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Instead, he told Davis what her ladyship ought to wear and what time she needed to be ready. He made suggestions about ways to avoid neighbors’ and other servants’ notice. The lady was not to bring any sort of weapon with which she might hurt herself—this won him a lethal look from her ladyship—but a walking stick or umbrella, he said, was entirely reasonable in any of the less respectable neighborhoods, day or night. “And, as she pointed out, if worse comes to worse, I’ll talk until they beg for mercy.”
He’d had all he could do not to laugh when Lady Clara said that.
Though he usually enjoyed jokes at Radford’s expense, Westcott didn’t laugh. He wasn’t smiling when Lady Clara and her maid took their leave.
He followed Radford into their private quarters. “Are you quite mad?” Westcott said. “You can’t take the Marquess of Warford’s daughter on a police raid.”
“I said I would. I can’t go back on my word.”
“You most certainly can! How did she get you to do it? Was there coercion? Because you know—”
“Don’t be absurd. What would she coerce me with? Her wet hat?”
Radford moved into his room and started taking off his damp clothes.
“I know you’re willing to use whatever and whomever will serve your purpose,” Westcott said, “but this isn’t your fight. It isn’t your job to capture gang leaders and their minions. That’s what we have a police force for. To prevent crime!”
“I’m only going to retrieve Bridget’s stupid brother,” Radford said. “The rest is up to the police.”
A silence followed, while he swiftly dressed.
Then, “If anything happens to his daughter, Lord Warford will destroy you,” Westcott said.
“Only if his three sons leave anything of me for their father to destroy,” Radford said.
“I didn’t mean he’d kill you,” Westcott said. “For you, there are far worse consequences. If anything goes wrong on this mad expedition—for instance, if the newspapers get wind of it—you’re done for. You can bid farewell to your legal career. You may have to leave England altogether.”
Absolutely true. His other self was tearing his hair out.
“No harm will come to her,” Radford said. “No one will find out. If I thought so, I should have pleaded temporary insanity and told her to go home and stop bothering me.”
“I’m waiting to learn why you didn’t.”
“Don’t be an idiot, Westcott. Why do you think?”
“Why, curse you? Why?”
Radford shrugged into his coat. “Because she looked up at me with those big blue eyes and said ‘Please.’ ”
“Radford.”
Radford found his hat and gloves.
“Where are you going?” Westcott demanded. “Haven’t you done enough damage this day?”
Radford moved to the door. “I’m off to Richmond,” he said. “I should like to see my father one last time before anybody kills me.”
He went out.
Ithaca House, Richmond
Later that evening
Radford told his father what Lady Clara had said, about talking villains to death. At the time, Radford had needed to keep matters under control, and throw his weight around if necessary. But he laughed with his father, who was delighted with the story.
George Radford was not well, and the drawn look of his face spoke clearly enough of his pain, though he didn’t. He half reclined on one of the library’s sofas, from which he could look out over the river.
But it was too dark now to see, and Radford knew his visits provided distraction from pain and its attendant low spirits. And so he talked, telling his father nearly everything, as always, and leaving out some details, as he often did. Kissing Lady Clara was one of the left-out details. The way his father questioned him, though, told Radford the paternal brain still functioned at its customary high rate of efficiency.
“But of course you must let Lady Clara help,” Father said. “She went after Chiver with a horsewhip, you said.”
Evidently unaware of the connection to Toby’s disappearance, her ladyship had not mentioned the altercation when she first told the story, in Westcott’s office. Not until Radford questioned Bridget had he learned of it, and realized how much it told one about Lady Clara. The incident had made Bridget idolize her, and this was why Bridget had confided in her. And set off this absurd manhunt. Boy hunt.
“She isn’t timid,” Radford said.
“I’ve never believed in coddling women,” his father said. “As your mother has pointed out on more than one occasion, women are not children, unless they’re made to believe they are.”
He had more to say about women, and Radford, who’d meant to stay for only an hour or two, stayed on, talking and listening, until his father fell asleep. Then he, too, fell asleep, in the chair by the sofa where the frail old man lay.
Unhappily for his sire, though luckily for Radford, the older man was a restless sleeper. It was he who woke Radford—with a sharp rap of cane against his son’s shins. “Get up, get up! What’s wrong with you? You’ll miss your rendezvous!”
Minutes later, Radford was riding back to London. He arrived at the Woodley Building as the sky was beginning to show signs of lightening. Plenty of time, he told himself as he hurried up the stairs and into the private chambers.
He found Westcott dozing in an armchair.
The solicitor woke when Radford came in.
“Is your father all right?” Westcott said.
“As all right as he’ll ever be,” Radford said. “Good spirits, at any rate. I fell asleep. I was more weary than I’d realized.”
“I’m afraid I have more wearisome news for you,” Westcott said. He moved to the fireplace, and retrieved a letter that had been propped between a pair of dueling ceramic toads on the mantelpiece.
He gave the letter to Radford, who quickly unfolded it and read.
Her Grace, the Duchess of Malvern, had died after miscarrying.
Radford was wanted at the duke’s residence immediately.
Chapter Six
Why should hackney-coaches be clean? Our ancestors found them dirty, and left them so. Why should we, with a feverish wish to “keep moving,” desire to roll along at the rate of six miles an hour, while they were content to rumble over the stones at four?
—Charles Dickens, “Hackney-Coach Stands,” January 1835
Kensington
Tuesday morning
Clara paced her great-aunt’s sitting room. “I should have known,” she said. “It was all a hum. He said it only to pacify me. The wretched man’s gone without me!”
She’d risen at a time most young ladies of her station would be arriving home from the night’s entertainments. She’d gone to bed early, like a child, and dressed this day like a schoolteacher—and all for nothing.
She looked again at the prim little watch pinned to her prim bodice. “I should have realized. He was much too cooperative—that is to say, relatively speaking. Never mind. I know where we’re to meet the police. I’ll go on my own.”
Davis stood at the window, looking out. “I wonder if Mr. Radford gave you the correct information.”
Clara stopped pacing. “You think he lied, on top of everything else?”
“I cannot say, my lady,” Davis said. “I’m unfamiliar with the streets he referred to. Maybe he told the truth. Either way, you might wish to take a footman with you.”
