The League of Rogues

Chapter 4-2

Yes, that would be a bloody good night.

Sir Hugo Waverly reclined in a seat at the back of the card room in Boodle’s Club, watching the evening unfold with little real interest. His mind was on more important matters. A cloud of cigar smoke hung at the base of the chandeliers like dark clouds, casting shifting shadows among the lights from the candles. Men threw cards upon the tables, gathering and losing fortunes over hasty gambles. But Hugo was not a betting man.

If I cannot secure my odds, I will not play.

The door to the card room opened, and a man Hugo knew entered. It was one of his most trusted men, Daniel Sheffield. With Daniel’s help, Hugo ran the most efficient and effective spy ring in the country, which, sadly, was not saying much. Spycraft as a whole in England was woefully amateurish, and it left his country vulnerable. It also made those who took the game seriously, such as Sheffield and himself, indispensible. They’d saved the Crown from more than one foreign war, and yet they would never be given credit for their actions.

But there was more to life than accolades. He was well compensated, both financially and through the power and influence his position afforded. He could blackmail just about anyone to do anything he required. If a man couldn’t be bought, he could be threatened, and that was enough for Hugo.

One step below the Crown. It was the closest a non-royal such as himself could ever be to ruling England.

Hugo made no sign that he noticed Daniel’s entrance. Daniel toyed with his pocket watch, lingered by a table where men were playing faro, and with a discreet glance, waited for Hugo to nod slightly before he approached.

Daniel took a full minute to make his way through the room. He paused to collect a drink from a passing waiter, then meandered over to Hugo’s table and chose a chair not close but not too far either. Tucked under one arm was the Quizzing Glass Gazette, and he slowly lifted it up to peruse the articles.

Lady Society’s gossip column was clearly visible from where Hugo sat, and he scowled at the name. What drivel! If he could be bothered to find out who the woman was, she would have an accident that rendered her incapable of writing ever again. He was tired of her endless parade of articles that painted the League of Rogues as heroes. They weren’t men to be admired or feared; they were fools. Dangerous fools. Fools he would destroy in good time.

The creak of wood told him that Sheffield had shifted his chair an inch closer. When Hugo ever so discreetly peeled his own paper aside, he saw Sheffield’s hand gently rolling a glass of brandy.

“Fair weather today, but I saw a chance of clouds,” Sheffield observed.

Hugo stiffened. That meant a situation he was having monitored was not going according to plan.

“What sort of clouds?” he asked.

Sheffield set his glass down on the table, and beneath it was a carefully folded note. “Black.” Hugo laid his paper down and let it cover the surface by Sheffield’s glass. Then he carefully nudged Sheffield’s drink aside and covered the note.

“The lady I’ve recently become interested in,” Sheffield added quietly, “has decided to visit friends in the country.”

That would be Rosalind Melbourne. So, the Scottish raven had taken flight to the country? That was worrisome. She preferred to stay in town, and he preferred that as well. It made it easier for him to keep an eye on her affairs. So far he’d been fortunate enough to manipulate her into taking him on as a business partner, then coaxing her into disrupting Ashton Lennox’s shipping companies.

“Which friends is the lady visiting?”

“The baron’s.” Sheffield took his half-empty glass from the table and drank.

Lennox? That was not good. Hugo wanted her and Lennox to remain at odds. If they were ever to form an alliance, half of his current schemes could easily unravel. The logistics of altering those plans with reliable substitutions would be bothersome to say the least.

He would need to find a way to entice Lady Melbourne back to London where he could keep a close eye on her.

“Hmm. Well, we can deal with that soon. Did the baron suffer any losses today?”

“He did. Two tenant houses burned down last night. It will keep him occupied and away from London.”

“Excellent.” That was just as he intended. He and Sheffield were arranging the transport of some agents to France, but Lennox had been keeping a close eye on Waverly’s actions of late. Too close. And Lennox and his men had a tendency to stumble into his missions and wreck them. It would be just like them to be responsible for a war because they refused to keep to themselves. So Sheffield had seen to a decent distraction to draw Lennox away from London for a time.

Sheffield cleared his throat. “One more matter to attend to,” he whispered, with a slight nod at the paper he’d tucked under the glass. “Urgent.”

Hugo slid his paper back toward his lip, deftly grasping the note Sheffield handed him. He noted the red wax seal—Scottish in design. The seal was one he recognized. Kincade. That conjured up some old memories.

Ten years ago he’d been a young man just entering the service of His Majesty. England had recently signed an act that united Scotland and England, but already there were separatist rumblings. Hugo’s job had been to suss out the leaders of the movement before it could gain popularity. And he had, a loose alliance of Scottish landowners who called themselves the Anti-Unionists.

Over the span of a year, all but one of its nine leaders had been dealt with in a series of accidents. Only one man remained, Montgomery Kincade—Rosalind Melbourne’s father.

The wily bastard had betrayed his compatriots for a hefty sum and to have his own life spared. It would have been prudent to take care of Kincade as well, but the man was cunning and had protected his interests well. He had warned Hugo that if he should die under accidental or suspicious circumstances, a collection of letters that Hugo had foolishly written would be exposed.

Such a thing would ruin Hugo. Beyond the damage to his reputation, the Scots would want him dead, and the Crown would disavow him to protect the tenuous relationship between itself and Scotland. They might go so far as to ensure he had an accident of his own.

He would not have made such a mistake now, but he’d been young then.

There were few things Hugo forgot, but this…this was one thing he wished he could. Ironically, it had been this very mission that had ensured his place among his peers and helped him to the position he was in today.

With a steadying breath, he broke the seal and read the letter. It was coded in the pattern of the old cipher he’d used ten years ago. It required a special device, one which Hugo had designed himself, to decode. He still carried it with him and occasionally used it for less important communications. He slipped it out of his pocket and set the symbols to match in the upper left corner of the letter, which then gave him the key to deciphering the rest of the message.

Sir Hugo,

It has been many years since we last spoke, but my memory is still sharp. I write to you from my deathbed. You cannot punish me any longer. That is up to the Lord now.

But do not think that you have won. I took money in exchange for silence when you murdered my fellow countrymen, and they call to me for revenge. I can ignore them no longer.

I still have every letter you wrote, with the code set out. Soon, the only person I trust will receive the device you once gave me, along with instructions to find where I’ve hidden the letters. They will expose you at last for what you are.

Soon your king and your country will know how many you murdered for the sake of your precious nation. A nation built on lies. A nation that kills its own people when they so much as suggest standing up for themselves.

I’m laughing at you, Waverly. Laughing from beyond the grave. I suspect I will be seeing you in hell soon enough.

Kincade

Hugo couldn’t breathe. The cipher device and the letters…the letters that could condemn him and ruin his life. And they were being sent to…whom?

Hugo scanned the letter again, searching for a clue. The only person I trust. He trusted no one, because he had been willing to betray anyone.

Except perhaps his family. If there was someone he trusted, it would have to be family. He thought back to what he knew of the man. Four children. Three sons and a daughter.

But it made no sense. Exposing those letters would destroy the Kincade name as well as his own. He wouldn’t trust his heirs to destroy their own futures.

Rosalind, however…

Her wealth and status were independent of the Kincade name. And from what he knew from their meetings, there had been no love between her and her father. Quite the opposite. For that very reason, the old bastard could assume she’d be more than willing to expose her father’s sins.

And she was en route to see one of his greatest enemies, presumably with the cipher in her possession. But not the letters. He still had time to find those before she did.

“Bloody hell,” he whispered.

“Anything to be concerned about?” Sheffield asked.

Hugo folded the letter and pocketed it. As soon as he was home he would burn it.

“A ghost is trying to haunt me. Reach out to our man inside Lennox’s estate. Have him send reports to our agent in Lonsdale’s employ. I want them to find a way to steal back a cipher device that may be in Lady Melbourne’s possession. It looks like this.” He raised his own for Sheffield to see before returning it to his pocket. “I want Lady Melbourne’s residence searched in case she left it behind. If it is not found, find a reason for Lady Melbourne to return to London. I will be able to handle her myself.”

“I’ll see to it.” Sheffield rose, and with a casual glance about the room, he set his empty brandy glass on the table and left Boodle’s card room.

Hugo felt the weight of Kincade’s letter in his waistcoat pocket. Rosalind possessed a weapon that could destroy him, and she was about to go straight toward one of his enemies with it. But on its own it was nothing more than a trinket. A curiosity. He would find a way to stop her from finding the letters before he did.

His nerves began to steady. Having a plan of action always calmed him. But as if to betray him and remind him of his concerns, his hands shook as he set down his glass.

Damn the League of Rogues, damn them all.

Brock Kincade was slumped over his escritoire in his small study at Castle Kincade. The last candle he could afford to spare was burning down to the end of its wick, the wax pooling at the base of the candleholder. Outside, the wind whistled through the tapestries and cracks in the stone and glass, filling every room with an inescapable biting wind, even in the spring.

The papers in front of him blurred together as exhaustion plagued him. But he had to stay awake in case he was needed. It seemed that the weight of the world crushed down upon him. Upstairs his father was dying, and the thought of it was leaving Brock’s life in a state of upheaval.