Page 87 of Lady Gambit
Aaron dropped into the chair, dumbfounded.
“The rest you’ve done on your own,” Mrs Haggert said proudly.
“How did I hurt my head?” Delphine was still holding Mrs Haggert’s hand. “I thought that was the cause of my memory loss.”
“You tripped over a loose cobblestone. It’s as Flynn said. Tobias helped you to suppress your memories. It was a trick he’d learned in Vienna. He left for the continent the night we took you, but the fool made the mistake of returning to town.” She sounded exasperated, as if her pleas had fallen on deaf ears. “That’s when he happened upon Nora. That’s when the plan fell to pieces.”
Delphine’s jaw dropped. “But I don’t remember my time here, either.”
“Tobias locked them memories away the night he lured Nora to the warehouse. Escaping the hen house was the one chance you had to make a new life for yourself.”
“One chance,” she whispered, gazing fondly at her brother. “How apt. The day I met Aaron changed my life.”
“You mention the night you took her from Green Park.” Dorian was keen to know why Delphine’s parents died. It was the key to the puzzle. It had to be the reason Nora had tried to kill her. The reason someone had hired thugs to abduct her off the street. “How did you know where to find her? And why would you steal a child from her parents?”
Perhaps her parents were already dead.
Mrs Haggert looked like she would rather lose a limb than repeat what happened that night. She shifted in her seat and stared at Aaron. “If the wrong people learn about this, she might hang.”
Delphine tugged Mrs Haggert’s hand to get her attention. “It has something to do with me scattering flower petals. They were going to kill my mother if I refused.”
He came for the Jubilee and got lost in the whispers.
Happen he meant for me to stay at the Pulteney Hotel.
Nora’s crazed words flitted through Dorian’s mind. Every foolish thing the woman said had a ring of truth to it. It was just a case of piecing the fragments together.
“He came for the Jubilee and stayed at the Pulteney Hotel. It’s on the corner of Bolton Street, where Delphine lived with her parents. The hotel is near Green Park, where she was told to wait for you.”
Mrs Haggert nodded and hung her head.
She wept for a minute or more.
But what the devil did it have to do with scattering flowers?
Then a thought struck him.
“Lots of foreign dignitaries came for the celebration. Many stayed at the Pulteney. There were processions. Some children were invited to sit with Queen Charlotte in the flotilla of boats parading along the Thames. With her father being secretary to the ambassador, Delphine was one of them.”
Mrs Haggert wiped away her tears. “Her father tried to stop it, but they had footpads rob him and throw him off Vauxhall Bridge.”
Stop what?
And why would the truth place Delphine in danger?
The Grand Jubilee of 1814 marked the 100thanniversary of Hanoverian rule. It was also a means of celebrating the end of the Napoleonic Wars. Whispers of assassination attempts were rife. London received an influx of Napoleon sympathisers. Hence they came up with the idea of having children sit with Queen Charlotte in the royal barge.
An icy chill rippled down Dorian’s spine.
While Delphine and Aaron looked confused, he said, “She was meant to carry something other than petals in her basket. Delphine was meant to carry the weapon someone planned to use to assassinate the Queen.”
Delphine shook her head. “That can’t be true.”
Mrs Haggert’s sigh carried the weight of her burden. “They were going to kill her mother if she didn’t. Sofia confided in a maid. The maid’s brother worked for me, and together, we made a plan.”
A mournful stillness filled the room.
The weight of unspoken grief hung heavily in the air.
