Read Online The Berkeley Square Affair (Malcolm & Suzanne Rannoch) by Teresa Grant - Free Book Online Page A

have a vested interest in you not blundering about as though this were a game of blindman’s bluff.” Carfax leaned forwards across the table in an unusually confiding posture. “Nearly twenty years ago, in July of ’98, Lord Dewhurst went from a late meeting with the prime minister to a dinner with a group of friends. He had his dispatch box with him. Containing documents relating to a secret mission he and I had just discussed with the P.M.”
    “In France?” Malcolm asked, shutting his mind to the instinctive recoil at the mention of Dewhurst.
    “In Ireland.” Carfax’s mouth tightened. “It was at the height of the United Irish Uprising. We’d scattered the rebels, but they were still strong. I had just received intelligence about the location where a group of the ringleaders were hiding out in Dunboyne. At our meeting Pitt had signed off on a mission to send a special force in to take them captive.”
    Memory clicked into place in Malcolm’s head. “Was that—”
    “Yes, when the force arrived, they found the rebels were prepared for them. We lost ten of our best men.” Carfax drew a breath that grated with frustration, but his gaze was uncompromising. “I believe the intelligence came from someone getting into Dewhurst’s dispatch box at that dinner party. Based on who was at that dinner party, that narrows it down to five men.”
    “My father or Harleton?”
    “No. Ironically, they were there, but they both left early. Before Dewhurst arrived. It has to be one of the five others.”
    “But you think whoever it was, this person was working with my father and Harleton?”
    “I’ve always wondered. This seems to confirm it.” Carfax hesitated again. His gaze shifted beyond Malcolm to the wall behind.
    “You know I’ll need their names, sir.”
    Carfax dragged his gaze back to Malcolm. “If asked I’ll deny I ever said any of this.”
    “Isn’t that true of all our conversations?”
    Carfax gave a wintry smile. “Lord Bessborough.”
    Malcolm blinked. “The Duke of Devonshire’s brother-in-law?”
    “Quite. You see why this is a ticklish business. Sir Horace Smytheton.”
    “The patron of the Tavistock?”
    “Interesting, isn’t it? Not sure what to make of the connection. Archibald Davenport.”
    “Good God.” Malcolm sat forwards in his chair.
    “Yes, I know you’re close to his nephew. I leave it to you how much you tell Harry Davenport, but for God’s sake use some discretion. I know Davenport was in intelligence, but we don’t need an outraged former agent defending the family honor.”
    “I don’t think Harry Davenport acknowledges the existence of family honor.”
    “You might well have said the same before your father was dragged into this.”
    Malcolm shifted in his chair. “Who are the last two?”
    “Hugo Cyrus.”
    Malcolm sorted through his knowledge of past events. “Didn’t Cyrus’s brother die in the Dunboyne business?”
    “He did, but he joined the mission at the last minute. Cyrus wouldn’t have known his brother was involved when he betrayed the mission. If he betrayed the mission. Though if that’s the case he now has to live with the guilt of it. Which I admit even I would find hard to bear.”
    Malcolm, thinking of his brother and sisters, including the one he had lost, could not suppress a shudder.
    “And the last person?”
    “Dewhurst himself.”
    Malcolm stared at his spymaster. “Good God.”
    “Oh, that’s right. He was involved in the business in France two years ago, wasn’t he?”
    “You know damned well he was.”
    “I did my best to stay out of that mess. It seemed to come down to a sad tangle of personal relationships and meddling by the French authorities.”
    “That was certainly the story we thought it best to put about. There was a fair amount of meddling and bungling on our own side as well.”
    Carfax smoothed a corner of the newspaper. “Precisely why I thought it best to stay out of it. Besides, it all dealt with