The Wild Princess

Twenty



He wasn’t intentionally neglecting his duties. That’s what Byrne kept telling himself. By nature he was neither lazy nor a coward. But since John Brown preferred to handle the royal family’s security by himself—contrary to the queen’s orders—Byrne felt justified in leaving the situation at the palace to the Scot while he continued hunting for the Fenian captain and Louise’s misplaced lover. Headquarters might well object to his reasoning, but what they didn’t know . . .

Byrne had strongly mixed feelings about the second of these tasks.

On the one hand, he wanted to please the princess, to be the man who brought her the truth about her first love. It seemed important to her, and he assumed she must have tried to find Donovan before this. Apparently earlier attempts had failed. He imagined her excitement, and the forms her gratitude might take, when he delivered proof of Donovan Heath’s fate and whereabouts. Would she fling her arms around his neck and plant an impulsive kiss on his mouth? (God knew the woman must be starved for affection.) And if he then trapped her delicate figure in an embrace would she yield to her rumored passionate nature and press ever more seductively, eagerly against his—

Damn, don’t go there, man. That’s treacherous territory.

Treacherous in more ways than one because, instinct told him, what he’d eventually discover was a truth darker than black. One that well might bring Louise intolerable grief. The idea of hurting her even more deeply than she’d already been hurt, heaping more undeserved pain on the poor woman—this was what caused him to stall for time.

During his years fighting for the North in the War between the States, he’d been accused, sometimes rightly so, of being many things—a rogue, spy, seducer, pragmatist, arrogant, merciless, brutal . . . even of being the devil himself. But never had anyone called him a coward.

Perhaps now he’d become even that. A coward where Louise was concerned. Because he hadn’t honestly put any real effort into finding Donovan Heath. And that was because he couldn’t bear the thought of seeing her brought to her knees, crushed by a truth too awful to bear.

So he’d argued with himself. Was it wiser to pretend he’d searched for the elusive young artists’ model and report he’d found nothing? Thereby saving Louise from the humiliation of learning she’d simply been dumped, or from the heartache of discovering the boy’s early and very possibly violent death. Or did he owe her the absolute truth that his respect for her demanded?

There was something decidedly sinister about this whole business of the missing Donovan, though he couldn’t yet put his finger on why. He didn’t know Victoria all that well. But what he did know of the monarch convinced him she was capable of absolute ruthlessness if threatened. Perhaps the worst of all possible scenarios involving the missing Lothario was one that directly involved the queen. Above all, he didn’t want to have to take news back to Louise that her mother had orchestrated the boy’s disappearance.

Byrne finally made his decision. As soon as he had proof of the identity of the dynamiteers, and a better lead on their commanding officer, he would dedicate serious time to finding Mr. Heath. If he still existed.

And so Byrne met in London with an informer named Clifton Riley who offered news about the Fenians, for a price. At their second meeting at the Green Dragon in Bishopsgate, his snitch, who claimed to be a brother of one of the Fenian recruits, verified some of Byrne’s suspicions.

“I heard two Americans came into the country.” Riley’s eyes glittered greedily. The more valuable the information, the higher his reward. “Rumor has it, they’re the best Chicago has to offer. Prime black powder men.”

“Who brought them here?” Byrne asked, looking around the pub, as if bored and ready to leave. “I need a name for their boss. I can get street gossip anywhere for free.”

Riley stared into his empty mug, as if in deep thought. Byrne ordered him another ale.

Thus fortified, his man continued. “No one knows his real name. Just he’s the Lieutenant.”

“And the names of the foreigners?” Riley gave him a blank look. “Come, man, you have to earn your keep.”

Riley flashed him a condescending glare. “Don’t be ridiculous. You, keep me? I’m the son of a duke.”

“The fourth son of a duke who has burned his way through his inheritance at the ripe old age of—twenty-five, is it? And you were in debt to half a dozen angry fellows at your club, who have delayed sending men to beat it out of you only because I gave you money to pay an installment on your gambling chits.”

Riley took to whining. “But how can you expect me to tell you what I don’t know? My brother only confides so much in me and hasn’t gained enough of their trust to meet with those at the top. All he hears are rumors.”

“What kinds of rumors?”

Riley hesitated. “Listen, I’ve told you enough for the price of a couple pints and some spare change. I don’t want to get my brother killed.”

“You’re right,” Byrne said, slamming his hands down on the table between them and standing up. “You’ll both be safer if Scotland Yard takes the two of you in for questioning.”

His snitch’s eyes widened with panic then darted across the room as if in terror of others hearing. In rookeries like Bishopsgate, the Yard was the enemy. He wouldn’t want anyone thinking he was either the police or aiding them. Most coppers wouldn’t chase a criminal into these thieves’ enclaves unless they had a veritable army battalion to back them up.

“No! You can’t do that,” Riley choked out. He reached over and pulled Byrne back down into his seat. “He’ll know I’ve been talking about his private business, his politics. He’s been promised a seat in Parliament and doesn’t take to my running my mouth.”

“Does he take to you accepting money from the police to settle your gambling debts?”

Riley blanched. “Please don’t . . . don’t tell him about that.”

Byrne leaned back in his chair and observed the other man, letting him stew. The Green Dragon was busy tonight, which was all to the good. In the noise and bantering, no one was paying attention to them in their dim corner, but the crowd made Riley all the more jumpy.

Byrne hardened his eyes. “I gave you a lot more money than spare change. I haven’t heard my investment’s worth.”

Riley hung his head, scratched at his sideburns, and winced stubbornly at the tabletop, but a few more swallows of ale and he perked up. “All right. I’ll tell you all I’ve heard. But there isn’t any more than this.”

“Well?”

Riley leaned closer and lowered his voice. “Some days mon frère talks of them bombing another train station. Some days of an attempt to assassinate the queen’s son-in-law on his way back to Germany.” Fritz, Byrne thought, married to the Crown Princess, Vicky. “The thing is, my brother thinks these are rumors to hide their real plot until the last minute, when orders will be given. They are playing their devious plans very close to the chest, if you ask me. Not so much as a believable whisper escapes to the foot soldiers.”

Byrne pushed himself into the man’s face. “You still owe me.”

“I know nothing more!”

“Then find out more. Fast. You think owing your gambling buddies is dangerous? You’ll find it a good deal less pleasant to be in my debt, sir.” He pulled back the duster just enough to give the man a glimpse of the Colt.

Riley shoved himself away, his face red, voice shaking. “You wouldn’t shoot a man for not delivering information he doesn’t have.”

“I’ve shot a dozen men for far less,” Bryne snarled. It wasn’t really a lie. There’d been a war on after all.

The duke’s son closed his eyes then huffed out noisily through his trim mustaches. He might have gambling debts to pay off, but he hadn’t missed a trip to his barber. “All right then. I’ll find out what I can for you about their plot. Then I’ll be free of your wretched blackmail.” He stood up shakily and retrieved his gloves from the table.

Byrne smiled. “Make it soon.” Free? The chances of that were slim to none. The fellow had a gambling addiction. He’d already run through all of his relations and friends. He had nowhere else to turn but to Byrne.

Having temporarily run into a dead end in his search for the Fenian commander, Byrne turned to Louise’s mission. By now he expected she would be climbing Buckingham’s walls, waiting for his return with news. With any luck he’d turn up just enough information to satisfy her. Then she would let go of the idea of reuniting with Donovan, if that was what she had in mind. Rekindling their affair might solve one problem for her, only to create a much more disastrous situation should their relationship become public.

His first stop was the National Art Training School in South Kensington. He interrupted a class taught by an elderly professor. After initially refusing to give Byrne any information about former students, the old man waved him reluctantly into an office across the hall from the classroom where he’d been teaching. He shut the door behind them.

“I wonder if I might ask you a few questions about the time when Princess Louise was studying with you,” Byrne began.

“So you said when you interrupted my class,” the old man huffed. “I repeat, sir, I do not provide personal information about students. And certainly not about the royal family.”

“This isn’t strictly about the princess; it’s more about a missing boy. His name is Donovan Heath. I believe he not only took lessons here, but he also paid his tuition by modeling?”

The professor sat behind his desk and settled his folded hands over a rotund belly covered in a paint-smeared smock. “That is so. But he is no longer here. I haven’t seen him in years. And I believe, now, you need to leave.” He pointed his eyes toward the door, as if to provide directions for the way out.

Byrne tried again. “This is official business. A missing person’s report has been filed.” Technically. Louise’s complaint to him.

“You are with Scotland Yard? You’ve offered no identification.”

“It is not so much police business as it is the Crown’s.” He produced the simple card that served as his only identification as a member of the queen’s Secret Service. There was no badge or uniform.

The old man stared at the paper rectangle for a moment without reaching out to take it, as if it might nip his fingertips. He looked back at Byrne with a puzzled expression. “I don’t understand. By your accent I’d say you are an American.”

Byrne gave a brusque nod. “That’s beside the point.”

“The queen wishes to locate this young man?” Byrne didn’t correct him. He wanted to cloak Louise’s connection to the search. The old man tilted his head to one side in contemplation. “I’d have thought Victoria would be glad he hasn’t shown his face all these years or continued to pester her daughter.”

“He accosted the princess?” A defensive anger roiled up in Byrne’s chest.

The old man shifted in his seat, as if he sat on something with a sharp edge. “It is a sensitive matter. For a period of three months, the two young people—Princess Louise and Master Donovan—were inseparable. I tried to warn the girl off. Told her he was not the sort of boy she should be talking to, let alone going off with for the noon meal. But I suppose, while she was here at the school, she was experiencing the only freedom she’d ever known. It became a kind of drug to her.”

“She was not chaperoned or escorted on her class days?” Despite what Louise had told him, this still seemed inconceivable to Byrne.

“She was, in the beginning. But after several weeks I noticed she was merely left at the door, on her own.” He smiled as though at an affectionate memory. “You’d have to have known the princess in those days. She was headstrong, determined to do as she pleased. Somehow she arranged matters as she liked.” He shrugged. “Hard to believe, I know.”

“Not hard at all,” Byrne murmured dryly. Some things never changed. “But weren’t you personally responsible for her during the days when she was here?”

The old man coughed into his hand, looking suddenly flustered. His white-whiskered face paled. “I did my best to control the girl. But you must have heard the stories. When she was young the gossip columns called her ‘the wild one.’ Of all Victoria’s children she was the little mischief maker.” He seemed unable to keep from smiling at the memory. “Do you know she insisted upon sitting in the boys’ sculpting class? No female had ever done so before. Not in this school or any other in London. The very idea was scandalous.” His smile faded, and he retrieved a handkerchief from inside his smock to dab at his sweaty brow. “Yet she insisted upon sketching from a live model. That’s how she met Donovan, you see. He was posing.”

“Naked?” Byrne gasped out loud before he could stop himself. Somehow it hadn’t occurred to him—the naked part. Society dictated that exposing a female to the sight of a male body risked sending her into apoplexy, hysteria, madness. He’d always rather doubted the theory, since none of the women he’d been with appeared infected by such negative aftereffects. Nonetheless it was a surprise that this had been a sheltered princess’s introduction to sexuality.

The little devil. Byrne caught himself grinning.

“Yes, naked—but of course. She was right. How can any artist learn the human form through endless layers of clothing or by studying a wooden mannequin? In the end, I agreed with her.”

“So, am I to assume that this friendship that grew between the two young people was a platonic one? Since both you and, I assume, the queen knew about it.”

The professor’s gaze dropped to his lap. He shook his head slowly, avoiding Byrne’s steady observation. “Whether they did anything more than share lunch at the street stalls with the other students, I cannot say, sir. But I assume, from the way they behaved when they were together, the looks they gave each other, that special tenderness . . .” He took a deep breath then let it out with a sense of unrelieved weight. “Well, one would have to be blind to assume there was never intimacy between them.”

Byrne felt a steady pressure building in his chest. The room seemed suddenly darker, the chemical-laced air drifting in from the studio across the hall oppressive. Young people were bound to find each other and experiment. Hadn’t he managed to scout out willing girls on which to test his adolescent equipment? The natural curiosity of youth would not be denied. Particularly if the young woman, though properly raised, possessed Louise’s spirit and passion. He’d already assumed there was more than friendship between the young Louise and her “friend.”

Well, that was all well and good for a boy and girl of the lower classes, or even among the offspring of merchants’ families. But a female royal who allowed a man to take liberties with her, a man who could never be her husband—such folly ruined her in society’s eyes and brought her family disgrace that would likely never be forgiven. His mind leaped toward possibilities he’d only vaguely feared before now.

What, exactly, had happened five years ago? His thoughts spiraled down to the bleakest of possibilities.

If Victoria knew about Donovan, and somehow learned of her daughter’s intimacies with him, she would have acted swiftly and decisively to prevent disaster. The only question was—how far had the queen gone to make the problem disappear?

“Supposing they did not simply walk and eat on the street with their classmates. Do you have any idea where they might have gone?” Byrne asked.

“At noon break?”

“Or other times.”

The man rubbed the knuckles of his hand with increasing agitation. “No. Of course not. If I’d known—”

“But if you were to guess,” Byrne prodded.

The professor shook his head, side to side, a great ox being led in a direction he didn’t wish to go. “I suppose the most likely place for a tête-à-tête would have been in one of the artists’ lofts where he was posing when he wasn’t working here. While Louise was still studying with me, Donovan stopped coming to model, you see. She seemed upset by this. Terribly so in fact.” The professor stood up abruptly but didn’t move from behind his desk. He studied the fleur-de-lis pattern in the blue-and-gold carpet. “Perhaps she went off to find him. She would have gone to the places he was most likely to be working or that she had frequented with him while he still worked here. I doubt he ever could have afforded his own room anywhere in the city. One of the artists likely would have given him a corner to sleep in.”

“Can you give me names? Anyone he might have worked for.” This was the precious connection he’d been waiting for. The back of his neck tingled with anticipation. Louise had been holding back, he was sure of it. Giving him only as much information as she thought necessary for him to track down her lover. Not daring to reveal too much for fear of his guessing the extent of her relationship with Donovan.

The professor sighed. “I can think of no one in particular. It’s been so long, you see.” He paced away from the desk, back again then away, hands clasped behind his back, deep in thought. “The boy seemed drawn to a brotherhood of experimental artists who called themselves Pre-Raphaelites. It was because of their avoiding the more modern styles and suggesting a return to a purer art before the famous Raphael did his fine work. But to my thinking, they were a strange and dangerous bunch.”

“In what way—dangerous?” Byrne stepped forward, wanting to shake the reluctant words out of the old man. He knew nothing of these artists, other than the general opinion that they had a reputation for loose living. He imagined a naïve, virginal princess becoming involved with such a group.

What had happened to her?

The professor said, “I believe there often has been trouble over their women. Affairs. Not that unusual, right? Made worse by the overindulgence of drink and certain drugs. The details, of course, I would have had no desire to learn. But I think the trouble among the artists in their group eventually split them up. I don’t know if any or all of them are still in London.”

“Can you give me a few names?” Byrne asked.

“Yes, there was John Everett Millais, William Holman Hunt, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, William Morris, and others. Rossetti, he was what you Americans call their ring leader. Of course Donovan might have been posing for and boarding with someone else entirely. Who am I to keep track of these young Turks? But I believe if Master Donovan were in London today, he would still be looking for work as a model or else turning to something other than painting to survive.”

Byrne looked around the room, thinking: maybe, or maybe not. “You said he was an art student. What about selling his art? Was he any good?”

The old man gave a soft snort. “The boy had no talent. A pity really. I can’t believe he’d ever become a true artist. He saw painting as a trick, a way to earn money he didn’t need to work for. Donovan didn’t have the heart of an artist. I could see that much even then.”