“It appears we have lost the game, Dora,” Richard said as he gathered the discarded cards from the table’s surface. “How much do we owe your father and Lady Emma?”
Theodora grinned. “As father insisted since Lady Emma has lost her reticule that we play for the honor rather than a few coins, I suppose a ‘well done’ must suffice.”
Richard told Lady Emma, “Well done,” before repeating the same to Duncan. Theodora had opened her mouth to do likewise when Mr. Fields entered, wheeling in a cart with tea for the ladies and port for Duncan and himself.
“Very good, Fields, thank you,” Duncan said with a smile, one of the first Richard had noted since the shooting. “Theodora, would you serve?”
“Yes, Father.”
“That will be all for now, Fields,” Duncan instructed.
The butler frowned rather than making his exit. “Pardon, my lord. There is a man who came around to the kitchen perhaps a quarter hour past. I told him he must wait.”
“And the man was?” Richard asked.
Fields shot an odd look to the ladies. “A man with a package, my lord. A servant, of sorts.”
“Whose servant?” Duncan demanded.
Richard supported Duncan to a chair. “While you enjoy the port, permit me to discover the right of this?” Duncan nodded his agreement, and Richard motioned Fields to lead the way from the room. Out in the hall, with the door closed behind him, Orson demanded, “A servant from which house?” Richard prayed he was not from Lord Davidson.
“A man employed by the Lyon’s Den, my lord. By that harlot who proudly runs a den of... of...”
Richard ignored Mr. Fields’s moralizing. He knew for a fact that Fields had a “lady friend” upon whom the man called on his half day off. “Where is this man now?”
“Below. As I instructed, waiting outside the kitchen door.”
Richard would have reprimanded Fields, but it would have done no good. They all had their quirks and their secrets. Instead, he turned towards the servants’ door and quickly descended to the kitchen. Ignoring all those gathered within, he exited to the small kitchen garden. “I apologize for keeping you waiting so long.”
The man turned slowly to reveal Mrs. Dove-Lyon’s manager, a man most called “Titan,” but Richard knew to be a former soldier, some said an officer by the name of Crosse. Truthfully, Richard did not care what others might call the man or the lady for whom Titan worked. He would forever be grateful for the actions of both Mrs. Dove-Lyon and Titan. Their efforts to save Duncan on the night he had been shot had turned the key from death to life.
“My lord,” Titan bowed respectfully. “Mrs. Dove-Lyon asked me to carry this package to Lord Duncan. It came into my mistress’s possession late last evening. Evidently, it had beenstuffed in a niche near the privates and the entrance used by the musicians at the back of the Lyon’s Den. I identified it as being similar to the one worn by Lord Duncan’s shooter. Mrs. Dove-Lyon thought it could prove to be useful to those investigating his lordship’s attack. To the best of our knowledge no one but Mrs. Dove-Lyon and I have touched it, but since the attack was a month prior, we cannot speak with any confidence on the matter. Mrs. Dove-Lyon secured the item in her office in a safe, for it was very late last evening when it was discovered. We waited until now, for the night permits us some passage not available in this part of London, otherwise.”
“Do you believe the coat has been in this niche this entire time?” Richard asked. He knew Beaufort and Graham had conducted an extensive search throughout the night, with Hartley and Thompson having joined them. Had Duncan’s men overlooked the coat, or had it been placed there after they left the area in the morning?
“I wish I could answer you with a response that would solve this mystery, but I can only speak to what I know. Mrs. Dove-Lyon wrapped the garment in silver paper before enclosing it in an old bed sheet, which had been laundered previously and meant to be torn into cleaning rags. Neither of us searched the pockets or examined the material for tears or tats.”
“Or extra bullets or a receipt?” Richard asked, not in accusation, but with a knowledge of how those at Whitehall would search every thread for information.
“No, my lord,” Titan said with a grin, “but such was quite tempting.”
“Thank your mistress and inform her Lord Duncan has made great progress in his recovery. Mr. Rheem praised how quickly you and the lady managed to stop the flow of blood. We look forward to another night at the Lyon’s Den soon. May I send you back to the club in my coach?”
“Thank you, my lord, but Mrs. Dove-Lyon ordered hers.” With a bow, Titan turned towards the alleyway behind the house. Richard waited until he heard the carriage roll away before he returned to the house with the package. Ignoring the odd looks of those gathered in the kitchen, he again used the servants’ stairs to reach where he knew Duncan waited for him.
“Who was it?” Duncan asked before Richard could close the door behind him.
Even so, Richard nodded to where Theodora and Lady Emma looked on. “Do not think of sending me away,” Dora declared. Her arms were folded across her chest in a gesture of pure stubbornness. She would not be moved. “Is this about Father’s attack?”
Richard noted when Lady Emma retreated in the direction of the other door, but Duncan said, “It would be of service if you would consider assisting my daughter, Lady Emma.”
“I hold no knowledge of what transpired, my lord,” Lady Emma said tentatively.
“You possess something more important: You have a kind heart,” Duncan instructed.
With that declaration, Richard placed the rolled sheet upon the now empty card table. “Mrs. Dove-Lyon’s Titan discovered this somewhere near the musicians’ entrance and the privacies at the back of the Lyon’s Den. The lady asked her club manager to deliver it to you.”
“At the back of the club, towards where the shooter ran?” Duncan thought aloud. “How convenient. Has anyone gone through it?” Richard was glad to know he had asked the same questions as Duncan, who had led more investigations than those at Whitehall could count.
