didn’t say it. Hendon would only have scoffed. “He seems to have managed to control his larcenous activities these last four months.”
“Or so you think.”
Sebastian drained his brandy and set the glass aside. “I’d best say good night. I plan to start for London at dawn.”
“London?” Hendon’s lips pursed in disapproval. “I thought the business with this murder would at least keep you away from there for a while.” Of course, it wasn’t London itself Hendon found objectionable; what troubled the Earl was the beautiful young actress he knew Sebastian would be seeing there.
Refusing to be drawn into an argument on that score, Sebastian turned toward the door. “I don’t see what else I can do here. Anglessey has agreed to allow Paul Gibson to transfer the Marchioness’s body to his surgery for a postmortem. Even if Lady Guinevere wasn’t killed in London, someone there might be able to tell me where she went—and why.”
THE NEXT MORNING DAWNED COOL, with a fine mist that drifted in from the sea in heavy, salt-laden patches of white swirling dampness to collect between the rows of tall, stately town houses and in the narrow winding alleyways of the Lanes.
Sebastian held the chestnuts in check until they were clear of the last straggling hamlet. Then he gave the big blood geldings their heads and let them run with the wind before easing them down to an even trot that ate away at the miles. By the time they reached Ed-burton, the strengthening sun had begun to burn away what was left of the fog. On the far side of the village, the rolling expanses of the South Downs could be seen quite clearly, stretching out in all directions. It was there Sebastian’s growing conviction that he was being followed solidified into a certainty.
Even in the thickness of the fog, Sebastian had been aware of a steady drumming of hoofbeats, staying always a comfortable distance behind them. One horse, he decided, ridden at a steady clip, never gaining, but not falling too far behind, either.
Then the mists began to thin to faint wisps of elusive white that hugged the deeply cut road’s stone walls and brambly hedgerows while laying bare the surrounding fields of green barley and flax. At that point, the shadowy horseman dropped back. But Sebastian’s eyesight was considerably keener than most others’. As the wide vistas of the South Downs opened up beneath a strengthening sun, he began to catch glimpses of a single, dark-clad rider mounted on a big bay, first seen in the distance through a tangle of hazel, then half-hidden by a copse of fine beech.
Thoughtful, Sebastian urged his chestnuts to a faster trot. The mysterious horseman quickened his pace, too. They continued on that way for a mile, two. Sebastian brought his pair down to a walk.
Their shadow dropped back.
“Don’t, whatever you do, look behind us,” Sebastian ordered his young tiger. “But I think…no, I am quite certain, actually, that we are being followed.”
Tom went visibly stiff with the effort of resisting the urge to turn around and look for himself. “Since when?”
“Since we left Brighton, it would seem.”
“What we gonna do?”
Sebastian held the chestnuts to a steady pace. They were winding up a gradual incline, the twisting road thrown into deep shade by a stand of poplars. But at the top of the slope the ground evened out, the road running across a broad common of vivid green pastureland dotted with a peacefully grazing herd of black-and-white milk cows.
Without looking behind, Sebastian whipped his team into an easy gallop so that the man behind them was forced to do the same. They streamed across the common, the sun shining on the chestnuts’ wet flanks, Sebastian urging his team on ever faster until the road crested a sudden rise and fell away rapidly before them in a long, steady sweep.
Sebastian immediately reined in his horses to a brisk walk. The rush of the wind and the thundering of hoofbeats gave way to a soft crunch of wheels and a relative silence in which Sebastian could hear the rapid soughing of Tom’s breath, quickened with excitement. They were only halfway down the slope when the rider on the bay crested the hill behind them at a loping canter.
At the sight of Sebastian, he checked for a moment, then urged his own horse forward at a easy walk.
Sebastian swung over to the verge and pulled up. At his signal, Tom hopped down to run to the horses’ heads.
“What’s he doing?” Sebastian asked, bending forward as if busying himself with something at his feet. In one hand, he clasped a neat little flintlock pistol.
Again the horseman had checked. But now he had no choice: he must either make his intentions obvious, or continue on and pass them. Pulling his hat low on his forehead, the dark-clad rider set his spurs to his horse’s flanks.
The rider charged past them in a dust-swirling rush of creaking saddle leather and sweat-flecked prime horseflesh. Looking up, Sebastian had a quick vision of a bloodred bay, its head up, its eyes wide, and a man of medium build wearing a gentleman’s beaver hat and a greatcoat of respectable tailoring. Then the bay disappeared with a clatter around a bend in the road ahead. The hoofbeats retreated into the distance until all was silent except for the rush of the wind through the sweetly scented grass and the gentle lowing of a cow.
Tom stood with a hand on the team’s reins, his head twisted around as he stared off up the road. “Who was he, gov’nor?”
“I’ve no idea,” said Sebastian, collecting his whip. “Stand away, Tom.”
Tom obediently sprang back, then scrambled to resume his perch as the curricle once again bowled away toward London.
THEY REACHED TOWN just after midday. The greatcoated rider on the big bay was not seen again.
