“And once I have found this man what am I to do?”
“Stay clear of him. Inform me only.” Her eyes never wavered from Crispin’s. “I need to know his movements. If he leaves London, for instance. Who he meets. And if he exchanges any…packages.”
“Packages? Of what size?”
“Of any size.”
“I see,” said Crispin, amused. He vigorously rubbed out his coat with the damp cloth. “And so, a man with no name with an object of no particulars is staying God-knows-where. Is that correct?”
“Be flippant if you wish, sir, but I am willing to pay.”
Crispin sighed as he worked on the coat. “My empty larder is convinced of your desperation. When was the last time you saw him?”
Lady Vivienne blinked her thick lashes and slowly rose. When she sauntered toward him, he dropped the cloth. Her hips rolled and the sinewy body followed, the whole suggesting the gait of a slender cat. She stood close to him, measuring him up and down. He smelled the scent of lavender but it did little to mask the muskiness of woman. “It might have been a sennight. It might have been less.”
“‘Might have been’? My lady, you are imprecise in the extreme. If I am to help you at all, I need more from you.”
“You need more from me?” She stepped closer. “I have told you what I know.”
“But only as you want me to know it.”
She laughed, giving her the excuse to touch him lightly on the chest. He winced from the renewed pain of the raw flesh beneath the coat. Her face betrayed her displeasure and he felt the need to explain.
“A wound newly received, Lady. I wear bandages beneath.” He gestured to the rust-colored coat.
“Oh. For a moment I thought my touch revolted you.”
“Now how could that be?”
She touched his shoulder. “Better?”
“Yes.”
Her features softened with sympathy. She took in the room before settling again on Crispin’s face. “Have you no one to see to your needs? It is a terrible thing to be alone. And in pain.”
Crispin drew a deep breath. “I have seen to my own needs for quite some time now.”
“But a wound so close to the heart….” Her fingers brushed his neck. She suddenly noticed where her hand lay and she blushed and drew it back.
Her face in its crumpled sympathy was far too close to his and he felt the warmth of her, and even smelled a faint breath of anise sweetening her lips. The effect intoxicated and he stepped closer. “You are too familiar with me, my lady. And here you are in a man’s room unescorted. What could you be thinking?”
She did not step back as expected. “It only seems to me that I recognize a kindred spirit. A man who is perhaps as lonely and as vulnerable as I.”
Was it his imagination, or was she leaning closer? He was a little too light-headed to debate it, and he found himself slanting toward her and met her mouth with his. His arms drew her into his sore chest causing only a hissing inhale through his nose. A dream. It must have been. He wasn’t in the habit of kissing strange women on their first meeting, but Vivienne’s palpable distress beckoned him. And her lips did nothing to repel his own. In fact, they seemed particularly inviting. He wanted to kiss her, but the circumstances restrained his full passion, and good sense finally made him push her back.
“My lady,” he whispered, and then cleared his throat. He offered an awkward bow. “You are quite correct. We are both most vulnerable.”
She offered a sad smile and sauntered the long way around the table to the door and touched the post. “Forgive me, Master Guest. I have a habit of giving in too easily to my…whims.”
A creeping sense of embarrassment reddened his ears. He pulled his coat partly to straighten it, partly to give him time to think. “Yes, well. It…it will help if I know what he looks like,” he said hastily. “I have been known to find a man by his description alone.”
She measured him coolly under her lashes. She seemed unmoved by their encounter. “He is slightly taller than you, clean-shaven, dark hair, with cruel, blue eyes. Ask for the Frenchman with the foreign gown. He is fond of wearing it.”
“A clean-shaven Frenchmen at the Spur. This shouldn’t be too difficult.”
“It is very important you find him and follow him. Not merely for me, but…” She cut herself off and shook her head slightly. Clearly she felt she had revealed too much.
“When I discover something, how shall I contact you? Shall I…send to court?” Court wasn’t a place Crispin was welcomed. He hadn’t passed through its doors in many a year now and he did not relish even passing by it.
“I will contact you.” She pulled a silver coin from the purse at her belt. “Your payment.”
He shook his head. “It is too much.”
“I am certain you will earn it.”
A smile lifted one side of his mouth, remembering their kiss. “I am certain I will.” He took the coin and watched her leave.
CHAPTER TEN
No sign of Jack Tucker. The boy had obviously taken Crispin’s words to heart. As usual, the timing was excellent. He wanted to ask the boy if he’d seen anything and help him clean his cotehardie and his room. Alas.
He tidied his lodgings as best he could. Nothing was broken or missing but it did not please him that strangers had been through his private things. What was it they were looking for? He rubbed his sore chest distractedly.
His pouch was heavier for a change. Usually it was feast or famine. And today it was raining clients. First the sheriffs and now Lady Vivienne. He sighed thinking of her. What a fool he was. How a flicking eyelash could bestir him!
Vivienne sought an “object of great price” and since she was not forthcoming he could only speculate as to what that might be. Some rare jewel, perhaps. Or something else. How could he begin to know?
He dismissed thoughts of Vivienne for the moment and thought of the other job. Yes, he wanted to solve this murder, and yes, he wanted more than anything to see Stephen hang for it, but now there were these damned men hunting him and ransacking his place. It was all getting to be a bit more trouble than sixpence a day might be worth.
Well, one thing at a time. He had no idea how to find Stephen, but he could first go to the Spur and find Lady Vivienne’s unnamed mystery man.
Crispin locked his lodgings and traveled down the Shambles, making the long walk west. He turned a corner and went down Friday Street before he stopped, measuring the two-story tavern, the Spur. Its front steps were washed, its sign newly painted.
He stood across from the tavern for a while before he ambled across the lane and pushed open the door. Making a slow circuit around the great room’s perimeter, he measured faces and characters of its noble inhabitants.
No one fit the description given by Lady Vivienne. At length, he decided to ask.
The innkeeper, a solitary man, stood very tall and very thin. He eyed Crispin’s clothes as Crispin inquired. “Nay. I do not remember a man of that description.”
“Perhaps it was a sennight ago. A man in a foreign gown or cloak. A Frenchman.”
“A Frenchman you say? Aye. There was such a gentleman. He’s been a lodger here for a sennight.”
“Is he still here?”
“His room is here, but as to the gentleman, I have not seen him for two days, maybe three, yet he paid for a full fortnight.”
“His room. Where is it?”
The innkeeper suddenly brought himself up short. “And just who might you be, my lord?”
Crispin straightened his shoulders. The cloak resting on them felt almost like it used to. “I am Lord Guest, and this man has something of mine. I would consider it a courtesy if you would take me to his room.”
The man jerked his head in a hasty bow. “If it’s as you say…then follow me, my lord.”
The man led Crispin up the stairs along the gallery where he glanced down below at the long tables and raucous drinkers. The hearth flung its light across their drunken faces.