Page 56 of A Ruse of Shadows
Lord Bancroft was silent for some time. “No condolences?”
Charlotte glanced at her adversary. His skin was papery; thin blue veins showed at his temples. “Are you saddened by his passing, my lord, or only inconvenienced?”
His expression turned frosty. “My lieutenant is dead. I hope you have not come to gloat over my misfortune.”
“I have come because I have completed my assignment: I have found Mr. Underwood. It is time you removed your mercenaries from Mrs. Watson’s house in Paris.”
Lord Bancroft stared straight ahead. “Your task was to find him, if he was alive, and if he was no more, to find out what happened to him. I need to know who killed him and why—and then we will discuss the situation in Paris.”
Charlotte looked up—but from under her parasol, there was no sky. “You do not wish for the police to handle the matter?”
“No.”
“What about his body then?”
“If you’ve seen all you need, then you need no longer concern yourself with it.”
Unlike Mrs. Watson, Charlotte had not repeatedly expressed her gladness that she had refused to marry Lord Bancroft. But she was. Oh, how she was.
She inclined her head. “I take my leave of you, my lord.”
“How do I know that you did not, in fact, kill Mr. Underwood?” He spat out the question as she turned away.
She glanced over her shoulder. “How do I knowyoudid not have him killed, my lord?”
Lord Bancroft’s jaw worked. “So I was in a position to get rid of one of the very few people I trusted?”
“And I am in a position to deliberately prolong my sister’s tenure as your hostage? If you don’t have other instructions, my lord, I will be on my way.”
Mrs. Watson kept rearranging the display on the mantelpiece. The figurine, the glass box, the vase with the peacock feather—she went on changing their order, left to right, right to center, switching the two on the outside, then switching them back again.
The memory of Mr. Underwood’s pale, lifeless face against the dark blue pile of the carpet beneath him, the smell of coal dust and the beginning of putrefaction, the trembling in her arms as she and Miss Charlotte pushed him over, so that the girl could get a good look at where he had been shot.
He had been running awaywas all that Mrs. Watson had been able to think. Then and now.He had been running away.
From whom? And how safe were any of them, just when they believed themselves meticulously careful and properly safeguarded?
At the sound of a key turning in the street entrance, she rushed into the vestibule to embrace Miss Charlotte.
When she let go, the young woman, uncharacteristically enough, took her arm as they walked into the parlor together. “Are you all right, ma’am?”
Mrs. Watson exhaled. “Not entirely, I’m afraid. But I shall be better once we’re out of this pickle. Once we’re safer.”
Miss Charlotte did not say anything, but unpinned her plain toque from her head.
Mrs. Watson knew then her trip to Ravensmere had not yielded any hoped-for results. Not that she’d hoped for anything, really, but still, Mrs. Watson’s ire rose. “He won’t do the honorable thing, will he? The bastard!”
This was strong language for Mrs. Watson. Strong language for anyone.
Miss Charlotte did not bother to pass judgment. “I might need to talk to Mumble and Jessie again. And it would be good if Mrs. Claiborne surfaced. How did your inquiries go, ma’am?”
“The villa is indeed under Mrs. Claiborne’s name. But interestingly enough, it was never in Lord Bancroft’s name. Before the deed changed hands three years ago, it was owned by an old widow who left it to a charity in her will. The charity sold it after her passing. There is no record on who leased it from the old widow earlier, so there is nothing to trace the house to Lord Bancroft.”
More indication that Lord Bancroft had known even then that if anyone scrutinized his finances, it would become apparent that he had too much income.
“As for the town house in which Mrs. Claiborne received us, it is leased to a Mr. Overhill, of course. Three months of rent paid ahead of time.”
Miss Charlotte took off her wig and dug her fingertips into her scalp.
