Lord Scoundrel Dies (5 page)

‘I think I’d remember something like that.
Somebody smacked the back of his head in with that
candlestick.’

The boy’s head turned, flicking a glance
towards the candlestick. ‘How unpleasant.’

Something about the voice – and the words –
made Mr. Lampforth pause. ‘I say,’ he said, suddenly suspicious.
‘You don’t sound like a servant.’

‘Don’t I?’ the lad sounded suddenly
cautious.

‘No. Far from it. I think it’s my turn to
ask some questions. Just who the devil are you?’

‘Well,’ the boy temporized, ‘I’m actually…’
There was another pause. Clearly the young fellow was trying to
come up with a reason for being there. Charlie gave the newcomer a
searching glance. It was impossible to see the boy’s face, the
beaver hat throwing his face into shadow. Abruptly he took a step
forward, snatching the hat off the head beneath.

‘Excuse me!’

Charlie paused, taken aback, when a wealth
of golden-red curls tumbled down to frame a very feminine face. His
jaw dropped in surprise. ‘Well I’ll be damned! You’re a
female.’

The girl colored rather
prettily. ‘Apparently so. That was
not
very well mannered of
you.’

He collected himself with an effort. ‘Well
beg pardon, I’m sure, but I wanted to see who I was dealing with. I
wasn’t expecting a female. What are you doing here?’

She hesitated again. ‘I am after something.
What about you?’

‘Same thing,’ he admitted. ‘Sutton bought up
a friend’s gambling debts and was holding them over his head. I
came to get them back.’

‘Steal them back, you mean?’

‘Well… now that you mention it I suppose
that was exactly what I was doing. You?’

‘I came to try and discover a necklace that
Lord Sutton stole from a relative of mine,’ she confessed.

‘A thief as well, was he?’ Charlie couldn’t
find it in him to be surprised. Thieving seemed well within the
scope of Arthur Sutton’s sins. He may have been born a gentleman –
although rumor had it that wasn’t entirely the case – but the man
had the instincts of a highwayman.

They eyed each other for a long moment.

‘I suppose it wouldn’t be too dreadful to
look for whatever it is that we’re after, would it?’ his companion
said, after a moment. She cast a glance at the oblivious figure on
the floor. ‘I do not mean to be insensible of the gentleman’s… ah,
situation. But I would very much dislike it if the necklace was
discovered by those who must necessarily go through his
things.’

Charlie welcomed this idea. Thank God the
girl wasn’t the hysterical type. Most females he knew would be
having the vapors by now, demanding hartshorn and a physician or a
week’s rest in the country.

‘Capital idea! Where shall we begin?’

She looked around thoughtfully. ‘The desk?
Although I have been doing some research and I believe that most
thieves like to keep their ill-gotten gains in a strongbox of some
kind. Usually cleverly concealed in a wall or suchlike. If you take
the desk, I’ll investigate behind the pictures.’

‘Right-o.’ Charlie set to with a will,
delighted he seemed to have encountered somebody with a good head
on her shoulders. He would never have thought to look behind
pictures but it made sense that the fellow would have employed some
wretched hidey-hole or another. They searched in silence for a time
before the girl spoke.

‘Did you see anybody coming or going from
the place?’

‘No, but the front door was ajar,’ Charlie
replied, trying the bottom drawer of the desk. It was locked. He
found a letter opener on the desk, a fancy dagger that hailed from
exotic climes. Inserting it in the top of the drawer next to the
lock, he thrust down sharply and there came the splinter of wood.
‘That was how I got in.’

‘It was closed when I tried it.’ She was
lifting the edge of another frame, peering behind it.

‘I must have shut it after me.’

Pulling the drawer open, he peered hopefully
inside. There were several leather bound folders stacked there.
Lifting one out, he opened it and looked at the contents. Paintings
and pencil drawings of naked ladies in very naughty poses. Charlie
gave the body on the floor a wry look. ‘What a rascally
fellow.’

‘What did you discover?’

‘Oh, nothing. Nothing at all.’ Replacing the
folders, he shut the drawer hastily. Such pictures were not the
kind he wanted to be bandied about in front of genteel ladies.

‘You’re Mr. Lampforth, are you not?’

‘I am indeed. Charles Lampforth at your
service. Have we met?’ He didn’t think they could have for surely
he would have remembered. She was a pretty little thing even if she
did have a few stray freckles across her small nose and not a great
deal of figure to be seen beneath the costume she was wearing.

‘No, but my aunt has pointed out any
unmarried males under the age of five and forty who have a
reasonable fortune and most of their faculties.’

‘Good to know that I qualify. May I be so
bold as to ask your name? I mean, I know it is not a formal
introduction or anything but under the cir –’

‘Oh!’

‘What?’ he demanded quickly. ‘What is
it?’

‘Can you come and help me lift this picture
down?’

Charlie hurried across and together, they
lifted down a large oil of an overblown female in Grecian costume
nursing a bunch of grapes while she fondled the head of a
particularly ugly dog. Hidden behind this was a hinged door that
had been cunningly fitted into the wall.

‘There you are then,’ his companion
breathed.

‘Good work,’ Charlie said approvingly. He
tried the handle. It came as no surprise that it was locked. ‘Where
do you suppose he keeps the key?’

‘I suppose the safest place would be on his
person.’

They both turned to regard the body of Lord
Sutton, still lying exactly as he must have fallen in the middle of
the rug. It would have been a miracle – and rather a disturbing one
at that – if he had changed position.

‘Why do you suppose there is a rose?’ she
said musingly. ‘It seems such an odd thing to see beside… well,
beside that.’

‘I have no idea. Perhaps the fellow enjoyed
horticulture.’ Charlie hesitated for a moment more, then sighed. ‘I
suppose I’ll have to go through his pockets.’

‘Try his fob chain. A great many men keep
more than their fobs on it.’

‘Good idea.’ He had taken two steps forward
when a voice spoke from the doorway, sounding both flabbergasted
and – paradoxically – extremely annoyed.

‘What the devil is going on in here?’

Charlie and his companion froze in place and
looked to the latest interloper in what was fast becoming a crowd
scene.

Aubrey had not had one of his better
days.

Incensed at discovering that Lord Sutton had
the nerve to try and blackmail his sister-in-law, he had left the
house in a rather thunderous state of mind, which stood him in good
stead when he had taken his lesson with Jackson who went so far as
to commend the viscount on his wicked right hook. Aubrey suspected
his right hook had more to do with temper than skill but had
thanked the man anyway.

After sparring, he went in search of Sutton,
determined to have it out with him. He was increasingly inclined to
give him a taste of that same right hook for if ever a man needed
to be thrashed, Aubrey had come to believe that man was Arthur
Sutton. Unfortunately, his search seemed destined to fail. The
fellow wasn’t at his usual haunts; not his club, not promenading on
Bond Street, not tooling around in that ridiculously showy phaeton
that he fancied himself in so much as he went through Hyde Park,
trying to impress females that should have more sense.

Aubrey, determined to have words, had called
around to Hill Street after luncheon, only to find his lordship
out. As the day wore on, his patience had worn thinner and by
evening, he was a bundle of unaccustomed frustration. Aubrey liked
to go about life with an untroubled outlook and could usually
manage this without any difficulty at all but he was still incensed
by the insult that had been offered to his family. His anger had
festered all day, finding no outlet and he had ended up pacing back
and forth in his library until, finally, he’d had enough.

Celeste and Edward had gone out to the
theatre together and there were any number of places that Aubrey
could go, if he so desired. He had invitations aplenty but none of
them held any appeal thanks to his unfinished business.

‘Damn and blast it,’ he muttered, scowling
around the room. ‘Damn and blast it to hell!’

There was no escaping it; the more he
thought about it, the more inclined he was to think that his
lordship needed a damn good kicking. It was just after eleven when
he decided he was going to go and hand one out. He would go around
to Hill Street and pay another call. If Sutton wasn’t home, then to
hell with it, he’d wait. Even if it took all night, he would wait
the worm out, just so he could say what he intended to say because
if he postponed the matter until he could catch the man up in the
usual way of things, he would probably be fit to be tied.

It was getting on for eleven-thirty when he
once again arrived at Hill Street. Standing on the front step, he
hesitated for a moment, wondering if he should knock the servants
up by ringing the bell. On impulse, he tried the door instead and
was gratified when it opened. Excellent; he could take himself
inside and wait. Unless Sutton was already at home. It seemed
unlikely, as the man was a creature of the night and he would most
likely be out causing trouble, but one never knew.

Aubrey walked through the
front door, entirely confident he could deal with any questions
that were put to him, should he encounter a servant. There were
benefits to being a viscount, one of which was the ability to stare
down practically anyone who was not a fully-fledged duke or a
member of the royal family (and even certain members of
that
exclusive family
were inclined to be intimidated if one raised an eyebrow just so).
He certainly did not anticipate anybody would challenge
him.

A light down the hallway and the murmur of
voices beckoned him forward and he strode towards it with
determination. Perhaps this reckoning would be a deal swifter than
he had anticipated. His fingers itched to get hold of Sutton and
wipe that oily smile off his face. But it was not Sutton that
greeted him, when he entered the library. That is to say; it was,
but not as he had thought to find him.

Sutton lay dead on the floor, quite clearly
the victim of a violent end if the vacant expression on his face,
and the bloodied candlestick resting beside one out flung hand,
were anything to go by. A single red rose decorated the carpet
beside Sutton’s head.

The two people who stood regarding his body
had guilt written large across their faces.

‘What the
devil
is going on
here?’

‘Oh dear,’ a light, rather musical voice
spoke with some exasperation. ‘We really should think about locking
that door. It seems that all the world is determined to visit
tonight.’

Aubrey, taken aback by the tone, looked
again and discovered that, rather than discovering two fellows in
the act of committing a crime, he had discovered a gentleman and a
lady. At least, he assumed she was a lady. It was difficult to
conceive how a lady could come to be in the same room as a body but
she certainly sounded well bred.

‘It’s a bit late now,’ her companion
returned wryly. ‘Who would have thought Sutton’s library would be
such a circus?’

‘Charles Lampforth,’ Aubrey said,
recognizing the young gentleman without any difficulty. Mr.
Lampforth was not a crony of his but they knew each other well
enough to nod to. The fellow was amiable enough; not quite a dandy,
not confident enough to be a Corinthian yet, but he was still
young, no more than three and twenty. Aubrey certainly knew nothing
against him, at least nothing that would have ever suggested he
would be keeping company with a murdered man.

‘Talisker,’ Mr. Lampforth said, sounding
depressed. ‘I suppose you’re here looking for something as
well.’

‘I was looking for Sutton.’

‘Well you’ve found him,’ Lampforth glanced
at the body and grimaced. ‘He’s not – ah – receiving at the
moment.’

‘Who killed him? Did you?’

‘Sink me, do I
look
like a killer? I’ve
already been through this once tonight, thank you very much. I
didn’t kill him, this young lady didn’t kill him and I suppose, as
you’re a late arrival on the scene, that you didn’t do the deed
either.’

‘Have you called the constable?’

Mr. Lampforth looked mildly alarmed. ‘Now
why would I go and do something silly like that?’

‘Because the fellow has been murdered?’

‘Yes, but there will be one hell of a to do
and frankly, I’d be just as happy not to be involved in it,’
Lampforth said with ready candor. ‘I’m by way of being a blow
through who happens to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. We
both are.’

Aubrey stared at him for a moment, before
turning his attention to the girl standing a little way behind
observing the proceedings with interest. He did not recognize her
and with that hair, he would have known if they had met before. It
occurred to him that perhaps she was one of Sutton’s light-o-loves.
It was well known that he had a taste for fly-by-nights and perhaps
the boy’s getup was some kind of bizarre game playing. She did not
look like a Cyprian, however. There was something in those clear
green eyes that seemed to indicate an innocence that would
certainly not be there if she was one of Sutton’s females.

‘And you are?’