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“Not in the least. But if your suspicions are correct and that Wagner fellow is involved in this, we shouldn’t have allowed him to accompany the others.”
“How could we have stopped him without revealing our hand?” Adelaide demanded.
Florent shrugged. “Well, maybe we couldn’t have stopped him, but at least one of us should have gone with the others.”
“Foster will look after your sister,” Adelaide assured him.
“I’m sure he will, but Daisy isn’t the only person in your wife’s company. And if I’m not mistaken, your wife is in an interesting condition. Why on earth did you allow her to go off with someone you have suspicions about?”
To Florent’s shock, Lord Adelaide laughed. “For one thing, I have a tendency to have suspicions about everyone, so my wife would never stand for me trying to stop her from doing what she wants to do merely based on my suspicions. For another, there are enough footmen and outriders accompanying her ladyship and the guests that I’m actually somewhat surprised Wagner even went with them. Surely, he’s not such a dunce that he didn’t notice.”
“I didn’t,” Florent pointed out sheepishly, “so it’s possible he was distracted as well.”
“Criminals notice this type of thing, Florent. The fact that you didn’t reveals your innocence, not your lack of intelligence. But now I must ask, what has you so distracted? Surely, it’s not still concern over the estate. From what I’ve seen and heard, you’ve turned Alcott around completely.”
“To the dismissal of everything else there might possibly be in life,” Florent added dismally, causing his friend to laugh and stare.
“You sound terribly glum.”
“Don’t mind me,” Florent waved away the viscount’s searching gaze. “We have other things to consider right now. If I’m not mistaken, we are nearly to our destination.”
Adelaide cast him a knowing glance that Florent did his best to ignore.
As they climbed down the trail that led from the moors to the beach, Florent pushed as many thoughts from his mind as possible. He couldn’t allow thoughts of Lady Constance to linger in his mind at this time. But he wondered if asking about Henry Wagner might be helpful.
“Adelaide,” Florent called out.
“Yes?” the viscount asked with a slight grin.
“How did Mr. Wagner come to be invited to your wife’s party?”
To Florent’s surprise, Adelaide muttered an unacceptable word and shot a glare over his shoulder toward his brother. “You’d have to ask the spare.”
Despite the gravity of the current excursion, Florent laughed over his friend’s teasing of his younger brother. Since Lord Adelaide was heir to the Earl of Everleigh, his brother Gilbert was the spare. It had occasionally been a source of contention between the brothers when they were boys, but Florent had thought they had accepted their roles in recent years. It would seem it was still a way for Adelaide to express his discontent toward his brother without going into detail. Gilbert, though, had grown steady in his reactions since they were boys and didn’t do anything other than smile over his brother’s words.
“Is there something I ought to know, Gilbert?” Florent persisted.
“In the course of our investigation into the possibility of smuggling being hidden on Everleigh lands, his name came up. So, I thought it might be helpful to have him at hand when we brought things to a head.”
“At my wife’s party,” Adelaide exclaimed. “Without warning either of us that there was the possibility the bounder was dangerous.”
“He’s too lily-livered to be dangerous,” Gilbert countered in what was probably supposed to be a soothing tone. “There is nothing to worry about from that worm. He’s greedy, not dangerous.”
“But what of the ladies?”
“Some could be in danger from him but not likely of the physical sort of danger.”
“That is not comforting,” Lord Adelaide expostulated. “My wife has invited ladies here in the hopes of matching them up suitably. Having a fortune hunter present does not set anyone at ease.”
“I promise we’ll have it all wrapped up soon,” Gilbert soothed.
“Not soon enough to suit my wife,” Adelaide growled, and it was all Florent could do not to laugh despite the gravity of the situation. Again, he thought of Lady Constance.
“What of the ladies who came from the continent?” he asked just as they arrived on the beach and set off to explore the caves.
“Lady Constance and her companion?” Gilbert and Adelaide said almost simultaneously. “What of her? Are you having an eye in those quarters?”
Florent ignored the question, only answering part of it. “She seems to be an associate or at least an acquaintance of Mr. Wagner. Is there reason to suspect she might be involved in the scheme?”
