The butler led us to one of these private tables where a round-stomached man in a finely tailored suit waited. He vaulted to his feet as we entered the otherwise empty room.
“Major. Thank you so much for joining me.” The man’s voice was smooth, his smile warm. His face and hands were brown from the Caribbean sunshine, his portly build attesting to his love of meals, but his suit was as well-made as any Grenville wore. His hair, going to gray, had been slicked back with pomade, his watch chain gleamed gold, and the stickpin in his lapel bore a winking emerald.
“Captain Lacey,” Orlando Fitzgerald said, shaking my hand. “Well met. I am so pleased you could come along. I love meeting new people. And a friend of Grenville’s no less.”
His final words told me how Eden had persuaded Fitzgerald to include me in the invitation.
We were seated, and the efficient butler brought red wine, sugar, and a bowl to set in front of Fitzgerald. While he proceeded to make these into punch, I accepted a glass of dry white hock to drink unadulterated. Eden took some of the punch.
“One grows used to sweet concoctions in the tropics,” Eden told me apologetically. “It takes the sting out of the torpid weather and the biting insects.”
Fitzgerald laughed heartily. “Indeed. Rum is best when mixed with orange, lime, and a dash of sugar. Delightful. To your good health, sir.”
He raised his glass to me and took a fulsome gulp. Eden and I sipped more modestly.
“Pity about Warrilow,” Fitzgerald went on after he’d dabbed his mouth with a handkerchief, leaving a pink stain on the linen. “He was not the most pleasant of fellows. Downright blistering on occasion. I imagine he startled a burglar, and Warrilow, instead of shouting for help like a sensible chap, snarled at him about the error of his ways. Burglar became fed up and smashed him over the head.” He chuckled.
“An interesting speculation,” Eden said. “But until we find the burglar, we shall never know.”
“Ah, well. It’s a terrible thing, and I am certain to tell my valet to lock my door at night. But it makes me all the more determined to enjoy life while I have it.” He lifted his glass in another toast.
“What brings you back to London?” I asked.
“A rather creaky ship.” Fitzgerald grinned. “It was time. I’m not a young man anymore. My poor old pa sent me out to Antigua to remove me from the danger of becoming a dissipated and useless blight on the landscape. A canny man, was my father. We didn’t have a title to keep the family from ruin, and I could have landed him in desperate straits. Look what happened to Brummell, who’s now rusticating in France, living on the charity of others. I was furious with my father for packing me off, but it turned out to be the making of me.”
Several footmen served us a cream soup as this speech ended, then quietly retreated. I dipped my spoon into the smooth, thick liquid, and tasted a velvety broth with a hint of nutmeg. Some among the dandy set disparaged White’s cuisine, considering Watier’s, run by a chef, to have the best food. However, I found nothing to sneer at as I imbibed the soup.
“You enjoyed Antigua?” I asked as we slurped.
“I am not certain one enjoys Antigua.” Fitzgerald swallowed his last bite of soup before Eden and I were halfway through our bowls. “But it was good to me. I made a circle of friends. I was a bit haughty about the plebeian crowd when I first arrived, but soon found genuinely good fellows. I nearly married but came to my senses in time. Ha ha. She wed a better man and bore him a half dozen sturdy children.”
“But it was time to come home?”
“Indeed. As I said, I am growing no younger. The heat became more difficult to bear each year, and the storms …” He shuddered. “They did not come along often but when they did, they were terrifying. Eden, here, knows what I mean. English weather is far more tame. Forever damp, but it’s predictable.”
Fitzgerald leaned back comfortably as he waited for Eden and me to catch up, not at all chagrined by his appetite.
The footmen whisked away our bowls as soon as I’d scooped up the last drop and replaced them with plates of fish in a butter sauce with plenty of fresh dill.
Eden took over the questions. “What do you plan to do now that you are home? Retire to the country and collect spoons?”
Fitzgerald laughed and thumped the table. Though he ate quickly, he did so neatly, wiped his fingers on a napkin, and only spoke or laughed when his mouth was empty. A gourmand, I decided, rather than a glutton.
“I hope not. No, I shall look up old acquaintance, go to the theatre, join a hunt, enjoy what I could not in the islands.”
“A sound plan,” I said.
We finished the fish, Fitzgerald inhaling it in several large bites. The footmen removed the plates and brought forth the meat, a roast in an excellent wine sauce accompanied by hunks of crusty bread.
“You did not join me tonight so I could speak nostalgically about my life, Captain Lacey,” Fitzgerald said after we’d made a start on the beef. “You want to know if I had anything to do with Warrilow’s death. I have heard much about you in the very short time I have been staying at White’s. Grenville’s captain friend, they say, who makes a nuisance of himself but finds criminals where the Runners cannot. The cavalryman with mud on his boots who stole away the beautiful Lady Breckenridge and has brought down men from on high.” Fitzgerald sawed at his roast and paused, a large hunk poised before his mouth. “So, Captain. What would you like to know?”
CHAPTER 13
F itzgerald’s amiable openness was disarming—almost. I decided not to let my fledgling liking for the man cloud my judgment.
“Why were you closely watching your baggage on the ship?” I asked casually. “Eden says you were worried about the common sailors, but if anything had gone missing, the captain surely would have made them turn out their pockets.”
“Ah.” Fitzgerald finished his mouthful of beef and washed it down with a long swig of wine—the butler had returned and filled our glasses with a hearty red. “Not for nefarious reasons, Captain, and nothing that had anything to do with Warrilow. I came across a curiosity while traveling among the islands, and I’d purchased it for a goodly sum. I was assured by the seller that it was worth quite a bit more, and I believe it. When we finish our meal, I’ll show it to you. If my boots or silver hairbrushes had gone missing, that would have been annoying but hardly devastating. However, I would have been quite upset if someone had stolen this prize. It is not large, and a sailor could hide it among his things. But even if the captain would have searched their belongings if I’d reported the item stolen, I did not want to risk it being damaged. It is irreplaceable.”
Fitzgerald punctuated his remarks with stabs of his fork. At the end, the fork dove into the last of his beef, and he masticated, mouth closed, explanation at an end.
He had me intrigued by this curiosity, whatever it was, which had been his purpose, I believed.
We finished the beef and turned to the next course, greens that were decidedly limp and a capon in a black pepper sauce that was tough. Perhaps this was why the dandies had preferred Watier’s, a lively club that had sadly come to an end.
“What will you do with yourself, Eden?” Fitzgerald asked as the chicken and greens vanished from his plate. “Unless you plan to do the spoon collecting?”