A Masquerade in the Moonlight

Chapter 15

He who speaks without modesty will find it difficult to make his words good.

— Confucius

“Well now, Tommie, would you take a look at this!”

Thomas, who had been lying full length on the couch once again, silently trying to figure out why he was allowing Marguerite—his Marguerite—to run rampant all over London causing trouble with the men he had been sent to deal with, and most probably getting herself into a mess of her own trouble, raised his head a notch and opened his eyes. “Will I look at what, Paddy? I’ve clapped eyes on your face a thousand times since we’ve been stuck in these rooms, and I have to tell you—Bridget must be a saint to see you before noon and still love you.”

“Hell! Scrape a bit of hair off his upper lip and he thinks himself a gentleman!” Dooley stood, still holding the morning newspaper, and shoved it in Thomas’s face. “Look here, you vain peacock—it says here that looby Totton is about to make himself a discovery.”

Thomas was on his way to the Tower within the hour, Dooley sitting beside him in the hack, still grumbling about having to shave and dress so fast that he’d all but sliced his own neck with the razor—and he still wasn’t quite sure he’d put his boots on the right feet.

Although Thomas had no idea precisely where inside the high stone walls he would locate the Chapel of Saint Peter ad Vincula, it wasn’t difficult to fall into place behind the snaking line of fashionably dressed ladies and gentlemen who were parading in the same general direction, some of them with servants in tow, the latter carrying chairs and picnicking baskets and, in case the gray, overcast day should turn wet, umbrellas.

“Sir Peregrine must think he’s died and been lifted to heaven on angels’ shoulders, Paddy, to have nearly all the ton here to witness his triumph,” Thomas commented, seeing that the Prince of Wales himself was in attendance, seated in a large, gilded chair that must have been brought outside just for him, His Royal Highness surrounded by giggling ladies of indeterminate age and one especially well-dressed gentleman Thomas immediately recognized as Beau Brummell himself.

“Let’s go over there, Paddy,” he said, motioning toward the prince and his entourage. “I have a feeling they’ve picked out the best vantage point for Sir Peregrine’s show.”

Dooley, who had just purchased a meat pie from a wide-awake peddler who had brought himself and his tray into the grounds, spoke around a bite of hot pastry. “Are you sure, Tommie? I see Miss Balfour over there, with her prune-faced chaperone. Sir Ralph is with her, and Lord Mappleton and his golden pigeon. Don’t you want to join her, or are you afraid you can’t be within ten feet of her without pouncing on the poor child?”

Thomas shook his head, pushing his way through the crowd toward the prince. “This is her party, Paddy, and since she didn’t send me an invitation, I think I’ll keep my distance. We’ve made a promise to each other, you see.”

“A promise, is it? As I recall, you promised me not so long ago that you’d explain why we had to go chasing down that chambermaid at four in the morning and beg her for clean linens. I’m still waiting, boyo, although I don’t think I want to hear it. I’m too old and feeble to have m’ears sullied with any more of your whopping crammers.”

Smiling and tipping his hat to a trio of ladies he could remember having met early in his visit to London, Thomas took up a position several yards from the prince’s entourage and shaded his eyes with his hand, for it was nearing eleven, and a watery sun had belatedly crept out from behind a near solid blanket of clouds just at precisely the correct angle to shine overtop the tall stone walls and into the courtyard. “There’s Sir Peregrine now, Paddy,” he said, watching as Totton, dressed in sober brown—his shoulders almost half again as wide as Thomas remembered them, his shirt points dangerously high—strutted into the middle of the circle formed by his observers and swept an elaborate leg in the direction of the prince.

“There’s a whacking mass of sense outside that man’s head, Tommie, I’m thinking,” Paddy said as a group of about a dozen poorly dressed men carrying spades and picks on their shoulders gathered around Sir Peregrine. “He hasn’t turned a shovelful of dirt, and he’s primping and preening like he’s just discovered diamonds in his morning porridge. Heading for a fall, he is—I can feel it in m’bones.”

Thomas didn’t answer, for he was busy watching Marguerite, who was dressed this morning in a lovely pale blue gown, the shadow cast by the wall and the brim of her fetching straw hat decorated with bluish purple grapes hiding her expression from him. She was clutching her unfurled parasol with both hands, though, and he could almost feel her tension. “Little she-devil,” he whispered under his breath. Oh, yes, this wasn’t Sir Peregrine’s party, he concluded, this was Marguerite’s, and he had a feeling he was going to enjoy it very much.

“Your royal highness, ladies and gentlemen,” Sir Peregrine announced in a carrying voice just as the sun (Ominously? Portentously? Predictably? Thomas wondered) disappeared behind the clouds once more, bowing in each direction of the compass, “thank you so much for your kind attendance at this, the most momentous moment in our nation’s history.”

“That’s putting it on a little too thick and rare, isn’t it Totton? Surely, dear man, there have been other moments? The birth of our beloved Prince of Wales, for instance? Or mayhap that day is yet to dawn, that day being the one in which you discover a tailor who does not list his address in Piccadilly?”

A ripple of laughter ran through the crowd as Sir Peregrine bowed to Brummell, who, after issuing his statement, was in the process of elegantly taking snuff.

“I should like to take a moment to explain to those who did not have the pleasure of thoroughly perusing the articles so graciously carried by all of our newspapers this morning some little background on the history of the Roman occupation of our grand island.”

“God’s teeth!” the prince exclaimed, his deep voice carrying over the moans and groans of Sir Peregrine’s audience. “If I had wanted a history lesson, Totton, I would have traveled up to Cambridge. Get on with it man—before the skies open and lay ruin to all our fair ladies’ fine clothes!”

“Very well,” Sir Peregrine said, sighing audibly. “From my studies I have deduced that the household property and, hopefully, much of the fortune of one Roman citizen named Balbus was buried just here, where the walls of the Tower of London were to rise several centuries later. I have in my possession”—he paused for a moment, to pull the parchment from his waistcoat—“a copy of the gentleman’s map, pinpointing the place where the treasure lies buried.

“The message was coded, and in Latin, so that it took me many hours of concentrated effort to unlock its secrets, but as I am a Latin scholar I am convinced that I have been successful in my intellectual pursuit. For I am not concerned with any personal gain and have already promised His Royal Highness that the Crown shall be the sole proprietor of Balbus’s treasure. Remember the name, ladies and gentlemen—Balbus, the Roman.”

“If the little banty keeps puffing out his chest like that, Tommie, and the sun chances to creep out again, he’ll scratch and crow like the cock of the walk,” Dooley whispered rather loudly, causing the three ladies in front of them to titter behind their hands.

Sir Peregrine looked to the small group, frowned, and then continued: “I have done all but the final pacing, leaving that historic moment until now, after which the men behind me will commence digging. Your Royal Highness,” he said questioningly, “with your kind permission?”

“You’ve had his permission forever, Totton,” Brummell called out. “It’s His Royal Highness’s patience you’re in danger of losing.”

“Yes, yes, I understand,” Sir Peregrine said hastily, turning to the laborers, one of whom was yawning widely, while another was scratching an itch close by his crotch. “Stand back, you fools, and let me get my bearings.”

“Go on the hunt for your wits while you’re about it! You’ll have plaguey little luck finding either, I’ll wager,” somebody called from the crowd.

“I’ll take that bet!” someone else called out. “Ten pounds says he can’t locate either of them.”

A dozen voices joined the debate, wagers flying faster than Sir Peregrine could pace from a point he must have plotted earlier, taking twelve carefully spaced steps before ending with his highly polished Hessians sinking in the middle of a circle of freshly planted spring flowers that had to be the glory of the Tower gardeners.

“Oh, surely, Totton, not the posies!” Brummell exclaimed dramatically, lifting a snowy white handkerchief to his eyes, as if to wipe away a tear at the sad fate of the flowers.

Sir Peregrine’s angry glare was not enough to stop the laughter of the crowd of more than one hundred easily amused onlookers, and he motioned jerkily to the laborers to begin digging just left of the center of the circle.

The men dug, as more ladies unfurled their parasols against the hint of a damp mist, as the gentlemen’s taunts and jeers increased in boldness, as tradesmen plied their wares throughout the crowd... as Thomas watched Marguerite watching Totton, her normally smiling mouth pinched, her ramrod straight posture betraying her excitement.

Lord Mappleton and Miss Rollins soon tired of the scene, and Thomas saw them leaving, Lord Mappleton solicitously holding her elbow as she picked her way across the grass to one of the stone paths. There was something strange about the rich Miss Rollins, as Thomas had believed from the very beginning, something about her that just did not seem quite real, but still he couldn’t put his finger on exactly what bothered him. Perhaps the flaw was too obvious, like a forest, so that he could not see the most important tree. But he couldn’t be bothered with such thoughts now.

Sir Ralph, Thomas noticed, remained stationed beside Marguerite, shaking his head, although otherwise looking as noncommittal as always. It was impossible to determine whether he was angry or amused or simply bored by the spectacle of his friend’s “scientific investigation.”

Only Sir Peregrine still looked relaxed as he walked around the perimeter of the digging site, his smile wide, his chin high, and his hopes, obviously, ever loftier.

The flowers were all uprooted, many of them already crushed beneath the boots of the energetic diggers, and earth was piled high everywhere before one of the laborers called out, “Oi hit sumthin’, yer worship! Oi hit sumthin’!”

Thomas leaned forward, surprised. He hadn’t thought there would be anything to find in the bottom of the hole except for, possibly, Sir Peregrine’s long missing humility. “Well, I’ll be damned,” he said quietly, looking to Marguerite in something akin to awe. “You’re even better than I thought.”

The Prince of Wales was moved to rise from his seat, and minced across the grass in his shiny Hessians, all the way to the edge of the excavation, peering intently into the three foot-deep pit. “It’s a box, by God—” he shouted, giving Brummell a soft punch in the belly as if to say he had been right and his sartorially infallible friend had been wrong in this single case, “a strongbox! You—Totton—have them bring it here to me at once!”

Dooley leaned close to Thomas. “That thing looks older than the flood, Tommie,” he said, shaking his head. “Look at all those leather straps and such. What d’you suppose is in it? And take a peek at Totton. He looks like to burst, he’s that proud of himself.”

Thomas saw that Marguerite had folded her parasol and was now standing very quietly, a smile playing about her lips as she looked to her right, as if searching for something or someone she had every reason to believe she would find. “I won’t pretend to know what’s going on, Paddy,” he said as one of the laborers cut the leather straps with his knife and prepared to raise the lid of the box, “but I don’t think we’ll have to wait too much longer for an answer.”

Sir Peregrine rudely pushed the laborer away from the box and knelt down in the dirt in front of it, reverently raising the heavy lid, then dramatically throwing it back and lifting a crumbling cloth that protected its contents, to allow everyone to see what was inside.

“Gold!” someone exclaimed excitedly a moment later as Sir Peregrine lifted out a vase no larger than his hand and held it aloft, where it winked like a flirtatious lover even in the dim daylight. Then he rose, bowed deeply—although entirely without humility—and passed the piece over to the prince.

“Look at it!” others shouted, shaken from their usual skepticism and practiced ennui. “And there’s more! Gold spoons! Golden plate! Gold coins! Dozens and dozens of them! Oh, well done, Totton! Well done!”

The crowd pressed forward, everyone eager to sec Totton’s Treasure, as it was already being called. Only Thomas and Paddy hung back—they and, Thomas noticed, Marguerite and Sir Ralph.

Sir Peregrine was surrounded by well-wishers and his thin face beamed with pleasure as he acknowledged the tribute he obviously believed he so richly deserved. Any remaining flowers were trampled beneath ladies’ heels and gentlemen’s boots as the ton braved the dirt and the damp mist that had changed to a steady drizzle in order to get a closer look at the magnificent treasure.

And then, just as Thomas had about given up cudgeling his brain for the reason behind this scene, he heard a single male voice raised in entreaty. “Balbus! Good gentlefolk, who’ll buy my Balbus? Coins, plate, pretty pots fer the ladies. Who’ll buy my Balbus? Threepenny a piece!”

One by one, people at the back of the crowd began to turn, looking at the peddler, until everyone was nudging the person next to him, pointing out the man hawking his “Balbus.”

The three ladies positioned in front of Thomas and Dooley saw the man as well. “What’s that?” said the first. “What’s the fellow selling? Balbus? But—but that’s impossible! Unless—”

“Unless that pretentious fool Totton has been thoroughly disgraced! Balbus! Oh, this is too delicious! I simply must have one!” the second lady exclaimed, already joining the throng of people surging toward the hawker.

The third remained immobile, making up one of the crowd directing their attention to Totton and shouting questions that held a hint of threat in them.

“I don’t believe it,” Thomas muttered, beginning to smile as he saw the peddler holding a shiny gold vase high above his head as he walked among the crowd, a wooden tray hung from his neck laden with a booty identical to that being oohed and aahed at by the Prince of Wales and the members of society. Take the rough woolen cowl from the man’s head and replace it with a leather visor, and he would be looking at Lord Chorley’s gaming partner, not that any but someone as discerning as Thomas would notice.

“I don’t bloody believe it,” Thomas repeated as Dooley began to laugh, “and I don’t for the life of me know how she did it, but it’s bloody brilliant!”

At last, as the crowd parted, the peddler reached Sir Peregrine, who was standing as if turned into one of the statues in his office at the ministry, although all his limbs were still intact. Only his consequence had gone missing, lost amid the laughter and derision now assaulting him from every side.

“Buy me Balbus, sir?” the peddler asked Totton before passing on, disappearing into the crowd.

Sir Peregrine continued to stand there, a beaten man, all his dreams lying in the dirt at his feet, and Thomas almost felt sorry for him.

Almost. For just then he happened to look up to see Marguerite staring at him across the expanse, her head tilted slightly, holding a single finger upraised at eye level. “One,” he whispered in agreement. “Indeed, yes, my devious aingeal, one. And four to go. If only I knew why.”

The drizzle was turning cold and Sir Peregrine’s audience, now that they had been entertained, were in a rush to be off to digest what they had seen and then spread the word of his humiliation all across Mayfair with the speed of a swarm of locusts. Thomas stood his ground as they weaved around him on their way to their carriages, listening to their complaints.

“The cheek of the fellow! My boots are ruined, and all for a Balbus, whatever in blazes that is. Did you purchase one, Marcus? So did I, a coin. If he ever shows his face in public again, I vow I’ll shove it up his nose!”

“He has become a laughingstock, and none too soon. Imagine—setting himself up as an expert on Roman antiquities! Always said he valued himself too high, and now he’s gone and proved it. Twopenny a piece, indeed!”

“Twopenny? I paid threepenny! Oh, now I’m really vexed. That bacon-brained Totton! I’ll cut him dead next I see him—if he has the temerity to show his face again!”

“You paid? I scooped up one of the vases from the box. There were dozens of the things. Nothing but heavy glass painted over with gold leaf. Prinny threw one of the plates at Totton before he tripped off with his ladies, and I saw it break against his shin. Oh, we’ll dine out on this story for a month, gentlemen—perhaps more!”

With the crowd thinning, Thomas was able to move closer just in time to see Brummell look inquiringly at Sir Peregrine and say, “You know what I think, dear fellow? I think you have gotten yourself an enemy. But I will commend you, albeit belatedly, on your choice of rig-out. The color matches the dirt on your knees—and that figurative mud on your face—quite to perfection. Good day to you, Totton, or should I say, good-bye? I believe His Royal Highness would appreciate your absence from the metropolis for some space of time. A decade of Totton-free London wouldn’t come amiss. Oh, yes—and you will be receiving a bill for the posies, rest assured of that.”

Sir Peregrine was left alone, even the laborers deserting him, their spades and picks littering the ground, but he continued to stand there, allowing the rain to soak through his new coat and the buckram padding in his shoulders, his expressions ranging from disbelief to despair to what looked very much like fear.

“Pitiful, ain’t he? Always knew he’d bring himself low one day. I’d enjoy it more if I weren’t in disgrace m’self.”

Thomas turned to see Lord Chorley standing in the rain that was threatening to become a downpour, a large black umbrella held over his head by a man who looked too rough to be a personal servant.

“Introduce you to my friend here, Mr. Donovan?” Lord Chorley offered, pointing back over his shoulder with his thumb. “His name is Wattle, and he’s my dun—or one of them, anyway. He came to stay yesterday and won’t leave. I think he believes I have money somewhere and he’s following me about until I lead him to it. I bent to pick up a penny piece I saw in the street as I was coming in, but he beat me to it, didn’t you, Wattle? Had to walk, for they took my phaeton last night—the curricle, too—and the horses. Stripped my stable to the walls, like jackals on the hunt. Came here to see Prinny, but he wouldn’t talk to me. I don’t owe the half of what he does, but I think he’s afraid of the taint.”

“I’m sorry to hear that, my lord. I had no idea you might be somewhat under the hatches,” Thomas said, discreetly stepping on Dooley’s toes as that man began to chuckle.

“Under the hatches,” his lordship repeated dolefully, then added, “up the River Tick sans boat or oar, left without a feather to fly with, pockets to let, scalded, burnt, down at the heels and out at the cuffs.”

Lord Chorley took a deep breath, then sighed. “Yesterday I thought it would be the end of me, but it ain’t. I’m going to have to leave London, of course—once I can shake Wattle here—but I don’t feel so bad now, for Perry’s going to have to go, too, and he won’t be able to show his face for a dozen dog years, while I’ll be back once you and Ralph straighten things out between you. You will still be able to do that, won’t you, with Perry gone? Did you ever see such a sorry mess as Perry? I saw Ralph earlier, leaving. Wouldn’t go near him right now, Donovan, he’s that angry. I would have been able to whisper a word in the prince’s ear, placing someone we could trust in Perry’s place, but you can put paid to any thoughts of that now, can’t you? Matter of fact, it’s the only thing I can put paid to—ain’t that right, Wattle?” he called over his shoulder. “Here now, hold that brolly over my head! Deuced lot of good it’s doing keeping you dry! If I were to take a chill and die, you’d be left with no chance of bleeding me of the rest of my money. Well, I’ll toddle off now, Donovan—it’s a long walk back to Grosvenor Square. Wattle has promised me some eggs. Good enough fellow, Wattle, and a decent man with an egg, even if he is a dun.”

Thomas, who had been unable to keep from smiling as Lord Chorley prattled on and on, waved the man on his way, then called after him, taking a leaf from Beau Brummell’s book. “My lord—do you have any enemies? Anyone? Perhaps someone nursing an old hurt who’d wish to see you brought low?”

Lord Chorley stopped, then turned to look at Thomas, his skin deadly white, his sunny disposition in the face of his financial and social ruin now completely vanished. Then, without answering, he walked on, Wattle holding the umbrella over his quarry’s bent head.

“What was that all about, Tommie?” Dooley, who had been off collecting Balbus plates and coins for his children, asked as he came up to Thomas. “You already know your little Miss Balfour is out to make trouble for all five of ‘em. We’ve lost our contact at the War Ministry today, no thanks to her, and now Lord Chorley as well, I suppose, who was thick as thieves with the Prince of Wales. She’s making mischief, I agree, but why ask a question that might send the man thinking, and maybe deciding she might be the one bringing him down?”

“He’s not that smart, Paddy. None of them is, except Harewood and Laleham. Mappleton and Totton would be nothing without their assistants, who have probably done all their work for them anyway, and Chorley has been trading on his pleasing disposition all his life, not his brainpower,” Thomas said, tipping his hat forward so that rain poured from the brim. “I just wanted to see his lordship’s face when I asked the question, and measure his guilt. And now I know. Whatever it is The Club did, Marguerite isn’t out to ruin their reputations because of some imagined slight. She’s got a terrible secret she’s been brooding over, and I just have to wait until she trusts me enough to tell me what it is.”

“You said she loves you,” Paddy pointed out as they walked toward their hired hack. “How can she love you and not trust you?”

Thomas increased his pace as it began to thunder. “I haven’t told her what we’re about, Paddy, and I love her. Sometimes too much truth is not a good thing. But there’s no denying she’s put a spoke in our wheels. She’s moving fast now, probably so that none of them will have time to figure out that they’re being targeted and begin thinking about who is out to bring them to grief. With any luck, this all should be over within a matter of days.”

“I suppose I should be thanking her, for she’s not dragging her heels, is she?”

“Hardly, Paddy. Two of them are gone already, with three to go. While I won’t be seeing Harewood until the masquerade tonight, and as I don’t trust myself to see Marguerite just now, I believe you should go searching for our friend of the frayed cuffs. He’s been as busy as the devil in a high wind, and I think he might have some answers for us. You should probably begin with waiting for him to show at Harewood’s, for Sir Ralph might lead us to him the way Chorley did.”

“Harewood? Why him?”

“Totton’s done, as is Chorley, although I do believe he may have found genuine happiness with his dun. Mappleton is already on his way down, even if I’m not sure how Marguerite plans to do him in. That leaves only Harewood —and Laleham. Somehow I don’t think Marguerite will chance going after him until the others are out of the way. I wouldn’t.”

“Which leads us straight back to Harewood,” Dooley said as they reached the relative dryness of the hackney cab. “But why me, I’m asking you? Where are you off to this time.”

Thomas patted Dooley on the back. “I’ve got to go find myself a domino and a mask, remember? Now, are you going to help me? It’s for your country, remember.”

“My country? In a pig’s eye! It’s for you, and that little girl. Any help to our country will only be by chance, as I see it. But you’ve been right so far, boyo, so who am I to gainsay you? Let’s go split a bird and a bottle someplace dry and then get on with it. I’m beginning to miss my Bridget, and want to be shed of this damp island before she stops missing me.”