Lord Langley Is Back in Town (35 page)

Minerva tried to shout, tried to warn the seconds, anyone, but the only thing she saw was Langley wavering, his hand on his chest.

Oh, heavens! He’s been shot!
She hauled herself up and ran headlong toward him, stumbling twice, yet before she reached his side, he dropped like a stone to the ground. Throwing herself beside him, she heaved him over, and to her horror a great stain of blood spilled across his chest.

Bedelia, who had hurried after her, arrived just then and screamed, a piercing, keening wail that might well have been heard across the distant Thames.

Minerva glanced up at the rider in the distance, even as the surgeon and Lord Chudley came striding over. Bedelia’s cacophony seemed enough confirmation for the assassin, for he saluted Minerva with his pistol and rode off.

Chudley arrived at his wife’s side and gave her a companionable pat on the arm. “There there, my dear, no need for hysterics.”

Bedelia pointed at Langley’s bloodied chest. “Oh, Chudley, what have you done?”

“I only meant to nick him,” he said, taking another bored glance down at the baron.

“It wasn’t you, my lord,” Minerva said, looking up. “There was another man, over there.” She pointed at the now distant figure riding off at a furious pace. “He fired as well. It wasn’t the viscount’s bullet that struck Langley, but that man’s.” The seconds and surgeon gaped at her, and she continued, “I will testify to it. This isn’t Chudley’s doing.”

“Fine way to ruin my reputation, you madcap girl,” Lord Chudley scolded, nudging his toe into Langley’s side. “Of course it was my bullet that hit this good-for-nothing devil. I’ve as good as killed him.”

Minerva staggered to her feet. “My lord, this is nothing to take credit for! There is a killer who is getting away!” She looked from the seconds to the surgeon and then back to Lord Chudley. “Aren’t any of you going to stop him?”

“Good God, Minerva!” Langley muttered from his spot on the ground. “Do you have to be so demmed observant?”

L
angley warily opened his eyes and gazed up at her. He refrained from laughing as her face went from shock to relief and then a sort of white fury that had him wondering if he wasn’t going to be truly dead in a few moments, instead of only feigning dead.

“You . . . you . . . you . . .” she stammered.

The light in her eyes said she’d settled on relief, but this was Minerva, his Minerva, and he knew she could be a prickly, mercurial sort.

’Twas why he loved her. Furious one moment, just as passionate the next. Steady and calm in a crisis, ready to do battle when necessary.

Langley grinned.
Yes, he loved her
. It was a staggering notion.

Even as he started to get up, if only to gather her into his arms and kiss away her now murderous gaze—for truly, he still wasn’t completely sure she wasn’t going to take up one of the second’s pistols and finish him off—Chudley planted his booted foot atop his chest, pinning him down. “Not so fast, Langley. He’s not quite out of sight yet. You need to remain mortally wounded a few moments more.”

“Needn’t sound so pleased with the notion, my good man,” Langley said, winking at Minerva.

“Was a rather galling notion to have to miss you when I shot, but duty first, I’ve always said,” Lord Chudley replied.

“Andrew, will they be able to keep track of him?” Langley asked, nodding toward the road that led down the backside of the hill.

Lord Andrew, dressed as a somber London surgeon, pulled his wide-brimmed hat from his head. “They’ll keep him in their sights. He won’t get away. Not this time.”

“Excellent plan, if I do say so,” Chudley said.

“Thank you, Uncle Chudley,” the young man said, grinning. “I knew you would be perfect for the task.”

Minerva glanced over her shoulder at the viscount and then back down at Langley. “This was all a ruse? You wretched beasts! You could have told us.”

Aunt Bedelia added her dismay by hitting her husband squarely in the shoulder with her reticule. “Chudley! You had me believing I was about to spend the remainder of my days hiding on the Continent surrounded by naught but low, horrid company. How could you?”

The viscount rubbed his shoulder. “Completely necessary, my dear. Why, you and Lady Standon added just the necessary drama to our little scenario. I daresay, your excellent shrieking will have all of London thinking that Lord Langley is dead, or at the very least, mortally wounded.”

“And you, Lord Andrew!” Aunt Bedelia added, rounding on her husband’s nephew. “I shall have some sharp words for your mother about your part in all this!”

Lord Andrew groaned, and Langley felt a moment of pity for the young man.

“Is he gone?” Langley asked, changing the subject.

Lord Andrew glanced around. “Yes. You can sit up.”

Langley did so, plucking a silver salver out of the front of his shirt.

“My salver!” Minerva gasped as she retrieved it. “Whatever were you doing with my salver . . .” He didn’t want to tell her, but of course the lady put the pieces together quickly. “You came here knowing you might be shot at.” She shook the dented thick metal at him as if she meant to finish the fate that the salver had saved him from.

“Not ‘might be,’ for indeed, I
was
shot at,” he corrected. Langley shook out his shirt, and the spent lump of lead dropped to the grass. “Though I knew it wasn’t going to be Chudley’s bullet that I had to be concerned with.” He turned to the viscount. “But you might have pulled your shot a little more to the right. I demmed well felt your lead go whistling past my shoulder.”

Chudley guffawed a bit. “Had to make it look good.”

“But the blood,” Lady Chudley said, with a shudder. “Good heavens how could that be?”

Lord Langley held up a small bladder. “Pig’s blood. An old Foreign Office trick. When I fell over, I nicked it and . . .” He waved at the mess on his shirt.

Minerva took a step back. “So this was all a farce?”

Langley nodded. “No, not all of it. Lord Chudley’s challenge was real—though twenty some years in the making.” He glanced over at Lord Andrew. “Why don’t you do the honors?”

The young man shot a wary glance at Bedelia and then took up the story. “I meant no distress to you, Aunt,” he began. “It was only done to keep Langley alive.”

“Harrumph!” the old girl sputtered, as if she thought that a foolhardy notion in itself.

Langley picked up the story. “Lord Andrew and Chudley thought it would work to our advantage if everyone believed I’d cocked up my toes and died for real. If only to lure our enemies into a sense of complacency.”

“That man,” Minerva said, pointing to the empty spot on the hill where the rider had been, “was here to ensure that no matter what, you didn’t come down from this hill alive.” Her brow furrowed, and Langley could only guess at the conjecture going on inside her head. “Was that Nottage?”

“I don’t know. I didn’t get a good look.”

Aunt Bedelia stepped forward. “Whyever would someone want you dead, Lord Langley? Beyond the obvious reasons.”

Lord Throssell, who had stood as a second, let out a bark of a laugh.

“Because of what I know,” Langley told her. “Or rather, what I knew.”

“What you knew? Are you addled, sir? Because I am starting to think you are all ’round the bend,” Aunt Bedelia prodded, as only she could.

“There was a time when I would have agreed with you,” he told her. “You see, about three years ago I was attacked in Paris—struck from behind. When I woke up, in Abbaye prison, I barely knew who I was, let alone where I was. It was nearly a year before I began to remember anything.” He glanced over at Minerva. “Like who I was or why I was in Paris.” He shook his head. “But the events beforehand, why someone wanted me killed—try as I might, I can only remember shadowy bits and pieces.”

“So your lack of memory isn’t enough for your enemies,” Minerva pointed out, hands fisted to her hips. “They still want you finished off.”

“That’s the rub, my lady,” Lord Andrew chimed in. “No one but those of us here know that Lord Langley can’t recall the necessary evidence needed to bring down Sir Basil, and from the looks of it, Neville Nottage. For this much we suspect: Sir Basil Browning is the mastermind behind a series of crimes that could disgrace England, and worst of all, put the shaky peace on the Continent into chaos. Anger many of our allies.”

“Allies we will need in the coming months,” Chudley added. “Especially now that there are rumors Napoleon has escaped and is raising his army anew.”

“Sir Basil? Do you mean to say you think Brownie is behind some grand scheme?” Aunt Bedelia scoffed, brushing aside the shocking news about that horrid Corsican. “Lord Andrew, it’s no wonder your mother won’t speak of you. You make it sound as if he’d gone and stole all the crown jewels of Europe!”

All the crown jewels. . .

Those words, spoken in haste, lit something in his memories. And from the way Minerva’s eyes widened, it seemed they sparked something in her mind as well.

“Langley, think of it,” she said. “The arrival of the nannies. The grooves in the picture frames. Lady Brownett at the theatre.” She ticked off the evidence like an excited child.
“
The velvet we found at Langley House. The case that holds the Sterling diamonds is lined like that as well.”

“Yes, by God, you have it!” he said. “Jewels. They were stealing jewels and then shipping them home in my art collections.”

Everyone gaped at them.

He grinned at her. “My lady, you are too smart by half.”

“I am just pleased I could help,” she said, smiling back at him.

Then Lord Throssell piped up. “Jewels, you say? Why the contessa was going on and on last night about her missing pearls and the duchessa’s lost rubies.” He glanced at the others. “I fear she’d had a bit too much to drink.” Then he rubbed his head. “I think I had as well, for I daresay I promised to replace those demmed pearls.”

“There you have it,” Aunt Bedelia said proudly, beaming at her niece. “Now go arrest the lot of them and we can all go home and put an end to this nonsense.”

“Unfortunately, my dear,” Chudley said, “we haven’t enough evidence, save our suspicions, and Lady Standon’s excellent theories.”

“Break into the Foreign Office!” Bedelia declared. “Find it.”

“It isn’t there,” Langley told her.

“Ooh! You foolhardy man!” Minerva gasped, shaking a finger at him. “That is where you went last night, isn’t it? You broke into the—” She stopped herself and sucked in a deep breath, as if she didn’t want to finish the sentence.

“Minerva, we are going to have to work on your discretion,” Langley said.

“Yes, I suppose,” she demurred. “I should learn not to speak out of turn.” Then she grinned and said, “Though not just yet.” Turning to Lord Andrew and Lord Chudley, she asked, “What do we do next?”

Not really asked, more like prodded. Demanded. Ordered.

“Lord Andrew’s crew is following our assassin—”

“Nottage,” Minerva corrected.

“Yes, yes, if you insist. Nottage,” Chudley said, his whiskers bristling to be so corrected. “Then once he’s reported in to Sir Basil, which I have no doubt he will, we’ll nab him and have him held on charges of murder.”

She didn’t look all that convinced. “How will you hold a man for murder charges when the victim was shot at a duel with another man?”

Lord Chudley huffed again. “I have a friend at Bow Street who owes me a favor. He’ll keep that fellow locked up where no one will find him. In the meantime . . .” The viscount took his wife’s hand and brought it to his lips. “This is where you come in, my dear. You need to return to Town—”

Aunt Bedelia beamed with delight. “And do what I do best?”

“Yes, precisely,” Chudley told her. “Recount this morning’s events high and low. Lament to anyone who will listen that I am off to the Continent, and that Lord Langley is . . .”

“Lost. Gone. Dearly departed,” Langley instructed. “And do make my stance in the face of your husband’s noted marksmanship a brave and valiant one.”

“Turn you into a hero?” she scoffed. “As if you deserve such an honor, you rakish devil!”

“Because I have an offer to make,” he told her, “a private one.”

“Careful there, Lord Langley, or I will shoot you,” Chudley said.

Bedelia rapped her husband on his shoulder. “I am no light-skirt, sir. You should have known better than to marry the likes of Susannah Sullivan all those years ago.”

“I thought we agreed never to discuss our previous spouses,” Chudley said.

Aunt Bedelia’s brow furrowed, but so reminded said nothing more. Rather she knelt beside Langley and he whispered his offer into her ear. She paused for a moment, then her mouth spread in a wide smile. As she got up, with Chudley’s help, she said to Langley, “There won’t be a dry eye in London, my lord. When I get done, they will wonder why you haven’t been elevated to a saint.”

T
rue to their deception, the seconds carried Lord Langley to the carriage as if he were in mortal danger.