Anne Barbour by A Pressing Engagement

Author:A Pressing Engagement [Engagement, A Pressing]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 14

Three floors below, Jared and Simon entered the house via a side door in the kitchen wing. Both wore top boots, leather breeches, and nankeen shooting jackets, all liberally daubed with mud, and each carried a brace of wood pigeons, which they deposited into the arms of a flustered kitchen maid.

They made their way to the upper floors, comparing the difficulty of the various shots they had made over the course of the afternoon, and congratulating each other on their marksmanship.

“I still say,” Jared remarked, “you could have had that hare, if you’d aimed a little to the left. Next time we’ll take the hedgerows. I daresay we should be able to pull some grouse out of them, although it’s a little early.”

“I shouldn’t wonder,” agreed Simon. “But tell me, speaking of hedge-birds, how did your visit to Silverwell go this morning? Anything of interest to report?”

“No, neither my lord Stedford nor his man saw anything that could possibly be construed as helpful.”

“What a chawbacon the fellow is!”

Jared uttered a crack of laughter.

“But, no—how can you speak of a veritable pink of the ton? Lord, you should have seen him! He wore a yellow coat with silver buttons the size of coach wheels, a puce corded waistcoat, and striped gaiters. The compleat country gentleman!”

“I hear he’s making some rather startling renovations at Silverwell.”

Jared snorted.

“You should see what he’s done there. The Green Saloon has been gutted. No outdated Queen Anne or Louis Quatorze for my lord. Oh, no! The room now contains the worst clutter of imitation relics of the Ancient World that you’re liable to find this side of an Arabian souk. Etruscan vases on the mantel, settees with crocodile feet, pier tables covered with Sphinxes, and a wine cooler in the shape of a Grecian um.”

“I heard,” added Simon, “that he’s putting up a Chinese pagoda on the south lawn. Pink of the ton or no, the fellow is making himself a laughing stock. What a crackbrain!”

“You know, though,” mused Jared, “he may be a court card, but he doesn’t strike me as being particularly stupid. That’s why it seems strange that, arriving on the scene of Diana’s attack as soon as he did, neither he nor his man was able to catch the fellow, or even to see what he looked like.”

“That fellow Churte is pretty stout,” replied Simon. “He probably couldn’t catch Aunt Amabelle at a dead run. And as for our precious Ninian, I’d wager he was more concerned with keeping his ringlets in place than with tackling nasty big ruffians in homespuns.”

Jared was still following his own line of puzzled thought.

“Does it strike you that there’s something dashed smoky about that pair?”

In answer to Simon’s look of startled inquiry, Jared’s mouth curved in an embarrassed smile.

“To be sure, I may be imagining things, but he was not at all pleased to find the magistrate on his doorstep this morning. Oh, he was cordial enough, but he certainly did not give the appearance of one welcoming the law with open arms.

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