Where Shadows Dance

The soft patter of footsteps and a faint waft of jasmine drew Sebastian’s attention to the door. Small and delicate and breathtakingly lovely, a woman slipped into the room.

Unlike her husband, Yasmina Ramadani was dressed in the style of her homeland, with a short fitted jacket of dark purple velvet worn over a white, filmy silk blouse and a brocade divided skirt that Sebastian suspected Miss Jarvis would love. A necklace of gold coins draped her long, thin neck; on her head she wore a purple velvet cap edged with more small gold coins. But her hair flowed loose, a glorious cascade of auburn-tinted dark waves. She looked to be somewhere in her twenties, with almond-shaped eyes, a long nose, and full, sensuous lips that broke into a wide smile.

“I believe you have not yet met my wife, Yasmina,” said the Ambassador.

Rising to his feet, Sebastian swept her a gracious bow. “Madame Ramadani. How do you do?”

He found himself looking into a pair of thickly lashed, piercingly intelligent green eyes. “Lord Devlin,” she said, extending a tiny, almost childlike hand. “My husband has told me much about you. Welcome to our home.”

Her English was good; exotically accented yet very clear. But then, a woman sent to seduce some of England’s finest would need to speak the language well.

“You like the narguileh?” she asked, coming to lounge gracefully on the carpet beside them. Rather than take her husband’s hose, she reached for Sebastian’s, her eyes on his as she took the mouthpiece between her full lips and sucked. Still holding his gaze, she pursed her lips and blew out a soft stream of mint-scented smoke.

“It’s certainly more pleasant than sniffing snuff.”

She gave a delighted laugh. “It does not shock you to see a woman smoke?”

“I’ve seen it before, in Egypt.”

“So you know our lands.”

“Not well, no.” He took the hose as she handed it back to him, her fingertips brushing his ever so discreetly. He said, “Do you miss Stanboul? Life is very different here, is it not?”

“It is, but not unpleasantly so—especially now that summer is here. I am very fond of your city’s parks. It is wonderful to be able to ride out every morning, even though we live in the middle of London. The Ambassador is an early riser, in the saddle always with the dawn. But me, I prefer to wait until the sun has chased away the mist.” She paused, her head tilting prettily to one side. “Do you ride in the park, my lord?”

“Sometimes, yes,” said Sebastian, once more drawing the sweetly scented tobacco deep into his lungs.

Her gaze holding his, her smile a warm secret that beckoned and tantalized, she reached once more to take the water pipe’s hose from his hand. “Then perhaps I shall see you there.”

His visit to the Turkish Ambassador’s residence left Sebastian with much food for thought as he turned his horses once more toward the east, to Stepney.

Until now, he’d given little credence to the rumors that Alexander Ross had been romantically entangled with the wife of the Turkish Ambassador. Not only did it fly in the face of everything he thought he had come to know about the man, but the logistics of such a liaison had seemed too fantastic to be credible.

Now he understood only too well how such a relationship could have come about. And yet he still found himself unwilling to believe it—although he also recognized that he could simply be allowing his sympathy for the dead man to cloud his judgment. There was certainly no doubt in his mind that Yasmina was a beautiful, brilliant young woman well versed in the arts of seduction—and that her “husband” had attempted to set her to work her wiles on Sebastian himself.

Why? Sebastian wondered. To discover what he might have learned about Ross? Or to lure Sebastian to his own death?

By the time he drew up before the Swedish trader’s neat white brick house with the yellow shutters, the setting sun was throwing long shadows across the narrow, cobbled streets. The house’s shiny black door stood open wide. A red-faced, sweating constable on the footpath out front was shooing away a gawking crowd of half- grown boys. A hackney carriage waited nearby, the bay between the poles twitching its dark tail against the buzzing flies.

“What the devil?” said Sebastian, handing Tom the reins.

A small man in a modest top hat and with a pair of spectacles perched on the end of his nose came out of the house to walk down the short path. “My lord,” said Sir Henry Lovejoy, pausing beside the curricle, his head tipped back so he could look up at Sebastian. “I gather you’ve come to see Mr. Lindquist?”

“I have, yes. Why?” asked Sebastian, hopping down to the flagway.

Lovejoy scratched the side of his nose. “Interesting. You see, he’s just been found dead.”

Chapter 34

“Murdered?” asked Sebastian as they walked together toward the house.

“I’d say so, yes. Unless you think he somehow bashed in his own head with a cudgel.”

Sebastian suppressed a smile. The magistrate was obviously becoming seriously aggrieved by Sebastian’s inability to be entirely forthcoming about his interest in the death of Alexander Ross. “Who found him?”

“The woman who comes in daily and does for him. She’d nipped down to the shops for some onions. By the time she came back, he was dead.”

Sebastian paused on the threshold. The house was small, with just a narrow hall and two rooms—a parlor and a dining room—on the ground floor. A steep staircase led up to the bedrooms and down to the kitchen. Carl Lindquist lay sprawled in a pool of blood just inside the parlor door, the back of his head a gruesome, crimson pulp. A gore-stained cudgel lay beside him.

“Nasty,” said Sebastian, hunkering down to study the dead man’s pale, blood-streaked face. No neat dagger thrust to the base of the skull here.

“Very,” said Sir Henry, stepping around the body to enter the parlor.

Sebastian let his gaze wander the room. It was simply furnished with a settee and several chairs, a tea table, and a small writing desk near the front window. But one of the chairs had been knocked over; the carpet was bunched, as if Lindquist had realized he was in danger and sought to resist. “One wonders why the killer didn’t wait until the housekeeper had left for the evening. Or even break in later tonight. Much less chance of being discovered that way.”

“True. Perhaps the murder was a spur-of-the-moment decision. Or a crime of passion.”

“It certainly was passionate.” Pushing to his feet, Sebastian went to take a look at the writing table. A quill lay on the floor; a bottle of ink had been tipped over, the stain on the blotter still wet to his touch. He glanced around. No sign of any letter, journal, or notebook entry that Lindquist could have been writing.

Sir Henry said, “It’s possible Lindquist knew his assailant. He let the man in.”

“If so, that could explain the timing.”

The magistrate cleared his throat. “May I venture to ask your interest in Mr. Lindquist, my lord?”

“Alexander Ross came here, the Friday before he died.”

“I see. And do you know the purpose of his visit?”

“A seance, according to Mr. Lindquist.”

“A seance?”

“So said Mr. Lindquist. He claims Ross was interested in spiritualism.”

“You can’t be serious.”

“I only know what—”

Sebastian broke off as a loud tread clattered down the stairs from the upper floor. “Sir Henry!” A gangly young constable burst into the room. “Sir Henry!”

Sir Henry frowned. “Yes, Constable? What is it?”

“You gotta come see this, sir! Upstairs!”

“Constable Starke, you forget yourself.”

“But it’s gold, Sir Henry! Gold! A whole trunk full of it!”