“Where would I be likely to find her tomorrow?” he asked. “Lady Quinlan, I mean.”
Aunt Henrietta drew her chin back against her fleshy neck in a way that made her look more like Hendon than ever. “Well, let’s see. Morgana considers herself something of a bluestocking—she’s forever attending lectures at the Royal Academy and prosing on about electrical currents and steam engines and such nonsense. I should think she’d be likely to attend this balloon ascension we’ve been hearing so much about.”
“Balloon ascension? Where?”
“Good heavens, as if I would know.” Draining her wine, she set the glass aside and pushed to her feet. “Now you must be off. I’ve a party to attend.”
SEBASTIAN STOOD IN THE SHADOWS of his empty box at Covent Garden Theater and watched as Kat, splendid in the regal diadem and filmy trappings of Shakespeare’s Cleopatra, swept onto the stage below. He knew she couldn’t see him. Yet somehow she must have sensed he was there, because for a moment she paused, her head turning toward him, and a brilliant smile flashed across her face. A smile meant just for him.
He stayed some minutes simply for the pleasure of watching her. But before the curtain came down for the entr’acte, he turned to make his way backstage. He was starting to worry about Tom, and he wanted to ask Kat if she’d seen the boy. But as he pushed his way past the Fashionable Impures and the groups of Town bucks ogling them, he spotted a small boy in tiger’s livery hovering near the corridor.
“Where the devil have you been?” demanded Sebastian, collaring his tiger. “I was about to send around to the watchhouses to see if you’d been taken up.”
Tom tightened his hold on the brown-paper-wrapped package in his arms. “I been waitin’ for them to finish cleaning Miss Kat’s costume.”
“Cleaning?” repeated Sebastian ominously.
“It’s as good as new, I promise,” he said hastily, then added, “Almost.”
“Almost?”
Tom’s shoulders drooped. “I should have told her I’d have the apple.”
Chapter 17
The Public Office at Queen Square didn’t have the cachet of Bow Street, with its famous Runners and its Bow Street Patrol and the vicarious glamour that lingered still from the days of the Fieldings. But the position of chief magistrate at Queen Square suited Sir Henry Lovejoy just fine.
He was a serious man, Lovejoy, unimpressed by either fame or glamour. A widower who’d been childless now for more than a decade, he had decided in midlife to devote the remainder of his years to public service. If he’d been a Catholic, Sir Henry probably would have become a priest. Instead, he’d become a magistrate, pursuing his new dedication to justice with a religious zeal that drove him to arrive at his Queen Square office every morning before eight.
The air was cool that Saturday and blessedly clear, thanks to the stiff wind blowing in from the east. Pausing in a slice of sunshine on the corner across from the Public Office, Lovejoy bought a muffin from a baker’s boy, then hesitated, his attention caught by a tall young man in an elegant chapeau bras and cape making his way through the crowd of street hawkers and milkmaids.
“You’re up early, my lord,” said Lovejoy when Viscount Devlin came abreast of him. It was rare to see a resident of Mayfair abroad before midday. But then, judging by the Viscount’s evening dress, Lovejoy realized it was unlikely the young Viscount had ever made it to bed last night—or at least, Lovejoy decided after a moment’s shocked reflection, it was obvious Devlin had never made it to his own bed.
A faint gleam lightened the younger man’s strange amber eyes, as if he had followed the progression of Lovejoy’s disapproving thoughts and been amused by it. But the amusement faded quickly. “You’ve heard about the discovery of the Marchioness of Anglessey’s body in the Pavilion?”
“Who has not?” said Lovejoy, the Viscount falling into step beside him as they turned to cut across the square. “I can tell you, I don’t like some of the whispers I’m hearing. It’s troublesome. Very troublesome. The royal family can ill afford such a scandal at this time.”
Lovejoy glanced sideways at his companion, but Devlin’s face was impassive. Either he had not heard the rumors about what they had taken to calling the Hanover Curse, or he had decided it was wiser not to comment upon them. Instead he said, “I’ve discovered Guinevere Anglessey left her house in Mount Street early last Wednesday afternoon, after asking one of her servants to procure a hackney for her.”
Lovejoy drew up short. “Do you mean to say she was here? In London?”
“That’s right. She could very well have been killed here.”
“Good God. Where?”
“I don’t know. It would help if I could talk to the hackney driver. The footman can’t recall the carriage number, but he thinks the driver was from Yorkshire.”
Lovejoy gave a pained sigh. “Do you have any idea how many hackney drivers in this city are from Yorkshire?”
“No. But I would imagine you do.”
He studied the young nobleman’s lean, handsome face. “Why are you involving yourself in this?”
Devlin widened his eyes in a feigned expression of innocent surprise. “If I remember correctly, you’re the one who suggested I might be of assistance in such delicate matters.”
“And you told me you were motivated to investigate last January’s murderers by pure self-interest. So what is your interest in the death of Lady Anglessey?”
“I have my reasons.”
“Huh. That’s what worries me.”
Ducking his head to hide a smile, the Viscount started to turn away, then paused to glance back and say, “You take an interest in scientific inquiries, do you not?”
It was something Lovejoy prided himself upon, his diligent determination to stay abreast of current scientific developments. But he wasn’t sure how Devlin had come to know of it. “Yes. Why?”
“You wouldn’t happen to know where there’s to be a balloon ascension today, would you?”
THE BALLOON ASCENSION WAS SCHEDULED for eleven o’clock that morning in St. George’s Fields on the south side of the Thames.
“It’s unnatural, it is,” said Tom as they neared the fields, and the rippling sheets of red and yellow silk could be seen taking shape just above the treetops. “Men weren’t meant to sail through the clouds.”
Sebastian laughed and handed the chestnuts’ reins to the boy. “Keep the curricle well back from the crowd. I’ve heard tales of these things catching fire and causing a panic.”
Tom nodded solemnly. “No need to worry about that, yer lordship. I’ve no intention of gettin’ anywhere near that contraption.”
Continuing on foot, Sebastian pushed his way onto the field. A motley throng had assembled to watch the balloon ascension, gentlemen in top hats and ladies with parasols mingling with tradesmen in their Sunday best and the usual assortment of thieves and cutthroats and pickpockets. The cool morning breeze had withered away, leaving the day still and hot. The beer peddlers were doing a brisk trade, the rich malty odor from their barrels rising up to mingle with the scents of grass and hot gas and warm, closely pressed bodies.
He found Guinevere Anglessey’s half sister, Morgana, not far from where a roaring furnace was slowly filling the silk sheath with gas. A tall, angular woman with a long, sharp-featured face and skin that was inclined to freckle, she had none of her sister’s soft curves or winning ways. She’d brought along a hatchet-faced abigail as a nod to the proprieties, although Morgana Quinlan struck Sebastian as the type of woman who was more than capable of taking care of herself.