Maireton rolled his eyes, and Kim laughed She was begin-
ning to like Renee in spite of herself
"1 don't know whether Lady Cranleigh knew that the Salt-
ash Platter was in Ranton Hill when she came down to Mrs
Brammgham's house party," Mairelon went on after a mo-
ment, "but I rather think not It didn't take her long to dis-
cover it and send for her brother, though, and the roads and
weather being as they've been, both of them were settled in
before we arrived
"Laverham must have known the platter's whereabouts for
—262—
several months, at least, but he was being very cautious. He
arranged for James Fenton to take a job as footman to Freddy
Meredith, intending to have Fenton steal the platter for him
later Fenton had other ideas "
Dan Laverham muttered something under his breath and
glared at Mairelon Mairelon smiled, and Kim shook her
head He was enjoying this altogether too much, she
thought
"Fenton's family was respectable, and his brother was a sil-
versmith Fenton persuaded him to copy the Saltash Platter
exactly Perhaps the original idea was to cover up the theft of
the platter for as long as possible, but he must have realized
fairly soon that he could make a tidy sum selling copies of the
platter to each of the, er, interested parties Since he wasn't a
magician himself, he didn't know that the forgeries would be
childishly easy to spot
"When the copies were finished, Fenton replaced the real
platter with a copy and hid it in the druid's lodge " Mairelon
waved at the gaping hole in the floor in front of the hearth
"But he was stretching his luck, making the copies had taken a
long time, and Laverham was beginning to worry, particu-
larly since by then he'd heard that I was back So Laverham
sent Jack Slower there down to Ranton Hill to check on Fen-
ton "
"Then he didn't follow me at alii" Kim exclaimed, remem-
bering how frightened she had been by Jack's unexpected ap-
pearance at the inn in Ranton Hill
"No, but it was as well that you kept out of sight," Mair-
elon said "Think of the trouble we'd have had if Laverham
had arrived a few days earlier than he did "
Kim shuddered
"Richard," the Ear! of Shoreham said His tone was mild,
but Mairelon signed and returned to his story
"Just to thoroughly confuse matters, at about this time
263
Freddy Meredith lost the false platter to Henry Bramingham
in a game of cards Henry knew that his uncle," Mairelon
nodded at Gregory St Clair, "collected oddities of that sort
and proposed to give it to him That brought St Ctair down
to Ranton Hill posthaste and set off an interesting round of
burglaries at Bramingham Place Kirn and I were privileged to
observe most of the parade "
"What, what?" said Mr Bramingham
"We hid in your priest's hole," Mairelon explained
"Priest's hole'" Kirn said, disappointed "Is that what it was?
! thought it was a spell "
"Bramingham showed it to me last time 1 visited," Mairelon
said "Next time your household is roused in the middle of
the night, Bramingham, you should remember to check inside
it "
"Yes, but what's this about burglaries?" Bramingham said
"Somebody broke into the library a couple of nights ago,
but—"
"Several somebodies," Mairelon interrupted "Actually, I
believe Renee was the first, but she recognized the platter for
a rake and left it where it was She was long gone when Kirn
and I got there "
"I knew I 'adn't ought to 'ave gone to London and left you
'ere with 'er," Hunch said
"It wasn't my ideal" Kmi protested
"I didn't figure as it was," Hunch said dryly, and Kim
blinked in surprise Then she grinned at him
"We were interrupted by Mr Stowers arrival/' Maireton
said with a quelling look at Hunch "Stower was interrupted
in turn by Marston and Stuggs, who were interrupted by
Jonathan Aberford "
"Jonathan?" Robert Choiniet said, startled "Are you sure?"
"He has a turn of phrase that is unmistakable," Mairelon
answered
264
"Have you got maggots in your head?" Robert demanded,
glaring at Jonathan "Or have you suddenly gotten as bacon-
brained as Freddy Meredith? Why in heaven's name would
you try to burgle Bramingham Place?"
"I thought it would work," Jonathan said sullenly
"He hadn't counted on the, er, competition," Mairelon
said "In the end, Lady Granleigh managed to obtain the plat-
ter by as neat a tnck as I've seen You might consider taking
her on, Shoreham; she's got the nerves for it "
Lady Granleigh looked as if she did not know whether to
be pleased or insulted by this remark, and Kim hid a smile
"Lady Granleigh quickly discovered that her platter was a
forgery, which left her in something of a dilemma She
couldn't return it to the Brammghams without awkward expla-
nations, but she didn't want to keep it, either And Jonathan
Aberford was hanging about Bramingham Place and making a
nuisance of himself, if Lady Granleigh and her brother made
any attempts to locate the real platter, Jonathan was sure to
notice. So she decided to give the forgery back to the druids
and solve two problems at once
"Miss D'Auber and I had agreed to meet this morning near
here to compare what we had each learned She was de-
layed—" Mairelon gave Andrew a quick look, and Andrew
smiled wryly, "—so 1 was here alone when Lady Granleigh
and her party arrived I, ah, accepted the platter on Mr Ab-
erford's behalf"
"By what right?" Jonathan demanded
Mairelon looked at him without answering Stuggs made a
peculiar noise that Kim realized, arter a moment, was a
smothered chuckle Jonathan turned very red and subsided,
muttering, and Mairelon turned back to the Earl of Shoreham
and continued his tale
"Meanwhile, Fenton was proceeding with his own plans
He gave or sold the second of his fakes to Jack Slower and
265
presumably made arrangements to meet with a couple of
other prospective customers " Mairelon glanced toward St
Clair, who did not react Jonathan Aberford, however,
scowled and shifted uneasily Mairelon smiled "Yes, I
thought so "
"Get on with it, Richard," the Earl said He sounded
amused but determined
"You have no sense of the dramatic, Shoreham," Mairelon
complained
"I have as much as I need," the Earl replied in a dry voice
"Though I will readily admit that I have not spent the last few
years on a stage No doubt it's a grave failing in my educa-
tion "
"No doubt," Mairelon said, looking somewhat disgruntled
"Well, Slower was on the point of returning to London with
his platter when he spotted Hunch in Ranton Hill He fol-
lowed Hunch to our camp and attempted to take the fa
lse
platter we had collected, instead, he lost his own and
prompted me to head by Brammgham Place to find out what
was going on
"I found more than I expected " Mairelon paused, stanng at
the far wall, and something in his stance kept the others from
commenting Then he shook himself and looked at Mr Bra-
mmgham "When you get back, you'd best send someone
down to the wood by the Long Avenue There's a body and
two more copies of the Saltash Platter hidden there "
"Richard'" said the Earl, his voice carrying clearly over the
confused babble that broke out among the rest of the lis-
teners "Who? What happened?"
"The body was the unfortunate and ambitious James Fen-
ton," Mairelon answered "As to what happened, I can only
speculate, Kirn and I heard the shot, but we didn't get a look
at the man who fired it"
"Speculate, then'"
—266—
"I think Fenton had arranged to meet someone in the Long
Avenue Two someones, actually, he couldn't very well have
sold both fakes to the same person I think he miscalculated
badly—remember, he didn't know that a magician could
easily tell the difference between his forgeries and the real
platter So when he tried to pass off one of the fakes, St
Clair shot him "
"Unlikely," Lord St Clair said into the horrified silence
that followed
"Not at all," Mairelon said with exaggerated politeness
"You, Laverham, and Aberford there are the most logical
people for Fenton to pick as possible customers for his re-
maining forgeries Laverham, or rather, Laverham's man
Stower, already had a platter Aberford would clearly do a lot
to get his hands on his, er. Sacred Dish, but I doubt he'd
commit murder Besides, if he'd killed Fenton, he wouldn't
have held up Laverham's coach half an hour later, looking for
the platter"
Jonathan Jerked "How did you know—"
"It's the only reason you've done anything for the past
week," Mairelon said "You were supposed to meet Fenton,
too, weren't you? How did you find out that he was hoping to
sell the platter to someone else?"
"I heard him bragging about it at the inn," Jonathan said
sullenly "I didn't kill anyone'"
"Yes, I know," Mairelon said "You thought you'd save
yourself some time and trouble, not to mention money, and
hold up the coach instead of paying Fenton "
"This is all speculation," St Clair said He acted as if he
were calm enough, but there were small lines of tension at the
corners of his eyes, and a muscle in his jaw twitched now and
again when he was not speaking
"Not entirely," Mairelon told him "A moment ago, you
told Laverham and Stuggs that they couldn't prove anything
267
against you without Fenton, but no one has mentioned Mr
Fenton's unfortunate demise until now If you didn't kill him,
how did you know"?"
"I was not referring to this Fenton's death," Lord St Clair
said coldly "I merely meant that no one knew where he was "
"Convince the Runners of that" Mairelon nodded at
Stuggs
"You were the man he was to meet'" Jonathan said sud-
denly, stanng intently at St Clair "You were the one to
whom he would have sold the Sacred Dishi"
Robert Choimet rolled his eyes Lady Granleigh looked
shocked The Earl of Shoreham frowned "How do you
know?" he demanded
"He was at the inn, I saw him hanging about while I was
following Fenton "
"Hardly convincing," St Clair said
"I doubt that the Runners will have any trouble finding
proof, one way or another," Mairelon said.
"Now that they're looking at the right man," Andrew mut-
tered
"In any case. St Clair shot Fenton, but Kirn and I inter-
rupted him Laverham and Stower interrupted us and brought
us here I presume St Clair followed us Fenton had hidden
the platter under the hearth, we found it and had a small
disagreement over its ownership 1 expect Stuggs can tell you
the rest; he was here for most of it And that's all "
268
TWENTY-SIX
-•V-AJE" T t wasn't alt by a long shot Everyone wanted a
JM^^^^ 1 chance to object, explain, or ask questions,
f r and it took all the Earl's considerable force of
character to keep them more or less under control Mairelon
was no help whatever, he took immediate advantage of the
commotion to dodge past Hunch and corner Lord Granleigh,
opments at the Royal College of Wizards
After a few minutes of chaos, Stuggs brought the confusion
to a halt by pointing out that he ought to take his prisoners
into town and make arrangements for them to be transported
to London
"There's another one asleep on the box of the coach out-
side," Mairelon said, turning his head "I don't know what he's
done, but I'm quite sure it's something nasty "
Stuggs frowned "'E ain't a wizard, too, is 'e?"
"What, driving a coach?" Jonathan said scornfully
"No, he's just another of Laverham's crew," Mairelon said
"Unpleasant enough, but quite ordinary so far as his skills are
concerned "
269
"Still, that makes four of them," Shoreham said- "Which is
a bit much to expect one man, however competent, to handle
alone "
"Well, I could go along as far as the town," Mr Bra-
mingham offered "It's not much out of my way, you know I
can't stop there, though, my wife will be waiting to hear
what's happened "
"And to spread it over as much of the county as she can
reach," Mairelon murmured "I'm afraid St Clair is going to
be a social outcast no matter how the trial turns out "
"I should think so," Lady Granleigh sniffed. "His behavior
to me, and to poor Marianne, has been simply unpardonable
If it hadn't been for him, Marianne would not have run off as
she did."
Everyone looked at Lady Granleigh in patent disbelief, in-
cluding Jasper Lady Granleigh stared haughtily down her
nose at the lot of them. "Pointing that pistol at poor Mar-
ianne clearly disordered her intellect I am quite confident
that, had you behaved as a gentleman ought, wiser counsels
would have prevailed, and she would not have dashed off to
be married in such a hole-in-the-corner fashion."
"I congratulate you, Lady Cranleigh," Lord St Clair said
after a moment "I have never before met anyone with so
great a talent for seeing the world as she wishes it to be."
Lady Granleigh stared through the space occupied by Lord
St Clair as if he were not there, then turned to her brother
"Come, Jasper, it is time we were going "
'Time and past," Kirn muttered Mairelon glanced sharply
in her direction, but no one else seemed to hear
"I'll accompany you, my dear," Lord Granleigh said in a
tone that brooked no argument "Bramingham's right; we
should be getting back "
Lady Granteigh did not look at all pleased by this develop-
ment (nor did Jasper), but they had no choice but to go
—270—
along Kim wondered whether Lord Cranteigh would give
them both a dressing-down in the carnage She hoped so, the
bracket-faced mort deserved a tongue-lashing and then some
for the way she'd been mucking about in everyone else's af-
fairs, and Jasper was no better
"Now, then, Stuggs," Lord Shoreham said when the
Cranleighs were safely out the door "You'll want someone
besides Brammgham to help with the prisoners, 1 think No
sense in taking chances "
"We'd be happy to help, sir," Robert Choiniet volunteered
"That is, if you think we'd be useful " He nudged Jonathan
with his elbow
"Happy"'". Jonathan said bitterly "Oh, yes, of course, cer-
tainly The Sacred Dish is gone for good, the lodge is in
ruins, and the Sons of the New Dawn will be a laughingstock
Naturally we're happy "
Mairelon looked at him "I hardly think one broken win-
dow, a displaced hearthstone, and a couple of overturned
chairs constitute being in ruins "
"Yes, we've done more damage ourselves on a good night,"
Robert agreed "Do stop playacting, Jon "
"Playacting? Playacting? You don't seem to realize how se-