Bound by Your Touch (24 page)

Lydia Boyce came to mind. She was like a chorus he could not get out of his head. As he focused on her consciously, he became aware that his mind had been straying toward the thought of her all night. A week had passed since he'd seen her last. Not at the Spencers' garden party, not at Elmore's rout, not even at the Mow-brays' musicale. Why the hell had he attended such idiotic events? To run into her? The possibility should not trouble him. He was in the mood for some righteous condemnation, a lecture in a darkened hallway, another kiss, more besides. He'd lounged about quite vigorously, waiting for her to appear. He would amuse her sufficiently; he had no doubt of it. But it seemed she did not want for amusement. She'd hared off to the Pateshalls' home in the Chilterns, and he knew this only because Elizabeth had traveled there for the weekend. In the letter she'd sent this morning, she mentioned how quietly his "nemesis" sat at a table.

Quiet? The description left him uneasy. It did not fit with what he knew of Lydia. He might have thought shed mention him, even if only by way of a dry, cutting remark.

But perhaps not. What cause had he given her to speak his name?
We are to befriends,
she'd told him. But she could not respect him. Christ, how could he blame her for that? He'd thrashed a man near to death in her presence. And her face when he'd looked up from the bastard—it had nearly snapped his mind. She'd been staring at him as if he were a brute, the sort of man who left women battered at the bottom of staircases. It had been wrong, bloody wrong of her to look at him as if he would
ever
raise a hand to her. The expression on her face could have been Stella's, during those last few weeks at Boland s.

And then afterward, for no reason whatsoever, she had forgiven him. It had thrown him for a loop. He flaunted the worst of himself to her. Why? Did he want her to be repelled? Had he grown so sick now that he taunted women for fun? Lovely women, who tasted like spun sugar, and melted sweedy beneath his touch. She had stolen his breath, on the roof. And later, over the remnants of the smashed stela—she had looked at him and there had been more wonder in her eyes than a newborns. He could have done anything to her, then. She should not issue such invitations with her
eyes.
Someone should warn her. One might skip from lust to fear and back; he knew several women who favored that recipe. But one did not go from fear to friendship in the space of a day. One exercised caution and demanded demonstrations. If her goddamned father were the hero she thought him, then he would have taught her these things. But no. She was even more naive than Stella had been. Terrifying thought.

Dalton wanted a drink.

He continued onward. The foyer was buzzing with patrons lined up for refreshment. He fought forward to the bar, where a girl in wilting feathers was dishing out gin in sixpence measures. Two giggling girls clasped onto his elbows and begged for a dram. He bought their rounds first, but declined when they offered to accompany him upstairs. He could not say what ailed him, but he felt curiously removed from himself, as if watching from above. Overdressed, with an elegantly amused sneer on his mouth: how stylishly he did a whole lot of nothing.
I find it very difficult to respect you.
Well, good for her. He hoped Lydia parceled out her respect in very stingy doses, since having it seemed to give one the ability to command anything of her.
Write my papers. Find me money. Brave a slum to protect me. Risk your safety for help from a fickle ne'er-do-well who fantasizes about pinning your wrists and bending you over a chair.

He had just mounted the third flight of stairs when the man slipped from the shadows. Barely a man, really: not yet twenty, with dark fuzz where his beard would one day grow in. But the knife in his hand was real enough, especially when he stepped forward and pressed it against James's throat.

Caught off guard, James stepped back. The boy followed, his arm outstretched over the three glasses of gin James held. A curious sort of ballet, this: not a single drop spilled onto his fingers as he stared into the boy's face. His assailant had skin the color of teak and eyes that bespoke darker things than unlit hallways.

"Give it back," the lad hissed.

James glanced past him. It was a very bad place to do murder. There were people below and footsteps approaching on the stairs. "Give what back?" he asked.

The boy's fingers tightened. The blade bit at his throat. Killed in a music hall, no doubt soaked by gin during the course of his collapse: he would give his father apoplexy yet. "You know well enough." The pup's looks were swarthy, but his accent was purely Whitecha-pel. "Don't pretend you don't have it. I can read a paper well as you. The Tears belong to Egypt!"

Those bloody notes again. They had increased in the last few days. This bit about Egypt was new, though. Generally the letter-writer just whined on about curses.

Egypt.
Something clicked in his mind. It seemed a very unlikely coincidence. He might have asked, had the act of speaking not seemed likely to do the boy's work for him, and drive the blade in further.

"What— I say! Is that a
knife?

This from a fellow in a top hat, who paused to goggle through his monocle at the scene. The boy took one look over his shoulder, snatched back his hand, then bowled past the man and down the stairs.

James lowered the glasses to the carpet. Straightening he touched his neck. Blood stained his fingers. Right, then. He sprang forward, past the gabbling top hat, to take the stairs three by three. On the first landing, he caught sight of the boy a flight below. As he rounded the last stair and jumped to the lobby, the crowd was already closing around his trail.

Out into the warm night air. Leicester Square swarmed with noise and light. A thousand blazing lamps lit the cream and gilt exteriors of the music halls and public houses. Throngs of shrieking women and boisterous young mashers pushed and shoved by. The boy was gone. James struggled to calm his breathing. The air smelled of burnt sugar and fried fish and vomit.

A lunatic. That was how he'd dismissed the letter-writer, but the word no longer seemed to fit. The boy had mentioned Egypt. And when had his notes begun to arrive? James did not think he misremembered: the first had come the day after the debacle at the Institute.

Hell. Someone clearly thought he'd gotten more from Hartnetts shipment than he had. And if they'd connected it to him, they'd certainly connect it to Lydia—if they hadn't already. She had better open her eyes, and quickly. He didn't care what she saw when she looked into his face; he would rather not be forced to imagine
her
with her throat sliced open.

He quickly made his way back to his box. "Outside," he said to Phin, and ignored Dalton's complaint about the drink he was owed. In the dark little corridor, he said, "I need your help. Are you sober enough to give it?"

Phin hesitated only briefly before replying, "Just about."

"Good. I need you to put out an ear. To be brief: some boy has been writing me about curses, tears, and my imminent decline. Cornered me just now and tried to slit my throat. I lost him, and I want him found. He's delivering the notes somehow; perhaps a watch on my house would work. Can you do that?"

Phin arched a brow. "No question. Tears, you say? And a curse. Is that all he writes?"

"I have cause to think it connected to a smuggling operation, run out of Egypt." For Lydia's sake, he did not want to mention the Boyces. What a stupid impulse. Failing to share all the facts was not the best way to protect her. "It has something to do with that forged stela I bought."
Protecting
her? Was that his aim, now? How ludicrous. "Turns out it came from Henry Boyces shipment." Ridiculous to feel a stir of guilt. "But it was placed in there by someone else, perhaps." Thoroughly irritated with himself, he shrugged and added, "You must have friends who play in that part of the world. If you consulted them, I'd appreciate it."

Phin was staring into the distance, an abstracted look on his face. "I can do you one better," he said slowly. "A rumor recendy came to me." He glanced back to James.

"I cannot think how you might have gotten involved— I hope to God you aren't. But to dismiss it as a coincidence seems .. .unwise."

"I'd be glad to hear it," James said. "But we'll have to talk on the way to the train station. I'm spending the night in the country."

Most estates were deserted during the spring. But Bagley End was only two hours from London, and the Pateshalls liked to use it as a retreat from the tiresome formalities of the season. When Sophie received their invitation, Lydia's uncharacteristic enthusiasm had star-ded her into accepting. "Perhaps it will do you good," she'd remarked thoughtfully. "You've been very blue of late." They had looked at each other then in equal surprise, and Ana had clapped and told them to hug, which they did, although of course they were quarreling again before dinner.

The Pateshalls catered to an athletic crowd. Croquet, tennis, bicycling, and archery consumed most of Ana's day, while Sophie preferred to laze in the drawing room, gossiping with friends and reading novels. Lydia, who'd explained her "biueness" as a slight ague, was left to her own devices. She spent her time reading in the turreted towers that topped the manor's grand hall, and hunting through the public rooms for treasure. Already she'd found a mummy mask behind a tapestry in the morning room, and an Assyrian obelisk serving as an extra leg for the snooker table. She regretted peeking into the smoking room. To her horror, a Roman urn was serving there as an ashtray.

The first few nights, she retired early. She had an ague, didn't she? Certainly her melancholy had nothing to do with her revelations about Sanburne. But as she lay in bed, listening to the dim shouts of revelry below, she could not budge her thoughts from him. Her distress seemed obscure to her. Even if some bizarre alignment of stars had led Sanburne to fall in love with her, she would not have wanted to marry him. Oh, he had some cause for his anger at Moreland; she didn't doubt that. But he deliberately sacrificed his own happiness to torment the man. His rage mattered more to him than love ever would.

On the fifth evening, sick of her own thoughts, she decided to linger downstairs. Several new guests had arrived for the weekend, and in some chemical reaction, they had transformed the bent of the entire crowd, causing everyone to incline toward rowdiness. At dinner, Mrs. Chudderleys teasing remark about Mr. Ensley's figure triggered a round of risqué comments that showed no sign of abating as the party transferred to the drawing room. She tried to send Ana to bed, but Ana protested that she was grown and should not have to go, especially since Mr. Pagett was there. Lydia pulled her into the hall for a lecture on the different licenses allowed to women who were engaged versus those who were married, at the conclusion of which Ana yanked away and said, "What would
you
know of it?" And then, clearly shocked by herself, she burst into tears, sobbed an apology, and ran for the stairs.

Lydia was not in a festive mood when she returned to the party. Mr. Ensley stood by the mantel, speechifying to a rapt audience. "Hide-and-seek," he was proposing.

Lydia took a seat next to Sophie. "But lets give it a real twist. Close your
eyes
and pretend it's August. Epsom, Henley, behind us. The Bisley Meeting and Speech Day, over. You're knackered. Sick of cudet for cutlet. Pretend this is a
real
country party—somewhere north, where it rains endlessly."

"The Hebrides!" Mrs. Chudderley cried out. Lydia glanced at her. She was sitting on a loveseat with Mr. Nelson, her hand resting quite casually on his knee. To Lydia's knowledge, they were neither family nor formally contracted. Of course
Sanburne
would not be surprised by such behavior. It was the sort of licentiousness he no doubt
required of his
friends.

"The Hebrides," Mr. Ensley said, miming a tip of an invisible hat. "Excellent. Stranded in the Hebrides, we must provide our own entertainment. And so I propose: kiss-in-the-closet." A gasp moved through the room, followed by nervous titters. "Oh yes," he confirmed with a grin. "You've heard of it: hide-and-go-seek with a difference. If a gentleman should catch a lady, he earns the right to kiss her. A lady is only safe if she manages to make it to the conservatory undetected!"

Mr. Pagett slipped from the room. Lydia thought better of him for his departure. Country weekends were famous for such juvenile entertainments, but usually they tended to break out during the late hours. She blamed this trend on the Marlborough House Set, with whom such games were rumored to be popular.

She made to rise, but Sophie caught her wrist. There was a feverish look in her eye. "You
must
stay," she said. "It will be so much fun, Lyd—but I can't play if you ~ don't."

"And you shouldn't. It's not proper. George would—"

"Oh,
George
would not care. George cares only for his career."

"Put out the lights!" Mr. Ensley cried to a footman, startling them both. "The whole ground floor must be darkened." He glanced sidelong at Sophie, very briefly. But when he noticed Lydia's regard on him, color came into his cheeks, and he turned to speak officiously to the servant.

His reaction discomfited Lydia extremely. "Sophie, this is unwise. I do not trust Mr. Ensley to behave himself."

Sophie rose. The stubborn look on her face was all too familiar. "Mr. Ensley is a gentleman, and George
specifically
told me to be friendly to him. His father has great influence."