I sat back when I'd finished and neatly piled the letters together. From them I had seen that Westin had been an ordinary man caught up in a war he did not like, in a profession he had taken to satisfy the pride of his father and grandfather. Nowhere did I a find a man who would dream of drinking himself into a frenzy and gleefully rushing about a fallen city looting homes and raping its inhabitants. Unless he had painted a very misleading portrait in these letters to his wife, I had to agree with Lydia. It was unlikely that Westin had murdered Captain Spencer in a fit of drunken madness.
Lydia herself entered the room as I laid the letters back in the desk where I'd found them. I sensed her presence before I looked up, or perhaps her faint perfume had alerted me.
Rest and food had erased the ravages of the last few days, though she was still pale, and her eyes bore smudges like bruises beneath them. She wore a black silk gown trimmed with dark gray piping, and a white widow's cap fixed to her carefully curled hair. Against this monotone, her blue eyes stood out like patches of sky on a cloud-filled day.
"Have you found anything?" she asked.
I rose to my feet. She motioned me to sit again, but I remained standing, manners beaten into me long ago winning out.
"Only what you told me I would find. The letters of a moral, conscientious man who abhorred violence. He makes no mention of Captain Spencer, by name or otherwise."
She pressed her slim hands together. "I do wish he had confided in me."
I mused. "Who would he have confided in? A friend, a colleague? Millar, perhaps?"
She shook her head. "He was not one for confidences. Or even for conversation, for that matter. At least not with me." She laughed a little.
Not every man made a friend of his wife. I had not, to my own shame. I had always found it easy and natural to speak to Louisa Brandon on almost any subject, but speaking to my own wife had been most awkward. I had tried, but Carlotta had only regarded my speeches with glazed-eyed boredom if not trepidation.
"I dislike to ask this," I began. "Do you know if your husband had a mistress?"
I waited for the icy scorn that she did so well, but she did not look offended. "Because he might have confided in her?" She shook her head. "I have not seen any hint of one. But then, Roe was not a man who enjoyed pleasures of the flesh. He believed in moderation in all things."
I began to grow irritated with the man. He had been married to one of the loveliest women I'd encountered in my lifetime, and by all accounts had taken little interest in her. He had been either mad or blind.
But Lydia championed him. Perhaps he'd had some redeeming quality after all.
She left the room with me and saw me to the front door. It was all I could do not to linger, not to hold her hand longer than was proper when I said good-bye.
As I left, William nodded to me. "Good luck, sir," he whispered. I would need it.
In the morning, I composed a letter to Lydia to thank her. I had thought to pen it then dress and wait for Grenville, but two hours later, I had to hastily sign the seventh draft and shrug into my coat as a knock sounded at my door.
It should have been simple to tell her that I appreciated her letting me look through her husband's correspondence and that I would keep her informed of my inquiries in Kent. Such a note should have taken ten minutes to write, and the ink should have long since dried.
But I could not get the words right, no matter how often I tried. My hand would tremble over the paper, a drop of black ink would tumble from the nib onto the white, and I would just stop myself from writing, When may I see you again?
The knock startled me and ink blotted the paper yet again. I muttered colorful curses as I swiftly scribbled my name, sanded the page, and rose to open the door.
The large man who filled the doorway was not Grenville's footman. He was tall and wide and hard-eyed, and I'd seen him before, inside the subdued and richly appointed library of James Denis.
"What do you want?" I asked unceremoniously.
"Mr. Denis would like a word, sir."
I had suspected the man had not come to invite me to dance. "Mr. Denis can go to the devil."
His face darkened. I imagined Denis had given the man instructions to bring me, willing or no. Once upon a time, Denis's minions had lured me into a stupid trap, to teach me a lesson, to cow me, to show me my place. I had never been one for keeping to my place.
"Mr. Denis wants only to speak to you. He gives his word."
I had no idea what the word of James Denis was worth. Likely, he would keep it, at least when it suited him, but I was not moved.
"He is too late. I am leaving London on the moment."
The man glared at me. I knew he did not want to return to Denis empty-handed, but that was not my concern.
"Sir?" A blond head looked over the beefy man's shoulder, not an easy feat, but one that Grenville's footman, Bartholomew, could perform. Grenville had the best in footmen, two very tall, very blond, Teutonic-looking brothers who possessed intelligence as well as strength. I suspected the two brothers lived a far more comfortable and civilized life than I did.
"The carriage is waiting, sir," Bartholomew said. "Do you require assistance?"
I saw by the gleam in his blue eye that he would enjoy tossing Denis's man down the stairs, but then said minion might call for a constable and delay me, so I shook my head.
Denis's man glowered. I should pity him, returning to Denis alone and confessing he could not shift me, but I did not.
"Convey my apologies to Mr. Denis," I said coldly. I told Bartholomew, "My case is in my chamber."
I snatched the letter from my writing table, walked past Denis's man and down the stairs. Bartholomew's brother Matthias waited below. He escorted me down the narrow lane to Grenville's carriage. "Post that for you, sir?" he asked as he opened the door for me.
I dropped the letter into his hand, and let him assist me into the carriage. Grenville waited for me there. He was correctly dressed for traveling-well-fitting trousers and square-toed boots topped with a subdued brown coat and a loose cravat.
I had few suits to my name, so I simply wore breeches and boots with a threadbare brown frock coat. The dust of the road could hardly render it worse for wear.
Bartholomew arrived with my case and secured it in the compartment beneath the coach. Denis's minion was nowhere in sight, and Bartholomew had a slightly satisfied look on his face. He joined his brother on top of the coach, and our journey began.
As we made for the Dover road, I told Grenville what I had discovered in Westin's letters, which had not been much. He listened with interest then related that he had made inquiries about John Spencer and found that the man and his brother had left London. This was not surprising; most families departed the hot city for cool country lanes in the summer. The Spencer brothers apparently made their home in Norfolk. Grenville suggested we travel there after we found what we could in Kent.
The Dover road led through pleasant countryside, the most pleasant in England, some said, although I, used to the rugged country of Spain and Portugal and before that, France and India, found the endless green hills, ribbon of road that dipped between hedgerows, and emerald fields dotted with sheep and country cottages a little tiring.
But it was high summer, and the soft air, cooler than the baking heat of London, soothed me. I watched farm laborers bending their backs in the fields, hoeing and raking, following strong draft horses behind plows.