by Erica Ridley
That his charges were every creed and color only made them more delightful. The boys didn’t bond over shared backgrounds. They bonded because for once, they all believed in their future.
After consuming every drop of lemonade in the pitchers, the lads wiped their upper lips and assumed their posts shadowing their assigned journeymen. Giles could not hide his fondness of the six bright-eyed children their neighborhood had previously given up on.
He glanced up at the sight of a carriage halting just outside the open doors of the smithy. When he caught sight of the ducal crest upon the door, Giles strode outside to attend to the visitor himself.
The door opened to reveal one of the Duke of Colehaven’s footmen.
“Harris,” Giles said warmly. “How have you been?”
“Very well, Mr. Langford.” The footman stepped down from the carriage. “And yourself?”
“Can’t complain,” Giles answered.
It was true. Business was booming, with every year even more successful than the last. Only a sentimental fool would grumble because he had no partner to share it with.
The sign overhead read Langford, just as it had done for thirty years. Father had promised to repaint it Langford & Langford once Giles commissioned his first paying client on his own, thereby proving himself worthy of becoming a full partner. Then the tremors started. Giles became the only Langford in the smithy long before either of them were ready.
He didn’t need a partner, Giles reminded himself. The past fifteen years had proved that. He had done far more than commission a single paying client. The smithy was now flanked by a large carriage house and a full mews, and had become as revered for some people as Vauxhall or Buckingham Palace.
To have accomplished all that as a solitary Langford should make him proud, not sad.
“How can I be of service?” he asked Harris.
The footman handed him a folded square of paper bearing a wax seal. “Message from His Grace. He would appreciate your immediate reply.”
Giles accepted the letter. The Duke of Colehaven was one of the smithy’s most important clients. They had met ten years ago this spring, when His Grace and a cohort had formed the Wicked Duke tavern near the Haymarket and opened its doors to any man, regardless of background or status.
Seeing an opportunity to expand his client list into the lucrative world of the ton, Giles had forged some items for Colehaven for free, in order to prove the speed and quality of his work. The gamble paid off. With the vocal support of a young, popular duke, the cachet of being one of Giles’s valued clients exploded overnight.
Whatever favor was requested inside the folded missive, Giles would see to it at once. Although His Grace might not realize it, Colehaven had rescued the Langford smithy when it teetered on the precipice of failure. A debt like that could never fully be repaid.
He broke the seal without further ado.
* * *
Langford,
In a fortnight, my curricle must win a race. I realize I am scarcely giving an hour’s notice, but please let my man know if you can pay my carriage house a visit this afternoon at four o’clock for a quick inspection of the vehicle.
Colehaven
* * *
“Please.” That was another way Colehaven was different from other peers. His Grace never failed to treat Giles as though a coach smith’s time was just as valuable as his own.
“Of course.” Giles refolded the letter. “Please let His Grace know I will present myself at his carriage house by four o’clock as requested.”
“Right away.” Harris disappeared without delay.
Giles turned back toward his smithy and paused. His journeymen and their studious apprentices were busy at their posts. Colehaven was one of their most valued clients. Since Giles was not needed in the smithy at the moment, was there any reason to make His Grace wait?
Bunyan, the duke’s stablemaster, was a jolly, friendly fellow, and had been an associate of Giles’s father long before the current duke had inherited the title. It would be splendid to see the irreverent old codger again.
In the interest of speed, Giles took a horse rather than a carriage, and made his way to Grosvenor Square. He tied his horse to a post along the narrow cobblestone lane behind the town house and headed toward the open carriage doors at the rear.
“Good afternoon,” he called out as he approached.
Although no one came to greet him, the sound of scurrying feet indicated his presence had caused some sort of stir.
“Are you certain?” whispered a youthful voice from behind the closest carriage.
“Positive,” an excited voice whispered back. “I swear it’s the Curricle King. He’s been here before.”
Giles hid his grin and pretended he hadn’t overheard. “Good afternoon, lads. Is Bunyan about?”
Three boys stepped out from behind the carriage with flushed cheeks and wide eyes.
“B-Bunyan?” stammered one.
“We expect ’im in an hour,” said the other.
So much for offering prompt service by arriving early to his appointment. Now that Giles was here, however, going home just to turn around and come back would be a ridiculous waste of his time. He might as well glance over the carriage in order to have his report ready for Bunyan when the man arrived at four.
“I’m here to inspect the curricle,” he informed the stable boys. “Do you mind if I get started?”
The lads exchanged doubtful looks.
Belatedly, Giles recalled that Colehaven was unusually fussy about meetings being held at precisely their appointed hour. An odd trait, given that half the ton were barely rising from slumber at three in the afternoon, much less worrying about keeping appointments to the very minute.
“The c-curricle?” asked one of the lads. “Not the coach?”
“The curricle,” Giles assured him, and pointed. “That one.”
Yet the wide-eyed stable boys remained positioned between him and the ducal carriages, as if they weren’t certain whether to beg for the Curricle King’s autograph or bar him from entry.
Of the two outcomes, the latter would be the most surprising. This was not Giles’s first visit. He could see the deuced curricle from here and had been summoned to work on it. What the devil was the problem?
“It’ll only be a moment,” he promised the stable boys. “I’ll just have a quick once-over, to gauge whether the vehicle requires more than a routine safety inspection.”
A harrumph sounded from elsewhere in the mews.
Giles glanced about in surprise, but saw no one other than the stable boys. He frowned. The strange sound must have been a gust of wind playing tricks.
He took a step in the direction of the duke’s curricle.
All three stable boys immediately fell behind him, like ducklings paddling after their mother.
“Did you do it?” the closest stable boy asked breathlessly. “Did you truly reach the finish line before Mr. Wiltchurch even made it halfway down Rotten Row?”
Giles tamped down a satisfied smile. One did not gloat over one’s racing wins, even if the losing party referred to him a “nothing more than a bloody blacksmith” or “a self-important peasant.”
“I did indeed,” Giles acknowledged as he strode to the duke’s curricle. “Is Mr. Wiltchurch who His Grace will be racing?”
The lads nodded in unison.
His chest lightened. Good. Colehaven and his curricle were more than a match for a rash know-it-all like Wiltchurch. Giles pulled a wrench from his leather satchel and began to check each bolt’s tightness.
The stable boys kept right on his heels.
Giles didn’t mind. He had once been a green lad just like them, eager to soak up experience and wisdom. Dreaming of someday having a carriage of his own.
The maintenance on the duke’s conveyances was second to none. In all the inspections Giles had performed in this carriage house, he had never once come across a loose axle or a missing bolt or an ill-seating spring or s
o much as a speck of rust. Every vehicle was always in impeccable condition.
Today was no exception. The duke’s racing curricle was in such immaculate shape, one could be forgiven for believing it had been serviced by a master craftsman moments before Giles walked through the door.
Nonetheless, he went through all the safety points in his mental list, skipping nothing. Not a day went by without a dozen accidents clogging up the already congested streets. Safety was a coach smith’s top priority.
“See this coupling?” he asked the boys as he ducked beneath to show them. “The reason we always check this one…”
The lads followed excitedly, peppering his explanations with questions and exclamations. Before long, he and the stable boys had hunched and crawled their way to the opposite side of the curricle.
Giles slipped his tools back into his leather satchel and turned toward the enthusiastic lads. “Next, let’s turn our focus to the wheels, in order to have an in-depth look at—”
Shapely ankles.
He blinked and looked again.
Dainty boots. A hint of lace. And two lovely ankles. Tucked beneath a stately coach. Barely visible behind the trio of stable boys. Almost as if they’d placed themselves in just the right position to block the coach’s undercarriage from view.
Almost…
As if…
Giles spun to face the lads. “There is a woman in your carriage house.”
“No,” the first boy said without hesitation. “Absolutely not.”
The others shook their heads just as firmly. “No women here.”
“There is.” As foolish as he felt saying so, Giles could not refute the evidence before his eyes. Ladies’ half-boots, feminine ankles, lace trim attached to what appeared to be delicate pantalettes. It did not require a Bow Street inspector to put these clues together. He pointed between their shoulders. “Look there! A woman is hiding beneath the duke’s primary coach.”
The lads glanced at each other before shaking their heads with even more fervor. “No females allowed here, sir.”
Giles frowned. If the lads were hiding her presence, then she must not be supposed to be there. Which meant what? Twelve-year-old stable boys were colluding with some madwoman bent on… theft? Sabotage? Not on Giles’s watch.
“Then what the devil is she doing beneath the carriage?” He pushed past the lads and dropped to his haunches beside the coach.
From this angle, he could not glimpse her face.
“Come out of there,” he ordered.
She did not move.
Giles narrowed his eyes over his shoulder at the three white-faced lads. “If the Duke of Colehaven finds out you’ve allowed a stranger to infiltrate his carriage house…”
All three boys blushed in unison.
“Not a stranger,” spluttered one.
“He already knows,” blurted another.
“Oh, for the love of…” With a breathtakingly unladylike muttered curse, the owner of the shapely ankles and lacy pantalettes wriggled out from beneath the Duke of Colehaven’s family coach.
Striking dark eyes glared out at him from a beautiful heart-shaped face. Silky coils of dark brown hair dipped from a crooked, oil-stained mobcap. Her well-tailored dress might have been the equal of any day gown belonging to the Quality…were it not for its horrifically frayed hems, unpatched holes, and impressive collection of enough grease stains to hide whatever had once been the fabric’s intended pattern.
One dusty hand clutched the neck of a worn leather satchel not unlike Giles’s own. In her other ungloved hand was a large iron wrench.
From the expression on her face, she was as prepared to wield it as a weapon as she was to use it as a tool.
Had he thought her presence mysterious before? She was now a full-blown enigma.
“Who are you?” he breathed.
“Stable lass,” she said briskly, as if those two words came close to resolving all his unanswered questions.
“Stable lass?” he repeated, tasting the unfamiliar words as they tripped from his tongue.
“Easy to understand. Stable lads…” She pointed at the three boys with the end of her wrench, then turned it toward her chest. “Stable lass. There. We’ve met. Good day.”
“I…” He turned to the lads, half-expecting to hear a chorus of protesting No, definitely not, no stable lasses here, sir.
Instead, they stared back at him wide-eyed and pasty-cheeked, as if their deepest, most heartfelt wish was that they’d never allowed him to inspect their master’s curricle after all.
Giles turned back to Stable Lass. If this was her place of employment, then he had no business interfering with her work. Then again, if this was her place of employment, the stable boys would have had no reason to lie about her presence or her purpose.
Something was definitely up. Giles narrowed his eyes in suspicion. He valued Colehaven too much to turn a blind eye while mischief was being committed.
“Why are you here?” he asked.
She dropped her wrench back into her satchel as if she was already bored with the encounter. “Do you want to test me, O great and powerful Curricle King?”
Bloody right, he did. She was beautiful and defiant and fascinating, and he’d met her crawling out from under a carriage with a wrench in her hand. The duke had a right to know if she was trespassing.
Giles opened his mouth.
She sighed, and began to point her index finger about the carriage house. “Barouche, landau, cabriolet, coach, and modified curricle.”
A fair enough parlor trick. “Many people—”
“Can name the types and styles of carriages? Very well. Let us see what pieces comprise a modern conveyance.” She began demonstrating the parts of the closest barouche, from the folding calash top to each nut and washing.
Giles snapped his jaw closed. He’d seen apprentices who couldn’t name half the components that comprised a carriage, much less explain the precise function of each part.
“Not enough?” asked the stable lass with faux innocence. She retrieved a hammer and chisel from her satchel and turned to the curricle he’d been inspecting. “Let’s take this one apart, then put it back together. I’ll begin with the—”
“So you’re a stable lass,” Giles said in a rush, interrupting her before the duke’s prized—and, yes, subtly modified—curricle was in a hundred pieces on the sawdust-covered floor.
Even if such a shocking event would have cost both of them their posts, part of Giles wished he could have let her do so, just to watch her work.
“Why didn’t you just say you worked here?” He tipped his hat to indicate he came in peace and meant no harm. “I’m Giles Langford.”
She arched her brows. “I know.”
He waited.
She said nothing.
He cleared his throat. “And you are…?”
“Declining to answer,” she replied sweetly.
Her name was none of his business, he reminded himself. He was here to speak to crotchety old Banyan, not some cheeky stable lass… who… knew every nut and bolt inside this carriage house?
“It’s you,” he realized suddenly.
Nonchalance vanished from her eyes at once, replacing her playful expression with one of wariness. “What’s me?”
“You’re the one who has been keeping Colehaven’s carriages in impeccable condition.” Banyan was a lovely man, but he was far from spry these days. Giles had long assumed the old man had an apprentice or two. He just hadn’t expected to meet her like this.
Stable Lass blinked. A tentative smile curved one edge of her dusky pink lips. “You’re right. It is me.”
“Can you teach my other clients to have half as much good sense?” Giles asked. “They should all hire stable lasses, if they’re half as competent as you.”
The smile blossomed into a grin, and the entire mews was transformed with its beauty.
“I would never dream of stealing work from the Curricle King,” she assured hi
m with a sassy smile, then ducked out of sight behind the coach.
He ignored the impulse to follow in her wake.
Inserting himself had been one thing when he’d believed her to be up to mischief. Giles was not foolish enough to prevent a valued employee from performing her duties. Rather than ousting a trespasser, Giles would be the one who found himself out on his ear.
If he’d met her anywhere but a client’s carriage house, however… Giles shook his head. He was not in the market for a romance, here or anywhere. Besides, he’d visited this carriage house for a decade without crossing paths with Miss Lass. Another decade might pass before their paths converged again.
“Langford,” came a familiar male voice from the other side of the carriage. “Good afternoon.”
Colehaven! Giles turned to face his client and blinked to discover a kitten cleaving to the duke’s shoulder.
“A fine afternoon, indeed. Almost as fine as your curricle.” Giles gestured beside him. “I’m not certain I’ve been earning my keep. Every time I check on one of your carriages, it’s already in great condition.”
“Great isn’t good enough,” Colehaven replied with a remarkably straight face, given the kitten was now playfully batting his earlobe. “I need it to be the best. There’s a race it needs to win.”
“You’re an excellent driver,” Giles said honestly.
“Thank you.” The duke plucked the kitten from the side of his head and settled it against his chest. “But I shan’t be at the reins. I’m hoping to employ you for the task.”
“Absolutely,” Giles answered without hesitation. “And you needn’t fear. I’ve won every race in which I oversaw my carriage.”
“This time,” the duke said as his kitten shredded his neckcloth, “you’ll work on a team.”
“A what?” Giles said blankly.
“A team,” the duke repeated. “With my mechanical artisan assisting with the technical aspects and you handling the actual race, there’ll be no choice but to win.”
“There’s no choice,” Giles said, “in one important aspect at least. I am the carriage smith, and the man handling the reins. Therefore, I shall handle the technical aspects. I’ll win your race, but I work alone.”
