The Gilded Scarab (25 page)

Perhaps I dreamt it. Sometimes I thought I did. Or perhaps I had some peculiar form of tinnitus. I had some idea of seeing a medical man about it, when I could find the time.

It was a minor annoyance and one I soon stopped fretting over. I didn’t have much of a personal life, anyway, so there would be little chance of meeting a good-looking man to bring home with me to christen the bed and sofa until I was making enough money to pay for some hired help. I was busy working the coffeehouse twelve hours a day and playing with the coffee roaster every chance I got, with occasional forays to the Fox or one of the other clubs. While I had some enjoyable encounters there, I didn’t want to take them home to the flat. I didn’t want to share it yet. None of them were special enough.

All in good time. In the meantime, Lancaster’s was going to work out well. Rafe Lancaster, coffeehouse owner, was going to work out well. I liked this new life. It suited me. I liked being answerable to no one but my conscience and myself and, all in all, I was happy. I was very happy.

Then one morning in early April, shortly after I opened the coffeehouse for the day, the door opened and Edward Fairfax walked in.

Chapter 16

S
ADLY
,
IT
was not quite the reunion about which I had, on occasion, speculated.

When I saw him, a most unaccountable warmth spread throughout my chest, and an “Edward!” escaped before I had the chance to think better of it. I smiled.

Edward didn’t smile back. Not to mention, his eyes narrowed, his mouth drew into a very hard line, and his hands clenched. In fact, he showed no sign of even recognizing me. And when I stepped forward from behind the counter, the man who followed him into the coffeehouse actually growled at me, an inarticulate noise that stopped me dead, and an instant later, the barrel of a harquebus slapped into his left hand. It was pointed at me.

“Not one step,” said the man.

I stared down the gun’s cavernous maw. I could have flown my aerofighter down its wide bore. So I was obedient and I froze. The tiny fusion hideaway gun in my pocket was no match for a harquebus.

A muffled shriek drew my gaze toward the window tables. My only other customers were a couple visiting home from one of the colonies—New Zealand, I believe. They sat frozen, the lady with her coffee cup in the air halfway to her mouth, her eyes round as pennies. Her companion had paused in the act of eating one of Will’s cakes.

The House guard glanced at them and stepped diagonally away from Edward, to allow him to cover both me and them. Cautious brutes, House guards. They don’t trust anyone.

I recognized him—the dark man from Margrethe’s, the one who had sat alone at the bar and the restaurant, and who had given me such a hard look as I left with Edward to rent one of the bedrooms. Then, he had worn evening dress, like everyone else. But now, it was House uniform: a black military-style coat with emerald green frogging, and the silver insignia embroidered on his left shoulder was a drawn sword slashing through a round shield.

Gallowglass.

I looked from him to Edward.

Gallowglass?

It couldn’t be. That would mean—

I swallowed down the sudden surge of acid in my throat.

Edward—no. This wasn’t Edward Fairfax. This was someone I didn’t know. This had to be Ned Winter, First Heir Gallowglass. Ned Winter, Aegyptologist. Ned Winter, Mr. Pearse’s favorite, Daniel Meredith’s ex-lover, and my one-night companion. Obviously Edward Fairfax didn’t really exist.

Ned Bloody Winter.

Well, wasn’t that wonderful? Where once I was free of the Houses, now I was back in their coils with a vengeance. Bad enough the Stravaigor had managed to enmesh me again, without adding Gallowglass to the mix. That was beyond bad enough and headed toward catastrophic. Gallowglass was the most powerful House in the Convocation, thanks to some canny ancestor of theirs seizing the nation’s purse strings. If Commander Abercrombie had outranked me socially, the Gallowglass First Heir probably wouldn’t even realize Abercrombie existed. That put me so far down the list, I was of no account whatsoever.

I felt sore all over. As if someone had peeled off my skin and left me open and helpless.

Damn Fairfax—Winter—to hell. This really wasn’t the meeting I had anticipated.

Fairfax took a step toward me, stiff-legged and his jaw thrust out. “Where is Mr. Pearse?”

“Retired.”

“Retired? What do you mean, retired?”

Why in hell were they treating me like a criminal? Was it my fault Fai—Winter couldn’t understand simple English? I wasn’t the one who had lied. I was the one lied to. So I didn’t attempt to hide the anger. “The usual dictionary definition applies. He decided he wanted to sell up and live in Eastbourne. With his niece.”

“Eastbourne? Why on earth would he go and live in Eastbourne?”

I shrugged. “I assume he prefers it to Hove.”

Winter flushed scarlet.

I looked again at the couple in the window. “You’re frightening my customers. Stop it.” I went over to them, trying to look reassuring, and smiled at them with a lot more confidence than I felt. “One of the disadvantages of visiting home is that these House people think they can trample all over us. If you’d like to leave… no, don’t worry about the bill.”

“Wait!” snapped the guard.

“No, Sam,” said Winter.

I ignored them both. I had my back to them as I helped the lady to her feet. She was trembling so much she could hardly stand. Her husband sidled around the table to help her up.

“Will they shoot us?” quavered the lady.

“No. Of course they won’t, madam.” Although I wasn’t too sure the guard wouldn’t shoot
me
.

“Will they let us go?” muttered her husband, eying the guard with understandable consternation.

“I’m sure they will. I am very sorry for the intrusion.” I opened the door for them and leaned in close. “Just think what a tale you’ll have to tell, though, when you get home.”

The lady gave me a tremulous smile. “Will you be all right?”

“Of course I will,” I said. “Don’t worry about me.”

“Stand down, Sam,” said Fairfax—No. He was Winter. Ned Winter. “Let them leave.”

“Civil of you.” I shot him a glare over my shoulder.

“Wait. Please.” Winter came toward us and bowed to the lady. “Madam, forgive me. I am very sorry to have startled you. The situation is a little complicated—”

“Do you always have armed guards with you?” demanded the husband. His fear was giving way to annoyance and bluster; his face reddened, and he stuck out chest and chin in unmistakable aggression.

Winter grimaced. “Sir, the first time someone tried to assassinate me was in this very street. I was eight years old. Sadly, it’s a fact of life for me. But I am truly sorry to have embroiled you in this.”

The man gave him a long calculating look. “We don’t have the Houses much where we are. I’m glad of it. I don’t like the way this works.” He looked at me. “I hope everything will be all right with you, sir. Do I need to find a constable?”

I think I managed a credible laugh. “I don’t think so, but thank you. I’m really very sorry.”

The man nodded, tucked his wife’s hand under his arm, and ran for it. I shut the door behind them and put up the Closed sign. When I turned to put my back to the door, the guard still had his harquebus trained on me, but Winter was looking thoughtful, frowning at me.

I scowled at him. “Your idea of an amusing start to the day, I suppose? I can’t afford to lose customers because your lackey there is flexing his muscles.”

Winter glanced sideways to the guard. “Rosens or Matthews should know what’s going on. Ask them.”

The guard wore an earpiece. He had to hold the harquebus one-handed to flip the speaking tube down into place, but the barrel didn’t waver for an instant. He was depressingly efficient. He spoke quickly into the tube, and three minutes later, one of my tenants thundered down the staircase and along the side hall, then came into the coffeehouse through my office at the back. Bloody cheek. I’d have a lock put on that door before the day was out.

“Mr. Winter! I didn’t know you were back. Welcome home, sir.” Rosens (or Matthews) didn’t quite bob a curtsy, but he came pretty close.

“Mr. Pearse?” demanded Winter.

Matthews (or Rosens) spoke to him soft and fast. I caught fragments such as “… told us after the New Year he was planning to sell. … No, Lancaster’s been around since sometime in November, I think. … Oh no, sir! Mr. Pearse really likes Lancaster, and they got on very well. Reminded me of him and you, if it isn’t a liberty to say so. … Sir Tane knows all about it, sir. … No, I don’t know where in Eastbourne, sir….”

“Oh, that reminds me,” I said, abrupt and not caring about interrupting, because that damn harquebus was still pointed at me, and I was extremely tired of it. “I assume you’re Ned Winter? Mr. Pearse left a note with me to give you.”

Winter had the grace to look a little ashamed, if the flush along his cheekbones was any indication.

I wasn’t prepared to be forgiving. “I’m Rafe Lancaster, and I own this place now.”

“I remember you,” he said. His gaze met mine.

“Really? Have we met?” I wasn’t at all prepared to be forgiving.

The House guard broke in then. His grip on the harquebus tightened visibly. “I knew I’d seen him before Margrethe’s, sir! He was out in the street, the last time we were here before we went to Aegypt, when you came to take your leave of the old man. He was watching us.”

I snorted. “I was in the street, yes. You pointed your bloody gun at me then too.”

“And then a couple of days later, you have a run-in with him at your club? I don’t like coincidences.”

“That’s all it was,” I said.

“Lancaster. That’s House Stravaigor.” The guard’s lip lifted and curled. It was the first moment of potential sympathy between us. If he were going to sneer at the Stravaigor, I could get right behind the notion. “He’s likely an intelligencer for Stravaigor, sir.”

The idea there was some sort of conspiracy, or that I’d promote anything the revered head of my House was plotting, was so ludicrous that I started to laugh. I couldn’t help it. It appeared to surprise the guard and Fairfax-Winter or whatever his name was. They both stared. “Not that this is any of your business, but I arrived back from South Africa that morning and moved into the Stravaigor Hostel—”

“In Russell Square,” said the guard, who was either one of those tedious experts in House matters or was tapping into the Gallowglass security net. I couldn’t see a handheld datascope, but he could still be connected to one somehow. Through the wireless Marconi communicator attached to his headgear, perhaps.

“Yes. Russell Square.” I stopped laughing. I was tired of the joke. “I was exploring and I wanted a cup of coffee. I didn’t know of your House’s attachment to Mr. Pearse or this coffeehouse, and, believe me, I could not have cared less. That’s it. No more explanations.”

“And the club, later?” My, but the guard could sneer. His lip curled beautifully.

I’d had enough of him. I looked directly at Winter. “You aren’t the only member there, and you aren’t the only man in the world who likes coffee. Now, would you care to order your guard to put down that gun? And do you want your letter before you leave?”

Winter stared at me for a long moment, his face blank but for the merest twitch of the corner of his mouth. It was a much smaller twitch than he’d had for me at Margrethe’s, and not nearly as happy. More of a nervous tic this time.

But he nodded at the guard. “It’s all right, Sam. Run a security check if you must, but I don’t want trouble now.”

A noble sentiment, doubtless, but rather too late.

“Your letter is in the desk in my office.” I turned to get it, but the guard objected.

“You go, Rosens.”

“Righty-ho, Mr. Hawkins.” Rosens grimaced at me. At least now I knew which one of the two he was. “Sorry, Lancaster.”

“You will be. We’ll be having a review of your lease. Top left drawer, and don’t damage anything.” I went back to looking at Ned Winter. “Did your good friend Mr. Pearse know you had Rosens and Matthews here to spy on him?”

“They’re part of my security guard, not intelligencers.” Winter dropped into a chair, and his guard, Hawkins, took up a protective stance behind him. Hawkins never took his eyes off me. “And yes, he knew.”

“He never mentioned it, and given his disdain for House matters, I’m surprised he allowed it.” I went behind the counter and poured myself a cup of coffee. I needed something to calm me down. I glanced at my hands. They were trembling, but I wasn’t afraid. I was so angry I could spit. I felt raw, rubbed. “It ends now. I won’t be spied upon. They can go and do their importing somewhere else.”

“They aren’t spying on you or Mr. Pearse. They’re stationed here because I use the coffeehouse so much.”

“As I said, it ends now. I don’t think they’ll be needed again here. Do you?”

He blinked. “Are you banning me?”

Quick on the uptake, this one. Perhaps not too inbred, then, like most of the House types.

I took a sip of my coffee and let the flavor soothe me. “I am giving it serious consideration.”