“Isn’t that a shocker?” Griffin murmured after he read the newspaper report aloud in the carriage. “I wonder if she will invite us to the wedding.”
They reached the park at precisely the same hour as they had on their previous outing. Griffin recalled watching Harriet tumble out of the carriage before she and his aunt had abandoned him to Constance. Edlyn had wandered off like a wisp of smoke. He had not kept her long in his view. Two governesses had been rescuing their charges from a cocker spaniel that had escaped its owner.
Or was he wrong? He frowned.
Perhaps only one of the bonneted, heavily cloaked women had been a governess. The other had been standing rather close to Edlyn. The more he thought about it, the more he realized that he had been paying too much attention to Harriet to notice anything else. And he could not even pretend to remember what Edlyn had been doing when Harriet’s half brother sprang out from behind the tree to cut Constance’s purse.
His aunt recalled little of what transpired that day. She became annoyed when Griffin pointed out that she was muddling the proper sequence of events. She blamed Constance’s prittle-prattle for impairing her memory and scoffed at his suggestion of old age.
Harriet thought to mention that there had been three phaetons sitting at the corner of the park. As to be expected, Sir Daniel had already questioned the drivers and a dozen or so pedestrians. None offered any pertinent information except to mention that the cutpurse had struck so fast, he could be described only by the color of his hair.
Evening arrived. Sir Daniel sent a brief message, reassuring the duke that a widespread search was under way.
“Edlyn’s disappearance could yet prove to be a prank,” Griffin reminded his aunt.
She rallied at the thought, then said, “I tell myself that every minute, but I’m not sure even she is that cruel.”
Harriet was fully aware that the duke said little else and that her own efforts to raise hope had not dispelled the mood of grim uncertainty that had settled upon his house.
“I think we might all feel better after a good dinner,” she said. “Something warm and savory, like roast beef with pudding. I’ll talk to Cook right this minute.”
But they only picked at their meal, dispirited, deprived of adequate sleep. Still, there was work to be done, and shortly after sherry and biscuits they set out again. The Marquess of Sedgecroft had invited them to his Park Lane mansion to review what had happened during the two soirees he had hosted in Griffin’s honor. Without the benefit of cheerful music and the glittering array of guests, the ballroom took on a disquieting emptiness that Harriet had not expected.
Their voices echoed eerily in the vast space. She felt as though she was tiptoeing through a cemetery and conjuring up ghosts, instead of remembering the few hours she had thought to treasure in her heart.
“The guest lists from both affairs have been checked,” Griffin said, walking behind her. “The young gentleman who danced with Edlyn is apparently distraught by what has happened.”
Harriet wandered toward the antechamber. Weed and several other footmen stood at the buffet table laid with light refreshments. For a moment she and the senior footman stared at each other in a thoughtful scrutiny, as if by doing so one of them might dredge up some forgotten detail that would prove helpful.
“Edlyn was sitting in those chairs by the door,” Griffin said. “There were people standing by her, but she-”
“-was drinking punch, I think,” Harriet said, “and talking with a woman who had her back to us.”
Weed followed them, bowing deeply. “Your grace, if I may speak?” The duke turned.
“I was present when Sir Daniel interviewed the guests who had gathered in this chamber on both occasions. None of them admitted to conversing with Miss Edlyn. But I do believe Miss Gardner is correct. There
Griffin nodded. “I think you are both right, but I shall be damned if I can describe her at all.”
“She was wearing a green dress,” Harriet said, contemplating the empty row of chairs. “And she might not have wanted us to see her. She left through that side door as soon as we entered the room.”
Weed paled. “Despite the staff’s stringent efforts, one or two intruders often manage to sneak into the marquess’s home during these affairs.” He paused. If Harriet was afraid he might mention her, he quickly proved he was too professional to be misguided from his current duty. “I shall question the servants at length, your grace.”
“All I remember,” Griffin said as he and Harriet walked back across the ballroom to his aunt and the marchioness, “is that I thought Edlyn was safe. And that-that you were the one in danger.”
Harriet slowed to look up at him. “From you?”
His lips tightened. “I wasn’t wrong, was I?”
“I expect we won’t know what was right or wrong until we’re able to think properly.”
He smiled tiredly. “Yes, and that time cannot come soon enough.”
Chapter Twenty-nine
His words had a strange effect upon me. I compassionated him and sometimes felt a wish to console him.
MARY SHELLEY
The strain had dampened everyone’s spirits. Lady Powlis appeared to be on the verge of an emotional crisis and had to be taken upstairs by the marchioness to await the family’s Scottish physician, who dosed her ladyship with laudanum and advised a night of unbroken rest.
Her ladyship’s collapse turned out to be a blessing in disguise. No sooner had the duke and Harriet returned to the town house than a messenger boy ran up the front steps behind them, gripping his knees to catch his breath. “Your grace?” he asked, half-bowing as Griffin looked around in surprise.
Harriet caught his arm. The boy appeared to be half her age, too young to conceal his own dismay at delivering unwelcome news. No doubt he ran fast and was agile enough to dodge the seedy characters who infested the streets at night.
“What is it?” Griffin asked, stepping in front of Harriet with the unthinking gallantry that never failed to move her.
“P’rhaps the lady ought not-”
“Go ahead,” Griffin said in resignation. “I won’t be able to keep it from her, anyway.”
The boy finally straightened, holding his cap to his heart in unspoken sorrow. “There’s a lady been found, beaten up outside the ’ood and Grapes. I’ve been directed to take you there.”
“I know where it is,” Harriet said. “Please let me go with you, your grace.”
She saw the hesitation in his eyes. But then he nodded and called out to the driver, who had been about to turn back toward the carriage house. It was a tense ride to the tavern, Harriet chewing her lip and not daring to break the duke’s silence. When at last they reached the Hood and Grapes, not tarrying in the taproom’s smoky gloom, it was only to meet Sir Daniel on the stairs. He stopped to stare as if he could not believe his eyes.
“How did you know to come here?” he asked in astonishment.
Griffin shook his head. “You sent for-was it-is it Edlyn?”
Sir Daniel blinked. “No. It was a shopkeeper’s assistant who had been sent to deliver a packet of thread. She will recover. But how on earth did you find out when I have only been here a minute or so myself?”
“Your messenger brought us here.” Griffin scrubbed his hand over his face with a relief that Harriet more than shared.
“I sent no messenger,” Sir Daniel said, his gaze searching the taproom below. His eyes lifted suspiciously to Harriet. “It would have been unconscionable to bring you here until I reviewed the incident myself.”
