‘That is the story Cottam told you, is it?’
‘That’s the gist of it. Thought it best to hush it up, of course.’
‘Was that Cottam’s idea, too? No, never mind, it really doesn’t matter.’ The Colonel had taken Cottam’s version of events at face value. Because Cottam was a man of the cloth. And there was no point in trying to explain what sort of man Cottam really was beneath his clerical guise. Nobody would believe it. Hell, he didn’t want to believe it himself.
But it was becoming increasingly clear that whatever was going on, regarding the jewel thefts, and the drownings of both Archie and the girl he was supposed to have driven to suicide, Cottam was up to his scrawny neck in it.
And then, as if to prove the old adage about speaking of the devil, the Colonel tossed his paper to one side and smiled at someone just entering the room. In spite of Jeavons promising to admit no one.
‘Ah, here he is now,’ said the Colonel. ‘Mr Cottam, you know the Marquess of Rawcliffe, I believe?’
Rawcliffe got to his feet and turned round, slowly, desperately resisting the urge to stride across the room and knock the corrupt little clergyman down. Never had he been so glad to have his cane to grip, because if he hadn’t, he would have been hard pressed not to clench his fists into the weapons he so badly wanted to use.
‘Know me?’ Cottam strolled forward, an unctuous smile on his face. ‘Why, hasn’t he told you? The Marquess is married to my little sister. I hope you don’t mind, Colonel, but I would like to have a word or two in private with my brother-in-law.’
‘Hmmph? Harrumph.’ The Colonel made as if to move from his chair and vacate the room, with exceedingly bad grace.
‘No need to get up,’ said Rawcliffe. ‘I believe we have finished discussing our business, Colonel, so I shall bid you good day.’
‘Oh? Ah!’ The Colonel looked distinctly relieved.
‘Cottam, you may walk with me back to my lodgings, if you wish.’
‘How very gracious of you, my lord,’ said Cottam with a bow that was practically a sneer.
They left the Three Tuns, navigated the shoals of the busy high street and turned into the lane leading to the lodgings before either of them said a word.
‘My sister,’ said Cottam with a strange smile, ‘appears to be very smitten with you, at the moment.’
They walked on in silence for a few paces.
‘It would be a pity, a very great pity, if she were to discover something that might lead her to work out your true reasons for marrying her, would it not?’
Rawcliffe ground his teeth. Though the weasel was quite right. He didn’t want to upset Clare. And so they kept right on walking past the row of cottages and struck out for the track leading up to the moors.
‘What reasons,’ he said, once they were well out of earshot of any building, ‘do you presume I had for marrying your sister?’
‘Why, the very same ones that brought you down here. Your relentless need to persecute me. These…trumped-up charges you plan to bring against me, that you have sent your minions to try to pin on me…they are all figments of your imagination. And so I shall tell Clare, if you pursue your enquiries. Then we shall see where her loyalties truly lie.’
He’d already factored that into his calculations and had counted the cost.
‘If they are not figments of my imagination, but are, on the contrary, facts, I will make sure the whole world knows of it.’
Clement glared at him. ‘If you dare to try to humiliate me, by making accusations in a court of law, I will inform Clare exactly why you married her. That it was merely a pretext to have an excuse for pursuing me down here, and trying to…discover what happened to your spy. Mr Kellet,’ he finished on a sneer.
If the man had been innocent, there would have been no need to make threats. It was as good as an admission of guilt.
At that moment, Rawcliffe decided that Clare’s brother really was the man behind the theft of the jewels, and the subsequent death of Archie, probably because he was getting too close to the truth. And as for the girl who drowned? Who was she and what part did she play in all this? Or had Cottam merely used her untimely death as something to pin on Archie?