watch out the window at night as well?'
He weighed his answer, as though deciding what he should admit, then at last, he chose to trust me. 'I don't sleep much. I watch people go out and then come back from their parties and the theatre. When I grow up, I won't be ill, and I'll go to balls and theatres and clubs all the time.'
'Did much ever happen at number 22 at night?'
'No, sir. Mr. Horne hardly went out at all.'
I pondered. 'Did anything out of the ordinary happen on a particular night, say three or four weeks ago?'
Philip's eyes lit with admiration. 'How'd you know, sir? That was the night the dark carriage came. No lights on it at all. I thought it was foolish and dangerous for it to go about like that. It sat in front of Mr. Horne's house for about a quarter of an hour.'
'Did anyone get out of this carriage?'
'No. But someone got in. It wasn't Mr. Horne; the man was too tall and bulky for him. And he was carrying something over his shoulder, a carpet it looked like. He got in, and the coach just went away.'
A carpet. Or a bundled-up girl, unconscious or dead. Had Horne killed her, or found some other means to rid himself of her?
'Does it have something to do with the murder?' Philip asked eagerly.
I spread my hands. 'It may have.'
'Do you think the fine gentleman who arrived that afternoon was the murderer, then?'
I pursed my lips. 'He certainly was in the right place at the right time.' I imagined again Denis flicking his little finger and his large manservant jumping to the task of stabbing Horne to death. I still thought it unlikely. And the mutilation of the body did not fit. I doubted that Denis, with his emotionless eyes, would bother lopping off Horne's genitals. It was almost as though that had been done by a different person entirely.
Alertness streaked through my body as the thought came and went. I reached for it again, turned it over slowly. Two different people. Threads wove and matched and fitted together.
'I know Bremer didn't murder him,' Philip was saying. 'He's too old, and he's frightened of everything. Even a spider frightens him.'
'He is frightened,' I said slowly. 'But fear can be a very powerful motivation.'
'Can it, sir?'
I nodded once, then rose and made a military bow. 'It can. I thank you for your candor, Mr. Preston. It has helped me immensely.'
I left Philip then, reassuring him that I would not forget my promise to give him a riding lesson on Monday.
I stopped at the newspaper office to inquire about further answers to Jane's whereabouts and found nothing. I returned home, ate one of Mrs. Beltan's buns without currants, and went upstairs. Later that day, I went to Bow Street and asked Pomeroy if he knew of any new developments. Pomeroy replied in the negative and seemed surprised that I wasn't satisfied with letting Bremer hang for the crime. Bremer's trial was Monday, he told me. It was Saturday now.
I thought about what Philip Preston had told me about the dark carriage in the middle of the night and the bundle they had taken from number 22. That bundle had likely been Jane. But had she been dead or alive? Had they taken her to a brothel or thrown her into the river?
A coach needed a coachman. From my inquiries about Horne and his household, I knew he'd kept no coach of his own, which meant he would have hired any he needed. So he would have had to hire a carriage and a man to drive it.
I thought of the coachman Nancy had found for me, Jemmy-who, in truth, worked for Denis. Denis had put him in place with the Carstairs, and I believed now that Denis had removed him as well. No doubt Jemmy had reported my inquisitiveness to Denis, his true employer.
I began making inquiries at coach yards, asking whether any remembered hiring out a coach to a gentry-cove in Hanover Square about a month previously. None did. I returned home as the sky darkened, and settled in to a cold supper of yesterday's roast from the pub and a loaf of my landlady's bread.
I returned to the subject of Denis. He had known all about me and what I wanted. Horne might have written him of my questions about Jane Thornton, but I doubted it. The only people who had known of my interest in Jane's abduction other than Horne had been Jemmy and Grenville.
I let my mind wander. Grenville had been eager to help, at his own expense. He'd been strangely interested in Charlotte Morrison's disappearance and had dragged me to Hampstead to investigate. Then he'd volunteered to travel all the way to Somerset to make further inquiries.
The night we'd spent in Hampstead, he'd disappeared from the inn, and he'd offered no explanation as to his whereabouts. He might have simply met an acquaintance, of course, or enjoyed walking about by himself, and he had no reason to inform me of his movements. And his night wanderings in Hampstead did not necessarily have anything to do with James Denis. But I still wondered why he'd tried to keep what he did secret.
A knock on my door startled me out of my contemplations. I had stared into the flames while I thought, and when I turned away, my eyes were dazzled, and I could barely see to cross the room.
A boy stood on the threshold with a letter and a hopeful look. I took the letter and gave him tuppence.
The note was from Grenville. I traveled hard to reach home, and then I heard you had gone to see Denis without me. It was too bad of you. I imagine you learned nothing on your own. Call 'round at my club tonight. I have something to tell you and plans to make. I'll send my carriage at nine.
I pitched the crumpled ball of the letter into the fire. I was tired of Grenville summoning me like his errand boy. I had displeased him; he wanted me to grovel. To hang on his every word and order as the rest of London did.
I seated myself at my writing table and wrote a letter back, telling him that I would call on him at my own convenience. I let my annoyance seep into the letter, and I let myself imply what I thought of a man who could ruin an artist's success with a simple frown and a person's acceptability with a raise of his brows. I was tired of his charity, and I refused to give up my integrity for Grenville's exquisite brandy and fine foods. I ended by recommending that if he wanted to hear all about true living, he should attend Louisa Brandon's supper party. No doubt Brandon would regale all present with detailed accounts of our adventures during the war.
His message had said he'd send his carriage at nine. Shortly before nine, I left the note for Mrs. Beltan to post in the morning, and I went out.
I walked all the way to Long Acre, and then east and north, away from my usual haunts. Let Grenville's footman search the environs of Covent Garden for me in vain.
Cool had come with the darkness, but the bitter cold of winter had gone. The air had softened at last, and it was almost a pleasure to walk. Others must have felt the same, because the streets were crowded.
I went to a tavern I'd never entered before. The locals, working-class men with calloused hands, leathery faces, and good-natured banter, looked me up and down in suspicion as I entered. These were the carters and wheelwrights and hostlers and a large man with knotted muscles who must have been a smith, catching time with their cronies before going home to sleep. After I'd settled onto a low stool by myself and remained sitting quietly, they left me alone. I had a glass of hot gin, then a tankard of ale.
I was halfway through that and pleasantly warmed when Black Nancy danced into the room. She looked about with wide, eager eyes, swishing her hips, then spotted me and rushed across the room.
'There you are, Captain. I tried to follow you, but I lost you in Long Acre. I had to ask everyone if they'd seen a lame man walking alone. A gent told me he'd spied you coming in here, and here you are.'
I set down my ale. 'Very clever of you. I came here because I am not in the mood for company.'
'I'm sorry to hear yer say that.' She dragged a three-legged stool to my table, perched on it, and gave me a wicked smile. 'I got something to offer yer.'
I was not in the mood for her teasing. I said sharply, 'Which I have refused before.'
'Not that. I know I ain't got a chance. Listen, Captain, ye want to nab this bloke what nabbed your Miss Jane or Miss Lily, or whatever her name might be, don't you?'
I nodded and sipped ale.
'Well, I can help ye there. Me and Jemmy. He thought it over, and he don't like that he was made to do it.
