“Actually, I can think of several reasons to kill a courier after he has delivered his message—particularly one with a reputation for failing to guard his tongue. For instance, you could have had him killed because you didn’t want whatever he told you to go further.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

Sebastian studied his father-in-law’s hooded gray eyes. “What if you’re wrong? What if, unbeknownst to you, Sedgewick did somehow manage to get his hands on such a list? If he didn’t deliver it to you, what might he have done with it?”

Jarvis closed his snuffbox with a snap and shrugged. “I suppose that would depend upon whose names were on the list.”

“Meaning?”

“Sedgewick had expensive habits, and his wife’s father was clever enough to tie up her money in ways that kept his son-in-law from getting his hands on most of it.”

“You’re suggesting he might have been tempted to sell the list to the highest bidder, or perhaps blackmail some of the people on it?”

“I’m saying it’s possible.”

Sebastian didn’t believe a word of it, but he still felt a vague stirring of uneasiness. “Why are you being so bloody cooperative?”

Jarvis huffed a soft laugh. “You’re suspicious because I’m cooperating with you?”

“Yes.”

“Perhaps you caught me in a benevolent mood.”

“No,” said Sebastian, and turned toward the door.

“If you find this list you claim exists, I want it,” said Jarvis. “Do you hear?”

But Sebastian simply kept walking.

Chapter 20

Sebastian was crossing the palace’s forecourt when he saw Hendon turning in through the ornamental colonnade that faced onto Pall Mall. The rain had stopped, but the pavements still glistened with wet; heavy gray clouds pressed low on the city, and the air was unseasonably cold for June.

“Ah, there you are,” said Hendon, pausing to let Sebastian come up to him. “I’m told you were looking for me earlier.”

“I was, yes. Do you have a moment? There’s something you need to hear.”

Hendon’s face hardened. “If it’s related to this latest murder investigation you’ve involved yourself in, I can’t imagine what makes you think I’d be the least bit interested.”

Sebastian swallowed the inevitable spurt of irritation. “You’ll understand when you hear it. Shall we go for a walk along the Mall?”

They walked beneath the parallel alleys of gnarled, leafy plane trees that stretched along the northern edge of St. James’s Park, toward Buckingham House. The Earl’s face showed no expression when Sebastian told him about the list Sedgewick was said to have brought back from Vienna and the actress’s name that was supposed to be on it. Hendon had long known that Kat once passed information to the French, and while it troubled him, he also understood what had motivated her. And he knew, too, that it had been years since she’d severed her contacts with Paris.

“But no one knows Kat is my natural daughter,” he said when Sebastian had finished.

“Perhaps not. But you spend a fair amount of time in her company. Do you think people haven’t noticed and drawn the inevitable conclusion?”

Hendon’s eyes widened. “Good God. You’re not suggesting people think she’s my mistress!”

“Would you rather they knew she’s your daughter?”

Hendon was silent for a moment, his jaw working back and forth in that way he had when he was thoughtful or troubled. As unseemly as it might be for a man in his seventies to take over his own son’s former mistress, that assumption was better than people knowing the truth of his relationship with Kat and thus concluding that her longtime liaison with Sebastian had been incestuous.

“You don’t know that the actress on this list is Kat,” Hendon said at last.

“No. But can you think of any other current member of the cabinet who has a known close relationship to someone in the theater?”

Hendon sighed and shook his head. “No.” He stared off across the grove of trees to the gleaming waters of the park’s long canal. “You think Sedgewick’s murder was linked to this list?”