The Devious Duchess Read Online Free PDF Page B

the table for a brandy glass. Just as he spotted it, the sausage like fingers of Straus reached out and picked up the glass. “We’ll add this to our collection of evidence, but my money’s on the stew. Her grace didn’t happen to serve this dish for dinner last night, by any chance?” he asked archly.
    “No!” Belami said at once. He regretted the lie as soon as it was out. Straus would question her servants and know that he had lied. “That is, she served something like it, but . . .”
    “But you’re courting the bright-eyed filly in the hallway and don’t like to say so. I appreciate your position, lad. We’ll deal discreet-like till we have the old malkin locked up right and tight.”
    Belami felt like a cornered rabbit. Mr. Straus had the ability to read his mind and the uncouth habit of giving voice to his every thought. The only hope was that the man was wrong, that there was no arsenic in anything. Lord Dudley had died of natural causes or had choked to death.
    “Yessir, she’s finally gotten around to killing her brother. I’ve been waiting for it. This sort of a case could make a man’s reputation,” Mr. Straus said, and smiled with infinite satisfaction.
     

Chapter 3
     
    Belami knew that he was in trouble when he came out of the dining room and found Deirdre had returned to Fernvale without him. He could see her wending her route across the meadow when he went to the stable. His aim was to drive like the wind and arrive with her or as soon after her as possible. His groom, Réal, stood waiting for praise, with a smile ready to break out at the first word of congratulation.
    “You’ve really done it this time, you jackass!” was definitely not what he expected to hear.
    “Comment?”
    “You heard me! Who told you to call in a constable?” Belami shouted as he vaulted into the driver’s seat himself to handle the ribbons. This was the cruelest punishment he could possibly have devised for his groom, to deprive him of driving and to force him to return to Fernvale inside the carriage. Walking was preferable. In fact, Réal had no choice in the matter. Belami wheeled the horses around and flew out of the yard while Réal was still reeling in angry shock.
    Deirdre arrived home only minutes before him. She ran to the little morning parlor and gasped out her story. Her aim was not to make trouble, as Belami feared, but to mitigate the trouble he had already stirred up. When she told the duchess that the constable had been to the Grange, speaking of murder, she said not a word about how he came to be present.
    “Murder, you say? I’m not at all surprised,” the duchess replied. “Why, I warned you myself that Ryder had poisoned him.”
    “Yes, but that’s not what the constable thinks, Auntie. I listened at the door for a while, and it came out that you had taken Uncle Dudley a bowl of that mulligatawny
    “Rubbish. Who says so?” she demanded. No one had seen her take it. Only Cook knew, and Cook would say what she was told to say in the matter.
    “Belami said so,” Deirdre answered, disliking having to bring his name into it but knowing it would arise sooner or later. “They think arsenic was the poison used,” she added to divert a tirade against Dick.
    This speech, uttered in innocence, had an alarming effect. The duchess turned perfectly rigid. She looked like a frozen rabbit Deirdre had seen one winter in the meadow. Then while she looked, the duchess defrosted and was galvanized into action. She flew up from her chair and darted out the door. Deirdre heard her steps on the kitchen stairs but didn’t go after her, as she wanted to check the road for signs of Dick’s carriage.
    When the duchess entered the kitchen, she spoke in her loftiest accents designed to inspire total submission from her cook. “Is there any of that mulligatawny left, Cook?” she asked.
    “Just a wee drop in the pantry. Shall I het it up for you, milady?”
    “No, you fool. Get rid of it at once. Burn