“Are you sure it was him?’ Julian asked.
She hesitated, then nodded. “He was the man we saw outside the theater and at Richmond.”
Felix looked at Julian. “It must have been him who set the trap.”
His expression grimly frustrated, Julian shook his head. “No. If he’s here for the reason I suspect, then I seriously doubt he set the trap. If he or whoever he represents wants my help with something—and I’m increasingly certain that’s why he’s stalking me—then he would hardly wish to harm me.”
Felix frowned. “But—”
Julian held up a staying hand. “However, I’ve had more than enough of playing hide-and-seek. He won’t get far on foot, and the chances are good that he’s putting up somewhere within easy reach.” After one last glance at the woods—now empty—he waved toward the castle. “Come on.” He started walking again.
Melissa kept pace as they walked briskly toward the terrace. “What do you plan to do?” By now, she knew him well enough to know that he’d come to a decision.
He threw her a swift, sidelong glance, then looked toward the castle. “I’m the local magistrate. After discovering a mantrap set in my shrubbery, no one will be surprised if I conduct a sweep of the immediate area and haul in any man unknown to the locals for questioning. The assumption will be that it’s about the trap, and that will serve as the perfect cover to have the Irishman brought in so he and I can talk.”
Later that day, Melissa sat in an armchair, placed to one side of Julian’s desk in the castle library, and watched as Phelps ushered out the first of the three men Julian’s sweep, conducted by the local constable assisted by various castle staff, had snared.
As expected, none of the castle staff had known anything about the mantrap, and neither had the faintly bewildered Scotsman, a traveling salesman engaged in the wool trade, whom Phelps was showing out.
Essentially, interviewing the first two men brought in was all for show. The man Julian—and she and Felix—wanted to speak with was the third man, the Irishman, who had been found at a small local inn.
The door closed behind Phelps, and Melissa looked down at Ulysses, who was curled at her feet and fast asleep. Although he’d opened one eye when the Scotsman had entered the room, he’d otherwise shown no interest in the visitor and had settled to sleep again.
That was quietly reassuring; Melissa was learning to trust Ulysses’s instincts. She’d spent the hours since coming in from the shrubbery assuring the entire household that her nerves were completely intact and she wasn’t in any danger of fainting—indeed, that she was no more fragile than she had been earlier that morning. As for Ulysses, news of his deeds had made the puppy the toast of the castle and the recipient of probably far too many tasty treats. Melissa had had to stop Veronica from rewarding him with a slice of seed cake.
Julian and Felix were talking about the mantrap. As Edgerton had predicted, he and Hockey hadn’t found any clue as to where the trap had come from. What they were adamantly certain about was that it hadn’t been something that had been left lying discarded in some castle store; it had been too new for that.
Julian and Felix broke off their discussion as a rap on the door heralded Phelps with the second of the three non-local men.
The middle-aged man, another man traveling on business if his neat but well-worn clothes were any guide, was understandably wary. When Julian waved him to the straight-backed chair before the desk, he sat and, on being invited to tell them who he was and what he was doing in the area, admitted that he was a clerk for a foundry, on his way to deliver a contract to a customer in Coventry.
The poor man was patently taken aback when Julian asked if his company manufactured mantraps. “No, my lord. We specialize in nails and rods.”
“Not springs?” Felix asked.
The man shook his head. “Straight and small. That’s all we do. We’re not one of the majors, you see.”
After establishing that the man hadn’t seen anything that might have been a mantrap during his time in the neighborhood and that, until brought to the castle, he hadn’t set foot on castle grounds, Julian released him to Phelps to see out.
“Right.” Julian sat back. “That’s our cover story in place. Now for the real point of this exercise.”
Phelps returned, ushering the Irishman into the room.
He was of medium height, tending stocky, with curly black hair, a pale complexion, and bright-blue eyes. Melissa judged him to be about thirty years old, but he carried the air of one who had seen hard times. He wore nondescript clothes—coat, breeches, and boots that would be unremarkable in town or country. If it wasn’t for his black curls, he wouldn’t stand out in anyone’s memory.
As it was, after Julian waved the man to the chair before the desk and nodded a dismissal to Phelps, when Julian briefly glanced Melissa’s way, she nodded decisively. The Irishman was the man she’d seen outside the theater, at Richmond Park, and under the trees earlier that day.
Julian clasped his hands on the desk and studied the Irishman, who, rather boldly, stared back.
After a second, Julian’s lips curved in a faint yet intent and satisfied smile. “As you know, I’m Carsely.” He arched his brows. “I don’t suppose you know anything about a mantrap set in a path of the shrubbery here?”
The Irishman blinked.
“Or,” Julian continued, “anything about the other recent attempts to kill me?”
“What?” The Irishman’s eyes widened. Then he shook his head. “I don’t want to kill you. I’ve been trying to catch you to tell you something.”
Julian nodded. “Indeed. So what is it you wish to tell me?”
