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“Anything else?” he asked the housekeeper.

But she had exhausted her knowledge, and the few other people Hugh spoke to next on the Beltons’ staff had nothing of substance to provide. He went to the other servant’s entrances along the short mews lane to speak to their household staff, but none of them, save the maid at Number 9, recalled anything untoward from the night before. The maid who did see the dray carrying a tarp-covered load impressed upon Hugh that the person at the reins had been draped heavily, revealing none of the driver’s features at all.

“It were a man,” she said, then twisted her mouth. “I suppose it coulda been a woman, but I never seen a woman drivin’ a cart like that.”

To have transported a body, Hugh thought it most likely a man’s strength was required. But then, there were women he’d known with the brawn to do the same physical labor as a man.

As Norris drove Hugh back to Berkeley Square, he sat in silence, disappointed not to have gleaned much from his trip to Cumberland Place. He half wished he’d gone with Audrey to speak to Lady Susan. Or with Sir, to speak with the Harwoods’ neighbors.

At home, Rivers announced that the duke and Lord Sinclair had arrived and were waiting for him in the drawing room. The footman began to remove Hugh’s greatcoat when Basil strode into the entrance hall and shooed him away, intending to see to the task himself. The valet looked peeved—as was his custom.

“Mr. Harwood and Mr. Messinger were where they said they were, when they said they were,” he announced as he shucked the greatcoat from Hugh’s shoulders with more force than necessary. “Lord Sinclair visited Boodle’s in the afternoon, leaving shortly after five o’clock. And the doorman at the Seven Sins said he recalled him arriving around half past seven. He was drenched and cold, and when he departed just after eight o’clock, he’d requested a cab.”

It matched what Tobias had said about walking for a bit in the foul weather. But it did nothing to bolster his claims of innocence, especially since he arrived at the gambling hell at the same time as the body was discovered at Messinger’s. If only he’d arrived a half-hour earlier…

Basil doffed Hugh’s hat, all but tearing it from his head.

“Oh, stop acting like you’ve been demoted,” he said, peering at his valet. “It was one assignment.”

“If it had only been to White’s and Boodle’s, I would not object,” Basil replied, turning up his nose as he brushed the crown of the top hat, removing some offensive particle invisible to all but him. “But Marsham’s and that gaming hell?” He shuddered. “I am only grateful the hour was early, and no one saw me knocking at their doors.”

“What’s wrong with Marsham’s?” Hugh asked. “I’m not familiar with it.”

Basil arched a brow. “Good.”

Hugh snorted a laugh. The old snob had never been so elated as when it became clear that Hugh was the true heir to the Neatham viscountcy. He’d served as Hugh’s trusted valet for years before that point. Employing a valet had been an unconventional luxury for a lowly Bow Street agent, but Hugh’s father, the late Fitzgerald Neatham, had provided his son a tidy income, a nice home on Bedford Street, and the ability to live as a gentleman, even if he was not considered as such.

Hugh’s father had done what he could for the son he had known all along to be his heir. It was a muddle of a history, but Hugh had been the product of Fitzgerald’s first marriage to a young, impoverished woman, April Barlow. They had secretly eloped, but when April realized she would never be accepted by Fitzgerald’s father and that the marriage had been too hasty, she had run away. Little did Fitzgerald know that she was carrying his child at the time.

He did not bother annulling the marriage, and Fitzgerald went on to marry another woman. Shortly after his second wife gave birth to a son, April showed up and handed a six-month-old Hugh over to his father. She did not wish to raise him, and so, knowing his new wife and infant son would be cast into ruin should the truth come out, the viscount had hired a nanny, Catherine Marsden, to care for Hugh as his mother.

Over the following years, they allowed everyone to believe that an indiscretion between the viscount and the nanny had occurred, and that Fitzgerald was raising his illegitimate son alongside his three legitimate children. It had all but destroyed his second marriage, but Fitzgerald had only been trying to do the honorable thing.

Hugh now clapped his fussy valet on the shoulder. “Let me know when Sir arrives. I want to hear what he learned from the Harwoods’ neighbors.”

He peered up the stairs, which led to where his study was on the next floor. He braced himself for the Duke of Fournier’s surly attitude.

“Have either of you seen my wife?” Hugh asked the valet and footman as he approached the bottom step.

“Her ladyship is with the duke, my lord,” Rivers intoned.

With that news, Hugh picked up his speed.

Chapter

Nine

“Iwill not tolerate my brother being accused of murder!” Michael bellowed. He paced the study, his cravat uncharacteristically loose. “My God, who in my family is next to be accused of such a heinous crime? My wife? Cassie?”

Audrey sat in one of the club chairs near the fire, her muscles taut. Nothing she said would appease Michael, especially since Tobias was still considered the main suspect in Miss Harwood’s killing.

As soon as she’d arrived home a quarter hour ago, Whitlock had met her in the entrance hall to inform her that the duke and Lord Sinclair were waiting for Hugh. Tea had been delivered, but it was so far untouched. Michael could neither sit nor stand still, and Tobias looked green from where he hunched on the club chair opposite Audrey. The heel of his foot tapped the floor incessantly.

“I do not believe Tobias has committed murder,” Audrey said. His heel tapping paused, and he met her eyes with a grateful, pleading stare. “However, there is the very large problem of his being at the scene sometime during the hour in which it is estimated Miss Harwood was stabbed. He has no driver to confirm that he left the premises when he claims he did.”

“Yes. And he was drunk to boot,” Michael said, nearly growling. “Tobias, what were you thinking going to the young woman’s home in that state?”

The youngest Sinclair knew better than to try to respond with an excuse. Instead, he smartly chose silence.