The Bad Baron's Daughter

by Laura London

  “Ho ho!” said Zack, with a credible expression of outraged integrity. “Is that so, Miss Kendricks?” Zack laid heavy emphasis on the Miss. “You come here, spruced up like St. Jacob’s goose and looking for all the world like you’ve landed in clover and then get mad at me for arranging it for you! Little ingrate! I suppose it would have suited your maidenly imagination better if I’d left you to Nasty Ned—you could have died martyred and pure and then maybe in three hundred years the church would have made a saint of you. You can’t humbug me into thinking you’d have liked that arrangement better than where you are now, Mouse-meat, no matter how many saucy names you call me!”

  “You,” said Katie, simply and with a great deal of dignity, “don’t understand me.”

  Zack rolled his eyes and tipped his head to the left. “That, at least, is God’s own truth! What did you come here for?”

  “I wanted to see if you’d heard anything from Papa,” said Katie.

  “Well, I ain’t,” he replied. “But since you’ve come, you might as well sit and take a glass of stingo with us. Winnie here’s been worried about you. Oh, this,” Zack gestured toward the young man with the wire-rimmed glasses, “is Patrick-Pat’s a damned radical crony of Winnie’s—they’ve been kidnapping together.”

  “Kidnapping?” gasped Katie, her mind fastening on the word. She sank into a low bench that Zack had tugged forward for her. “I’m glad to see you, Winnie, but oh, never say you’ve kidnapped somebody?”

  “Well, oi ‘ave,” confirmed Winnie stoutly. “Or, leastwise me radical cell ‘as. We’ve taken one o’ ‘is majesty’s admirals as a political ‘ostage ‘n we don’t mean ta give ‘im up ‘til our demands is met!”

  Katie took a modest gulp of the strong beer Zack had slid onto the table before her. “What kinds of demands are they?” asked Katie, torn between sympathy for the unfortunate victim and an abounding curiosity.

  Winnie shrugged. “Usual sorts o’ demands. Loike Westminster Abbey oughta be split into apartments fer war widows.”

  “Oh,” said Katie, her face awash with doubt. “That sounds like a good thing, though I should think the widows would find it a trifle drafty. Has the government responded to your demands yet?”

  “Na, they’s been ignorin’ ‘em,” admitted Patrick, entering the conversation. “But they’s bound ta cave in. Oi means, an admiral ain’t nobody.”

  Katie had to admit this was true but could not forbear to ask anxiously what they intended to do with the admiral if the government remained adamant.

  “Don’t be bird-witted, Kate,” recommended Winnie, “we’ll let th’ fellow go, o’ course. We can’t spend th’ rest o’ our lives guarding some rascally admiral. Couldn’t afford it neither. The fellow drinks loike a German ‘n it’s costing us a fortune ta keep ‘im in grog.”

  “He must be a queer sort of admiral,” said Katie, disconcerted. “What’s his name?”

  “Um…” said Winnie, “oi forgets. Calls ‘im ‘The Admiral’ mostly. ‘E’s Admiral… Entail… Entangle… no, I mean Enfield. Admiral Enfield.”

  Zack shook his head derisively. “War widows, indeed! Bugger ‘em! The two of you will be lucky if you don’t end up adorning Tyburn Tree. You’re an odd pair of dogs.” He turned to Katie and looked her over closely, as if performing mental calculations as to the cost of her costume. “Linden’s got you decked out fine as a heifer on fair day. I’ll say one thing. The man ain’t pinchfisted.”

  “He’s not,” said Katie, regarding Zack with dislike. “But it’s not he that has the dressing of me.” She leaned forward with the air of one who was about to make a momentous announcement, the trace of a small expectant smile beginning on her lips. “You’re the one who’s been dished, Zack. Because Linden didn’t seduce me, I haven’t become his mistress, and these aren’t his clothes. I’m living with a friend of his, Miss Laurel Steele, and these are her clothes.”

  Zack stared at her for a moment, speechless. Then the blank look left his eyes and one side of his lip curved into a wry smile. “Dished, ditched and dinged! Laurel Steele? Queen of the Fashionable Impures? Are you going to tell me the tale or should I let my imagination fill in the details?”

  She hastily sketched a picture of what had happened since Zack had left her on Linden’s doorstep.

  Zack looked skeptical. “Well, I’ll never be moved from the opinion that you’ve made a rare muddle of a golden opportunity. And why Linden is helping you now is more than I can figure out; there’s nothing in it for him.” A light dawned in his eyes. “I suppose he’s decided to take his time with you. A slow seduction is more amusing for him than a quick rape.”

  Katie flushed and jumped to her feet, upsetting the tarnished tankard she had been resting on her knees. A golden shower of frothy beer spread in all directions. “Zack, are you incapable of understanding that someone might do something out of kind motives?” she asked angrily. “Lord Linden isn’t like that. He’s…”

  “They’re all like that,” interrupted Zack. “Don’t deceive yourself, darling. You don’t like what I’m saying, but I’m being honest with you.”

  “Like you were being honest with me when you took me to Linden’s house and said he was a friend of yours? And said I would be safe there?” exclaimed Katie wrathfully. “Zack, I’ve trusted you since I was a baby and you turn around and sell me like a slave at auction! I can’t hate you for it because I understand you; I’ll probably even be able to forgive you someday. But not,” said Katie, jerking open the door, “for a while.”

  She hunched against the penetrating damp, her running footsteps smacking the pavement. The Merry Maidenhead disappeared into the fog, but she heard Zack calling behind her. It was the closest she had come in her life to having a fight with someone, and she was shaken. Her shoulders ached and her stomach felt cold. Irregular shapes of passersby materialized and disappeared in the fog: a pieman, a group led by a link-boy carrying a flambeau. She hurried on and had nearly reached a cross avenue when a gruff voice hailed her.

  “ ‘Ey, where ya goin’ in sech a ‘urry, missie?”

  Katie hoped the voice was not directed at her and quickened her step.

  “Say, wot’s th’ matter wi’ ya? ‘Avent ya got time fer a poor sailor ‘ome from servin’ ‘is country?”

  Katie turned. Bearing down on her with some speed was a jolly old tar dressed in a seacape and pegging agilely along on one good leg and one wooden. Sailors and admirals, thought Katie, feeling that her day had been cruelly overset by the navy.

  “Can I help you with something?” she asked, trying to recall her best gin shop form when dealing with querulous customers.

  “Can she ‘elp me wi’ somethin’,” growled the tar, not unfriendly. “Methinks when she sees th’ color o’ me money, mebbe she can ‘elp me wi’ somethin’.” He walked up beside Katie, flashing a fistful of pound notes. “Mebbe she’ll ‘elp a lonely old sailor ta find a little ‘appiness in this cold world, I says. ‘Ow about duckin’ into one o’ these establishments along in ‘ere, lassie? Mebbe we both be thirsty fer some Blue Ruin… or somethin’ else.” He wiggled his eyebrows expressively.

  Katie groaned inwardly. “Oh, dear, I’m afraid not, sir. You see I have to get home now or they’ll be getting worried.”

  “Well, them at ‘ome will be right ‘appy when ya bring ‘ome one o’ these, won’t they?” snickered the sailor, trying to push a pound note into Katie’s palm. “‘Ey, come on ‘n take it now, wench. Ya’ll be earnin’ it from me soon, won’t ya?” The man chuckled, made a suggestive gesture with his fingers, and clutched Katie tightly by the arm.

  “No! Sir, you quite mistake things, I assure you. I don’t want your money and there is no one who would be the least happy if I brought it home,” said Katie, trying resolutely to disengage her arm from his clinging fingers.

  “Well, ain’t we th’ fine talkin’ little chippy!” gasped the sailor indignantly, his good nature vanishing. “Wot’s yer problem, eh? Not enough money fer ya? Ya
can name yer price then.”

  Katie was becoming alarmed by the strength in the sailor’s grip. “F-fifty pounds,” she stuttered, hoping fervently that she had named a figure beyond the sailor’s resources.

  Traffic on the through street moved carefully in the fog; the approach of a vehicle could be heard before seen and now the smart trot of a high-stepping thoroughbred heralded the arrival of a sleek high-perch phaeton. Katie’s eyes dilated in amazement as she saw the rakish driver, who was accompanied by a slender youth with peach-blond hair and lively pale brown eyes who clung easily to the stepping-board behind. The phaeton pulled to a sharp halt beside Katie and her would-be cavalier. Its driver set his bicorne to the back of his head, pushed his fog-dampened ebony hair away from his eyes, and looked down at the sailor.

  “Has this young lady been accosting you, my good fellow?” inquired the driver, in a tone that might have been civil.

  “Lord Linden! Andrew!” cried Katie. “Oh, how glad I am to see you!”

  The sailor seemed to wax increasingly offended. “Oh, it’s lord’ is it, now. Do ya mean ta tell me, my fine buck, that ya know this ‘ere piece o’ goods?”

  “Never seen her before in my life,” said Lord Linden ignobly. “What’s she done?”

  The sailor perceived at once that he had captured a sympathetic masculine audience. “Why, oi offer this article ‘ere a decent bit o’ business ‘n she tells me she’s not ta be ‘ad fer less ‘n fifty pounds! Fifty pounds!” The poor old salt was fairly staggered by the enormity of Katie’s demand. He waggled his finger emphatically at Lord Linden. “By all that’s ‘oly, it’s a crime, that’s wot it is. ‘Ow’s an ‘onest workin’ man like meself ta ‘ave a little tumble ‘n tickle if that’s th’ way prices is? Seems ta me that th’ London bawds ‘as gotten right out o’ ‘and, so it does.”

  “Very true, my good man. Parliament should look to it,” agreed Linden readily. “But perhaps if we bargain with her, we could persuade her to accept a more reasonable offer. What do you say to thirty pounds, wench?”

  “Not enough,” said Katie, wishing that the street would open and swallow her.

  “Well, I niver ‘eard th’ like,” exclaimed the sailor, “not in all me born days. Not ta say she ain’t no prime armful, but ain’t no woman worth no fifty pounds.”

  “You are a sage, sir,” said Linden, regarding Katie smolderingly. “And I am fully in agreement. Yet…” He ran his gaze slowly down the length of Katie’s slender frame. “As you say, she’s a prime armful.” He drew a fifty-pound note from his coat and leaned over to tuck it into the bosom of Katie’s gown. “I think I am compelled to experiment with your theory. Come, wench, up with you. Let’s see just how far short of your price you fall.” He put out an imperious hand and pulled Katie up to sit beside him on the phaeton with a force that nearly wrenched her arm from its socket.

  “That’s th’ wicket, guvnor,” cheered the grizzled sailor. “Show th’ uppity jade wot it’s for!”

  “That,” said Linden grimly as he snapped the reins, “you may be sure of.”

  They rode without speaking for a few minutes before Katie turned to Lord Linden and said contritely, “You’re mad at me, aren’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  Linden had a certain genius for injecting mountains of meaning into a monosyllable. Katie subsided into a snubbed silence. She twisted her head to look at Andrew, who signaled his sympathy and grimaced at Linden behind his back. “Courage, Peaches,” he mouthed.

  When they arrived at Laurel’s house, Andrew ran up to take charge of the horses.

  “Walk ‘em, Drew,” Linden ordered, and assisted Katie into Laurel’s library with a roughness quite in keeping with his callous reputation. Once there, he took Katie’s shoulders, thrust her into one of the despised sphinx settees and stood regarding her as though she were a particularly obnoxious bug that he would enjoy swatting.

  “Do you know,” he asked conversationally, “what I would like to do to you?”

  “Something painful?” suggested Katie in a small voice.

  “Something very painful,” agreed Lord Linden.

  “Did you not like it that I went out by myself?”

  “No. I did not.” Those crushing monosyllables again.

  “I’m sorry.”

  Lord Linden dropped beside Katie on the settee and ran one finger slowly across the bridge of her nose. “I would like to make you much, much sorrier but, unfortunately, this country has a legal system that refuses to smile upon the horsewhipping of girls in their teens, no matter how justified. A… pity.”

  Katie’s shoulders sagged and she leaned her head back against the tapestry-worked upholstery. It was hard to settle comfortably with the straw bonnet on, so Linden untied the wide satin ribbon and pulled off the bonnet. Katie’s hair tumbled to her shoulders.

  “I wanted to go to The Merry Maidenhead to ask Zack if Papa had sent him a message for me yet. But he hasn’t,” said Katie, trying to keep the hurt from her voice. “Laurel said that I shouldn’t bother you about it and besides, it gave me the feeling that I was doing something toward finding my father. But I wouldn’t have gone if I’d known that you wouldn’t like it. I owe you so much; I would never wish to distress you.” It was an artless speech uttered in a pitifully conciliatory voice that might have wrung tears from a stump. On Lord Linden’s handsome countenance it had no softening effect.

  “Katie. You grow tiresome,” he said coldly. “There is a man somewhere in this city who would like very much to free you from your rather unhappy mortal existence. If you wander about the city alone, then you may be sure that he will do so. Furthermore, this is London, not Essex, and young women do not traverse the streets without some kind of attendant unless they wish to be mistaken for members of the muslin company. Nor do they pass their time in earnest chats with every chance-met male who feels inclined to accost them. What would you have done if he had had fifty pounds?”

  Katie remembered then that she still had Lord Linden’s fifty-pound note stuck into her bodice so she drew it out and handed it back to her benefactor. “I don’t know,” she said sheepishly, “but it wouldn’t have mattered, would it? The sailor thought fifty pounds exorbitant—I don’t think anything could have induced him to part with that sum. Besides,” she added, a flash of spirit animating her lustrous blue eyes, “if I ignored all chance-met males, I should never have become acquainted with you.”

  “A fine example,” said Linden sarcastically. “I almost raped you. Doesn’t that tell you anything?”

  “ ‘Twas only because you were quite drunk at the time,” said Katie, looking up at him placatingly.

  “Of all the obtuse… is that really what you think? Is that why you’ve stayed within my protection, because you thought I was safe when sober?” Involuntarily, Linden’s hands rose to Katie’s shoulders and he pulled her close against his chest. “Little idiot. Don’t you realize that when men look at you, they feel like the prize stallion on a stud farm?” He let his hand glide deliberately from Katie’s shoulder down the soft cup of her breast until it rested on her curving hip. He heard a tiny, startled gasp in her throat as though she had suddenly needed to fill her lungs with air; her breathing changed its pace, quickening imperceptibly. Her clear, jewel-like eyes were as readable as any child’s, emotions filtering through them like bright water sparkling over stones in a stream. She was struggling with herself. He could see she wanted to push his hand away, and it was so hard for her to do, hypnotized as she was by the pleasure his touch fed her.

  The cold highlights in Linden’s eyes seemed to dim, then glow.

  “Katie,” he said softly. “My quaint, silly darling. You’re sorry; you hope I don’t mind; you don’t want to distress me. Look up at me, little virgin. That’s right, my dear. Hush, I won’t hurt you.” Carefully, carefully, he pressed a light, lazy kiss on Katie’s trembling lips. His fingers played slowly with a red-gold lock of hair which curled over the rise of her cheek. A shiver of fear and long
ing disturbed her sweet, high cheekbone; he brushed it away with his searching lips. She felt a warm relaxing sensation flooding over her, as if she had been brought from a cold winter storm and set in front of a roaring fire. Her lips parted softly, and were covered by his in a long, caressing kiss. Now she was floating, out of her body, and reached an arm around his shoulder as if to anchor herself safely in this sweep of passion. He fit her closer to his hard body, savoring her yielding softness, her stunned surrender; his lips moved hungrily over the fragrant curve of her neck, whispering her name over and over as if it were a magic charm that would increase his power over her until, finally, she would be his. He told her that he wanted her, that she shouldn’t be afraid, that he would help her, please her. One of his hands pressed firmly on her back, his facile fingers opening first one and then another of the buttons that bound her inside her dress, and his lips moved up to her ear, murmuring reassurances.

  But the library’s japanned rosewood door swung open on its well-oiled hinges, banging into the wall with a crack that caused Katie to jump nearly out of her half-buttoned dress. It was, in Linden’s opinion, at least, a bad moment for Laurel to enter the library. In fact, one might shy from so mild an expression as “enter” because Laurel’s advent was more in the nature of an invasion. She whirled angrily into the room, her silk skirts flushed and scolding, her hands clenched into fists. A bad moment indeed.

  “Don’t disengage on my account. I’ve no objection to the public celebration of fertility rites,” she said snappishly.

  “Plague take you, Laurel, don’t you know how to knock?” There was a range of emotions in Lord Linden’s voice. Regretfully, shame was not among them.

  “Why, Lesley, this is my house. But you misinterpret, my dear. I merely came to ask if you might like to use my bed upstairs? Perhaps little Katie would care to borrow one of my negligees?” asked Laurel, all civil sarcasm.

  Linden smiled. It was that particularly unpleasant, one-sided smile that made la Steele long to scratch it from his face. “I don’t need a bed or a negligee, sweet; I’m not so fastidious.”