Page 52 of A Winter Scandal

“I wish Myles and Alan weren’t off drinking. Blast Emily for showing up and bringing gentility to the house. If they were here, we could hold you and keep you from going off half-cocked.”

Gabriel shot him a cool look. “You mean, you could try to hold me here.”

Ian sighed. “I’ll go with you then. Just let me get dressed.”

“No, stay with your wife.” Ian rolled his eyes and started to protest, but Gabriel went on, “I can’t wait. Rawdon may be leaving town; I have to get there as soon as I can. If I need help, Myles and Alan may still be at the tavern.”

“Bloody domesticity,” Ian muttered.

“Don’t fret.” Gabriel clapped Ian on the shoulder. “Go see to your wife. I have to leave.”

Gabriel took Thea’s hand and picked up her lantern with his other hand, but to her surprise he turned and went down the hallway behind them. She understood why he had turned that way when he strode into a room, pulled a box from a cabinet, and opened it to reveal a set of dueling pistols. Checking to make sure the guns were loaded, he stuck them into the great pockets of his coat, then led Thea out of the house by the back door.

“Good Lord!” he said as they stepped outside. “It’s snowing.” He looked at her. “You came here through the snow?”

She nodded. “I know it took a great deal of time. Perhaps I should have gone straight to the inn and confronted him myself.”

“No!” He scowled. “You definitely should not do that. He is not someone you can count on to act like a gentleman.” Gabriel started off toward the stables, putting his arm around her and pulling her against his side. “You were right to get me. But I hate to think of you tramping through this nasty weather.”

“It isn’t that far if you come through the ruins instead of round by the road.”

“You struck out across the countryside?” He let out a little laugh and his arm tightened around her shoulders. “Ah, Thea, Thea … you are definitely a daughter of Boadicea.”

The groom had worked quickly, despite being awakened in the middle of the night, and by the time they reached the stables, he had harnessed the pair of horses to the light open carriage. Gabriel gave Thea a hand up into the curricle, then hung the lantern from the front of it and climbed in to take the reins. The hood of the vehicle protected them in large part from the falling snow, but it did not keep the flakes from drifting in from the sides. Thea was grateful for the warm fur lap robe.

The snow had completely covered the road by now, adding to the difficulty of seeing it in the darkness, but much of the lane was lined on one side or the other by a hedge, which made it easier to follow. The matched grays seemed to have little trouble staying on the road, though Thea noticed that Gabriel drove them at a much slower pace than he had the other day.

“Tell me again what happened,” he said after they had maneuvered out of the Priory grounds and onto the main road into the village. “Everything.”

Thea described to him how she had awakened and looked out at the snow, then had heard the noise and gone downstairs to investigate. She explained the drops of water she’d seen on the floor and the stairs, adding, “I realized that it had to be melted snow that had dripped off someone who had come inside since it started snowing. And I remembered that I had closed the door to my bedchamber, but it was open when I awoke.”

“He had been in your room?” Gabriel’s hand clenched on the reins.

“I assume he must have been looking for the baby. Matthew has always been in my room before—though I can’t imagine he would know that—but tonight Lolly took the baby to bed in her room because I was at the rehearsal. Oh, I wish I had brought his basket back to my chamber when I got home!”

“Don’t blame yourself. Rawdon would have taken him no matter whose room he was in.”

“But I might have heard him and awakened. Maybe I could have kept him from stealing Matthew, or at least raised an alarm.”

“Yes, and you might have been hurt trying. Or you might have slept through it just as Lolly did. Don’t worry; we shall get him back. Hopefully Rawdon wouldn’t have been fool enough to set out for London in this snow. I don’t know what he hoped to accomplish by doing such a thing, other than to cause me some bad moments. Of course, he seems to think Jocelyn is with me, so perhaps his purpose was to force her to talk to him.”

“At least I was somewhat reassured when I realized that it must have been Lord Rawdon who took the baby. I mean, he would not harm his own son, would he?”

“I would not think so, though God only knows. I cannot understand his mind.”

They reached the village sooner than Thea would have thought possible, given the snowstorm. When Gabriel pulled the curricle into the yard of the inn, it took a moment for an ostler to come hurrying out to take the team from him. The lad gave Gabriel an odd look, but that changed quickly enough to admiration when Gabriel pressed a silver coin into his palm. “Pull them in and keep them warm, but don’t unharness them just yet. Tell me, is Lord Rawdon still here? Has he ridden out tonight?”

The ostler’s eyebrows went up. “That swell from London, sir? Nay, his black’s still in the stable, right and tight. Beautiful piece of horseflesh, that one.”

“Yes, he is. Good.” Gabriel gave the boy a pat on the shoulder and turned to Thea, who had jumped down from the carriage while he was talking to the ostler. Gabriel took her arm, and they hurried into the inn.

Gabriel veered into the public room as soon as he stepped inside, and Thea peeked curiously around his shoulder into what constituted Chesley’s main tavern. The fire in the great fireplace had burned down to embers, and a potboy was wrapped in a blanket, asleep on the rug in front of it. No one else was in the room.

“Sir Myles and Mr. Carmichael aren’t here?” Thea asked. “Where could they be? We didn’t pass them on the road.”

“There’s another place, ah, not too far away.” He shifted uncomfortably and glanced around. “They, um, know some people there.”

Thea looked at him blankly for a moment, then colored as she realized what subject Gabriel was dancing around. “Oh! You mean … um, women. Of that sort.”