Miss Ardleigh looked confused. "I'm afraid I don't understand any of this," she said. "What did you do wrong, Mr. Milbank? And why should you have wanted to be arrested?"
Milbank unbuttoned his dustcoat. "It's the Home Office, y' see, ma'am. Rules of the road. Parliament has set a speed limit of four miles an hour in open country and two miles an hour in towns. And a man has to walk twenty yards in front, carrying a red flag."
"It's to ensure the citizens' safety," Patsy explained excitedly to Miss Ardleigh. "Motorcars go so exceedingly fast that-"
"Safety be damned," Milbank said with a snort. "Begging your pardon, ma'am. It's the commercial interests, y' see. The railroads, chiefly. They fear competition."
"So Mr. Milbank has made a cause of it," Bradford told Miss Ardleigh. "He travels about, lecturing on the promise of the combustion engine and breaking the law wherever he can."
"Breaking the law!" Patsy cried, wide-eyed. "How wonderfully wicked!"
"Right," Bradford said emphatically. "Shouldn't wonder if he'll be arrested yet."
"Shouldn't wonder," Charles agreed affably, glancing once more at Patsy. He was gratified to see the blush on her cheek as she looked at her new hero. Eleanor's eyes, as well, were fixed on Milbank. Miss Ardleigh, he saw, merely looked thoughtful.
' 'I suppose the combustion engine will make some people very rich," she observed, stepping back to look at the machine with a critical eye.
Milbank and Bradford Marsden exchanged glances. "To be sure," Milbank said, "provided that the Home Office takes the blinders off before it's too late. The Self-Propelled Traffic Association, of which I am proud to be a member, is trying to persuade 'em."
Bradford looked somber. "What do you think of the chances, old man?"
Milbank shrugged. "Could be worse," he said. "We could be trying to bargain with the Royal Navy."
There was a commotion on the other side of the stable yard, and the lookers-on began to scramble. "I demand to know the meaning of this!" a voice roared. Charles turned. It was Lord Marsden, striding formidably across the yard in his riding clothes.
With a look of trepidation, Bradford stepped forward. "Let me present the Honorable Mr. Thomas Milbank to you, Papa. He has stopped on his way back from Cambridge to show us his-"
"The cfo-honorable Mr. Milbank," Lord Marsden thundered. He raised his riding crop in a threatening gesture. "Sir, I'll thank you to get your bloody contraption out of my stable yard. It's scared the horses and fouled the air. And there's not been tuppence of work out of anybody since you got here." He glared at the motorcar. "Not only wicked, but vulgar," he muttered.
"But Papa," Eleanor objected hurriedly, "we've asked Mr. Milbank to stay to tea."
"Didn't ask me," Lord Marsden snapped, and stalked off.
Bradford looked chagrined. "Fearfully sorry, old chap," he muttered. ' 'The guv has no love for motorcars. But I didn't think he would be insulting."
"Not to worry," Mr. Milbank said comfortably. "I'm continually being insulted. The motorcar has a way of stirring men up." He buttoned up his dustcoat. "Should be off, anyway. Dining in Colchester tonight. Friend of mine-actress- has removed there from London. D'you know her? Mrs. Farnsworth. Florence Faber, she was, when she was on the stage."
"Oh, yes," Miss Ardleigh said unexpectedly. "My aunt introduced me to her last Saturday. Quite an interesting lady."
Eleanor stared, her sensibilities obviously shocked. "An… actress? And you found such a person… interesting?"
Miss Ardleigh smiled. "I did indeed," she answered. "It was at her house that I met Conan Doyle, the author of the Sherlock Holmes mysteries-and Oscar Wilde, as well."
"Dear Kathryn," Eleanor said with a nervous turn of her head. "Murder mysteries and Oscar Wilde. You constantly amaze me." She paused, seeming to reflect. "But then, you are an American. I suppose that is the explanation."
"Doyle and Wilde, eh?" Milbank remarked with a laugh. "That's Florence Farnsworth, to be sure. She dares to be both wicked and wonderful at once, and everyone flocks to her. What a creature."
What a creature indeed, Charles was thinking. The object of his attention, however, was not Tommy Milbank's Farnsworth, but Miss Ardleigh, absorbed just now in her conversation with Eleanor. The woman at once intrigued and exasperated him. Stumbling onto the dig as if by accident, pretending that she had chanced into the railway station in search of a timetable, intruding upon his investigation of Prodger, finding that fragment of feather-blast it, the woman was ubiquitous! The more he thought about her, the more outrageous her behavior seemed to him. It was a wonder he had been able to get to Queen Street and back today without her turning up.
While the women talked, Bradford pulled Milbank aside. "I wonder, Milbank," he said, lowering his voice, "if I might drive into Colchester with you. I have some questions about motorcars. In particular, about Mr. Harry Landers. He has
acquired a number of patent licenses and is planning to float a new company, which he calls the British Motor Car Syndicate. Are you acquainted with him?''
Charles turned his attention from Miss Ardleigh to Bradford. Harry Landers? If his friend was involved with that charlatan, no wonder he had been worried of late. Anything Landers turned his hand to be likely to prove a confidence game.
Milbank jerked on his helmet. "To be sure, I know Landers," he said. "Wish I didn't, either," he added.
"I think we had better talk," Bradford said quietly. "I'll get my coat."
A few minutes later, Charles watched Bradford and Tommy Milbank drive off, accompanied by the vulgar belch-ings of the motor, the exultant shouts of small children, and the excited yapping of the manor dogs. Eleanor picked up the skirt of her green dress. "I suppose we might as well go in to tea," she said with evident regret. "Although how Papa could be so rude-"
"Yes, he was rude, wasn't he?" Patsy said, frowning. "I can't think why." She shook her golden curls, clearly nettled. "Mr. Milbank is such a handsome gentleman." A veiled glance at Charles suggested that her remark was intended to inspire jealousy.
Charles responded with a quick smile. "Handsome and rich," he said agreeably. "The Milbanks, of course, hold quite a prominent role in society." Patsy lapsed into a thoughtful silence.
As they turned toward the manor house, Miss Ardleigh adroitly allowed the sisters to move ahead and fell in step with Charles. Although he was perfectly disposed to be irritated with this forward behavior, which so nearly resembled her brash intrusions of the past few days, he could not help noticing that the pale gold of her wool costume, reminiscent of champagne, was striking against her mahogany hair. And if he had not been distracted by the odd compound of irritation and admiration that swirled like an alchemist's brew inside him, he might have been prepared for the observation that followed her greeting. Instead, it startled him.
"I wonder," she remarked, "whether the portfolio under your arm contains the photographs of which we have spoken."
Charles clutched his portfolio tighter. If he had looked into his feelings at this moment, he might have remarked that he was holding on to it exactly as a drowning man holds on to a life preserver. But he did not. "As a matter of fact, it does," he said stiffly. "But I do not think it is especially prudent to-"
"You promised to show them to me," Miss Ardleigh reminded him. Her sidewise glance seemed oddly merry, as if she were making fun of him. "You think my interest… wicked? Or vulgar?"
"Neither." He frowned. Actually, he found her interest both disconcerting and stimulating, but he could hardly tell her that. He settled for a caution that, even to his ears, sounded remarkably like something Sir Archibald or Lady Henrietta might say. "They are, after all, the photographs of a dead man."