Page 20 of Dead Beside the Thames
“And I’d be a fool to pass it up, especially if the Hales decide to sell Sedbury’s whips.” Charlie headed for the hall, and Garvey followed.
Within minutes, Charlie was coated, hatted, and out of his door and striding the short distance to Sedbury’s address, which Jonathon had given as Number 15, Duke Street.
Reaching the building, as instructed, Charlie climbed to the first floor. Faced with a single oak door, he knocked a sharprat-a-tat-taton the panel.
A few seconds passed, then the door opened, revealing Lord Jonathon Hale. On seeing Charlie, relief lit the younger man’s features. “Thank you for coming.” Jonathon waved Charlie inside. “Do come in. I take it you’ve heard that Sedbury’s dead?”
“I had heard, yes.” Although no report had as yet appeared in the news sheets, in the way of such happenings, whispers of the event had spread like wildfire through the ton, so Charlie knowing of it meant nothing. He halted just beyond the short entrance hall and turned to his host. As Jonathon halted beside him, Charlie’s gaze was drawn to a livid scrape that slashed across Jonathon’s left cheek. “I say, that looks nasty.”
Jonathon blinked, then grimaced and raised his fingers to gingerly touch the wound. “I went riding yesterday morning and wasn’t looking ahead well enough. I rode straight into a branch. It nearly took my head off.”
With another quirk of his lips, Jonathon held out his hand. “But thank you for coming. Bryan and I have been tasked with seeing to Sedbury’s things, and neither of us have any idea about his whips other than the lot were said to be something of a collection.”
Jonathon turned as another gentleman—another Hale by his features and size; all the Hale men were tall, large, and solid—came out of a room to their left. “Ah, Bryan—this is Charlie Hastings. He’s the whip collector I told you I’d asked for assistance.”
Bryan Hale hesitated, then held out his hand and gave Charlie a careful nod. “Hastings.”
Charlie returned the nod and shook Bryan’s hand, but it was obvious Bryan had heard about Charlie’s altercations with Sedbury.
Bryan confirmed that by asking, “Forgive me, but aren’t you the gentleman Sedbury bailed up in White’s card room on Saturday night?”
“I am,” Charlie admitted. “And I believe I was the first gentleman the police inspector investigating the case questioned, but he—Inspector Stokes—has accepted that I had nothing to do with Sedbury’s murder.”
That might have been stating matters in a somewhat more definite light than, currently, was warranted, but Charlie knew he was innocent, and he was confident that Barnaby and Penelope would ensure he was fully exonerated by finding Sedbury’s murderer.
Jonathon and Bryan studied Charlie. The pair were a good head taller than he was and half again as wide, and Sedburyhad been even larger and heavier and arguably stronger. After only a moment of consideration, the brothers nodded in ready acceptance of Charlie’s innocence.
Jonathon shared a grimacing look with Bryan. “We both know what a ferocious brawler Sedbury was, and if you’ll excuse the observation, it’s difficult to see how you might have bested him.”
Charlie waved the apology aside. “Believe me, I’ve never been so glad to be average-sized before.”
Jonathon and Bryan smiled, and Jonathon waved toward an open door at the far end of the room. “So, to the whips. They’re through there?—”
He broke off as, behind Charlie, the front door opened.
Charlie swung around as a fashionably dressed lady—he was in two minds as to whether to label her a young lady as she clearly wasn’t that young—swept inside. Long, wavy, brown-blonde hair, caught up and anchored beneath her elegant hat, large, thickly lashed brilliant-blue eyes, an oval face blessed with a straight nose, perfectly arched brown eyebrows, and a pair of lush lips all combined to render the lady quite striking, at least to Charlie’s eyes.
The lady’s gaze landed first on the Hales, then moved to Charlie, and she halted. “Oh!” Her eyes widened.
He met her bright-blue gaze and was instantly seized by countervailing impulses—to step back and fade into the background, as he normally would in the presence of a beautiful and eligible female, or stand his ground in the hope of appeasing his unexpectedly flaring curiosity regarding her.
Despite her scrutiny, he remained where he was and waited…
Jonathon broke the momentary hiatus. He waved at Charlie. “Claude, this is Mr. Charles Hastings, who is a renowned whip collector.” To Charlie, he said, “My sister, Lady Claudia Hale.”Returning his gaze to Claudia, Jonathon explained, “I invited Charlie to call, hoping to pick his brains over Sedbury’s whips.”
Bryan leapt in to reassure her, “Charlie was the gentleman who had a run-in with Sedbury at White’s on Saturday evening, but that inspector you met has already spoken with him, and Hastings is no longer a suspect.”
“I see.” Claudia’s clear blue gaze returned to Charlie’s face.
It was a shock to realize that he found her quite dazzling, even though she was plainly in two minds about whether to accept his exoneration or treat him with suspicion. He couldn’t really see why he was drawn to her. She appeared to be a managing sort of female, and he’d never been fond of those.
Claudia was, indeed, sizing up Charlie Hastings and mentally cursing her brothers’ readiness to acknowledge him free of suspicion. Didn’t they realize that this was a case of the more the better, and other gentlemen being suspected of Sedbury’s murder would help deflect attention from them?
She had no doubt that, all too soon, the investigators’ attention would turn her brothers’ way. Aside from all else, Penelope Adair knew far too much of the ways of the ton to overlook two such prime suspects.
Still, perhaps this was an opportunity to learn more about Hastings and his association with Sedbury. Fashionably attired in a unostentatious way, with his neat fair hair and kind brown eyes, Hastings looked to be the quiet sort of gentleman who saw and knew far more than anyone expected. Even if he himself was entirely innocent of the crime, he might know more than he realized, enough to point the finger at someone else.
Claudia held out her hand. “Mr. Hastings.”
