The Ruthless Rake Read online

  “Thank you, sir,” Syringa said shyly. “But would you be obliging enough to answer my question?”

  “I am afraid that is something I cannot do,” Mr. Neame replied. “But believe me when I tell you in all sincerity that what I do presently I do with the deepest regret. You are too young and too lovely for the cruelty and the evil of this most unjust world.”

  There was something in his voice that made Syringa afraid.

  “You speak as if something horrible is about to happen to me,” she faltered.

  “I am afraid so,” he said, his voice more melancholy than it had been before, “but there is nothing either of us can do to prevent it.”

  “I think there is,” Syringa replied.

  As she spoke, she bent forward and put out her hand towards the door.

  Mr. Neame made no effort to stop her and, as she felt for it, she realised that there was no handle.

  She turned towards him – a white frightened face.

  “I am sorry, my dear lady,” he said, “but this is one of those coaches that are used for the abduction of fair maidens! It is also useful to convey from one place to another anyone who has been enticed into furthering some nefarious scheme.”

  “I don’t understand what you are – trying to say,” Syringa said. “Please – please – let me go!”

  “Even if I wished to do so, I assure you it is impossible,” Mr. Neame replied. “Every precaution has been taken so that you should not escape.”

  “But why? Where are you taking me? What is all this – about?”

  Syringa had a terrified feeling that she was caught in a trap that she could not even put it into thought or words.

  “Please, sir,” she said desperately, “tell me what has happened – or at least give me a chance to get away – to return to those who – care for me.”

  She thought of the Dowager as she spoke and of Nanny. Even though the Earl was angry with her, they would help and protect her.

  “There is nothing I can do for you, fair charmer,” Mr. Neame replied. “I must play my part and all the world is a stage as far as I am concerned. I have been paid to act and, the actor having accepted a fee, the play must go on. That at least you can understand,”

  “What part? How am I involved with you in – this?” Syringa asked.

  “You will learn the truth very shortly,” he replied.

  He drew from his pocket a flask and lifted it to his lips. The smell of brandy seemed to impregnate the whole interior of the coach.

  Syringa sank back in her corner trying desperately to puzzle out what was happening, what it could all mean.

  Mr. Neame replaced the top of his flask and put it back into his pocket.

  She could see now that he was older than he had appeared at first. He wore a wig and she guessed that his face was skilfully made up.

  She wondered why even for a moment she had thought him to be a gentleman.

  There was something in his bombastic tones that told her all too clearly that he spoke as an actor and declaimed his lines.

  She glanced through the closed window. She could see that they were passing through dirty narrow streets. It was very late, but there were still a number of people moving about.

  Then suddenly the carriage came to a standstill.

  They appeared to be in the centre of a small square. The houses surrounding it were dingy with broken windows and the gutters full of filth.

  “Why are we stopping here?” Syringa asked apprehensively.

  “This is where we alight,” Mr. Neame replied.

  His voice sounded a little thicker than before and now, as the coach door was opened by the coachman who had descended from the box, he stepped out into the road and with a theatrical gesture reached out his hand towards Syringa.

  “Come,” he suggested.

  For a moment she thought of refusing to alight.

  Then she realised that it would be quite easy for Mr. Neame and the coachman to drag her out.

  Because she had no alternative she took the actor’s hand and stepped from the carriage. Almost immediately the coachman jumped back on the box and drove off.

  Syringa looked round her. Even with her dark cloak covering her evening gown she knew that she must look out of place in the poverty-stricken street.

  There were men and women in rags and tatters sitting on the steps of the houses and she felt that there were eyes everywhere looking at her and watching her.

  What light there was came from one lantern and several tarred flares.

  There were ragged barefooted children and a number of rough men of frightening looks standing round a stall selling winkles and whelks. They all turned to stare at Syringa and the actor.

  Suddenly to Syringa’s astonishment Mr. Neame drew some articles from his pocket and pressed them into her hands.

  “Hold these,” he said.

  She took them from him automatically and then looked down in astonishment.

  There was a gold watch, a fat purse, a wallet and a tiepin, which glittered in the light.

  As she stared at what she held, Mr. Neame began to shout in a loud voice,

  “You have stolen my wallet from me! You have picked my pocket! It’s an outrage! I shall hand you over to the Magistrates! You shall be punished! You are a thief! A thief! A thief!”

  His shouts attracted people to converge from the dark corners of every part of the street.

  Then, as he was still yelling at her, Syringa saw another gentleman appear. He was dressed as elaborately as Mr. Neame in knee breeches and an evening cloak.

  There were two men accompanying him wearing red waistcoats, and, as Syringa glanced up at the sight of them, the gentleman shouted loudly,

  “There she is! That’s the woman! Seize her! Seize her!”

  The two men in red waistcoats ran towards her. Syringa did not move, but stood holding in her hands the objects that Mr. Neame had given her, her face white and bewildered.

  “Seize her!” the gentleman was calling. “She is a swindler!”

  Then to the Bow Street Runners, for that was what Syringa suddenly realised they were, Mr. Neame exclaimed,

  “Thank God you have come! Arrest this woman! You can see she holds my watch in her hand, my purse and yes, that is my tiepin, I have had it for years!”

  “It’s all a – mistake,” Syringa tried to say, but no one would listen to her.

  The watch and purse were snatched from her. The Bow Street Runners took hold of her arms and hustled her along the roadway.

  The people watching began to jeer while the two gentlemen who had accused her talked loudly, shouting their grievances to each other, repeating over and over again how they had been robbed.

  “Please let me – explain, this is not true – !” Syringa managed to say at last to the Bow Street Runners.

  But already they had reached a closed wagon standing a little way along the street.

  They hustled her into it so roughly that she fell on the floor and then the two of them climbed in to sit on the wooden seats on either side of the door.

  There was a rumble of wheels, the voice of a coachman shouting to clear the way.

  Syringa, pulling herself onto the seat, realised with horror that she was in a prison wagon!

  Chapter Eight

  The Earl returned to Berkeley Square as the sun was rising.

  He walked into his house with an expression on his face that made the night-footman glance at him apprehensively.

  Placing his cape and hat in the man’s hand, the Earl went towards the staircase, but, as he was about to ascend it, a figure came from the shadows and said,

  “May I speak with your Lordship?”

  He glanced round in surprise to see Syringa’s Nanny standing in the hall.

  “It’s very late!” the Earl replied, his hand on the banister.

  “What I have to say is urgent, my Lord!”

  There was a steely note in Nanny’s voice that the Earl recognised.

 
Although his inclination was to dismiss her without hearing what she had to say, he turned with an irritated movement of his shoulders and walked across the hall to the library.

  Nanny followed him and, entering the room, closed the door behind her.

  “What is it?” the Earl asked impatiently. “Surely anything you have to say can wait until the morning?”

  “I want to ask your Lordship,” Nanny replied and there was no mistaking the note of defiance in her voice, “what you’ve done with Miss Syringa.”

  The Earl made no answer and after a moment she continued,

  “’Tis not right, my Lord, that she should be taken from this house without my knowledge or without my accompanyin’ her.”

  “Taken from this house!”

  There was no mistaking the astonishment in the Earl’s voice as he continued,

  “What are you saying? Miss Syringa is upstairs in her room!”

  “She’s not, my Lord,” Nanny contradicted. “If she was, do you imagine I would have waited up for your Lordship for nearly five hours hopin’ for an explanation?”

  The Earl stared at Nanny as if he could hardly credit what she was saying and then sat down at his desk.

  “You tell me that Miss Syringa is not upstairs,” he said slowly.

  It was as if he found it difficult to articulate the words.

  “She was taken away just after one o’clock on your Lordship’s instructions, as I heard with my own ears,” Nanny retorted.

  “Taken away?” the Earl echoed her words.

  “That’s what I am sayin’, your Lordship,” Nanny replied grimly.

  The Earl put his hand to his forehead as if he could hardly take in what was being said.

  The wine he had drunk at White’s while gambling with a recklessness that had made his friends stare at him in amazement had left him feeling as if his brain was not functioning properly.

  Yet when he spoke again his voice was steady and his eyes watched Nanny’s face as if he was determined to discover the truth.

  “I left Miss Syringa in her bedroom,” he said after a moment. “What has happened since?”

  “When we came back from the stables – ” Nanny began, only to be interrupted by the Earl ejaculating,

  “The stables?”

  The words seemed to reverberate around the library.

  “Yes, my Lord. Miss Syringa and I had been to your Lordship’s stables to attend to her horse.”

  “To attend to her horse?”

  The Earl seemed to repeat the words under his breath.

  “You were with her?”

  “But, of course, I was with her!” Nanny replied sharply. “Does your Lordship suppose I would let Miss Syringa go out of this house night after night alone? But, my Lord, you knows as well as I do that she fair dotes on that horse of hers.”

  “Yes, I know that,” the Earl agreed, “but what was wrong? Why should she wish to visit the stables at that hour of the night?”

  Nana hesitated for a moment and the Earl insisted sternly,

  “I want the truth!”

  “Very well, my Lord, you shall have it,” Nanny replied. “Your Lordship’s Head Groom is continually at the bottle. He neglects the horses and I shouldn’t be surprised if he’s sellin’ the feed. ’Tis often enough that they goes short.”

  The Earl drew a deep breath.

  “So Miss Syringa has been out late at night to attend to Mercury.”

  “That’s a fact, my Lord, seein’ that he has enough food and groomin’ him as often as not. I’ve said to her ’tis not a lady’s job, but she’ll not listen.”

  “Why did she not tell me?” the Earl asked.

  “I advised she should do so,” Nanny replied tartly, “but she replied it was not right for her to complain about your Lordship’s staff.”

  “And she met no one else?”

  The Earl asked the question as if he could not prevent it coming from between his lips.

  “Who should she meet?” Nanny asked. “The grooms were asleep at that time of the night except for those who were out with your Lordship.”

  The Earl was silent for a moment.

  Then he said abruptly,

  “What happened tonight?”

  “We were later than usual because Miss Syringa thought that Mercury had not been properly groomed,” Nanny answered. “Brush him down she would, although I says she should be between the sheets. Anyway, when we comes back to the house, I went downstairs to the kitchen to get Miss Syringa a glass of milk.”

  “So she came upstairs alone,” the Earl interrupted.

  Again it was as if he spoke to himself.

  “As I reached the top of the backstairs,” Nanny continued as if he had not spoken, “I has the glass of milk in my hand and I was walkin’ careful-like as the candles were gutterin’ down low. It was then I heard your Lordship’s voice in Miss Syringa’s room. Thinkin’ it best not to interrupt you, my Lord, I stood in the open door of an empty bedroom.”

  Pausing a moment she realised that the Earl’s eyes were on her face and he was listening intently to every word.

  “It was then,” Nanny said almost dramatically, “that I saw I was not the only person listenin’.”

  “What do you mean?” the Earl asked.

  “There was someone else the other side of the landin’, someone cranin’ forward to hear what your Lordship was a-sayin’! I could not fail to recognise her Ladyship with that ruby necklace of hers glitterin’ in the candlelight.”

  “Lady Elaine was there?” the Earl said almost incredulously.

  “She was there and all ears for what was goin’ on,” Nanny replied with some asperity.

  “Continue,” the Earl said briefly.

  “Your Lordship comes out from Miss Syringa’s bedroom, slams the door and goes downstairs,” Nanny said and there was a reproach in her tone. “I was just about to go in to Miss Syringa, when I thought it might be wise to let her Ladyship leave first. I knew that Miss Syringa would want no questions asked as to where we’d been so late at night.”

  “So you waited,” the Earl prompted.

  “I waited and then to my surprise, her Ladyship goes in to Miss Syringa. She’s only there for a few seconds and then they both comes out with Miss Syringa wearin’ her cloak.”

  “Where did they go?” the Earl asked as if he felt that Nanny’s story was needlessly long and drawn out.

  “Her Ladyship comes out of the bedroom door first. I slipped further into the shadows of the door where I’d been standin’, but I heard her say,

  “‘We will go down the backstairs, his Lordship’s carriage is waiting at the side door.’

  “‘But why?’ Miss Syringa asks.

  “‘He will explain everythin’ to you,’ her Ladyship replies. ‘Come on we must hurry’.”

  “They passed without seein’ me. I puts the milk down on the floor and followed them down the backstairs. When they came to the side door that leads into Charles Street, her Ladyship turns the key and pushes back the bolts. They were out on the pavement and the door was closed again before I could get down the last flight of stairs. So I goes to the window and there I sees two coaches.”

  “Two!” the Earl ejaculated.

  “Two,” Nanny replied, “and I sees Lady Elaine with my own eyes push Miss Syringa into the first. She slams the door behind her and then she stands on the pavement and watches the coach drive away.”

  “Miss Syringa went alone?” the Earl asked.

  “Alone, my Lord. Then her Ladyship gets into the other coach which turns round and drives off in the opposite direction.”

  “I cannot understand it!” the Earl exclaimed.

  “Nor can I, my Lord,” Nanny replied. “That’s why I’m askin’ your Lordship for an explanation. Where has Miss Syringa gone and why did I not accompany her?”

  The Earl rose to his feet.

  “There is something wrong – very wrong.”

  “But if your Lordship has no knowledge of my bab
y’s whereabouts,” Nanny said and now her voice was frightened, “then I’m a-feared, desperately a-feared that there’s been treachery afoot! Miss Syringa expected it.”

  “Expected treachery?” the Earl exclaimed. “What do you mean?”

  “It was when Mr. Ninian Roth and her Ladyship forced her to sign a paper. They told her it was somethin’ to do with fortune-tellin’, but she says to me when she gets upstairs –

  “‘I did not want to do it, Nana. I had a strange presentiment that they are plottin’ somethin’ evil, somethin’ perhaps against his Lordship. I am afraid they may harm him!’”

  “When did this happen ?” the Earl asked.

  Nanny considered for a moment.

  “It was the evenin’ you gave Miss Syringa the flower brooch. She told me that she went into the salon and Lady Elaine and Mr. Roth were there together.”

  “What was this paper that she signed?” the Earl asked.

  “I don’t know, my Lord. I wasn’t listenin’ to half what she said. I only know it perturbed Miss Syringa and she was worried not for herself but for your Lordship.”

  The Earl said nothing and Nanny asked plaintively,

  “And now what’s become of her? If it’s treachery, ’tis Miss Syringa who is sufferin’ from it. Find her, my Lord, and find her quick, because I feels in my very bones somethin’ terrible is a-happenin’!”

  “I will find her,” the Earl promised and his voice was grim.

  *

  “Help me – God – help me.”

  Syringa whispered the words over and over again to herself and felt that she was in some terrible nightmare that she could not awake from.

  When the great iron-hinged door had swung open, she had known without being told where she was.

  There was no need for her to look up at the high gaunt building with its small barred windows to realise that she had been brought to the most dreaded prison in all London – Newgate.

  Then, as a half-drunken Turnkey, grumbling and using foul language, cursed the Bow Street Runners for wakening him at such an hour, she had heard the shrieking voices of the prisoners echoing and re-echoing round the dark walls. They were like the voices of lost souls.

  As Syringa was led along the dark stone passages in the dim light of flickering torches, she could see distorted white faces peering at her through bars. Coarse men shouted obscenities at her.