“No more vestal virgins?” Jessica asked, praying it was true.
“Even sex can become tiresome, difficult as that may be to believe. Then there’s the problem of abducting suitably high-born virgins. Six in the space of a year? That would have to raise an alarm,” Trixie said, her forehead wrinkling as she considered her own words. “There could be a wholesale shifting of purpose we’re seeing here, Gideon.”
“Again, sedition.”
“I wish you’d stop saying that. With Bonaparte still running amok through the world, the thought is unnerving. He has too many admirers, even here in England. Worse, your search for members now borders on the impossible. Remember, pet, that body you carried out of here last night belonged to the last of the members from your father’s time, the last name I know for certain. Who knows, he may have been the next one to suffer a fatal accident. He should be grateful to me, if I saved him from that.”
“Yes,” Gideon said flatly, “a lucky man.”
Trixie laughed softly. “I know you’re being facetious, but he did seem happy…at least up until the end. Now, stop scowling at me and listen carefully. This last section is the most valuable, the list of member names. Once a code name is assigned, it becomes permanent, whether it be the original member, or handed down to the next generation, which is why family names are used, as titles can change. The bible would have all the details, everything spelled out. Find the bible, Gideon, and you’ve solved it all, as that’s the single volume that traces the history all the way to your grandfather’s time. Names, events, purposes, triumphs. All of it dutifully recorded every year. It’s quite the magnificently fashioned tome, huge, ridiculously ornate, wrapped all about with gold chains, the lock in the shape of a devil’s head. Highly melodramatic.”
“That…” Jessica had to clear her throat, finding it difficult to speak. “That journal is for last year. Wouldn’t my…Shouldn’t it have been turned over to somebody, to have the information recorded in the bible?”
“Yes, that is puzzling,” Trixie said, turning the journal over to look at its cover. “Gideon? Do you suppose the Keeper of the bible has died, or was one of the accidents? Could the society be in the midst of choosing a new leader, so that all the members still hold their journals from last year? Could this be what all the deaths are about—a weeding out of competition, bringing in a whole new order?”
“Or Cotsworth didn’t much care for the new leader, and had decided to leave the Society,” Gideon suggested.
“Pet, no member ever leaves the Society. Not alive. The accidents you’ve uncovered fairly well prove that point. But what an interesting theory, killing off the competition within the Society. Death certainly has made quite a run at the devil’s thirteen.” The dowager duchess opened the journal once again and adjusted her spectacles, that had slipped down her nose. “Let’s have a good look at the list as it was last year, shall we? All right, here’s the first. Either. That’s Ranald Orford.”
“The first death I know of,” Gideon said. “Hunting accident.”
“Yes, I remember. And then this one. Less. That could only be George Dunmore, eldest son of Walter, who was one of your grandfather’s original devil’s thirteen. He’s the one who drowned? And, if you’re beginning to understand this silliness, Gideon, Soft would be…?”
“Baron Harden, who died in that fall down the stairs. My God, it’s that simple?”
“The journals were only for the members. They aren’t all so simple as mere opposites, but they’re not all that difficult. Either, less, soft. If you didn’t already know the names, you would have no idea what this list of words refers to, now would you?”
“And my father?” Jessica asked, leaning forward on the couch.
Trixie ran a fingertip down the list of names. “Ah, here we are. Miner. Because colliers are miners, correct? Now let me see…” She squinted at the page. “Yes, here are the two I can add to our list of deceased members. The Right Honorable Noddy Selkirk, another second generation member, has to be Church. He fell afoul of a rock slide while hiking in the Lake District this past autumn, and Cecil Appleby would have to be Pear. Lord knows he was shaped like one. He supposedly succumbed to some sudden stomach ailment a few months past, although I now have it on the highest authority his tongue had turned black.”
“Who is this highest authority?” Gideon asked.
Trixie rolled her eyes. “You’re questioning me? Cecil’s valet is brother to my glover’s assistant, if you must know. It can take positively hours to fit a new glove properly, and there’s plenty of time for gossip. It took an entire afternoon last Thursday, and an order for six new pairs of gloves, but I’m assured my information is correct. I had the bill sent to you.”
“I suppose I can’t quibble with that,” he said, smiling.
“As well you shouldn’t. And now poor Guy has cocked up his toes. Here he is. Cot, which of course stands for Bedworth.” She ran her finger down the list of names. “Strange. I don’t recognize any of these. If they were still passing father to eldest son, I should know these names. Perhaps one of you should be writing them down?”
Jessica got to her feet and walked over to the writing desk, where paper and pen were already assembled for just such a purpose. She only hoped her hands wouldn’t shake so much her words wouldn’t be legible. She felt as if she was trapped in some sort of nightmare. How else could they be speaking so calmly about murder and other atrocities?
She had soon assembled a list, as dictated by Trixie. Hammer. Weaver. City. Bird. Post. Burn.
By now, Gideon was standing behind her, leaning over her shoulder to look at the list of words. “You’re right, Trixie. Simple words, but if you don’t already know the answers, all I see here are questions.”
Jessica looked at Trixie, who was still paging through the journal. “But you said you had more information for us. Did Cot give you any other names?”
“A question you should have asked, Gideon. I may have had them all, if Guy hadn’t gotten so belatedly suspicious and then so inconveniently dead. Why women don’t rule the world has always been a conundrum to me. Greater physical strength has led you all to believe your minds are stronger, as well, which is poppycock. At any rate, we women couldn’t do worse—you men just keep bollixing it all up. But yes, two others, although I can’t say I know them personally, although I know their families. Lord Charles Mailer, and Archie Urban.”
“Post and City,” Gideon said quickly, almost triumphantly, as if they were solving puzzles in some game. Perhaps that was the only way to deal with any of it without going mad?
“Leaving us with Hammer, Weaver, Bird and Burn. Four more members.”
It was wrong. So wrong. Jessica felt so ashamed of herself, even as she opened her mouth and heard the words come tumbling out: “Three French hens, two turtledoves and a partridge in a…”
And then Gideon was catching at her as she felt herself slipping sideways on the chair, darkness closing all around her… .
THE KING IS DEAD, long live the king.
Those words kept repeating themselves inside Gideon’s head as he sat in his study, trying to make sense of all they’d learned.
With the Marquis of Mellis sticking his spoon in the wall at the same time he was sticking his—no, he wouldn’t go there—the last of the members active during Barry Redgrave’s time had died.