Dancing on the Wind (The Regency Intrigue Series Book 8)

by M C Beaton

  His long fingers were clever and sensitive and his lips traced a wandering seductive course across her body. He spent a long time exploring her mouth and kissing her breasts and neck. Polly, one quivering mass of sweet sensation, was barely aware that his questing hands had moved lower. She moved wantonly against him, each intimacy making her crave more.

  His searching, probing hands suddenly stilled. His whole body went rigid. She continued to kiss him passionately until the very coldness of his lack of response made her stop. She looked up at him. His eyes in the candlelight glittered with green fire. “Polly Jones,” he said through his teeth. “You are a virgin.”

  He rolled away from her and swung his legs out of bed and sat with his back to her, his head in his hands. “You would not have touched me had you known I was a virgin,” said Polly in a dry whisper.

  He stood up and wrenched the coverlet from under her and threw it over her naked body. He went to a wardrobe and pulled out a dressing gown and shrugged himself into it.

  Then he went back and sat on the edge of the bed.

  “You should not have lied to me,” he said.

  “Do I not please you?” Polly’s eyes looked almost black as she looked up at him.

  He shook his head as though to clear it. “I must try to talk some sense into you. You are still a virgin. That makes you marriageable … not to me, of course. If you stay quietly at the dower house for about, say, two years until the people of the neighborhood become so accustomed to your presence they will have forgotten you do not belong here, then I will provide you with a dowry and arrange a marriage for you to someone suitable.”

  Polly winced as though beneath a blow.

  “Now, I shall leave the room and let you dress again in decency and privacy. I will then take you back to the dower house.”

  Polly wet her dry lips. “You cannot love me,” she said. It was a statement, not a question, but he replied with a shake of his head.

  He rose to his feet and went into the powder closet and shut the door.

  Polly felt like the slut she had pretended to be. She had lost any chance of friendship, of respect. She put on her clothes very quickly and then sat waiting in the chair by the fire, her back ramrod straight.

  He said not a word when he returned and conducted her down the stairs and out into the moonlit night. They walked down the drive in silence, each at opposite sides of it.

  When they reached the dower house, Polly turned and dropped a low curtsy. “My apologies, my lord,” she said. “You must find me a wearisome charge.” And with her head held high, she opened the door of the dower house and disappeared from his sight.

  The marquess walked away. His lips still tasted of Polly, and his palms still tingled with the feel of all that silky skin. Never in all his long experience had he been presented with such generous burning warmth and passion. Marriage to such as she was totally out of the question. The coat of arms above the door of his home shone in the moonlight, reminding him sternly of what was due to his name.

  He let himself in and walked up the stairs, trying to banish the thought of her from his mind. His bed still smelled of her perfume. There, on his pillow, had she lain, the long tresses of her hair shining in the candlelight.

  He felt bowed down with an immeasurable feeling of loss. She was not only immoral, she was amoral. She stole and lied. She consorted with villains. He would talk to Miss Gentle on the morrow and see that Polly was schooled in moral values. In two years’ time, she would be a fitting consort for some respectable squire or country lawyer.

  Polly awoke from a fitful sleep early the following morning. She rose and dressed, suddenly anxious to escape from the house before Drusilla should wake and possibly ask questions.

  She remembered a red rose bush which grew in profusion by the south lodge and decided to go and cut some flowers to decorate the parlor. She moved slowly as if just recovered from an accident. Shame and despair made her feel ill.

  She walked to the south lodge, glad of the warmth of the sun on her body. She tried to face up to the thought of life without any hope of his love, but the thought was so painful it made her want to cry. Meg’s face seemed to rise before her. Poor Meg. Polly shook her head, weary with shame and guilt. She hoped Meg was not able to look down from heaven and see the hopeless sorry mess her foundling charge was in.

  She took a sharp pair of scissors from her apron and started to cut the roses, placing them in a basket she had brought with her. She heard the sound of a carriage approaching and resolutely kept her face turned to the rose bush. She was not prepared to face any callers.

  The carriage stopped outside the gates and she heard the lodgekeeper going out to find out who it was.

  She was just reaching for another bloom when she heard a sharp cry and a thud. She dropped both basket and roses and ran to the gates. On the other side stood a travelling carriage. There was no coachman on the box and no face looked out of the window. In front of the neighing, pawing horses and right against the closed iron gates lay the body of the lodgekeeper, Mr. Rathbone. Polly, thinking he must have had a seizure, ran into the lodge house by the back door and out through the front, which was on the other side of the gates.

  She knelt over Mr. Rathbone and turned him over. Blood poured down from a wound on his forehead. Polly whipped around and stood up to see if there was anyone in the carriage. A movement to her left startled her, but she was too late. A cruel blow from a cudgel caught her on the side of the head. The world reeled dizzily, and then went completely black.

  The marquess of Canonby rose early that morning as well. His first thought was that the sunshine of a new day would soon banish his muddled feelings and worry about Polly. Instead, he was struck by such an intense feeling of yearning that for a moment he felt he could hardly breathe.

  It would not work, he told himself. Passion would burn out and leave him with a stranger who lied and stole. On the other hand, how could he bear to see her wed to anyone else? Damn his great name. He could do as he pleased. He could … his mind raced … yes, he could take Polly to, say, Italy, and there they could be married by some consul and stay for a few years until the world had forgotten about Polly Jones. He would need to change her name, to provide her with another identity, but money could always do that. He dressed quickly. There was a growing fear in the back of his mind that she might have run away.

  When he reached the dower house, a housemaid told him that Miss Peterson had gone out very early to pick roses at the south lodge and that Miss Gentle was still asleep.

  Relieved that he would have a chance to talk to Polly alone, he hurried in the direction of the south lodge.

  The huge rose bush rioted in all its glory by the gate of the south lodge. He saw the basket of roses spilled across the drive and felt a stab of dread. It dawned on him that he had been so taken up with his relationship with Polly Jones that he had almost forgotten she was a hunted woman.

  And then he saw his lodgekeeper, lying against the gates.

  He ran through the lodge house and out the other side and bent over the fallen Mr. Rathbone. There were the marks of carriage wheels in the beaten earth of the entrance. Mr. Rathbone groaned faintly and stirred.

  “Rathbone,” said the marquess urgently. “What happened?”

  The man moaned again. The marquess picked him up and carried him into the lodge and placed him on his bed. Then he took a gun from over the mantel in the kitchen, primed it, went outside and fired it in the air.

  He went back in and scooped a ladle of water from a pail in the kitchen, soaked a cloth in it, and carried both into the bedroom. A gamekeeper, who had heard the shot, came running in.

  “Rouse all the staff,” said the marquess. “Send help to me here. Then fetch the apothecary as fast as you can. And get my hunter here as fast as you can.”

  He gently sponged the wound on Mr. Rathbone’s head. The man stirred again and this time his eyes opened fully. “My lord,” he said weakly. “It was two men. They struc
k me down. Just before I lost consciousness, one man said, ‘No call to do that. We could have left the carriage down the road and climbed over the wall.’ The other said, ‘There she is,’ and that’s all I know.”

  “Lie still, Rathbone,” said the marquess. He went out and looked at the marks of those carriage wheels and then at two rose petals lying on the ground.

  He returned to the lodgekeeper’s side. “Rathbone,” he said urgently. “The man who spoke. Describe his voice.”

  Mr. Rathbone tried to struggle up but the marquess pressed him back against the pillows with a gentle hand. “He spoke like a gentleman,” said Mr. Rathbone. “I got a blurred glimpse o’ them. They were foppishly dressed. One’s hair was dressed so high it looked like a mountain, and he was wearing pink powder. Oh, and when the other said, ‘There she is,’ the first said. ‘Yes.’ Only he said it funny, more like, ‘Yaas.’”

  There was the sound of running feet coming down the drive and the neighing of a horse. The marquess went out to give orders to his staff. Then he swung himself up into the saddle of his hunter and set off, riding hard, riding desperately, crouched over the saddle, racing in pursuit down the long miles which led to London.

  Mr. Barks and Mrs. Caldicott were nearing London with their prize. They had taken a long circuitous route, hiding out in hedge taverns, changing horses at small unfashionable posting houses, but never stopping anywhere for the night. They were tired and weary, but exultant. They had done it! And Polly Jones lay trussed up like a hen on the floor of the carriage.

  Apart from checking occasionally to see that she was still alive, they were otherwise indifferent to her welfare. For a long time after she recovered consciousness, Polly was too sick to worry about anything other than the stabbing pain in her head and the heaving sickness of her stomach. The cords they had bound her with cut deep and the gag on her mouth was cruelly tight.

  She heard the noise and sound of the London streets again. Hard to tell what time of day it was, for the curtains on the carriage windows were tightly drawn.

  After an eternity of travel, the carriage stopped. Two men, not Caldicott or Barks, climbed into the carriage and proceeded to stuff her into a large smelly sack. She closed her eyes and feigned unconsciousness. She felt herself being lifted up and out. Then her head was bumped against a wall as the man carrying her appeared to negotiate a narrow corridor.

  Then she was dumped down and the sack was drawn from her body.

  She peered up through her eyelashes into that all-too-familiar motherly face of Mrs. Blanchard. “What have we here?” she heard Mrs. Blanchard demanding. “What have you done with her? What a mess! Could you not have taken better care of the goods?”

  “This is no way to thank us,” said Mr. Barks huffily. “We have been monstrous brave.”

  “You had best leave her with me until I have her restored to health and prettified, else Canonby won’t want her back.”

  Polly felt herself go weak with relief. Canonby might hate her, but he would certainly not leave her in the clutches of Mrs. Blanchard.

  She continued to feign unconsciousness after Mr. Barks and Mr. Caldicott had left. Two of the prostitutes stripped her and bathed her, then dressed her in a nightgown.

  Polly at last decided to open her eyes. She was in the grip of a raging hunger and did not want to be left for the night without food.

  “I am hungry,” she said.

  “Found your voice, eh?” jeered Mrs. Blanchard. “Well, you shall eat of the best, my pretty, for you will need all your strength for what lies in store for you.”

  Polly was given a large plate of cold beef and a bottle of wine. She ate the beef but asked for water instead of wine. Finally, her captors withdrew and she was left alone in the high barred room she had been kept in before.

  She settled herself down to sleep. All she had to do was stay alive until the marquess came to buy her back.

  In the morning, she was arrayed in a stiff cream silk dress. It had a ribbed satin stripe and was embroidered with flower sprays. The petticoat was matching. The sleeves had double embroidered ruffles. They must be worried he will not want me back unless I am grandly dressed, thought Polly. She behaved in a docile manner and ate a good breakfast. She was resigned to her captivity.

  When Mrs. Blanchard entered with two henchmen, Polly surveyed her calmly, although she could not help glancing at the henchmen in the hope of surprising some sympathy for her plight in their eyes. But they were small, wiry men like acrobats and their eyes were flat and reptilian.

  “Now, my dear,” cooed Mrs. Blanchard. “Anything you want, just ring the bell, for I am monstrous pleased with you, my chuck. You will make me a fortune.”

  “Canonby might not pay.”

  “You will have made me thousands before my lord finds out where you are.”

  Polly looked at her wide-eyed. “You’re going to earn your keep, Polly. The men who want to mount Polly Jones are prepared to pay the earth to do so. I have six of them booked for the early evening and many more for later in the night.”

  “You cannot mean it,” gasped Polly. “I am a wanted felon. If you have put it about that I am here, then the authorities will be alerted and you will go to Tyburn along with me.”

  “I know my business,” said Mrs. Blanchard, “and my business is with the Mohawks.”

  Polly blenched. The Mohawks were gangs of young aristocratic men who roamed the London streets, tormenting, torturing and raping the poor and defenseless.

  “Oh, I know what you’re thinking,” said Mrs. Blanchard, “that there won’t be much left of you by the time Canonby comes to call. But whether he will still be prepared to pay for you or not is a small matter. You will have earned me enough to set me up for life.”

  She went out with her henchmen and locked the door.

  Polly sat and shook with terror.

  Then, after a long time, she began to think of Meg, and for the first time Polly began to feel almost angry with her kind protector. Why had Meg let her run so wild? Why had Meg never bothered to instill any rudiments of right and wrong into her young and heedless head? The answer, although Polly did not know it, was that Meg thought Polly’s aristocratic blood would be enough to turn her into a lady, provide her with a fund of social manners and courtesies. Being in awe of Polly’s noble birth, Meg felt it was not her place to bridle or chastise the girl. Polly’s inherent good nature had managed to stop her from being as spoilt and willful as any pampered young miss. Then she thought of Silas. Silas would say she had only to ask God for help

  “Oh, very well,” she said aloud to no one in particular. She knelt down beside the bed and told God to hurry up and get her out of her predicament. Then she waited. Nothing happened. The door did not fly open, no angel voices spoke to her.

  “Right, God,” said Polly Jones. “I shall try to help myself but I wish, oh, I wish I were not so very frightened.”

  She paced up and down the room. She heard voices outside and pressed her ear against the panels of the door. “You stay and guard the place, Willis,” she heard Mother Blanchard say. “No point in letting my girls stay idle because of our celebrity. No men allowed in until six o’clock, but I will be back long before then. The ones that wants to have Polly, take their money and cross their names off the book and get them to form an orderly line on the stairs. I’d have put her in one of the better bedrooms, but they haven’t got bars on the windows.”

  Polly remembered Jake saying something about the scandal of the prostitutes who roamed the parks of London during the day under the stern eye of their abbess. Their job was to solicit as many men as possible, even handing out cards, like business cards, with the name and address of the brothel.

  She stayed with her ear pressed against the door until she heard the sounds of departure downstairs.

  “I think, God,” said Polly, beginning to pace up and down again, “I really think I am going to get out of here, and if I don’t, I am somehow going to take this evil building down with
me, like Samson. Far better to die clean than waste away under the hands of those villainous Mohawks.”

  She pulled at the bars of the windows, wishing she had a file.

  “Let me see,” she said, still speaking aloud. “That harridan said I was to ring for anything I want. There is no bell.”

  She leaned against the door and began to scream for help at the top of her voice. Soon she heard Willis’s voice on the other side calling, “Stow your whids. What’s to do?”

  “A spider!” screamed Polly. “There’s a spider under my bed.”

  Willis began to laugh. He had never believed those tales of Polly’s escape from Newgate. He was sure she had bribed her jailors to help her. Then her voice came again, “If you kill the spider, I will let you have me first.” Her voice grew coaxing. “I won’t tell Mrs. Blanchard.”