The Duchess War (Brothers Sinister #1)(4)

Tonight, though, the Great Hall was in use—which was why she hadn’t expected anyone from the mayor’s parlor.

A stocky figure approached in quick, sure strides. “Lydia has been looking for you this last half hour. As have I.”

Minnie let out a breath of relief. George Stevens was a decent fellow. Better than the two louts that she’d just escaped. He was the captain of the town’s militia, and her best friend’s fiancé.

“Captain Stevens. It’s so crowded in there. I simply had to get some air.”

“Did you, now.” He came toward her. At first, he was nothing more than a shadow. Then he drew close enough for her to make out details without her spectacles, and he resolved into familiar features: jovial mustache, puffed-up sideburns.

“You don’t like crowds, do you?” His tone was solicitous.

“No.”

“Why not?”

“I just never have.” But she had, once. She had a dim memory of a swarm of men surrounding her, calling out her name, wanting to speak with her. There’d been no possibility of coquetry at the time—she’d been eight years old and dressed as a boy to boot—but there had once been a time when the energy of a crowd had buoyed her up, instead of tying her stomach in knots.

Captain Stevens came to stand beside her.

“I don’t like raspberries, either,” Minnie confessed. “They make my throat tingle.”

But he was looking down at her, the ends of his mustache dipping with the weight of his frown. He rubbed his eyes, as if he wasn’t sure what he was seeing.

“Come,” Minnie said with a smile. “You’ve known me all these years, and in all that time I’ve never liked large gatherings.”

“No,” he said thoughtfully. “But you see, Miss Pursling, I happened to be in Manchester last week on business.”

Don’t react. The instinct was deeply ingrained; Minnie made sure her smile was just as easy, that she continued to smooth her skirts without freezing in fear. But there was a great roaring in her ears, and her heart began to thump all too swiftly.

“Oh,” she heard herself say. Her voice sounded overly bright to her ears, and entirely too brittle. “My old home. It’s been so long. How did you find it?”

“I found it strange.” He took another step toward her. “I visited your Great-Aunt Caroline’s old neighborhood. I intended to merely make polite conversation, convey news of you to those who might recall you as a child. But nobody remembered Caroline’s sister marrying. And when I looked, there was no record of your birth in the parish register.”

“How odd.” Minnie stared at the cobblestones. “I don’t know where my birth was registered. You’ll have to ask Great-Aunt Caroline.”

“Nobody had heard of you. You did reside in the same neighborhood as the one where she was raised, did you not?”

The wind whipped through the courtyard with a mournful two-toned whistle. Minnie’s heart pounded out a little accompanying rhythm. Not now. Not now. Please don’t fall to pieces now.

“I have never liked crowds,” she heard herself say. “Not even then. I was not well-known as a child.”

“Hmm.”

“I was really so young when I left that I’m afraid I can be of no help. I scarcely remember Manchester at all. Great-Aunt Caro, on the other hand—”

“But it is not your great-aunt who worries me,” he said slowly. “You know that keeping the peace forms a part of my duty.”

Stevens had always been a serious fellow. Even though the militia had been called on only once in the last year—and then to assist in fighting a fire—he took his task quite seriously.

She no longer needed to pretend to confusion. “I don’t understand. What does any of this have to do with the peace?”

“These are dangerous times,” he intoned. “Why, I was part of the militia that put down the Chartist demonstrations in ’42, and I’ve never forgotten how they started.”

“This still has nothing to do with—”

“I remember the days before violence broke out,” he continued coldly. “I know how it starts. It starts when someone tells the workers that they should have a voice of their own, instead of doing what they’ve been told. Meetings. Talks. Handbills. I’ve heard what you said as part of the Workers’ Hygiene Commission, Miss Pursling. And I don’t like it. I don’t like it one bit.”

His voice had gone very cold indeed, and a little shiver ran up Minnie’s arms. “But all I said was—”

“I know what you said. At the time, I put it down to mere naïveté. But now I know the truth. You’re not who you say you are. You’re lying.”

Her heart began to beat faster. She glanced to her left, at the small group ten feet away. One of the girls was drinking punch and giggling. Surely, if she screamed—

But screaming wouldn’t do any good. As impossible as it seemed, someone had discovered the truth.

“I cannot be certain,” he said, “but I feel in my bones that something is amiss. You are a part of this.” So saying, he thrust a piece of paper at her, jabbing it almost into her breastbone.

She took it from him reflexively and held it up to catch the light emanating from the windows. For a second, she wondered what she was looking at—a newspaper article? There had been enough of them, but the paper didn’t have the feel of newsprint. Or perhaps it was her birth record. That would be bad enough. She retrieved her glasses from her pocket.