Elizabeth Kidd (6 page)

They continued their tour, Mr. Melville attaching himself to Lady Kedrington. She cast a reproachful glance at Mr. Campbell for allowing himself to be usurped, but he could only return an apologetic shrug as he fell in with Kedrington. Antonia hoped her husband would think to invite his friend to dinner. She supposed they must invite Mr. Melville as well—but preferably not at the same time.

Anticipating her wishes, Kedrington extended an invitation to Mr. Campbell for the following evening, while Mr. Melville was distracted by his conversation with Antonia; he would leave it to her to manage Melville, an easy feat for her. Robin gratefully accepted the invitation.

“Where are you living?” Kedrington asked, half expecting to hear that he was camped out in some corner of Burlington House. Happily, this was not the case.

“A group of us veterans are making use of the family home of Sergeant Hollister, whom you may recall. It turned out that he’s something of a nob and could have purchased a commission, although he claims he preferred sticking by his mates. The family made a killing in trade with the Indies over the last century, and although the house is in the East End, it’s a bloody great place, where five extra of us are hardly noticed.”

“Perhaps I should have invited myself to dine
there
.”

Robin laughed. “You’re welcome, of course, but it’s pretty much like an army mess—scarcely elegant dining at the best of times. In fact, I’m not at all sure I’ll remember my manners when I come to you, having used them so little of late.”

“Oh, Antonia won’t mind, as I’m sure you’ve noticed.”

“You’re a lucky dog, Kedrington.”

The viscount smiled. “People do keep pointing out the obvious.”

He paused just then in his perusal of a huge frieze, having noticed that it was placed on a wheeled platform. Robin following his gaze and explained, “Some of the smaller pieces have already been moved to Montagu House. The larger ones will be taken one by one, most likely at night when their progress will not disrupt traffic between here and there. This frieze will be the next piece to go.”

“It doesn’t look very secure.”

“Oh, it won’t be wheeled all the way to Bloomsbury like that. It will be battened down more securely.”

“I did not mean precisely that…. Are any precautions being taken against thieves?”

“Not really. The assumption is that the remaining pieces are all too heavy to move even one of them without a great deal of commotion and several men, and there is a round-the-clock watch on them. I am only one of many guards.”

“There has been no vandalism of any kind?”

“Not that anyone has noticed.”

“Are you armed?”

Robin began to look concerned. “No.”

“I’ll lend you something suitable when you come to dinner tomorrow.”

“Look, Duncan, do you really think there’s any danger?”

Kedrington shrugged. “Very likely not. Put it down to over-caution on my part—or perhaps just a distrustful nature. We all got into bad habits in the war, didn’t we?”

Robin smiled, put slightly more at ease. “Some of them come in useful in civilian life, I’ve noticed.”

“Such as
esprit de corps
, perhaps?” When Robin did not meet his eyes, Kedrington went on, “I refer of course to your current living arrangements. Any other collection of such mismatched individuals would come to blows within days, had they not a strong common history.”

Robin smiled and admitted that this was true.

“It also tends to foster trust among comrades,” Kedrington went on, closing his net. “So that when one man needs a favor, he will not hesitate to ask another for it.”

Robin met his look then, conceding the point. “I’ll keep that in mind. Thank you.”

Chapter 5

“Oh, there you are, Duncan,” said Lady Kedrington. “I must thank you for inviting Mr. Campbell to dinner tonight. Carey is taking Elena to the theater—happily, there is some famous Greek tragedy being enacted at Drury Lane—and therefore I need not invite Mr. Melville, and we may have a pleasant evening amongst ourselves.”

Kedrington kissed the top of his wife’s head and then stepped back to regard her quizzically. She was seated at her writing desk, pen in hand and engagement calendar before her, looking the picture of a society hostess in a white cap and a morning dress of striped India muslin, with a lace fichu tied over her shoulders.

“If I understand you correctly,” he ventured, “I have been lucky to choose tonight to invite Robin to dinner, as Elena will not be with us and you therefore need not invite her guardian to bore us at dinner.”

“Isn’t that what I said?”

“I’m sure you intended to, but occasionally I must test myself to see if I can still interpret your meaning without translation.”

She smiled and rose to kiss his cheek. “I am sure we are as much in harmony as we ever were, my love.”

“I do have some difficulty in comprehending, however, why a Greek tragedy should cause you happiness.”

She pushed him away in mock exasperation. “Oh, you know what I meant.”

“I’m afraid I do—which is what concerns me. Will my fame as a man of mystery degenerate into only a reputation for being obtuse?”

“What do you need with mystery when you have something much more fascinating?”

He smiled. “And what may that be?”

“Me, of course.”

He smiled and lifted her hand to kiss it. “I hope you will not seduce poor Robin.”

“If I have not already brought him under my spell, I shall be very disappointed in myself. But no matter. I mean to introduce him to some nice girl—”

“Not tonight, I trust.”

“Oh, no. I must find one first, and they are not so thick on the ground as you might suppose for someone like Robin. I shall consult your aunts, I think.”

“I must extend my sympathies to Robin.”

“You must not say anything to him, of course. I do not want him to think I am interfering.”

“Heaven forbid. Have you presented Elena to Julia, by the way?”

“She passed that hurdle yesterday, which is why I made no objection to her going to the theater tonight with Carey, unchaperoned. She will be much happier if she feels she is not under scrutiny for at least one evening, and Julia will hear about it before I am obliged to tell her myself. Where are you going, by the way?”

“First to call on Julia, before I fall to the depths of her contempt, then to bring Robin here for dinner.”

“Surely you need not leave so soon for that. Besides, he would not expect you to come yourself, only to send a carriage.”

“I should like to meet some of the fellows he is staying with. I may know some of them.”

Antonia eyed him warily. “You will return sober, won’t you?”

“I assure you, I will behave myself.”

“See that you do. I shall demand a full report from Mr. Campbell on your return—and do not be late!”

* * * *

Kedrington spent half an hour in his aunts’ company, which was passed as usual by Julia’s not always subtle reminders to him that he was the head of the family and should comport himself as such. As this conviction was stated whether he had been found lacking in his duty or not, he took it in good part, parrying every statement of hers with a teasing compliment on her cap—which she dismissed with a sniff—or praise of her great nephew Angus, Kedrington’s heir—which never failed to raise her dander, even when she knew perfectly well that he was teasing.

Hester, meanwhile, tried with little success to stifle her giggles at what she knew was his attempt to prevent Julia from endowing her favorite nephew with responsibilities he did not want and to turn his visits into something more like an ordinary afternoon call. Hester would never dare to speak to Julia the way Kedrington did, but she enjoyed listening to him. And, she had told him once in confidence, she believed he was actually wearing Julia down.

Kedrington was still smiling when he left his aunts’ house and set his horses in the direction of the City, but navigation of the narrow, crowded streets off Whitechapel Road soon concentrated his attention on his driving and his anxious groom’s on the likelihood that desperate footpads might spring from every alley they passed.

“Calm down, Thomas. We are armed.”

“Yes, my lord,” said Thomas, looking as if he thought an escort of artillery would be insufficient. A beer wagon rumbled noisily out of a side street behind them, and Thomas looked back in alarm.

“And when we get there,” Kedrington said, “you are not to call me ‘my lord’, if you please. And do not boast to the stable lads about your noble employer, either.”

“No, sir.”

Kedrington smiled. Thomas was a bright lad and caught on quickly, even if he was sometimes as nervous as a highly bred horse being asked to charge cannon.

Robin had told him that Hollister’s house was in Leman Street, one of the few in the district which boasted large, prosperous homes. Robin had assured him that his cattle would be safe in the stables at Number 68, so Kedrington drove through the gate without hesitation, noting that holes in the drive had been patched recently, and the house itself was being repainted.

His arrival did not go unnoticed, and he had scarcely handed the reins to Thomas to stable the horses when Robin and his host came out to greet him. Hollister was a tall man with a ruddy complexion and the large hands of a manual laborer, but his manner was confident without being arrogant and he spoke like a well-educated man.

Robin clapped him on the shoulder, saying, “Well, Duncan, I’m glad to see you again. You remember Sergeant Hollister?”

Hollister shook his hand. “Didn’t have any trouble finding the way, then, my lord?”

“Not in the least,” Kedrington said, taking the ex-sergeant’s big hand in his. “Good to see you again, Jim. And please do not put titles between us.”

“I didn’t mention it to the other men,” Robin said, “Although some of them may remember you.”

“At least by reputation,” Hollister put in. He had a ready smile, too, although from what Kedrington remembered, his manner had been somewhat freer in Spain. Doubtless the sergeant’s family had pointed out the impropriety of a man of substance maintaining the acquaintance of such unsuitable persons as former soldiers of no rank and no position at home. He hoped the sergeant would not be unduly influenced by such opinions.

As if reading his mind, Robin said as they entered the house by a side door, “Jim’s family don’t live here anymore, having found more genteel domicile on the other side of the city in Kensington.”

“Aye,” said Hollister, “and a great relief it is. I miss my sisters, but my cousins are a rum lot, and Uncle Jeremiah hasn’t forgiven my dad for leaving the business to me—or me for coming back from the war in one piece.”

“What sort of business is it, Jim?”

“Carting and general hauling,” Jim replied. “What with the way the city’s expanding since the war, there’s plenty of profit in it. We haul everything from my family’s household goods to produce for Covent Garden market. I’ve been able to hire some of the lads who’ve come home looking for work, too, which gives me a good deal of satisfaction.”

Kedrington hoped that Hollister profited from his generosity in more material ways as well, but he did not make an issue of the sergeant’s good deeds. Men of his kind rarely wanted praise for something that they considered to be no effort on their part. Instead, he asked more pertinent questions about the business, thinking to send some custom Hollister’s way.

Jim led them to a large room which must once have been the principal drawing room of the house, or even two, for it extended the length of the building on one side and now served as a kind of club where the men who lived there could smoke, read, and play cards. Half a dozen or so were there now, and Kedrington was introduced to them all as Duncan Heywood.

“You look familiar,” one Private Lincoln remarked, sizing Kedrington up. “Been in the army?”

“I’m afraid not.”

“Not officially,” Robin remarked with a grin.

“Blimey, ‘e’s a bleedin’ diplomat,” exclaimed one man, making everyone, including Kedrington, laugh.

“I’ve got it!” Lincoln said. “You were with the
guerilleros
! Saw you talking to Old Hooky once at Salamanca. They told me you were an Englishman, though I didn’t believe it at the time. You dressed more like a Spaniard then, but you’ve still got the look of one.”

This aroused the interest of the other men present, and despite Kedrington’s best efforts, tales of his exploits in Spain were resurrected and told again. He insisted that most of what they had heard was pure fabrication, but what truth he would admit to shortly won him the respect of the men whose lives may even have been in his hands once or twice. Their friendship would be more hardly won, Kedrington knew, but he could be patient in a worthwhile cause.

“Have a smoke?” Lincoln said, offering a cigar.

“Have one of mine,” Kedrington said, producing his Spanish cigarillos. These proved most welcome, and Hollister suggested that he go into the import business.

“Not a bad idea,” Kedrington conceded. “If I find a supplier, sergeant, can you market them?”

Hollister grinned. “I reckon we could find more than enough buyers by word of mouth—if we tells these lads here when we get a shipment in.”

“Don’t suppose you could lay in some
vinho verde
, too, Hollister, eh?” another man offered, to an immediate chorus of groans at the memory of the cheap Portuguese wine they had all been reduced to on the campaign.

It was several hours before Kedrington reminded Robin that they must not be late for dinner, or Antonia would feed them both on the back stoop like beggars. Robin was not reluctant to tear himself away for such a good cause, so they made their farewells, Kedrington promising to come back again.

The sun was close to setting as they drove westward again, and Thomas was even more anxious with every dark alley they passed. Kedrington had learned to ignore him, but Robin was amused by the groom’s attempt to imitate his employer’s insouciance while casting fearful glances in all directions, and it was he who saw what Thomas did before Kedrington became aware of anything but his horses.