A Private Duel with Agent Gunn (The Gentlemen of Scotland Yard) (44 page)

Finn said a silent prayer, then cursed Hardy, in that order. Toweling off, he yanked his dresser open. “Do you know where they went?”

Mrs. Doty sniffed. “I’ve a mind they didn’t venture far, sir.”

“Why do you say that?”

“They left on foot.”

Finn pulled on a fresh shirt. Belgrave Square’s private garden was large and a bit overgrown. Plenty of spots to pace off a duel. Christ, just like old Rufus to get himself gunned down in front of his own town house. “Be a dear, Mrs. Doty, and fetch my white braces and evening trousers.” He raised his chin. “And I shall make a hash out of this tie.”

Finn dressed and headed downstairs with his housekeeper whimpering behind him. “I don’t know what I’ll do if something happens to that young man.” Even though Hardy teased the woman mercilessly, Mrs. Doty had a mighty affection for his brother. She pointed down the hall. “Your things are in the study, sir.”

He turned at the banister and made his way down the hallway. He stopped at the umbrella stand to pick up his double-barrel rifle, the most reliable gun he owned. Inside his study he pocketed a box of shells and his Webley revolver. Mrs. Doty watched him from the open door. “How is Sergeant MacGregor?” he asked her.

“Doing well, I believe. The groom called the farrier out, sir.”

He exited the house and climbed into the waiting hansom. As they pulled away, he caught a glimpse of his overwrought housekeeper standing on the porch. Finn let down the side window. “Try not to worry yourself. Hardy’s been in worse spots.”

Chapter Thirty-five

“W
hat’s going on?” Cate pushed through a crowd of hovering onlookers and leaned over the young dancer. “Millicent, what on earth?”

Her understudy was lying on the ground gasping for breath. A glance down her body ended in a horrible sight. The young dancer’s foot lay at an odd angle, and the ankle bone jutted from the skin. Cate winced. It hurt just to look at the injury.

Gray Chamberlain knelt down and wrapped a towel around the bloodied leg. Cate shook her head. “How did this happen?”

He used a pocket square to secure the cloth bandage. “We were on our way downstairs—she slipped.” He shook his head. “She’s landed in a bad way on her ankle.”

Cate stared at him. “I can see as much.” He ran a hand through sandy brown hair.

“Mr. O’Donnell, we need to get Millicent to a doctor,” she called out to the stage manager.

“Henry’s on his way, Miss de Dovia.” One of the hands pushed his way through the bystanders. The burly lad
picked up Millicent as though she were a child’s doll. Cate led the way upstairs and out the backstage door. She squeezed Millicent’s hand. “You’re in good hands, Millie. Henry will stay with you, and I’ll send Francis over as well.”

Cate gave the driver a Harley Street address for a doctor who treated the dancers’ complaints and injuries. The big lad stuffed himself in beside Millicent and lifted the girl’s leg onto his lap. Millicent rolled her eyes. “Don’t you be getting any ideas, there.” She turned to Cate and managed a wistful smile. “I’m afraid you’ll have to go on tonight.”

Her heart leaped in her chest as she stepped away. Millicent grabbed hold and yanked her back. “Be careful.”

She searched her understudy’s face. “What are you saying, Millie?”

The girl lowered her voice to a whisper. “I remember being jostled on the stairs, more of a push than any stumble.” The hansom lurched off and Millicent let go of her hand. A confusing panoply of thoughts whirled through her mind as the cab turned the corner.

“She’s right, you’ll have to go on now.”

Cate whirled around to face Chamberlain. “I promised Finn I wouldn’t dance under any circumstances.” She found it hard to meet this man’s piercing gaze for long.

Cate brushed past him and headed into the theatre. What perturbed her most of all was that Chamberlain was right. No matter what she had promised Finn, she would have to go on. The entire operation had been planned around the opening movements of the dance and a silk streamer.

She could feel Mr. Chamberlain’s eyes on her back as she hurried down the backstage stairs. On the floor below,
a janitor mopped up smears of blood. She wondered if Millie would ever dance again. Tears filled her eyes at just the thought of it.

Cate chanced a glance behind her. Chamberlain also descended the stairs, but at a good distance behind her. The very attractive, disturbing man winked at her. There was only man in the world who was allowed to look at her that way, and he was on his way back to the theatre this very minute—togged up in evening attire and armed with his rifle.

She ran the rest of the way to her dressing room and slammed the door shut.

  *  *  *  

FINN STEADIED HIS long gun on the low branch of a small tree and took aim. Hardy stood a head taller than any of the other men gathered on the green, negotiating some finer point of rule. “Get cracking, gentlemen,” Finn hissed under his breath. He needed to be back at the Alhambra, posthaste.

“Twenty paces is far enough, since the earl has forgotten his spectacles.” Hardy’s voice carried over a rise of grass and through the dense vegetation. Finn gritted his teeth. Lennox House was just across the square. Easy enough to send a man over to collect a pair of eyeglasses. Advantage, Earl of Lennox.

Hardy finished rolling up his shirtsleeve. “Shall we, Rufus?” He selected a pistol out of the open case and inspected his weapon.

He knew his brother well enough to know Hardy planned to aim over the earl’s shoulder. But the fact remained, one could never be sure about these affairs of honor. Rufus might get off a lucky shot, and he’d be damned if his brother
would get killed by that nearsighted old bugger—and for a liaison with Lady Lennox, no less. Christ, every gay blade in London had been under her skirts.

No, Hardy and Gwen were being singled out because they hadn’t followed the protocols of polite adultery, and those rules were very clear. One could have an affair, just keep it discreet. And never let an attachment get out of hand.

Finn positioned his line of sight parallel to the dueler’s path. It would be a quick adjustment to move his aim from one man to the other. Bootes was calling out the paces. “Seventeen, eighteen . . .” At the stroke of twenty both men turned and lowered their pistols. Finn aimed. A rustle of breeze fluttered the fabric of the earl’s shirtsleeve. He squeezed the trigger. The bullet in barrel one brushed the earl’s shooting arm. Finn swiveled the gun barrel at Hardy and narrowed an eye down the sight. His brother aimed high, over the elder man’s shoulder. A breath ahead of Hardy, Finn pressed the second trigger and winged his brother in the arm.

Finn shifted his gaze above his gun sight. A streak of red marred each man’s shirtsleeve. He angled his rifle against the tree trunk and dipped under a branch. “Bootes! Hardy!” He called up the green. His manservant appeared pleasantly surprised to see him. “Good news, sir: both gentlemen have incurred only minor injuries.”

“There you are, Finn. Finally made it, I see.” A bit dazed, Rufus Lennox stared at his bloodied sleeve. “What the hell happened here?”

Finn stepped between the earl and his butler. He discreetly dropped two large-caliber bullets in Bootes’s palm. “My rifle is up against a tree behind you. Reload it for me, would you?”

“Very good, sir.” He caught a shifty grin from his butler.

Finn had a closer look at the earl’s arm while Rufus growled. “I don’t believe my honor has been satisfied.”

“Feeling well enough to grouse, Rufus?” Finn inspected the man’s arm. “I’d have that wound looked at.”

Hardy made his way over wearing a “you don’t fool me, brother” look on his face, and a shirtsleeve as red as the earl’s. “Nice shooting . . .” At the last minute Hardy turned to the earl. “Rufus.”

Taken aback, the earl sputtered out a return compliment.

“Excellent.” Finn smiled at both men. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I am expected elsewhere. I’m afraid London is awash in anarchist plots this evening.” He took a moment to eyeball the earl before turning to his brother. “Scotland Yard could always use an extra hand. Interested?”

“Wouldn’t miss it.” One of the earl’s footmen handed Hardy his coat.

“As my brother’s official second,” Finn backed away, “I declare the match satisfied.” They were outside the garden before his brother looked at his wound. “Barely nicked the flesh.” Finn tied a pocket square around Hardy’s arm.

“I didn’t know you were a trick shooter.”

Finn ignored Hardy’s jibe and climbed into the waiting hansom.

Hardy squeezed in beside him. “You might challenge Annie Oakley in Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show.”

Finn stared at his brother. “How many times have we come to blows?”

Hardy leaned away. Finn leaned closer.

Hardy retreated farther—as far as one could when wedged into a narrow cab seat. “I take back the Annie Oakley remark.”

“This is very important, Hardy, so listen carefully. There is going to be an assassination attempt tonight at the Alhambra—two Spanish dignitaries, or so we would like the perpetrator to believe. We’ve supplanted two of our own men in their place.”

A rush of heartbeats forced him to inhale a breath. “Against my better judgment, Cate has volunteered to be a part of this scheme. It seems she is the only one who can reliably identify the marksman. If anything happens to me, I want you to promise me you’ll take care of her. See to it she’s well provided for.”

“Christ, you sound like you want to marry her.” Now it was Hardy’s turn to stare, openmouthed. “Dog’s bollocks, Finn, you want to marry her.”

  *  *  *  

CATE STARED IN the dressing room mirror. “He’s been gone nearly three hours,” she mumbled under her breath. Lucy, her dresser, placed the feather tiara on her head.

“Did you say something, mademoiselle?” Lucy looked up from her pinning.

Feeling more than prickly, she inhaled a deep breath and moistened her lips. “Just wondering where a certain gentleman is.”

“Hold still now.” Lucy tilted her head to make eye contact in the mirror. “That fine looker I saw you with in the boxes?” She winked.

Cate grinned. “That would be him.”

Lucy dusted her nose with powder. “A lot of good-looking toffs about this afternoon—official-looking. Nosing around asking questions, like they were from Scotland Yard.”

Cate rolled her eyes. “That was because they were, Lucy.”
She turned toward her capable young dresser. “Stay away from the stage tonight.”

Her dresser lowered her voice, eyes like saucers. “Are there dynamiters about?”

Cate frowned. “Just—stay far back in the wings.”

A knock sounded at the door. “Ten minutes, Miss de Dovia.”

  *  *  *  

DOOR GLASS SHATTERED on both sides of the cab as the hansom turned onto Leicester Square. Caught in a hail of bullets, the horse screamed in panic and reared up on hind legs, raising the cab and nearly flipping it over. Finn fired his pistol over the heads of innocent bystanders. “We’ve lost our driver.” He glanced at Hardy. “Are you hit?”

“Just the nick you gave me—” Using the butt end of Finn’s rifle, Hardy cleared his window of broken glass. “We’re sitting ducks here.” His brother took aim. “Who am I shooting at?”

“You can’t—not unless you see a target.”

The blazing electric lights of the theaters brightened the square, but the glare made it hard to see where the bullets came from. Terrified theatergoers scattered in all directions as the reins fell slack and the horse charged off through the garden, taking them directly into a throng of pedestrians.

Finn reached through the shattered side window to the top of the hansom, but couldn’t reach the reins. “Break out the front window,” he yelled to Hardy, who used the butt end of the rifle to shatter the windshield. The hansom jerked, and they were both tossed back inside the cab as the horse bolted into the crowd. They careened
through the square, and another barrage of shots hit the rear of the cab.

Bystanders flung themselves out of the path of the runaway carriage. Any moment now, the hansom would topple over in the thick of the crowd. They were well past the fountain, and rolling wildly down a side street. Finn guessed they were somewhere behind the National Gallery. Leaning out his side window, he fired behind them. Even if he didn’t get close to whoever was shooting, it might serve as a bit of cover.