The whole building trembled, and then a low rumble became audible, and the rumble swiftly swelled into a deafening thundering that surely heraldedArmageddon and Aurelie found herself instinctively reaching out for Delilah’s hand as Delilah was reaching out for her, because if this was the end of the world it seemed, somehow, important to be touching another human. At one end of the foyer, Helga and Mrs. Pariseau leaped into each other’s arms; at the other, Angelique continued to muffle Dot.
But it was just the sound of Captain Hardy and Lord Bolt taking three flights of stairs at a run.
“DELILAH!”The word was a primal roar. The bare-chest blur that was Captain Hardy skipped the last four steps, hurdled the banister, and landed in the foyer, pistol in hand, and Lucien, trouserless, shirttails sailing like wings, soared after him, and that’s when Maggie, conveniently already on the floor, fainted in earnest.
“I’m here! Tristan! We’re here!” Delilah steered them to the bloody man.
Bolt, long shirt whipping about his legs and barely protecting his modesty, whirled like a mad compass until he saw Angelique.
Aurelie would never forget the look on his face then.
And then he and Captain Hardy dropped to their knees next to the man in the foyer.
Dot took a long, long breath and began anew.“SOMEONE KILLED MR. BELLINGMMPH—”
Angelique clapped her hand over Dot’s mouth and walked her backward toward the parlor.
Captain Hardy pressed his fingers against the man’s pulse. “He’s alive. Can you tell us your name please, sir?”
There was a brief lull while everyone held their breath, and waited, and prayed.
“I’m going tokillthat bastard,” the man muttered viciously.
Two complete seconds of absolutely shocked silence dropped like an anvil.
“Knife wound, looks like,” Lucien told Captain Hardy grimly. He’d swiftly, gently gotten the man’s shirt up. “A slash, not a puncture. Ugly, but it could be worse. I think.”
Aurelie looked down at Mr. Bellingham’s face, then regretted it, because she felt as though she’d committed a violation. His eyes were half-closed, his bronze lashes stark against pale sharp cheekbones, his hat jarred from his head, his hair mussed. His throat tipped back and exposed. His clothes were a gentleman’s well-tended clothes and for some reason his shiny boots moved and upset her unbearably. All the humble things people do every day, caring for their boots and such, suddenly seemed almost silly, like acts of pure faith, when dignity and life could be stripped in seconds.
His utter vulnerability filled her with such an inexplicable and nearly intolerable rage her heart ricocheted about her chest like a trapped animal.
Before she realized she was even moving, she was across the foyer crouching next to Lord Bolt, her handkerchief in hand. She pressed it into Lord Bolt’s hand.
“Thank you,” Bolt said curtly.
Until that moment she hadn’t known she was the kind of person who would run toward a bleeding man rather than shrink away.
Bolt swiftly folded it and pressed her handkerchief against the wound.
It was quickly scarlet.
Her head went light with fear. She briefly closed her eyes and mouthed one word, half prayer, half oath, and she stood back quickly to allow Captain Hardy and Lord Bolt to take charge of him.
“Delacorte, we’ll need your help to get him into a room. We need to get them out of here,” Lucien ordered tersely. He jerked his head in the direction of the prone maids.
After a few seconds worth of milling about in indecision, Helga and Mrs. Pariseau gamely but gently seized the maids’ ankles, hoisted their legs, and like horses hitched to plows, undertook to drag them very gently across the smooth, spotless marble foyer.
Just as Mr. Tweedy cheerfully stepped through the ajar door.
He was wearing a happy smile.
(Delilah would remember this later, and it comforted her a little. He’d been so happy to come to them!)
He attempted to fling his arms up over his eyes, but it was too late. His vision was at once filled with Maggie’s stockinged calves all the way up to her garters, two half-naked men brandishing pistols crouching over another half-naked man bleeding beneath the chandelier, while Mrs. Durand seemed to be smothering a bulging-eyed, shrieking Dot with one hand in the reception room.
He quickly backed out and closed the door behind him, turned, swiftly departed the way he came.
They never saw him again.