Читать книгу Regency Rogues and Rakes: Silk is for Seduction / Scandal Wears Satin / Vixen in Velvet / Seven Nights in a Rogue's Bed / A Rake's Midnight Kiss / What a Duke Dares - Loretta Chase - Страница 20

This gateway cannot possibly be described correctly, as the ornaments are scattered in the utmost profusion, from the base to the attic, which supports a copy of Michael Angelo’s celebrated lion. Double ranges of grotesque pilasters inclose eight niches on the sides, and there are a bow window and an open arch above the gate.

Leigh Hunt (describing Northumberland House),

The Town: Its Memorable Characters and Events, Vol. 1, 1848

Like its present owner, Clevedon House mocked convention. While other noble families had torn down their ancient houses overlooking the river and moved westward into Mayfair, while commercial enterprises took over what the nobles had abandoned, the Earls and Dukes of Clevedon stubbornly remained. One of the last of the palaces that had once lined the Strand, Clevedon House sprawled along the southwestern end of the street, overlooking Charing Cross. It was a great Jacobean pile, complete with turrets and a heavily ornamented gateway topped by a bay window that was topped by an arch upon which a lion stood roaring at the heavens. Marcelline had passed it countless times on her way to one of the many shops and warehouses in the neighborhood.

Within, she found it even larger and more imposing than the street front promised. A marbled vestibule led to an immense entrance hall. At the other end, apparently a mile away, a crimson carpet climbed a great, white marble staircase whose ornate brass balustrades seemed, at this distance, to be made of golden lace. Black, bronze-topped columns adorned the yellow marble walls.

As Marcelline and her family uneasily followed Clevedon past a gaping porter into the entrance hall, a straight-backed, dignified man not dressed in livery appeared, magically, it seemed, from nowhere.

“Ah, here is Halliday,” Clevedon said. “My house steward.”

Halliday, apparently inured to his grace’s erratic habits, did no more than widen his eyes momentarily as he took in the duke’s smoky visage, his torn, blackened clothes, and the equally dirty, bedraggled child in his arms.

“There’s been a fire,” Clevedon said shortly. “These ladies have been driven from their home.”

“Yes, your grace.”

Lucie still in his arms, Clevedon gestured the house steward aside. They spoke briefly, in low voices. Marcel-line couldn’t make out what they said. Too stunned and tired to question anything at this point, she left them to it.

Leonie had wandered away a few paces to study the candelabrum that stood on marble bases, one on each side of the bottom of the staircase. When she came back, she reported in a whisper, “They would have paid at least a thousand apiece for each candelabra. Was Warford House like this?”

“This makes Warford House look like a parson’s cottage,” Marcelline said. “It may even rival Buckingham House.”

“No wonder Lady Warford wanted his grace back from France,” Sophy said. What if Lady Clara succumbed to another, lesser fellow’s lures? Quelle horreur!”

Marcelline saw Halliday withdraw, the discussion over. He signaled to a hovering footman, who approached, took his orders, and hurried away. Not two minutes passed before a great tide of servants began flowing into the entrance hall.

Clevedon approached. “Everything is in train,” he said. “Halliday and Mrs. Michaels, my housekeeper, will look after you. But I’m obliged, as you no doubt understand, to take myself elsewhere.” He relinquished Lucie to her mother, crossed into one of the side rooms on the ground floor, and vanished.

Marcelline hadn’t time to wonder at his sudden departure—not that there was anything to wonder at. She understood that he needed to disassociate himself from them. He was merely providing refuge. It was philanthropy, nothing personal.

That explained, she supposed, why the servants treated them so kindly.

As Mrs. Michaels led them up the staircase, she provided the kind of running monologue housekeepers typically offered when taking visitors through a great house. The Noirot family learned that Clevedon House contained a hundred fifty rooms, more or less—“Who can be troubled to count them all?” Sophy whispered to Marcelline—and that it had been renovated and expanded over the centuries. She led them into one of the pair of wings his grace’s grandfather had added, which extended into a tree-lined garden.

The staff, Mrs. Michaels assured them, were accustomed to accommodating house guests on short notice. “Lady Adelaide, his grace’s aunt, was with us quite recently,” she said as she led them into a set of apartments in the north wing overlooking the garden. “Their ladyships his aunts often stay with us, whether his grace is in Town or not, and we pride ourselves on having the north wing always ready for company.”

In between pointing out some of the more spectacular furnishings as well as works of art, the housekeeper sent maids and footmen scurrying hither and yon, to make up fires in the rooms and find fresh clothing and draw hot baths.

True, the servants couldn’t completely conceal their curiosity about the new houseguests, but they seemed to accept the women calmly enough.

In fact, when Marcelline protested that her assigned bedroom was more than sufficient for them all—it was easily as large as the first floor of her shop—Mrs. Michaels looked shocked.

“We don’t want to cause an upheaval,” Marcelline said. “It’s only for the night.” The bed was enormous, and they’d slept all three sisters plus Lucie in a single, far smaller bed more than once.

“His grace’s orders were quite specific,” Mrs. Michaels said firmly. “The rooms are nearly ready. We’re merely seeing to the fires. His grace stressed the dangers of taking a chill after the recent ordeal. And perfectly right he was. Shocks like that are very weakening to the balance of the body. He was worried, in particular, about the little girl. But we’ve a good blaze now, in the sitting room.” She ushered them into one of two slightly smaller rooms adjoining Marcelline’s bedroom.

The housekeeper’s shrewd gaze went to Lucie, who’d forgotten her initial shyness and was wandering about the sitting room, gaping at the grandeur about her. “His grace said you would want a nursemaid for the young lady.”

Millie had disappeared shortly after Clevedon emerged with Lucie from the burning building. Since the maid was the one who’d let Lucie get away from her, she must have decided not to remain to face the consequences.

“Really, it isn’t necessary,” Marcelline said. “I can manage.”

Mrs. Michaels’s eyebrows went up. “Now, madam, I know you’ve had a dreadful time of it, but here are Mary and Sarah.” She beckoned, and two young maids stepped out from among the swarm of servants and curtseyed—quite as though the Noirots were persons of quality. “Very good with children, I assure you. I know you can do with a little rest and quiet while the maids tend to Miss Noirot. And his grace said particularly that the young lady was to see Lady Alice’s dollhouse. That was his grace’s late sister,” she explained in a lower voice to Marcelline. “He said he thought that playing with the dollhouse would take the child’s mind off her shocking experience.”

She moved to Lucie and, bending down, said gently, “Did his grace not promise you a dollhouse?”

“A dollhouse, yes, he did,” Lucie said. She held out the sooty doll, the doll that had nearly killed her, for Mrs. Michaels’s inspection. “And Susannah needs a bath.”

“And she shall have one,” said Mrs. Michaels, not in the least nonplussed. She straightened and put up her hand, and the two young maids drew nearer. “Would you like to have a bath as well? And then a little supper? Would you like to go with Sarah and Mary?”

Lucie looked at Marcelline. “May I go with them, Mama?”

Marcelline looked at the maids. They had eyes for no one but Lucie, of course. She was recovered enough to be winsome; and bedraggled and dirty though she was, her great blue eyes worked their usual magic on the unsuspecting.

“Yes, you may,” Marcelline said.

She would have added, They are not to indulge your every whim, but she knew that was a waste of breath. They would pet and spoil Lucie, and she would do as she pleased, and probably drive them mad, as she’d driven Millie mad. It was very difficult to discipline a charming child, even when she was extremely naughty. Lucie, who had the passionate nature and obstinacy of her ancestors, was also gifted with their complete lack of scruples. Being a child, she had not yet learned to get everything she wanted by guile. When her charm didn’t work, she threw stupendous temper fits.

Yet she’d had a terrifying time, and the pampering would not go amiss. The dollhouse would draw her mind away from what had happened in the shop. At any rate, it was only for a night, Marcelline told herself while she watched the maids lead Lucie away. And while Lucie played princess, Marcelline would have some quiet time to collect herself and plan what to do next.

It would have been easier if she weren’t under Clevedon’s roof, if her surroundings didn’t remind her of who and what he was…apart from being a desirable man who’d belonged to her for a short, short time.

But that was nothing, she told herself. It was lust, no more. From the start, she’d wanted him and he’d wanted her. She’d had him, and that turned out to be more than she’d bargained for.

Still, no matter what she’d bargained for, he was more than simply a desirable man. He was the Duke of Clevedon. She was a shopkeeper. She could never be anything more than a mistress to him. It was a position any of her ancestors would have accepted. But along with the family she had to consider, she had her own aspirations to keep in the front of her mind: the something she’d made of herself, the greater something she meant to be, the work she truly loved.

What was between them was done. It belonged to the past.

She had to think about the future.

They had to find lodgings. They needed a place to work. Sophy would need to deal with the newspapers immediately. Their story was a nine-days’ wonder, and Sophy must turn it to account…though it might already be too late. Headlines swam in Marcelline’s head. The duke’s heroics—yes, of course—running into a burning building to save a child—but then the newspapers would speculate about what he was doing there at that hour…and why he’d taken the lot of them home with him…and what his intended bride would make of it.

“Oh, my God,” she said. She clutched her forehead.

“What?” Sophy said. “You’re not panicking about Lucie, I hope.”

“It’s obvious that his grace has ordered his servants to dote on her,” Leonie said.

“And what better remedy could she have for her fears than this?” Sophy said with a sweeping gesture at their surroundings. “Nothing but luxury as far as the eye can see. And not one but two maids to slave for her. They’ll wash her curst doll, you may depend on it, and style her hair, I don’t doubt.”

“Not Lucie,” Marcelline said. “Lady Clara! Her dress! What on earth are we to do?”

Pritchett raced to her lodgings, packed, told her land-lady a story about a dying relative, and took a hackney to the Golden Cross Inn at Charing Cross. From there she sent a message to Mrs. Downes, explaining that she intended to board the very next coach to Dover, and if Mrs. Downes wanted any articles from her, she’d better get there quickly. The Royal Mail had left for the General Post Office at half-past seven, but if all went well, Pritchett could hire a post chaise, and would not have to wait for tomorrow’s day coach.

Mrs. Downes made her appearance before too long.

She made it clear she didn’t like being summoned at a late hour to a public inn, and liked still less transacting business in the coach yard. About them, despite the hour, horses were being harnessed, coachmen and postboys fraternized, inn servants came and went, prostitutes tried to lure passengers, and bawds hunted for innocent country lasses.

Ignoring the dressmaker’s sour look, Pritchett went straight to the point. “I got more than I expected. Found her portfolio, which they usually keep under lock and key.” She took out a drawing.

Mrs. Downes pretended to barely glance at it. “I heard about the fire,” she said with a shrug. “She’s finished.

These are worthless.”

Pritchett put the drawing back into the portfolio. “She has insurance and money in the bank. She’ll be back in business in a matter of weeks. She’s the most determined woman in London. If you don’t want these, I’ll take them with me. I shouldn’t have any trouble doing well with them in the provinces. The patterns are worth their weight in gold, and I know the trick of making them. I can expect to do a great deal better than twenty guineas. Yes, you’re quite right. They’re more good to me than they are to you.”

“You said twenty guineas,” Mrs. Downes said.

“That was for the sketchbook,” Pritchett said. “And tonight I was in a hurry enough to make it twenty for the portfolio as well. But now you’ve annoyed me.”

“I ought to report you. They hang people for arson.”

“I wonder what would happen if I said you put me up to it,” Pritchett said. “We’ll never know, I suppose. There’s my coach.” She nodded at a vehicle entering the inn yard. “Fifty guineas. Now or never.”

“I don’t carry that sort of money with me.”

Pritchett tucked the portfolio under her arm, picked up her bag, and started to walk away. She counted under her breath, “One. Two. Three. Four. F—”

“Wait.”

Pritchett paused without turning around.

Mrs. Downes walked very quickly toward her. Not a minute later, a very large purse changed hands, and a very short time thereafter, Pritchett stepped into the coaching office to order a post chaise.

Though she and her sisters had made a plan before they collapsed, exhausted, in their beds, Marcelline slept poorly.

She’d watched while one of the maidservants bathed Lucie—and the other one bathed the doll, taking off her filthy little gown and sponging her off—even sponging the soot from her hair—as though it was the most normal thing in the world. They took the doll’s dress away to clean, along with Lucie’s clothes. Then Lucie had to see the dollhouse. By that time, she had three maidservants wanting to look after her. They moved a dainty little bed into a pretty little room adjoining Marcelline’s. And that was where Lucie had wanted to sleep: not with her mother, but in state.

Her child was safe, probably safer than she’d ever been in all her short life. All the same, Marcelline had nightmares. She dreamed that Lucie hadn’t escaped the fire, and Marcelline had gone to the mouth of Hell, screaming for her daughter, and she’d heard horrible laughter in answer before the door slammed in her face.

The next morning, when the maid came in with chocolate, Marcelline discovered that she’d slept much later than usual. It was past nine o’clock, she was told, and Lucie was having breakfast with the duke.

She leapt from the bed, rejecting the chocolate. “Where are my sisters?” she said.

They’d agreed to rise by half-past six. The seamstresses had been told to go to the shop at eight. By now they would have arrived and found a charred spot where the shop used to be.

“Mrs. Michaels said we were not to disturb you, Mrs. Noirot,” the maid said. “But Miss Lucie was asking for you, and I was told I might wake you.”

Noirot didn’t burst into the breakfast room, and she didn’t seem any more flurried or disordered than usual. Her hair was slightly askew, as always, but in a manner Clevedon felt certain was deliberate, not careless. No matter what happened, she couldn’t present herself with anything less than style.

Her face was pale, her eyes deeply shadowed. She couldn’t have slept well. He hadn’t slept well, either, and he’d awakened in low spirits.

But then he’d come down to breakfast and found Lucie, with Joseph the footman’s assistance, investigating the sideboard’s contents. Seeing her made him smile, and lightened his heart.

Now she sat at his right, enthroned upon a chair piled with pillows. She was happily slathering butter and jam on bread. Her doll sat next to her, on another chair piled with pillows.

“Ah, here is your mother,” Clevedon said, while his heart pounded. So stupid it was to pound that way, like a boy’s heart upon seeing his first infatuation.

Noirot went to her daughter and kissed her forehead and smoothed her hair.

“Good morning, Mama,” Lucie said. “We’re going to drive in the carriage after breakfast. There is a very good breakfast on the sideboard. Joseph will help you lift the covers. There are eggs and bacon and all manner of breads and pastries.”

“I haven’t time for breakfast,” Noirot said. “As soon as your aunts come down, we must leave.”

Lucie’s blue eyes narrowed, and her face set into the hard expression Clevedon had seen before.

“And you will not make a fuss,” Noirot said. “You will thank his grace for his kindness—his many kind-nesses—”

“She’ll do nothing of the kind,” Clevedon said. “We were having an interesting conversation about the dollhouse. She’s scarcely had time to play with it. She was too sleepy last night. And I promised to drive her in the carriage. I do not see what the great hurry is to be gone.”

At this moment, the two sisters entered, looking cross. Doubtless they’d been awakened before they liked, and they were hungry.

“We need to get quickly to the shop and see what can be salvaged,” Noirot said. “Someone must be there to meet the seamstresses—if they’re there. We should have sent them word last night, but I didn’t think of it until this morning. I need them. We need to find a place to work. We need to make Lady Clara’s dress.”

He ought to wince at the mention of Clara. He ought to feel ashamed, and he did. But not enough to be thrown off the course he’d devised last night, to keep his mind off what had happened in the workroom, and off what he wanted, still, though he’d got what he wanted and was supposed to be done with this woman.

“I dispatched Varley, my man of business, to your shop early this morning, along with a parcel of servants,” he said. “They reported that the structure as a whole survived, though the damage is extensive. But the contents that were not reduced to ashes are black, wet, and reeking, as I suspected. We retrieved a set of iron strongboxes, which will be carried up to your rooms as soon as the filth has been cleaned from them.”

“Carried up—”

“Varley rescued some account books or some such from wherever you’d hidden them, as well.” He gestured at the sideboard. “Everything is in hand. Pray take some breakfast.”

“In hand?” she said, and he thought she staggered a bit. But that was his mind, playing tricks. Nothing staggered Noirot.

Yet she sat down hard, in the chair to his left, opposite Lucie.

“Shall I make you a plate, Mama?” Lucie said with a suspicious sweetness. “Joseph will help me.” She set down her cutlery, wiped her hands carefully on her napkin, and made to climb down from her throne. The footman Joseph obediently came forward, helped her down, and followed her to the sideboard. She pointed and he dutifully filled the plate according to her directions.

“It’s grand to be a duke,” the blonde sister said.

“So it is,” he said. “I live in a house large enough to accommodate your work without disrupting my own life. I have a good number of servants, all of whom will be happy to do something a little different, if offered. And I possess the resources to assist you, without the least discomfort to myself, in getting your business going again.”

Joseph set the filled plate down before Mrs. Noirot, then returned to Lucie, who directed him regarding her aunts’ breakfasts.

“Accommodate us?” Noirot said. “You can’t be serious.”

“I understand that time is of the essence,” he said. “You don’t wish to lose any more business than can absolutely be helped. I’ve consulted with Varley on the matter. It’s his opinion that a suitable new location can be found within a few days. In the meantime, he agreed that you can do what needs to be done more quickly and easily from here.”

“Here,” she repeated. “You’re suggesting we set up shop in Clevedon House.”

“It’s the simplest solution,” he said.

He knew it was. He’d thought about the problem and little else for most of the night. By concentrating on her business difficulties, he’d kept the other thoughts at bay. “I’m not used to so much drama in my life. I was too excited, you see, to fall asleep. While I lay awake, my mind gnawed on your dilemma.”

“It didn’t occur to you that your mind might be addled by all the excitement?”

“On the contrary, I believe my mind was sharpened by the experience, in the way that metal is sharpened after being thrust into a fierce flame,” he said.

Her dark gaze met his, and then he couldn’t block out the memory of their hurried, furious coupling on the worktable: her choked sounds of pleasure, the mad heat and ferocious joy…

Business, he told himself. Stick to business. Order. Logic.

“Mrs. Michaels can help you organize a proper work space,” he said. “You and your sisters may take my vehicles and servants, and purchase what you need to fill the most pressing orders. Your seamstresses may come here, as soon as you like, to start working. If you need additional help, Mrs. Michaels will select the better needlewomen from among the maids.”

Her face had gone very white, indeed. Her sisters were watching her. He couldn’t tell whether they were alarmed or not. They showed as little of their feelings as she did. But they must have sensed she needed help because the blonde jumped in.

“I like it better than our plan,” she said. “Marcelline was going to play cards, to win the money to buy what we needed.”

Marcelline.

He was aware of his pulse racing and of the mad excitement that made it race. So ridiculous. Through shipwreck, physical intimacy, catastrophic fire, they’d maintained the polite forms of address. She’d been “Noirot” to him and he was “your grace” or “Clevedon” to her. But now he sat among family members, and they’d revealed who she was to them.

He couldn’t say it aloud, but he could feel it on his tongue.

Marcelline. It was a name like a secret, a whisper in the dark.

She was all secrets and guile—and of course she would play cards to get money, he thought.

“We can send for Belcher,” the redhead said. “He and your grace’s solicitor—Varley, is it?—can draw up papers for a loan.”

“Nonsense,” Clevedon said. “Whatever your supplies cost can be only a fraction of what we give away to sundry charities every month.”

Noirot’s—Marcelline’s—color came and went. “We’re not a charity,” she said. She leaned toward him, and in a low, choked voice, she added, “I owe you my daughter’s life. Don’t make me owe you any more.”

His heart tightened into a fist, and it beat against his chest. There was a moment of pain so fierce he had to look away and catch his breath.

His gaze went to Lucie, the child he had saved.

Noirot thought it was a debt she owed him, one impossible to repay. She had no way of knowing the value of the gift he’d been given.

He couldn’t save Alice. He’d been far away when the accident happened. He knew he could never bring her back. He knew that saving this child could not bring her back.

But he knew, too, that when he’d carried Lucie, alive and unhurt, out of the burning building, he’d felt not only profound relief but a joy greater than anything he could have imagined.

Lucie, with Joseph’s help, was settling back upon her throne.

“It isn’t the same,” he said, scorning to whisper. Let the servants hear, and make what they would of it. “For once, put your pride aside and your need to dominate everybody, and do the sensible thing.”

“You’re the one who’s not being sensible,” she said. “Think of the talk.”

“My sister is being sensible in that regard, certainly,” the redhead said. “We can’t accept gifts from you, your grace. We’ve lost our shop, but we can’t lose our reputation.”

“We can’t give the tittle-tattles ammunition,” the blonde said. “Our rivals—”

“We have no rivals,” Noirot said, chin up, dark eyes flashing.

He bit back a smile.

“I mean, those who fancy themselves our rivals will be sure to tell lurid tales,” the blonde said.

He looked at Lucie. “What do you say, Erroll?”

“May I play with the dollhouse?”

“Of course you may, sweetling.”

To Noirot he said, “You three drive a hard bargain. A loan it is.”

“Thank you,” Noirot said. Her sisters echoed her. At her glance, they all rose. “May I leave Lucie in your servants’ care, your grace?” she said. “You’re all determined to spoil her, and she’s not going to discourage you, and I haven’t time for a battle of wills. We haven’t a minute to lose. We absolutely must have Lady Clara’s dress ready by seven o’clock this evening.”

He stared at her. “You must be joking,” he said. “Your shop burnt down. Surely your customers won’t expect you to complete orders today.”

“You don’t understand,” Marcelline said. “Lady Clara has nothing to wear to Almack’s tonight. I threw out all of her clothes. She must have that dress. I promised.”

Five o’clock that afternoon

Clevedon House was in a state of what its owner hoped was controlled chaos.

Servants hurried to and fro, some carrying in the goods the women had shopped for in the morning—what seemed to Clevedon like bales of fabric, along with boxes containing who knew what—while others raced from one part of the house to another, carrying messages or sustenance, fetching this or that from cupboards and closets and even the attics.

A bevy of seamstresses had arrived in the late morning, gaping at their surroundings before they disappeared into the rooms on the first floor set aside for the temporary workplace.

The redhead—Miss Leonie Noirot she turned out to be—at some point assured him that all would settle by tomorrow, once everyone was properly installed and their materials in place. She thanked him more than once for his rescue of the account books and only smiled when he told her that was none of his doing; he wouldn’t know a ledger from a book of sermons, never having looked into either item.

The blonde, meanwhile—she was Miss Sophia Noirot—had borrowed paper and pens and ink to write advertising for the newspapers. He’d offered his private study for her use, because Miss Leonie had told him that Sophy needed quiet in which to compose—really, it was like writing a chapter of a novel, she explained—and their work area was too busy, with people coming and going and Marcelline giving orders right and left.

Clevedon had retreated to the library. He could have fled the house altogether, but that seemed irresponsible. He’d started this; he ought to see it through. As it turned out, he was needed more than he’d supposed. Every now and again someone came by with a question only he could answer or a problem only he could solve. Usually, this was one of Noirot’s sisters, for madame herself kept scrupulously away, but sometimes it was Mrs. Michaels and occasionally Halliday, regarding one issue or other that puzzled even his omniscience.

The truth was, Clevedon didn’t want to flee. He found the enterprise vastly interesting. Every so often, he would stand in the library doorway to watch the hurrying to and fro. He would have liked to watch the women make Clara’s dress, but Miss Sophia had tactfully warned him away: The seamstresses would never be able to concentrate with a gentleman about, she said. As it was, the big footmen in their finery threw the women into a flutter.

Clevedon still had doubts they’d be able to finish the dress in time. The materials had not arrived until early afternoon, and what hints he’d caught of the design told him the labor involved would be prodigious.

At present he was scanning a copy of a woman’s magazine, La Belle Assemblée, that one of his aunts had left behind. Hearing approaching footsteps, he put the magazine down and pushed a heap of invitations on top of it.

The door opened and the footman Thomas announced Lord Longmore, who stormed in close on the servant’s heels, black eyes blazing. “Have you taken leave of your senses?” he demanded.

Thomas quietly made himself scarce.

“Good afternoon, Longmore,” Clevedon said. “I’m in excellent health, thank you. I regret to say that you seem to be in a state of delirium. I hope it isn’t a contagious fever. I’ve a rather large company in the house at present, and I should hate for them all to come down with whatever is ailing you.”

“Don’t talk rubbish,” Longmore said. “When I read this morning’s papers, I thought it was another of their lunatic fantasies—like that nonsense about suicidal scenes with a temperamental dressmaker. And so I attempted to tell my mother, who, as you can well imagine, is in a frenzy.”

That brought Clevedon back to earth with a thud.

He’d forgotten about Lady Warford. But what difference did it make? He refused to let her nerves and hysterias control his behavior. She was her husband’s problem.

“I come here because nothing must do, Mother says, but I must see for myself what my friend is about,” Long-more went on. “And what do I discover when I arrive? It turns out that the newspapers, not to mention my mother, have sadly understated the case. I find that my friend has settled three unwed women, not in a discreet cottage in Kensington, but in his ancestral home! And along with them another half dozen females—and the servants sweating like coal-carriers, fetching and carrying for shopkeepers! With my own eyes I saw Halliday carrying what looked to be a laundry basket. A laundry basket!”

The house steward oversaw the household. He kept his master’s books and acted as his secretary. He gave orders. He did not sully his hands with fetching and carrying. If he’d carried a basket, then Halliday was doing it for his own amusement—or as an excuse to appease his curiosity about the strangers in their midst.

Longmore was still ranting. “I know you like to play with convention,” he said, “but this—Plague take it, words fail me! Never mind my mother, how am I to look my sister in the eye?”

“Well, that’s amusing,” Clevedon said.

“Amusing?”

“Considering the women are here still only because of your sister,” Clevedon said. “They engaged to make a dress for Clara for this evening, and they seem to believe that nothing—acts of God or man, plague, pestilence, flood, famine, or fire—excuses them from keeping their promise. It is very curious. They seem to view a promise to make a dress in the same uncompromising light you and I would view a debt of honor.”

“The dress be damned,” Longmore said. “Have you been eating opium? Drinking absinthe? Contracted a fever? The clap, perchance? I understand it goes to the brain. That dressmaker—”

“Which one do you mean?” Clevedon said. “There are three of them.”

“Don’t play with me,” Longmore snapped. “By God, you’re enough to try the patience of all the saints and martyrs combined. You’ll drive me to call you out. I will not let you make a fool of my sister. You will not—”

He broke off because the door flew open and Miss Sophia hurried into the room. “Your grace, I wonder—”

She stopped short, apparently noticing Longmore belatedly. Or maybe she’d noticed the instant she came through the door, if not before. Clevedon suspected that both sisters were as well supplied with guile as Noirot. For all he knew, Miss Sophia had interrupted on purpose. They’d probably heard Longmore at the other end of the house.

In any case, he would have been hard for her to miss, not only because he was as tall as Clevedon but also because he was standing in her way.

But maybe she’d mistaken him for Clevedon. People did sometimes, from the back or from a distance. They were both large dark-haired men, though Longmore dressed more carelessly.

Whatever the reason, she appeared surprised and stopped short. “I do beg your pardon,” she said. “How rude of me to burst in.”

“Not at all,” Clevedon said. “I told you not to stand on ceremony with me. We haven’t time for ceremony. This is only my friend—or perhaps former friend—Lord Longmore. Longmore, though you don’t deserve it, I’ll allow you to meet Miss Noirot, one of our esteemed dressmakers.”

Longmore, meanwhile, who’d spun around at her abrupt entrance, had not taken his eyes off her. For a moment he appeared dumbstruck. Then he bowed. “Miss Noirot.”

“My lord.” She curtseyed.

And, oh, it was one of those curtsies, not precisely like Noirot’s, but something equally impressive in its own way.

Longmore’s black eyes widened.

“What is it, then?” Clevedon said.

Sophia’s blue gaze, suspiciously innocent, came back to him. “It’s about the notice we’re putting in the papers, your grace. I write these all the time, and you would think it’d give me no trouble at all, but I continue to struggle, in spite of having quiet.”

She’d heard, Clevedon thought. She’d heard Longmore raging, and she’d stepped in. She was the one who’d written the account for the papers of the famous gown Noirot had worn. She was the one in charge of turning difficulties and scandal to the shop’s advantage.

“It’s the shock,” Clevedon said, playing along. “You can’t expect to recover overnight, especially when everything is in a turmoil.”

“To be sure, I can’t judge my own prose,” she said. “Will you give me your opinion?” She shot a glance at Longmore. “If his lordship would pardon the intrusion.”

Longmore stalked away and flung himself onto the sofa.

“‘Mrs. Noirot begs leave to inform her friends and the public in general,’” she read, “‘that she intends re-opening her showrooms very shortly, with a new and elegant assortment of millinery and dresses, in the first style of fashion, on reasonable terms—’”

“Leave out ‘reasonable terms,’” Clevedon cut in. “Economies matter to the middling classes. If you want the custom of my friends’ ladies, it’s better to be unreasonable. If it isn’t expensive, they won’t value it.”

She nodded. “There, you see? Marcelline would have caught that—but I daren’t interrupt her. If Lady Clara’s dress isn’t finished on time, my sister will be devastated.”

Clevedon saw Longmore shoot the dressmaker a darkling look from under his thick black eyebrows. “If my mother lets her wear the dress,” he muttered.

Blue eyes wide, Sophia turned fully toward him. “Not let her wear the dress? You can’t be serious. My sister is killing herself to finish that dress.”

“My dear girl—” Longmore began.

“Our shop burned down,” Sophia said. “My sister’s little girl—my niece—the only niece I have—nearly died in that fire. His grace saved her life—he risked his own—he ran into a burning building.” Her voice was climbing. “He took us in—he’s lent us money to buy supplies—we are all running ourselves ragged to fulfill our obligations to our customers—and you say—you say your mother won’t let Lady Clara wear our dr-dress.” Her voice shook. Tears shimmered in her blue eyes.

Longmore leapt up from the sofa. “I say,” he said. “There’s no need to take on.”

Sophia drew herself up. “If her ladyship your mother says a word against that dress—against my sister—after what she’s endured—I promise you, I shall personally, with my own bare hands, strangle her, marchioness or no.”

She threw down the advertisement she’d written and stalked out of the room, slamming the door behind her.

Longmore picked up the piece of paper, opened the door, and went after her.

Clevedon waited until their footsteps had faded. Then he clapped his hands. “Well done, Miss Noirot,” he said. “Well done.”

Smiling, he quietly closed the door, and returned to perusing La Belle Assemblée.

Clevedon had taken the magazine to the writing table. He was making notes when the door opened, only far enough for a bonneted head to make its appearance.

“I’m going,” Noirot said. The bonnet withdrew, and she started to close the door.

He rose and started to the door. “Wait.”

She stuck her head in again. “I haven’t time to wait,” she said. “I only wanted you to know the dress is done.” She spoke coolly enough, yet he detected the note of triumph in her voice.

He reached the door, and opened it fully.

She had what appeared to be a shrouded body in her arms.

That must be the dress, tucked in among layers of tissue paper, and wrapped, like a mummy, in muslin.

“You’re not carrying it yourself,” he said. “Where’s a footman?” He saw one loitering against the corridor wall. “There. You, Thomas.”

“No.” She waved Thomas back to his post in the corridor. “I promised to deliver it personally, and it will not leave my hands.”

He glanced down at the corpse. “May I see it?” he said.

“Certainly not. I haven’t time to unwrap it and wrap it up again. You’ll see it tonight, and be astonished, like everybody else. At Almack’s.”

Almack’s. A weight settled upon him. Another Wednesday night with the same people who gathered there every Wednesday night during the Season. The same conversations, enlivened by the latest scandal. That would be him, most likely, tonight. They’d be whispering about him behind their fans, behind their cards. Lady Warford would have plenty to say, and would imagine she expressed herself with the greatest subtlety while she dropped indignant hints as large and unmistakable as elephant dung.

He remembered what Longmore had said about his mother not allowing Clara to wear the dress. “I’d better come with you,” he said. “Longmore was here—”

“I know,” she said. “Sophy dealt with him. And I’ll deal with Lady Warford, if that becomes necessary. I doubt it will. When Lady Clara sees herself in this dress—but never mind, I haven’t time to boast, and you’d be bored, in any event.”

“No, I wouldn’t be bored,” he said. He’d been reading La Belle Assemblée. He had ideas. “I’ve been—”

“It’s half-past six,” she said. “I’ve still got to get to Warford House.”

“Take the curricle,” he said.

“I don’t know what I’m taking,” she said. “Halliday promised I’d have your fastest vehicle. They’re waiting for me.”

He wanted to go with her. He wanted to see the dress, and Clara’s face when she saw it. He wanted them all to see that it was business, and Noirot was not only talented but principled—to a point—when it came to her work, in any case—and honorable—to a point—when it came to her work, in any case…

But that, to his shame, wasn’t the only reason he wanted to go with her.

He was near enough to breathe her scent, to see the faint wash of color come and go in her cheeks…and the pearly glow of her skin where the light caught it…and the tendrils of dark hair straying artfully from her bonnet, curling near her ears. He wanted to bring his hand up to cup her face and turn it to his and bring his mouth to hers…

Stupid, stupid, stupid.

And ignoble as well, when she was carrying Clara’s dress, and he loved Clara and had always loved her and couldn’t bear the thought of hurting her.

He’d caused trouble enough. Lady Warford had probably been harassing Clara all day long, blaming her for Clevedon’s negligence and misbehavior. The jealous cats who pretended to be their friends would be sure to sharpen their claws on Clara, too.

He stepped back from the door. “I should be a great idiot to keep you, after you’ve achieved what I could have sworn was impossible.”

She stepped back, too. “Let’s hope they let me deliver it.”