Her stage setting proved inspired; as they walked into the front hall from the direction of the stables, Nicholas came down the stairs.
She looked up. “Good morning, Nicholas.”
“Penelope.” Gaining the hall, he nodded in greeting, his gaze shifting immediately to Charles.
Who smiled. “Good morning, Arbry.”
“Lostwithiel.”
A pregnant pause.
“I’ve offered Charles the use of Papa’s maps,” she cheerily announced-anything to bring their masculine eyeing contest to an end. “We’ve just come to fetch them. They’re in the library-we won’t disturb you.”
Charles hid a grin at her phrasing; she’d already disturbed Nicholas greatly, no matter he concealed it well.
“Maps?” Nicholas hesitated, then asked, “What sort of maps?”
“Of the area.” Turning, Penny led the way to the library.
As Charles had hoped, Nicholas followed.
Flinging the double doors of the library wide, Penny sailed through. “Papa had a wonderfully detailed set showing every little stream and inlet all along this stretch of coast. Invaluable if one wishes to scout the area thoroughly.”
She made for a bookcase at the end of the long room. “They were somewhere around here, I believe.”
Nicholas watched as she crouched, studying the large folios housed on the bottommost shelf. Hanging back, Charles studied his face; Nicholas was reasonably skilled in hiding his thoughts, but rather less adept at hiding his reactions. His pale features, clean-cut and patrician, remained studiously expressionless, yet his eyes, and his hands, were more revealing.
His fingers plucked restlessly at his watch chain as, a frown in his eyes, he tried to decide what to do.
In the end, he glanced at Charles. “I take it there’s evidence the smugglers in this area were involved in passing secrets?”
Charles smiled one of his predatory smiles. “Finding the evidence is what I’ve been sent here to do, so we can follow it back to the traitor involved.”
Was it his imagination, or did Nicholas’s pale face grow a touch paler?
Looking down, Nicholas frowned. “If there’s no real evidence…well, isn’t it likely you’re simply chasing hares?”
His grin grew intent. “Whitehall expects its minions to be thorough.” He glanced at one of the two six-foot-long display cases flanking the library’s central carpet. “If after I’ve shaken every tree and turned every stone, no substantiating evidence is forthcoming, then doubtless it’ll be concluded that there was no truth in the information received.”
“Here they are.” Penny pulled a thick folio from the shelf; cradling it in her arms, she rose and went to the desk.
Laying the heavy tome down, she opened it. Nicholas went to look; Charles followed.
“See?” With one finger, Penny traced the fine lines of the highly detailed hand-drawn maps. “These show every little inlet along the estuary and the nearby coast.” She looked up at him, transparently delighted at having found such a valuable tool to aid him. “With these, you can be certain you’re not missing any of the landing places.”
“Excellent.” Reaching out, he turned the book his way, then shut it and picked it up. “Thank you-these will indeed help enormously.”
Nicholas’s lips had set in a thin line; Charles could easily imagine his chagrin. For a nonlocal seeking to learn about the local smugglers, the maps would be a godsend. Nicholas had had access to them, but hadn’t known. He now had to watch as Charles, of all people, tucked the tome under his arm.
Looking at Penny, with his head he indicated the display case he’d glanced at earlier. “Your father’s collection seems just the same as I remember it as a child. I’m surprised he never added to it.”
Penny met his eyes briefly, played to his lead. “I’m not sure why he stopped collecting.” Rounding the desk, she glanced at both cases. “But you’re right-it’s been, well, decades since he last bought a new one.”
Sweeping up to one case, she trailed her fingers across the glass, studying the pillboxes laid neatly on white satin with small cards engraved in her father’s precise hand describing each one.
Charles came up beside her. “Perhaps he grew bored with pillboxes.”
Nicholas was watching, listening to every word, every inflection, his intensely focused attention the equivalent of a red flag waving in Charles’s face. Any notion Nicholas wasn’t deeply involved in whatever scheme had been operating was untenable. He had been involved, and was now intent on ensuring Charles did not find the evidence he was seeking.
“Perhaps.” Penny shrugged, then turned to Nicholas. “Now we’ve found the maps, we won’t disturb you further, Nicholas.”
Nicholas blinked, then seemed to shake himself. “Why-ah, surely you’ll stay for tea. Take some refreshment?”
“No, no!” Penny waved aside the invitation. “Thank you, but no. By the time we ride back to the Abbey it’ll be time for luncheon.”
She glanced at Charles, a question in her eyes. He smiled approvingly, adding just a hint of wicked anticipation-enough, he hoped, to prick Nicholas.
From the way Nicholas’s jaw set, he succeeded.
Nicholas rather stiffly took his leave of them. Together, they left the house.
It was indeed time for luncheon when they clattered back into the Abbey stable yard. Charles’s grooms came running. Penny slid from her saddle without waiting to be lifted down; handing the reins to a groom, she joined Charles, and they started across the gently rising lawn toward the house.
“That went well!” Head up, she savored the exhilaration still singing through her veins. They hadn’t talked on their journey home, just exchanged triumphant smiles, and ridden, laughing, before the wind.
“We’ve certainly given Nicholas a few things to think about.” The book of maps under his arm, Charles paced beside her.
“He was put out about the maps-and your questions about the pillboxes were inspired. He was hanging on every word.”
“With luck, he’ll accept that you-and thus I-have no knowledge of the pillboxes hidden in the priest hole.”
She frowned. “Why didn’t you want him knowing we knew?”
“Because they’re the proof-the irrefutable evidence-that some presently inexplicable but clandestine relationship has existed between the French and your family’s menfolk for decades. I’d rather they remained where they are, accessible should we need them.”
She glanced at him. “Decades?”
He met her eyes, baldly reiterated, “Decades. You counted the boxes-how many were there?”
“Sixty-four.”
“If we assume every piece of information was paid for with a pillbox, and I checked-most are the work of French jewelers-then given the rate at which sufficiently valuable information would crop up to be passed, it would take something like thirty years to amass sixty-four boxes.”
“Oh.” The knowledge cast a pall on the day, leaving her feeling as if clouds had covered the sun.
“Do you still want to help me?”
She looked up to see Charles regarding her, understanding very clear in his midnight eyes. She stared into them for a moment, then looked ahead. “Yes. I have to.”
She didn’t need to explain. He nodded, and they walked on, passing beneath the spreading branches of the huge oaks bordering the south lawn, the side door their goal.
Despite the confirmation that it wasn’t only Granville but her father, too, who’d been involved in the traitorous scheme, she still felt curiously buoyed by their success, minor though it had been.
That morning, for the first time in she couldn’t remember when, she’d shared fears and concerns with someone she trusted, someone who understood. Just being able to air such thoughts had been a catharsis in itself.
As for her specific concern, while the problem hadn’t gone away, its weight had lessened, lifted in part from her shoulders-truly shared. She now felt immeasurably more confident that whatever the truth was, Elaine, her half sisters, and she would be safe. Shielded as far as it was possible to be.
