Martin pressed his lips together. Daizell couldn’t quite make out his expression. ‘Well,’ he said after a moment. ‘You deserve to be happy, Daize, and I’m glad for you. I’ll buy you a drink, you and your beau. We can toast your future. Don’t make more of a mess of it than you can help.’
‘I don’t intend to, and I’ll hold you to that drink. But, talking of messes, I have a bone to pick with you.’
‘About what?’
‘Cassian, that’s what. My lover. Under the name—’ Damnation; he’d forgotten. ‘Another name. You met him in Gloucester, bedded him, and robbed him, calling yourself John Martin . . . Don’t make faces,’ he added, because Martin was staring at him with a look of stunned horror. ‘If you’re ashamed at being caught for it, you shouldn’t have done it.’
‘How—’ Martin swallowed. ‘How did you find me?’
‘He told me about it and I realised it was you. He wants his ring back, the one you stole off his finger. God rot it, what did you have to be such an arsehole for? What terrible thing did he do that you felt obliged to take everything down to his clothes and the ring – his dead father’s ring, for God’s sake – off his finger? Did he dare to enjoy your company and say so? How long are you going to punish everyone you meet for one man’s acts?’
He regretted that last immediately, since Martin’s face had gone an unattractively grey shade. ‘I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said that. But you—’
‘Shut up. No, stop talking, Daize, let me think. That man – him –he’syour lover?’
‘We met, he asked me to help him retrieve his ring, we took a shine to one another. If you even think to use that—’
Martin licked his lips. ‘Do you know who he is?’
‘Cassian. His name’s Vernon Cassian.’
‘Oh Christ.’ Martin pressed his fingers to his temples, making white dints in the flesh. ‘Hell and damnation. I’m so sorry, Daizell. Truly, I am.’
‘As you should be, and you can tell him so yourself. He’s just upstairs.’
‘Sorry foryou, not him. I’m extremely sorry for you.’ Martin exhaled hard. ‘Just to be sure, we’re talking about a short, inconsequential sort of fellow, yes? Brown hair, soft voice?’
‘How many men did you fuck and rob in Gloucester?’
‘One. I hoped he might have sent someone to retrieve his ring for him.’
‘What? Why would he?’
Martin squeezed his eyes shut for a second, visibly bracing himself. ‘Because the man I robbed – the wonderful lover who trusts you so – is the Duke of Severn. And it doesn’t sound like you know that.’
Daizell turned the words over in his mind, gave it some thought, and said, ‘Are you drunk?’
‘I wish to God I was. What did you say he called himself?’
‘Vernon Cassian.’
‘He told me Wotton. In fact – this is burned on my memory – he’s Vernon Fortescue Cassian George de Vere Crosse. Duke of Severn, Earl of Harmsford, Baron Crosse of Wotton, and Baron Vere.’
‘No,’ Daizell said. ‘No, that’s not— No.’
‘Yes. And I know this for a fact, because when I attempted to pawn the ring, the pawnbroker asked me if it was a replicaof the Severn ring. He showed me a picture of the bloody thing, so I went and found a likeness of the duke. It’s a damned cheek to look that insignificant when you bear quite so many titles. Sailing under false colours.’
Daizell was barely listening. He couldn’t seem to think. ‘Severn,’ he repeated. The child-duke of Severn had been to Eton at the same time as him, a few years below. Daizell remembered again that small, pale boy, and thought of Cassian with his dead father’s ring put warm on his finger, and his responsibilities, and his Grand Tour, and how he had dropped shirts on the floor as if someone would pick them up. ‘Oh Jesus.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Martin said again. ‘I quite believe you trusted him and thought he trusted you, but you shouldn’t have, and he didn’t. He’s aduke.And as for how I treated him, I know. I only meant to take the money, but he had so much – money, things, silver and gold – and it made me angry, and I just got . . . carried away. Since when I’ve spent the last fortnight looking over my shoulder in a state of sheer terror, which I dare say I deserve. You’re welcome to his damned ring. Good riddance. I was tempted to throw it in a ditch but I decided I’d rather be able to give it back.’
He fished the ring out of his pocket as he spoke. Daizell held out his hand, which was shaking a little, and took it: an odd, lumpy, rather misshapen thing in red gold.
‘Doesn’t look like much,’ he said, because he couldn’t think of anything else to say.
‘A very unremarkable object at first glance, but if you examine it closely, it’s a dragon,’ Martin said. ‘Much like its owner. I’m getting out of here. You’re sure he doesn’t have men with him?’
‘Yes. Go.’ Daizell should probably get more answers out ofhim but he didn’t think he cared any more. He didn’t think he cared about anything at all.
