Page 1 of The Secrets of Lord Grayson Child
Chapter 1
Woburn Place, London. January 2, 1852
Lord Grayson Child stepped down from the hackney he’d instructed to halt at the southern end of Woburn Place, at the northernmost corner of Russell Square.
Gray glanced around, then paid the jarvey and waited until the cab pulled away before crossing the busy thoroughfare, at that hour thronged with traffic, and continuing into Bernard Street.
As Corby, Gray’s gentleman’s gentleman, had assured him, he found Woburn Mews a block along on the left. Thrusting his hands into his greatcoat pockets and dipping his head, Gray confidently strode up the mews, consciously projecting the image of a man who knew where he was going.
His bootheels rang on the cobbles. He adjusted his stride and placed his feet more quietly; he didn’t want to draw unnecessary attention. With the time nearing five o’clock, the encroaching winter evening progressively deepened the shadows that draped the western side of the street along which he was pacing.
As the street’s name indicated, the area had once played host to the homes of the well-to-do. While pockets of private houses wreathed in quiet gentility remained, with the university so close, many residences had been converted to lodging houses for scholars and faculty, and other buildings had been taken over by businesses catering to academe.
The eastern side of Woburn Mews played host to several such establishments—a paper supplier, a purveyor of artists’ supplies, and the Molyneaux Printing Works, which produced the popular gossip ragThe London Crier.
From the opposite side of the street, Gray surveyed the printing works’ façade. Two stone steps led up to a neat, white-painted, half-glass-paned front door with the words “Molyneaux Printing Works” etched into the glass and highlighted in gold.
To the left of the door, a tall, wide window, uncurtained and stretching from approximately waist height to what must nearly be the ceiling, presumably allowed daylight to strike deep into the large workshop beyond.
Gray’s eyesight was excellent; through the window, he could see a long counter that ran across about half the workshop’s width, running parallel to the window and separated from it by a narrow space—a foyer of sorts. Behind the counter, deeper within the lighted interior, several figures moved about, busy and absorbed with their tasks.
Noting that, Gray strolled on. After the wide window, a more normal-sized window, currently with blinds unhelpfully drawn, faced the cobbles; the window belonged to a narrower room separated from the printing works’ foyer and workshop by a wooden partition. Behind the screening blinds, a lamp burned brightly.
Gray eyed his target—the office in which he hoped to find either the proprietor ofThe London Crier, I. Molyneaux, or failing him, the editor of the gossip rag.
Surreptitiously, Gray glanced around, then slowed and stepped into a shadowy alcove before a padlocked door. Effectively hidden from sight, he settled to watchThe Crier’sdoor.
He’d learned of the threatThe Crierposed when, the previous Saturday, while visiting his parents at Ancaster Park, his ancestral home, he’d been reduced to reading the gossip rag and, on the front page, had discovered a notice toutingThe Crier’supcoming exposé.
The words still rang in his mind.
From the Editor’s Desk:
An Upcoming Exposé
Which scion of a noble house, after a lengthy sojourn in far-flung lands, has recently returned to these shores a veritable Croesus, yet is being exceedingly careful to hide his remarkable fortune from the eyes of the world?
More details will be revealed in coming editions.
Unfortunately, given the festive season, his family’s expectations, and various social obligations he had not wished to break, he’d had to remain in Lincolnshire to see in the New Year. Today—the Friday after he’d first seen the vexatious notice—had been the earliest he’d been able to come racing down the Great North Road.
On reaching London, he’d been irritated to discover that, being a weekly publication,The London Crierhad released a new edition that day. A copy was jammed into his greatcoat pocket; he didn’t need to consult it again to recite the substance of the latest titillating revelation.
Latest from the Editor’s Desk:
As promised, we have an update on our most recent and highly secretive Golden Ball, who continues to play least-in-sight, at least as far as society is concerned. However, in this season, perhaps such retiring behavior isn’t to be wondered at or, indeed, discouraged, as our sources assure us this long-lost son has spent the festive weeks being re-embraced into the ducal fold. And that, of course, can only heighten society’s interest in him. Be assured that, as the Season approaches, your trusty correspondent will reveal further insights into this elusive yet exceedingly eligible gentleman.
More to come.
Reading that had hardened his resolve to ensure no further revelations were made. He had no wish to become the target of every matchmaker in London, let alone every Captain Sharp and purveyor of shady investments, all of whom would, inevitably, beat a path to his door. News of sensational and unexpected wealth invariably brought all three types running, hoping, respectively, to marry the money, acquire it via wagering, or extract it through convoluted business deals.
Gray failed to understand why such charlatans believed that anyone blessed with unexpected good fortune should be a fool readily parted from it, but so it was. And while he would take a certain delight in disabusing anyone of the notion that he was an easy mark, having to do so repeatedly would quickly become annoying and—even more irritating—potentially damaging with respect to the genuine business and investment relationships he’d begun developing and nurturing.
In his opinion, having money brought with it a certain responsibility, and that meantThe London Crier’sproprietor was going to have to find some other scandalous morsel with which to titillate his audience.
In the distance, the city’s bells pealed, melodiously tolling for five o’clock. Gray detected renewed movement inside the printing works, then the lamps deeper in the workshop were extinguished, with only one lamp, on the long counter, left turned low.
Gray glanced at the office. As he’d hoped, that lamp continued to burn brightly. He had no wish to identify himself to the printing works’ staff and was counting on the owner or editor being the last to leave.
