Ashley Gardner - The Necklace Affair

I decided to leave it at that and make my way to Hyde Park and the stables for a little exercise. At one time, I'd given riding lessons to a lad I'd met while investigating the Hanover Square problem. The lad's father stabled his beasts in Hyde Park and generously allowed me to ride one of his geldings whenever I liked, even now that the boy had returned to school. His father had told me he recognized a man who could handle horses right enough.

It was nearly two when I rode out, I having slept longer than usual. The fashionable hour wouldn't begin until five, but plenty of riders and drivers already moved about the park, enjoying the respite from the rain.

I walked and trotted the well-trained gelding, letting him canter a bit down an empty stretch of the Row. I turned down a lesser path to keep riding and spied Grenville astride his bay ahead of me, his tall hat shining in the sunshine.

I nudged my horse into a faster trot to catch up, but as I neared Grenville, another man on horseback swung out of an intersecting path. I recognized Lord Clifford, who began bellowing as he rode at Grenville.

"What do you mean by it, Grenville? Hounding a man's womenfolk until they're ill with it? My wife's life hung by a hair's breadth, all because of you and your interfering captain."

As I spurred my horse forward, Lord Clifford leaned down and tried to drag Grenville from the saddle.

My horse leapt forward in a burst of speed. Grenville's mount was already dancing sideways, Lord Clifford's doing the same. My long cavalry experience let me steer my gelding between them and wedge the two horses apart.

"What the devil?" Grenville said, out of temper. "Have a care, Clifford."

Lord Clifford was red-faced, spittle flecking his mouth. "What will you do, Grenville, have me thrown out of the Jockey Club? Doesn't matter. I refuse to be a member when fellows like you hold sway. You nearly killed my wife."

Clifford tried to ride around me and at Grenville again, but I remained firmly between Grenville's horse and Clifford's. I rode better than either of them, and Clifford would not get through me.

"Explain yourself," I said to him. "What happened?"

"My wife swallowed a large dose of laudanum last night, that is what happened. Only the care of her ladies brought her back to life. She cited some nonsense about guilt and misery, and how she never ought to have spoken to either of you. You gentlemen have turned my house into Bedlam, and I will not have it."

"Is Lady Clifford well?" I asked quickly.

"She will recover. Likely she only took it for the attention, but this was your doing, Grenville. Stay the hell out of my private affairs."

With that, he turned his horse and spurred it cruelly. The horse leapt away, ears back, gravel flying from his hooves.

Grenville was breathing hard. "Damn the man. He is an ogre. He doesn't care that Lady Clifford might have died, only that her troubles have disrupted him." He removed a handkerchief from his black coat, brushed away the dust Clifford's horse had kicked up, and carefully folded the handkerchief again. "I will have to do something about him, I think."

"He is not wrong," I said. "Our interference, especially mine, did lead to her distress of mind, but something does not quite ring true. I spoke to Lady Clifford last evening. She told me she'd changed her mind about Mrs. Dale being the culprit, and that she no longer wanted me to pursue the matter. She was agitated about it, but hardly in a state to go home and take too much laudanum."

"Unless she did not administer it herself," Grenville said. "You did say that Lady Breckenridge believed Mrs. Dale drinks laudanum for pleasure. She'd have a bottle close at hand."

"Possibly, but why she'd want to kill Lady Clifford is unclear to me." I told Grenville the theory about Lady Clifford and Mrs. Dale being lovers, or at least former lovers, without implying that the idea had come from anywhere but my own head. Any mention of Marianne would likely turn this conversation in an uncomfortable direction.

"You might be right," Grenville said. "It's a very insular household, and something like that would be kept quiet. But does it have that any bearing on the lost necklace?"

"I have no idea," I said. "I hoped to speak to Lady Clifford today, but…" I broke off. "I will try to find out."

"I for one will be pleased to be quit of Clifford and his family. They are devilish melodramatic."

While Grenville, I realized, disliked personal drama of any kind. No wonder Marianne drove him distracted.

"My boyhood home could be as melodramatic," I said. "Histrionics seemed to be the sought-after state, in my father, the housekeeper, the staff-anyone he controlled. My father was a bit like Lord Clifford, in fact."

Grenville straightened his hat, his face still red, but he regained his composure as I watched. "Well, I am pleased you turned out as well as you did, my dear fellow. My boyhood home was devoid of emotion at all. We were calm and careful from sunrise to sunset, sunset to sunrise. My father tolerated no dramatics of any kind. I'm not certain which is more devilish uncomfortable-too many emotions or none at all."

"Perhaps that is why you and I rub along well," I said. "I find your coolness restful, you find my volatility interesting."

Grenville raised his brows. "I do hope our friendship has progressed beyond that. Shall we ride on, Lacey? It is a fine afternoon, the park is not yet crowded, and I dislike to waste the opportunity simply because Clifford put me off."

He turned his horse and guided it onward, and I followed.

I admired Grenville's ability to brush aside bad encounters and continue serenely with his day, as though no one could possibly upset him. Perhaps he was practiced because he'd been raised to it, but I'd never learned the art of it, and doubted I ever would.

I received word from Lady Breckenridge the next morning that I could call on her, but when I arrived at her house in South Audley Street, the lady she had in her front sitting room was Mrs. Dale.

Annabelle Dale was much as Lady Breckenridge had described-red-rimmed eyes, past her first youth, thin and pale. She regarded me calmly, though her fingers twitched in her lap.

I was introduced, Lady Breckenridge and I sat down, and Barnstable brought coffee with cakes-an innocuous gathering. When Barnstable departed, Mrs. Dale set aside her cup and lifted her gaze to mine.

"Well, Captain Lacey. What did you wish to ask me?"

"I wanted to express my regret for the harm this incident has done," I said, "and to ask after Lady Clifford. Is she well?"

"She will recover. She has done this before, unfortunately. Living with his lordship is a great trial to her. He does everything to set us against each other." She smiled, and I could see that once, Annabelle Dale had been quite pretty. "It piques him that he cannot, not forever."

"But you and Lady Clifford must have had a bad quarrel," I said. "She was willing to accuse you of stealing her necklace."

"It is nothing we have not weathered before. I've known Marguerite since we were girls. She feels things too deeply and can become so easily jealous. She sought to punish me for… well, let us just say it was jealousy. And hurt. She sought to punish her husband, as well. Two in one blow."

"Then she felt remorse when Waters was arrested," I said. "But she was still angry at you, which is why she accused you to me. I think she hoped that I, with my reputation for running down criminals, could find an outside party on which to pin the crime. A known housebreaker or jewel thief. That person would be arrested, and you and Waters would be cleared."

Mrs. Dale pulled a handkerchief from her pocket, but she only clutched it between her fingers. "You have the right of it. Marguerite can be a fool sometimes. When you spoke to her at the musicale, she realized that you were unraveling her lies, and she panicked. She drank enough laudanum to make her dangerously ill, and of course Lord Clifford went to shout at Mr. Grenville. Mr. Grenville would tell you to leave it alone, and all would be finished."