Straightening, he glanced down into the intelligent cornflower blue eyes of Lady Rebecca Blackburn as she came up beside him. He’d known her since the day that she’d been born. As the Duke’s goddaughter and the Earl of Kendall’s only child, she’d often visited the castle, and many of her holidays had coincided with his own sojourns. He’d been as devastated as the Duke and her family when she’d been stricken with smallpox at the age of seven. No one had expected her to live. She’d surprised them all by surviving, although not without consequences.
Her face was badly disfigured by the pockmarks that accompanied the disease. Because of it, she’d endured long stretches of being either teased or shunned. Not surprisingly, she’d decided to forgo a London season, preferring her art and country life, and at twenty-three was considered quite on the shelf, with no prospects for marriage except for rogues attracted to her sizeable inheritance, rather than her person. The mischievous, affectionate child he’d known could easily have become embittered by her unfortunate circumstance. Instead, she seemed at peace with herself. Which, Alec reflected ruefully, was more than he could say about himself.
“Well?” she persisted.
“Is what true?”
“Don’t be a goose, Sutcliffe!” Rebecca gave his arm a playful rap with her ivory fan. “Everybody’s talking about the murder! They say the murderer is still about.”
Though the crowd around them was well occupied with their own conversations and dancing a lively quadrille, Alec lowered his voice. “And when did you start believing in gossip, Becca?”
“Since a dead girl was found in the lake,” she answered pertly. “Don’t evade, Sutcliffe. You already bullied me once today. I shall not let you do it again!”
“If you’re referring to my not letting you view the body, I had your best interest at heart.”
Rebecca rolled her eyes. “I have my own best interest at heart, thank you very much. And I’d be pleased if you remembered that. I noticed that you did not order all women away.” When he remained silent, she gave him another rap. “Who is she, Sutcliffe? The maid with the short hair?”
That was an excellent question. “She is an American, which may explain her peculiarities, including her hairstyle.”
Rebecca laughed. “Caroline Lamb cut her hair short.”
“You make my point. Caroline Lamb is an eccentric who is making a cake of herself over Lord Bryon.”
Since she couldn’t argue with that, she merely waved her fan. “They say that the madman did the most horrid things to the girl.”
Alec scowled. “’Tis not something that should be consumed for the amusement of the Beau Monde.”
“And yet the ton is so easily amused,” she murmured dryly.
“What else are they saying?”
“That the girl was a prostitute.”
Alec’s scowl deepened. Hell and damnation. The fact that Becca had heard that particular tidbit meant that either someone in the study had gossiped, or a footman had been listening at the door. Both scenarios were entirely possible.
“Who did you hear that from, pray tell?”
“Mary, my maid, of course—although it’s being bandied all around the castle. I daresay, all around the village. She also told me that you sent for a Runner.” She gave him a speculative look. “And that the maid from this morning is assisting the Duke in finding the murderer.”
Alec pressed his lips together in annoyance. He noticed, across the room, Gabriel weaving toward the doors that led off to the garden. In his cups. Again. At the last moment, his friend, Captain Harcourt, steered him clear of a large urn in his path.
“Well?” Rebecca pressed. “Is the maid really assisting His Grace?”
“Miss Donovan appears to be remarkably well-informed about criminal behavior.”
Rebecca peered at him closely. “Are you joking?” When he remained silent, she murmured, “How very interesting. She sounds like an Original.”
“That kind of originality is nothing to aspire to, my dear.”
She grinned. “If not an Original, what then?”
“Minx.”
She hesitated, and her smile vanished. “Sutcliffe, there is something else being said.”
“Yes?”
Instead of answering immediately, she shifted her gaze to the familiar faces circulating around the ballroom that had been redesigned by none other than the great John Nash himself. An inexplicable chill danced up her arms.
“’Tis being said that the murderer is someone we know,” she said slowly, and then looked up at the marquis, her gaze troubled. “That must be a Banbury tale. Is it not, Sutcliffe?”
“It certainly sounds ridiculous enough to be a Banbury tale.”
“That is not a definitive answer.”
Alec sighed, and wished, for the first time, that she wasn’t so bloody perceptive. “There’s the rub, my dear. I have no definitive answers. I have only many questions.” Beginning, he thought grimly, with Kendra Donovan.