Page 75 of Never a Duke
And yet, the prospect of a match between Rosalind and Ned Wentworth had sent Papa into a tantrum. Papa’s reaction was absurd. PerhapsPapahad been refused a loan from the Wentworth bank?
Rosalind pondered that conundrum while she penned a short note to Ned. She rang for a footman, passed him the sealed note and a package she’d chosen the previous day. Then she took out a fresh sheet of paper and sent off a lengthier epistle to Aunt Ida.
***
Ned rumpled his cravat, rubbed a smudge of mud onto his boot, added some dust to the back of one coat sleeve, and generally affected the demeanor of a weary traveler. In that guise, he inquired in a half dozen wharf-side taverns about where a fellow newly returned to London could safely spend a night or two on the cheap.
The same several lodging houses were suggested over and over. Ned called at four of them, asking after a brother—Robert Taylor—who’d come through London three months ago. In the first three cases, he was told to inquire at one of the other doss houses.
The landlady at the fourth house, an old woman a trifle tidier than her predecessors, added that earlier in the year, Mr. Taylor might have stayed at the place on Grapeshot Court—number twenty, it was—but that establishment no longer took in boarders.
Ned got directions to Grapeshot Court, which was a dog’s leg off a dead end not far from Cuckminster Lane, and made his way through lengthening shadows to the designated neighborhood.
London changed moods between one street and the next, with seedy dilapidation yielding to respectable terraces, or venerable Tudor dwellings sliding into disreputable tenements. Grapeshot Court clung to shabby pretensions of respectability. One determined housekeeper had put potted pansies on her stoop, though Ned was certain those pansies were taken inside before sunset each evening.
The rest of the court was tattered around the edges, with grass springing up between flagstones, evidence of pigeons speckling the walkways, and a scrawny one-eyed tabby perched like a vulture on the lid of a rain barrel.
Ned withdrew to the narrow space between two houses on the court and watched number twenty for more than an hour. Nobody came or went, and on this fine spring day not a single window was cracked. Not on the ground floor, not on the upper stories, which would be getting warm this late in the afternoon.
Ned knew better than to be on unfamiliar turf after dark. He rapped on the front door of number twenty, which was arguably foolish of him. If Tryphena’s thugs were up to no good here, they might recognize Ned.
The young man who opened the door an entire six inches was large enough to qualify as one of Tryphena’s henchmen, and had the requisite broken nose and wrinkled finery, but Ned didn’t recognize him.
“Wot yer want?”
“Lookin’ fer me bruvver,” Ned said. “Came through earlier in the year and mighta stayed here. Name a Robert Taylor.”
“We don’t take in boarders no more.”
“But he mighta stayed here when ya did, and if I knew that, then I’d know Bobbie made it to Lunnon.”
The door eased back another two inches. “Can’t help ya, mate. This place offered a cot for a coin, no names needed.”
“What about regulars?” Ned asked. “If I could find somebody who stayed here back then regular-like, maybe they could tell me if Bob passed this way?”
“This ain’t my patch,” the fellow replied, shaking his head. “I wouldn’t know about any regulars from months back. Ask at the Dog and Dam, maybe they might know, but I can’t tell you nuffink.”
Ned adopted the requisite frustrated expression and touched a finger to his hat brim. “Thanks all the same. Where’s the Dog and Dam?”
He was given directions, and he shuffled on his way. A glance over his shoulder told him that the door to number twenty did not close until Ned was almost at the end of the lane.
He turned in the direction of the Dog and Dam, though he didn’t need to make any inquiries there. He needed to get back to the genteel environs of the bank before the sun set, and he needed to sort through the disappointing interview with Lord Woodruff earlier in the day.
Not for all the wedded bliss in England would Ned risk causing Rosalind to be banished again, but neither was he about to give up on the quest to find her missing maids.
The windows at number twenty had been nailed shut from the outside, and Ned knew of only one reason why that might be.
***
“If you are officially courting Lady Rosalind,” Walden said, setting aside the bank policy he’d been reading in the fading afternoon light, “you might want to tidy up a bit before venturing forth in public.”
Ned’s attire was uncharacteristically scuffed and wrinkled, considering that the bank was still open for business. Ned himself had an impatient, annoyed air as he stalked into Walden’s office.
“I ventured into surrounds where too much tidiness is an invitation to get your pocket picked. Where is Artie?”
Walden rose from the settee beneath the window. “He’s a badger. How the hell should I know?”
“He’s the badger assignedto me, and thus you keep an eye on him. I sent Artie back with the curricle more than two hours ago.”
