Part 21 (1/2)
”You'd have made a good Sergeant major, darling,” he said softly, but when Lydia turned and glared at him, he managed to control his smile before backing up two paces.
”Who is your lover?” she asked Jasmine flatly, clearly not in the mood to tread carefully on the girl's recently bereaved sensibilities.
”But-but that was to be our secret. You promised.” Jasmine's gaze s.h.i.+fted to Tanner. ”She told you the name?”
”Schoolmaster Beattie, yes. As I have a healthy regard for my neck, I'm doing my best not to interfere, but I have to tell you that I don't think she believes you any more.”
As if her last hope was gone with his defection, Jasmine buried her face in her hands and sobbed piteously.
Well, he'd thought it was piteously. Lydia didn't seem much impressed.
”Jasmine, your Bru-your lover probably murdered your father. We'll have his name, now.”
”I know,” Jasmine whimpered. ”I know, I know. And it's all my fault, isn't it?”
”No, Jasmine, sweetheart, you couldn't have known what-” Tanner held up his hands in mock surrender when Lydia turned on him, and backed up another pace. Clearly the love of his life had been pushed beyond all endurance.
”His name, and his location. You were in bed with him. You know where he resides.”
”In bed with him? You make it all sound so tawdry. I loved him...”
At last Lydia looked at Tanner with more than cold purpose in her eyes. Confronting Jasmine, in her recent bereavement, was not easy for her. She sighed, as if in resignation, and gathered the weeping girl into her arms. ”It's all right, Jasmine. n.o.body blames you for anything that happened. You were foolish, yes, but this man, this unscrupulous scoundrel, could come here now, could cause us all terrible trouble. Please, help us.”
Jasmine lifted her tear-drenched face and looked at Tanner, her eyes wide. ”Me? He could come here for me? He could...he could want to kill me?”
Tanner shrugged his shoulders, believing Lydia had found the way to get through to his cousin. If there was one thing in life Jasmine cared about, he was coming to realize, it was Jasmine. ”It's possible. You know who he is.”
”Oh, my G.o.d! He'll kill me, won't he? Because I know who he is. No, no, I don't want to die! Tanner, you have to help me. You have to find him, and kill him before he kills us!”
”Tell me again,” Justin said as they stood hidden in the dense trees outside the small tavern in near Malvern Wells.
”I've already told you,” Tanner said, peering through the branches, taking his measure of the place. It was half-past midnight.
”True. But I don't think I'll ever tire of hearing it. Wrung every last bit of information from her, did she? And all the sordid details? Tell me again about the sordid details.”
”Another time,” Tanner said, shaking his head. ”How do you want to do this? He knows what we look like, which was probably why he showed me his face in the first place, so we can't just go walking in there. Jasmine swears he's alone, but Lydia warned me not to believe that. She's still suspicious of Jasmine.”
”And if your beloved is suspicious, you're suspicious, and so am I. Why are we suspicious, hmm?”
”Because Lydia wouldn't believe Jasmine if she told her the sky was blue. And something about sugared buns, but we didn't have time to get into that. Well, d.a.m.n, Justin, there he is. And he's alone. That makes things easier. I thought we might be here all night.”
The baron, who had been standing with his back to a tree trunk, an unlit cheroot between his teeth, turned and peered into the clearing in front of the tavern. ”And he's had a miracle, hasn't he? Heaven be praised, his sight has been restored.”
Tanner watched Brice Flanagan walk out of the tavern, cautiously looking about the area with his two good eyes as he mounted the horse they'd already recognized as belonging to the man.
Without speaking again, each knowing what the other had concluded, Tanner and Justin hurried back through the trees to where their own horses were waiting. Flanagan could have mates inside the tavern who could come to his defense. Much easier to take him on the road.
They followed at a safe distance for over a mile, Flanagan's familiarity with the road as easy as Tanner's.
”He's heading for Malvern,” Justin whispered at last, unnecessarily. ”Cheeky thing, isn't he?”
”Desperate is more like it,” Tanner returned just as quietly. ”He had to know that Jasmine would turn on him at some point. Are you ready?”
”I don't know. I almost wish to see what he's up to, don't you?”
Tanner considered this for a few moments. Was Flanagan on his way to the estate in some last bold attempt to find the Malvern Pride, that hadn't been among the stolen jewels, according to Jasmine? Was he going there to collect Jasmine, his lover? Or, yes, to kill her...
”All right,” he said at last, as they slowed their horses, no longer needing to be too close to Flanagan. ”I admit to some curiosity of my own. Why chance capture for the Malvern Pride? He's got the rest, he's got all of the real jewelry, enough to live handsomely on the rest of his life, d.a.m.n him. Besides, n.o.body knows where the Pride is, remember? That's why he'd demanded the key from Jasmine, in order to conduct his own search.”
”All of which brings us back to your cousin. He's already rid of Thomas. Jasmine is the only remaining loose end, the only one that could identify him. Save us, but he can't know we've been so brilliant. After all, if you called in Bow Street or anyone else, you'd be sending them after a red-haired one-eyed man with a patch. Not the best of disguises, but certainly effective.”
They were on the estate now, Flanagan completely out of sight on the nearly moonless night.
Tanner's horse lifted his head, sniffing the air, and then whinnying softly.
”Over there,” Justin said, pointing into the trees. ”That's the fellow's mare, isn't it? He's on foot now.”
”We can't stumble over him out here in the dark,” Tanner said. ”He'll take his time approaching, picking his place of entry.”
”I'll give you odds on the doors to your study. I know that's where I plan to continue my own search in the morning. Another hidey-hole, this one much more cleverly concealed. So you're simply going to let him walk in?”
Tanner urged his mount ahead on the road, heading for the front gates rather than to ride through the trees to reach the rear of the house and gardens, and his study. He turned and grinned at his friend in the darkness. ”Should we pour him a brandy, do you think?”
They left their horses tied to tree branches halfway up the drive, and traveled the rest of the way on foot, pistols at the ready in case Flanagan didn't behave as Justin thought he would. But there was little chance the man would be so bold as to try one of Thomas's keys on the front doors of Malvern.
”You put Roswell on the front doors?” Tanner said in amazement as he watched the aged butler step out from the shadows, an equally aged blunderbuss in his hands.
”He insisted, and I thought this was the safest place for him. Don't shoot, man, it's your duke.”
Roswell lowered his weapon and bowed, as if greeting his master this way were an everyday occurrence. ”Your Grace. May I be some humble service?”
”No, thank-yes, Roswell, if you don't mind stationing yourself at the foot of the stairs. There may be some...commotion shortly, and I would ask that you keep the ladies from coming downstairs.”
”Sans this nasty thing, I believe,” Justin said, deftly removing the blunderbuss from the butler's hands as they entered the foyer.
”I can't believe I'm doing this,” Tanner said as they made their way down the hall after refusing Roswell's offer of candles to light their way. ”Lydia's upstairs, and I've just all but invited a murderer into the house.”
”Having second thoughts, are you?”
”Second thoughts, third thoughts. But if we don't get him now, I'd never sleep easily, wondering if and when he'd show up here again. Lydia understands that.”
Then he held up his hand, pointing to his right, and the corridor that led to a second door to the study, one closer to the servant stairs.
Justin nodded and headed off. Tanner counted to ten, and then proceeded to the main door to what was supposed to be the duke's inner sanctum. He eased the door open, relieved to see that no fire burned in the grate, and that the only faint light in the large chamber came from the few stars in the sky outside the French doors.
But he was confident, having chosen his battlefield, and familiar with the placement of every chair, every table shrouded in darkness. He slipped into the room, staying low, having already decided that he would move to his left, and position himself in the far corner, behind a marble pedestal supporting a bust of Socrates.