I moved past her. She stared at me as though I'd run mad. but made no move to stop me.
I quickly and quietly ascended to the first floor. My door stood closed. Long ago, it had been painted dove gray and its panels outlined in gold. The handle was fancifully shaped like a maiden who’d sprouted great long wings from her back. Once she had been gold, but now she was only the tarnished brass that had lain beneath the gold leafing.
I opened the door.
Two large footmen stood to either side, waiting for me to come bursting in. I foiled them by simply swinging open the door and remaining in the hall. Across the room, James Denis rose from my worn wing chair.
Chapter Fifteen
He wore a black evening suit of superfine, as though he'd just arrived from the theatre or opera. A sapphire ring glinted on his third finger, and a diamond sparkled coldly on his cravat. He or his toadies had lit every one of my candles. The light tinged the flaking ceiling plaster the delicate red-gold of rose petals.
"What do you want?" I asked unceremoniously.
"A moment of your time," Denis replied. "Since I could not convince you to visit me in my home, I have traveled to yours. Please come inside."
"I will when you leave."
He gave me a frosty look. "You will want to hear what I have to say, believe me, Captain."
"I did not ask for your help."
"Yet I give it. And this after my encounters with you last spring. You owe me much."
"There we differ. I say I owe you nothing." I unsheathed my sword. "Please get out. I have no interest in your information."
He paused, his eyes hooded. "Not even in the whereabouts of Mrs. Brandon?"
The words dropped into silence. My heart jumped, then stopped, then began pounding again.
"What the devil have you to do with Mrs. Brandon?"
"I know where she is. You do not. I offer the information in fair exchange."
My limbs unfroze and I went for him. The two brutes to either side of me seized my arms. I jerked free, and with two strides across the room, my hands locked around James Denis's throat.
His cold blue eyes flickered, but other than that he remained still. Beneath his cravat, his throat was surprisingly warm, and his pulse beat beneath my fingers.
"Tell me where she is," I said, "or by God, I will kill you where you stand."
"Then you would not learn anything."
In a swift, sudden movement, he brought up his hands between my wrists and snapped them apart.
His henchmen closed on me again as he looked me up and down. "I imagine you have heard the term 'loose cannon,' Captain. Aboard a frigate, I believe, a cannon that is not fastened down properly provides for much danger. You are that loose cannon for me. You do not heed counsel to stay out of my way, and wherever I turn these days, I nearly trip over you."
I remembered my encounter with him the day Lydia had asked me to help her. I had wondered what errand he'd been performing in Russel Street. "If I have met you by chance, that is hardly my fault."
"That may be. But I do not trust you not to interfere with my business. I have determined that the only way I can trust you-although "trust" is not quite the word I would use-is to tame you."
"Tame me?" I almost laughed. "Like one of your trained lackeys?"
"No," he said. "I want you obligated to me. I will appeal to your sense of duty, your sense of fair play. One gentleman does not cheat another."
"But I do not consider you a gentleman."
"I believe that." He gave me the faintest of smiles. "Mrs. Brandon speaks highly of you. She claims you have a good heart, though your judgment is often rash. I believe you a bit misguided myself."
Fury welled up so tight I could barely see. "Where is she?"
"We will come to that in a moment- "
"Where?"
"I will tell you when you meet my price."
I would not encourage him by asking what the price was. I remained stubbornly silent.
"It will be very simple," he continued. "I want you to promise me-your word as a gentleman-that when I call upon you to assist me, in any way or for any reason, you will do so at once, no matter what your situation."
His expression was utterly still, but I did not delude myself that everything he said was not precisely calculated, his thoughts running far ahead of the conversation. He had decided the outcome of this interview before he had even conducted it.
This man bought and sold favors and owned people outright, and he had an extensive network that stretched all over the continent, perhaps the world. He dressed like a gentleman, lived in a fine house, and drove a fine carriage, but he was as much an underworld figure as the blacklegs who fleeced gentlemen at the gaming hells of St. James’s.
I in no way wanted myself obligated to him. But I thought of Louisa, of her cool gray eyes and warm smile and slightly crooked nose. My blood chilled.
"Why did you come to me and not her husband?" I asked.
"She does not want to see her husband," he replied. "Or so she said."
"She is safe?"
Denis met my eye, cold clarity in his gaze. "That depends very much on you, Captain."
I hated him powerfully at that moment. He had me, and he knew it.
"I want your word," he said.
A candle sputtered in the silence, loud as a pistol shot.
I nodded, my neck sore with it. "I give you my word."
"I will hold you to the bargain. Know that." His voice went soft. "I believe Louisa Brandon is very dear to you, is she not?"
"Just tell me where she is."
He watched a bit of plaster float to the carpet. "She is a clever woman, your Mrs. Brandon. She has hidden herself well." And he told me.
I arrived at a respectable-looking boardinghouse down the Thames in Greenwich at two that afternoon. Denis had told me Louisa had moved into the house under the name "Mrs. Taylor," and had purported to be a widow who had recently lost her husband, found herself cut off by an indifferent son, and had nowhere to go. Her story was not far-fetched; by law, sons were not related to their mothers, and had no legal obligation to care for them. I wondered, on a sudden, what provisions Brandon had made, if any, for Louisa in case of his death.
The landlady who ran the household had a kind face and a softness about her eyes. She told me I'd been expected, and led me to the back of the house to a small, sunny parlor.
Louisa lay on a divan, a shawl over her knees. Her golden hair was loose about her, and a widow's cap similar to the one Lydia had worn rested on her head, verisimilitude for the part of the widowed Mrs. Taylor.
I meant to greet her with a jest about it, but I was struck with how thin she'd grown since I'd last seen her. Her fingers were white and frail, and her gray eyes were enormous in her nearly bloodless face.
My heart tightened. She had been ill, damned ill, if I were any judge. Life could be brutally short in these times, and to be sure, I had already seen a number of childhood acquaintance lost to disease and war, but Louisa had always seemed indomitable, strong, everlasting. The thought that she could be taken from me so easily made my pulse quicken with dread.
But her smile was welcoming. She held out her hands to me. I clasped them in mine and bent to kiss her cheek.
"Gabriel. I am so glad you've come." She squeezed my fingers hard, to the bone.
I went down on one knee beside her. "Louisa, what is it? Are you ill?"
She shook her head. "Not any longer."
"What has happened? Tell me."
She smiled and released my hands. "Oh, do take a chair, Gabriel. The floor must be devilish uncomfortable."
I rose and dragged a rather shabby armchair with ball and claw feet to her side. When I seated myself, I took one of her hands in mine again. Her fingers curled against my palm, but she did not pull away.