“Damn it,” Daniel grunted. But there was no use in cursing the man who’d knocked him to the street. He knew he might well be dead if not for his intervention.
If he wanted answers, he was going to have to find Hugh Prentice.
Now.
Chapter Five
Hugh lived in a small set of apartments in The Albany, an elegant building that catered to gentlemen of exceptional birth and modest means. Hugh certainly could have remained in his father’s enormous manse, and in fact Lord Ramsgate had tried everything short of blackmail to force him to stay, but as Hugh had told Daniel on the long journey home from Italy, he no longer spoke to his father.
His father, unfortunately, still spoke to him.
Hugh was not home when Daniel arrived, but his valet was, and he showed Daniel to the sitting room, assuring him that Hugh was expected to return shortly.
For nearly an hour Daniel paced the room, going over every detail of the attack. It hadn’t been the best lit of London streets, but it certainly wasn’t considered one of the more dangerous. Then again, if a thief wanted to capture a heavy purse, he would need to venture beyond the rookeries of St. Giles and Old Nichol. Daniel would not have been the first gentleman to be robbed so close to Mayfair and St. James’s.
It could have been a simple robbery. Couldn’t it? They had said they wanted his money. It could have been the truth.
But Daniel had spent too long looking over his shoulder to accept the simple explanation for anything. And so when Hugh finally let himself into his rooms, Daniel was waiting for him.
“Winstead,” Hugh said immediately. He did not appear to be surprised, but then again, Daniel didn’t think he had ever seen Hugh appear surprised. He had always had the most remarkably expressionless face. It was one of the reasons he’d been so unbeatable at cards. That and his freakish aptitude for numbers.
“What are you doing here?” Hugh asked. He closed the door behind himself and limped in, leaning heavily on his cane. Daniel forced himself to watch his progress. When they had first met up again, back in Italy, it had been difficult for Daniel to watch Hugh’s painful gait, knowing that he was the cause of it. Now he bore witness as a sort of penance, although after what had happened to him that very evening, he was not certain it was a penance he deserved.
“I was attacked,” Daniel said curtly.
Hugh went still. Slowly, he turned, his eyes carefully sweeping from Daniel’s face, to his feet, and back again. “Sit,” he said abruptly, and he motioned to a chair.
Daniel’s blood was rushing far too quickly to take a seat. “I would rather stand.”
“Excuse me, then, if I sit,” Hugh said with a self-deprecating twist of his lips. He made his way over to a chair, awkwardly, and then lowered himself down. When he finally took his weight off his bad leg, he sighed with audible relief.
This, he was not faking. He might be lying about other things, but not this. Daniel had seen Hugh’s leg. It was twisted and puckered, its very existence an improbable feat of medicine. That he could put any weight on it at all was a miracle.
“Do you mind if I have drink?” Hugh inquired. He rested his cane on a table and then began to knead the muscles in his leg. He did not bother to hide his pain from his face. “It’s over there,” he winced, jerking his head toward a cabinet.
Daniel crossed the room and extracted a bottle of brandy. “Two fingers?” he asked.
“Three. Please. It’s been a long day.”
Daniel poured the drink and brought it over. He had not touched alcohol since that fateful drunken night, but then again, he did not have a shattered leg that needed numbing.
“Thank you,” Hugh said, his voice somewhere between a groan and a whisper. He took a long swallow, and then another, closing his eyes as the fire rolled down his throat. “There,” he said, once he’d regained his composure. He set the glass down and looked up. “I was told that your injuries came at the hands of Lord Chatteris.”
“That was something else,” Daniel said dismissively. “I was attacked by two men as I was walking home this evening.”
Hugh straightened, his eyes sharpening. “Did they say anything?”
“They demanded money.”
“But did they know your name?”
Daniel shook his head. “They did not say it.”
Hugh was silent for a long moment, then said, “It’s possible they were ordinary footpads.”
Daniel crossed his arms and stared at him.
“I told you that I extracted a promise from my father,” Hugh said quietly. “He will not touch you.”