Читать книгу The Captain's Courtesan - Lucy Ashford, Lucy Ashford - Страница 11

By the time that Rosalie let herself into Helen’s house in Clerkenwell, it was almost midnight. Lighting the lamp in the kitchen, she made a pot of tea quietly so as not to wake anyone. Then she sat down by the embers of the fire, still huddled in her cloak. Tonight had been a disaster—not least her encounter with the Captain, who’d managed to disturb her peace of mind in a manner that she guessed would cause her more than one sleepless night.

Why was he there?

Be honest with yourself, Rosalie. Why did any men go there? They went, of course, be they lords or tradesmen, to ogle the girls and pick out one for an hour of lechery upstairs. And at a place like that, her sister’s seducer would have found it easy to spot Linette, with her head full of fanciful dreams.

She drew some blank paper from a nearby table towards her and by the light of the lamp started writing, assuming the easy-going tones of her alter ego, Ro Rowland. Since childhood, she’d found that it helped to write. Her earliest stories had been fantasies, a way of escaping into a place where happy endings existed. Later she’d found that wit was an even more effective weapon against the cruelty of strangers and this was now Ro Rowland’s world—a world not one of heartbreak, but of wry, almost cynical humour.

Tonight your fellow about town Ro Rowland took himself to the well-known Temple of Beauty. And there he observed … The Captain. Damn him, damn him. She stared into the distance, her thoughts unravelling once more. A fencing master, Sal had said.

It had been a long time since Rosalie allowed herself to think of any man with anything other than suspicion. Yet the thought of an hour alone with that dark-haired rogue, using the private room in Dr Barnard’s house for the purpose it was intended, set off a disturbing wobble somewhere at the pit of her stomach. She could not forget the rough silk of his lips and tongue; the warm, muscle-packed strength of his body—his aroused body—moving against hers … Oh, Lord. You stupid fool.

Suddenly she heard footsteps out in the hallway and Helen padded in, her long nightshirt covered by a large India shawl. Rosalie jumped to her feet. ‘I’m so sorry, Helen. I didn’t mean to wake you!’

‘I was awake anyway. I heard the hackney and I’m just so glad you’re back safely … Rosalie, why are you still wearing your cloak?’

Because I’m wearing next to nothing underneath it! Airily Rosalie replied, ‘Oh, I’m a little cold, that’s all. Would you like some tea?’

‘Yes, please.’ Helen pushed her loose brown hair back from her face, adjusted her spectacles and flopped down in a chair. ‘How did you get on at the Temple of Beauty? Was it full of fat old roués?’

‘They weren’t all old!’

‘But they’re all despicable, the men who patronise such entertainments! Oh, I knew that you shouldn’t go.’

Rosalie decided there and then that it just wasn’t safe to tell her friend any more. ‘I was perfectly all right.’ What a terrible lie. ‘It was actually quite boring.’ An even worse lie. Rosalie quickly poured Helen’s tea and curled up on the small settee opposite her. ‘Helen, did you manage to get The Scribbler out everywhere today?’

Helen immediately looked happier. ‘I did. That piece you wrote about the swells in Hyde Park is going down an absolute treat.’

‘Good! Though I hope none of the men I described recognises himself; I’d really hate to get you into trouble. Did you take Toby with you to deliver them?’

Helen sipped her tea. ‘Yes, but I left Katy with Biddy; she’s happy with her.’

Biddy O’Brien was a warm-hearted young Irish neighbour who kept house for her brothers, all in the building trade. She came in every day to clean Helen’s home and the children adored her.

‘Thank goodness for Biddy,’ said Rosalie fervently. ‘But, Helen, you really should allow me to pay you for letting Katy and me stay here.’ She had offered before, but had always been refused.

Helen chuckled. ‘Your Ro Rowland articles are payment enough, believe me. I’ve never sold so many copies of The Scribbler, and people are always asking me who the real Ro Rowland is!’ Her face suddenly became more serious. ‘We’re two sides of the same coin, you and I. You expose the wealthy by making fun of them, whereas I hope to shame them by pointing out the truth. Just as in my report the other day about that haughty woman—the wife of an earl, no less!—who had a young maidservant whipped and dismissed, simply because she accidentally dropped a vase. A paltry vase, Rosalie!’

‘I know. The poor, poor girl …’ Rosalie hesitated. ‘Helen, I did just wonder. If this earl or his wife should hear of your article …’

‘I mentioned no names. And even if they guess, they’ll not dare to take action. That would be as good as admitting their own guilt!’ replied Helen crisply. ‘You know, it’s as if the so-called lower classes aren’t human to these people! Though it’s one thing for me to be as outspoken as I am, but quite another for you, you’re so much younger. Sometimes I even wonder if you should be writing your articles for me.’

‘What, me stop being Ro Rowland? Dear Helen, I adore writing; if you didn’t print my pieces in The Scribbler, I’d find someone else to publish them, I assure you! I am twenty-one, after all! I love exploring London, and all the fascinating people I meet on its streets …’ Her smile faded. ‘Well, nearly all of them.’

‘Be careful. That’s all,’ said Helen crisply. ‘And, Rosalie dear—’ Helen was already delving into a pile of notes on the table ‘—if you’re determined to keep writing as Ro Rowland—’

‘Try to stop me!’

‘In that case, I thought that this might be just up your street, because I know that you were, only the other day, starting to write an article about the rapacious landlords of London who let out hovels for high rents to desperate people!’

Rosalie nodded. The practice known as rackrenting was a subject close to her heart, not least because of that dreadful room off the Ratcliffe Highway where her sister had died.

Helen was adjusting her spectacles and running her finger down a sheet of her own notes. ‘As chance would have it, I heard today about a place in—yes, Spitalfields—that takes disgraceful advantage of poor soldiers. It’s called Two Crows Castle, and it’s not a real castle at all, but a rundown barracks of a place, owned by some ne’er-do-well—I haven’t got his name—who lets out rooms at exorbitant rents to unemployed soldiers. I thought you might investigate.’

‘Of course! Spitalfields, you said? Where, exactly?’

‘The house is in Crispin Street. It’s an unsavoury area even by daylight, so I trust you’re not even thinking of actually going there, my dear! But what I did hope was that tomorrow you might deliver a bundle of Scribblers to the news vendor in Bishopsgate, which is close by. You could take one of Biddy’s brothers with you and just ask some of the shopkeepers there—carefully, mind!—about this Two Crows place.’

Building work was slack this time of year and Rosalie knew that one or other of Biddy’s burly brothers could usually be relied upon to take on extra jobs for Helen—repair work to Helen’s house, errands, or in this case, thought Rosalie wryly, a spot of personal protection.

Rosalie patted Helen’s hand. ‘It sounds just my sort of story. I’ll get your Scribblers delivered, and I’ll make sure I’ve got an O’Brien brother with me before I start asking any questions about crooked rackrenters.’ She was just getting up to tidy away the tea things when the door opened and two sleepy little figures stood there hand in hand.

‘Toby!’ cried Helen. ‘Katy! What are you doing, out of your beds?’

Toby clung to Katy’s hand protectively. ‘She was crying,’ he explained. ‘I thought one of you would hear her, but you didn’t. She’s upset.’

‘Oh, Katy darling.’ Rosalie picked up and hugged the tear-stained infant, who was clutching her battered rag doll. ‘Poor Katy, what’s the matter?’

‘Mama,’ whispered the child. ‘I want Mama.’

Rosalie kissed her, at the same time fighting down the sudden ache in her throat. Taking Katy upstairs to the cot in the corner of the bedroom they shared, she gently sang her to sleep. Tenderness and love she could give in abundance; she would also fight, with all her strength, to make sure Katy was not pointed at, whispered at, as she and her sister used to be as children.

Taking off her cloak at last, she smoothed down her filmy muslin gown and stared into the darkness beyond the candlelight as another memory wrenched her: of her mother dressing both her children carefully for the Christmas service at the nearby church. It had been their second winter in England and snow lay thickly. ‘Mama,’ Rosalie had said, ‘do we have to go? I don’t think they like us there …’

‘Christmas is different, ma chère,’ had said her mother, wrapping Rosalie’s scarf tightly against the winter chill. ‘It is the season of goodwill to all.’

But not to the Frenchwoman and her family. The vicar had turned them away. And her mother’s stricken face, as they trudged home through the snow, would stay with Rosalie for ever.

That same night Rosalie had written a story for Linette, about a party at a magical castle. Linette’s face had lit up as she read it. ‘Will I ever go inside a real castle?’

‘Some day, why not? There’ll be food, and dancing, and—oh, we shall wear such pretty dresses, Linette!’

‘There might be a prince!’ Linette’s eyes shone. ‘And he will dance with me, and I will be a princess … Won’t I, Rosalie? Won’t I?’

Now Linette was dead, along with all her dreams. As Helen bustled around downstairs putting out the lamps, and Katy slept, Rosalie vowed anew that she would never rest, until she’d found the man who’d destroyed her sister’s life.

Lord Stephen Maybury was sitting alone in the candlelit library of his fine house in Brook Street. And the more he pondered on the events of the evening, the darker grew his thoughts. The girl. The girl with impossibly fair hair and turquoise eyes, at the Temple of Beauty tonight … Who in hell was she?

When Markin, his serving man, had informed him earlier about the new one who’d joined Dr Barnard’s troupe of so-called actresses, and how she resembled the other, Stephen had put it down to Markin’s imagination.

But Markin, whose visage was made sinister by a pale scar, had been, in his way, adamant. Markin had spies everywhere; that was what Stephen paid him for. Markin had seen her himself, he’d told his master, entering the building early this evening to get ready for her first night on stage with the other women. Looking nervous.