to be running blindly. Truth to tell, she looked disgustingly pleased with herself.”
Charles leaned back and rested his long-fingered hands on the desk behind him. “Why do you think she told you she was leaving and no one else?”
“Oh, she explained that straight out. She asked me to visit her uncle and tell him she’d left London. She said she wouldn’t be able to say good-bye to him herself.”
“Her uncle lives in London?”
“He’s imprisoned for debt in the Marshalsea. He used to be an actor. Hugo Trevennen. Some of the company still remember him. He was quite talented apparently, but he had extravagant tastes and a weakness for the horses. I went to see him as Helen asked. A thoroughly charming man.”
“Did you ask him where he thought his niece might have gone?”
“Naturally, I was curious. He said he never had the least idea what Helen might do from one minute to the next.”
Charles swung his booted foot against the side of the desk. “Did she have any other relatives?”
“Not that I know of.” Miss Goddard pulled the folds of her shawl about her throat. “Until then she’d never spoken about her family.”
“Were there other men?” Melanie said, hoping to catch her off her guard with the bluntness of the question. “Besides Lieutenant Jennings?”
Miss Goddard’s eyes widened. She looked at Melanie as though reassessing her opinion of the decorous Mrs. Fraser. “Helen flirted with men by the stage door. We all did. I expect she did more than flirt, though I couldn’t swear to it. But the only man I ever met in her presence was someone she called ‘Will.’ He may have been your friend Lieutenant Jennings. He had the bearing of an army officer.”
“Dark hair?” Charles asked. “Blue eyes? Tall, midtwenties?”
She nodded. “He called to take her out after the performance every so often, though his visits stopped some time before Helen disappeared. She said he’d been posted abroad with his regiment.”
“Did you know he’d died?”
“Yes, I heard about it just before Helen disappeared.” Miss Goddard twisted the end of her shawl round her shapely fingers. Some further words hung unspoken in the air.
“But?” Charles said in a gentle voice.
Miss Goddard looked up at him. “That’s all, Mr. Fraser.”
“Oh, come, Miss Goddard, surely an actress knows how much can be read into a pause.” Charles hesitated a moment. “I know it sits oddly with my threats and I’d no doubt say it anyway. But I told the truth when I said I mean Miss Trevennen no harm.”
No one could look more compellingly honest than Charles when he put his mind to it. Perhaps because the honesty was genuine. Miss Goddard studied him for a long moment, an actress judging the authenticity of a performance. “That last night, Helen said she’d meet me at the tavern. But I forgot my gloves, so I ran back into the theater after most of the company had gone home. I heard Helen crying in her dressing room. Or laughing, I couldn’t be sure which—it sounded a bit hysterical. The door was ajar, so I peeked inside. A packet of papers was spread on the dressing table in front of her. When I asked her what was wrong, all she’d say is that she’d lost the person in the world who meant most to her and her life had just changed completely.”
“And you think she was crying with grief?” Charles said.
“At the time I did, though she didn’t act at all broken-hearted later in the tavern. But perhaps she cared for Lieutenant Jennings as much as she was capable of caring for anyone. She certainly must have meant something to him or he never would have sent her such a precious keepsake.”
Melanie’s pulse quickened, as though she had been running. “What sort of keepsake?”
Violet Goddard raised her brows at the urgency in Melanie’s voice. “He sent her a piece of jewelry with the letter. I couldn’t see it properly, but it was gold and there was some sort of red stone.”
Miss Goddard shook her head. “She pulled the pages of the letter over it. I don’t think she realized I’d seen. I don’t think she wanted me to see. Helen was free enough with other people’s property, but she was jealous of her own.”
“Did she say anything else?” Charles kept his voice even, stripped of all but essentials.
“No, just that she’d be ready in a minute. I fetched my gloves and she met me in the corridor. When I tried to offer my condolences on her loss, she laughed it off and said no man was worth crying over. We went to the tavern and had the conversation I told you about. It was the last time I saw her.”
“Did you mention any of this to Iago Lorano?” Charles said. “Did you tell him about her uncle in the Marshalsea?”
“No.” Miss Goddard smoothed the fabric of her shawl, a gesture that seemed uncharacteristically nervous. “I didn’t particularly trust his story—if he was someone who’d known Helen in the past, he might have had something to do with why she ran away.” The ironic look crossed her face again. “Besides, he didn’t threaten to use his influence against the theater.”
Charles got to his feet. “Believe me, Miss Goddard, I wouldn’t have resorted to such despicable tactics had I seen an alternative.”
Miss Goddard gave him one of her incandescent smiles. “Do you know, I have the oddest inclination to believe you, Mr. Fraser. You’re either a very honest man or an exceedingly good actor.”
When they returned to the stage, the foils were still clanging. “‘Tybalt, you rat-catcher, will you walk?’” said one of the actors, sounding more natural now.
“Thank God,” Miss Goddard murmured. “Perhaps we’ll actually get to one of my scenes before the midday break.”
Ned Thurgood emerged from the wings, a jeweled flask in one hand, a feathered mask in the other.
“Miss Goddard was a great help,” Charles said. “We appreciate her cooperation. And yours.”
Thurgood nodded, one eye on the duelists. “I’m glad to hear it. I wish you well in your search.”
Miss Goddard stared at the mask. “Please tell me that isn’t for me.”
“For the ball scene.”
“Neddie. Dearest. Chicken feathers make me sneeze.”
“Well, at least—”
Charles and Melanie left them to argue it out and made their way out of the theater in silence. Charles turned toward the corner where Randall was waiting with the carriage. The full reality of what they had learned washed over him. He stopped and gripped a lamppost with one hand. “God,” he said, his forehead against the iron of the lamppost, his voice so wracked with relief it trembled. “Sweet Jesus.”
Melanie laid a hand on his arm. Her fingers were shaking. “I know. I didn’t really believe Helen Trevennen had the ring until now.”
Charles released the lamppost. “She may have sold it. Do you have any paper?”
She dropped her hand and took a notebook and pencil from her reticule.
Charles propped the notebook against the iron lamppost and scribbled a brief note as he spoke. “I’ll have Addison start making inquiries among London jewelers while we visit Helen Trevennen’s uncle at the Marshalsea.”
“Mr. Trevennen told Miss Goddard he didn’t have any idea where Helen had gone.”
“But he must know something about her friends or at the very least her family. At present he’s our only lead.”
They returned to the carriage, and Charles gave Randall the note. “This is for Addison. Stop back at the Thistle and ask Baxter to have someone he trusts deliver it to Berkeley Square. Then take us to the Marshalsea.”
“Right you are.” Randall pocketed the note and accepted the direction to the debtors’ prison as matter-of- factly as if Charles had asked to be driven to Parliament or his club in St. James’s.
When they were settled in the carriage, Melanie looked at Charles as though about to ask something, then clamped her lips shut.
