Bedford Square - Anne Perry [110]
Two young soldiers paraded by in uniform, dashing and elegant. Charlotte could not help thinking that probably in ordinary browns and grays they would have looked like any other clerks or apprentices. The bravado made all the difference. She smiled as she watched them. They had a kind of brash innocence. Had Balantyne once been like that, thirty years ago?
It was impossible to imagine him so young, so callow and unaware.
An elderly lady came past dressed in lavender. Perhaps she was in half-mourning, or maybe she merely liked the color. She walked slowly, her entire attention upon the flowers, profuse and dazzling in their beauty.
Although Charlotte was waiting for Balantyne, she did not see him until he was at her elbow.
“Good morning,” he said, startling her. “They are beautiful, aren’t they?”
She realized he was speaking about the roses.
“Oh, yes. Marvelous.” She was suddenly completely uninterested in them. In the bright sunlight the weariness showed in his face, the network of fine lines about his eyes and mouth, the shadows from too little sleep.
“How are you?” he continued, looking at her as if the answer mattered to him greatly.
“Let us walk,” she suggested, reaching to take his arm.
He offered it unhesitatingly.
“I am very well,” she answered as they passed between the flower beds, just another two people among the many. “But the situation is hardly better; in fact, I am afraid it is worse.” She felt his arm tighten under her hand. “There have been very curious developments which have not been in the newspapers. It is proved beyond doubt that the body was not that of Albert Cole at all, but a petty thief from Shoreditch called Josiah Slingsby.”
He stopped and swung around to stare at her. “But that makes no sense!” he protested. “Did he steal the snuffbox? From whom? He cannot have been the blackmailer … I received another letter this morning!”
She had known more would come, and yet she still felt a shock as if someone had struck her. He had touched them again, closely, personally, had reminded them of his reality, his power to act, to hurt them.
“What did he say?” She found the words awkward, her lips dry.
“The same,” he answered, beginning to walk again. In the shelter they had lost the breeze, and the perfume of the roses was heavy, dizzying in the sun.
“Did he still not ask for anything?” she pressed. She wished he would. Waiting for the blow to fall was almost worse than facing it when it did. But then, that was presumably a large part of the plan, the weakening, the fear, the wearing down before the attack.
“No.” He faced straight ahead, avoiding looking at her. “There is still no request for money or anything else. I have lost count of the hours I have lain awake trying to imagine what he could wish of me. I have thought of every area in which I could act, or have influence, of every person I know whose behavior I could affect, for good or ill, and I can think of nothing.”
She hated the thought, but it must be faced if it were to be fought against.
“Is there anyone in whose path of promotion or gain you are standing?”
“Militarily?” He laughed with a sharp, desperate sound. “Hardly. I am retired. I have no title or wealth that should pass to anyone but Brandy, and he could not be behind this. You know that as well as I.”
“Any other position, social or financial?” she pressed. “Any elected office?”
He smiled. “I am president of an explorers’ club which meets once a quarter and tells each other stories, greatly embellished by imagination and wishful thinking, entirely for entertainment. We are all of us over fifty, and many over sixty. We live in the glory and the color of our past exploits. We remember Africa when it truly was a dark