Chapter 27

Simon noticed Quixote as soon as he pulled up to his flat. The nondescript man was mustache-less this time, dressed in the clothes of a beggar. He crouched by the steps to the building, a tin can stretched out in front of him.

Simon helped Bella out of the carriage and guided her towards the stairs. She pulled aside from him at the last minute, however, bending down to drop a coin in the man's cup before walking ahead of Simon up the stairs. When his housekeeper greeted the two inside, Simon introduced Bella.

"Please show the new Mrs. Lyndon to her chambers," he said cordially, smiling at Bella in a way he hoped would be reassuring. "I will go back down and bring up your luggage and we can have a bite to eat."

"I don't have anything on," the housekeeper said nervously. "I did not know to expect you this evening, Mr. Lyndon. I would have made something hot, especially if I'd known…" she nodded significantly towards Bella, "…your happy news."

"We did not send word ahead, and so did not expect anything special by way of food this evening," he assured her graciously. "If you have anything cold in the larder, I'm sure that will suffice, along with a pot of tea to wash it down."

The housekeeper bobbed into a curtsy, clearly still worried about shirking her duties, and disappeared with Bella into the flat. Simon turned on his heel and hurried back downstairs, stopping on the bottom step and leaning against the railing above Quixote to light a pipe. He kept his eyes forward as he spoke, so that a passerby would not guess the two men were talking.

"This is not your best disguise," he growled. "This part of London does not get a lot of beggars. You will draw attention merely because you're outside this building in rags."

"Do not flatter yourself, Captain," Quixote mumbled in response. "You aren't in the fashionable part of town, although I imagine you wish you were with that pretty little thing on your arm. Who is she?"

"My wife." Simon wondered when the words would stop sounding foreign in his own ears.

Quixote whistled. "New development? I pride myself on knowing everything about my agents, and I did not know of a Mrs. Lyndon until now."

"Recently wed," Simon answered. "But as you are not here to deliver felicitations, let us not waste any more time on the subject."

"You must really like her, if you want to keep your business far from her doorstep," the other spy said in a low voice.

"I want to keep my business far from everyone's doorstep," Simon retorted. "It's the nature of my business."

"Did you look into the man in the north?"

"A dead end." Simon took a puff on his pipe. "The man did not have any connections to our agents. Furthermore, he was a fool. I watched him for days without witnessing anything of note. Is that why you're here? To check on my progress?"

"I'm here to tell you we lost another agent."

A shiver ran over Simon. "Who?"

"You don't know him. It was a young lad we employed to carry messages in Paris. He was nine years old, found with his throat slit outside the public house where he slept." Quixote's voice was grim. "Like Wickham, he was not on our roster. It had to be an insider who tipped off the French to the boy's betrayal."

"Couldn't he have died because of some other matter?" Simon asked, his heart breaking. "A botched robbing, perhaps?"

"I don't think a robber would have left a note on the boy warning spies and their ilk to stay out of Paris," Quixote said stiffly. "The murder was clearly about the boy's allegiances."

"And I'm sure he had no real allegiances," Simon said grimly. "Likely he only took the job to stay off the streets, or to keep some family member alive. You are certain the informer is English?"

"Fairly. You're running out of time, Captain." Quixote's voice grew cold. "If this continues, we will lose some of our greatest assets before the war is through."

"I cannot imagine what sort of Englishman would betray his own countrymen," Simon whispered, puffing at his pipe again.

"The boy was French."

"But he fought on the side of the English. He should not have died in the gutter." Simon tapped the contents of his pipe out onto the top of the banister and cleared his throat. "I will inquire after the nobleman I mentioned in our last correspondence, but he is the last lead I have."

"Let us hope he is a good one." Quixote stood, tucking away his beggars cup. "That little wife of yours is a sweet thing, but do not let her distract you. Love is second to service of country. Everything is second to service of country."

He disappeared as he always did, ducking away down the alley and then vanishing as though into thin air. Perhaps for you, love is second, Simon thought. But not everyone has your same priorities. The thought sparked something in the recesses of his mind—something about the spies and the common thread between the deaths—but he did not have the time to pull the notion out into the light of day. He would have to ruminate on it another time. He had already been gone from Bella's side long enough, and he did not doubt that she was growing uncertain in his absence.

He unloaded her chest from the carriage, dismissed the driver, and climbed the stairs back into his flat under the heavy load he bore.

The parlor inside, sparsely but neatly furnished, was empty. He went through it into the study, and beyond that to the hall where two bedrooms were divided by a small sitting room. He set the chest down here and knocked on the door that was closed. There was a rustling inside, and Bella appeared barely cracking open the door to look out.

"Oh, it is you," she said. "Mrs. Smith showed me to your rooms."

"As she ought to have," he answered. He nodded at the door. "If you open that a bit wider, I can bring in your things."

She stepped back and gave him space to place the chest at the end of his bed. "Thank you."

"For now," he said quietly, "I'll stay in the guest room across the way."

"I can stay in the guest room," she said quickly, clearly having thought of this already. "I don't like to put you out of your chambers."

"They are your chambers now too," he said. "You are my wife. I know we are not ready for… more… but you are still my wife. I do not want you feeling like a guest in your home."

She blushed a little and nodded. "Mrs. Smith said she would lay the food out in the parlor."

"I don't have a dining room," Simon confessed, feeling foolish. "Not yet, anyway. I will look next week for a more suitable living arrangement."

She frowned, her face crinkling prettily in thought. "I cannot imagine we will be entertaining much these first months. There is no hurry to have a dining room."

Simon couldn't hide his frown. "You are gracious, My Lady, but you do not need to pretend this is what you expected. I do not imagine anyone thought Lady Isabella Collingwood would end up in a London flat without a proper dining room when she finally married."

Bella hesitated for a strained moment, and then reached out to take Simon's arm. "You do not need to call me My Lady, Simon. I've always been Bella to you, and that certainly should remain the case now that we are married."

They walked together to the sitting room, where Mrs. Smith had laid out a meal for them to share. She had found more than a few cold things in the larder, it seemed. In addition to the teapot, there was a few slices of meat pie, fresh cheeses, a bowl of fruit, and leftover roast capon from what looked like the night before.

There was a fire in the hearth, and the curtains were drawn. Simon still felt strange being alone with Bella like this, as though they were doing something improper.

He knew that was not the case—after all, they were married and could be in each other's company without crossing any lines of propriety. But the suddenness of the arrangement made it seem as though he had cheated somehow. He had gotten what he always wanted, the hand of the woman he loved, but there was a divide between them that he did not know how to bridge.

She sat primly, her back ramrod straight, and nibbled at a piece of cheese. "This is a good meal," she said after a long moment of silence. "Mrs. Smith did well. Where did you find her?"

"My mother knew a woman," Simon said. "She found me Jacks as well."

"Your manservant?"

"Yes, but he only works here when I am staying at the flat. Otherwise, I do not have the ability to employ him around the clock." Simon felt suddenly uncomfortable admitting as much. It felt like failure to be frugal with one's salary.

Bella did not seem to notice. She took a sip of tea out of the teacup, and then reached for a grape from the fruit bowl. "I will meet with Mrs. Smith tomorrow and see if she has any questions about the future of the house," she said. "I know that I shall have some responsibility in the running of the place, but I confess I hardly know where to begin. I ought to write to Aunt Nellie and ask what she thinks."

"I imagine when she trained you in proper household duties it was to fill a bit larger of a role," Simon said quietly. "You likely expected to be running a grand house with an estate attached. There will be less logistics for you to manage here."

Bella said nothing, looking uncomfortable.

Simon wondered if she was regretting marrying him, or if she simply did not know how to respond to his comments about his lack of wealth and position. A wave of nerves swept over him, tying his tongue up and halting their conversation.

A few long moments passed in silence. The fire crackled. Simon ate a bit of the meat pie with half-hearted enthusiasm.

"I wonder…" Bella said at last, her voice so low that Simon had to lean in close to hear her, "…if all newlywed couples have so little to say to each other."

Simon's first response was guilt and embarrassment, but he pushed this aside to better understand her meaning. "I suppose," he answered carefully, "that it depends on how long the couple has known each other. Longer courtships likely lead to more comfort after marriage."

"We did not have a long courtship," she said, pointing out the obvious.

"But we are not strangers, either," he countered. "We have known each other all our lives."

She smiled weakly and set aside her food. "I suppose that is the problem, isn't it? We have known each other so long and so well under different circumstances—"

"Friendship alone, you mean?" he interjected.

"Exactly." She swallowed hard. "Now that we are facing the bonds of marriage we must learn to interact with each other in an entirely different way. I hardly know what to say to Simon my husband, while I always had easy repartee with Simon my friend."

"Then let us not move too fast too quickly," he assured her. "What if we just went on as though we were friends for the time being? Try not to dwell on the nature of our new relationship. If nothing had happened at Gretna Green, what would you want to say to me?"

Bella winced. "I hardly know. Before Gretna Green, we had not really talked since our argument."

Simon sighed. "I have thought of that often over the last few days. Bella, you deserved better than the lack of respect I gave you that night at the house party. I was very accusatory."

"And I shrink to remember my behavior as well," she interrupted, blushing deeply. "I was encouraging the attentions of a man who would end up kidnapping me and trying to force me to marry against my will."

"You had no idea of his character at the time."

"No, but I knew that I did not care for his personality," she said, raising her eyes to Simon. Firelight flickered in their depths. "You were right. I was playing a part for the sake of my parents."

"And you were right," he said softly. "It was a part you felt you had to play. I should not have condemned you without understanding the position you were in. In many ways, you were backed into a corner without the options available to me."

She nodded. "I was not in the best of temper during that house party, I fear. I may not have conducted myself well overall."

"Why?" he asked.

"My mind was… divided." She looked as though she wanted to tell him something more, but thought better of it. "And I was rather distracted by the surprise appearance of Lady O'Mara, I confess."

Amelia. In the rush of Lord Ramsgate's prosecution, the return to London, and Quixote's appearance at the flat, Simon had forgotten entirely about the woman who was in part responsible for this whole mess. "We ought to speak about Lady O'Mara," he said. "I believe what you have shared about the night you were kidnapped means she had a hand in this, I'm sure. I don't know her motive, but I believe her to be part of the crime."

"I think I know her motive," Bella said with a small smile. "And I'm certain the knowledge that you and I are married will be punishment enough for any wrongdoing on her part."

Simon frowned. "You think she kidnapped you to secure her chances with…"

"You, Simon," Bella gave a dry little laugh. "Heavens, I cannot imagine how it escaped you until this moment. You ought to have a higher opinion of yourself. Doubtless Lady O'Mara is not the only woman in London who has considered drastic means to hold on to the man she loves."

Simon chose his words carefully. "If you are correct in your assessment, than Lady O'Mara would have had to suspect some attachment between you and me. How do you think she came to that conclusion?"

Bella withdrew into herself at once. "I… I don't… who knows how anyone comes up with the conclusions that govern their lives?"

"Did you and she have a conversation on the subject?"

"Not exactly." Bella seemed to gather her wits about her again. "We spoke on many occasions, and I sensed a hostility from her that had no explanation. Coupled with her obvious preference for your company, and the way she appeared connected to the kidnapping in the park, I formed the conclusion that she wanted to protect her relationship with you at all costs." She added hurriedly, "Although she had nothing to fear, of course. Likely she misinterpreted our long-time friendship as something more."

"An easy thing to do," Simon said slowly. "That may have been her motive. Either way, her involvement seems undeniable to me. The question is… how to prove it?"

Bella bit her lip. "It would be easy enough for her to claim that my memory of her in the park was disconnected from the kidnapping, or else manufactured altogether."

"I have another witness that connects them," Simon said, remembering Grant. "But I doubt he would appear before the authorities. He has likely fled town or disappeared into the back alleys of London. He will not be easy to find, and even less willing to testify."

"The best thing is to lay low, I suspect," Bella assured him. "We will go about our business and watch for an opportunity to speak with Lady O'Mara privately. Perhaps she has thought better of her involvement. Perhaps she did not know what Lord Ramsgate intended."

Simon doubted it. He knew Amelia fairly well and she was as brazen as she was conniving. He had no doubt that if she had been involved to any degree in Bella's kidnapping, she was the mastermind behind it. She was not the sort of woman to take a back seat and let the likes of Lord Ramsgate drag her into a plot against her will.

He stood, changing the subject to something more pleasant. "I have something for you." He walked across the room, scanning the tall bookshelves lining his north wall until he landed on a little volume with a red cover. He took it down, and walked it over to where Bella sat, extending it to her.

She took the book, her fingers brushing his as she did so, and frowned at the title. "A Comprehensive Guide to Ropework and Nautical Knots. What is this?"

"A little something I had to keep on hand after the prank you pulled when we were children at the county fair in the village," he said, grinning down at her.

Memory lit her eyes with delight. "When you fell asleep in the hammock, and I lashed it shut with a bit of fishing line? Ah, yes, I remember." She laughed lightly. "I was surprised it took you so long to get out, but you did look a pretty sight flopping around in there like a fish in a net."

"You were watching?" he said, pretending offense and astonishment. "And you did nothing to aid me?"

"I cannot believe you did not have a knife on you at the time," she tsked, as though scolding him. "That would have been the easiest solution to your predicament. As it was, you took the much more difficult route of thrashing about and tightening the knots before… what was it you did…?" She pretended not to remember and then widened her eyes to say, "Ah yes, you called for help in absolute terror."

"Not terror. Expediency," he corrected her, laughing despite himself. "It was the quickest way to break free. I bought this book shortly afterwards to be certain I had the ability to get free should you choose to repeat the offense."

"I doubt it," Bella said. "I imagine you bought this so that you could take your revenge one day. It is one of the reasons I avoided hammocks after that event."

"The other reason?"

"A lady does not lie about dangling over empty space," Bella said, mimicking her aunt's proper tones.

Then she laughed, and it sounded to Simon like the first genuine, relaxed thing she'd done since her ordeal. It was music to his ears.