Linda Needham by A Scandal to Remember

Author:A Scandal to Remember
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

“Then that must make the daguerreotype twice as significant, my lord. Because he took quite a chance carrying it in his pocket. It must have meant a great deal to him—or he was a complete amateur, after all.”

Exactly the reason Drew had just sent two agents to Antwerp in such a blazing hurry.

“Suffice it to say, Princess,” Drew said, “the man had been lying in wait for your carriage for a few hours.”

“But how did he know we would take that road yesterday? It’s not the main route to Grandauer Hall.” She raised her startled gaze to him. “You don’t think someone is watching the house?”

“More likely someone knows your schedule to the minute.”

“Dear God, how? Oh, wait!” She pointed toward the door. “I keep my calendar on my desk in the library, which was broken into and—”

“You kept your calendar on your desk, Princess.” He patted his coat pocket. “I’ve got it now. Which brings us to your new loyal subjects.”

“Oh, and what about them?” she said with a snappish snort, as immediately defensive as he had anticipated.

“Davidson, please explain to the princess what you and Grant discovered in just an hour’s investigation.” Drew settled into a chair, wanting to get this over with as soon as possible.

The princess stood above him, her fists on her hips. “You couldn’t have found anything, Wexford.”

“Tell her what you discovered, Davidson.”

The big man demurred, shrugged his beefy shoulders as he flipped through his notepad. “Well, there’s not too much to tell, Your Highness.”

She fixed her glare at Drew as she said, “I didn’t think so.”

“It’s just that I followed the carriage to their lodgings in a disreputable tavern near Holborn Bridge, where I found them to be in possession of a great deal of money.”

The princess looked between Drew and Davidson. “How do you know this about them?”

Davidson’s brow dipped. “Because I saw for myself, Your Highness.”

“Do you mean that these men walked into the tavern, opened up a strongbox and spread their money all over the table for everyone to see?”

“Well, no, Your Highness. I…” Davidson shifted his weight and cast a wary look at Drew. “The money was in the room they shared.”

She turned the full force of her blue-eyed inquiry on poor Davidson. “So, they invited you to their room to show off their cache of gold?”

“Bank notes and coin, actually, Your Highness. But I was alone in their room at the time.” The usually unyielding man was nearly quaking under the princess’s quiet anger. “The owner of the inn was happy enough to let me in after I’d crossed his palm with a suitable reward.”

“You bribed the innkeeper and then searched their room without their permission, without mine?”

“But he had my permission, Princess,” Drew said, rising from the chair. “I’ll take the blame for any sleight against your sovereignty. The point is that these relatively simple men are traveling with a huge amount of money.”

“They’re exiles, Wexford, about to return to their homeland! It’s probably all the money they have in the world.

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