“Nay,” Annabelle put in, “I could ill afford it.”
“Yes, where else but in our wild theater could you find ready entertainment and a host of fops slobbering at your heels?” Colin snapped.
When Annabelle glared at him, Lady Falkham said, “Pay Colin no mind, dear. He’s become tedious these days, I’m afraid. He probably thinks men should be allowed to dance and sing and sow their seed freely while women sit prettily at home waiting for their poor drunken lords to show them some attention.”
“That’s a lie, and you know it,” he protested. “Besides, when did you become so freethinking, Mina? I don’t see you allowing every gallant in London to follow you about.”
“Ah, but that’s because I don’t have a poor drunken fool for a husband. Though if I ever found him sowing his seed anywhere but in my field, first I’d crush his plow, then not waste one moment in finding myself a string of gallants.”
“A ruthless woman,” Colin said with a laugh. “Well, if the time ever comes for you to seek interests farther afield, pigeon, do remember me.”
Lady Falkham rolled her eyes. “Oh, of course. I could join the other fifty women who’ve tried to capture your heart.”
With a scowl, he glanced at Annabelle. “It hasn’t been so many,” he muttered and rose to go stand by the window.
“Gossip has it to be a hundred,” Lady Falkham teased. “Be glad I’ve allowed for some exaggeration.”
Though Charity smothered a laugh, Annabelle found it impossible to smile.
“Well, that’s neither here nor there,” Colin growled. “We should be discussing our plans to save Annabelle from a rogue who truly has had a hundred women. Or more.”
Lady Falkham flashed her a knowing smile. Annabelle liked Colin’s friend more than she’d expected. Anyone who could parry Colin’s witty comments word for word drew her admiration.
But she did envy Lady Falkham her easy friendship with him. Not to mention the respect he showed the woman. Annabelle would give anything to have him consider her in such high esteem. Alas, Lady Falkham was nobility—a countess, no less—and . . . and . . .
I’m nobility, too.
Mother had been a knight’s daughter. Yet Annabelle no longer felt like a noblewoman or even a gentlewoman. The theater had made her wonder who she was. Squire’s stepdaughter? Earl’s daughter? Actress? Wanton? They seemed like so many roles disguising Annabelle of Norwood.
Oh, if only she could simply be Annabelle of Norwood again.
“Well?” Colin asked impatiently. “What are you waiting for? Let’s get to it. We don’t have all night.”
With a laugh, Lady Falkham sprang into action. She sent Charity to the apothecary’s for oxeye daisy and black alder while Colin went in search of a boy to send a message to the Earl of Falkham about his wife’s whereabouts.
He returned just as Lady Falkham finished mixing up the balm. Annabelle couldn’t help noticing that he seemed tenser now.
“I supposed Garett will be furious with me when I arrive home,” Lady Falkham commented when Colin entered.
“No doubt. But I’m sure you can sweeten his temper with a kiss, pigeon.” Colin sat down at the table, his eyes on Annabelle, who was spooning soot out of the fire grate to use to blacken under her eyes. “Where’s Charity?”
“She’s gone down to tell my landlady how ill I’m feeling. It wouldn’t do to have the woman give the lie to our tale.”
“Well, it’s done,” Lady Falkham announced, wiping her fingers on a rag. “Are you ready to have this ghastly mess rubbed in?”
Annabelle sighed. “I suppose we’ll have to put it all over.”
“Certainly anywhere that might be exposed when you leap out of bed to vomit. Your back, neck, legs, arms, upper chest . . .”
That got Colin’s attention. “Can I watch?”
“No!” both women cried in unison. Then they went into her bedroom. Annabelle stripped down to her smock and slipped into bed.
Lady Falkham appeared embarrassed. “If I could let you rub it on yourself, I would, but in truth, I worry about the amount. Too much and it might blister your skin. Too little and there will be no effect. Better if I do it myself.”
“It’s all right.” Annabelle forced a smile. “In the theater, I’ve grown used to being seen half-dressed.”
To Lady Falkham’s credit, she managed not to expose much of Annabelle’s skin at a time. Her matter-of-fact chatter as she worked put Annabelle at ease, too. Until she had Annabelle turn onto her stomach.
Just as Annabelle realized that she shouldn’t let Lady Falkham see her back, the noblewoman drew down her smock and gasped.
Colin rushed in at the sound, and Annabelle turned swiftly onto her back. She should have thought to prepare Lady Falkham for the scars from her stepfather’s whippings. The woman looked white as chalk.
“What is it?” Colin demanded. “ ’Sdeath, Mina, you haven’t hurt her with that concoction, have you?”
With her eyes, Annabelle begged her ladyship not to speak. If Colin knew, he’d ask a million infernal questions.
Lady Falkham gave her the barest of nods. “I merely knocked my knee against the bedstead, Hampden. Now, get out, so I can finish.”
Colin stared at them a moment longer, then left.
“Thank you,” Annabelle whispered.
Annabelle could see the questions in the woman’s gaze but could never answer them, not when Lady Falkham was such a good friend of Colin’s.
After that, they finished quickly. Colin went off to Lady Falkham’s carriage across the street, where he could watch for Rochester. Charity bustled about trying to make the bedroom appear more like a sickroom. And Lady Falkham held the emetic ready to give Annabelle as soon as Rochester arrived.
Then they settled down to wait.
Chapter Nine
“Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale
Her infinite variety; other women cloy
The appetites they feed, but she makes hungry
Where most she satisfies . . .”
—William Shakespeare, Antony and Cleopatra, Act 2, Sc. 2
As Colin waited in Mina’s carriage, all he could think about was Annabelle and their ruse. What if it didn’t work? What if she either made a fool of herself and Mina or found herself bound for Whitehall despite it all?
If she made a fool of Mina before Rochester, Falkham would never forgive him. Mina had enough problems with her reputation as it was, since people regarded her abilities as a healer and her half-Gypsy blood with suspicion. Colin didn’t even want to think how Falkham might react to hear that his wife had been involved in some scandalous actress’s scheme.
Then again, Mina was glad to do it, and what other choice had they had?
You could have refused to help her.
Yes. Then he’d have sentenced himself to the torment of imagining her in the king’s arms. Hell and furies, but this one woman roused in him a peculiarly possessive instinct. No doubt about it, the Silver Swan had bewitched him.
Still, whenever he thought of her fear and the silent sadness in her eyes, he knew he would do it all over again if he had the chance. What gentleman could have resisted an appeal as desperate as hers?
The sound of a carriage approaching interrupted his thoughts. He pushed aside the velvet curtain just in time to see Rochester’s coach pull up across the street. His heart hammered as the earl climbed out and sauntered inside.
Damn the man! Colin hated to think of Rochester going within two miles of Annabelle in her smock.
So Colin waited with his pulse quickening by the moment. He could see only Annabelle’s window and the light on in her rooms. After an ungodly amount of time, Rochester came out of the lodging house looking quite green.
Alone.
The relief that flooded Colin was so intense he marveled at it. He hadn’t realized until now how fearful he’d been that they wouldn’t pull it off. It was all he could do to wait until Rochester’s coach turned the corner, leaping f
rom Mina’s carriage and hurrying back into Annabelle’s lodging house.
He’d made it halfway up the stairs when he heard peals of laughter coming from Annabelle’s room. Damnable women! Didn’t they have enough sense to keep up the pretense until they were certain Rochester was gone for good?
Determined to teach them a lesson, he took the remaining steps two at a time, then rapped on the door with imperious insistence. Everything went silent.
Charity’s voice asked, “Who is it?”
In his best approximation of Rochester’s bored tones, he said, “Lord Rochester.”
“One moment, milord,” Charity called out.
He could hear them scurrying about inside. Then the door swung open to reveal a white-faced Charity and Mina standing behind her.
As Charity slumped in relief, Mina cried, “For shame, Hampden, scaring us like that! You’re no gentleman to play such a trick on us.”
He entered and shut the door behind him. “I could hear you hens cackling all the way down the stairs,” he grumbled. “Rochester could easily have come back for . . . for—”
“For what?” Annabelle asked as she came out of her bedchamber. She still wore only her smock, and although her face was flushed, he thought her the loveliest woman he’d ever seen. Only Annabelle could fake an illness and still look ravishing.
“For another look at you in your smock,” he growled.
Annabelle and Mina glanced at each other, then burst into laughter.
“Me in my smock?” Annabelle said between gasps. “I don’t think he noticed. He was too busy recoiling from my vomiting!”
“I assure you, Hampden, he hadn’t a thought in his head about Annabelle’s attire,” Mina put in. “You should have seen this pair. Annabelle moaned like a woman on the verge of death. Then when she emptied her stomach in the chamber pot, Charity set up a pretend wailing for her poor mistress that would have awakened the dead.”
“ ’Tweren’t all pretend, milady,” Charity said with wide eyes. “I tell you, I never saw anybody cast up her accounts so violently in all my life.”
Annabelle grinned. “That emetic worked quite well. Lord Rochester couldn’t wait to escape the smell.”
“Everything turned out splendidly, didn’t it?” Mina exclaimed. “It was delightful fun, for me at any rate. I only wish you could have seen it, Hampden. I had to force Lord Rochester to put his hand on Annabelle’s head to feel her ‘fever.’ He wanted to bolt the moment she swung her head over the side of the bed.”
Her eyes twinkled. “But we kept him a bit longer just to torment him, and the whole while he was edging toward the door. I swear, it’ll be a long time before Lord Rochester agrees to play messenger for His Majesty again.”
At Mina’s mention of the king, Annabelle’s smile faded. “Aye, I doubt Lord Rochester will return.” She shot Colin a worried glance. “But the king can always send someone else. I don’t think we could manage this ruse twice.”
Colin’s temper rose at the very thought. “We won’t have to. I’ll make sure of that.”
“How?” Annabelle asked.
“We’ll discuss that later,” he said evasively.
The seriousness in his voice dampened their good spirits, and a heavy silence descended on the room.
Colin’s eyes met Annabelle’s. She knew it was time for her reckoning, and he forced himself to ignore the sudden alarm in her face. He’d done as he’d promised to gain her secrets, and now he damn well deserved to have them.
“I’m off, then,” Charity announced. “If none of you have further need of me. I have a supper engagement.”
“Oh yes,” Annabelle said dryly. “Do enjoy yourself.”
“Tell Sir John I said you deserve a reward for your service to your mistress this day,” Colin put in.
Charity halted to glare at him. “For all you know, milord, I’m meeting someone else.”
When he arched an eyebrow, she colored, then hurried from the room.
Mina was busy tidying up, although he noticed she kept watching him and Annabelle. Well, he’d put a stop to that. This was one discussion he intended to have without an audience. “It’s time you went home, Mina. Falkham will be beside himself with worry by now, despite my note. I’ll walk you to the carriage; it’s waiting at the end of the alley.”
Mina stopped wiping the table to stare at him. “You’re not coming with me?”
His eyes locked with Annabelle’s. “Annabelle and I have some unfinished business.”
She met his gaze steadily, acknowledging that he’d earned his payment.
Mina glanced from him to Annabelle, then hesitated, as if about to say something. But she seemed to think better of it. “Let’s go, then.”
As she walked to the door, Colin told Annabelle, “I’ll be back shortly.”
She nodded.
He and Mina descended the stairs in silence, but as soon as they’d walked out into the night air, Mina rounded on him. “Listen to me, Hampden. I don’t care what Annabelle has done or said to you. She’s not the kind of woman you think she is.”
Her fiercely protective air irritated him. “How do you know what kind of woman I think she is?”
“You think she deserves your censure. You treat her like a woman who can’t be trusted.” She tipped her chin up. “Perhaps she can’t. I don’t know.”
“No, you don’t.”
She ignored his acid comment. “But no matter what she’s done, she deserves some consideration from you. That woman has suffered. I don’t think you should make her suffer further.”
Mina had obviously become attached to Annabelle, so it would do him little good to try convincing her of Annabelle’s coldhearted side. Still, it annoyed him that Mina should presume so much about his relationship to the woman.
“When did you become so concerned about the private affairs of an actress?” he snapped.
“When I discovered that the actress was intelligent, witty, and interesting. Not at all like the barely educated women they pull out of the slums and throw into the theaters these days.”
“You’re right about that. Annabelle is anything but ordinary.”
“Then I hope you admit she should be treated with care.”
Stung by her lack of faith in him, he glowered at her. “Have I ever treated a woman otherwise?”
“Nay. But neither have I ever seen you react this strongly to one. I suspect she’s capable of rousing your anger more than any.”
’Sdeath, but the woman could read minds. “What lies between me and Annabelle is none of your affair,” he bit out.
“It became my affair when you brought me here to help her.”
“Annabelle would find that amusing, I’m sure.” He tried for a flippant tone, but managed only to sound bitter. “She considers herself quite capable of fending off any unwanted attentions.”
“She hasn’t fended them all off successfully, I assure you.”
That raised a cold chill within him. “What do you mean?”
A sudden flush suffused her face. “I shouldn’t say. She wouldn’t wish it.”
“Has she told you something about her past?” he prodded.
“I saw something,” she mumbled.
“What?” He remembered Mina’s gasp while she was spreading the balm on Annabelle’s back. “Damn it, Mina, tell me what you saw.”
“She . . . she has scars on her back from where someone whipped her rather mercilessly. Some of the marks were recent, but some were faint, probably done when she was a good deal younger.” She grabbed his arm. “Someone has mistreated that poor woman from the time she was merely a girl. Remember that when you . . . take care of your ‘unfinished business.’ ”
Bile rose in his throat at the thought of Annabelle being whipped. “Hell and furies, what black devil would do such a thing?”
“I don’t know.” Mina shuddered. “We didn’t discuss it. But I think she wishes you not to know, so don’t tell her I told you.”
He thou
ght of Annabelle’s defensiveness, of how she shied from him sometimes. It was a wonder she allowed anyone close to her at all. To think that she’d held such a terrible secret inside her all this time, never daring to trust another with her pain. It made him want to murder whoever had abused her.
“One more thing,” Mina said, jerking him from his dark thoughts. “She may react later to the balm or the other herbs. If she does, she’ll have trouble sleeping.”
He scowled. “I thought your balm was harmless?”
“It is, it is. But if . . . it should happen to cause her problems later . . .” She pressed a pouch into his hand. “Here’s a powder to help her sleep. Tell her to use it if she feels uncomfortable. All right?”
Still frowning, he tucked the pouch under the sash about his waist. How ironic that Mina should offer Annabelle, of all people, a sleeping potion.
Mina’s hand still lay on his arm. “You’ll be gentle with her, won’t you, Hampden?”
Her sympathy for a woman she’d just met touched him. Obviously, Mina had made some assumptions about what he planned to do to Annabelle. Coming from any other noblewoman, her bluntness would have shocked him, but he’d long ago come to admire Mina for her straightforwardness.
“Don’t worry.” He laid his hand over hers. “ ’Tis not my intent to hurt or force her. I merely wish some questions answered.”
She searched his face, then smiled, apparently satisfied. “I’ve always thought you a good man. Now I know it.”
As they walked on to the carriage, he held her words close in his heart, hoping she wasn’t mistaken. After all, good men didn’t spy on young women with tragic pasts unless they were prepared to take responsibility for dealing with what they learned.
He was beginning to think that in Annabelle’s case, that might be a large responsibility indeed.
Chapter Ten
“For one heat, all know, doth drive out another,
One passion doth expel another still.”
—George Chapman, Monsieur D’Olive, Act 5, Sc. 1
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