“Because for obvious reasons we’re hunting for Randall’s killer, and a necessary part of our investigation is considering all who knew him well. He mentioned you in his will as a longtime friend, and if, as you intimated, you were green with envy over his acquisition of the Glockstein clock, then—”
“No, no!” Trowbridge waved his hands. “Good Lord. It wasn’t like that. Our acquaintance…well, friendship as it was, was nothing like that.” He looked sincerely horrified. “If you really must know, we met at school.”
Letitia opened her mouth. Christian silenced her with a look. “Which school?”
“Hexham Grammar School.”
Christian looked into Trowbridge’s large, slightly pro-truberant blue eyes. “Did you know Randall was a farmer’s son?”
“Yes, of course. We…ah, he wished it kept secret. Especially when he went up in the world.” Trowbridge glanced at Letitia, as if conscious of what such a secret would mean to her.
Christian grasped the moment to ask, “And what about you, Trowbridge? Have you come up in the world, too? Are you, too, hiding something?”
Abruptly Trowbridge looked him in the eye. “Patently, I’m hiding nothing at all.” He held out his arms, hands spread, inviting them to view him as he was. “From which you may infer that deception isn’t my strong suit.” He glanced at Letitia. “It was Randall’s.” He looked again at Christian. “If I had half his talent, I would, without doubt, be more circumspect. As it is…”
Again he gestured, turning the movement into an extravagant bow. “If you’ll excuse me?”
With a nod, he turned away, and walked swiftly, rather stiffly, back up the lawn.
Shoulder-to-shoulder, Christian and Letitia watched him go.
“I’ll lay odds,” Christian murmured, “that he’s from a lower class family, too. That he was another governors’ scholar. His natural…flair, for want of a better word, is his disguise—in our circles quite an effective one.”
Letitia snorted. “If we’re to talk of odds, what are the chances of two governors’ scholars from Hexham Grammar School rising from nothing to walk our gilded circles?”
“I wouldn’t like to think.” Christian took her arm and started back to the house. “Regardless, what would you wager that when we learn about Swithin, he, too, will prove to have attended Hexham Grammar School, and that he, too, was a governors’ scholar?”
“Regardless of Trowbridge’s protestations, his particular bent, no matter how widely recognized, how relatively open and undisguised, still gives him a powerful motive for murder.”
Later that night, Christian moved about Letitia’s bedchamber; shrugging out of his coat, he laid it over the back of a chair. “For instance, if Randall, who must have known his secret, including numerous details—a gentleman who could claim long acquaintance—were to explicitly expose Trowbridge, then everything he’s worked for, his position in the ton, would evaporate overnight. The fact that he and Randall shared another secret wouldn’t matter—the secret of their births counts for much less, and affects them both equally.”
In light of Trowbridge’s “particular bent,” they’d had to wait until now, when they were free of both Agnes and Hermione, to discuss the subject.
Standing before the window looking out over the night-shrouded street, Letitia folded her arms. “No lady would be able to allow him to cross her threshold, not if his inclination was public fact.”
They’d returned to South Audley Street to find that Tristan had indeed arrived and spent several hours with Dalziel searching through the files and papers. They’d eventually departed, leaving a message with Hermione—chuffed to be a part of their investigation—to the effect that they’d return the following day to continue searching and share any news.
Beyond that, Hermione knew no more, which had done nothing to ease Letitia’s growing concern over the Orient Trading Company. She had a gnawing premonition that Randall being a farmer’s son might prove the least troubling of the secrets he’d left behind. She leaned against the window frame. “I wish I’d asked Trowbridge about the company—whether he knew anything of it, or whether, indeed, he was another part owner.”
On the journey back from Chelsea, they’d speculated as to whether Trowbridge and Swithin might prove to also be part owners in the company, accounting, perhaps, for the other two-thirds.
Unbuttoning his shirt, Christian crossed to stand behind her. “One step at a time. We’ve established that Randall and Trowbridge were once friends, that they’d known each other for decades, but that for some reason they grew distant with the years…or they played down and actively hid their association.”
Reaching for her, he drew her back against him; she let him, but remained stiff, spine straight, in his arms. He continued, “If Trowbridge is a part owner of the Orient Trading Company, then claiming he barely knows Randall won’t wash—they would have had to meet frequently, and with Randall leaving him a bequest in a relatively recent will, citing their friendship, then Trowbridge’s claim of mere acquaintance isn’t believable.”
“Which in itself is strange—why hide a friendship if it were there? Trowbridge didn’t attend Randall’s funeral, yet he must have known of his death. He hasn’t called to offer his condolences—he didn’t offer any even today.”
Settling her against him, he reviewed the short interview. “Trowbridge was taken aback that Randall had named him in his will. It seemed to me his reaction had more to do with Randall acknowledging him at all, rather than that it was via a bequest.”
“Hmm.” She closed her hands about his at her waist. “What I don’t see is how any of this is helping us clear Justin’s name.”
Secure in the knowledge that she couldn’t see, he let his lips curve, then he touched them to her temple, drew them slowly down, barely touching, over the whorl of her ear to press a more definite kiss into the shadowed hollow behind it.
Eliciting an encouraging shiver.
“We’re identifying other possible suspects.” He murmured the words against the soft skin of her throat. “And once we know more about the Orient Trading Company, we’ll doubtless have more. If Randall was managing an enterprise directly engaged in trade, there’s always the chance of a disgruntled customer or supplier furious enough, or desperate enough, to commit murder. We now know we can add Trowbridge to our list. And most likely Swithin as well. The more potential suspects we can identify, the weaker the case against Justin.”
She eased back against him, into his warmth. “Perhaps, but he’s still the prime suspect.”