Read Online Hanover Square Affair, The by Ashley Gardner - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Ashley Gardner
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air. If he were innocent, I’d deserve it.
The butler took his time. I plied the knocker again.
Instead of the butler, a young footman yanked open the door and peered out at me. I handed him my card. He looked me up and down, inspected my drab suit, then ushered me inside to the dim hall.
The hooknose butler entered from the back of the house as the footman took my hat and gloves. “Captain. Welcome, sir. My master is expecting you. I will inform him of your arrival.”
He limped away and mounted the stairs. The footman led me to the same reception room with the same annoying Egyptian drawings and the same clumsy paintings. I did not sit down.
The footman moved to stir the fire. He shot me a few eager looks over his shoulder before he wet his lips and spoke. “Were you in the war, sir? At Waterloo?”
I was asked that often, but no. Brandon and I had chosen semiretirement before Napoleon’s escape and return to power in 1815. While the last, glorious battle had been waging in Belgium, we’d remained in London, learning of the outcome only when the guns in St. James’s Park had fired to celebrate the victory. “Not Waterloo,” I answered. “The Peninsular campaign.”
The footman grinned in delight. Already, the horrors of the war were fading, the brutal battles of Vitoria, Salamanca, and Albuera becoming distant and romantic tales.
“What regiment, sir?”
“Thirty-Fifth Light.”
“Aye, sir? My brother was in the Seventh Hussars. He was batman to a colonel. The colonel died. Shot out of the saddle. My brother was that broken up. Narrowly missed ending up a Frog prisoner.”
“My condolences for his loss,” I said.
“I wanted to go. But I was only fifteen, and me ma wouldn’t hear of it. What was to happen to her if both her sons died over in foreign parts? she wanted to know. So I stayed. My brother came back all right, so she worried for nothing.”
My own father had forbidden me to go into the army; the fact that he could not afford a commission for me had been moot. We’d had day-and-night screaming rows about it, which included him cuffing me or beating me with a stick when I couldn’t elude him. I’d no money of my own for a commission either, and I’d assumed I had no hope. Then, just after my twentieth birthday, I’d met Aloysius Brandon, who convinced me to come with him to India and volunteer.
Brandon had been a compelling man in those days and our friendship had deepened quickly. So I’d turned my back on my father and gone with Brandon to the King’s army. I heard of my father’s death the very day I’d followed Arthur Wellesley, the brilliant general who was to become the Duke of Wellington, into Talavera, in Spain. The next morning, I’d been promoted from lieutenant to captain.
We heard the butler returning, but he was running, clattering down the stairs. Somewhere upstairs, a woman began screaming.
The footman with his young exuberance gained the hall before I could. The butler swayed on the stairs above us, clutching the rail, his face gray. His gaze fixed on me and clung for a moment, then he doubled over and vomited onto the polished floor.
The screaming went on, winding down to wails of despair. Footsteps sounded on the lower stairs—the rest of the staff emerging from the kitchens to see what was the matter.
The footman charged past me and up the stairs. I came behind, my injured leg slowing me. On the first floor, in the doorway of the study in which I’d met Horne the day before, huddled the maid called Grace. Her cap had fallen from her brown hair, and her face was blotched with weeping.
The footman looked past her into the room, and his face drained of color.
The pretty yellow carpet had been ruined. A huge brown stain marred it, spreading from under the body of Josiah Horne. He lay face up, his eyes wide, his mouth frozen in a grimace of horror. The hilt of a knife protruded from the center of his chest, and a small circle of blood stained his ivory
The butler took his time. I plied the knocker again.
Instead of the butler, a young footman yanked open the door and peered out at me. I handed him my card. He looked me up and down, inspected my drab suit, then ushered me inside to the dim hall.
The hooknose butler entered from the back of the house as the footman took my hat and gloves. “Captain. Welcome, sir. My master is expecting you. I will inform him of your arrival.”
He limped away and mounted the stairs. The footman led me to the same reception room with the same annoying Egyptian drawings and the same clumsy paintings. I did not sit down.
The footman moved to stir the fire. He shot me a few eager looks over his shoulder before he wet his lips and spoke. “Were you in the war, sir? At Waterloo?”
I was asked that often, but no. Brandon and I had chosen semiretirement before Napoleon’s escape and return to power in 1815. While the last, glorious battle had been waging in Belgium, we’d remained in London, learning of the outcome only when the guns in St. James’s Park had fired to celebrate the victory. “Not Waterloo,” I answered. “The Peninsular campaign.”
The footman grinned in delight. Already, the horrors of the war were fading, the brutal battles of Vitoria, Salamanca, and Albuera becoming distant and romantic tales.
“What regiment, sir?”
“Thirty-Fifth Light.”
“Aye, sir? My brother was in the Seventh Hussars. He was batman to a colonel. The colonel died. Shot out of the saddle. My brother was that broken up. Narrowly missed ending up a Frog prisoner.”
“My condolences for his loss,” I said.
“I wanted to go. But I was only fifteen, and me ma wouldn’t hear of it. What was to happen to her if both her sons died over in foreign parts? she wanted to know. So I stayed. My brother came back all right, so she worried for nothing.”
My own father had forbidden me to go into the army; the fact that he could not afford a commission for me had been moot. We’d had day-and-night screaming rows about it, which included him cuffing me or beating me with a stick when I couldn’t elude him. I’d no money of my own for a commission either, and I’d assumed I had no hope. Then, just after my twentieth birthday, I’d met Aloysius Brandon, who convinced me to come with him to India and volunteer.
Brandon had been a compelling man in those days and our friendship had deepened quickly. So I’d turned my back on my father and gone with Brandon to the King’s army. I heard of my father’s death the very day I’d followed Arthur Wellesley, the brilliant general who was to become the Duke of Wellington, into Talavera, in Spain. The next morning, I’d been promoted from lieutenant to captain.
We heard the butler returning, but he was running, clattering down the stairs. Somewhere upstairs, a woman began screaming.
The footman with his young exuberance gained the hall before I could. The butler swayed on the stairs above us, clutching the rail, his face gray. His gaze fixed on me and clung for a moment, then he doubled over and vomited onto the polished floor.
The screaming went on, winding down to wails of despair. Footsteps sounded on the lower stairs—the rest of the staff emerging from the kitchens to see what was the matter.
The footman charged past me and up the stairs. I came behind, my injured leg slowing me. On the first floor, in the doorway of the study in which I’d met Horne the day before, huddled the maid called Grace. Her cap had fallen from her brown hair, and her face was blotched with weeping.
The footman looked past her into the room, and his face drained of color.
The pretty yellow carpet had been ruined. A huge brown stain marred it, spreading from under the body of Josiah Horne. He lay face up, his eyes wide, his mouth frozen in a grimace of horror. The hilt of a knife protruded from the center of his chest, and a small circle of blood stained his ivory
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