“Not at all.” Lady Harwin gave me a cheery grin. “I’ve never known such excitement. I can’t wait to tell my friends about what happened. They’ll all want to come and visit the scene of murder and espionage. Our terrace will be the envy of all.”
“Oh, Celeste, you’d be too ashamed,” Lady Ormond said.
“Nonsense, Mildred. It was almost like a play. The events happened here, but we didn’t know the dead man. He was a burglar, wasn’t he?”
“Yes, he was,” I answered when no one else would.
“Well, there, you see? Nothing to do with us. Events just came and happened here.” She smiled gleefully around the room. “Such excitement. And the good and loyal subjects of the crown triumphed. Thank you, Mrs. Monthalf, for bringing us such a diversion.”
I needed to disabuse her of that idea immediately. “I’m afraid I didn’t bring you anything. Lady Peters and the burglar brought the excitement here. I just went on a scavenger hunt and found the missing plans. Nothing you couldn’t have done.”
“But you were the one who saved England. You, a gentlewoman. Makes me proud to know you.”
“But no more likely to become a duchess,” Lady Ormond sniffed.
“A duchess? Of course not. But perhaps the wife of a baronet. Or one of these modern industrialists you read about. I’d imagine they’d want a wife with spunk,” Lady Harwin said.
The aristocrats present had considered me for duchess material and found me lacking. I wondered what they’d say if they knew how we’d deceived them. The person I couldn’t deceive was myself. I knew I could never be a duchess. But, oh, how I wanted to be.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
WE returned to London the next day and dropped Phyllida off to oversee the packing up of our borrowed town house. Then we dropped Emma off at Fenchurch’s Books, and Blackford and I traveled on to Newgate Prison to talk to Ken Gattenger.
He had already been taken to the visitors’ room by the time we marched down the hallways, our steps ringing in the stone passageways. He stared at us but didn’t speak until we sat across from him. “Well?”
“The blueprints have been recovered and are back in the Admiralty records room. The records room clerk on the German payroll has been apprehended. Despite my doubts, Sir Henry Stanford appears to have had no hand in the theft or the death of your wife,” Blackford said.
“Thank goodness the drawings are safe. And you heard there was nothing wrong with my calculations? You know my new warship design is everything I promised it would be? You do realize that means I never needed to take those drawings out that night and Clara wouldn’t have died.” Tears flowed down his cheeks.
Blackford cleared his throat and looked away.
I reached out and took his hand. “The man who killed Clara is dead. He was killed for the blueprints, and the person who took your drawings has been captured.”
“Is that supposed to make me feel better?”
I had no answer for that. I said, “Your solicitor is working on having the treason and murder charges dropped. You never responded in writing to the letter from the German embassy, did you?”
“No. Only verbally. And I never agreed. Not really. I ended up turning them down almost immediately.”
“Good. Then your solicitor should succeed. Once he does, you’ll be able to walk out of here a free man.”
Gattenger shook his head. “Free. And alone. I’m going to leave London, perhaps leave England. I can’t stay here. Not after what has happened. Would you have the servants close up the house and give them good references? None of this is their fault.”
“What about your ship designs?” Blackford thundered.
“The Admiralty has everything I’ve done. I don’t care about them anymore. Perhaps I’ll go to Paris and join the Expressionists. I know I’ll never draw another ship.”
“Think what a loss this would be to your country.”
Gattenger looked at the duke and shrugged his shoulders. “It doesn’t matter to me now. Nothing does.”
“Where were you the night before Clara died?”
He hadn’t expected my question. His gaze shifted between the duke and me. “I was at home.”
I glared at him. “Don’t lie to me. Where were you? We know you weren’t home in the evening.”
“It doesn’t matter now.”
“If it doesn’t matter, why don’t you tell us?”
He ran his hands through his fair hair. “I went to see Lord Watson. The present Lord Watson.”
“Who?”
“Mrs. Gattenger’s cousin. The man who inherited her father’s title,” Blackford told me.
“His title. His house. His money,” Gattenger said. “I knew Clara would be in danger if the man who’d threatened me the night before decided to attack me at home. So I went to Lord Watson and begged him to take Clara in for a little while to keep her safe.”
“Did you tell him why?” the duke asked.
“No. Only that I’d made a stupid mistake and I’d been threatened. I wasn’t afraid for me, but I wanted Clara where she’d be safe. Lord Watson employs a butler and a footman. A larger staff for a larger house where she’d be protected.”
“What did he say?”
“He’s recently married, and he told me he feared I was saddling him with his cousin so I could be free to do as I liked. I told him nothing could be further from the truth.”
“So he said no?” I asked.
“He said he’d think about it.”
Lord Watson hadn’t invited Clara back to her childhood home. I’d never met the man and already I didn’t like him. “Did you tell Clara this?”
“How could I tell her Lord Watson, her cousin, wouldn’t take her in for her own safety? If only he had.”
“His testimony may be enough to have your charges dropped. I’ll tell your solicitor and he’ll soon have you a free man,” Blackford said.
“Watson’s never liked me. Finding out I told him the truth will come as a shock to him.” Gattenger stared at us with a look of pure devastation. “Clara’s gone. There’s nothing left for me.”
* * *
BLACKFORD STEWED THE entire ride across London to my shop. I didn’t say a word. I understood Gattenger’s pain. He’d have to find his own way, alone, into his future.
Just as I would eventually have to face a future without Blackford. A future without love.
Once we arrived at the bookshop, Blackford handed me down to the street. I dashed inside to find Frances waiting on a customer while Grace, Emma, Jacob, and Sumner carried on a hushed conversation between two rows of bookshelves.
I took a deep breath of warm, slightly musty air and felt at home. My bookshop was still in one piece. Dickens ran over to greet me, swiped at my hem with the claws extended from his paw, and stomped out the front door of the shop. I watched him, fascinated. I had never seen a cat stomp before.
I had also never seen a duke hold a door open for a cat.
“I’m glad to see you’re all right,” I said, hurrying over to the four. I knew Blackford would follow.
“Thanks to Sumner. The baron’s valet tried to kill me last night after I saw him arguing with one of the Admiralty clerks. The clerk was beaten up worse than I was,” Jacob said. One eye was blackened and he had a bandage on that side of his head. I could see the bottom of another bandage sticking out below his shirt cuff.
Fortunately, Sumner showed no ill effects from the encounter, because Emma now stood a modest few feet from him, looking him over. The protective expression on her face told me I didn’t want to think about what Emma would do if Sumner had been hurt.
He was staring back at her and grinning. “Sir William Darby spoke to Sir Broderick yesterday afternoon. He said you looked a treat in a pale blue dress. Any chance the rest of us will get to see you in it?”