Silence No More

46. The True Evil

"He's a truly delightful fellow, that Lord Daniel Eugene Dalgliesh."

The words fell on my ears like heavy rocks. No, like mountains. I almost staggered under the weight. It couldn't really be true, right? It couldn't.

With that man? It can. It definitely can.

"¡Bastardo!" a curse erupted from my mouth. "¡Maldito hijo de puta intrigante! ¡Encontraré a esa serpiente y haré que se ahogue con su propio veneno!"

The vicomte cleared his throat. "Um, Monsieur Linton? Could you translate, please? You do remember me mentioning that I only speak English and French, non?"

I completely ignored him in favour of continuing my cursing rant. "Jadōṁ maiṁ usanū labha lavāṅgā, maiṁ usadē jigara nū pāṛa di'āṅgā atē usadē hakadāra gadhē nū bhara di'āṅgā! Maiṁ usadē jhūṭhē mūha dē sārē dada tōṛa di'āṅgā atē usadī ataṛī'āṁ nū sūrāṁ dē cārē vajōṁ varata di'āṅgā!"

"I can't help but agree with the sentiment, Mr Linton." Mr Rikkard Ambrose sent me a chilly look. "But I suggest refraining from that sort of language when we are in the company of a certain someone, understood?"

I nodded obediently and made a mental note to teach Berty my repertoire of curses at the earliest opportunity. As a good mother, it was my duty to educate the next generation.

But...not now.

Not till I had gotten to the bottom of this matter.

But before I could open my mouth, Mr Ambrose spoke up. Which, considering his usual lack of loquaciousness, told me a lot about how very, very furious he was at this moment.

"Monsieur Vicomte...did you just say 'Dalgliesh'?"

"Yes, I did. Why?"

My husband muttered something under his breath too low for me to hear. Did Mr Rikkard Ambrose actually just curse? "DeMordaunt, tell me—do you have any business in the Caribbean?"

"No, the weather does not agree with me." Saint-Celeste frowned. "Why?"

"No shipping lines? No trade at all?"

"The French have not had significant colonies in the Americas since the sale of Louisiana in 1803. Why would I bother sending ships to foreign parts when I can make business within the French Empire without paying tariffs?"

That...was a good point, actually.

He had made a lot of good points recently. Far too many for my liking. It was looking more and more like he wasn't actually the despicable villain we had thought him to be—just incredibly dense when it came to women. And considering all the men I had met during my life, that wasn't exactly something I could punch him in the face for, even if I really, really wanted to. It was starting to appear more and more likely that everything that had befallen me and my family recently wasn't, in fact, the vicomte's fault.

And if it wasn't...

I exchanged a look with Mr Ambrose. "Dalgliesh?"

"Yes. Dalgliesh!" The word was spit from his mouth like a curse.

Truth be told, I felt like adding some actual curses of my own. But now wasn't the time. The realisation we just had come to...it was more important than anything else.

"A double-bluff!" I snarled. "Back when we were attacked in the Caribbean, that bastard Dalgliesh played us with a double-bluff! Remember how, at first, everything pointed to him being the culprit? Only, later we discovered clues that pointed to another figure manipulating everything from the shadows, and we thought Dalgliesh had simply been used as a scapegoat! Now it turns out the bastard had us dancing by his strings every step of the way!"