“Well, yes,” Leland said. “It’s hard to run in evening shoes. Had I been wearing my boots, I’d have gotten him.”
“You look very pale, my lord,” Helena said with concern. “Are you all right?”
“Pale as a sheet,” Daisy pronounced. “Sit down.”
“No,” Leland said. “I’ll do better standing.” He put a hand to his heart in his usual gesture of sincerity, but then lifted it, looked at it, and frowned. His hand was covered with blood.
Daisy gasped as she saw the widening stain on the front of his jacket.
“I see the fellow was after more than your purse,” Leland said as he stared at his gory palm. “It appears he tried to take my life as well. If I sit, I doubt I’d stand again. So, shall we go?”
Chapter Nine
“You should lie down,” Daisy told the viscount.
“If I did everything I should, I’d be a very different man, and a much unhappier one,” Leland said. “Don’t worry,” he added more gently, “not only is there not enough room in this carriage for a maypole like myself to lie down, there’s no need of it.”
The viscount had gotten a knife thrust in his chest, and no one could be sure he was as well as he insisted he was. He sat in the carriage, head back, the earl and Daffyd close on either side of him so he wouldn’t be shaken by the ride. Daisy worried because he was so pale, and because of the amount of blood she’d seen. She sat opposite him, alongside Helena, and they stared at their wounded companion.
“Nothing vital’s been punctured,” Leland reassured them with a faint smile. “Or I couldn’t be sitting here arguing with you. Nothing’s bubbling or spurting-sorry, but you force me to be graphic. How can I say it politely? However I put it, I’m not in distress. I’ve got handkerchiefs and my neck cloth binding up the wound, so I won’t be shedding any more blood. My only concern is being seen in public with a bare throat.
“You’re right. I’d have just tied a handkerchief ’round my neck like the Gypsy I am,” Daffyd said. “Don’t worry about being seen. No one will see you but the doctor. He’s already been sent for.”
Leland peered out the coach window. “This is not the way to my house.”
“No,” the earl agreed. “It isn’t. You’re coming with me. I don’t trust you to care for yourself, Lee. You’re too casual with your life. You get a knife in your chest, diagnose the wound, whip off a neck cloth to blot up the gore, and pronounce yourself fine. That won’t do.”
“Worse if I pronounced myself dead,” Leland muttered. But though he joked, his voice was fainter, his pallor pronounced, and those in the coach with him exchanged worried glances. “Any rate, even if it were bad, it’s always best to greet the devil with a quip. I hear he likes that… Only jesting,” he said into the sudden silence. “Would you rather I moaned?”
“I’d rather you took it seriously,” the earl said.
“I’ve survived worse,” Leland murmured. “My poor heart must be impervious to insult by now, what with all the fair maidens who have rejected me, and the rivals who stabbed me in the back. But thank you, Geoff. I think I will take advantage of your hospitality, because…” He paused, and his eyelids fluttered down.
Everyone in the coach stiffened.
Leland opened his eyes, and laughed. “… because my valet would surely suffer a heart attack if he saw me in this state.”
They waited in the earl’s salon, not saying much because they were too anxious. Daffyd paced and Daisy looked out the window, while Helena sat quietly waiting. They relaxed when they saw the earl’s expression as he came into the room.
“He’ll do,” the earl told his guests. “The doctor says he’s lucky, the knife missed heart and lungs, but we guessed that. He might run a fever, and that would be another story. I’ve sent for his valet. Lee’s agreed to stay on here until I’m sure he’s well, but not with good grace, I might add. He’d still be complaining if the doctor hadn’t given him a draught so he’d sleep.”
“I’ll postpone leaving in the morning, as I’d planned,” Daffyd said. “I’ll stay on, too, if you don’t mind. At least until I’m sure he’s better.”
“Do that, and he’ll rage himself into that fever we don’t want to see,” the earl said. “In fact, he mentioned it to me just now. ‘Send Daffy on his way,’ he said. ‘I’ll be fine.’ ”
“He’d say that if his head was cut off and on a pike,” Daffyd grumbled.
“If he could, yes,” the earl agreed. “He’s a remarkable man. He dresses like a dandy and carries on like a fop, but he’s pure steel beneath. He fences, rides like a demon, and spars with the Gentleman himself,” he told Daisy. “You wouldn’t know it from his conversation. He even worked with the government in secret when Napoleon was marching toward Paris again; dangerous work, too. Did you know that?”
“Aye,” Daffyd said. “What’s more, the little emperor has no hard feelings. Rumor says Lee’s visited him on Saint Helena since.”
The earl smiled. “The man could talk rings around anyone.”
“He’s a master of flattery, even I can see that,” Daisy admitted.
“It’s more than that,” Daffyd said. “He never says what he doesn’t mean.”
The earl shook his head. “Let’s not go on like this, it sounds like we’re at a wake. Lee’s very much alive, and I hope to keep him that way. So,” he said seriously. “Time to get down to nasty details. Do you think the knifing was an accident? A cutpurse who got frightened when Leland lunged at him? Or do you suspect something else?”
Daisy frowned, Helena looked surprised, but Daffyd nodded approval.
“Good question,” he said. “Could have been a mistake: The fellow was trying a simple slice and run, and that don’t make for accuracy. And Lee’s big and he was going at him like a charging war-horse. He could have just frightened the filching cove so much he struck out and cut by accident. I don’t know. Now, I do know we’re a pack of old lags, so we always have crime on our minds. If it was something else, was Lee the mark, or one of us? We’d be fools not to think about it.”
He stared at Daisy. “No one’s angry at me at the moment, that I know of. Anyone mad at you, Daisy? I’m not saying it was you the cove was after; think of the risks he took when he knifed Lee. If he’d nabbed a purse and thrown it away before he got caught, he might have got clean away. Even if he was caught with it, he’d have got off light if your purse was light, too. And ladies don’t carry too much lolly. But flashing a blade at a gent? Everyone knows it’s the nubbing cheat for attempted murder, if the victim’s a gent. Did he mean it or not? Was he just a rattle pate, or a murderer? We’ve got to think of everything.”
“Too right,” Daisy said. She saw Helena’s expression, and translated for her. “Pickpockets have to be careful they don’t nick too much money, or they’d be hanged if caught. And it’s certain hanging for trying to kill the gentry. We don’t know if the bloke was out for money or blood. Was he such a fool that he tried to stab anyone who might catch him? Or was he sent to do murder?”
She looked thoughtful. “As for me having any enemies… I’ve got some who are vexed with me, true. But they’re all back in Botany Bay, and far as I know none of them mad enough to be after my head. It was my hand they wanted. Although I think I see them everywhere, I’ve never really seen them anywhere.”
“Did Tanner have any relatives who disputed his will?” the earl asked.
Daisy made a sour face. “He had no kin, or so he said. That’s why he took a job in the Antipodes. And he had no will. He couldn’t write. The judge gave everything to me, because I was all there was. And I think, because the judge knew Tanner, he thought I deserved it.”
“And you, Geoff?” Daffyd asked. “Anyone angry with you these days?”
“The man who hated me is in his tomb, Daffyd. I don’t know of any others. But I’ll think on. I’ll also send word to some of our old friends who did settle here in London and ask them. And I’ll call in Bow Street. I’ll have to ask Lee, too,” he added unhappily. “But not today.”
“Don’t worry,” Daffyd said. “If I know my man, he’s already dreaming on it. He doesn’t miss much. In the meanwhile, it’s late. I’ll see the ladies back to their hotel. While I’m out I’ll get some old friends to watch their
