Nodding agreement, a very puzzled Mcintosh went to the window and watched Faro leave the building and head across the High Street, as if such action might reveal some indication of his plans.
With a sigh he returned to his desk. Borders, eh. Then this could not be a police matter, hence his own exclusion from the details. Besides, the English police had very different ideas of how the law should be administered and were, as far as he was concerned, a race apart.
No doubt time would reveal all.
Faro, however, hoped most fervently that it would not as he walked rapidly homewards through the crowded, odorous High Street and emerged at last in the quiet villa quarters of Newington.
All around him Edinburgh blossomed, touched with the gentle splendour of Maytime. Arthur's Seat, proud and majestic, bloomed richly under the gold of broom while roadside hedgerows and gardens beguiled him with the scent of hawthorn blossom, of meadowsweet and delicate wild irises marching in sedate regiments shaded by mighty trees.
He breathed deeply. The warm breeze and gentle sunlight carried sweet odours of new grass and distant peat fires.
Approaching the tree-lined avenue leading to Sheridan Place with its handsome Georgian houses, he observed his housekeeper, Mrs Brook, industriously polishing the brass plate outside the home he shared with his stepson: DR VINCENT B. LAURIE, FAMILY PHYSICIAN, to which a new name, DR STEPHEN BALFOUR, had been added recently, a partner to accommodate the growing practice in this ever-expanding suburb of prosperous merchants.
Mrs Brook looked up at his approach. 'This is a grand day to be alive, sir,' she said cheerfully.
'It is indeed, Mrs Brook.'
Alive, he thought grimly as the sudden cool darkness of the interior hallway engulfed him and he climbed the stairs to his study. Beyond the window the distant Pentland Hills glowed in the late sunlight. This room containing all his books, his most precious possessions, had never looked more desirable, more comfortable and protective. And he sighed, with an ominous feeling that there might be precious few days like this in the immediate future.
As far as he was concerned, for 'incognito' read ‘Royal spy' and he winced at having to conceal his identity. Once a policeman, always a policeman.
That he was incapable of successfully wearing any other disguise was a possibility that Her Majesty obviously had not taken into consideration.
He shuddered as a sudden vision of the Tower of London loomed before him. He had seen gloomy and alarming lithographs of its grim interior and, considering its bloody and dreadful history, it was one place he had no desire to visit either outside or in.
What if he discovered that the Prince of Wales was guilty of worse than cowardice. What then?
The Queen's displeasure for a mission failed and a scandal might at best merit discreet exile to the Colonies, or at worst a rather splendid civic funeral financed by Edinburgh City Police.
Such were his sour thoughts as he prepared to assume the new role necessary for what promised to be a most trying investigation. Given a straight choice, he would have taken on an Edinburgh murder any day.
CHAPTER 2
'A pity you are no actor,' said Dr Vincent Laurie, who sympathised with his stepfather's present predicament.
For the sake of his two young daughters, Rose and Emily, living in Orkney with their grandmother, Faro realised that he must disregard the Royal Command to the extent of taking a member of his family into his confidence. In case a similar fate awaited him in Elrigg and he too was victim of a mysterious fatal accident.
And who better to be trusted with the details of his secret mission than his stepson, whose quick thinking had on many occasions saved his life?
'Elrigg Castle?' said Vince. 'Sir Archie Elrigg's place - equerry to the Prince of Wales, was he not?' Wide-eyed, he looked at Faro. The one who has just been gored to death by a bull? A bit about in the paper few weeks ago. Didn't you read it?'
Faro shook his head rather irritably. He had been particularly busy chasing a notorious villain, a fact that seemed to have escaped his stepson's memory. As he gently reminded him, Vince shook his head.
The wild cattle are notorious. I seem to remember there was a similar accident in the papers a while back. An actor - Philip Gray. Entertaining guests with monologues from Shakespeare. Remember we saw him in Hamlet at the theatre...'
As Faro listened, he wondered if the actor had also been the Prince's rival for a lady's love. From the few veiled hints Her Majesty had vouchsafed in this sorry tale - hints that were all he had in the way of clues - he guessed that Bertie was more than a little interested in the laird's wife, Lady Elrigg, the former actress Miss Poppy Lynne.
Such knowledge was enough to support the theory that Bertie was following the usual pattern of his seductions. Fancy a married lady and, providing the social stratum was correct, the first step on the road to her bed was to appoint her husband as equerry. Next, suggest a weekend shooting party; grouse, deer, wild cattle, nothing on wing or hoof was safe from His Royal Highness's attentions. If the lady was willing and the mansion large enough to conceal indiscretions, the husband was more often than not only too honoured at enjoying Royal patronage to care about being cuckolded.
There were scores of such stories, at least one a year, but for Bertie, Royal sportsman, the thrill was in the kill. Once the lady had succumbed to his arms, the Royal eyes soon wandered. An expensive piece of jewellery for the lady, a knighthood and a
