former profession with that loss. Lionel could understand the emptiness such a loss might leave behind. He looked into Lennox's face, thin and drawn. The old man looked tired, as though his very essence had been drawn out of him in the quest that Lionel had set him on. Every drop of his very life's blood going to its culmination. In that moment, he felt a wave of compassion and sickened horror. He saw himself, old, gray, and obsessed. Lonely and animated only by his quest. A quest that would possibly never be fulfilled and which he would end up too weak to pursue.

"There is a ship at dock at the mouth of the Lea, just beyond the East India docks," Lennox explained, "I have traced its passage from Western Africa to Bristol and Liverpool. To the West Indies and the Americas. To Glasgow. But always on paper. It always sailed on paper. But now, I finally have it. And I have Sir Gerald Knightley!"

"A ship?" Lionel asked, despite himself.

His mind had been going back to his wife, suffering and with child. Of how to placate Lennox so that he could be free to be by her side. But the mention of a ship caught his attention.

"A ship supposedly bearing ivory but, in actuality, carrying slaves meant for the West Indies. And Sir Gerald is there to inspect the ship. We can catch him red-handed, Your Grace. Then let the magistrates of Bow Street sweat him for information on his compatriots. This is the closest we have ever come to evidence of criminality linked to Lord Thorpe. We must act now!"

Lionel felt a rush of excitement. It swept away thoughts of Cecilia like a flooding river washing away its banks.

"How do you know what the ship carries?" he asked urgently.

"They are moored in the Lea. Not in the East or West India docks and not further upriver. They hide this ship from prying eyes amid the marshes. I found out the ship was due into London and have kept watch for it. I saw with my own eyes the slaves being brought up from the hold and inspected by Sir Gerald Knightley. Other ships arrived and then departed. I believe these villains are conducting their own slave market here in England for distribution to the southern states of America, to Jamaica. Everywhere. Since the slave trade was banned and the Royal Navy set to police the ban, what better way to hide than under the banner of a respectable gentleman? I'll wager no Navy frigate would think to board a ship bearing the Union Jack and coming from England."

"No," Lionel added thoughtfully, "they will not expect slave ships to come from English ports. They will be patrolling the mid-Atlantic between western Africa and the Caribbean. Those villains!"

"Exactly. And we have them! You are a justice of the peace, you can raise a militia to take the ship," Lennox chimed, eyes shining.

Lionel waved a hand. "I am a JP of Surrey, of the county. I doubt my writ holds in London."

"But your name does. Bow Street will listen to you as will His Majesty's Custom and Excise men," Lennox insisted.

Lionel's heart was racing. Could it be that here was the opportunity, at least, to destroy his enemy? To undermine his business and expose him publicly as a villain. As a slave trader, one who was regarded with contempt and disgust by high and low in England. The common people and the gentry were united in their opposition thanks to the efforts of brave Parliamentarians and others in stamping out the vile business.

"You're right. I will pen a note to Bow Street and another to the Excise Office in Broad Street. Two of my most reliable men will carry them. In the meantime, we will go and see this ship. Wait here."

Lionel strode away towards the study, calling out for servants as he went. His mind was filled with the prospect of victory. After long years of waiting, after the painful years of learning to use his legs, feeling weak and vulnerable before a dangerous adversary, revenge was finally within his grasp. As he penned the notes to the respective authorities, his thoughts danced to his wife. He had promised to be by her side but surely she would understand. His promise had been made when revenge was no closer to being realized than it had been five years ago. This was different. Evidence had fallen into his lap, proof was waiting to be discovered. She would surely not begrudge him taking the opportunity that fate had presented him. She would wholeheartedly give her consent for him to leave her side. Even if he went into danger.

Which he would not. Lionel would not be storming the decks of a ship. He would be watching from the marshes while Excise men did the storming and took the risk. In fact, he could probably take the opportunity, while waiting for responses to his notes, to go up and tell Cecilia everything.

Something stopped him.

He froze in the act of sealing the notes using the signet ring he wore on his right hand, bearing the Grisham seal. A candle burned in a sconce before him, waiting to drip its wax onto the folded paper. If he was so confident that his wife would support him, then there was no reason not to tell her. Was there? And yet he hesitated. Lionel shook his head angrily, astonished at his own temerity. This was the breakthrough he had been waiting for. All promises were void next to that.

"I will have victory!" he whispered fiercely as he pressed his ring into the wax and sealed the letter.

"But my sister does not understand men's need to fight and win. She will think only of a promise broken," Arthur's voice whispered in his head.

Lionel shook his head, blowing on the newly imprinted wax seal to dry it. Arrant nonsense. Cecilia would understand but she was in no condition to do so now. Not when she was so struggling with the sickness of pregnancy. Best she be allowed to rest and sleep. He would be back before she was even aware that he had gone and would congratulate him on his victory.

All would be well.

And he would be the victor.