Elizabeth Thornton (16 page)

Even worse, she’d actually believed that Hugh’s attackers ran away because she’d fired a shot over their heads. How stupid could she get? She’d left herself defenseless. They could have rushed her and overpowered her. If it hadn’t been for the man on the gallery, it would have been a catastrophe.

She thought for a long time about the men who had attacked Hugh. The man who had accosted her in her own bed wasn’t one of them. She let the thought turn in her mind and wondered how she could be so sure.

She didn’t know. Instinct or intuition. Hugh’s attackers were too fearful, almost as afraid as she was herself. The man in the brown coat was obviously the leader, and he didn’t fit the bill at all. He wasn’t big enough. He wasn’t bold. And he didn’t make her skin crawl. They’d all run away and she just couldn’t see the man who had accosted her running away from anything.

The man on the gallery didn’t fit her impressions of her assailant either. It was something in his voice. She didn’t know what. Not his accent. She’d recognized a trace of a brogue, Irish or Scottish, but it was more than that. The voice on the gallery belonged to a baritone. The voice that she’d awakened to on that harrowing night was much lighter. And much more terrifying.

It didn’t help. Nothing helped. She didn’t know how she could hope to save George against such a man.

Just thinking about how pathetic she was made her temper boil—she, Abigail Vayle, who didn’t have a temper! Maybe, if she asked him nicely, Harper would teach her how to use a gun.

On that thought, she went in search of Harper.

T
hree hours later, having emerged from a dreamless sleep, Hugh had the conversation with Harper he’d promised himself. He was propped up in bed, with hot bricks to keep his feet warm and a cup of contraband whiskey to do the same for his insides. The whiskey was contraband because Abbie had expressly forbidden wine or strong spirits on account of possible effects on any inflammation that may have set in. She’d made a pot of tea instead. They’d drunk the tea and were now working their way through the last of the whiskey Harper had found in the coach.

Hugh said, “Abbie didn’t look too happy when she brought me my tea. What’s got into her?”

Harper made a face. “She’s as mad as a hornet ’cause she couldn’t hit the target I set up for her when she asked me to show her how to use a pistol.”

“I didn’t hear anything.”

“Didn’t you? Well, you was out like a light and we was some ways from the house.”

“Why does she want to learn how to use a pistol?”

Harper shrugged. “She said that she felt like a clown
when I had to tell her to pull back the hammer when she was covering those bastards who attacked you.”

Hugh thought about this for a moment and his lips began to twitch. “What was the target?”

“A broken-down barn door.”

“And she couldn’t hit it?” Hugh asked incredulously.

“I suppose she could if she was standing three feet in front of it. She won’t give up, though. She says we’re to practice again tomorrow. What she lacks in skill she makes up for in sheer determination. She’s a regular trooper.”

Since his coachman didn’t have a high opinion of women, this tribute made Hugh stare. Harper, in his time, had contracted four irregular “marriages,” without benefit of clergy, and his sad experiences had turned him into a confirmed misogynist. Harper had been Hugh’s sergeant in Spain, the man who, as Harper would have it, had “saved his arse” on more occasions than he cared to remember.

Hugh had discovered that there was no shame in this. Most greenhorn officers who saw active service were either made or unmade by their sergeants. He’d been lucky to have Harper, and Harper never let him forget it.

They might have gone their separate ways except for something that happened after Hugh was recruited to British intelligence. During a battle, with all the officers dying around him, Harper had been promoted to lieutenant on the spot. But Harper’s friends were enlisted men and he didn’t want to be an officer. So he’d taken matters into his own hands. When the battle was over, he’d started a brawl and was hauled off to the block house. All he’d wanted was to be demoted. What he’d got was a court-martial. Hugh heard about it, had intervened, and had Harper transferred to British intelligence where,
much to Hugh’s surprise, he’d proved invaluable. They’d made a good team.

But that was during the war. In peace time, Harper had no skills that were in demand. He was wasted as a coachman, but it was the only employment Hugh could find for him. Harper was a born soldier, but the army wouldn’t have him back at any price.

Harper said, “Now would you mind telling me why you gave me all them strange looks when we first got here? I wasn’t sure what to make of them.”

“I didn’t want Maitland’s name to come up. Miss Vayle doesn’t know about the time I spent with British intelligence and that’s the way I’d like to keep it.”

Somehow, he didn’t think Abbie would appreciate knowing that he had once been a spy. Besides, that part of his life was over, and he was going to make damn sure that it stayed that way.

“You said that Miss Vayle sounded the alarm?”

Harper nodded. “She’d seen you speaking to a stranger in a brown coat, and when she couldn’t find you, she came to me.”

“Were you as alarmed as she?”

“Well, I was and I wasn’t. After all, you’d only been gone a few minutes. But when I saw how worried
she
was, that worried me too.”

Hugh frowned. “It strikes me that she was expecting trouble, which is why she jumped to the conclusion that something had happened to me. But then she risked her life to save me.”

Harper nodded. “She saved your arse. There ain’t no doubt about that.”

Hugh smiled. “She did, didn’t she?”

There was a long, unbroken silence. Hugh held out
his cup. Harper lifted the china teapot with flowers on it and poured out a generous measure of whiskey, then he did the same to his own cup. Both men sipped their drinks as they reviewed the events at the Black Boar.

Finally, Hugh said, “Tell me about Maitland again.”

Harper looked at Hugh with a question in his eyes and a half smile hovering at the corner of his mouth.

“What?” demanded Hugh, frowning.

“I never could understand,” said Harper, almost drawling the words, “why you and Maitland was always at each other’s throats. You was on the same side. You was both good agents, or so I heard the colonel say. But you never could work together without falling out.”

“You’ll have to ask Maitland that.” When Harper’s bushy eyebrows rose, Hugh said, “Look, it happens sometimes. Two people just take a dislike to one another.” And when those brows climbed another notch, Hugh gave a reluctant laugh. “We were recruited at the same time,” he said. “Maitland always felt he was at a disadvantage. He didn’t go to the right schools; he didn’t have the right background. I believe his father was a country solicitor. He was out to prove himself and didn’t care what methods he used. And he didn’t like me because he thought I was born with a silver spoon in my mouth, and that the colonel favored me. That’s how it started, and as time went on, it only got worse.”

“Mmm,” said Harper, looking only half convinced.

“So tell me again,” said Hugh. “What happened with Maitland?”

“At first, when I saw him on the gallery, I thought that he and his merry band of men had come to rescue us. But they pointed their pistols straight at us, and would have used them, too, if there hadn’t been innocent people standing around.”

“But why would Maitland turn on us? It doesn’t make sense.”

“Maybe it’s Miss Vayle he’s after. But that don’t make no sense neither.”

Hugh reflected on this then said, “The men who tried to abduct me—they weren’t working for Maitland?”

“It was Maitland and his crew that scared them off. Well, think about it. Miss Vayle had emptied her pistol so those thugs could easily have overpowered her.”

“A woman wouldn’t think about that,” said Hugh, “especially a frightened woman.” He paused as he tried to visualize exactly what had happened. “But you’re right. They wouldn’t have run off after Abbie discharged her pistol. So, there must be two units working against each other. British intelligence and—?” He looked a question at Harper.

But Harper could only shake his head.

Hugh sank back against the pillows and closed his eyes. There were so many loose threads, and he didn’t know how to knit them together—Abbie, her brother, Maitland, and the thugs who had beat him up with their pistols.

There was only one way to get at the truth, and that was through Abbie. But if she refused to confide in him, he didn’t know how to make her talk. When they reached London, he could go straight to Colonel Langley. The colonel would know what his men were up to.

Unless Maitland was working alone.

It wouldn’t be the first time. He was a secretive bastard, and guarded his territory jealously. He wasn’t a good agent, in Hugh’s opinion. He didn’t share information with his colleagues, and that was dangerous. He liked nothing better than to show them up as incompetent while taking all the credit himself.

Hugh opened his eyes. “Maitland can tell me what I want to know. And I bet he knows more than Abbie.”

Harper choked on a swallow of whiskey. When he had cleared his throat, he said, “I hopes that doesn’t mean what I thinks it means. You’re surely not going back to the Black Boar?”

“He’ll get the surprise of his life when I turn up.”

Harper shook his head. “Just like that? You’re going to walk into the lion’s den?”

Hugh snorted. “Credit me with some sense. I’m going back there to give Maitland a taste of his own medicine. I’ll do whatever I have to do to get the truth out of Maitland.”

“If I was you, I’d start with Miss Vayle. She knows more than she’s telling.”

Hugh straightened and winced at the pain that pierced his shoulder. Gritting his teeth, he said, “I intend to. But I can’t believe that Abbie would involve herself in anything criminal. Maybe she does know more than she’s telling, but her motives are pure. I’m sure of it. She’s an innocent pawn. But Maitland—he’d use his own mother to advance his career.”

Harper stared into space. “She reminds me of wife number three,” he said.

Hugh stifled a groan. Every woman reminded Harper of one or another of his “wives,” and he had a fund of horror stories on each one. Hugh wasn’t in the mood to hear them right now. “Don’t your wives have names?” he asked testily.

Harper ignored the bad temper. “She looked as innocent as an angel, but looks can be deceiving. One night, she bashed me with the kettle, just because I had one too many, then she run off with all my money.”

“Maybe you deserved it!”

“Oh, I didn’t care about the money. But she run off with my mate as well, the one she was always telling me was a bad influence. He was a good mate, none better, and I never found anyone to replace him.”

“Harper,” said Hugh, pressing a hand to his brow, “this isn’t helping.”

Harper grinned. “No? Well, maybe this will help.” He pointed to the window. “That there snow is coming down like pigeon shit in one of them Spanish plazas. Now, it’s true that Maitland won’t be going anywhere, but neither will we, see? We’re stuck here until the snow melts or we digs ourselves out. And if that wasn’t enough, there’s you to think about. In your condition, you couldn’t fight your way out of your bathwater, so how can you hope to take on Maitland?”

“I’m not going to take him on in hand-to-hand combat. I intend to take him by surprise, if necessary with a pistol to his head. And as for getting out of here, I know this area like the back of my hand. I’ve walked out of here in snowstorms before.”

“And I suppose you’ll want me to go along with you?”

Hugh grinned. “I couldn’t do it on my own,” he said.

“In that case,” said Harper, “we’ll leave it till tomorrow night.”

“But that could be too late.”

“I means it. I’m not having no invalid on my hands to worry about.”

When the door suddenly opened and Abbie entered with a laden tray, both men jumped like guilty schoolboys.

“How’s the patient?” she asked pleasantly.

“Feeling much better, thanks to you,” Hugh replied, eyeing her pleasant expression with some mistrust.

As she drew closer, she sniffed the air. “What’s that I smell?” she asked.

Hugh and Harper exchanged a quick look. “It’s—it’s the salve you put on my cuts,” said Hugh.

“It smells like whiskey.”

Harper rose abruptly. “Well, I best be getting along. I has to look after—”

“The horses,” supplied Abbie. “Yes, I know.”

Harper left with a sheepish grin. Hugh’s grin was calculated to melt a heart of stone. “Did Harper give you the box of provisions from the coach?” he asked.

“You mean the basket with steak pies, and cold chicken and ham and French champagne? Yes, I was surprised, though I suppose I shouldn’t have been. You
do
like to plan for every possibility, don’t you, Hugh? Too bad that this time it’s not going to do you any good.”

“Why not?”

“Because you’re an invalid, Hugh, and invalids must be very careful about what they eat.
And drink
.” She whisked off the silver cover from the server on the tray. “There’s plenty more where that came from,” she said cheerfully, “so don’t stint yourself.”

Hugh looked down at a bowl of watery mush. “What,” he asked ominously, “is that?”

“Gruel,” she replied, drawing out the word. “Fortunately, I found oatmeal and butter in the larder, so I was able to make a full pot.” She touched a small glass of slimy black liquid. “And that’s your purgative. It’s always important to purge a patient who has an inflammation. So be sure to drink it to the last drop.”

Hugh was rendered speechless.

“Shall I hold the glass for you?”

His eyes glinted. “If you do, it will be the last thing you do.”

She smiled unpleasantly. “I’ll be back later to collect the dishes.” She walked to the door.

“Abbie!” he roared. “You’ve had your joke! Now get me my dinner!”

“Joke? Who said anything about a joke?” Arms akimbo, she glared at him. “I warned you that in your weakened condition you weren’t allowed to touch strong spirits, and you went behind my back and got Harper involved in your underhanded scheme. Well, now you’ll pay the consequences,” and she flounced from the room.