Testing Miss Toogood Read online

  Dear Reader,

  Thank you for buying Testing Miss Toogood. I had a lot of fun writing this story and I hope you spend some happy hours getting to know Fleur Toogood, a woman who occasionally trips over her own “unshakable” standards, and Lord Dominic Elliot, who would shake any woman’s resolve!

  In October my romantic thriller Now You See Him will be available in paperback for the first time, followed by A Grave Mistake in November. In A Grave Mistake “The Toussaint Gang”—Spike, Father Cyrus, Madge, Dr. Reb and Marc Girard, Jilly Gable, Ellie and Joe Gable, and of course Wazoo—face an old mystery with very new and very frightening implications. Jilly Gable and NOPD homicide detective Guy Gautreaux are wary partners who follow the trail deep into the steamy nights of New Orleans’s French Quarter, where they learn that their only hope is to build a shaky trust. They’re out on a limb—together.

  Happy reading, and take care,

  Stella

  Also by STELLA CAMERON

  NOW YOU SEE HIM

  A USEFUL AFFAIR

  KISS THEM GOODBYE

  COLD DAY IN JULY

  ABOUT ADAM

  THE ORPHAN

  FRENCH QUARTER

  7B

  ALL SMILES

  A GRAVE MISTAKE

  TESTING MISS TOOGOOD

  STELLA CAMERON

  For Jerry

  Thank you for sharing my life.

  Contents

  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

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  1

  Covent Garden

  London, 1815

  Success…or failure…depended on this, on what happened now, here, in a shabby park in one of London’s sleaziest districts.

  He reached a hedge, pushed through an overgrown gap that passed as a gateway and hurried inside. He saw her. A girl huddled in the middle of a pathway where what moon there was played hide-and-seek and picked her out for any interested eye to see.

  Running, he hissed, “It’s all right. You have nothing to fear. Get off the path. Sit on the bench over there—by the bushes.”

  “I’d rather stand, sir…father.”

  “Keep your voice down, I beg of you. They call me Brother Juste and I insist we sit. We could be too easily spotted standing here.” He caught her by the arm and rushed her along. She kept quiet and didn’t shrink from him. His real name was Lord Dominic Elliot, but the disguise served him well.

  The girl’s courage impressed him. He hadn’t been sure she’d come to meet a stranger in this deserted place after sunset. From what he could make out, she was young, wholesome and simply dressed.

  Jane Weller, a desperate servant wrongly dismissed from her place, sped along at his side, her breath coming in frightened gasps, until she plopped down on the stone seat he’d indicated. Tucked in the deep shadows of tall laurel bushes, anyone there would be all but invisible. He followed, his habit flowing around his feet, the rough brown wool heavy with moisture from the fog.

  “I’d best be quick,” Jane said. “I want to get back.” She sat down, crossed her booted feet, wrapped a prim dark coat tightly about her and held it together at the neck. She bowed her head and an unadorned bonnet hid her face completely, not that there was much to see in this light, even if he had become accustomed to getting around very well in darkness.

  She touched her chin and drew in a sharp breath.

  “Are you hurt?” he asked.

  Miss Weller shook her head, no, and muttered something inaudible.

  Laughter carried on the heavy air, drunken voices bellowed and Jane muffled a cry with her hands and looked up at him. He saw her face better then, her eyes glittering up at him.

  “Hush,” he said, sitting beside her but with an appropriate distance between them. “You are safe with me, I promise.” Acrid smoke from too many chimneys to imagine stung the eyes.

  A long walk from ancient St. Mary’s Church in Pearl Lane had given him time to think about the most efficient way to deal with the best, possibly the only, chance he might get to solve a most disturbing mystery before it was too late.

  “I shall accompany you home to your rooms,” he told Jane. “No harm shall come to you. Now, tell me your story.” He already knew most of it, as reported by the son of her former employers while that young man wallowed in his cups at a certain gentlemen’s club.

  “It’s not true what my mistress said.” The girl’s voice wobbled but she didn’t cry. A brave one, this. “I didn’t stay out all night with my young man—last Thursday that would be—I didn’t. I don’t have a young man. I was taken, that’s what I was, taken. Kidnapped. And I know why.”

  You do? “And why would that be?” He knew very well but couldn’t imagine how Jane Weller would have any idea why she was abducted in Hyde Park—opposite her employers’ mansion—and spirited away.

  “The gentleman thought I was Miss Victoria. On account of I was wearing one of her cloaks. She gave it to me,” she added hurriedly. “Miss Victoria gets tired of her things and likes to give them away. It was her he wanted—he said as much when he was so angry at seeing he’d got a nobody for all his trouble.”

  The Victoria she spoke of was Victoria Crewe-Burns whose wealthy family was famous for, among other products, Crewe-Burns Serviceable Stockings—a mainstay of the working classes. There had been a time when Vicky’s name had been linked to that of Dominic’s brother, Nathan.

  “You’re sure of this, Miss Weller?” He kept his voice low.

  She whispered in return, “Oh, yes. The man who took me never said a word till I was in that house of his.” He noted she spoke quite well and tucked the fact away in case it might be useful to remember. “Look,” she continued, “I will help you try to find this man. I want to because I think he’ll hurt someone one day if he isn’t caught. But they watch you at that rooming house where I’m staying and if I’m too late back someone will say things about me and I’ll be out on the street again. I don’t know if I could find another place as cheap.”

  He needed so much more from her. “Did you actually see this man’s face?” Surely a good description would be too much to hope for.

  “Yes and no.”

  Waiting for her to go on took almost more patience than he had.

  “A painted face, that’s what he had. He frightened me so, his face white like some ladies used to have, all stiff and hard from the stuff he’d spread on. And a little red mouth painted on and eyebrows almost up to his wig. A white wig it was, and white powder on his eyelashes so his eyes looked pink and nasty.”

  The next answer was expected but he asked the question anyway. “Would you know him if you saw him again?”

  She didn’t laugh or say no immediately. “I don’t know. There was something about him—a feeling he gave me. He pushed me down and kicked me. He said I was a waste of time.”

  “I’m sorry.” And he was furious. “Did you feel as if you’d met him before?”


  “Oh, no.” She shook her head vehemently. “I couldn’t have. No. But when I say he gave me a funny feeling, I don’t just mean the scared feeling. I wouldn’t know his face unless he was painted the same way, of course, but…I don’t know, I probably couldn’t recognize him. He said he’s a master of disguises so I suppose that means he changes how he looks.” She looked up at him. “I’m sorry I’m not more help.”

  “You are a great deal of help.” He must make sure they would meet again and soon. The thought of not being able to find her after tonight sent panic into his heart. “You cannot have a great deal of money.”

  She tossed her head and averted her face from him. “I know how to look after myself. I’ll do well enough.”

  “How long can you manage without a position?”

  Miss Weller fiddled with the neck of her coat. “Long enough.”

  “Let me give you some money.”

  “No, thank you.” She stood up and he heard her rapid breathing. “I shall find a place soon enough. I must.”

  “You sound desperate,” he said gently. “If you have enough money to manage, why must you find a place soon?”

  “Because—because I must, that’s all. Please, I wish I could be more useful but I’m going to that house now.”

  “Fair enough.” He rose and offered her his arm. Jane Weller got up and stood beside him, ignoring his arm. “Very well, let us get you home but there’s something I want you to do tomorrow morning.”

  “I can’t do anything extra in the morning.” She hesitated, cleared her throat. “The landlady said I could help pay my way by doing some work for her. I start first thing.”

  “In the afternoon, then?”

  They walked to the nearest exit from the little park. He had to peer ahead to see where they were going.

  “All right,” she said at last. “If I can, I will.”

  “Miss Weller, remember you are not without a friend. I shall make sure you are cared for.”

  “I don’t need—”

  “You don’t need help? Of course you don’t. But would you please go to Heatherly tomorrow afternoon? You will be expected. Ask for my friend the Dowager Marchioness of Granville. Tell the butler you’ve been sent about a job and you’re expected. You will be.”

  “But—” She stopped walking. “When the Crewe-Burnses let me go they said they wouldn’t speak for me. They said if they were asked, they’d say about me being off with a man—like you were told. And they’d say how I was a liar you couldn’t trust.”

  “None of that will matter. I will speak for you.”

  “I don’t know any Heatherly.”

  “You’ll find the estate. It’s immediately northwest of Regent’s Park. Anyone in the area will direct you. You will do it, won’t you?”

  “I’ll think about it,” she said.

  The horses stood quietly enough. He was grateful for that. With his habit safely stowed in a tiny secret room above the porch of St. Mary’s Church, Lord Dominic Elliot strode toward the animals. He doubted if it would be long before he needed to don one of his Brother Juste disguises again.

  Dominic’s shadowy friend, Brother Cadwin of the Brown Monastery, had arranged with a priest at St. Mary’s for Dominic to use the church as a haven when he needed one.

  “Hurry up then.” Dominic’s older brother Nathan waited on one of the pair of blacks. “You’re late, dammit. We can’t afford to be seen.”

  Dominic held his tongue. He swung into the saddle of his own horse and took the reins while the animal skittered sideways, blowing. He and Nathan rode away at once, switching back and forth through a maze of narrow streets in the Covent Garden area. Fog ebbed and flowed and with it, visibility. Sometimes a patch of sky—gray stained with purple—showed, only to be snuffed out by another curling swathe. At last they clattered into a small square and paused to listen. They heard no sounds of pursuit.

  “What took you so long?” Nathan said.

  “The girl is brave but nervous,” Dominic told him. “She wasn’t quick to tell me everything. I made sure she got back to her wretched boardinghouse safely. Just as well since she finally told me what that cur said to her. And did to her. He was painted, by the way. Disguised as some sort of dandy but with a white wig and maquillage. Gaudy silks and white satin, I gather. Florid embroidery, gold thread, that sort of thing.”

  “You think you should be the only man allowed to pretend he’s someone he’s not?” Nathan said with laughter in his voice.

  Dominic wasn’t amused. “What we surmised about Bertie Crewe-Burns was correct. He wasn’t as foxed as he pretended to be when the two of you spoke. The story about the servant was fabricated. She doesn’t even have a gentleman friend, she says, and I believe her. They turned her out because they’re afraid and they don’t want to draw any attention to the probable truth.”

  “Did the girl say something to make you certain it was Victoria that man was after?” Nathan asked.

  Dominic told him about the cloak, then went on with what Jane had revealed as he took her home. “She said he taunted her, pushed her down. Apparently he’s got a fantastic—and awful—little house where he locked himself inside with Jane. Music boxes everywhere on a gallery and he set them all playing, one after another, twirling around like a madman as he did so.”

  The horses danced on the cobbles, their hoofs ringing. When they settled down Nathan said, very softly, “Perhaps he is mad. Not a pretty thought.”

  “I think it’s all an extravagant pretense,” Dominic said flatly. “He stopped that piece of nonsense and actually looked at his captive. She said he became angry and completely changed from the capering fool. He threatened her, said she was useless to him so she might as well die. Then he said he couldn’t be bothered to kill her because she was no threat to him anyway—because she was a nothing. Why should he get blood in his favorite room just to murder a servant.”

  “Bloody hound.” Nathan snarled. “Did she give you any idea where this place he took her might be?”

  “Nothing really helpful. The Crewe-Burns mansion is on Park Lane—as you know—and Jane thought they traveled for about half an hour. She isn’t sure but she thinks they went south, possibly across the southeast corner of Hyde Park. Then she felt the direction change—east or so she thinks. She appears to have a strong sense of direction.”

  “Do you think there’s more, something she didn’t remember to say?”

  “If there is, and if she does as she’s promised, we’ll have plenty of opportunity to find out. She is to go to Heatherly tomorrow afternoon. Mother will offer her a position. It’s arranged. Jane doesn’t know I am the Dowager Marchioness’s son.”

  Nathan clicked his tongue. “How do you accomplish so much in so little time, then forget to tell the brother who backs you up in all things? I had no idea what all this was about until this evening. I’m the one who brought this case to your attention, remember?”

  “I didn’t ask you to join me in my investigations at all,” Dominic said. “You said you wanted to do it and that Mother would think better of you if you appeared to be busy and sober.”

  “Am I complaining?”

  Dominic thought, but only for a moment. “Yes. But then, you often do. We can be grateful one of the Crewe-Burnses’ servants could be bribed to say where Jane Weller went after she left Hyde Park or I’d never have found her.”

  “Yes, yes.” Nathan sighed. “I’ve been celibate too long, that’s the problem. My mind is becoming fevered.”

  “Exactly how long have you been celibate?” Dominic asked.

  “Er—” Nathan closed his eyes and appeared in deep thought. “At least two days.”

  Dominic shook his head. “That long. No wonder your mind is affected. Nathan, there is more. You say your discreet enquiries lead you to believe several eligible, well-born girls have been spirited away by our evil clown. Spirited away and released again, most probably after payment of some ransom.”

  “Yes, and I’m
even more certain he threatens to ruin their reputations if the families make a fuss.” Nathan scowled toward the sodden sky. “Bertie let Gussy Arbuthnot’s name drop. That was an accident, I’m convinced. But he rambled about other girls going missing and said it before he remembered his story about Jane Weller.”

  “I think Bertie’s scared for Victoria and looking for help even though he’s afraid to come out and admit it,” Dominic told his brother.

  “So am I,” Nathan said quietly.

  Dominic looked at his brother. “There’s something between the two of you, isn’t there?”

  “From time to time I’ve thought there could be. She’s too immature.”

  Dominic decided to back off the subject. “What did Bertie say about Gussy?”

  “That she’d been what he called ‘off for a day or more,’ and how her family had worried she’d be ruined. I pressed him and first he said she was back and safe—which she is—then he said he was too drunk to know what he was saying and she’d never been missing at all. Made no sense except I’m sure he was telling the truth at the outset.”

  So was Dominic.

  “We may be making too much out of this,” Nathan said. “The villain is likely a harmless prankster.”

  “I think not,” Dominic told him. “I intend to find a way to discover what Gussy knows. And Victoria’s a forthright girl with strong opinions, even if she did bow to pressure and allow her maid to be sacrificed. If it becomes necessary I could ask Mother to invite Victoria to visit, then allow her to see we’ve employed Jane Weller. I hope we don’t have to do it because it would be hard to explain without revealing Brother Juste, but it might lead to some potentially interesting comments.”

  “Gawd,” Nathan said. “Mother hates visitors. A little of this intrigue will go a long way. She’s likely to drive her heels in and tell you not to bother her. You know she only likes to be left alone to paint bunches of grapes, or whatever it is she paints.”

  Dominic was all too aware that his reclusive parent could decide not to help him, especially when he couldn’t reveal Brother Juste or the work he did.

  He urged his mount close to Nathan’s and spoke softly. “As our clown grew more angry he started drinking. Three bottles of hock, one after the other, evidently. That was when he took out a roll of white satin and unwound it to reveal a number of wicked-looking knives. Jane Weller’s description, not mine.”