Too Hot to Handel Read online

  Emily rolled her eyes toward the ceiling, making mental calculations. “And over thirty-five hundred people had just evacuated the theatre, in addition to any number of curiosity seekers milling about in the street—Julia, it seems to me that any assailant must have been taking a terrible risk of being seen.”

  “Perhaps you’re right,” Julia said slowly. “Granted, it was dark outside, and the flickering light of the flames would have made it difficult to identify details—facial features, for instance—but surely out of so many people someone must have noticed something.” Coming to a decision, she rose abruptly to her feet. “At any rate, it is worth a try.”

  “What is worth a try?” asked Lady Dunnington, unaware of any plan of action having been suggested.

  Julia set her jaw. “I intend to find out who did this to Mr. Pickett, and I am going to bring him to justice.”

  CHAPTER 11

  IN WHICH LADY FIELDHURST TAKES MATTERS INTO HER OWN HANDS

  After Lady Dunnington had gone (still not entirely convinced that her friend was not making a rash decision that she must eventually come to regret), Julia sat down at her writing desk and applied herself to the task of composing a suitable advertisement. After several abortive attempts, she finally produced one that she felt was capable of eliciting the desired response. Reward offered for Information concerning Attack on Unarmed Man in Russell Street on the Night of the Drury Lane Theatre Fire. Call in person, Number 84 Drury Lane. Inquire of Mrs. P. She folded the paper and sealed it, then directed it to the Times in Printing House Square, Blackfriars. Then she rang for Thomas the footman, and while she waited for him to answer her summons, she dashed off another missive, this one to Mr. Walter Crumpton, Esquire, of Crumpton and Crumpton, Solicitors, Lincoln’s Inn Fields.

  “You rang, my lady?” asked Thomas, hovering in the doorway.

  “Yes, I have a few errands for you,” she said, shaking sand over the last of her letters. “A couple of letters to deliver, and then I need you to try to find that girl, Lucy, who came to Mr. Pickett’s lodgings yesterday.”

  “Yes, ma’am!” said Thomas, brightening.

  “Tell her I must see her as soon as possible. I realize she may be—busy—this evening, but tomorrow will suffice. Have her call on me at Mr. Pickett’s rooms.” As Thomas contemplated this command with every appearance of eager anticipation, she added firmly, “I realize it may present quite a challenge for you to find her again, and I shall see that you are well recompensed for your efforts, but whatever additional wages I pay you are not to end up in Lucy’s purse, if you take my meaning.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” said Thomas again, crestfallen.

  Not long after she sent Thomas on his way, Rogers appeared in the drawing room to inquire, as he said, into her young man’s health. Upon discovering that she was preparing to fly once more to Mr. Pickett’s side, the butler urged her to allow him to fetch a cold collation for her to eat before her return to that insalubrious part of Town. It did not take her long to discover that she could spend much more time arguing the point than she would if she were simply to agree to it. Given these combined distractions, she was much later in returning to Drury Lane than she had anticipated. In fact, by the time the carriage set her down in front of the chandler’s shop below Pickett’s lodgings, the sun was already beginning to set. She climbed the stairs to the flat above and rapped on the door. A moment later, the magistrate opened it.

  “I am so sorry, Mr. Colquhoun,” she said breathlessly, sweeping past him into the room. “I had intended to be back long before now.”

  “Never mind, my lady, you needed the rest.”

  “How is he?” she asked urgently. “Has he—?”

  “He awakened once, earlier this afternoon. He asked after you—”

  “Oh, and I wasn’t here!” she exclaimed in dismay.

  “I told him I’d sent you home to get some sleep, and assured him that you would return later,” said Mr. Colquhoun.

  “You did well.” Without taking the time to remove her pelisse and bonnet, she hurried into the small bedroom where Pickett lay, apparently oblivious. She sat down quietly on the edge of the bed and took his hand in both of hers.

  “John?” she called softly. “John, I’ve come back.”

  “I doubt he will awaken again for some time,” opined the magistrate. “He complained of his head aching, so I dosed him with laudanum.”

  “His head? Not his feet?”

  “No.” And this was something that had puzzled him. “I must say, my lady, it seems to me rather peculiar that, having sustained a blow to his head, he would complain of a relatively minor injury to his feet. Is it possible you might have misunderstood?”

  “No, for he spoke quite plainly,” she said, then turned her attention back to her patient. “John? I’m sorry I had to leave you. I had not meant to be gone for so long.”

  In spite of Mr. Colquhoun’s predictions to the contrary, Pickett’s eyes fluttered open. “My lady?”

  “Yes, love, how do you feel?”

  “Drunk,” he said groggily.

  “It’s the laudanum,” said the magistrate, tactfully ignoring the endearment she had let slip. “I daresay it will wear off soon, John—at which time you will probably wish it had not,” he prophesied grimly.

  He received no reply. Mr. Colquhoun had never thought of himself as being particularly invisible—in fact, he had put on flesh in recent years—but as he watched the pair of them conversing in hushed voices, he was struck with the thought that he might have disappeared, for all the notice they took of him; as far as the two young people were concerned, they might have been the only ones in the room. And perhaps that was as it should be.

  “I’ll be back tomorrow,” he said aloud to no one in particular, then backed away from Pickett’s bedside and quietly showed himself out.

  It could not be said that they took any more notice of the magistrate’s leave-taking than they had of his presence. Lady Fieldhurst stood up just long enough to divest herself of pelisse and bonnet, hanging them both on the peg beside the door before returning to her perch on the edge of the mattress.

  “Would you like something to drink, John?” she asked. “Water, perhaps, or tea?” She was not entirely confident of her ability to boil water without scorching her fingers—or worse—but if he wanted tea, then no sacrifice was too great.

  “Just water, please.”

  He pushed himself up to a sitting position to drink, and although she was almost a foot shorter than he, she supported him with one arm about his shoulders while she steadied the cup he held to his lips. He took a few sips, then allowed her to set the cup on the table beside the bed.

  “You shouldn’t be here, my lady, but I’m glad you are.” It was the most he had spoken since he’d been injured, and she could tell the effort it cost him. “I can’t thank you—I can never thank you enough—”

  “Hush,” she scolded gently, laying her finger on his lips. “The only thanks I need is for you to make a full recovery.” Actually, there was something else as well, but although she flattered herself that he would find it no very great burden, she knew him well enough to suspect he might worry; and since no mental distress must be allowed to interfere with his recovery, she would wait until a later time to broach that particular subject.

  Pickett, of course, knew nothing of this, but for him, her presence was enough. He captured her hand and kissed it, then sank back down onto the pillow with a sigh.

  “John,” she began, disregarding her own advice to Mr. Colquhoun not to worry him with questions, “do you remember anything that happened before you were—before you went down? Did you perhaps see anyone, or hear anything?”

  “I don’t—I can’t—” He grimaced with the effort of concentration. “It hurts to think.”

  “Then don’t,” she said quickly, regretting that she had brought it up. “Don’t think, just rest. Shall I go into the other room so you can sleep?”

  “No!” As she started to
move away, he grabbed her wrist. “I want to see you.”

  She gave a self-conscious little laugh. “I fear I’m not much to look at, at present.”

  “You’re beautiful,” he said, looking up at her with his heart in his eyes.

  In fact, he was not much to look at, either. His eyes appeared sunken, his brown curls were tangled and matted, and his chin sported three days’ growth of fine dark whiskers. And she wanted nothing more than to be able to look at him every day for the rest of her life.

  “If you’re not ready to go back to sleep, perhaps I could read aloud to you,” she suggested. “I noticed The Vicar of Wakefield on the shelf. It is a favorite of my mother’s, so I know it well. Shall I fetch it?”

  He nodded, and grimaced at the pain in his head. She left the room and returned a moment later with the book, fully expecting to find him asleep. But no, he lay watching the door as if impatient for her return. She drew the chair as near to the bed as possible, then sat down, opened the book, and began to read.

  “ ‘Chapter one,’ ” she said. “ ‘The description of the family of Wakefield, in which a kindred likeness prevails, as well of minds as of persons. I was ever of opinion, that the honest man who married and brought up a large family, did more service than he who continued single and only talked of population. From this motive, I had scarcely taken orders a year, before I began to think seriously of matrimony . . .’ ”

  He was asleep before she finished the first chapter. She set the book aside, then kissed him on the forehead and set about the task of discovering everything she could about the case that he was investigating, and that had ended so disastrously. The logical place to start, she decided, was with the small notebook he always carried in the inside pocket of his coat. She had tucked it away in his top drawer along with the diamonds, and when she looked there, she was relieved to discover that it, at least, was still where she had left it. She took it from its hiding place and returned to the chair beside the bed, determined to learn everything she could from it.

  Unfortunately, this was not much. She knew Pickett’s handwriting well enough; in fact, the top drawer of her writing desk held a couple of letters written in this same hand and kept for reasons that at the time she had not fully understood, or perhaps had refused to acknowledge. The problem lay not in his penmanship, but rather in the fact that he employed a system of abbreviations that she could not begin to decipher. She examined one page after another with no more success, until she turned over a leaf and found herself looking at a crude rendering of the theatre’s interior. Pickett lacked the advantage of a drawing-master such as she had enjoyed, but the horseshoe-shaped seating arrangement was instantly recognizable, and if she had harbored any doubts as to what the sketch represented, these would have been allayed by the “X” marking the location of the box where they had sat. A lopsided star shape marked the royal box, while an apparently random assortment of letters—a “D” here, an “M” there, and a “G” over there—apparently indicated the location of other members of the Bow Street force. It was an interesting glimpse into his work (let alone the methodical workings of his mind), but not very informative.

  “My lady?”

  At the sound of his voice, she dropped the little notebook onto the floor beside her chair, out of his range of vision. She was not prying, exactly—or if she was, it was at least in a worthy cause—but he would not like it if he knew she was doing a little investigating of her own, and nothing must be allowed to vex him in his current fragile state.

  “Yes, darling, what is it?”

  “Is it c-c-cold in here t-t-to you?”

  “Well, it is February,” she reminded him, rising to search the small flat for an extra blanket nevertheless.

  But it would not be February much longer, for March was only a few days away. Soon spring would return, and with it another social Season, another crop of young ladies emancipated from the schoolroom and launched onto the ton in the hopes that they might make a brilliant match. Alas, she knew all too well that brilliant matches were not always what they were made out to be, and hard on the heels of this thought came the realization that spring would also bring the anniversary of her husband’s death. It was strange to think that this time a year ago, she’d had no idea John Pickett even existed; now, at least in the eyes of the law, he was her husband. But that, too, was supposed to change with the coming of spring. Far from being impatient to put the episode behind her, as her solicitor seemed to think she must be, she did not like to think of what her future might be without John Pickett in it.

  Pushing away an image too dreadful to contemplate, she pulled the covers up to his chin and brushed a drooping curl back from his brow—and was shocked to find his skin far warmer than the temperature in the room warranted.

  “S-s-so c-c-cold,” said Pickett through chattering teeth.

  She pressed her palm to his forehead, and her worst fears were confirmed. This was the fever the doctor had spoken of. What had he said? Something about how the risk of infection was the greatest danger in injuries of this type. Now it appeared that the “greatest danger” had come to pass, and she hadn’t the slightest idea of what to do. She must send for Mr. Gilroy, but how? A glance out the window revealed no one in the dark street below—no one whom she would trust to deliver a message, at any rate—and she had no intention of going for the doctor herself. Quite aside from the fact that she would not feel safe traipsing about London unescorted at such an hour, she had no intention of leaving Pickett alone.

  No, it appeared the doctor would have to wait until morning. In the meantime, she could only try to keep Pickett as warm and comfortable as possible. She snatched up the poker beside the fireplace and stirred the banked coals back to life, then plundered the bureau drawers for every spare sheet and blanket she could find and spread them over the bed, topping them off with her own woolen pelisse. And finally, having done all she could, she put on her white cambric night rail and slid beneath the mountain of covers, pressing close to Pickett’s side and wrapping her arms around his shivering form in an effort to warm him with her body and her love.

  She awoke the next morning a bit embarrassed to find herself nestled closely against him. Edging away, she laid the back of her hand against his unshaven jaw and found it still unnaturally warm; clearly his fever had not abated in the night.

  “John?” she called softly. “John, darling, wake up.”

  There was no response. Under happier circumstances, she reflected, it might be rather lovely to begin each new day by waking up next to him; given the current state of affairs, however, she hadn’t the luxury of savoring this novel experience. Mrs. Catchpole would be arriving soon with fresh supplies of water and coal, and Thomas (assuming he did not allow his search for Lucy to trump all other considerations) shortly thereafter with a hamper of food as well as clean clothes. This, too, was the day her advertisement was to appear in the Times, and since she did not know at what hour, if ever, it might begin to bear fruit, it behooved her to be prepared. With a sigh for what might have been, she rolled away from Pickett and left the warm cocoon of the bed for the frigid room beyond.

  She made a rudimentary toilette and put on a fresh gown, and had just finished twisting her hair into a simple knot when she heard a thump on the door. She opened it to find Mrs. Catchpole with a scuttle full of coal in one hand and a pitcher of water in the other.

  “Good morning, my lady,” Pickett’s landlady said cheerfully as she waddled into the room. She set the pitcher on the table, then bent over the fireplace and began arranging coals on the grate.

  “No, not in here,” Julia said quickly. “Save the coal for the fire in his bedroom. I can keep the door closed to retain the heat.”

  Something in the tone of her voice alerted Mrs. Catchpole. She stood up and regarded Julia keenly. “Aye, ma’am, but you’ll want a fire here for boiling water, since it’s the one what’s got the crane to hang the kettle from.” She glanced at the closed door to the bedroom. “Taken
a turn for the worse, has he?”

  “I’m afraid so,” Julia confessed. “I fear the wound may have become infected, for he came down with a fever last night. I should like to have the doctor in to look at him again, but I dare not leave him alone. Do you know of someone who might be trusted to deliver a message?”

  “Aye, my lady, that I do. Depend upon it, we’ll have that doctor here within the hour. As for the fire, never you mind; there’ll be more coal where that came from.”

  Mrs. Catchpole was as good as her word, for in addition to the landlady bearing an additional scuttle of coal, the doctor arrived far more promptly than Julia had any reason to expect.

  “Thank you for coming so quickly, Mr. Gilroy,” said Julia, opening the door to his knock.

  “Not at all, Mrs. Pickett,” he assured her. “In fact, I have been wondering how Mr. Pickett fared, and had thought to take a look at him today in any case.”

  “I fear the news is not good,” she confessed. “He has awakened several times, and has even spoken, but last night he began running a fever.”

  Mr. Gilroy offered no opinion on these observations, but strode across the room and through the door into the bedroom where Pickett lay.

  “Mr. Pickett?” called the doctor in carrying tones. “Mr. Pickett, I am Mr. Thomas Gilroy, your attending physician. Let’s have a look at you, shall we?”

  Receiving no response, he began deftly unwinding the bandages encompassing Pickett’s head. “Hmm,” he said, frowning.

  “What is it?” Julia asked eagerly.

  “The wound appears to be no worse, but the unnatural warmth of his skin indicates that infection has set in.”

  It was what she had feared, but somehow hearing it stated so baldly made it infinitely worse. She took a deep, steadying breath. “So what do we do now?”

  The doctor shrugged. “I’m afraid there is very little we can do. There are no medicines that are effective against infection. I could always attempt to draw out the infection by bleeding him—”