Charlotte toyed with the cushion’s gold tassels. “I have experience? What are you talking about?”
“The novels, cousin, the novels! You have read so many more than I have, and I know you pay closer attention to them than I do, for you are forever anticipating a crime, or you know who the villain is before I do. Thus you are better equipped to deal with this situation. As I see it, we have two mysteries to solve — first and foremost, who is behind the attack on my dear Noble, and second, who killed the late Lady Weston?”
Charlotte stopped spinning the cushion on her fingertip and stared at her cousin. “But I thought — surely I mentioned — didn’t Mama tell you — Gillian, don’t you remember that I told you Lord Weston was responsible for his wife’s demise?”
“Oh, of course I’ve heard that bit of cruel hearsay,” Gillian responded, waving a hand airily. “But it’s all false. Completely false. Noble would never harm anyone.” She paused and remembered his actions that morning. “Well, no one of the female gender, that is. No, someone else is responsible for her death and is quite happy blaming Noble for it. I intend to get to the bottom of that, too. Perhaps then I can persuade Noble to give our marriage the same chance he gave his first.”
Charlotte frowned at the wistful note in her cousin’s voice, tossed the cushion to Nick, then turned her mind to the task at hand. “Well, it seems to me that if you wish to find out who abducted Lord Weston, you must first find out who his enemies are. Then you may question them and eliminate the ones who do not seem to be the type to kidnap him and shackle him to his ex-mistr…uh…friend’s bed.”
“I see your point,” Gillian said thoughtfully, eyeing Nick as he made the tassels dance a little tassel dance on his bony knees. “It is not an everyday sort of enemy who would do that; more a special enemy with a particular goal in mind?”
“Exactly. Someone who wanted to embarrass Lord Weston as well as endanger him.”
Gillian thought about that for a moment, watching Nick balance the cushion on his head. She said slowly, “Oddly enough, Char, I do not believe Noble was in any danger. He was confined, but there were no signs of occupation in the house, no signs that someone might have wished to harm him physically.
It seems to me that whoever did this wanted…well, just wanted him found shackled naked to that bed.”
“You mean it was a jest? Someone did that to him as a lark?”
“Nooo,” Gillian said, chewing on her lower lip, being careful to hold her head still since Nick had transferred the cushion to her fiery crown of braids. “No, I don’t believe it was a prank. I believe it was a warning of some sort.”
“How are we to find out what that warning was? And whom it was from?”
“We shall have to do as you say — find out who Noble’s enemies are and interview them.” The tassels bobbed rakishly over one eye as she nodded her head emphatically.
Charlotte looked doubtful. “How are you going to find his enemies?”
“Well…” Gillian balanced the cushion on the toes of one foot as she thought. A slow smile spread over her face as she kicked the cushion high in the air. Nick leaped up and caught it. “I shall ask the people who knew him best.”
She patted her cousin on the shoulder and stood. “Who knows a man better than anyone else, Char?”
“His friends? His family? His valet?”
Gillian shook her head at each. “Put the cushion back, Nick, and make your good-bye bow to your cousin. No, Charlotte, I want someone who will know all of the on-dits, someone who is familiar with all of the ton gossip, and who is willing to share it with me. I shall meet with”—she smiled a triumphant little smile—“his ladybugs.”
“Ladybugs?” Charlotte snorted and clutched the cushion to her chest as she fell over backward laughing. “Ladybugs? I think you mean ladybirds!”
“Oh.” Gillian made a face. “Whatever they’re called, I shall ask them. They will surely be able to tell me what I want to know.”
“Do you know, cousin,” Charlotte said, still laughing, “I believe that if anyone can do it, you can. No one else would have the gumption, let alone the desire, to interview her husband’s former mistresses. Leave it to you unschooled Colonials to simply ignore the precepts of good breeding and gentle manners when it suits you. Oh, I do wish I could be there when you question them. I would give an entire year’s pin money to see the looks on their faces when you ask them about Lord Weston.”
Gillian pushed her son gently toward the door. “Shall I see you tomorrow to help me plan my strategy?”
Charlotte nodded and twirled the cushion. Gillian bid her good-bye and started out the door.
“Oh, Char?” Her cousin looked up, a slight frown of puzzlement wrinkling her brow. Gillian smiled. “Don’t be spending any of your pin money. You will be helping me interview the ladybirds. I couldn’t possibly interview them myself, being as unschooled and ignorant of the precepts of good breeding as I am. I’m sure your gently bred, noble touch is just the one needed to get them to unbend and tell us everything we want to know.”
Gillian escaped out the door just a few seconds before the cushion hit it. She chuckled at the undignified and unladylike language coming from behind the door and hurried down the hall after her son.
“Crouch, I wish to go to Lord Carlisle’s house. Do you have the direction?”
“Ye be wantin’ to do what, m’lady?”
“I wish to go to Lord Carlisle’s house. Tomorrow.”
Crouch stared at Gillian as he handed her into the carriage. “Lord Carlisle, m’lady?”
“Yes, Lord Carlisle, Crouch. Is there a problem?”
Crouch’s eyes glazed over at the thought of all the problems his mistress’s unusual request would generate. The number alone staggered the mind. “Aye, m’lady, ye could be sayin’ there’s a problem. A right big problem it be, too.”
“You don’t know his direction?”
“Eh…well, as to that, m’lady, as ye’ve asked me outright…”
“Excellent. Then I shall assume that you will be able to accompany Lady Charlotte and me tomorrow to pay a call upon Lord Carlisle.”
A stunned Crouch climbed onto the seat next to John Coachman. “I’m all-a-mort, Johnny. What do ye think of that, then?”
“She fair bewattles me.” John Coachman shook his head. “I wouldn’t want to be in your shoes, Crouch, having to tell his lordship that.”
Crouch, known to inspire terror in men with just one sneer of his scarred face, blanched with horror at the thought of what his employer would have to say.
“It’s not so much what ’e’ll say as what ’e’ll do,” he corrected himself.
“Aye, you’re right there. He’ll have your head if you let the mistress go calling on his hated enemy.”
Crouch cupped a protective hand around his most prized possessions and stared ahead through the leader’s ears. “I could live without me ’ead. It’s what else ’e might take off that turns me blood pale!”
At the very time Gillian was on her way home, explaining to her son that she and Noble were going to be out that evening, Noble stepped down from his friend Rosse’s carriage and glanced down Bond Street. Lord Rosse squinted against the afternoon sun and followed his friend’s gaze. “I see Poodle Byng is back in town, stouter than ever. Who’s that with him?”
“Sefton.”
“Oh, yes, should know that nose anywhere. Shall we stay a moment and greet them?” Rosse looked speculatively at his friend. “Or is there a need to?”
“My dear friend, you may pass your time as you like, but I intend on expelling a bit of energy on whoever might be willing to oblige me.” Weston started up the steps to Gentleman Jackson’s rooms.