Page 58 of The Lawrence Browne Affair
The fisherman grunted and left Georgie alone.
Then there was the other option. Riskier, but Georgie had never been one to shy away from danger. Georgie only had one card that was any good whatsoever, and if he played it right, he could . . . well, not precisely win, because there was no winning in this game, but he could make sure that Brewster lost.
Halliday arrived at Penkellis as soon as the snow had melted enough to allow foot travel from the village.
“You could have warned me,” Lawrence said, greeting the vicar in the hall. He had been looking forward to confronting Halliday ever since he learned that the vicar had thought Lawrence’s sanity needed inquiring into. Never mind the fact that Lawrence himself had been quite convinced of his own lunacy. One expected one’s vicar to have more sense.
Halliday’s habitually concerned expression grew several degrees more anxious and he ran a finger between his neck and his collar. “Oh?” He was plainly striving for innocent curiosity but failing miserably.
Lawrence drew himself up to his full height, effectively towering over Halliday. “You knew Courtenay was out to get me declared mad, and instead of simply telling me, you went and hired a spy. You put a man into my own house.”
The vicar’s brow furrowed. “Now, that isn’t entirely fair. What would you have done if I had said that Simon’s maternal relations were investigating your competence? You would have thrown me out on my ear, and then you’d be in Bedlam before you even knew what happened.”
“Besides,” said a voice from the doorway. Courtenay, of course. The man was forever materializing from the shadows like a nasty insect. “You couldn’t blame the fellow if he were a bit concerned about your . . . ” He gestured at his own head. “What with your pedigree.”
“That’s terribly rich coming from someone who called my late brother a friend,” Lawrence retorted. “Pedigree, my arse.”
“I take it the matter is moot?” Halliday asked. “You’re satisfied of Radnor’s mental state? Mr. Turner saw nothing amiss.”
“Yes, yes,” Courtenay answered. “You can’t imagine how relieved I am. I had visions of needing to rescue a small boy from the clutches of a monster, and instead, I find this.” His gaze traveled around the hall, taking in the furnishings Georgie had hastily put in place. “Shabby and tired, but respectable. In all events, it’s clear enough that you’ve none of your brother’s predilections, Laurie. I see no courtesans, either dead or living, on the premises. No evidence of any recent orgies, more’s the pity. No pregnant servants, no creditors banging on the doors. Utterly, boringly respectable.” He paused, blowing some hair off his forehead. “God, I can’t wait to get out of here.”
“You’re welcome to leave.” Lawrence gestured helpfully at the door. “More than welcome, in fact.”
“The mail coach arrived in Penryn this morning,” Halliday said. “So the roads must be clear.”
“I’d run off to pack my bags, but of course my bags have vanished, right along with the fellow you hired to keep an eye on Radnor,” Courtenay told the vicar.
Courtenay was the only one who had dared allude to Georgie’s absence. Lady Standish instinctively knew it was a delicate matter, and Simon seemed grimly accustomed to the idea that people he was fond of might disappear.
“I’ll give you whatever you need to get back to the rock you crawled out from,” Lawrence growled. Twenty pounds, thirty pounds, whatever it took to get Courtenay out of his hair would be money well spent.
But instead he found himself taking tea with the vicar, because that was evidently what one did with afternoon callers. A maid arrived with a tray of tea and biscuits, and Lawrence let himself be swept into the parlor. Lady Standish and Simon arrived, as if summoned by the presence of tea, both chattering about their progress in laying wires from the study to the kitchens. Lawrence couldn’t figure out the purpose in that endeavor, except that it kept both of them busy.
Courtenay was absolutely right that it was boring, but he was also right that it was perfectly respectable. Ordinary. Sane. Unremarkable. Lawrence had never even aspired to such outright normalcy. If anyone had told him in October that before the end of the year he’d be taking tea with Simon, the vicar, Standish’s sister and brother-in-law, and one of Percy’s nearest and dearest, he’d have thought it more likely that he would open up the window of his study and discover he could fly.
He knew he had Georgie to thank for easing Lawrence’s way back among the living. And Lawrence had done nothing for him in return. Georgie hadn’t even taken the jewels, the one thing that Lawrencecouldgive him. He had simply disappeared into thin air, and Lawrence knew that he would never see the man again.
No, Georgie hadn’t disappeared into thin air. People didn’t simply evaporate, for heaven’s sake. Georgie had gone somewhere, and based on what he had said, there were few safe places he could have gone.
But there was a niggling doubt that he hadn’t gone someplace safe at all. It was past time for Lawrence to stop feeling sorry for himself and start figuring out how to help Georgie. He put down his teacup and paced the length of the parlor, searching his brain for some clue as to Georgie’s destination. The roads had been blocked, and no horses were missing from the stables, which mean that Georgie had left Penkellis on foot. Which was a stupid thing to have done in the middle of a blizzard.
But Georgie was clever. He was brilliant. Either he was holed up in a cottage within an easy walking distance, or he had found some other means of leaving.
Either way, he would couldn’t have acted on his own, and there was only one person at Penkellis who was in a position to help. Lawrence strode out of the room and was in the kitchens before he could second-guess himself.
“Where did he go?” Lawrence asked, ignoring the flutter of curtsies from the kitchen maids.
Mrs. Ferris put down her rolling pin and looked at him levelly. “Tell me why it’s your business again?”
“I need to know whether he crossed the channel.” Whether he was safe. “And if you want to have this conversation in plain hearing of a dozen strangers, it’s up to you.”
She followed him into the larder. “I don’t know where he went,” she whispered. “But he didn’t say anything about France, and he knows full well I could have gotten him there.”
So Georgie knew about the smuggling. The Ferrises had run goods inland for generations, and Lawrence accepted it as a fact of Cornwall life, much like weather.
“What exactly did he ask you?”
She hesitated a moment, wiping her hands on her apron. “He asked if I could get him close to London. And I told him I could send a boat as far as Plymouth if the wind was right, and that he could travel by land the rest of the way.”
