A Wedding Wager (29 page)

“Good.” Serena abandoned her Rhenish cream and went to the secretaire. She scribbled a few lines on a sheet of vellum, folded it, held the stick of wax in the candle flame, and dropped a seal on the fold. She wrote the direction on the front and took a shilling from her coin box. “Give this to Timmy, and tell him the shilling is for a chair if he’d like to take one; otherwise, it’s for whatever he wishes.”

“Yes, ma’am. Seems a lot for such a little journey,” Bridget added with clear disapproval. She didn’t believe in overindulging the youngsters who worked beneath her.

“’Tis late and cold,” Serena pointed out.

Bridget shrugged. “If ’n you says so, m’lady.” She went off with the letter.

Serena sat down at the table again, but she’d lost interest in food, so after a minute, she took her wine glass to the window seat and drew back the curtains far enough to give her a view of the street below. Of course, if Sebastian was not at home or was out with the intention of not going home until dawn, her testing little adventure would not come to fruition.

The sounds from the salons drifted up to her. Voices raised in laughter and greeting, a babble of conversation on the stairs as the guests went down to the first supper,
the chink of glasses, the clink of silverware. At least one of the general’s faro banks would not come out the winner tonight. He couldn’t handle both of them and would have to give the bank to one of the gamesters. She found the reflection immensely satisfying.

A footman came in to clear away her dinner dishes and left her with the decanter and a dish of candied fruits. Bridget came in a few minutes later to say that Timmy had left the note but that the boy at the house who’d taken it had said that neither of the gentlemen was at home.

Serena was a little disappointed but not surprised. Sebastian and his brother had numerous friends; there was no reason to expect them to be kicking their heels by their own fireside in the middle of the autumn season.
Even if one of them had just spent the better part of a day making love.
She squashed the reflection, it didn’t suit her mood, and considered her next move.

If Sebastian did not get her message until late, he would not be able to gain admittance to the house as she’d intended. There would be no one around to answer a knock on the side door. That meant she would have to unlock it herself and leave it like that. The trick would be to find the right moment. Too soon, and one of the servants might discover it before they went to bed and lock it again. Too late, and Sebastian could have been standing in the frigid cold in the side alley for goodness knows how long before she got there. And why should he trouble to wait?

So, when?

The servants in the salons would not seek their beds until the last gamester had left, but the regular household staff retired soon after the first supper dishes had been cleared. They would arise early to deal with the second supper’s debris while their fellows slept a little longer. The time between the two suppers would be the best, Serena decided. The side door was little used, and the servants taking care of the salons and the second supper would not think to check it. If Sebastian followed her instructions to the letter, he could be in her bedchamber, unseen and unheard.

Peregrine called an early close to his own evening. He’d joined a party of friends at the theatre but the play didn’t hold his interest, and, unusually, he found his companions’ conversation insipid. His mind was occupied elsewhere.

He excused himself with the hint of an important tryst and strolled home to Stratton Street. His twin, unsurprisingly, was not at home, but a message addressed to Sebastian waited on a table in the foyer. Perry picked it up, idly glancing at the writing, wondering if he could recognize it. It was instantly recognizable as a feminine hand, although he didn’t know whose it was. He could guess, though. He stood in the hall, thinking as he tapped the message on the palm of his hand. Was it important?

Still holding the message, he made his way to the kitchen, where Bart was dozing by the fire. The lad jumped up as Peregrine stuck his head around the door. “You want summat, sir?”

“No, I just wanted to know what time this message for my brother was delivered.”

Bart rubbed sleep from his eyes. “Dunno exactly, sir. An hour ago, mebbe.”

“All right, thank you. We won’t need you again tonight, if you wish to seek your bed.” Peregrine went back to the hall. He examined the message again, frowning. There had to be some urgency about sending a message so late in the evening. He made up his mind, took up his hat again, and left the house.

Sebastian had not returned to the house since he had left with Lady Serena that morning. If he was still with her, why would she be sending him messages? So it was safe to assume that he had continued with his original plans for the evening. Peregrine remembered he had said something about dinner at the Swan tavern behind St. Paul’s church. It was worth seeing if he was still there.

He took a hackney to St. Paul’s and went into the tavern, peering through the fog of tobacco smoke and billowing clouds of foul-smelling smoke from the sea-coal burning in the fireplace. The taproom was crowded, but Sebastian would have dined in one of the private rooms upstairs. Perry pushed his way to the counter, where the
landlord was filling ale tankards from the keg behind him.

“Did you have a private party dining abovestairs this evening?”

The man straightened, wiping his hands on a stained apron. “Aye, they’re still there. ’Aven’t paid their reckonin’ at all events.”

Peregrine nodded his thanks and pushed his way to the narrow wooden staircase at the end of the taproom. Upstairs, he heard voices raised in laughter coming from a room to the left. He pushed open the door. Six men were sprawled around a table laden with dirty dishes and glasses. One of them was shaking a dice cup, the rest chanting encouragement, banging glasses on the table.

Sebastian looked up as the door opened. “Perry … come and join us, man. You know everyone … oh, except for Mr. Jonas Wedgwood.” He indicated a rather flushed young man, whose slightly crossed eyes indicated a well-spent evening. “Jonas, my brother, the Honorable Peregrine Sullivan.”

Jonas struggled to his feet, swayed, and sat down again with a thump. “An honor, sir … beg pardon,” he mumbled.

Peregrine regarded him with an understanding smile, before saying to his twin, “This came for you an hour or so ago. I thought it might be important.”

Sebastian took the message, and his expression changed instantly. He stepped away from the table and
went to the window, standing with his back to the room as he slit the wafer. The message was short and simple:
I find myself alone for the evening. The side door will be unlocked after midnight. Use the backstairs. My chamber is at the front of the house. A red ribbon on the doorknob will tell you which one. I’ll be waiting. S.

For a moment, he was bewildered. And then slowly, the sense of the message came through. Serena was inviting him to an assignation, in the lion’s den, no less. It was so unlike her normally cautious self that his first thought was that she must be in trouble. But there was nothing in the tone of the note to suggest such a thing.

He tucked the message into his inside pocket and turned back to the room, aware of the eyes of his friends on him in question and concern.

“Is everything all right, Seb?” Perry asked for the group. He looked closely at his twin. He could usually read him quite well, but now he wasn’t sure. Sebastian had been pent up with whatever complex feelings he had about Lady Serena ever since he’d first seen her again in Pickering Place, and after their joint breakfast that morning, Peregrine had no idea where they’d spent the day, although he could make a guess as to
how
they’d spent it. But Sebastian seemed neither euphoric, as he would have expected after a glorious day of lovemaking, nor as tense as he had been before.

Sebastian nodded. “Oh, yes … everything’s fine. But I’m afraid I must love you and leave you.” His gaze fell
on young Jonas, who was leaning heavily on an elbow-propped hand and looked as if he was about to fall asleep. He couldn’t leave him to make his own way to Henrietta Place in this condition.

“Perry … I don’t wish to impose, but could you possibly …?” He gestured to the young man. “Henrietta Place, the Queen’s Head.”

Peregrine regarded the young man and shook his head. “Shame on you, Seb. Allowing him to get into this state. Clearly, he’s not used to his drink.”

“’Tis better to have his first such experience among friends,” Sebastian pointed out. Then he said with a rueful smile, “Although I own I was not watching closely enough. I should have reined him in earlier. But could you get him to his bed?”

Peregrine shrugged, saying agreeably, “Of course. But I think we’d best start now, before he falls completely asleep.” He put his hands under Jonas’s arms and hauled him to his feet. “Come on, then. Time you were in bed, my friend.”

Jonas struggled to keep his feet, and one of the men at the table jumped up. “It’ll take two of us to get him down the stairs, Perry.” He took Jonas’s other arm. “We’ll get a hackney outside.”

Sebastian put a handful of sovereigns on the table. “My share of the reckoning, gentlemen. I beg pardon for leaving in such haste, but something urgent has occurred.”

They waved him away with good-natured farewells, and he bounded down the stairs and out into the street, where he saw Perry and his friend hoist the near-comatose Jonas into the interior of a hackney.

He set off at a brisk walk. The clock of St. Paul’s church had struck midnight almost an hour since. He must hurry. Whatever the reason for the summons, it was clearly urgent, and he didn’t want Serena giving up on him if he took overlong to make the rendezvous. A pair of chairmen were standing idly on the street corner, smoking corncob pipes, leaning against the body of their chair. He raised a hand, and they seized the poles and trotted over to him.

“Where to, guv?”

“Pickering Place. As fast as you can.” He climbed in, and the chairmen started off at a brisk trot. It wasn’t very far to his destination, but he couldn’t run through the streets himself without drawing unwelcome attention, whereas the chairmen could cover the distance at this pace without notice.

The chairmen set Sebastian down as instructed on the corner of Pickering Place. He didn’t wish to draw attention from anyone entering or leaving the house, which he assumed at half past one in the morning would still be in the midst of its entertainment. He kept to the shadows as he walked down the street, looking for the alley that would give access to the side door Serena had mentioned. He couldn’t remember having noticed such an alley before, but then, he wouldn’t have been looking for it. In general, arrivals at the house would see only the lighted front door.

He found it quickly enough, running alongside the house and leading to the mews that served the houses on Pickering Place. The house itself still blazed with light, but the alley was dimly lit, a flickering sconce at the far end offering the only illumination. But the door was there, towards the rear of the alley, close to the kitchen regions. He tried the latch, half afraid it would be locked, but it lifted easily, and the door swung open onto a dark, cramped space. He slipped inside quickly, pulling the
door closed behind him, and stood for a moment getting his bearings while his eyes accustomed themselves to the gloom.

He was in a small hallway, with a narrow staircase leading up from the far wall. The backstairs, presumably. He went up, treading as softly as he could, afraid that each creak of the old floorboards would alert someone to a trespasser. He could hear voices as he reached a branch in the staircase, coming, he assumed, from the kitchen regions. To the right, the staircase led down to what he assumed was the kitchen, where the door was closed but light showed around the edges. To the left, it curved straight up, leading to the upper regions of the house. Serena’s instructions had been clear enough. He went up and very softly eased open the door at the very head of the staircase.

He peered around it and found himself in a long corridor, sconced candles at intervals throwing a degree of light. At the end of the corridor, a pool of bright light spilled from what he knew to be the wide landing from which the main gaming salons opened.