Barbara Metzger (16 page)

The boys hadn’t spotted anything that looked like a potato or an onion, not even in that farmer’s own garden, only some green stuff. In disgust, Handy threw into the cooking pot another handful of leaves and stems from Mrs. Bagshott’s herb patch, the ones she grew to keep her cat from getting fur balls.

At least the ensuing digestive upset gave Jake something else to think about besides his aches and pains, and how his nephews had let a dead body get away. The way he lit into Sailor and Handy with that cane would have made Uncle Albert proud, if Jake hadn’t been so weak on his feet that every swing sent him reeling into one or another of the stone walls.

“You didn’t even look for a wallet or rings or nothing! How could you be so dumb?”
Swish
went the cane through the air,
whap
as it connected with one of the hapless lads, then
thud
as Jake’s head hit another wall. “Marks what carry canes like this allus have a watch or a lookin’ glass on a chain, or a stickpin in their chokers. They got brass buttons and pockets full of change. Hell, they got gold in their teeth!”

No way were Sailor and Handy going to go back and pick the fillings out of a dead man’s mouth, or pocket in this instance. But they still needed a stake. Jake didn’t think he could hold the pistol steady enough to hold up another coach. Hell, he didn’t think he could lift the pistol, much less aim it, and he didn’t trust either of his nincompoop nevvies with it. They’d likely shoot each other. No, with his luck, they’d shoot him.

Instead he sent Handy into the village with the silver flask. He chose Handy because Sailor was too distinctive, being of inordinate size, with flaming red hair and freckles. The runt, contrariwise, was a frail-looking lad with pale silvery hair down to his shoulders and a high-pitched voice. No, not too distinctive at all.

So Handy took the flask and went from back door to back door, asking if anyone knew who owned the thing, because he found it on the road and wanted to return it to its rightful owner. “I juth want to do what’th wight,” he lisped. The menfolks looked away, but the women cooed over him and handed him baskets of muffins and paper-wrapped sausages and jugs of cider. Such a nice boy.

Handy was far out of town with two pillow slips filled with booty before any of the housewives realized that while he had their attention in the kitchen, his accomplice was stealing their laundry off the clotheslines. “Good dog, Sal.”

Now they had food on the table—or on the floor, since the table had long been consigned to the fire. And they had clean, respectable clothes to wear to look for jobs at that wedding. Of course, they’d both have to find some kind of disguise since the law would be looking for Handy and Sailor and Sal after today, but they’d do it. And they weren’t going to hand any loot out the window to Jake neither. Let him do his own stealing for once. The boys meant to snabble what they could at that mansion, then run with it before Jake knew they were done. They were going to Portsmouth and buy passage to America, to start new, decent lives. Sailor was going to be a pirate, and Handsome was going to be a gigolo.

Chapter Sixteen

Terwent the valet heard about the pilfering in the village with the silver flask as decoy. He decided against going to London, and went to Magistrate Pomeroy instead.

Even Miles had to agree that the man made a good case for foul play. The descriptions of the flasks matched, and Terwent swore his master never went anywhere without his “medicinal spirits.” Miles could believe that, from his short exposure to the old tosspot.

So what happened? Had that here-and-thereian Howell ditched the body under a hedge for some vagabond to find and strip? Or had the whole tale been a Banbury story for his benefit and they really killed the old coot? Miles was so upset, he couldn’t finish his dinner. He left some peas.

Here was a fine rowdydow indeed. Terwent was demanding they form a search party to comb the area for the baron’s corpse. The townsfolk were insisting he call up the militia to rid them of the ring of vicious hoodlums. And Miss Whilton was asking him to keep his mouth shut. His worst problem was Miss Whilton.

Any female so lacking in delicacy as to suggest he suborn the law for her was capable of anything: lies, misdemeanors, murder. Her beauty, her bounty, and her blue blood couldn’t change the fact that Miss Whilton would be the death of his career as justice of the peace, to say nothing of his peace of mind. And he’d have to marry her, b’gad, if she accepted his proposal! A gentleman couldn’t renege on an offer. She was thinking on it, she’d said, begging him so sweetly to be patient. Pomeroy could have bitten his tongue out, to get back his honorable proposition. Deuce take it, he’d waited years for her to grow out of her hoydenish ways, then two more for her to forget that childish attachment to Rake Howell. Patient be damned. Why the devil couldn’t he have been a bit more patient?

*

Daphne, meanwhile, wasn’t thinking of Miles at all, his proposal or his predicament. Nor was she any more patient than he was, chewing on her pencil stub as she waited for Graydon to return. No matter what he’d said, she couldn’t help worrying over what problems he’d face in London. What if his curricle turned over and Uncle Albert rolled out? There’d be hell to pay, and no mistake. But that was borrowing trouble. Gray would never put his carriage in the ditch. He was the most competent whip she knew, for all his other sins.

Just what had the infuriating man meant by inviting her on a picnic after dark, or blowing her a kiss as he pulled off this morning? Probably nothing. Gray simply couldn’t help dallying with any female in the vicinity. And she couldn’t help wishing it were otherwise.

*

Graydon was making quick work of his job in London, anxious to get back to Hampshire and Daphne. He didn’t like leaving her alone to face that prig Pomeroy. He didn’t like leaving her alone
with
that prig Pomeroy. Hell, he didn’t like leaving her alone, period.

He stopped at a grave site at the edge of town and asked the sexton where to go for his special needs, congratulating himself on his cleverness. He couldn’t see driving about the city all day asking directions, not with Uncle Albert’s barrel in the boot.

Of course, the place he wanted was shut up on Sunday, but Death didn’t wait for a weekday; the major saw no reason for himself to wait either. He banged on doors until he found someone who could direct him to the establishment’s proprietor, who wasn’t best pleased to be dragged from his Sunday dinner. Until he saw the color of Lord Howell’s gold.

“And the family isn’t in such a rush to get the thing done,” Graydon explained, “so you can take your time. I just couldn’t leave him lying around, you understand.”

Jedediah Biggs didn’t understand why the cove couldn’t wait for a mortician and a regular funeral wagon, nary a bit. More gold joined the pile. Then Jed Biggs wiped his soot-stained fingers on his pants and
said, “Time is all I’ve got, till
you bring me a death certificate. No death certificate, nothing for me to put in my records. No records, and I could be transported for removing evidence of a crime. You could’ve kilt your old granfer for his gold and no one the wiser, iffen I don’t keep records. Hell, he might be the husband of some sweet young thing you’ve got your eye on, randy-looking buck like you.”

Graydon wasn’t interested in hearing any more of the man’s theories. He supposed the fellow was hinting that enough gold could eliminate the need for any records whatsoever, but the lawyers and such would have to be notified anyway. And he hadn’t killed the old shabster. There was nothing to hide except his body for a bit.

So Graydon left to get a death certificate.

“Ain’t you forgetting something?” Mr. Biggs jerked his permanently blackened jaw toward the barrel, now in the yard of his brick row house, right on his wife’s primroses.

Graydon saw no need to encumber his search around town with such a traveling companion. The pyreman, as he liked to call himself, saw it differently. “There’s no magistrate going to give you that piece of paper without seeing the body. You could say it’s your aunt Tillie, what’s leaving you her silver tea set, or a servant, instead of some bloke you killed in a duel. Magistrate’s going to want some proof.”

“Bloodthirsty chap, aren’t you? I suppose you’ve seen it all in your days.”

“That’s neither here nor there. I gots to have that paper. The magistrate might even want to hold an inquest.”

Graydon gave the notion some thought. “Interesting how the legal system works. How long do you think an inquest would take?”

Biggs scratched his head. “A day or two for them to send a sawbones out to examine the body to fix the cause of death, then maybe weeks before they hold the hearing, to let you hire a barrister, or leave the country.”

Graydon could only suppose he looked guilty as hell, driving around with a corpse, the way this man’s imagination was running. But weeks were too long a delay, and he’d have to be in town for the hearing. “No, that won’t do. But I refuse to go tripping about town with a dead man as groom. He can’t even get down to hold the horses, don’t you know. I’ll bring my godfather back if he insists.”

Biggs spat on the ground. “Now, what good’s some other swell going to do me?”

“Oh, didn’t I say? My godfather’s a magistrate. He’s not the Lord High Magistrate of all of London, but I don’t think this little matter is worth bothering Uncle Roderick, do you?”

*

Graydon’s godfather didn’t insist on seeing the body, naturally. “What, and ruin my appetite on a Sunday? It’s that swine Whilton, you say? Good. Didn’t kill him, did you, my boy? No? Good. See you at the wedding next week? Good. Your father’s getting a fine wife. I dangled after Cleo Harracourt myself before she chose Whilton. Too bad the daughter’s such a high stickler.”

“Daphne? She’s as game as a pebble!”

“Won’t have a rake like you, I heard. Too bad.”

When Graydon got back to the row house, Mrs. Biggs sent him off to the crematorium with a flea in his ear about care-for-naughts who didn’t respect the Lord’s day or His flowers.

Biggs apologized, once he had the certificate in his hand, all full of official stamps and seals. “And I can’t do the job right away; the place is full of missionaries fresh off a boat what came from spreading God’s words, and God knows what diseases. You wouldn’t want your relation mixed in with that crowd.”

“No, he might contaminate them. But take your time, as I said. Uncle Albert’s in no hurry.”

“May as well pick out an urn meantime; save you a trip back. M’brother runs the shop next door.”

A trinket for Lady Whilton? Graydon wondered how she’d like a Grecian urn with handles, or maybe a brass one that looked like a spittoon. There were copper and silver ones, marble and jade, porcelain urns and plain earthenware crocks for ashes up the River Tick. One looked like a genie’d appear if you rubbed hard enough. Uncle Albert had already granted everyone’s fondest wish by dying. It was a deuced hard choice. Graydon didn’t want one with angels or flowers on the sides. Nehemiah Biggs didn’t have any with a pair of dice on them.

The decision finally made, Graydon thought of returning to Hampshire that night, but his horses were tired and his father had given him a commission. All he had to do was wait for the shops to open Monday morning, so he passed the evening at his clubs, returning early to Howell House for a good night’s sleep.

The gift for Lady Whilton was an easy selection, two ruby hearts joined by a diamond arrow. If that wasn’t sincere, and expensive, nothing was. He couldn’t properly give Daphne jewelry, although there were sapphires that almost begged to match her eyes. He reluctantly settled on a gold locket to replace the one he’d given her so long ago, another lifetime, it seemed, that she’d tromped on that fateful night. He’d offer it as a wedding gift, to celebrate the joining of the families. He told the clerk to hold the sapphires, too, in hopes of another joining.

To prove his constancy to Daffy, he picked out an extravagant diamond choker for Lady Seline Bowles. She’d know it for her
congé,
a parting gift. Unfortunately the clasp was faulty, and he didn’t want to wait around to have it repaired.

“Oh, we can deliver it, my lord.”

Yes, and bandy Seline’s name and his all over Mayfair. “No, I have to return to town in a few days.” He could deliver the necklace in person, which was the honorable thing to do anyway, while he fetched the urn. Seline’s hysterics couldn’t be any worse than toting around Albert’s ashes.

*

If Jake were a cat, he’d be dead. Twice. As it was, he didn’t know if he could survive another day of his nephews’ company. He’d walk out on them, taking nothing but his dog and his cane, if he could walk. He couldn’t, though; he needed a horse. A horse, his kinfolk for a horse. So he sent the boys out to steal him a mount, promising them one more try at the high toby.

Finding a field of hayburners was easy; catching one of them was a horse of a different color, gray, to be exact. Old Dan used to be chestnut, now he was just grizzled. The farmer only kept him around out of sentiment, and as a ride for his little grandchildren. All the other horses ran from the
two thieves,
who smelled of smoke, blood, and worse, but Old Dan didn’t have a lot of run left in him. So he left with Sailor and Handy.

They hoisted Jake aboard and tied the dead man’s linen cravat around the horse’s neck for Jake to hang on to, since there was no saddle, no reins. Then they led him back to that narrow stretch of roadway to wait for a carriage.

Jake was a real highwayman now. He had a horse, a pistol, a gang. He was proud. He was also delirious. The boys picked him up and put him back on Old Dan.

Unfortunately but not totally unexpectedly in the country, the next traveler wasn’t a diamond-bedecked dowager in a fancy coach. It was a farmer. A pig farmer, to be exact, driving his herd from one place to another, right down the center of the highway. As Old Dan stepped aside without instruction, Jake called to the boys to watch out for little ’uns as might get lost. Sailor tried to lose one, but it squealed so loud, its mama chased him into the ditch at the side of the road. The farmer came and kicked Handy into the ditch, too, to make his point. The ditch being filled with muddy, stagnant water, and Jake for once not in it, he whistled in delight. Which was the sound the farmer made when he called the swine for supper.