Page 38 of A Silence in Belgrave Square (Below Stairs #8)

We stared at the map with its damning markings in shock.

Small wonder that neither Daniel nor Hannah had been able to find it.

Lord Peyton had been literally sitting on the evidence of the Fenian connection.

When he retired for the night, the chair would have been right next to his bed.

I wagered even Lord Peyton’s coconspirators hadn’t known where he kept the map.

But Fagan would have.

“I must go,” I said hastily. “So should you. Give your notice, or simply disappear, but please go home and take care of Adam—I mean, Sean.”

Hannah shook her head. “I don’t like to, not yet. Lady Fontaine’s a daft old bag, but she don’t need everyone deserting her now.”

“Now who is being astonishingly kind?” I demanded. “It won’t be safe for you here—or for her either.”

Hannah regarded me stubbornly. “But his lordship’s gone now, ain’t he? His friends haven’t darkened the door since he pegged it. Even his doctor looked his lordship over, pronounced him dead, and couldn’t run off fast enough. I reckon the Fenians are done with this place.”

“There’s Fagan,” I pointed out. “He won’t be happy when he finds this map gone.”

“You’re taking it, then?” Hannah asked. “Why not call the police back in to discover it for themselves?”

“They didn’t find it the first time they searched the house, did they? Besides, Fagan could move it by then. He had to know where his master hid it.”

“You have a point,” she conceded.

“If you wish to look after Lady Fontaine, then take her to a hotel or a lodging house,” I urged her. “They can be paid from Lord Peyton’s estate.”

“I can’t take her to no hotel, Katie. She’ll get us slung out for stealing all the candlesticks and whatnot. At least here, whatever she takes stays inside the house. Don’t worry about Fagan. I can handle him.”

I wasn’t certain she could, but I admitted that Hannah was smart and resourceful. Hopefully she wouldn’t have to worry about him at all, once Scotland Yard had this map.

“If anything untoward happens,” I said emphatically, “anything at all, even if you’re not frightened, you send for me.”

“I will,” Hannah said. She was the sort who’d try to face down any peril on her own, and I prayed she’d heed me.

I gave her an impulsive hug. “Thank you,” I said. “For everything.”

“You knew I couldn’t resist an adventure.” Hannah squeezed me back, then helped me stuff the map into my small handbag. “Off you go then, Katie, love.”

We’d put the rooms to rights when we’d finished searching, and it appeared as though no one had disturbed them. I left Hannah fastening the cushion together again and restoring the blankets to the wheeled chair.

I pattered down the staircase as quietly as I could, my heart pounding, the map feeling like a stone in my bag. At any moment, I expected Fagan to jump out at me, seize me, and find the purloined map. What he’d do then, I shuddered to think.

The staircase and ground floor hall remained empty, however, the servants seemingly obeying Hannah’s stricture to not awaken Lady Fontaine. They were no doubt happy to leave the fussy woman in Hannah’s capable hands.

I didn’t breathe easily until I sped out the front door and carefully closed it behind me.

Belgrave Square appeared refreshingly normal, with a pair of ladies strolling arm in arm toward the park in its middle, maids hastening after them with blankets and baskets. Carts and delivery wagons rolled along the main streets, the business of London continuing.

A carriage pulled up in front of the house next door, disgorging a small man with a bushy beard and sharp face beneath a tall hat. He didn’t glance at me as I lingered by the railings to stare, but an unremarkable working-class woman in an unremarkable gown was unlikely to draw his attention.

He growled something at the footman who’d opened the carriage door for him, then clumped past him and into the house.

I recognized the groom who’d appeared to take hold of the horses while the man descended. The coachman drove the carriage on and around the corner toward the mews, with the groom ambling behind it.

I fell into step with the groom. “Is that Lord Downes?” I asked him.

The groom blinked at me in recognition, then back at the house as we rounded the corner. “Aye, that’s ’im.”

I said nothing more until the carriage was rattling into the mews. I stopped the groom following it with the touch of my hand.

“The night Lord Peyton died,” I asked him. “Did anything happen outside in the mews that Lord Peyton might have seen? That might have frightened him?”

The groom looked surprised. “Can’t think of anything. It were an ordinary night—we were looking after the horses and cleaning harness. Lord Downes likes every buckle to shine. At least, head groom says that. I think Lord Downes just likes to squeeze as much work out of us as he can.” He grimaced.

“Shouldn’t be much longer,” I told him. Once the police were finished and Lady Fontaine moved on to whatever house she’d stay in next, the groom could go home.

He shrugged. “I don’t mind. I like the beasts.”

“Lady Fontaine seems a bit smitten with Lord Downes,” I remarked.

The groom’s lips twitched. “She is that. Buttonholes him anytime she sees him coming out of his house. Morning, evening, and night.”

“Is he as taken with her?” If Lord Downes felt enough for Lady Fontaine to marry her, she’d not have to worry about whether her brother’s heir would support her.

“Not certain he is, no. But he’s kind, I suppose, to listen to her natter on. She can certainly talk, can Lady Fontaine. Delays him for long stretches, but he don’t run her off.”

“Very gentlemanly of him,” I said.

“Aye, Downes ain’t a bad sort. Apart from being a stickler about his harness.” The groom went thoughtful. “Lord Downes was marching about with his shotgun the night Lord Peyton died. Might have put the wind up Lord Peyton, though I don’t know why it would.”

“Shotgun?” I repeated in alarm.

“Aye, the old duffer likes to walk about with it draped over his arm. Lord Downes is a great one for shooting in the country, or so he tells us. Over and over again, about how much game he’s shot.

Never goes to the country—stays in London most of the time.

He don’t load the gun neither. Just wanders about with it. Reliving the old days, most like.”

I recalled the painting of the country house in the reception room, with the man firing off his shotgun in the background, the two children in the meadow in front. Lady Fontaine had said admiringly how fit Lord Downes had been in his youth, implying they’d all been acquaintances then, as well.

I wondered if the painting had depicted Lord Downes, though the figure could simply have been the Peyton family’s steward, not an old friend. I had no way of knowing which without quizzing Lady Fontaine again.

“Does Lord Downes wander about with the shotgun most nights?” I asked.

The groom nodded. “Lord Peyton would have seen him many a time. So I can’t think why that frightened him.”

I agreed. But something had…

I might suspect the affable groom himself if Mr.Fielding hadn’t vouched for him. Mr.Fielding was careful, more than most people would be, so he likely was trustworthy.

I thanked him and took my leave. The groom touched his cap, and I sped on down the road, keeping a lookout behind me all the way.

At the next hansom stand I encountered, I climbed into a cab and instructed the driver to take me to Scotland Yard.

* * *

I kept my hands over my bag as the hansom bumped across the metropolis, certain every villain knew what I had. I half expected one to grab the horse and stop the cab, dragging me out and tearing my bag from me.

Nothing so dramatic happened. When I reached Scotland Yard, I handed the cabbie coins for the fare, clutched my handbag to my chest, and hurried into the building that housed the CID.

Inspector McGregor was busy. At least, I heard him rumbling at somebody behind his closed door. That opened as I approached it, and the detective called Sergeant Scott emerged.

Sergeant Scott was a slender man in his thirties, with pale hair pomaded flat and light blue eyes. I’d first encountered him late last year, when he’d been investigating a fraud, and I’d learned he had sharp intelligence and dogged resolve.

Sergeant Scott did not greet me, only skewered me with a cool gaze.

“Who is it?” Inspector McGregor called irritably.

I ducked past Sergeant Scott and into the office. Though I’d come to trust Scott, I didn’t know him well, and I wanted to hand the map only to Inspector McGregor.

Inspector McGregor regarded me with his usual impatience. “I thought I told you to stay home.”

“You did. But I could not remain idle when I found evidence of a plot to set off bombs all over London tomorrow.”

I set the map on McGregor’s desk with a flourish.

I admit I enjoyed the drama of my move, but Inspector McGregor remained unimpressed. “How could you have possibly found…?”

He trailed off as he unfolded the map and gazed at it, becoming still. Sergeant Scott pushed his way around me and peered at it over the inspector’s shoulder.

“The X ’s are places where explosions have occurred or will occur.

” I poked a gloved finger at Victoria Station, then moved to the Underground stations and Whitehall.

“These have already been done, as you know. But these .” I pointed to the square that represented Scotland Yard. “I believe this hasn’t happened yet.”

Inspector McGregor gaped at the map and then at me. “Where the devil did you come by this?”

“The home of Lord Peyton,” I answered serenely. “It was hidden inside the cushion of his wheeled chair.”

Inspector McGregor’s face went nearly purple. Sergeant Scott remained impassive but watched me closely.

“Parker!” Inspector McGregor bellowed past me into the outer office. “Take some constables and get around to Lord Peyton’s in Belgrave Square. Find that manservant, Fagan, and bring him in. Take firearms—he’s got form.”