Mr. Darcy nodded, adding, “I have some news as well. My man of business, Mr. Dawton, has found Mrs. Younge’s boarding house. It is in St. Giles.”
The Colonel’s eyes lit up. “Excellent! I will accompany you there.”
“That was my hope.”
“Do not take the Fitzwilliam carriage,” the Earl advised. “It will be far too conspicuous in that part of town.”
“Quite right; a hackney, I think,” Mr. Darcy said.
***
The hackney pulled up in front of a rundown boarding house. It was three stories tall, though the top floor seemed to be leaning toward the street. The paint was flaking off, the roof was pitched rather lower on one end than the other, and one of the posts in the front entryway looked very much as if it had given up on life and would collapse at any moment.
The Colonel wrinkled his nose. “I think I would prefer sleeping in an Army tent to this place.”
The hackney driver called down. “Oi! Are ya wanting me to wait fer ya here? Cost ya extra, you know, it bein’ St. Giles.”
“Yes, please wait,” Mr. Darcy replied at once. He flipped the man a coin, adding, “There will be another like it when we come out.”
The driver pocketed the coin at once, looking about himself furtively to make certain no one had seen it.
Mr. Darcy and the Colonel stepped to the front door and knocked. The door opened a minute later, and then promptly closed again – or it would have, had the Colonel not inserted a booted foot into the doorway.
“Mrs. Younge, there is no point in hiding,” Mr. Darcy said. “I know where you live now.”
There was no sound from the other side, so the Colonel pushed the door open. Mrs. Younge stepped back. “I had rather hoped I had seen the last of you, Mr. Darcy,” she snapped at him.
“Oddly, I was thinking the same thing,” Mr. Darcy snapped back.
“Then why are you here?” she demanded.
“I am looking for your old friend Wickham.”
“He is not present,” she said, pulling her dignity about her like a tattered cloak.
“I can see that he is not present; where is he?”
“I do not know.” She shrugged and began to turn away.
“I find myself hard-pressed to believe you,” Mr. Darcy replied. Turning to the Colonel, he said, “Richard, evidently there is nothing for it but to knock on every door.”
“And if the door is locked, simply break it in,” the Colonel added.
“Exactly.”
“No! No, do not break the doors. I will bring my keys,” Mrs. Younge said, quickly.
“Very good,” Mr. Darcy said. “Though I do think the Colonel was rather looking forward to breaking the doors.”
The Colonel turned to his cousin. “I will wait here by the front door in case the devil tries to escape while you are searching.”
Mrs. Younge scowled fiercely at the Colonel, who merely stared back at her.
Mr. Darcy followed Mrs. Younge up the stairs. She opened the doors, one after another, waiting while he searched the room for any hint that Wickham had resided there. One of the rooms contained a woman with three children; she immediately set up an outcry upon seeing a strange man in the doorway, but Mr. Darcy apologised profusely, handed her a guinea, and backed out.
“You might have warned me,” he told Mrs. Younge, irritably.
“Would you have believed me?”
