Everyone in the vicinity could hear her.
“—give you a single shilling. Not a single solitary shilling for your betrayal.” Shaking in anger, she turned her head. “The writing is the same, Robert. The same. Mavis Caudle is behind the threat.”
The name did nothing to clarify who this young woman was, why she would do such a terrible thing, or how she was connected to Aldershot, but Robert felt Lydia should know the worst.
“Lydia, look—” He pointed to the face behind Aldershot.
But the groom was gone.
In an instant, Robert dropped the reins and rushed to the back of the phaeton. The groom was not gone; he had crouched behind the hood so that he was no longer visible from the front—away from Robert’s discerning stare. It had been a wasted effort.
Robert grabbed the groom’s coat and hauled him off the carriage; he dragged the accomplice to where he was visible to all concerned.
Lydia, still clinging on the side of the carriage, took one look at the groom and swung her head around to confront Aldershot.
“How could you do this, Barley?”
Lord Aldershot opened his mouth and then snapped it shut without saying anything. He turned to the young woman beside him and gaped wordless once again.
Mavis Caudle shook her head and then lifted her chin. Staring back at Lydia, she raised her voice. “I have never been so insulted in my life. You have insulted my honor.” Half turning, she flicked her eyes toward Aldershot. “Defend my honor, Barley. Challenge Mr. Newton.”
“What?” he and Lydia said at the same time—his inquiry was a squeak, hers a shout.
“But it was Lydia, not Mr. Newton, who insulted you, Mavis-dear. I have no quarrel with—”
“My honor has been insulted before this throng of people.” Mavis-dear swept her arm across the front of the silent woman beside her and gestured toward the few pedestrians trying to make their way around the stopped carriage. “Challenge Mr. Newton.”
To Robert’s great surprise, Manfred Barley, Lord Aldershot, did just that.
“You cannot insult the honor of Miss Caudle, Mr. Newton, without answering to me.” Aldershot nodded, pursed his lips, and then looked at Mavis-dear for what appeared to be approval.
Without looking his way, Mavis-dear reached across and gave Aldershot’s arm a squeeze. It was so casually done that their intimacy was instantly revealed.
Robert started and exchanged a questioning glance with Lydia just as Mavis-dear spoke again.
“Tomorrow at dawn.”
“Tomorrow?” Aldershot’s voice was high and thin.
“Yes, now go. Barley, walk on!”
“But Lydia is still holding—”
Before Lydia could step down and away from the carriage, Mavis-dear grabbed the reins and flicked them. The horses stepped-to, and Lydia was knocked off balance. Throwing the groom aside, Robert lunged forward and caught Lydia before she could hit the stone sidewalk.
They tumbled into a heap, both safe but severely rumpled. Standing as quickly as a tangle of skirts and limbs would allow, they watched in silence as the released groom chased and then caught the phaeton, jumping up as it turned the corner and disappeared.
“So.” Robert sighed. “Aldershot and…”
“Mavis Caudle, Reverend Caudle’s daughter.”
“Oh dear.”
“Yes. Exactly.” And then she sighed, too, very deeply. “I would never have conceived of it. Barley. The very man I was planning to marry. How could I have been so blind? Papa would be so very disappointed.”
Robert thought the gentleman would more likely be livid, but he refrained from saying so.
“And Miss Caudle. I don’t know her, but I would think a parsonage upbringing would have included the rule that one must not snatch people off the street without a by-your-leave.”
“Yes, I would hope so.”
“And then threaten to blackmail said person for a situation not of her making. I mean really, can they be any more despicable!”
“I think not.”
Lydia heaved yet another heavy sigh and pulled her gaze from the end of the Pulteney Bridge. “They cannot—will not—get away with it!”
“Absolutely not.”
And then Lydia lifted her eyes to Robert’s face. She frowned and tipped her head as if trying to understand his expression.
Robert was smiling.
“What are you thinking?” she asked, her frown unfurling, her eyes losing their stormy glare.
Robert stepped to Lydia’s side, offering her his elbow. “If we play our cards right, justice will be served.” Stepping forward in a slow but steady pace, they headed back toward the rented town house.
“But Barley is a baron. We cannot have him arrested—even if we have proof.” She looked down at the letter still in her hand. “Which we have against Mavis—for blackmail, at least. But as to the kidnapping and Barley’s involvement, we have nothing.”
“Nothing in hand as yet. If we get hold of his groom, we might have a case—a good case. And any gentleman of the peerage can call Lord Aldershot to task or anyone acting on behalf of a peer, such as a Bow—”
“A Bow Street Runner! Robert, that is brilliant. There is no need for the duel after all; we can set Mr. Warner on him. He can find the evidence.”
“If we don’t seem to comply, they will disappear.”
“They don’t have to disappear. Barley can simply go back to Spelding—minus his groom, of course. Mavis, though, is in the suds.… But no, you are right, he wouldn’t go home without her. Mavis has Barley wrapped around her finger. Whatever they do, it will be together. In fact, what is to stop them from disappearing right now?”
“Pardon?”
“If I were them—caught, as it were—I would have immediately turned the carriage toward London … no, Bristol, and boarded the next ship to the Americas.”
“I don’t think they have the funds to do that.”
“They could earn their way across the ocean, working.”
Robert gave Lydia a significant look.
“You’re right,” she said, though he had not said anything. “They would never consider doing anything so demeaning. Still…” She frowned. “What then would be the purpose of this duel? They can’t very well sell tickets. Where is their profit?”
“There is only one way to find out.”
“What kind of person challenges an apprentice lawyer to a duel?” It was a rhetorical question, for all and sundry knew the answer: a very foolish person.
“Robert, you are not going to participate, are you? You can’t; it’s against the law.”
“Indeed. It is.”
“Robert,” Lydia’s voice was plaintive. “You can’t.… You could be killed.”
“Worry not. I’ll think of something.” Robert squeezed her arm and led her past the door being held open by an unseen hand.