A Spy's Guide to Seduction Page 3

  Just weeks earlier the club’s former spies, Hazelwood and Clare, had managed to snare the Russian Count Malikov with incriminating documents in his possession. Malikov, who wasn’t talking, now languished in a cell pending the outcome of negotiations between his government and England’s. The English were quite willing to let the count rot there until Lynley could find Malikov’s source.

  Several links in the chain forged by Malikov to convey documents from Lord Chartwell’s office to St. Petersburg were broken, but somewhere in London was that cache of leaked letters.

  Part of the puzzle was how such an extensive collection of papers had gone missing. Goldsworthy reasoned that whoever had the letters must be eager to get them to the Russians, who paid well for information, and very uneasy about being found with the incriminating documents. Suspicion had turned, fairly or unfairly, to Lady Ravenhurst’s husband, a devoted Foreign Office drudge, as the source of the leak. In the weeks before his arrest, Malikov had often been a guest of Lady Ravenhurst’s. Goldsworthy was keen to show Lynley the layout of the lady’s house.

  When Kirby released Lynley from the fitting, promising to have the coat ready for the evening, Goldsworthy unrolled a floor plan of the Ravenhurst house on the tailor’s cutting table. “Usually, we’d put Wilde on the staff, to help you out, but with the boy’s arm in a sling, we can’t use him for a week or so. You’ll be working alone tonight.”

  Working alone suited Lynley just fine. He studied the floor plan. The house was grander than most London row houses, with five windows across the front, but it was easy to see how the position of the stairs and doors made Ravenhurst’s library vulnerable from the entry hall and the grand dining room.

  Lynley pictured the guests moving through the evening ahead, from the arrival and greeting, to the supper that would confine them to the dining room for hours, through the traditional interlude of separation between the ladies and gentlemen after the meal, and finally to the dancing. Somehow in between the rituals that punctuated the flow of a London evening, he would have to search the house. The trick for Lynley would be to make himself invisible to his hosts and fellow guests long enough to determine how someone might have stolen the documents.

  Goldsworthy rolled up the house plan and gave Lynley a clap on the back like a cricket bat connecting with a ball. “Good to have you on the case, lad.”

  Lynley shook off the big man’s hearty approval and returned to the coffee room and his favorite sofa. As he sank into its comfort, the copy of the Times rustled under him. He pulled it out, drew a lamp near, and began to read. Emily Radstock had written concerning the recent death of the elephant Chunee at the hands of his caretakers.

  Sir:

  The facts in the death of Chunee are so well known as to need no recounting. Thousands in London have seen the prints depicting his cruel slaughter. His agony at the hands of those on whom he long depended for his sustenance and whose pockets were lined with the proceeds of exhibiting him to the public is indefensible.

  His handlers’ inability to consider his needs and to foresee a time when distress of body and spirit would render him a danger to himself and others and to plan accordingly for his care and ultimately for his end brings into question the fitness of human persons for keeping any wild animals in captivity, confined against their nature in cages, to be stared at by the masses with no freedom to act in accord with the promptings of their natures.

  It is time to close the Exeter Change and all similar institutions whose indifference to the well-being of their charges is a stain on the honor of our city.

  I am, Sir, your obedient servant,

  E. Radstock

  Every sentence rang with fierce conviction and independence of mind. He admired her stand against cruelty. But it was her contempt for the betrayal at the heart of the elephant’s suffering that made him shake his head as he folded the paper and tucked it back into his coat. She spoke of agony, but what, after all, did she know of the pain of betrayal?

  He recognized her spirit though. She was the sort who thought the world could be a better place, who believed in noble sacrifice, who thought she could make a difference. As a girl she had probably nursed butterflies and kept hurt birds in boxes in her room. To care about caged elephants and the weak and the vulnerable was to risk great heartache.

  He would wager the price of a good horse that she knew nothing about having fun. Few people knew how genuinely to enjoy themselves. They were always doing their duty. As for saving the world, or even saving England, that was for other fellows. He needed an adventure, and if the British government wanted to house and feed and clothe him while he had his adventure, and compensate him for it in the end, he was fine with that.

  And along the way, he might teach Lady Emily Radstock what it meant to have fun.

  Chapter Three

  The husband hunter may expect the announcement of her betrothal to be met with surprise, curiosity, and even genuine delight. What she must not expect is that such an announcement will be met with tact. Whether the news bursts upon her acquaintance at a ball, whether it is the whispered gossip of a morning call, or whether her neighbors and friends see the printed notice in the paper, everyone acquainted with either party will have an opinion as to how deserving each is of the other, and few will resist the temptation to comment.

  —The Husband Hunter’s Guide to London

  Within a few moments of entering Ravenhurst House, Lynley had a fair idea of how carelessly his host and hostess ran their household. Unconventionally, Lady Ravenhurst mingled with her guests in the marble entry chamber. Servants rushed from guest to guest, collecting coats and hats and pointing the way to the stairs. It was the sort of din and confusion in which pickpockets thrived in marketplaces all over the world.

  Lady Ravenhurst fit Goldsworthy’s report of her. She was a deep-breasted golden beauty, who appeared to be of a restless, impatient disposition. Seven years into her marriage to Ravenhurst, she had a reputation as a dashing hostess. Her laugh had a brittle edge as she flirted with a pair of younger gentlemen.

  Lynley turned from his hostess to make note of servants passing in and out of an open closet in front of him and the entrance to Ravenhurst’s library opposite the grand stairway. As he slipped Lady Emily’s black satin cloak from her shoulders, he thought he’d fumbled the simple gesture. Her outer garment fell away, and she appeared dressed in a shroud of deep ebony. Very little of her person was visible.

  She turned to him with a guileless smile. He handed her cloak to the waiting footman, making no sign of anything out of the ordinary in her dress, as if going to a fashionable dinner with a woman dressed like a hearse horse was an ordinary occurrence. Clearly, his betrothed was up to something.

  He offered his arm, and her touch sent a current of sensation through him. How carefully she’d planned her surprise. She had been cloaked and ready to meet him at her father’s door, and she’d kept her hair simple. Nothing in her outward appearance had prepared him for what she’d been hiding under that cloak. He led her toward the stairs.

  “It is customary for a gentleman to offer a lady some compliment on her attire,” she said.

  “Is it? I must be out of practice.” He resisted the kick in his pulse at the thought that she had been thinking of him as she dressed, standing before her glass in a shift and corset. She was testing him, daring him to react, inviting him to play a game.

  They passed from the top of the stairs into a great room already set up for dancing with the rugs removed and the furnishings pushed to the perimeter. Lynley noted a small dais at the far end with chairs for musicians and a potted palm at the edge that concealed what might be a useful door.

  Their host, Ravenhurst, stood to one side in conversation with Lord Chartwell of the Foreign Office. Ravenhurst gave only a distracted greeting as guests entered, returning at once to his conversation with Chartwell. As Emily and Lynley passed the two men, Lyn
ley caught the words of an impassioned assurance from Ravenhurst to Chartwell. “We’ll get him tonight. I promise you.”

  Chartwell made only a brief, close-lipped reply. “If he takes the bait, Ravenhurst.”

  “He will.”

  “He’d better.”

  Chartwell moved off, and Lynley glanced round to see whether anyone else noted the exchange.

  Lynley’s mouth tightened. It was not a house where vital documents would be safe.

  * * * *

  An hour spent among the Ravenhursts’ guests did not alter Lynley’s opinion. As the guests descended for supper, many passed through the open doors of the library before realizing their mistake. Some guests turned back, blocking the smooth flow to the dining room.

  Lord Ravenhurst took charge, assuring his confused guests that they could pass through the library into the dining room. Lynley steered Emily Radstock that way.

  Before the window stood a mahogany desk with a red leather government documents box in plain sight and a number of papers lying on the desk’s surface around it. Lynley’s path through the library did not permit him to observe the papers closely, but he suspected that at least one of them had to be the bait Ravenhurst had mentioned to Chartwell, a paper that would be marked as a Foreign Office “confidential print.”

  In spite of the confusion on entering the dining room, the guests were seated in minutes. From the head of the table Ravenhurst looked directly toward his library. Then Lady Ravenhurst signaled her butler to close the doors, and the footmen began to serve. Lynley set himself to observe his fellow guests and wait for one of them to make a move toward the door, though he thought it unlikely that a clever spy would fall for Ravenhurst’s bait.

  Two hours later Lynley discovered how wrong he was. Servants moved in and out of the dining room as the gentlemen lingered over a good port and a weak sherry. Ravenhurst made a point of bringing the conversation around to the importance of the papers he handled for the Foreign Office. Lynley left the dining room with a pair of gentlemen intent on smoking outside. Another brief ruse and he was on his own. For the moment no one occupied the library, and by standing to one side of the dining room door, Lynley could look at Ravenhurst’s desk unobserved from either the hall or the dining room. The papers had been moved. The thief had been quick and had settled for one paper at best.

  When he heard Ravenhurst coming, Lynley backed into the entry and slipped into the darkened cloakroom. It occurred to him as he stood among the coats and cloaks that a clever thief might slip a stolen paper into a pocket or a sleeve for later retrieval.

  * * * *

  Emily was waltzing with Ajax Lynley when the full force of her folly hit her. She had dressed to test his resolve as a suitor. Her gown was the oldest one she could find in her mother’s closet, a black crape with a high, tight bodice ten years out of fashion and long, loose sleeves that bore a strong resemblance to elephant trunks.

  She had counted on shocking him, but if he had recognized her attire as a crime against fashion, he gave no sign of it. Now, she could only look at him as they whirled around the room, for if she allowed her gaze to wander she would encounter the glances of the curious and the judgmental.

  After her disastrous third Season when she had tried in earnest to find a husband, she had confined herself to the margins of fashionable gatherings. Now, with an announcement in the papers, a ring on her finger, and the substantial person of Sir Ajax Lynley at her side, she had been lured from the shadows into the glare of public notice.

  They were noticed. He, at any rate, was impossible to overlook in a ballroom. His height, his dark good looks, his assured manner drew glances. He appeared oblivious to whispers and stares. And yet, twice in the evening he had vanished from her sight, and she had no idea how he’d contrived to do it or where he’d disappeared.

  He plainly knew his way around a ballroom, but she did not remember him from any previous Season.

  “Where were you?” she asked.

  “When?” He lifted his heavy-lidded gaze, and she realized he’d been looking at her bosom, what little of it her mother’s gown exposed.

  “These last few Seasons?”

  “In Spain.”

  “The war ended years ago.”

  “My uncle has business there.”

  Emily gave him a sharp glance. His reply told her nothing really. She tried a different tack. “How do you bear being looked at so much?”

  A hint of amusement lightened his gaze. “Do you think anyone sees us? Really sees us?”

  “What do you think they see?”

  One of his black brows lifted. “Clothes. I’m sure there are women in this room who can name your...mother’s modiste, and gentlemen who’d like to know the name of my tailor.”

  Emily could not help the laugh that escaped her. So he had noticed her gown after all.

  He pulled her a fraction closer, settling her more firmly in his hold as the tempo of the dance accelerated. The plan was to keep him at a distance until she understood him better. She had not counted on the intimacy of the waltz. Or the dizzying effect of being held so closely. He smelled of citrus and cardamom and woods and smoke.

  She had endured enough awkward partners in her first three Seasons to marvel a little at how easily they moved together. For a few moments she was caught up in admiring the way he communicated how they would move together. A light touch, the pressure of his hand, the tilt of his head invited her partnership in the dance. It seemed a miracle that he heard the beat as she did. It made her more curious to know his past.

  “Why did you return?” she asked as the dance ended and he tucked her arm in his.

  “I inherited.” He whispered it in her ear as if he were confiding a lover’s secret. “Something to drink?” he asked. She nodded, and he slipped away. Like that the intimacy of their dance dissolved. She could see only the back of his head above the crowd as he disappeared through the doors to the refreshment room.

  She turned back to find a lady in a fashionable gown of lemon-colored Turkish satin.

  “Emily Radstock,” said the vision in yellow, “whatever are you wearing?”

  “I’m in mourning for Chunee.” Emily said the first thing that came to mind, referring to the poor elephant brutally killed at the Exeter Change.

  The lady in yellow laughed, and Emily remembered her name. Miss Sophia Throckmorton. They’d been introduced at a party not a fortnight earlier. The girl was just what a husband hunter ought to be, as bright and shiny as a new-minted coin.

  “Oh, I’m glad you explained,” she said. “It’s so common for ladies who don’t take simply to give up on fashion.” Miss Throckmorton’s fan waved gently just below her magnificent bosom. “Of course, now that you have a fiancé, perhaps you are no longer a slave to appearance as we younger ladies are.”

  A pair of ladies laughed at that and joined them. Kitty Beckford and her sister Clarissa. Emily made the introductions.

  “Oh, Emily, I heard the news,” Kitty said. “I never imagined you would have to wait so long to find a husband.”

  “Obscure title,” Miss Throckmorton observed, “but at your time of life, one does what one must. Where is he, by the way? You’d think he would be eager to be at your side every minute.”

  “At least he’s very rich,” Emily said.

  When Lynley did not return with the promised refreshment, his absence began to look like abandonment, or like repaying her for dressing as she had. He had whirled her about the dance floor for everyone to see, and then left her to face the consequences of her choices in fashion and fiancés.

  As long as he had been at her side, her black gown had not set her so wholly apart from the other women, but on her own, she looked like a crow at a dove party. She had tried to discompose him with the gown. Instead she had driven him away. She would have to think of a better way to knock him off balance. A
t the moment what she wanted was escape.

  When Miss Throckmorton moved on to her next victim, Emily stepped back from the little group of ladies and edged her way toward a large potted palm at the end of the musicians’ dais and slipped behind it. There she came face-to-face with one of the fiddlers, who gave her a wink and a leer, and mouthed a hello that sent a wave of spirits over her. She stepped back and collided with a door handle. She reached behind her, pulled it, and slipped into the dark space between the inner and outer doors of the ballroom.

  The door closed behind her, cutting off the music and gaiety of the dancing. At once she knew she was not alone. A large gloved hand covered her mouth, and a strong arm seized her by the waist. Her heart pounded in her chest. She pulled at the hand covering her mouth, but could not budge it. A voice in her ear whispered, “Quiet, my love.” Simultaneously, her senses recognized him, his height, and the bracing blend of citrus and smoke that was Lynley.

  Emily eased her grip on his arm. Why is he hiding?

  At once two voices could be heard on the other side of the door. He was eavesdropping. Emily recognized the voices—Lord and Lady Ravenhurst.

  “Don’t be absurd,” the lady was saying. “We can’t search our guests. We’ll insult everyone. We’ll be the laughingstock of London.”

  “Pamela, you’ll ruin me. You don’t understand what’s at stake.”

  “So you’ve told me a hundred times, Ravenhurst. Matters of state are too subtle for my female brain. But it’s you who fails to understand anything.”

  “You can’t wish another war on England.”

  “War? Hah! You think the papers in one of your little red boxes could cause a war? You’re mad as well as absurd.”

  “Just don’t try to stop me, wife. Every guest must be searched. I’ve instructed the footmen. They know what to do.”

  “How dare you? I must speak to them immediately. I refuse to let you embarrass me before our friends.”