“True enough. More likely they’ll put it down once they reach this house. It sounds like someone’s country house.” The man glanced at him. “Like a palace to you.”
“Apparently the man who owns it is a duke.”
“Is that so?” The man was silent for a moment, then said, “Likely it’ll be huge. You meet me there tonight, at ten o’clock, behind the stable there. There’ll be a big stable, for sure.” Once again, the man’s pale eyes locked on Sangay. “If you get the holder, you bring it there tonight, but even if you don’t lay hands on it, you come and meet me there, you hear?”
Sangay hung his head, forced himself to nod even as misery washed over him. His nightmare was still not at an end. “Yes, sahib.”
“You wouldn’t want anything to happen to your mother, would you?”
He looked up, eyes wide. “No, sahib! I mean, yes-I will be there. I don’t want anything to happen to my maataa, sahib.”
“Good.” The man tipped his head. “Now get back there before they miss you. Go!”
Sangay turned and all but fled. Back down the mews and up the alley, but instead of going through the side door and across the hotel foyer, he followed the alley to the street and peeked around the corner.
The flurry about the carriages was in full swing. Likely no one had missed him. Mustaf, Kumulay and Cobby each stood on the roof of a different carriage, stowing the bags that an army of footmen, under Janay’s directions, handed up. The women in their colored saris, bright shawls wrapped about their heads, stood on the pavement and pointed and directed and argued with Janay and the men over where this bag, that bundle, should go. The colonel and the memsahib stood on the pavement closer to the door, haughtily surveying and waiting.
They all had been so much kinder to Sangay than any other people in his entire life, and yet he’d have to repay their niceness, all their kindnesses, by stealing from the colonel.
Sangay felt as if dirt was being ground into his soul.
But there was no help for it. If it had been only his death to be feared, Sangay hoped he would be brave enough to tell the man no, but he couldn’t let his maataa be killed-and killed horribly, too. No good son could have that on his conscience.
Dragging in a breath, Sangay straightened, then, seeing the women start to enter the carriages, he hurried out and quietly joined the melee.
Eight
December 15
Albemarle Street, London
Her hand in Del’s, Deliah climbed onto the step of the front carriage. Pausing to, from her temporary vantage point, look over the heads at the others entering the two carriages behind, she noticed the young Indian lad-the one Bess called the colonel’s boy-scurrying up from around the corner. He spoke to Janay, then conferred with Mustaf, who pointed at the roof of the third carriage. The boy nodded eagerly, and with the agility of a monkey, swarmed up to the roof, settling amid the bags and bundles secured there.
With a quirk of her brows, Deliah ducked and entered the carriage. As she took her seat, she decided she envied the boy. He’d have a good view as they traveled north through London, and with all the luggage around him, he’d have reasonable protection from the elements.
It was a still day, pervasively cold with gray clouds hanging low and a scent in the air that foretold snow. Not yet, however. Once they reached the open countryside, they would get a better sense of what the day might bring.
Del had paused on the pavement to exchange a few words with the head porter. Deliah settled her skirts, sank into the comforting leather. Del’s household and hers had merged into an effective team. The women had banded together and commandeered the second, slightly larger carriage. They would sit and chat and gossip through the journey. The men had been consigned to the third carriage; that no doubt would travel north in greater silence.
The doorway darkened as Del climbed in. He sat beside her, and the head porter, beaming and touching the brim of his hat, shut the door.
The carriage tipped fractionally as Cobby climbed up beside the driver, then a whip cracked, the carriage jerked as the horses leaned into the harness, and they were away, rolling slowly through the streets on their journey into Cambridgeshire.
Deliah glanced at Del. He was looking out of the window at the streetscapes sliding by. Her thoughts returned to the boy. She wondered how he’d come to be part of Del’s household, felt sure there would be some story there. It was tempting to ask, but…having Del there, seated beside her, reminded her of other things. Other things she really should take the time to think about.
So she did. Let the observations and questions she’d set aside over recent days, that she’d allowed to be overtaken by recent events, finally form in her mind.
Let her thoughts dwell on him, and on what had happened between them, what now existed between them-what label it was most accurate to attach to their…liaison.
Chief among her mental questions was how long that liaison would last.
As they rattled and rumbled through the streets of London, a comfortable silence enveloped them, contrasting with the bustle and noisy hustle outside, the buzz of humanity natural in any large city. And London was the largest of them all. It had spread and sprawled since she’d last traveled through it.
They’d chosen not to take the Great North Road, the obvious route to Cambridgeshire. With its constant stream of carriages, coaches and carts, wagons and riders, that route would be no help in tempting the Black Cobra into an attack. They’d opted instead for the lesser road through Royston. They should reach that minor town in the open country beyond London’s sprawl by lunchtime.
It was after that, once they’d lunched and taken to the road again, traveling along a straight but less frequented stretch to Godmanchester, then along a series of progressively quieter country roads to Somersham, that they expected their invitation to be accepted and the fiend to stage an ambush.
The view beyond the carriage window was growing more countrified. Deliah stirred, glanced at Del. “This house-Somersham Place. Why are you, and Tony and Gervase, so sure no attack will be made after we reach there?”
His lips curved in clear reminiscence. “You’ll understand when you see it. It’s a principal ducal residence, and it’s huge-massive. You could lose a company in it without effort.” He glanced at her, met her eyes. “I visited there years ago-in my school days. I knew houses could be large, but it was a revelation.”
“Is it the duke you know from…Eton?”
He nodded. “Sylvester Cynster, as he was then, known from the cradle by all as Devil. For good reason.”
She arched her brows. “Are you sure-if he was named that from the cradle-that it wasn’t simply a case of him living up to the title?”
He smiled. “That, too. Regardless, when the word went out for extra troops, cavalry in particular, in the lead up to Waterloo, Devil and his Cynster cousins joined as a body of six. We’d kept in touch. Through a feat of string-pulling, they were attached to my troop, so we fought together there.”
“Side by side?”
“Mostly back to back. It wasn’t pretty fighting, that day.” His voice, his expression, had turned grim.
She waited.
After a moment, Del shook aside the darker memories, refocused, then smiled again. “You’ll meet them-the six cousins. Apparently they’re all at Somersham with their wives.” That he was waiting to see. The idea of those hellions brought to heel by a pack of ladies…he wasn’t quite sure he believed it, but he was certainly curious, and looking forward to meeting the ladies involved. “They-the whole family-always gather at Somersham for Christmas, but this year the six families came early so the men could assist with Wolverstone’s plan. They know the other three couriers who are ferrying in the scroll-holders almost as well as they know me.”