He gave no orders as to the smaller man, whom the other two footmen proceeded to beat and kick. I glared up at Denis.
“Surely he can be no more threat to you,” I said. “Whatever lesson you intended to teach him is learned. If they go on, they’ll kill him.”
Denis’s cold blue eyes found mine. I read in them great displeasure.
He waited while his footmen, paying no attention to me, got in a few more blows. Finally, he raised a hand.
“Enough.”
The word was calm and not very loud, but instantly, the ruffians left off their pounding and dragged the small man to his feet.
The man was somewhere between thirty and forty, and had wide brown eyes that looked upon the world with friendliness. His face at the moment was covered in blood and bruises, a trickle of red at the side of his mouth.
“Thank you, sir,” he said in a clogged whisper, not to Denis, but to me.
Denis made a curt gesture. His men dragged their hapless victim the rest of the way to the ground floor. They did not throw him into the street—no, that would attract the attention of the neighbors. A carriage had been pulled very close to the door, and Denis’s men shoved the beaten man into it.
The coach pulled away, and then the footmen returned to the house, looking neither triumphant nor gloating. They were barely out of breath. They’d done their task; now they would turn to the next one.
“Captain, if you please.” Denis’s cold voice cut the air.
I hauled myself back up the stairs, shaking with anger.
“What sort of threat could such a small, harmless-looking man be to you?” I demanded as I followed Denis into his study.
The room I entered was barren but elegant, clean-lined, the furniture with delicate, tapered legs, the chamber free of the clutter that could fill the houses of the rich.
Denis must be one of the wealthiest gentlemen in England, but he shunned ostentation. The sole concession to luxury was a painting on the paneled wall, a portrait done in subdued but exquisite colors, the paint thick. The subject of the portrait was a painter from the Netherlands of the seventeenth century, a man with rumpled hair, a bulbous nose, and small black eyes, who looked as though he viewed the world with shrewd good humor.
I had not seen the portrait in this room before. Fortunate, I thought, that it hadn’t been here when the incendiary device had exploded and ruined the walls. I wondered if the painting was a recent acquisition or had simply been moved from another room.
Denis seemed in a hurry, and impatient—for Denis. “Mr. Brewster has told me of your request,” he said. “You might have saved yourself a journey. The answer is no.”
“The surgeon’s help would be invaluable,” I said. “I need an expert, and he seemed to be.”
“I cannot be expected to lay my hands on him at a moment’s notice.” Denis had not sat down, as usual, behind his blank-topped desk, nor had he requested that I sit. We faced each other in the middle of the room with Mr. van Rijn’s portrait looking on.
I lifted my brows. “No?”
“No.” Denis’s look was severe. We were of a height, the two of us, though he was about ten years younger than me, and whole of body, while I leaned heavily on my stick.
“Well then,” I said. “Give me his direction, and I will ask him myself.”
“Not as simple a task as you suppose.”
I waited for him to say more, but Denis closed his mouth and regarded me in stony silence.
I recalled what Brewster had said about the surgeon after I’d met him the first time.
When I had remarked, He must owe Mr. Denis an enormous favor for hiding him, Brewster had answered, Or t’other way around.
What hold did a convicted criminal have on Denis, who held the reins of any number of villains across Britain and the Continent?
“In that case,” I said, “if you happen to chance upon him, perhaps you will mention that I would be interested in his opinion on a corpse. One that has deteriorated to bones.”
Denis’s brows flicked upward. “I see you have found yourself another nest of vipers to poke.”
“Possibly. The woman was found in the river, near the docks at Wapping. Dead a long time. No one knows who she was or where she came from, but she was certainly killed.”
“I see.”
I could not decide whether Denis showed interest or not. On the one hand, nothing moved in his eyes. On the other, he didn’t simply repeat his request for me to leave.
“If I can discover what happened to her,” I said, not knowing why I continued to explain, “I might give her, and her family, a measure of peace.”
Denis’s gaze sharpened. He didn’t speak, but I could almost hear his thoughts.
I had wondered and worried for years about my own daughter—had she been alive or dead? Gone forever? Denis had discovered the truth and used it to gain hold over me. I should hate him for that, but whenever my rage stirred, it quieted because he had found my daughter.
“I shall trouble you no more, then,” I said, pretending to be as calm as he. “Good day to you.”
“Good day, Captain.” Denis’s voice took a dry note. I observed that he had never said he would actually pass on my message to the surgeon. Which meant he might or might not, as he chose.
I turned to go, but paused at the door the butler pointedly held open for me. “Who was the gentleman your men were so unceremoniously beating? The victim of your attentions?”
Denis’s annoyance returned. “He is not so much a victim as a bloody nuisance.” He eyed me severely. “As you are beginning to be.”
“You have Mr. Brewster to trounce me anytime you command it,” I said. “If you must teach me another lesson, I would be honored if you would let him do it. I have come to respect him.”
Denis heaved a cool sigh. “Please go, Captain, before you try my patience too far. Else I will have all my hired help take you down the stairs and throw you out. Along with Mr. Brewster, who ought to keep you from me.”
“Do not blame him,” I said, bowing. “I am a slippery devil. Good afternoon.”
I gave him another polite nod and left the room. It was not often I could leave Denis fuming, and I enjoyed it.
***
If I could not find Denis’s surgeon to help me with the body, I would have to attempt to employ another to give me his opinion. Army surgeons were the only men of that profession I knew—I would go to the club formed by cavalrymen and ask about until I was directed toward one. I had known many on the Peninsula, but they had dispersed once the war was over, home to their families scattered all over England.
I returned to the South Audley Street house, Brewster accompanying me in the hackney in a growling temper.
I looked forward to the evening, when I would be in the bosom of my new family. Gabriella had been spending a few days in the Berkeley Square home of Lady Aline Carrington, who was grooming her in the finer points of being a young lady, but she would be home this evening. I’d spend time with young Peter, Donata’s son, of whom I was growing quite fond. Peter had the brutish strength of his deceased father but the sharp mind of his mother. I was pleased to be able to watch him flourish.
Before I could go to Donata’s chamber and tell her what I had learned, Barnstable sought me out in my study, a pained look on his face.
Barnstable had crisp black hair that I suspected he touched with something from a bottle, a lean face, and intense brown eyes. He could display the greatest hauteur as a butler, but he was also a human being, very protective of his mistress and her family.
“Sir,” Barnstable said, indignation in his eyes. “There is a person asking to see you.”
I waited, but he simply stood and radiated disapproval. “Does this person have a name?”
The chill in Barnstable’s voice could have sent frost up the walls. “I have put him in the back reception room.”