Page 46 of The Ladies Road Guide to Utter Ruin (The Ill-Mannered Ladies #2)

46

A cup of chocolate revived me enough to dress, but it took me an hour to ready myself for the interview. I craved a warm bath but made do with a carefully administered wash from Tully, who tutted as she navigated the sponge around the bruises and cuts upon my body.

Upon finishing my toilette, I looked at myself in the dressing room mirror. No wonder the Ermine had been so shocked at the sight of me: the right side of my face was deeply bruised and still a little swollen, the deepest blue and black upon my jawbone. I blinked, suddenly back in the forest, clawing at Mulholland’s face, my breath hard and fast.

“My lady,” said Tully, grabbing my hands, “what is it? Shall I fetch Lady Julia?”

“No!” I drew in a long, shaking breath. I was not in the forest; I was in the dressing room at Davenport Hall. I pulled in another breath, and another, fighting back the night and the trees and the hands. “I will be quite myself in a minute.”

It took more than a minute, but eventually I stood and made my way to the corridor and collected Julia from her room, and together we descended the staircase to the drawing room.

“It reminds me of when we first met Mr. Kent,” she whispered, outside the door.

“Well, do not fall in love with Captain Morland,” I said.

“Very funny.” But she was smiling. The first I had seen since I had woken up, and I was glad to see it.

She nodded to the footman. He opened the door and stood aside with a bow.

At the sound of our entrance, Captain Morland turned from the far window. He was in dress uniform, complete with sword, and holding something small wrapped in a cloth. Our eyes met, his shock at my appearance plain in his youthful, good-humored face. A good start. I added a slow, stiff gait into the room, but resisted tottering—one did not wish to overplay it.

“Lady Augusta,” he said. “I am—I did not know how bad—”

He bethought himself of his manners and quickly bowed to both of us.

Julia returned the courtesy, but I said, “You will excuse me if I do not curtsy, Captain.”

“Of course, my lady.”

“You wished to speak to us?” Julia said, helping me onto Charlotte’s damask sofa. I added a hiss of pain as I sat, which was not entirely fabricated.

Julia sat beside me and motioned to the chair opposite. “Please do sit.”

“Thank you.” He took the seat, back stiff and straight, his initial shock under control, for he studied us both with a return of his usual shrewdness. After what felt like a full minute of silent scrutiny, he placed the cloth-wrapped item upon the small table beside his armchair and said, “There are some matters pertaining to two nights ago that I have been sent to clarify.”

“As you can imagine, it is not an evening my sister wishes to recall,” Julia said.

“I understand, Lady Julia, but there are inconsistencies that need to be answered.”

“Go ahead, Captain. We are, of course, happy to answer your questions, although I do warn you that I cannot remember much.” I hoped the lie did not show on my face.

“It has transpired that the men who stopped you upon the road were not Luddites, as you reported to us, Lady Julia, but a thieftaker by the name of Mulholland—the man who held you at knifepoint, Lady Augusta—and his crew on the task to arrest a criminal.”

I managed not to flinch at Mulholland’s name. “A thieftaker?” I echoed. “He did not identify himself at the time, did he, sister?”

Julia shook her head. “No. With all your talk of Luddites in the area, Captain, we just assumed it was that desperate band of men.”

“I see,” Morland said, his eyes narrowing slightly at my sister’s gentle invocation of his own warnings. “It has also come to our attention that the man calling himself Mr. Talbot is in fact Lord Evan Belford, the man Mulholland was seeking to arrest. He is wanted for absconding from a penal colony, highway robbery, and other crimes. He and his companion, Kent, a Runner who seems to have crossed to the side of lawlessness, are still at large.”

“Really?” Julia said, her voice under careful control. “How shocking.”

Still at large. I knew my sister felt as much relief as I did.

“You did not know?” Morland demanded.

“We did not,” I said, arranging my features into some semblance of astonishment. “To think we dined with him and I rode at his side. Shocking. How did you discover such a masquerade?”

“It seems Mrs. Ellis-Brant realized who he was and reported the matter to my superiors.”

Of course she did; it was going to be hard to resist slapping the Ermine when we next met. I glanced at Julia, but she was keeping a polite smile pasted on her face.

The captain leaned forward. “I find it hard to believe you did not know, since Mrs. Ellis-Brant told me you arrived here with Belford’s sister and her companion, the two ladies traveling under assumed names.”

Ah, the Ermine had done a very thorough job.

“Indeed we were traveling with Lady Hester and her companion, Captain,” I said. Always best to stay as close as possible to the truth when lying through one’s teeth. “There is a family matter between her and Lord Deele, her other brother, that we are not at liberty to discuss. But we did not know that Lord Evan had joined the party here at Davenport Hall as Mr. Talbot, and Lady Hester certainly did not tell us. He hoodwinked us all, but I can understand Lady Hester’s reticence.”

Morland sat back. “Can you, now?”

“Indeed. Family loyalties and so forth,” I said, waving an expansive hand. It was time to bring this interview to a close. “We are of course shocked to hear that such a desperate man was among us, but we have no other information for you.”

Morland, however, was not about to be so summarily dismissed. “Why were you in that clearing, Lady Augusta? It seems very odd that a thieftaker arresting a highwayman and an ex–Bow Street Runner would march one lady through a forest and leave the other on the roadside in a phaeton.”

Well, that was a very good point. I glanced at Julia, then bowed my head theatrically under the weight of my ordeal. “I have no insights into the minds of such men, Captain. It was a terrifying few hours, which I can barely recall.”

I risked a glance at him.

He met the glance with raised brows. Damn.

“I have no doubt your experience was terrifying, Lady Augusta,” he said. “However—” He reached over and picked up the cloth-wrapped packet at his side. With a flick he unfolded its edges and held out the item to me upon the flat of his hand. A silver dagger, set with a ruby. “I found it in the clearing. Not the usual weapon of a thieftaker. Is it yours, by chance?”

The engraved cartouche was face down. Was it mine? Or was it Evan’s? Either way, I wanted it back with a violence I had not expected. Yet, if I claimed it, what would this sharp mind before me glean from such an admission?

By all rights I should deny it. And yet…

“Indeed,” I said, “it is mine.”

The captain smiled and turned the dagger over. “Why, then, is it engraved with the initials EB ?” He ran his forefinger over the letters. “Does it stand for Evan Belford, by chance? I saw him run to you in the clearing, call you by the name Gus, and embrace you. Moreover, you called him Evan and returned the embrace quite fervently.”

I cleared my throat. “I have no recollection of such familiarity,” I said.

“It is not a B ,” Julia said abruptly. “It is a D . It stands for Ex Deo . From God.”

Both the captain and I stared at her, nonplussed.

“It is a D ?” Morland said, peering at the cartouche. He frowned. “No, it is a B .”

Julia leaned over, her fingertip tracing the engraved letters. “It is all the flourish around it. It is a D . I gave it to my sister as a gift.”

I managed to nod. “And I will have it back, please.” I held out my hand.

He hesitated, then flipped the cloth back over the blade and passed it to me. I felt the weight of it across my palm, an image of Evan’s delight as he balanced it upon his fingers warring with the memory of its cold metal against my throat. If I had a chance, I would return it to Evan. But would I have that chance?

“Something is awry here; I know it.” Morland’s voice drew me back into the room. “Something unlawful, I think.”

“But you are not the law, Captain Morland, are you? You are a soldier, and a very good one,” my sister said, rising from her seat. The captain, bound by his sense of etiquette, stood too. “I thank you for coming to the aid of my sister. Without your gallant intervention, I cannot conceive of what would have happened. In our eyes you are a hero. We cannot add to our reports of the evening. It was a most disturbing time and our memories are clouded by the agitation to our delicate womanly nerves. Perhaps that is what should be reported to your superiors.”

Captain Morland opened his mouth to protest, but then shut it again and smiled: the half smile of a man admitting defeat. “I rather think you and Lady Augusta have never had a clouded minute in your lives,” he said. “It is obvious I am on a fool’s errand.” He turned to me, his voice sincere. “Lady Augusta, I am sorry for your injuries. I wish I had arrived earlier to spare you such hurt.”

“You came at exactly the right moment, Captain Morland,” I said, matching his sincerity, for he had, indeed, saved me from a much worse hurt. “Thank you.”

“I will take my leave and wish you all the best,” he said. “But in all seriousness, I know it is a B .”

“It is a D ,” Julia said firmly. “Ex Deo.”

“Yes, of course. For God. Let us hope he does not take umbrage at such an invocation of his name,” the captain said dryly, and, with a somewhat ironic bow, made his exit.