“What is it you had to tell me? Only that I am pretty and you love me?”
He sighed. “Sir Henry’s family has asked the London magistrate to make inquiries into his death. I meant to tell you last night but was distracted by our…er, going at it like a pair of wild monkeys.”
“Octavian! Stop describing us as that.” She rolled her eyes. “You are such a big ox.”
He grinned. “And you are a kitten.”
She rolled her eyes again. “I thought I was a minx? Stop being naughty and just tell me.”
“The magistrate intends to question your father.”
Syd thought on it a moment. “But he doesn’t know anything about the night Sir Henry died. He was already on his way to London. Does the magistrate believe my father might have done it? He certainly had enough motive. But you and I know he is innocent. He can provide witnesses to attest to his whereabouts. The Armstrongs and those gamblers he swindled along the way. Thank goodness he was nowhere near the Abbott’s Cross Inn at the time.”
“Indeed,” Octavian muttered. “Otherwise, your father would be thinking up ways to blackmail poor Mr. Douglas.”
“No! My father would never…well, perhaps you are right. He is wretched, isn’t he?”
Octavian nodded. “The magistrate is sure to come around to us next. I am not concerned about proving your father’s innocence. As you said, we all know he was in England and not in Scotland at the time. It is Mr. Douglas I am most worried about. The magistrate must be kept in the dark about what really happened. For this, we have to keep our story consistent, Syd.”
“I understand.”
“We must tell him that we were at the inn, but none of us heard anything. We assume he was set upon and robbed while following us to the inn. He must have resisted and fought back, so this assailant, or unknown assailants, killed him.”
She nibbled her lip as she began to fret. “The magistrate will question why he was following us. I’m sure my father will tell him about Sir Henry’s desire to marry me.”
“His filthy obsession,” Octavian said in disgust. “There’s no reason to lie about any of it.”
“What about the Armstrongs? What do you think they might tell him? And the Gretna Green blacksmith? What will he tell the magistrate? He is not going to lie for us.”
“They can all swear to the truth about our wedding ceremony, and so should we. Why should they lie about your father and Sir Henry attempting to stop our marriage? It happened. Everyone saw them try to stop us.”
“But this will give us a motive for killing him.”
“Syd, it doesn’t matter. We did not kill him and can attest to it because it is the truth. There is only one fact that needs omitting…that we know who did it.”
Syd acknowledged his concern with a nod.
“If asked, all we need to say is Sir Henry must have followed us. But we were unaware because he never made it to the inn. There’s no need to deny Sir Henry was angry or wanted revenge. We did not even consider the possibility of his following us because we saw him and your father ride out of Gretna Green on their way back to London. Everyone saw them ride south and assumed their chase was over.”
“Octavian, you know I am not a good liar. What if the magistrate senses I am holding something back?”
He pursed his lips. “I’ll request that he question only me.”
“Will he agree?”
“Yes. I will let him know that Sir Henry was a brute who was obsessed with you and scared the wits out of you. Just speaking about him oversets you because you are such a delicate, fluttery thing.”
She poked him in the ribs. “Don’t you dare call me delicate or fluttery.”
“Would you rather I describe you as a harpy? A tavern brawler? But there really is no reason to involve you since we were together the entire time, and whatever you saw, I saw. Ormore to the point, it was our wedding night and we were in bed, doing somethingotherthan thinking of Sir Henry.”
“Octavian! You cannot say that.”
“Why not? The magistrate is not going to ask more questions after that statement.”
“It is not right to discuss our wedding night.”
“I am not going to describe how you and I were naked together and–”
