Rules of Engagement (25 page)

"You had me get a child for you when you didn't intend to keep her—"

"Him. I wanted a lad, remember?" From a drawer in his cabinet he removed a black silk scarf and collar.

"You don't intend to adopt Beth, do you?"

"You always knew that."

"Yes, and I'm damned for going along with your despicable scheme. I knew better, but I—"

"You wanted the money." He picked up his boots and showed them and the neckwear to her. "I'll go downstairs and find my valet to help me don these. I would ask you, but your resentment is too large for you to get close."

He left her standing there, swallowing hard and not crying.

He opened the door all the way. "Blast!" Stepping out, he stared down the corridor.

"What?" she asked.

"Beth," he said.

It took her a moment to realize the door had been partially open. She forgot her own troubles. She swallowed. Dear God, Beth had come seeking comfort or to show off or just to tell them it was time, and she must have asked a servant and found them—and heard them talk about her hopes and how they were never anything but foolishness.

Rushing to the door, she looked out at the empty corridor, then up at him, sick with worry and horror.

"She'll understand," Kerrich said with pigheaded nonchalance. "She'll be fine. What time will she be presented to Her Majesty?"

"Six o' the clock. You mean you aren't going after Beth? You hurt her!"

"I'd say we both hurt her." He groped for his pocket watch, then strode over and plucked it from his jewel case and looked at it. "I'll do everything in my power to make it to the palace—but I have to go."

She could scarcely breathe for disappointment. "How does a man like you look at himself in the mirror? You
are
like my father."

He stared at her as if he didn't know her, then took her by the arm and inexorably pulled her toward him. Looking down into her eyes, he said, "And you're like my mother. You don't know a diamond when you hold it in your hand."

Kerrich stared at Mr. Gordon, agent for the government, in absolute disbelief. "So you let Athersmith get away?"

"He had a pistol! We weren't prepared! Who would have thought that in broad daylight so bold a thievery could take place!" Given a listener, the makeshift guard would go on making excuses for hours. "He just walked right in. He loaded up paper to print banknotes. He took our ink! Then when we apprehended him, he shot at us."

"A single shot pistol?"

"Indeed!"

"If it was empty, what further harm could he do?"

"He was waving another! Besides, people were in the lobby! Customers were at the windows. The bullet knocked a chip out of the venerable statue at the end of the lobby!" That was clearly the greatest indignation.

Luckily Moulton walked into the now-deserted lobby of the Bank of England before Kerrich gave in to his urge to strangle Mr. Gordon. Kerrich left the man without apology, and speaking in an undertone to Moulton, mocked the man's feeble defense. "Yes. Who would think they would want to steal from a place where they store money?"

"I did warn you, my lord, of the government men's pathetic inefficiency," Moulton said. "If they had consented to warn the regular guards, none of this would have happened."

"They didn't give warning to the bank's guards?"

Moulton smiled in a fed-up manner. "It is the government, sir."

Kerrich strode with Moulton outside the bank building on Threadneedle Street. Leaning his hand on one of the mighty columns, he took a breath of fresh air and asked, "What information did
you
glean?"

"According to the government men—and we have established how effective they are—there was no diversion of any kind, yet somehow Mr. Athersmith walked into the storeroom in the back of the building, removed fifty reams of watermarked paper and several crates of the special, jet-black ink with which they print the banknotes. He placed them on a handcart and was on his way out the front door when he was spotted—by the bank guards."

"Hurrah for the bank guards! But if there wasn't an accomplice, how do the government men account for Lewis's near-success?" Kerrich asked in frustration.

"Unfortunately, even the bank guards are uncertain how he got so far, and my only man on the scene came back from supper into the midst of the shouting of 'Stop, thief,' the customers screaming and running, and that damned pistol." Moulton shook his head. "I'm sorry, my lord, but not even my men will argue with a lunatic holding a gun."

"So Lewis got away," Kerrich said.

"He's gone."

"There was no sign of an accomplice. No diversion."

"Not according to the government men or the bank guards."

"Are they lying or are they idiots?"

"As for the government men, I would have to choose for idiots, my lord. But the bank guards should have seen something and they claim they didn't."

"Keep questioning them. See if you can drag some version of the truth from them." Kerrich looked out the door and into the afternoon sunshine. This incident, muddled, confusing and frustrating as it was, was nothing compared to what he had fled at home. He thought of Beth and her inopportune discovery and of Pamela and that disagreeable scene they'd enacted. Now he had to go to Buckingham Palace where the queen held his trousers ransom and Beth and Pamela stalked the halls, out for his blood.

He was going to have to grovel before all three. The snarl of muddled affection and hurt feelings was just the reason that, when women were involved, he eschewed emotional relationships. Yes, he much preferred the shallow, the vapid and the silly.

Unfortunately, neither Queen Victoria, Pamela nor even Beth fulfilled his qualifications. The evening was going to be an execrable experience.

Pulling out his pocket watch, he looked at the time. "If I hurry, I can just make Beth's presentation to Her Majesty."

"You'll be at Buckingham Palace, my lord?"

Turning to Moulton, Kerrich glared as if he held Moulton responsible for the bloody mess his life had become. "Indeed. I have to go make merry."

Two hours ago, Pamela couldn't have imagined she could travel to Buckingham Palace, the new royal residence, and that she would be anything but preoccupied with her own personal torment at meeting the queen and seeing so many society people who knew her identity and background.

But as Kerrich's carriage inched forward in the line that would deposit them on the wide stone steps, she thought only of Beth. Beth, seated on the back-facing seat across from Pamela and Lord Reynard. Beth, clad in her ruffled dress, white stockings and black leather slippers. Beth, blessed with that combination of sensitivity and street wisdom that made a mockery of Pamela's attempts to explain the unexplainable.

"Lord Kerrich wanted a child to make himself look respectable," Pamela said.

"I know." Beth had her face pressed to the window, watching the milling of carriage runners and footmen outside.

"I agreed to get him one."

"You got him one," Beth said in an even tone.

Hesitantly, Pamela told the bad part. "We both always knew the child would not be adopted." In a rush, she added, "But I wanted him to adopt you. I encouraged him to spend time with you because I knew he would fall in love with you."

The afternoon sun shone through the windows, and Pamela plainly saw Beth roll her eyes.

Worse, Lord Reynard snorted.

If Pamela wasn't justifying her actions to that pleasant old man, she had no chance of convincing anyone. Especially not Beth, who was the one who really mattered. "Lord Kerrich would be here with you right now," Pamela said, "but he had something very important to do."

"Oh, indeed?" Beth pressed her face against the glass as the carriage inched forward. "I'll wager
you
don't even know what it is."

"No. No, I don't." Pamela didn't even know why she was defending him, except that his absence hurt Beth even more than she'd already been hurt, and this child deserved better. "But I know he wouldn't have gone unless it mattered greatly."

Beth looked straight at Lord Reynard. "It's the counterfeiting, ain't it?"

"Isn't it," Pamela correct automatically. "What counterfeiting? What are you talking about?" She found herself ignored by both other occupants of the carriage.

Lord Reynard looked taken aback, and the normally genial old face became stern and still. "Young lady, what do you know about the counterfeiting?"

"I overheard Mr. Athersmith talking about it at my party."

"You were eavesdropping?" Pamela asked in censure, but for all the attention the other two paid her, she might as well have been speaking a different language.

Leaning forward, Lord Reynard put his face down to Beth's level. "Do you understand how important this is?"

"Yes." Beth shrugged. "No, not really."

"Counterfeiting is a very bad crime," Lord Reynard explained. "Like stealing without having the courage to face the victim."

"Mr. Athersmith was sure in trouble about it."

"I don't understand. Lord Kerrich and Mr. Athersmith are investigating a counterfeiting?" Pamela scrambled to catch up.

Lord Reynard said, "Beth, I need you to tell me—who was Mr. Athersmith talking to and what was he saying?"

"He was talking to a lady. Upstairs, where they weren't supposed to be."

"A lady? You mean, a female?"

"A lady," Beth insisted. "I didn't see her, because she was being so mean to him I knew they wouldn't want to know I was there." She looked delightful, feminine and childish, and she swung her foot back and forth as she bounced on the padded leather seat.

But her gaze was perceptive and Pamela could see that Lord Reynard was taking her seriously.

"She talked like a noble lady?" he asked. "Not a servant, then. Miss Fotherby?"

"No! "Cause this lady said if Mr. Athersmith wanted Miss Fotherby, he had to be clever and rich. He had to stop galloping off at the mouth, and not drink, and she took his bottle away from him." Beth wrinkled her nose. "Besides, I heard Miss Fotherby talking. She's got a little voice and she squeaks a lot. This lady sounded deeper and annoyed like Mrs. Fallowfield when we orphans were feeding the mice."

Pamela's mind whirled. She'd never experienced such confusion. A crime had been occurring right under her own nose, and everyone knew about it except her. For precisely this reason, she always advised young governesses not to get involved with their employers. "Mr. Athersmith was trying to get some money by… by trapping a counterfeiter?"

"Ooh, I don't think Mr. Athersmith is a good man," Beth said.

Pamela thought of the affable young gentleman who looked so blond and upright and, when compared to his cousin, seemed the epitome of virtue. "Mr. Athersmith is involved in the counterfeiting?" Her voice rose.

Beth judged Mr. Athersmith with the astute perception of a child. "He's not important. He's poor, and he's one of those fellows that wants everything everybody else has, except he wants it the easy way." Seeing Pamela's wide-eyed horror, she added hastily, "But I could be wrong."

"Of course you're wrong. Mr. Athersmith is… proper and good." Pamela glanced at Lord Reynard, expecting that he would defend his great-nephew, but he was staring out the window. Still trying to gain some comprehension, she asked, "Even if it's true about Mr. Athersmith, why would a lady be interested in counterfeiting?"

For the first time, Lord Reynard looked at her, and he acted as if she'd uttered something profound. Rubbing his chin, he asked in a thoughtful tone, "That is just what I've been asking myself."

Lord Albon was going down as Kerrich ascended the stairs, and Kerrich's heart sank. "Tell me the reception's not over."

"No, of course not. But I made the required appearance, now I'm off to meet my ladybird."

Kerrich pressed his hand to his chest. He could breathe again.

"The queen's in the blue drawing room," Albon said.

"But you're looking a little rumpled. Been falling out of windows lately?"

With a hearty
ha ha!
and a punch on the arm he passed Kerrich, and Kerrich stumbled on a step as he turned to stare at the fellow. What had Albon meant by that? It had better have been a random comment on Kerrich's dishabille and not what Kerrich feared it was.

But when he passed a group of matrons on the landing, they grinned at him with most unladylike mirth, and one of them winked at him. As he climbed the second flight, a cold sensation crept down his neck and he glanced back to see them watching him, or, more specifically, his buttocks, in what could only be described as a lascivious manner.

This wasn't good. This wasn't good at all. Indignation began to mix with uneasiness, but still he hoped he was imagining things.

In the upper corridor, when he could hear a multitude of voices, he paused before a mirror and finger-combed his hair and straightened his coat. Then, taking a sustaining breath, he stepped into the blue drawing room.

Everything appeared to be normal. Brown marble columns rose to the gilded ceiling. Classically carved murals decorated the panels above the doors, flung wide to connect the blue and bow drawing rooms. Ladies and gentlemen stood in groups, chatting and smiling. The children were nowhere to be seen; no doubt their fete took place in another chamber.

As Kerrich strolled into the room, he scanned the throng for Pamela and Lord Reynard. At the same time, he anxiously attended any snippets of conversation he could hear. At first, the discourses sounded bland enough. He overheard a complaint about the size of the room, altogether too small. Some people had never been to Buckingham Palace, for this queen was the first to use it as a royal residence, and the gossips claimed she found that the drains were faulty, the windows stuck shut and the bells would not ring. Buckingham Palace was a disgrace and a dreadful waste of money.

But as Kerrich walked farther into the chamber, the occasional titter assaulted his ears. As he glanced around, he saw smiles slanted at him. And the ladies continued to behave oddly—every time he turned, he found at least one of them examining his backside. Damn it. Damn it, this couldn't be happening. Not today. Not when so much had already gone wrong. Not when so much was at stake.

When he ran into Tomlin, he was relieved to see his friend, but that lasted only until Tomlin grabbed him by the arm.

"You sly old dog," Tomlin roared. "A full moon on a foggy night!"

At that one phrase, all Kerrich's suspicions were confirmed. Rage hit him hard and low. Rage and the instinct to shush Tomlin, to cover up, to hope no one else had heard. But it didn't matter. His surmise were true. This was how Pamela had chosen to get her revenge. While he'd been at the Bank of England, saving the country from ruin, Pamela had been here at the queen's reception, telling his secret to everyone. Everyone knew. Everyone was laughing at him. The moment he'd been dreading for years had finally come, and he wanted to howl out his wrath.

He couldn't.

Not with Tomlin still babbling on. "You were the famed full moon on a foggy night? All these years and you never told
me,
your best friend?"

Kerrich thought of and discarded several strategies in rapid succession. All of them involved denial, and denial, he knew damned good and well, would never succeed. Not against this scandal. Not against this truth.

He retained the presence of mind to smile a crooked smile and continue walking. "I didn't want to brag. I thought you might feel somehow"—he glanced pointedly at Tomlin's crotch—"inferior."

Putting back his head, Tomlin laughed heartily. As always, Tomlin was good-natured, and as always, he shambled along beside Kerrich, clumsy and prone to trip over his own feet. "You're famous, man!"

"I would have said infamous, myself." Kerrich glanced around, carefully avoiding eye contact with anyone. "Does everyone know?"

"I heard it as soon as I walked in the door."

"I'll be constantly assaulted with it then, I suppose."

Tomlin laughed again and nodded. "I'll wager you have a scrapbook hidden somewhere with all the caricatures and lampoons from all the gazettes."

"I don't, and as much as I want to discuss this with you, I have something more pressing on my mind right now. Have you seen Miss Lockhart and my charge? We're supposed to be officially presented to Her Majesty at six, and it's nearly that now."

"Saw Miss Lockhart pacing between the blue drawing room and the bow drawing room." Tomlin cocked his head as if he didn't understand Kerrich's mood. "You're certainly taking this calmly."

Kerrich pulled out his pocket watch and checked it. "Taking what calmly?"

"This full moon on a foggy night revelation."

Looking deliberately surprised, Kerrich said, "It was no revelation to me. I've known all along. Now if you'll excuse me, it's bad form to make Her Majesty wait."

As he walked away, he congratulated himself on a good performance. His ruddy cheeks could be blamed on the heat, his slight smile was one he always wore on formal occasions and, he flattered himself, he appeared completely ordinary. No one looking at him could know the wrath that rocked him with every step. No one could guess that, in his mind, he was picturing himself with Miss Lockhart, wringing her neck. While he had his hands on her, he would roar out his displeasure until she never dared vex him again. Then he would withdraw his suit with the most withering sarcasm of which he was capable, and after that he would never see her again. Never. Not unless he had the happy occasion of tossing her a coin when she begged at his gate because she was so devastated she could never work again. Yes, that was it. He could see her now, in rags, her beautiful face smudged and her hair prematurely gray, begging him to—

Pamela caught his sleeve before he realized she was there. "My lord, I was hoping you would appear."

Torn from his walking daydream, he looked at her. This was no smudged, ragged, haggard prune. The handsome gown that he had chosen for her swirled like a silver cloud. Her blue eyes picked up the shades of gray and glittered with a combination not unlike a drift of clouds on a sunny day. Her hair, airily draped and curled, softened her countenance into a parody of sweetness. She looked like the embodiment of his sweetest dream—when she had actually executed his greatest nightmare.

Pulling him toward an unoccupied corner, she said quietly, "A terrible thing has happened."

The last of his discipline vanished. He was livid, absolutely livid, and he scarcely maintained the presence of mind to keep his voice down. "Did you think I wouldn't hear the moment I walked in the door?"

"You… know?" She glanced around, pale and daring to pretend innocence when she had betrayed him as soon as she set foot in Buckingham Palace. "Other people know?"

"Know? Everyone knows, and they've done nothing but tell me about it in one way or another since I came in."

Her forehead puckered and her eyes widened. "They know where Beth is?"

"With my grandfather, I would suppose."

"Lord Reynard found her? He went after her. We've both been searching, but without success, and if you're saying—"

"What are you talking about?"

"About… Beth." She examined him. "What are
you
talking about?"

Taking her arm, he backed her into a corner. He pulled himself up to tower over her, and he glared into her eyes. "I'm talking about you telling everyone my secret."

"Your secret?" The little harpy wasn't cringing as she was supposed to, and she blinked in obviously feigned confusion. "You have a secret? All I know about is that nonsense at Kensington Palace and you can't be worried about
that
at a time like
this!"

"Everyone is laughing!"

She held up her hand to halt him. "I believe we are talking at cross purposes, my lord. Let us understand each other. You are unhappy because somehow the truth of your youthful indiscretion got out and people are discussing your bare posterior."

"Among other things, and don't use that patient, tutorial tone with me."

"I, on the other hand, have a
real
problem."

His command clearly had had little effect on her, and he hadn't seen that expression on her face since she'd changed from the old Miss Lockhart to the young Pamela. But he recognized it. She wanted to rap his knuckles—or worse.

In a crisp, no-nonsense tone, she told him, "Beth arrived at the palace with Lord Reynard and me, but as soon as we entered, she disappeared. She was incredibly distraught. I fear she has run away."

"This is your terrible thing that happened?" Kerrich was trying to absorb the new information and not succeeding well. "If she disappeared right away, when did you have time to betray me?"

She stared at him as if he were demented, or worse. "I didn't betray you. Why would I care to? My only concern is that child, loose in the palace, wandering the halls. Perhaps she's lost."

"Nonsense. How could she get lost in here?"

"She's from a small orphanage and before that, a small home," Pamela snapped. "You tell me."

Kerrich looked around the long room, saw the smiling, chatting guests, thought about the size of the palace, and for the first time since he'd found Pamela, comprehended the seriousness of his predicament. The mystery of the counterfeiting genius was still unsolved, his cousin was on the loose, Queen Victoria was expecting to see him, child in tow, on the hour, Beth had disappeared, and he'd just proved to the woman he wanted to wed that he was not only a selfish noddy-pate, but also that he had no faith in her and her discretion. Assuming Pamela was telling the truth and had not spread the story of his upended and naked debut—and now that it was too late he saw no reason to doubt her—he would have to wait to discover the sly busybody who had informed against him, for now he had to find Beth, and make amends, and… this day couldn't get any worse. "Tell me where you've looked."

"I've walked all the rooms with guests in them. I didn't see her, but she's small and she probably wants to hide from me because she… is disappointed in me."

"Did you ask the governesses if they'd seen her?"

"No." Pamela wrung her hands. "I've been afraid to ask anyone for fear the news will spread that we are not responsible enough to care for a child, and that will ruin everything we've worked for. At the same time I think I'm being foolish for caring about something as trivial as the queen's good opinion when Beth is lost."

Kerrich had seen the expression on Beth's face when she'd heard them fighting. He doubted that she would do anything foolish; she'd proved herself savvy in every way. But she might very well be willing to see them embarrassed, and they had little time before their presentation to Queen Victoria.

That brat. To leave them standing before the queen and stammering out an explanation! Yet at the same time, he had to appreciate such a heady revenge, and he knew damned good and well that Beth had no incentive to cooperate. Not if she thought herself used and soon-to-be-abandoned.

"She isn't lost," he said with assurance. "She's hiding. But we need to find her." Untangling Pamela's hands, he placed one on his arm, then led her through the crowd toward the bow drawing room. He could feel her trembling, and in as soothing a tone as he could manage, he said, "Let's find the chamber where the children are playing and question them, and we can talk to the governesses, too."

Pamela's fingers flexed on his arm, and in a voice he had to lean close to hear, she said, "Devon, she was angry with me because I led her to believe you'd give her a real home. A place where she could stay forever."

He searched as they walked, and whenever he looked at someone, they smiled at him as if they were imagining him naked. He never smiled back. "She was angry with me, too."

"Yes, but I always knew that you were… that is, I thought of myself as better than… I just didn't realize how much I had betrayed my own integrity by making promises I couldn't keep."

She was insulting him. Blatantly, horribly. But she sounded wretched, and he did know what she meant. More than that, he wanted to comfort the woman who just now faced the results of her deal with the devil. "Beth is a bright girl," he murmured. "She'll come back."