heartily, “what did you need me for?” He looked over the rim of his mug. “Costuming ideas? You both look as if you could use a fair bit of aid.”
Ambrose’s hand shot out and grasped Hugh by the forearm almost before the thought to do so occurred to him. Hugh glared at him, then deliberately folded his arms over his chest. Ambrose chose to ignore the fact that his left hand was tucked under his right arm where it might most readily grasp the dagger tucked into his belt. Hugh, as many a foe had found out too late, was ambidextrous. Ambrose turned back to Sir Richard.
“I believe, friend, that our concerns might turn out to rest a little closer to home than you know.”
Sir Richard pursed his lips. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Don’t you?”
“I most certainly do not.”
Ambrose set his cup aside and placed his hands on the table in plain sight. “Then allow me to enlighten you. We’ve a task for you to accomplish—”
“What!” Sir Richard said, drawing himself up haughtily. “Give me a task, you say? You, sir, have overstepped your bounds.”
Ambrose continued without hesitation. “There are two who must be brought together.”
“Who? Are we interbreeding again with McKinnons and MacLeods?” Richard asked, lacing his tone with a heavy layer of disdain. “Oh, yes, that’s right. That’s what you two are, isn’t it?”
Ambrose stopped Hugh before he had even begun to lunge. That gave him something to do besides fling his own sweet self forward. He looked at Richard coolly.
“There is a goodly work for you to do.”
“Unless it requires my presence in Drury Lane, my good man, it is not goodly.”
“Something even more interesting than that,” Ambrose assured him.
“I can’t imagine what.”
“Then allow me to tell you,” Ambrose said pleasantly. “There is a particular lad who needs to meet a certain lassie at a distinct point in time. There will be things that try to get in the way of that.”
“Good sense?” Sir Richard asked politely.
“Your big nose,” Hugh shot back, “poking itself in places it don’t belong whilst ignoring the places it should be poking itself!”
Sir Richard shot him a look of undisguised antipathy, then turned back to Ambrose. “Do tell.”
Ambrose slid a carefully cut piece of parchment across the table and waited until Sir Richard had read it before he spoke.
“There are the particulars for the young woman. On the reverse is a description of the young man. Try not to mistake him for anyone else.”
Sir Richard curled his lip. “I doubt that’s possible, unless he’s up to his usual tricks of disguise.”
“One never knows,” Ambrose conceded. He looked at Sir Richard pointedly. “Fail, and you know what the reward will be.”
Sir Richard looked for the briefest of moments slightly pale, but that passed quickly enough. He tossed both the parchment and his mug into oblivion, then rose. He wrapped his cape around himself and looked down at them coldly.
“I will do what you have requested because it suits me,” he said. “No other reason.”
And with that, he swept out of the pub. Ambrose watched him go and considered the encounter. It hadn’t gone as well as he’d hoped nor as poorly as he’d feared. He sat back and reached for his ale. He would, of course, oversee the entire affair as best he could, but there were things he simply wouldn’t be able to control, places he perhaps could have gone but dared not go.
“Does he know?” Hugh asked, his face scrunched up thoughtfully. “What will happen if he fails?”
“Of course he knows.”
“He isn’t happy about it.”
Ambrose looked at him. “He’s an Englishman.” He paused. “Well, at least he’s playing an Englishman as a permanent role.”
“He’s good at it.”
Ambrose smiled. “He certainly would like to be, I imagine. We might have to make certain he’s about his business properly at first, but I daresay with what he has at stake, he won’t shirk his duties.”
Hugh shook his head. “Ambrose, I’ll tell ye plain. I’m happier when things are a bit more removed from where we stand.”
“And speaking of that,” Ambrose said brightly, “shall we return to the Globe and see how our current Drummond is taking these recent tidings we’ve given him?”
“Only if I can fling things at him from the floor.”
“Why not?”
Ten minutes later, Ambrose was standing again in the shadows watching Richard Drummond chew the scenery. He was no longer even attempting to restrain his ego. He was absolutely furious.