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  TOO HOT TO HANDEL

  ANOTHER JOHN PICKETT MYSTERY

  TOO HOT TO HANDEL

  SHERI COBB SOUTH

  FIVE STAR

  A part of Gale, Cengage Learning

  Copyright © 2016 by Sheri Cobb South

  Five Star™ Publishing, a part of Cengage Learning, Inc.

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

  This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination, or, if real, used fictitiously.

  No part of this work covered by the copyright herein may be reproduced, transmitted, stored, or used in any form or by any means graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including but not limited to photocopying, recording, scanning, digitizing, taping, Web distribution, information networks, or information storage and retrieval systems, except as permitted under Section 107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

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  LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA

  Names: South, Sheri Cobb, author.

  Title: Too hot to handel : another John Pickett Mystery / Sheri Cobb South.

  Description: First Edition. | Waterville, Maine : Five Star, a part of Cengage Learning, Inc. 2016.

  Identifiers: LCCN 2016001557 (print) | LCCN 2016006084 (ebook) | ISBN 9781432831684 (hardback) | ISBN 1432831682 (hardcover) | ISBN 9781432831653 (ebook) | ISBN 1432831658 (ebook)

  eISBN-13: 978-1-4328-3165-3 eISBN-10: 1-43283165-8

  Subjects: LCSH: Police—England—London—Fiction. | Aristocracy (Social class)—Fiction. | BISAC: FICTION / Mystery & Detective / Historical. | FICTION / Historical. | GSAFD: Mystery fiction.

  Classification: LCC PS3569.O755 T66 2016 (print) | LCC PS3569.O755 (ebook) | DDC 813/.54—dc23

  LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2016001557

  First Edition. First Printing: June 2016

  This title is available as an e-book.

  ISBN-13: 978-1-4328-3165-3 ISBN-10: 1-43283165-8

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  Printed in the United States of America

  1 2 3 4 5 6 7 20 19 18 17 16

  To Kathy and the gang at Thompson Valley Starbucks in Loveland, Colorado, who kept me supplied with mocha frappuccinos (nonfat, with whip) during the writing of this and other books.

  CHAPTER 1

  WHICH FINDS TROUBLE BREWING AT THE THEATRE ROYAL IN DRURY LANE

  As an evening of amusement it was a disappointment on all fronts, reflected Julia, Lady Fieldhurst, widow of the sixth Viscount Fieldhurst. For one thing, the theatre offerings were of necessity sober during this Lenten season of 1809—although as George, seventh Viscount Fieldhurst and cousin of her late husband, pointed out (several times), it was the very sobriety of Milton’s Samson Agonistes that made the Theatre Royal in Drury Lane an acceptable diversion for a woman still in mourning for her husband. Quite aside from Samson’s tragic fate being played out on the stage below, there was also the matter of Julia’s present company: In addition to the current Lord Fieldhurst, the party included her mother-in-law, the Dowager Viscountess. Neither of these two would have been her choice for companionship, but as her dearest friend, Lady Dunnington, had recently reconciled with her long-estranged husband and was now wintering with him on the Dunnington estate in Sussex, Julia’s options were limited. Heartily sick of her own company, she had accepted George’s invitation with gratitude, if not eagerness.

  If she were honest with herself, there was another reason for her disappointment in the evening’s entertainment, one that had little to do with her present company, and still less with the actors onstage. In between acts, she found herself scanning the pit below for the familiar figure of a tall young man with curling brown hair worn unfashionably long and tied back in an outmoded queue. She had seen no sign of him—which, she told herself sternly, was probably a good thing. The last time she had spotted him in the pit, she’d had him summoned to her box—an impulsive action which had so scandalized Lord Fieldhurst and the dowager that they had exiled her to Scotland for her sins. As an act of penance, it hardly had the desired result: Through a series of circumstances she could only ascribe to the workings of a mischievous Providence, she had found herself joined in a Scottish irregular marriage to the very young man for whom she now searched the pit.

  What she needed, she decided, was a murder. Samson and his fair betrayer forgotten, she trained her opera glasses on the boxes across the theatre, scanning their occupants to decide whom among her various acquaintances she could best afford to spare. She was still engaged in this rather bloodthirsty pastime when the final curtain fell. The orchestra struck up the overture once more, and the Dowager Lady Fieldhurst awakened with a snort.

  “Well, that’s that,” declared Lord Fieldhurst as he stood up and stretched. “If you’re ready, Aunt Fieldhurst, Cousin Julia, we’ll go.”

  “Yes, George.”

  Julia made no effort to comply, however, for at that moment she caught a glimpse of a man sitting on one of the benches below, a rather tall man with brown hair tied back at the nape of his neck. To be sure, his hair was darker and not so curly as she recalled, but the mind could play tricks on one, could it not? Look up, she thought urgently, as if she could somehow communicate with him through sheer force of will. Look up.

  “Cousin Julia?” repeated George.

  As if in answer to her silent plea, the man in the pit chose that moment to look up, revealing an unfamiliar face fully a decade older than the one she had hoped to see. Yes, the mind could indeed play tricks. Heaving a sigh, she tucked her opera glasses into her reticule and rose from her chair with the air of one abandoning a forlorn hope.

  She allowed George to lead her by the elbow while he offered his other arm to her mother-in-law, and the threesome exited the box and joined the throng of fashionables descending the stairs to the main floor. Here they were obliged to wait while cloaks were fetched and carriages summoned. Lord Fieldhurst placed the dowager’s evening cloak about her shoulders, but as he turned to Julia to perform this same office, she became aware of a commotion near the door. She moved toward the sound, scarcely noticing as the cloak slipped from her shoulders and landed on the floor in a pool of black velvet.

  “They are gone, I tell you,” insisted an elegantly dressed woman of advanced years, pressing gnarled fingers to her bare throat. “They have been stolen!”

  “There, there, your ladyship,” the theatre’s majordomo said soothingly. “Perhaps they were merely misplaced. A faulty catch, perhaps—”

  “There is nothing ‘faulty’ about the Oversley emeralds,” she informed him frostily.

  “No, no, of course not,” he amended hastily. “Still, I have sent a servant to look in your box, just in case—”

  “What is the matter, Lady Oversley?” Julia interrupted.

  “The Oversley emeralds are missing, and this fool insists the fault is mine!” said the older woman indignantly, waving one contemptuous hand at the offending party.

  “I’m sure I never said—” the majordomo protested, then brightened as he saw the footman returning. “Ah, here he comes now! Did you find them, Edward?”

  Edward sh
ook his head. “No sign of them in her ladyship’s box, sir.”

  “No, for I was wearing them when I exited the box,” put in Lady Oversley. “I tell you, they were stolen! And that is not the first time it has happened here, is it? It was only two weeks ago, was it not, that the Duchess of Mallen’s rubies disappeared from this very theatre?”

  “Sadly true, my lady,” conceded the majordomo, “but I assure you, we are doing all we can—”

  “Which doesn’t appear to be nearly enough,” Lady Oversley pointed out.

  “Maybe you should send to Bow Street,” Lady Fieldhurst suggested with perhaps undue eagerness.

  “Engage a Runner?” Lady Oversley scowled at the very idea. “One hates to bring outsiders into one’s private affairs. The scandal, you know.” She shook her head in disapproval, and her earrings—apparently part of the same set as the missing necklace—flashed green fire.

  “But you do want the emeralds back, do you not?” insisted Julia. “If I remember correctly, Her Grace’s rubies were recovered by the Bow Street force.”

  “That is true,” Lady Oversley admitted, clearly wavering. “Well, I—”

  “Cousin Julia, come away at once!” George, Lord Fieldhurst, pushed his way through the crowd that had begun to gather about the distressed Lady Oversley. “Our carriage is waiting, and your mother-in-law is growing impatient.”

  “In a minute, George.” She turned back to the dowager marchioness. “If you want to have a message sent to Bow Street, my lady, I would be happy to wait with you until the Runner arrives. I have had dealings with them before, you know.”

  “Yes, for there was that unpleasant business with your husband, was there not, and a young man who was able to clear you of any wrongdoing?” Lady Oversley regarded her steadily for a long moment, then nodded. “Very well, Lady Fieldhurst. I shall take you up on the offer.”

  Julia was hardly aware of what followed, although she supposed the majordomo must have dispatched Edward or some other servant with a message to Bow Street. Nor was she more than vaguely conscious of George’s grumbling or Mother Fieldhurst’s scowling disapproval. All she could think was that she was about to see him again, the Bow Street Runner who had proven her innocence in her husband’s murder, and who had played an increasingly important rôle in her life in the months since. And to whom she was, at least so far as the law was concerned, legally wed. She had not seen him in three long months, but she would never forget his last words to her. I am in love with you . . . I know there is no hope for me . . . I will not see you again . . . His voice floated at the edges of her consciousness during the day, and haunted her dreams at night. Of her own sentiments, she was not certain; she shied away from examining too closely feelings for which there appeared to be no outlet. After all, what future could there possibly be for a viscountess and a Bow Street Runner, no matter how irresistible the attraction between them?

  She could hardly speak of these things to Lady Oversley, however, so she restricted herself to describing for the dowager marchioness Mr. Pickett’s competence, intelligence, and discretion. In spite of these reassurances—or perhaps because of them—Lady Oversley (as she later confided to friends) confessed herself taken aback when, some twenty minutes later, Edward announced the arrival of the Runner from Bow Street. The elder of the two ladies turned to thank the younger for staying with her, and found Lady Fieldhurst watching the door with an expression of such joyful anticipation that it could only be described as, well, bridal.

  In the next instant a stranger entered the room, a man in his mid-thirties with straw-colored hair, a prominent nose, and rather cold blue eyes. This individual approached Lady Oversley and executed a deep bow that seemed somehow more insolent than respectful.

  “Lady Oversley? William Foote of the Bow Street Public Office, at your service.”

  “Mr. Foote.” The dowager marchioness inclined her head regally. “It was good of you to come so promptly. I fear a rather valuable set of emeralds has been stolen.”

  Her radiance abruptly extinguished, Julia could only stare dumbly at this stranger who should have been John Pickett. At last she became aware of George tugging at her arm.

  “Come along, Cousin Julia,” he said impatiently. “There is nothing more for you to do here.”

  Numb with disappointment, she nodded wordlessly and allowed him to lead her away.

  “I hope you are happy, for you made quite a scene in there,” he scolded, once they were settled in the carriage and headed westward toward the fashionable district of Mayfair. “Really, Julia, how can you expect Society to forget about the scandal of Cousin Frederick’s death when you persist in reminding everyone of your friendship with that Bow Street fellow? A friendship, I might add, of which your late husband would no doubt have heartily disapproved.”

  Julia was scarcely conscious of his harangue, for she was hearing quite another voice. I will not see you again . . . I am in love with you . . . I will not see you again . . . It appeared he had meant it. What sort of man declared his love for a woman and then walked out of her life forever? Her brain had scarcely formed the question when the answer presented itself: a man who believed himself unworthy of her. No, she amended, a man who knew himself unworthy, according to every standard of the world in which they both lived.

  “The evening post, my lady.”

  She blinked at the sight of her butler offering a silver tray bearing a couple of letters; she could not recall taking her leave of George and Mother Fieldhurst, let alone descending the carriage and entering her own domicile, so lost was she in her own misery.

  She summoned a feeble smile. “Thank you, Rogers.”

  She took the two letters and, recognizing Lady Dunnington’s spidery script on one, tore it open eagerly. The crossed lines were full of “Dunnington this” and “Dunnington that,” but even the knowledge of her friend’s newfound happiness was bittersweet, since it was Mr. Pickett who was indirectly responsible for their reconciliation.

  The handwriting on the front of the other letter was unfamiliar. She broke the seal and spread the single sheet. The missive proved to be from Walter Crumpton, Esquire, of Crumpton and Crumpton, Lincoln’s Inn Fields, solicitors to the Fieldhurst family for generations. He was (he wrote) happy to inform her that the annulment of her marriage to Mr. John Pickett would come before the Ecclesiastical Court on Wednesday, the fifteenth of March, at which time she might put this unpleasant chapter of her life behind her. It was, he reminded her, unnecessary for her to appear personally before the court. Furthermore, he had taken the liberty of informing Mr. Pickett of the court date by the same evening’s post, so she need have no further contact with that young man at all.

  “Bad news, my lady?” asked Rogers solicitously, upon hearing his mistress make a small whimpering sound.

  “Oh, no!” she said a bit too brightly. “Very good news indeed! Just—just unexpected.”

  Of course it was good news, she reminded herself firmly. It was the news she had been waiting for since November, when she’d first learned that they had accidentally contracted an irregular Scottish marriage. On the fifteenth of March, in only three weeks’ time, John Pickett would be as completely erased from her life as if he had never entered it. There was no reason, no reason at all, for her to feel as if the ground were suddenly crumbling beneath her feet, and still less for the solicitor’s words to blur on the paper, for all the world as if her eyes were filling with tears.

  CHAPTER 2

  IN WHICH MR. COLQUHOUN HATCHES A SCHEME

  Mr. Patrick Colquhoun, magistrate, surveyed from beneath beetling white brows the group of men gathered in the Bow Street Public Office. All six of the Bow Street Runners were there, as well as most of the more numerous but less prestigious foot patrol. He had summoned them himself for this meeting after learning late the previous night of the newest development in the most recent crime wave to strike his adopted city.

  “I daresay most of you have heard by now that it happened again last ni
ght,” he said sternly. “The Dowager Marchioness of Oversley lost a valuable emerald necklace at the Theatre Royal in Drury Lane.”

  A tall young man, his curly brown hair tied at the nape of his neck with a narrow black ribbon, looked up from the notes he was taking. “ ‘Lost,’ sir?”

  Mr. Colquhoun acknowledged the young Runner with a nod. “So says the theatre’s majordomo. Well, he would, wouldn’t he? Can’t blame the man for not wanting to admit his theatre has become a favorite haunt of jewel thieves. We, however, need have no such scruples. Like Lady Oversley, I believe it was a case of theft, and am treating it as such.” He pounded his desk with one fist. “It will not do, men! This is the second case in as many weeks, and the fourth since Christmas.”

  “But all the jewels that have been stolen up to now have been recovered, have they not?” pointed out another Runner, this one considerably older than the first.

  “They have indeed, but that is hardly the point. I am fed to the back teeth with paying out finders’ fees—although I realize you have profited handsomely by them, Mr. Foote,” he added, to a smattering of envious chuckles.

  “I can’t understand how this thief is snatching the jewels right off the ladies’ necks,” marveled Mr. Maxwell, a new Runner recently invalided out of His Majesty’s First Foot Guards.

  “It’s not that difficult, really,” put in the young Runner with the queue. “All it takes is a momentary distraction.”

  “You should know,” Mr. Foote said with a smirk.

  The younger man stiffened. “Yes, I should.”

  “And I, for one, am glad to have the benefit of Mr. Pickett’s unique perspective,” Mr. Colquhoun said, scowling at the senior Runner. “But as I was saying, I believe it is time we put a stop to the thefts once and for all.”

  “But how, sir?” asked Mr. Pickett, his brow creased in a thoughtful frown.