next.
‘Nothing as dire as that. It seems she’s pillaged furniture, paintings and assorted bric-a-brac.’ Leggett held his hands wide to indicate the variety in the theft. ‘It is all quite random. The only record of the sales exists in her faulty memory.’
‘You need someone to search the Lombard merchants for the missing items.’
‘With a dray and draught horses if necessary. God knows how much is missing. Buy it all back at my expense,’ Leggett said, closing his eyes in resignation. ‘And finish before the arrival of the new Comstock. There are rumours of rough seas between here and Philadelphia, but weather will not forestall discovery once his man of business arrives. With two sisters yet to be married, my wife is terrified that any scandal will spoil their reputation.’
‘I have contacts in the industry that might help me with retrieval,’ Gregory assured him. ‘You are not the first to come to me with such a problem. Once I am on the case, it will be sorted in no time.’
‘But in the past, you did not have to contend with the Strickland sisters.’ Leggett gave him a rueful grimace.
Gregory countered with what he hoped was a reassuring smile. ‘If they are named for the three theological virtues, how much trouble can they be?’
‘How much trouble? As much as they can manage, I suspect.’ There was something in the quirk of his lips that was not quite a smile. It spoke of bitter experience. Then, his face gentled. ‘My Faith is a continual delight, of course. But she has a will of iron.’
‘The shield and bulwark of the family?’
‘Rather,’ Leggett replied. ‘She is the eldest and used to running things. I am removing her from the equation, for my pleasure and her piece of mind. A month in Italy will leave you free to do the work she would take on herself, if I allowed her to.’
‘That is probably for the best,’ Gregory said cautiously. ‘And the other two?’
‘Charity is the youngest,’ Leggett said.
‘A sweet child, I am sure.’
‘She is no child. She is fully nineteen and cold comfort, at best.’ Leggett glanced about him to be sure no one heard his candid assessment. ‘A whey-faced girl with a mind as sharp as a razor and a tongue to match. She will be a great help, if you can persuade her to put down her books and leave the library. But she has the brain of a chess master and, if she decides to work against you, your battle is lost before it has begun.’
Gregory nodded, already thinking of ways to win the favour of Charity. ‘And the third?’
‘The enfant perdu, in the military sense, of course.’
‘A lost child?’ Gregory waited in silence for an explanation as Leggett sipped his drink.
‘Are you familiar with the military concept of a forlorn hope? Those soldiers willing to risk certain death and lead a charge, straight into the enemy cannons?’
‘They seek great reward.’
‘Weighed against almost certain failure,’ Leggett confirmed. ‘That describes Hope Strickland. She is a girl with a plan. A rather stupid plan, in my opinion. But it is hers and she cannot be dissuaded.’
‘And what would that be?’
‘She means to wed the new Earl as soon as the fellow’s shoes touch British soil. She thinks his marrying into the family will soften the blow of learning that the Dowager has been pinching his property.’
‘Such a connection would be expedient,’ Gregory said.
‘It would save us the trouble of finding a husband for Charity,’ Leggett agreed. ‘She has spurned Faith’s offer to share our home and refuses to put herself in the way of gentlemen who might court her. But if Hope snags the Earl, Charity could remain in the Comstock Manor library as though nothing had changed.’
It sounded almost like he was describing a piece of furniture that was valuable, but too heavy to move.
‘All the same,’ Leggett continued, ‘a man should have some say in choosing his own wife.’
‘And you know nothing about him,’ Gregory added. ‘He might already be married.’
Leggett nodded. ‘Or he might be too young to marry. Or old and without the vigour for it. Also, he will have to be even-tempered enough to forgive the pilfering and inclined to care more for family than the money that this new title is bringing him.’
‘He might not be the sort of man a gently bred girl should marry at all,’ Gregory said.
‘He could be a drooling idiot, for all we know: a villain, a cad, a deviant or a toss pot. I cannot let Hope marry into misery just to maintain the status quo for her little sister.’ Now, Leggett had the worried look that so many of Gregory’s clients got when faced with an insolvable problem.
‘Women get ideas,’ Gregory said in his most reassuring tone. ‘Especially when they are thinking of the family and not themselves.’
‘My wife was guilty of similar foolishness. When I discovered her, she was about to marry for money over love.’ Leggett smiled. ‘I managed to set that to rights. But I cannot marry all of them to save them from themselves.’ Then he looked at Gregory in a way that hinted that the finding of lost objects would not be the hardest part of his job.
‘You do not think that I...’ Gregory paused. ‘You do not expect me to find them husbands.’ He prided himself on his ability to rise to a challenge, but matchmaking was not within his purview.
‘Lord, no. We are all agreed that Charity is a lost cause. But Hope is more than pretty enough and will have no trouble finding a husband if she can be persuaded to look for one. I do not want the Season to slip away, or offers to be refused, as she waits like a princess in a tower for a rescue that may never come.’
‘You wish me to make enquiries into the heir?’
‘Any information would be helpful,’ Leggett said. ‘Should you find that there is a wife and ten little Stricklands in America, make Hope aware of them so she will abandon her scheme.’
‘And if I do not?’
‘I would not object to your taking a certain creative licence with the truth,’ Leggett said, as optimistic in his own way as Miss Strickland was in hers.
‘You wish me to lie to her?’ Gregory put it plainly. Though he was not a gentleman by birth, he held his honour as dear, often more dearly than the men who hired him did. If he was to break his word with lies, he had no intention of hiding those untruths under elegant euphemisms like creative licence.
Leggett sighed. ‘I merely want her to set her sights on the men right in front of her. Do what is necessary to persuade her. I will leave the details of it to you.’
‘Thank you.’ That left him plenty of room to manoeuvre before resorting to falsehood.
‘And you will have ample opportunity to come up with something, since you will be forced to work directly with her. It is Miss Hope Strickland who holds the list of items you must
