Secrets of a Lady

Colin. Let’s go.”

They half ran up the stairs and down the second-floor corridor to room 212. Charles turned the handle without bothering to knock. The door was unlatched. “O’Roarke?” he called, pushing the door open.

“Fraser?” A familiar voice, light with mockery, carried into the narrow entryway from the sitting room beyond. “Come in and tell me what the devil’s going on.”

The air in the sitting room smelled of toast and marmalade and coffee. O’Roarke was seated at a linen- covered table, his long fingers curled round a cup, a newspaper spread before him. He wore an immaculate white shirt and a rich paisley silk dressing gown. He had always been elegant, even in the blood and grime of the field.

“Look here, Fraser—” O’Roarke broke off as his gaze fell on Melanie. “Mrs. Fraser.” He pushed himself to his feet. “I didn’t realize.”

“Where’s Carevalo?” Charles said.

“I was hoping you could tell me.” O’Roarke tightened the belt on his dressing gown. “He hammered on my door at an ungodly hour this morning to say he was leaving and I was to deliver a letter to you if you called. Very cloak-and-dagger. Typical Carevalo.”

Charles’s gaze had already fallen on the letter, leaning against a black basalt candlestick on the mantel. He crossed to the fireplace, snatched up the letter, and broke the seal. Melanie was beside him.

It was a single page, written in English in a flowing black hand.

My dear Fraser,

Congratulations. How long did it take you to work it out, I wonder? But that’s neither here nor there, as you British say. You know now of course. I have the boy. I want the ring. You have until this Saturday evening. When you are ready to hand over the ring, place an advertisement in the Morning Chronicle. I will respond with instructions. If you value your son’s life half as much as I think you do, you won’t fail me.

Carevalo

P.S.

Don’t make the mistake of thinking I don’t mean what I say. I’m not the man you knew in Lisbon. I can play the cheerful boon companion when it serves my purpose. But believe me, antagonist is a role to which I am much better suited.

Charles opened his fist, dropped the letter, crossed to the table, and grabbed O’Roarke by the shoulders. “Where is he?”

O’Roarke stared at him. “Don’t be an idiot, Fraser. I told you—”

“Goddamnit, O’Roarke.” Charles pushed him up against the wall. The plate-glass windows rattled in their frames. “Where’s Carevalo?”

The early-morning light flickered over the finely molded bones of O’Roarke’s face. “What’s Carevalo done?” he said.

“He’s taken Colin.” Melanie spoke from across the room. “He wants us to give him the Carevalo Ring.”

“Oh, Christ.” O’Roarke closed his eyes for a moment. “Oh, sweet Jesus. The damned fool.”

Charles tightened his grip. “I need answers. I’ll beat them out of you if I have to.”

“That would be a lamentable waste of time for us both, Fraser. I don’t have answers to give you, however many of my bones you manage to break.” O’Roarke drew a breath. “For God’s sake, Charles. You’ve known me all your life. Do you really think I’d be party to abducting a child?”

“If you thought it was the only way to further your cause.” Charles stared hard into O’Roarke’s eyes. The man was more than capable of lying. Charles had seen him do so with great agility. But he realized, too, that Carevalo would know the lengths to which he would go to get information. So unless Carevalo was more fool than Charles thought, he’d make sure O’Roarke didn’t have any information to give. O’Roarke was most likely telling the truth.

Charles released O’Roarke and took a step back. “Tell us what you know.”

“I arrived in London last night and came straight to the hotel.” O’Roarke’s voice had the rifle-shot crispness Charles remembered from moments of crisis in the Peninsula. “I expected to meet with Carevalo this morning. Instead he woke me sometime after four and said he’d been called away on private business. He wouldn’t say what business or where he was going.”

“Did you ask?”

“Of course.” O’Roarke took a quick turn round the room. “I had no particular desire to twiddle my thumbs waiting for him. He refused to tell me anything else. Had I been a little more awake I might have pressed him further, but I doubt I’d have been successful. He gave me the letter and said you’d probably call for it sometime today.” O’Roarke whirled round and faced Charles across the breakfast table. “I had no idea how important the letter was. I’m sorry.”

“Sorry—” Melanie said.

“Where would he go?” Charles asked.

“Somewhere none of us will be able to trace him.”

“And he probably doesn’t have Colin with him in any event. He’ll have left the messy bits up to his hirelings.” Charles pressed his hands over his eyes. “Whom does Carevalo know in England?”

“Lord and Lady Holland. Lord John Russell. The Lydgates. You and Mrs. Fraser. A score of others, I imagine.”

Charles moved to the table, keeping O’Roarke within striking distance. “Does he have a mistress?”

“I expect he has more than one. But he’s of far too jealous a disposition to share their names with anyone, let alone me.”

“Damn it, O’Roarke.” Charles slammed his hand down on the table. “He’s your friend. He must have written to you.”

“Don’t break the china, Fraser, it won’t get us anywhere. He’s not my friend, he’s my ally. There’s a world of difference.”

“Allies write to allies,” Melanie said.

“Oh, Carevalo wrote to me.” O’Roarke rested one hand on a chair back with the deceptive nonchalance of a panther. “He wrote to me about the stubborn loyalty of the British government to the monarchy in Spain. About the arrogant contempt British soldiers have for their former Spanish comrades. About the way the liberals at Holland House lectured him on the virtues of British constitutionalism. He didn’t include personal details.” O’Roarke looked at Charles, his expression not unkind. “You don’t have the ring?”

“Of course I don’t have the ring.”

“There’s no of course about it, Fraser. The ring disappeared in the ambush. The men who had it were killed. The French soldier claims the French never got their hands on it.”

“They must be lying.”

“Or you are. Carevalo has evidently decided you are.”

Something snapped inside Charles. He reached out to grab O’Roarke. O’Roarke caught his arm. “Steady, Fraser. For what it’s worth, I’m inclined to believe you. Though I can’t for the life of me say why. There was little to choose between your side and the French. In the end you both used us. You used Spain as a private battleground to fight your war. You used our people as cannon fodder, you used our women as whores, you used our land for pillage. And when it was over, you threw your support behind our incompetent tyrant of a king.”

Charles wrenched his arm away. “I’m no supporter of King Ferdinand. I never have been.”

“Your country is. The government you served are doing their damnedest to keep Ferdinand in power while he rips to shreds any of the reforms that came out of the war. That’s what Carevalo would say.”

Melanie, who had been watching in silence, moved to the table. “You seem to be forgetting that I’m half- Spanish,” she said. Her hands closed hard on a chair back. “Just as you are, Mr. O’Roarke.”

O’Roarke turned his gaze to her. His eyes were hard and unyielding. “But you’ve clearly decided your loyalties lie with your husband’s country, madam.”

Melanie looked back at him, as though she could cut through to his soul. “He’s six years old. He still worries about ogres under the bed, though he won’t admit it. He can’t go to sleep without his stuffed bear. He woke screaming from a nightmare only last week and I had to go sit with him. He—”

“Mrs. Fraser—” O’Roarke stretched out his hand to her, then let it fall to his side. “If I hear anything from Carevalo, I’ll let you know.”