The Perfect Crimes of Marian Hayes Read online

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Prologue

  Interstitial

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Interstitial

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Epilogue

  The Perfect Crimes of Marian Hayes Book Club Discussion Questions

  Acknowledgments

  Announcement

  About the Author

  Praise for Cat Sebastian

  Also by Cat Sebastian

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  Prologue

  Rob Brooks had not survived to the age of five and twenty without having mastered the art of escape.

  He had been arrested heaven only knew how many times and convicted rather more often than he cared to admit. He had been charged with robbery (true), burglary (false), smuggling (true, but he hadn’t known what was in those barrels), counterfeiting (false), and horse theft (he had done that horse a favor). By the age of five and twenty he had visited so many of His Majesty’s establishments that if any publisher wished to commission a travelers’ guide to the prisons of Surrey, Oxfordshire, and Buckinghamshire, they could seek no author more qualified than Rob. On one memorable occasion, he progressed so far as to make the acquaintance of the hangman. He had been shot, stabbed, whipped, cudgeled, and thrown overboard.

  And yet: here he was, quite thoroughly and unmistakably alive, not to mention intact and in the pink of health. He knew he was impulsive, maybe even reckless, and that this lack of caution had made his biography nothing but a string of narrowly avoided disasters.

  The fact was that he had made something of a career out of close calls and near-run things. When people talked about Rob—which was to say Gladhand Jack, the nom de guerre he and his friend used when liberating coin from rich men’s purses—they spoke of his escapes as much as his triumphs. He escaped, evaded, and wriggled out; he bribed, cajoled, and charmed.

  It boiled down to this: people liked Rob and they wanted to help him. As luck would have it, Rob liked them right back and wished to return the favor. The world, as far as Rob could tell, was filled with people who were simply waiting for the chance to participate in an adventure, and Rob was willing to furnish them with precisely that. This transformed the difficulty of sneaking lockpicks, rasps, and files into prisons from the merely transactional and uninspiring business of bribery into a jolly time for everyone concerned. Everybody went home feeling good about themselves and their fellow man.

  That was why it was especially galling that, try as he might, Rob could not see a way out of his current predicament. There was nobody to charm, nobody to bribe. No quantity of lockpicks, no number of rasps cunningly baked into cakes or sewn into cloaks could undo the trouble he was in. The sorry truth of it was that his mother—his beloved, inscrutable, maddening mother—had seen fit to marry the eldest son of a duke some months before Rob’s arrival into the world. What could possibly have been going through the minds of his mother, the piece of aristocratic vermin she took to the altar, the priest, the witnesses, or anyone else who allowed this catastrophe of a marriage to take place, Rob could not guess and had given up trying to understand.

  Upon learning of this marriage the previous year, Rob spent a month in the comforting embrace of a gin bottle, then got down to the familiar business of attempting to wriggle out of this mess. He wanted to inherit a dukedom about as much as he wished to further his acquaintance with the hangman. He had gone directly to the godforsaken church in Boulogne where this lunatic marriage had taken place, only to find a parish populated by the most intractably honest and dull citizens he could have conjured up in his worst nightmares. Nobody there was in the least bribable, and perhaps Rob’s charm didn’t translate into French, because when he attempted to steal the parish register, the townspeople did not prove to be terribly understanding about the matter. On the whole, he preferred English prisons.

  This left him with few options. London was filled to the very brim with people who would identify him as his mother’s son and who would prove depressingly glad to see a title and fortune inflicted on him.

  After dedicating one’s life to creating mischief for his betters, Rob would be the worst kind of hypocrite if he found a place among that very group he had spent years robbing, cheating, and otherwise tormenting. It would be sadly unmotivating for the criminal classes to discover that their figurehead was one of the enemies. It would have the effect of a reverse Agincourt speech. The entire city would lay down their arms—or lockpicks, daggers, and coin clippers—and become honest citizens. It would end with decent young troublemakers becoming ardent monarchists and Rob simply couldn’t let that happen. He had to be responsible, for the children if nothing else.

  This left him with blackmail. If he couldn’t erase all evidence of his mother’s marriage, he could persuade his mother’s husband—now the Duke of Clare, may the pox take him—to pay Rob handsomely to keep his secret. The duke, after all, had a son—Percy, Lord Holland, the worst sort of coxcomb—who the world thought was legitimate; surely the duke would pay through the nose to ensure his son’s inheritance and protect his family from scandal, not to mention prevent infamous commoners from moving up in the world. This would be a happy arrangement for everybody concerned.

  Rob supposed he could go to the duke in the manner of a beneficent fairy godmother and simply offer to forget what his mother had told him, but—given what he knew of the Duke of Clare—this would likely result in his prompt murder. Besides, he hated the Duke of Clare even more than any run-of-the-mill aristocrat and was rather looking forward to emptying the duke’s purse and putting its contents to good use.

  It was a good plan. A few anonymous letters, an appropriately mysterious location where he would collect his payment, and he’d go on his merry way.

  But then he saw the duke’s new wife: much too young for him, with disapproving black eyebrows and an obviously pregnant belly.

  And so he did what anyone would do, or at least anyone with a long-standing habit of making terrible choices—he addressed his correspondence to the lady herself. She deserved to know the truth about the man she believed to be her husband. She deserved to choose whether to present him with information that might make him extremely difficult to live with. If the duke were as bad as Rob suspected, then he didn’t like to think about what might become of a woman who found herself in possession of such a dangerous secret. He didn’t like to think about what might become of a child who was revealed to be illegitimate. Perhaps it would be in everybody’s best interest to get this business settled without the duke ever finding out. Surely, the duchess could raise a bit of money on her own.

  He wrote the letter. “Dear Madam,” he began—polite, but not ingrat
iating—“As much as one hates to be the bearer of bad news, I regret to inform you . . .” It should have ended with that letter, and indeed would have done if he had been halfway reasonable. But among all the acts of which Rob had rightly and wrongly been accused, nobody had ever accused him of making reasonable choices in matters of the heart.

  And yet, nearly three months later, he still thought it was a sufficiently good plan until he tasted the laudanum in his beer and recognized the woman across the table.

  Interstitial

  October 1751

  Ten Weeks Before the Incident

  Dear Madam,

  As much as one hates to be the bearer of bad news, I regret to inform you that the man you believe to be your husband contracted a valid marriage in 1725 to a woman who still lives. This marriage was duly recorded in the parish register of the Église du Sacré-Couer, Boulogne-sur-Mer, France. I have myself seen both the parish record and the woman. You will, of course, note that this renders invalid not only his marriage to you, but also his marriage to Lord Holland’s mother.

  It would give me no joy to expose these facts to the world, and I might venture to guess that you are much of the same mind. If you present me with five hundred pounds by the first of January, I will take this secret with me to the grave.

  I can be reached via letter at the Lamb and Flag in Hackney. Kindly address correspondence to John Smith.

  Your obedient servant,

  X

  * * *

  Dear Sir,

  How droll it is that you expect me to simply take your word for it that this woman, who if you are to be believed is the rightful Duchess of Clare, still lives. Even supposing that this purported marriage ever took place, you cannot possibly expect me to give you five hundred pounds with no evidence except what may or may not be written in a parish register somewhere in France. You must be one of those gentlemen who is unaccustomed to having his statements challenged, and as such belong to the most sadly overrepresented specimen of humanity.

  You may be interested to know that Dante placed blackmailers in the eighth circle of hell, where they were thrown into boiling pits of tar and guarded by demons armed with grappling claws (or possibly hooks; I am not in the mood for accurate translation).

  Your mortal enemy,

  Marian, Duchess of Clare

  * * *

  Dear Madam,

  Believe me that I would gladly present you with any evidence you could possibly desire if not for the fact that the other parties in this case require privacy. The woman in question has no desire whatsoever to have her name bandied about town as the lawful wife of the Duke of Clare, a man she delights in being rid of. I’m afraid I cannot and will not give you any information about her.

  Naturally, it is your right to refuse to take me at my word. I can’t say that I’d be overeager to put much stock in what a blackmailer says, myself. But whatever the case, I will present this information in as public a venue as I can dream up on the first of January—unless, that is, you pay me five hundred pounds.

  I have no idea who Dante is or what you are going on about in re: circles but you may feel free to enlighten me.

  Your obedient servant,

  X

  P.S. How bold of you to assume that I’m a gentleman.

  P.P.S. Address correspondence to Jebediah Chisholm, care of The Seven Stars in Putney.

  * * *

  Dear Sir,

  Regrettably, I must concede that you are correct about the parish register. Its contents have been verified, as has the duke’s signature. You are surely clever enough to understand that this means we also know the name of his bride and are presently looking for Louise Thierry.

  I will gladly educate you regarding Dante and any other poets of the Italian vernacular who strike your fancy. My fee is five hundred pounds, payable immediately.

  Your mortal enemy,

  Marian, Duchess of Clare

  P.S. I refuse to believe that you are a woman. There is something inexpressibly masculine about expecting to be believed.

  * * *

  Dear Madam,

  Indeed, I confess that I am a man but must refute all charges of being a gentleman. As for my being in the habit of getting my own way, I’m afraid you can’t expect me to admit to any such thing.

  You say that you have confirmed the contents of the parish registry. As you have not left London, this must mean you have taken somebody into your confidence. I am glad to know that at least you aren’t alone in your predicament.

  Considering the circumstances, I have put a guard on Madame Thierry.

  Your obedient servant,

  X

  P.S. Aloysius Crowley, The Three Tuns, Soho

  * * *

  Dear Sir,

  You have put a guard on Madame Thierry? Am I to understand that you believe I wish to harm her? What a vulgar assumption, and quite unwarranted by any of our correspondence. I hardly think myself less a sinner than any of my neighbors, but I’ve never committed a violent act in my life and have no wish to start now, either with my own hands or by proxy. When we find Madame Thierry, I only wish to confirm that she is who she says she is, and then—perhaps—purchase her silence. It seems unfair for you to be the only one who profits from this sad state of affairs.

  As for the rest of your letter, I fear that I do not have words to convey the extent to which I am unimpressed by this show of condescension. You are pleased to know that I am not alone in my predicament, are you? Has it somehow slipped your mind that you placed me in this predicament? Has that escaped your attention? You do not strike me as an especially stupid person, but we both know what kind of judge of character I am.

  Your enemy,

  Marian, Duchess of Clare (for lack of anything better to call myself)

  * * *

  Dear Madam,

  Let’s not mince words. It was the duke who placed you in this predicament. I simply let you know about it. Naturally, you’re cross with me, and probably think even less of me for seeking to profit off your troubles. But don’t mistake me for the agent of your misfortune.

  I realize that I expressed myself poorly. I often do, if it comes to that. What I meant to convey was that when one is in trouble, it is good to have friends to rely on, or at least to confide in. Due entirely to my own idiocy, I find myself rather alone, and I wouldn’t wish that on you or on anyone else.

  The guard remains on Madame Thierry, not because I mistrust you, but because one can never predict what unfortunate actions will seem inevitable in the heat of the moment. This, I’m afraid, I know from experience.

  Your obedient servant,

  X

  P.S. Francine Delaney, The Red Lion near Covent Garden

  * * *

  Dear Sir,

  May I humbly suggest being less of an idiot and doing whatever it takes to make amends with your friends? Or perhaps find some new ones? You are clearly terrible at being alone (I am excellent at it; I will give you lessons for the reasonable fee of five hundred pounds).

  I see that you’re adopting a woman’s name this time. Does this mean you will collect your post in women’s clothing? How intriguing.

  MH

  * * *

  Dear Madam,

  I avail myself of all manner of disguise. I have been a beggar, a priest, and a sailor, and that’s just in the past week.

  You, of course, already know this because you’ve had a man following me about. I did wonder why you were so willing to write to me. I’m not particularly experienced in blackmail but I don’t believe a sustained correspondence to be customary. Imagine my dismay when I realized that someone has lain in wait for me to collect my letters at the designated taverns and alehouses and then attempted to follow me.

  Naturally, my first thought was that you meant to do away with me. This, I’m given to understand, is customary in blackmail proceedings. But for various reasons that I won’t bore you with, I can’t be too bothered by murder attempts. Much to my surprise, though, nobo
dy has laid a finger on me, which leads me to believe that you only wish to discover my identity. I welcome your efforts as they enlighten what would otherwise be a tedious business; it will, however, take more than the bumbling attempts of an amateur to discover me.

  Your obedient servant,

  X

  Elspeth Buchanan, The King’s Arms, Piccadilly

  * * *

  Dear Sir,

  Goodness. Well, that certainly puts me in my place. And here I thought I was being rather clever with my letter writing ruse. Blundering amateur, indeed. I can’t remember the last time I received such a set down. Or is it a compliment, given the implication that I’m not a terribly accomplished criminal?

  MH

  * * *

  Dear Madam,

  I hope this missive finds you in good health and the best of spirits. Your present circumstances are of a sort that must be uniquely trying, even without the added hardship of blackmail. Given the nature of our previous correspondence, it is unlikely that you’ll put much faith in what I say, dear lady, but please believe me when I say that I would much prefer never to have come into the knowledge that has formed the basis of our communications.

  If I am to be frank—and, really, to whom can one be frank if not the person whose fortune and reputation one holds ransom—I would much prefer you give me the five hundred pounds and let me disappear into the night. I assure you it will be my life’s work to keep your secrets. Surely, you will protest that I ought to keep your secret out of the goodness of my heart; the trouble is that my heart isn’t in the least good. I am, to the core, a mercenary creature.

  Please consider this letter a statement of my good faith promise to uphold my end of our bargain; while I am a rotten sort of fellow, I am not a dishonest one. I anxiously await your reply by the usual means.

  Your obedient servant,

  X

  P.S. Andrew Marvell, The Swan, Ludgate Hill