Page 11 of A Gentleman in Possession of Secrets (The Lord Julian Mysteries #10)

“We were aware of that much as well.” I ran a finger along the edge of the bookshelf and rubbed the dust off with my thumb. “We need to know which establishment, when, and any other particulars regarding the child’s current whereabouts.”

Devilbiss dimmed the beacon of his self-congratulation. “Might I inquire as to why, my lord?”

“Because in the normal course, siblings care for each other and should not be turned into strangers for the convenience of those charged with their protection.”

I took a turn on the receiving end of one of those flicking appraisals.

“Just so, my lord, and you are absolutely right. The poorhouse, however, is not the normal course. You will surely agree that the lad Atticus would have suffered, would have continued to suffer, had his naughty brother been permitted to go on leading the slower sibling astray. That would have been an injustice, my lord, and might have blighted the slower boy’s prospects for his entire life.

One must be logical about these things, because sentiment can invite one down many a bewildering path.

The best interests of the child must always prevail. ”

I could hardly breathe for the impulse to do violence. At four years old, Thomas had been labeled incorrigible and Atticus considered a dunce. No family, cast into an unfamiliar and terrifying world, then ripped apart because of a childish prank or two.

I’d fisted both hands. I opened those fists and found myself staring at the hydrangeas.

The floral symbol for bad luck in love.

Hyperia rose and linked her arm through mine. “If you will tell us the specific situation into which Thomas was sent, we’ll take no more of your time.”

“Thomas was placed with a Mrs. Merryweather on Burden Lane, Chelsea. I am sorry to report that her establishment is listed in the notes as having burned to the ground shortly thereafter. You might inquire locally for details, but our files relate to our charges, and once Thomas was given the benefit of a new placement, our obligation to him was fulfilled.” He looked from me to Hyperia. “I am sorry.”

He wasn’t sorry enough, not nearly.

“Mrs. Merryweather, Burden Lane, Chelsea,” Hyperia murmured. “Thank you. We shall continue our inquiries elsewhere. My lord, I am in need of fresh air.”

“Of course.” I offered Devilbiss half a bow and let Perry lead me out into the bright sunshine, and for once, I was glad for it.

“You could leave the matter there,” she said as we waited for the coach to come plodding around the corner. “Atticus can take up the investigation when he’s older. No one would blame you for delegating further inquiries to him if he’s so inclined.”

And let the cold trail become entirely obliterated? “I would blame myself.”

“Julian…”

“I thought Atticus should be spared uncertainty regarding his brother’s fate, Perry, and that was before I learned that Thomas has likely perished in a fire.

It’s bad enough to think you have a sibling in an obscure location, living a life you have no part of, but to conclude that he’s dead and not know for certain how and why he expired?

I can tell you, emphatically, that is a hell nobody should have to dwell in. ”

The coach appeared. I wanted to cover the distance to the ducal town house on foot, to walk off my upset, but Hyperia was deserving of my escort and the comfort of the coach.

“You’d rather not sit in that vehicle and brood,” she said. “I’d rather not sit in there and watch you brood. Tell John Coachman we’ll walk, but promise me you will set a modest pace, Jules. My legs are shorter than yours, and I’m wearing stays.”

“You are also carrying my heart.” Which at the moment was a weighty burden indeed. “I could not love you more, Hyperia West.”

She discreetly hugged me by the arm, and in due course, we made a dignified progress to the leafy surrounds of Mayfair.

My brother Arthur, His Grace of Waltham, was six years my senior and worlds ahead of me in the art of living a life that was both responsible and comfortable.

In Spain, I’d excelled at surviving on short rations with little shelter.

Arthur excelled at carrying the weight of a duchy upon his shoulders, while yet allowing himself excellent tucker, fine art, and a back garden that soothed and delighted the senses.

The roses were in a blooming riot, the irises still making a show, and the spices thriving in their pots and borders.

The effect was a magical feast for the nose, eyes, and subtler senses.

I wished, for the hundred thousandth time, that Arthur were home and not kicking his heels in France with Banter.

“His Grace moved the roses,” I said, peeling the rind from a succulent orange. “They were along the back wall—a deterrent to invaders—but he moved them into the sun, where they appear to be thriving.”

Hyperia and I were finishing our meal at a wrought-iron grouping that caught morning sun and afternoon shade. The perfect place to sit and read the newspapers or simply sit and think.

“Your mother might have done that,” Hyperia said, sipping her meadow tea.

“She had decades to rearrange this garden if that was her preference. Arthur moved the roses. Had them moved. He should put raspberries along the back wall if he needs to deter housebreakers. Raspberries need less sun and have more thorns.” Though less sun meant fewer berries.

Hyperia regarded me over her tankard. “Julian, this is a Mayfair residence, not a fortress. I must conclude the heat truly disagrees with you.”

“While present company agrees with me very much. Thank you, Perry.”

She put aside her drink. “For?”

“For keeping me from putting out Devilbiss’s lights, for prodding Postlethwaite to usefulness, for knowing more about MacNamara’s situation than I do.

In the usual course, an investigation grips my imagination, and I can’t wait to be kicking over rocks and peering under figurative beds.

The doubts and reluctance come later. I almost expect them now.

In this case… I know Miss Stadler might be in peril or at least enduring uncomfortable circumstances.

I know she could have been abducted for nefarious purposes.

My interest in resolving her difficulties has yet to catch fire. ”

The situation was worse even than that. I knew Miss Stadler might be enduring captivity , a fate in some cases worse than death.

I wanted to free her if that was the reality, truly I did.

And yet, she might also be strolling the seashore at Lyme Regis, so here I was, dodging off to London on the trail of answers that in all probability led to a pauper’s grave.

Bad of me. My priorities were not as they should be, and I knew it.

“Has melancholia come to call, Julian?” Hyperia put the question gently, which both touched and annoyed me.

I wanted to protest, but this was Perry. My dear, dear Perry, and like me, she preferred the truth to pretty nonsense.

“Some of the elements of melancholia are present. A sense of detachment, of what’s-the-use, of watching myself move about and speak and function, and wondering why that Caldicott fellow must ceaselessly stir around.

Part of me would rather sit in a dim room with a book open on my lap while I stare at nothing. ”

“And the rest of you?”

“Is grateful to share a meal with you, to be able to stir around. So many who served with me cannot. Harry…”

“Harry?” Hyperia conveyed a touch of asperity even saying his name.

“Harry should be taking Leander to the bootmaker’s and the tailor’s, shouldn’t he?”

She patted my wrist. “If I had one wish for you, Julian, for us , it would be to lay to rest Harry’s ghost once and for all.

He got himself killed, and now it’s up to you to see to his son.

I dearly hope, wherever Harry is—and I do not automatically consign him to the celestial realm—that he has the plain decency to be grateful to you for taking his offspring in hand. Not all uncles would.”

I grasped her fingers and kissed her knuckles. “Come back to the Hall with us. Please. We can be there by sunset tomorrow.”

The lady and I were engaged to be married. The highest sticklers would still insist that we not travel a long distance unchaperoned, but Miss Hunter and Leander would be underfoot the whole time, and good roads would see us home in a matter of hours.

“I would love to, Julian, but I am reluctant to leave Healy to his own devices in Town.”

“We’ll bring him along.” I detested the notion of having the great, as yet undiscovered, playwright underfoot at the Hall.

Nonetheless, Hyperia was being her usual indispensable self when a matter needed investigating.

Then too, whatever malaise stalked me, it kept a greater distance when I was with Hyperia.

I added selfishness to my growing inventory of shortcomings.

“I can discuss it with him,” Hyperia said as a rapid patter of feet sounded on the terrace above us. “Your nephew approaches.”

“Uncle Julian!” Leander stopped at the top of the terrace steps and spun like a top. “Miss says we’re off to Hoby’s, and then the tailors’, and then Gunter’s. Gunter’s has ices and cakes and sweets and everything.”

His whirling caused him to miss a step, and down the stairs he toppled.

I rushed over to where he lay, sprawled half on the bottom steps, half on the flagstones. “For God’s sake, boy, be more careful. You could have cracked your fool head on the stones.”

He sat up and pushed aside the hands I was using to check for blood in his hair. “I’m fine, Uncle Julian. You needn’t shout. Can we still go to Gunter’s?”

Both Hyperia and Miss Hunter were looking at me curiously, and I realized I had raised my voice and spoken quite sharply, while they appeared entirely composed.

Little boys took tumbles. Little boys got up and dusted themselves off in the majority of cases, particularly when the staircases figuring in their misadventures were comprised of exactly six shallow steps.

I hauled him to his feet by the expedient of grasping both of his wrists. “We can still go to Gunter’s, provided you are well behaved as we complete our errands. Perhaps you’d fetch my brown top hat from the foyer, and we can be on our way.”

He was off like a swift on the wing.

“You’ll take the coach?” Hyperia asked.

“We’ll go on horseback.” I made the decision in the moment.

“I have pleasant memories of being up before my father on some of our London jaunts, and wheeled traffic is still miserable.” A month hence, fashionable Society would have abandoned the heat and stink of London for the house parties, rural respites, and Scottish hillwalking expeditions.

“First,” I went on, “I will escort you home. Leander can assist the grooms to get a horse ready, preferably the biggest hack in the stable.”

The boy returned at his usual gallop, I explained the sequence of events, and Miss Hunter gratefully yielded her charge into the keeping of the grooms. Hyperia and I kept to the shaded alleys, and I soon had her in her own back garden.

“You’re struggling a bit, aren’t you?” she said. “You’ve had a busy year, Julian. Perhaps you should tell Captain MacNamara that you haven’t the time to take on his problems.”

“Now you are being a bad influence. I like the investigations, Perry. They are invariably challenging.” Though the challenge was usually how to locate the villains, not finding the gumption to catch them.

“MacNamara is a fellow soldier, the last person whose troubles I could ignore, even if I wanted to, though I don’t want to. Not truly.”

She hugged me among the straggly rhododendrons.

“I worry about you, Julian, and I also miss you terribly. Town will soon be dull indeed, and I will try to talk Healy into a repairing lease at the Hall.” She kissed my cheek.

“Don’t brood. Think of Miss Stadler being kept in a stuffy garret somewhere and surviving on crusts of bread and watered ale with only a tattered copy of Cecilia to sustain her spirits. She needs you, and I do too.”

Hyperia stepped back, and my heart felt bereft.

I waited in the garden until she’d disappeared into the house, and said a small prayer that I was worthy of her esteem. She could be difficult, in a polite, intransigent way, and she could be wrongheaded, but we were learning to be patient with each other and to put differences behind us.

I left the garden and set a fast pace back to headquarters.

Leander would be doubting my return—a bequest from his parents, that doubt—and I wanted the afternoon’s tasks behind us.

In the morning, Hyperia and I would make a sortie to Chelsea and learn what we could about Mrs. Merryweather, late of Burden Lane.

As I mentally reviewed the day’s activities, I heard again my exchange with Hyperia in the garden. She had made one of her rare errors in the discussion, though with the best of intentions. According to her, Harry had got himself killed.

Strictly speaking, I had got myself captured—I walked right up to the French patrol that had taken Harry into custody and presented myself for the same treatment. I had thus arguably been responsible for getting Harry killed.

Not a new thought, but one that sat ill with me, especially when I spent time in proximity to Harry’s only surviving child.