“Unfortunately, you’ve no real proof,” said Sir Henry Lovejoy. They were seated beside the cold hearth in the magistrate’s simple parlor on Russell Square. A fire would have helped take the chill off the damp night, but Lovejoy never allowed a fire to be kindled in his house outside the kitchen after the first of April. Sebastian knew that for Lovejoy, it wasn’t a matter of frugality so much as a question of moral fiber.
Sebastian poured himself another cup of hot tea and said, “Hannah Green identified Patrick Somerville.”
“As a customer. There’s no law against paying a woman for a moment’s physical gratification, however morally repugnant it might be. She didn’t see him kill anyone. And even if she had, who’d take the word of a soiled dove against that of a hussar captain wounded in the defense of his country?”
“He wasn’t wounded. He has malaria.”
“I think I’d rather be wounded.”
“Frankly, so would I.” Sebastian took a sip of his tea and wished it were something stronger. “There’s still the harp player. She heard the men who attacked the Academy last night. If Somerville was one of them—and I strongly suspect he was—she would recognize his voice. If we can set up a situation in which she can hear him—”
“No jury would convict a hussar captain on the strength of testimony given by a blind woman who played the harp in a brothel.”
Sebastian knew a welling of frustration. Lovejoy was right, of course. But there had to be a way. . . . “The girl who worked in the cheesemonger’s shop across from the Magdalene House might recognize him. She noticed several gentlemen loitering in the street right before the fire.”
“Did she actually see them go into the house?”
“No.”
Lovejoy thrust out his short legs and crossed them at the ankles. “It’s just all too convoluted and confused. Even I still don’t understand it properly.”
Sebastian leaned forward, his elbows braced on his knees. “A week ago last Tuesday, two men—Max Ludlow and another gentleman I’ve yet to identify—hired Rose Fletcher, Hannah Green, and Hessy Abrahams off the floor of the Academy as part of a birthday surprise for one of their friends—Captain Patrick Somerville. The women were taken by hackney to rooms someplace, where Somerville later joined them. It must have been decidedly awkward when he realized one of the women his friends had hired for the night was Rachel Fairchild, the sister of his childhood playmate.”
Lovejoy cleared his throat uncomfortably. “Decidedly awkward, I should think.”
“So awkward that I get the impression neither one of them let on about it. But Somerville must have said something to his friends the next day. And when it came out that Rachel’s mother was French—that Rachel herself spoke French—they realized they’d been indiscreet. That she had overheard—and understood—a dangerous conversation the men had conducted in French, assuming none of the women could understand them.”
“So they went back to the Academy the next night, planning to kill the women? Before they could tell anyone what they’d heard?”
“Yes. Except, of course, it all went awry. The mysterious third gentleman made his kill quickly, breaking Hessy Abrahams’s neck. But Rachel Fairchild managed to stab Max Ludlow with a pair of sewing scissors, and then warn Hannah Green. I gather the three men were supposed to meet up at a tavern later. When Ludlow didn’t show up, the others had no way of knowing what had gone wrong. It must have taken them several days to figure it out, and to trace the two surviving women to the Magdalene House.”
“By which time Hannah Green had already fled.” Lovejoy stared thoughtfully at the cold, blackened recesses of the hearth. “They killed an extraordinary number of people, simply to silence one woman.”
“They’re soldiers. They’re trained to kill. And they’re on a mission.”
“To kill the Prime Minister?” Lovejoy stirred his tea, his features pinched and troubled. “You’ve told Perceval of your theory?”
“That someone is planning to assassinate him? Yes.”
“And?”
Sebastian smiled. “He didn’t believe me any more than you do.”
Lovejoy laid aside his spoon with a soft clatter. “It just seems so absurd. No British prime minister has ever been assassinated. And by three of His Majesty’s own officers? What possible motive could they have for doing such a thing?”
Sebastian shook his head. “I don’t know. What can you tell me about the man found this morning? Max Ludlow.”
“Nothing to his discredit. He’s described as a model officer—loyal, brave, efficient.”
“Which regiment?”
“The Twentieth Hussars.”
The same as Somerville, thought Sebastian. Aloud, he said, “Where did he serve?”
“Italy, Jamaica, Egypt, the Sudan—just about everywhere. He even had a hand in the capture of Cape Town from the Dutch.”
“Then he was sent to Argentina?”
“That’s right.”
Sebastian stared down at the dregs of his teacup. It had been nearly five years since the disastrous Argentinean campaign, when Britain had tried to wrest Spain’s wealthy South American colony for its own. The expedition had been ill conceived and undermanned. Thousands of men from England, Scotland, and Ireland had left their bones in the Rio de la Plata, while many of the survivors returned home ruined and bitter.
“You’ve no idea who this third man is?” said Lovejoy.
Sebastian set aside his empty cup and pushed to his feet. “No. If I could find out who Ludlow and Somerville’s associates are—who they served with in the past—it might tell me something.”
Lovejoy nodded. “I’ll set one of the constables to look into it.”
“You’ll—” Sebastian broke off as comprehension dawned. “So you’ve done it, have you? You’ve decided to accept the position at Bow Street.”
Sir Henry permitted himself a small, proud smile. “It’s not official until tomorrow morning, of course. But, yes.”
“Congratulations.”
Sir Henry’s smile widened, then slowly began to dim.
Chapter 55
MONDAY, 11 MAY 1812
Hero slept poorly that night. Long after the house had settled down around her and the last of the carriages had rattled past in the street below, she lay awake staring at the satin folds in the hangings above her bed.
She’d thought, once, that if she could only discover who killed the women of the Magdalene House, and why, then she’d understand how Rachel Fairchild had come to be there—how the granddaughter of a duke could ever have fallen so low as to make the sordid life of a woman of the streets her own. Once or twice Hero’d had the niggling suspicion that Devlin knew more than he was letting on. But she couldn’t begin to comprehend why he was refusing to tell her. Hero herself felt no closer, today, to understanding the riddle of Rachel’s life than she’d been a week ago. And she knew a growing sense of frustration, a fear that she was never going to know, never going to understand.