Denis sat back, steepling his fingers. He had not covered the hand again but fixed his gaze on it, as though not letting himself look away.
'I want whoever has done this,' he said.
'I'd like to find him myself. I know you do not want magistrates, but he deserves to be caught and arrested.'
'No, he deserves this to be done to him at the very least.'
An eye for an eye. Justice served by James Denis.
After a moment, he asked me, 'What do you have to go on?'
'Very little, unfortunately. I went back to the beginning again-my house, the last place he'd been seen. Cooper is not there, nor did I find trace of him in what remains of the outbuildings. I saw no sign of him on the marshes or the sands beyond-no footprints, nothing. No one I have spoken to has reported seeing an injured man, nor have I heard of any gossip of one being so treated.'
Denis's fingers tightened the slightest bit. 'Leave no stone unturned, Lacey.'
'As to that, I would like to speak to your men,' I said. 'Individually, I mean. I want to know what they know about Cooper, if he mentioned anything about leaving or pursuing a matter somewhere in the countryside-to investigate something he thought might interest you, perhaps. They might have seen or heard something that seemed inconsequential at the time, but might be significant. Also, they might have some clue about Ferguson's death.'
Denis was studying me coldly. 'You may be certain, Captain, that I have asked them.'
'Yes, but they work for you, and I imagine you stood them all in a row and demanded them to tell you what they knew. I want to interview them one at a time, alone, without you listening. That is a different thing.'
He fell silent. Though nothing of his thoughts showed on his face, I knew he was weighing every consequence of letting me ask questions, in private, of the men who worked for him. That he was considering it at all told me how much Cooper meant to him.
After a long time, Denis gave me a single nod. 'I will have them speak to you in the dining room, after supper. You will use the rest of this day to search. I am not so foolish as to believe you can accomplish this task alone, so I am sending out teams.'
I decided not to mention I'd recruited my own team. I had no doubt he already knew. 'They need to be careful,' I said. 'The countryside can be dangerous if you don't know it.'
'I agree. That is why you will be directing them.'
My mother's notebook would have to wait. I hoped he intended to give me a bedchamber to myself, where I could be alone to read it, rather than expecting me to bunk down with his lackeys. With Denis, one could never be certain.
I looked at the hand. 'What will you do with that?'
Denis tossed a corner of the canvas back over it. 'Burn it,' he said. 'It is of no use to Cooper now.'
The afternoon's search proved less fruitful than the morning's. I managed to find Terrance riding toward Blakeney, and I told him I would be conducting the search with Denis's men. If he wanted to continue to help, fine; otherwise, he could go home.
Terrance told me he'd continue. He seemed more animated this afternoon, less morose. I suppose he was happy that he had something useful to do.
I took my handful of men toward Salthouse, with its rise of ground, open heath, and view of the sea. The ocean was gray with rain, the wind strong here. When it grew dark, we returned to Easton's, with nothing to report.
I had been given my own bedchamber, I was happy to see. Bartholomew was there. He'd already unpacked my few belongings, had a fire stoked and the bed warmed and turned down. He asked as he drew off my coat, whether I wanted a bath.
I longed for a hot soak, but I had more to do until I retired. I removed the notebook from my coat's inner pocket and handed it to Bartholomew. 'Put that in a safe place. I'll need it later tonight but I want no one coming across it.'
'Right you are, sir.' Bartholomew's usual cheerfulness was subdued, however. 'Will you be all right here, sir?'
'I will,' I said, stripping off my damp shirt and reaching for a dry one. 'What about you?'
'Below stairs, those what used to be pugilists are mostly leaving me alone. Mr. Denis's chef from London, now, he's ruder than the ruffians, I must say. I have my own billet in the attic-I don't have to share-but I'm to prepare a room for Mr. Grenville, who will arrive tomorrow.'
'Mr. Denis arranges everything,' I said.
'He does, sir.' Bartholomew brushed the creases out of my shirt, tied my cravat, and helped me into a dry coat, then I went back downstairs for supper.
I ate alone in the dining room, with one of the lackeys to serve me. When I asked where his fellows were, he told me they were eating in the servants' hall. Denis did not join me.
The fare was good, the dining room quiet. I contrasted it to the garish dining chamber at Lady Southwick's with its blood-soaked hunting scene and the not-so-thinly veiled insults of her guests. Whatever Brigadier Easton's faults had been, I found his house restful.
After supper, the lackey cleared away the plates, brought me a pile of clean paper, a pen, pen sharpener, ink, and a blotter, and left again. My interviews began.
Chapter Fourteen
James Denis hired men of a type-most of them former fighters, all of them large and strong. Many, but not all, had criminal pasts. Six had accompanied Cooper to Norfolk to search for the lost artwork, which still had not turned up. Denis had brought three more with him. All nine filed in, one after the other, sat opposite me, and answered my questions.
I'd been used to thinking of them collectively-Denis's men-but as each came in and either stood or sat in front of me, they solidified into individuals, men with separate pasts, characters, ambitions.
One man told me he had a son he was raising on his own, his wife having passed six years before. He worked for Denis because Denis paid so much, and if a man kept his head down and got on, he had a place for life. He'd tucked his son away in a school in Scotland, far from Denis's exploits.
Another, younger man, who called himself Tom and gave no surname, had been thought slow in the Yorkshire village where he'd grown up. At age fourteen, his father had more or less turned him out to fend for himself. He'd become an exhibition fighter for trainers who also thought him slow, but had been tossed out when he hurt other, more valuable fighters.
Tom had then worked his way south toward London, doing odd jobs, usually being paid only in a meal and a place to sleep. People feared him and did not like him lingering, so he'd never stayed anywhere more than a day or two. When he'd reached London, street toughs had lit into him, and Cooper had happened by during the fight. Liking how Tom had held his own against four men, Cooper had broken up the fight and brought the young man to Denis. Tom had been working for Denis ever since.
He related all this in short sentences with long pauses between. Not so much slow, I saw, as careful. Tom was happy in his employment now, with no ambition to go anywhere else. He was grateful to Cooper, but he did not know where Cooper was, nor did he know what had happened to Ferguson. He'd been searching Easton's attics for the art when the cry had gone up at the windmill, and he'd run out to see what was the matter.
I believed him. The way he spoke, leaving out no detail but not embellishing, told me that here was a man not comfortable with lying.
The next person to speak to me was the man who'd beaten me on the boat a year ago, the same one who'd stood behind me in the dining room when Denis had explained that he owned me.
He sprawled in a chair, folded his arms, and grinned at me. 'What am I supposed to tell you, Captain?'
I shrugged. 'Where you think Cooper is, who you think killed Ferguson. Anything unusual you've seen these
