“Not this sort of confrontation.”
Spare me from overly protective men. “I am leaving Hyde Park with Fleming, and a half dozen people, including you, will see me get into his coach. He is not foolish enough to harm a guest of Their Graces of Walden, much less to make an enemy of Lord Stephen Wentworth.”
Ned scowled in Fleming’s direction. “I will inspect the interior of the coach before handing you up, you will take the dog with you inside the coach and wherever else Fleming hauls you, and I will alert Stephen to this madness before St. Paul’s tolls the quarter hour.”
“Miss Abbott,” Fleming called. “Are you coming with me, or do I have Wentworth arrested?”
“He can do that, Ned, but he won’t physically harm me. He could have shot me from a rooftop as I returned from Sunday services if my actual end was Stapleton’s objective. They must believe I know where the letters are, and that ensures my safe conduct.”
“Miss Abbott,” Fleming said again. “You try my patience.”
“And you,” Abigail said, striding up to him, “would try the patience of St. Peter himself. I will accompany you, Lord Fleming. Your dis-honor guard will remain here, and Mr. Wentworth will see me to your coach. Hercules comes with me, and if you object to those terms, I invite you to go for a swim in the Serpentine. Lord Stapleton’s next caller will be Lord Stephen Wentworth, and he will do much more than try your meager patience.”
Ned made a shooing motion toward Fleming’s toughs, and they shuffled off in the direction of Knightsbridge, where any number of drinking establishments doubtless awaited their custom.
Abigail took a firm hold of Hercules’s leash with one hand, grasped Fleming’s arm with the other, and directed his lordship back to the walkway.
Hercules trotted along at her side, issuing the occasional growl. Truth be told, the dog’s company did make Abigail feel ever so much safer.
Chapter Thirteen
“She was enjoying herself,” Ned said, pacing the length of Stephen’s office. “The damned female was meant to rule Britain, and she knows it.”
“She doesn’t,” Stephen said, shrugging into his morning coat before getting to his feet. “Miss Abbott cannot be talked into considering the management of even a duchy. I must be off. Send a badger to tell Quinn and Duncan what you saw, and that I’ve gone to aid…I’ve gone to see if I can render any service to Miss Abbott.”
And to kill Stapleton, if need be.
Badgers were the Wentworth family’s network of street urchins, beggars, flower girls, and crossing sweepers. Some of them took work as bank messengers, and all of them answered to Ned. They were sharper than Wellington’s scouts and expected a good deal less in terms of wages.
“A badger has already been dispatched, and I will follow as soon as I talk sense to you. You can’t just barge in on a marquess’s household, Stephen. Not even you would be that bold.”
“Yes, I would”—he slipped a knife into his boot and tucked another into a coat pocket—“if I thought Abigail was in immediate danger. Stapleton tried to make off with her in York, but she belongs to the Wentworths now, and the marquess will tread carefully, at least for a time. Abigail knew that, or she would not have gone with Fleming. Once Stapleton realizes she doesn’t have the letters, he might not be so polite.”
“These are the copies?” Ned asked, gesturing to the papers spread over Stephen’s desk.
“Reconstructions, such as they are. Champlain was a nearly slavish correspondent, as if he thought his letters might be published someday to vast acclaim. He wrote to Abigail every Monday and Thursday without fail, for better than five months. Ninety percent of it is drivel.”
“And the other ten percent?”
“Worse than drivel. You may read them as examples of what not to write to your lady love. If you see anything approaching a pattern, you will tell me. I am at my wit’s end with the damned things.”
The object of the exercise was to give Ned something interesting to do, lest dear Neddy take it upon himself to break a few heads that were by rights Stephen’s heads to break.
“You think a code of some sort might be embedded here?” Ned asked, gathering the letters into a stack.
“A cypher, a signal, something.” Except that only Abigail had ever read the dratted letters, so what was the point of a hidden message?
“And you’re off to challenge Stapleton to a duel?” Ned said, shuffling the letters into some sort of order.
“Abigail frowns on violence, so no. I am off to call on Lady Champlain,” Stephen said. “When I showed up in Portman’s ballroom, I was swarmed by matchmakers, hostesses, dowagers, and the usual straying wives and merry widows. Lady Champlain did not offer me so much as a smile during the eternity that was the ball.”
“She’s one of your…”
“Dear former acquaintances. I met Harmonia when she was in the mood to make Champlain jealous, and I—being an agreeable sort of fellow—obliged her.”
“You are a disgrace.”
“I am a charming man who enjoys the occasional interlude with a willing woman, and Champlain all but threw her at me. Said my consequence exceeded his, and she ought to like that. I am not proud of my behavior, but everybody involved was willing.”
Ned folded the letters into a pocket of his tailcoat. “I do not now, nor will I ever, understand the Quality. Miss Abbott and I are agreed on that.”
“Read the letters,” Stephen said. “I will find out why Harmonia ignored me and see what Abigail’s about with Stapleton.”
Stephen knew better than to hurry—hurry resulted in falls, and falls could result in complete bed rest, not to mention days of pain and self-recrimination—but he made an efficient trip to the stables and a very quick jaunt on horseback to Stapleton’s front door.
The marquess’s butler was too well trained to overtly convey surprise, but he did try to take Stephen’s cane from him.
“I’ll keep it, if you don’t mind,” Stephen said. “I can see myself to the formal parlor.”
“My lord, I must announce you.”
“No, you must not. Her ladyship and I are old friends, and I’m surprising her.”
“But, my lord, she’s not in the formal parlor. His little lordship’s sixth birthday is next week, and the formal parlor is being thoroughly cleaned in anticipation of the happy day. Her ladyship is in the family parlor.”
“And where is Stapleton?” Stephen asked, examining his appearance in the mirror hanging on the door of the porter’s nook.
“I’m sure I couldn’t say, my lord. If you’ll follow me this way.”
A carriage rolled up to the front door, the Fleming town coach, though the crests were turned and the coachy and groom were not in livery. The chestnuts in the traces were distinctive, though, in that their white stockings did not quite match.
Fleming emerged and politely offered Abigail a hand down, which she ignored. She was in magnificent good looks, her parasol and walking stick at the ready. Hercules, regal and dangerous, panted at her side. Stephen had figured out on the ride over that her objective was reconnaissance of enemy territory. If she spotted one of Champlain’s journals, she’d doubtless discreetly borrow it.