Lord Langley Is Back in Town (16 page)

“He’s engaged to me,” Minerva snapped. “Langley is betrothed to me.”

Jamilla paused, then smiled widely. “La! Lady Standon, who knew you could jest so!”

“But I am not joking,” Minerva told her.

“Est-ce vrai?”
she asked, reverting to her native French, as she did when she became overcome.

“Yes.”

Jamilla glanced toward the parlor. “Langley must have his reasons,” she said under her breath. Then she brightened and smiled at Minerva. “And the others, they don’t like this?”

“Not in the least.”

The former nanny lit up. “Oh, darling, how wonderful for you.” She glanced over Minerva from the top of her brown hair tucked into a plain chignon, down her sensible day gown, to the plain slippers on her feet. “But of course they are right,” she said. “However will you keep him?”

L
angley knew immediately he’d found an ally in Lord Andrew Stowe.

Though young, impossibly so, most likely no more than twenty, Lord Andrew was the last agent Ellyson had trained before the man had died five years earlier. And being a Stowe meant Lord Andrew came from a long line of men who’d served their kings and queens loyally. The third son of the Marquess of Drayton, he was not yet at his full height, but he was a commanding sort even in his low attire.

Having given Langley a hearty handshake, Lord Andrew invited him to come have a drink, and off they went into the bowels of Seven Dials, to the rooms where the young man lived, with the line of guttersnipes bringing up their rear.

That is, after Lord Andrew had admonished the little pack of thieves to give Lord Langley back his belongings.

“Unfortunately there were those in the Foreign Office who thought me too young and too much of a liability to send over to the Continent when I finished with Ellyson,” the young man said, as he gestured for Langley and Thomas-William to sit at the table in the middle of the large room. He shrugged as he put a decanter and glasses down for them and poured drinks for the men.

“Was your hair,” Thomas-William laughed.

Lord Andrew raked a hand through his dark auburn locks. “I suppose I do look rather a bit too English.” The young man laughed. “Kept me here. Much to my mother’s relief, though not so much to mine. Then after a few years chafing about Whitehall—”

“Making a pest of yourself,” Thomas-William noted.

The young man grinned. “Yes, a bit, I suppose. But it did get me this assignment. Or got me demoted, as some might aver.” He waved his hand at his large apartment, which looked like a replica of George Ellyson’s map room in Hampstead Heath—with the large table in the middle, books overflowing their shelves, and collections of oddities and bits of aristocratic comforts filling the room—a globe, a tusk from something mounted on the wall, a few etchings and paintings. Comfortable furniture filled every corner and a good, thick carpet kept out the chill of the floorboards.

“And that assignment is?” Langley asked, glancing around, eyeing particularly their audience, the seven youngsters all perched about the room.

“Training my crew for the work ahead,” Lord Andrew said, sending a wink to one of the lads. “Now that you’ve all gotten a very good look at Lord Langley, upstairs with you and see to your lessons. I do believe Mr. Crunkshaft is waiting.” There were good-hearted groans and muttered complaints, but the lot of them made their way to a narrow set of stairs in the back of the room. “And Goldy, mind you, I won’t have you stealing poor Crunkshaft’s pocket watch again and resetting it so classes end early.” The young imp grinned, a toothless smile glowing back in the shadows. “Oh, and good work this morning, the entire lot of you! I’m quite proud.”

They all trooped up the stairs and then were heard tromping across the floor overhead.

Langley glanced back as the last of them disappeared into the attic. “A crew of street children?”

Lord Andrew grinned. “Yes. And an excellent lot they are. You’ll see—they are going to be your guardians, your watchdogs, for the next few weeks until we get this all sorted out.”

“My what?” he stammered.

Lord Andrew glanced over at Thomas-William. “Didn’t you explain this to him?”

“Thought it best coming from you.”

“Left me to the dirty work,” Lord Andrew teased back.

The other man shrugged.

“Goldy and her companions are going to fan out around Brook Street or wherever you go, and make sure no one is lurking about. No one will give them a second glance. Then, if they notice anything odd or suspicious, they’ll be able to give you fair warning.”

Langley did a second take at the attic stairs. “That little bit of baggage was a girl?”

“Oh, aye. Actually there are three of them in the lot. Three girls, four boys. But the girls dress like boys—keeps them safer, not that I worry about Goldy much. She’s never without a knife, and rumor around the Dials is that her father was the finest miller around.”

The baron glanced over at the stairs again, for he knew in the cant of the Dials what a “miller” was: a murderer. That aside, it was a ridiculous notion. To keep him safe by using children.

Children capable of slitting throats . . .

Still, he met Thomas-William’s dark gaze with the question in his own.
Are you certain of this?

The large man just sat back in his chair, arms crossed over his barrel of a chest, looking quite content.

“Now, my lord, how can I help you?” Lord Andrew said, settling into his seat and looking far more assured of himself than a twenty-year-old lad should.

After taking a deep breath, and remembering this was—as Thomas-William had assured him on the ride over—his best chance at clearing his name, he continued, “I need to get into the Foreign Office, specifically into the intelligence files from Paris in the months before I was attacked.”

“Get into the Foreign Office files?” Lord Andrew let out a low whistle. “It would be madness to attempt.”

Thomas-William added a snort of agreement.

But Langley was undeterred. “But I must, it is the only way.”

Lord Andrew shook his head. “Not always. George always said to start at the beginning: So what do you remember of Paris, sir—that is before we decide to get ourselves killed by making a suicide run into Brownie’s files.”

The baron rubbed the side of his head—the one that had been struck that fateful night. It always ached when he tried to force up the memories. And as always, there was nothing much to remember. Just flashes of things—the ripe stench of the alleyway, the chill of the cobblestones beneath his fingers, and voices, a babble of voices with not a single word that could be discerned.

Closing his eyes, he tried to bear the pain of it and pull something up, anything that would help.

“He doesn’t,” Thomas-William said. “He can’t recall a thing.”

Lord Andrew pushed back from the table and sighed. “Would be helpful, but just the same, perhaps we can sort out some other clues.”

Langley wished he shared the young man’s optimism, for right now his head rang like the bells of St. Paul’s, driving out any coherent thought.

“How did you make your reports?” Lord Andrew asked.

“I was known in diplomatic circles as an art collector with very little taste—an easy mark, so to say. I’d buy horrid counterfeits, the sort only the most ignorant rube or mushroom would own and send them back to England via Strout who would forward them to Langley House for storage.”

“And with them, your reports,” Lord Andrew finished.

“Yes, exactly. Inside sculptures, behind paintings. Pieces of work so worthless no one would bother stealing them—”

“A paum,” Lord Andrew said. “Like a shell game.”

“Exactly,” Lord Langley said. “But I would address the box slightly differently if it needed closer examination, so to say, and my tenant, Mr. Harrow, would forward that collection on to George so he could gain the reports.”

“Did this Harrow know about George?” Lord Andrew asked.

Langley shook his head. “No. All Harrow knew was that George Ellyson was a fellow collector.”

“What was the last thing you remember sending?” Lord Andrew asked.

Langley shook his head. “That’s just it. I don’t recall what last I sent.”

“Then perhaps that is the best place to start—discovering what last you sent,” the young agent said.

By God, he was right. Langley had all but forgotten about his shipments. Could it be that he had sent one just before he’d been attacked?

“Then once we find that, we can go about confronting old Brownie,” Lord Andrew was saying.

Harrumph
, Thomas-William snorted.

“What’s this?” Lord Andrew said, sitting up straight.

“I’ve already met with Brownie—“

Thomas-William shook his head.

“Yes, well, I rather jumped into his carriage last night,” Langley corrected. “And shoved a pistol up his nose and demanded answers.”

Lord Andrew laughed. “Good God, you don’t know how many times I’ve longed to do just that. Not that I imagine he was all that forthcoming even with your pops in his face. Surprising bit of bottom for such a low fellow.”

Langley nodded in agreement. All too true. Brownie had surprised him, for he thought that faced with his own mortality, the man would have given over everything he knew.

Which only meant the man was in deep. And like Lord Andrew said, had enough courage to protect himself.

“I thought I might startle him into giving me what I want, at the very least rattle his cage a bit.” Langley thought of Brownie’s shock when he’d plucked off his scarf and the other man realized the baron wasn’t dead.

“A little pressure to put him off his game,” Lord Andrew said. “I can see you don’t like it, Thomas-William.”

“Get us all killed, going out in the open,” the man said. “Not the way it should be done.”

“Well, Sir Basil will be more dangerous now that he’s been forewarned,” Lord Andrew agreed, “but he will also be more likely to make a mistake in his haste to finish you off.”

“Exactly,” Langley said. “I intend to keep him on his toes. Watch him. Shake him up a bit.”

“Get yourself killed,” Thomas-William grumbled.

“That is where my crew can help,” Lord Andrew said.

“What I need is to get into his files,” Langley told the younger man, getting straight to the point.

The young agent shook his head and let out a low whistle. “Nosing about those files is what got me sent here to the Dials. You’re right to suspect Brownie. Odd bits of business going on around the office, and he’s at the center of all of it.”

Cupping his glass in his hand, Langley stared down at the amber liquid inside. “What exactly?”

Lord Andrew lowered his voice. “Rumors that you and Ellyson were in league with the French to damage English relations. Sealed reports and shipments with your name and Ellyson’s name attached—all of which went directly to Brownie or through Nottage and then were hushed up and buried who-knows-where—”

“Nottage?” Langley said, glancing up. “As in Neville Nottage? My secretary?”

“Yes, the two of them were as thick as thieves after you were reported missing, and then—” Lord Andrew began.

“What do you mean after I went missing?” Langley said, straightening in his chair, a rare shiver running down his spine. “Nottage died in Paris. He was killed in the same alleyway where I was attacked.”

Thomas-William and the younger man exchanged puzzled glances.

“Nottage isn’t dead,” Lord Andrew told him.

Langley shook his head. “He’s dead, I had it from the prison guard.”

Again Lord Andrew glanced at Thomas-William and then back at Langley. “Then you have been misled. Nottage is the one who came back to England with the reports of your demise.”

Langley tried to take it all in. “Are you telling me that Neville Nottage is alive?”

“Yes,” Lord Andrew said with a bit of a huff. “Where there should have been a formal investigation into what happened to you, there wasn’t, just a lot of rumors floating around about your loyalties, the secret reports and shipments, like I said, and then all of a sudden Brownie is elevated to a knighthood, and Nottage inherits a small fortune from some distant uncle, and both of them are living in the clover.”

“Nottage.” Langley muttered the man’s name like a curse. Here he had trusted the man for over a decade, mourned his death, and now the baron feared his all-too-capable secretary had taken all those years of experience in his shadow and put them to some devilish use.

This put an entirely new light on his troubles.

Lord Andrew glanced over at him and then continued, “I must say, Brownie’s sudden elevation was odd enough, but when
Sir Basil
moved into that fancy house of his, his wife started looking like one of my father’s mistresses, all covered in rubies and such, well it was just too much to ignore. So I began to ask myself, how the devil could he afford it all? It stank of something buried much deeper.”

Yes, indeed
, Langley pondered silently, as he let the young man continue.