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“What are you driving at?”
“I am certainly not interested in names, so I’ll not ask for them, but Mandy was out and about…last evening. Traveled to a place called Witches’ Elbow and took a shortcut through your land on her way back…about midnight it was,” the duke leveled a look at his friend.
“Dash it! Never say so,” exclaimed the viscount running a hand through his silken locks.
“I am afraid I just did and what is more, what she saw, gave credence to Sir Owen’s claim that you wanted Celia out of the way as your interest was elsewhere.”
“Demme, but I am in a tangle, Brock.” He eyed his friend for a long silent moment and released a long heavy breath of air. “Right, I know I can trust you, so I shall. It goes no further, agreed?”
The duke nodded and the viscount threw down the remainder of his glass and sat heavily on a nearby upholstered winged chair. “It was just after I had discovered Celia was, shall we say, not the sort of woman I wanted for a wife, that I met Kathleen. We were at an assembly in Harrowgate. She is Irish and she and her father were on holiday at his sister’s when her father had some sort of attack and fell very ill. The doctor said he should not sustain any shocks of any sort. He can’t be moved, because he is dying.”
He stared at the duke, “I love her…she loves me…but you must know that if Mandy saw us together. Her father forbade the match. She is Catholic, you see and he wouldn’t hear of her taking an English Protestant husband. We continued to meet in secret and as soon as she became of age, last month…I obtained a special license and we were married in secret.”
“Devil you say!” the duke remarked with some surprise.
“We can not announce our union for fear it would send her father off…and she couldn’t bear to have that on her conscience. Her aunt knows and approves of our marriage and has helped us to keep it from him. The doctor says he doesn’t have long…so we have decided to wait.”
“Good Lord, Skip, I suppose I should felicitate you!”
“You should, for she is the world to me,” said the viscount simply.
“Very well, then my man, I do. And I suppose this explains all your strange behavior,” rallied the duke with a shake of his head.
“Yes, but it does rather give me motive…” Skip offered.
“And an alibi as well, as no doubt, you were with your wife when Celia was murdered.”
&nb
sp; The viscount brightened incongruously, “Yes, yes I was.”
“However, Sir Owen means to point a finger in your direction,” the duke said pulling at his lip. “And Skip, this secret must be exposed to Mandy, since she was the one who actually saw you with your wife.”
“By Jove, you are right there…” the viscount put back his head. “This is all beginning to unravel.”
“Never mind that. There is something else,” said the duke. “I met with Fowler last evening and we discussed some very interesting possibilities. By the way, runner he may be, but not here because of Ned.”
“What? Well, how you always happen to be in the know of everything is beyond me. Why is he here, then?”
“Gold, m’bucko, gold. Three chests of the new sovereigns,” the duke replied portentously.
“Where…how…?”
“A shipment of the new coins was scheduled to leave for Barings of York to replace paper currency. A leak that we believe came from Agatha Brinley…” he put up his hand, “Don’t ask…at any rate, through her to someone she obviously meant to impress and the coach holding the gold, its guards and drivers all vanished.”
“Poor fellows—killed do you think?”
“Undoubtedly, Skip. What else. Someone smart enough to arrange this would not leave behind any witnesses. And as their families have not heard a word from them and continue to live in poverty, one must suppose they are dead.”
“Who…?” Skip played with his lower lip and then looked sharply at the duke. “You know, don’t you?”
“I suspect. At the moment, there are but two possible suspects, both in desperate need of cash.”
“By Jove…but ‘tis beyond thinking…”
“Precisely so.”
Chapter Eighteen
