Sylvia recoiled from her venomous expression. ‘You hate my father, yet you help him.’
‘I’ve never helped him. I told Madame Gilbert he’d pay. And he did. He bled freely, just like my sainted mistress coughing up her lungs and bleeding and bleeding, till I couldna’ wipe the blood from her lips fast enough.’
Jeannie’s wrinkled face twisted into a mask of hate. ‘Then the war got so bad, even Rafter could no’ get in or out of Paris. Niver mind that the Irish sided with France. After that, there was no money for food or medicine.’
Sylvia sank on to the bed, sickened as she imagined her mother unable to work at all and with no money to pay the doctor.
‘Oh, aye,’ Jeannie said, her watery eyes gazing into the distance at the scenes playing out in her head. ‘I stole and I even tried whoring, but with my face and form I never got naught but pennies from drunks and sailors.’
Regret, dark and painful, crushed Sylvia’s soul. She should have stayed. ‘But why do you hate me, Jeannie? What did I ever do to hurt you or my mother?’
‘If she’d have never bore you, he’d never have left her. I know it.’
‘That is hardly my fault.’
Jeannie’s gnarled hands shook. She twisted them in her apron and glared at Sylvia. ‘You selfish little bitch. You left her to die with niver a thought for her who bore ye and fed ye and kept ye by the toils of her body. You left her when she needed you most. Dying she was. Your beautiful little body could have kept her alive.’
The bitterness in the old woman’s tone struck Sylvia like a blow. Jeannie had expected her, a child of eleven, to provide for her mother. And, Sylvia realised with shock, she would have if her mother hadn’t sent her away.
She sank down on the bed. The sheet clenched in her fingers felt slippery and cold, like the tears on her cheeks when she learned what her mother and Monsieur Jean had done that long-ago day. She gazed at Jeannie, desperate to be believed. ‘I didn’t want to go. I didn’t want to leave her. I missed her so much.’
A sob broke free. She swallowed the lump in her throat. ‘Monsieur Jean was kind and generous, but I would have given up my life to stay with maman to the end.’ Husky and raw with emotion, her voice broke. ‘She was all I had. I loved her.’
Puzzlement in her tired eyes, Jeannie stared, then sank to perch next to her. ‘D’ye mean John Evernden forced you to leave with him?’
Sylvia cast her mind back. ‘He never said we were leaving. She sent us for pastries. The carriage just kept going and going, further and further. Then he put me under a blanket in the coach. It was a game, he said, hide and seek from the bad soldiers. I must have fallen asleep. When I awoke we were in England. They tricked me. He told me I would never see maman again.’
Tears glazed Jeannie’s eyes and she swiped at them. ‘Aye. She was that set on saving you. But she pined away after. I couldna’ forgive ye. My poor sweet lady that was so beautiful, so sweet and loving, and they all left her to die.’
Scalding tears trickled down Sylvia’s cheeks. She envisaged her mother’s last days, saw again the face that had become vague and misty over the years, only a faint likeness in her locket to remind her. The memories sharpened to vivid pictures of blonde hair, sallow skin and unhealthy flushed cheeks. Dark circles outlined luminous blue eyes full of pain and soul-deep hurt. Jeannie was right. Sylvia should have stayed.
She placed an arm around Jeannie’s bony shoulders. ‘I’m so sorry. Thank you for taking care of her. I know she loved you just as much as you loved her.’
Jeannie pulled a handkerchief from her apron pocket and blew her nose. ‘Aye. She did. I didna’ tell her where the extra money came from to feed the two of you. ’Twas between me, the madame and the Irishman. She never would have let me take money from that bastard. She loved him, y’see, and she wouldna’ listen to reason.’
Jeannie dabbed at her eyes. ‘They were so happy when they first came to France. I thought he loved her too. Then the troubles started. All the nobles left Paris. A message came from the old duke for him to come home, but he wouldna’ accept your mither. They couldna’ make up their minds.’
The old maid wrung her hands. ‘Then it was almost too late. The embassy closed and British soldiers were sent to take us all to a boat, her and the duke. We got separated from him in the confusion. He got to the boat, we didna’. Rafter was a soldier then. He brought us to Madame Gilbert’s to hide.’
Rafter? Suspicion uncoiled like a loathsome snake in Sylvia’s stomach. ‘Rafter brought you to Madame Gilbert’s?’
Lost in the past, Jeannie stared into the distance. ‘We waited and we waited, but he niver came back. But we had to eat. Your mither was two months gone with you and, in the end, Madame Gilbert gave her no choice but to work. All the old friends were gone from Paris, or had lost their heads, ye ken. After you were born, you had to be fed. Rafter came back to see his old friend Madame Gilbert a few months after your birth with the news the Duke wasna’ interested in your mither. I decided your father would pay. I found the paper that Marguerite said proved who you were tucked away with her trinkets. I gave it to Madame Gilbert.’ Her face lit with a smile of triumph. ‘For a while things were easier, he sent money to keep us in France. He’d do anything to keep the both of ye a secret, Rafter said.’
Sylvia froze. She placed a hand on Jeannie’s arm, jerking the old woman back into the present. ‘Wait a minute. Are you saying there really is proof I’m his daughter?’
‘Aye. But Marguerite wouldna’ use it. If he didna’ want her, then she said she didna’ care, not for herself. So I took it to pay him back. I niver dared tell her what I’d done, even when she discovered it gone that day when Evernden took ye.’
Sylvia got up and went to the window. Outside the day was bright, the sky blue, while inside this dreadful house everything seemed dark and twisted. ‘What did the paper say?’
The old woman slumped and shook her grizzled head. ‘I canna read. But they came home one day giggling like naughty children with the paper. They must have known then that she was with child.’ Jeannie’s claw-like hands clenched. ‘Everything was a game to them in those days. A game against his father.’
Sylvia’s mind whirled. All those years Monsieur Jean had sought proof, and it was here all the time. ‘Why did my father deny us all these years?’
Sorrow crumpled Jeannie’s wizened face. ‘I don’t know, lassie. I just dinna’ ken. I suppose he didna’ love her as she did him.’ Her old eyes filled with tears again. ‘You look just like her. Ah, I’m right sorry, lass. I should never have told them about John Evernden whisking ye off. It fair makes my heart weep to see such loveliness wasted. It’s inner beauty what counts. She had it and now I see it in you too.’
With a heart aching so much she thought it would break, Sylvia hugged Jeannie’s bony body close. ‘My father should not have abandoned her and nor should I.’
‘Dear God,’ the old woman moaned. ‘What have I done?’
Footsteps and female voices sounded on the stairs. They jumped apart.
‘That’s Madame Gilbert,’ Jeannie said, wiping her eyes. ‘And the other girls, coming to settle you in.’
The sounds drew close and Jeannie stood. ‘I must go. I’ll help ye if I can, Sylvie, with my last breath, so I will.’
The door opened. Madame Gilbert waddled in with what looked like a bottle of medicine. Three girls in tawdry, revealing gowns, their eyes bright and hard and distant, followed her in.
‘That will be all, Jeannie,’ the Madame said, her smile treacle-sweet. ‘You can leave Sylvie to us.’
Christopher felt an utter idiot lurking in a hedge like some peeping Tom. The rented hack flicked its tail at the flies on its sweating, dun-brown flanks. He’d pushed the nag hard to catch up to the travelling carriage containing Sylvia and her escort after he caught sight of the blue bonnet he’d bought in Tunbridge Wells. It had passed him on his way in to a Calais inn in search of her.
Cradling the horse’s nose to keep it sil
ent and still, he peered through the hedge. The dusty black coach turned around in the narrow lane outside the unremarkable house. Large and square, it had tangled bushes encroaching on the path to the front door. Weeds infested what must once have been a rose garden, while ancient ivy clung to the grey stonework, draping the upper windows. It appeared to be the kind of country house a gentleman might own, if it weren’t so neglected. Yet for all its apparent state of disrepair, the ruts in the lane indicated frequent visitors.
Into this house Sylvia had waltzed, encircled within the protective embrace of the Irishman from the Bird. A friend or a lover? A pang pierced his chest. He didn’t want to believe it.
Damnation. Was he about to make a fool of himself over a strumpet, a beauty who tempted him against all his principles? He’d only wanted her because he couldn’t have her. Lust. Nothing more.
Yet he wanted her still.
He cursed. Perhaps she’d plotted with this man to blackmail the Evernden family. In that case, why had she left without the rest of the money Christopher had promised her?
While he stood here wondering like a besotted fool, matters of business awaited him in London, important matters she’d driven from his mind. He’d wasted enough time over a woman who had so quickly found another protector. He mounted and brought the horse’s head around.
A door slammed.
He glanced over his shoulder.
The Irishman sauntered down the steps and out of the front gate. Alone. A smile curved his thin lips. He set what looked like a brand-new hat on his head at a jaunty angle. With a brief word to the coachman, he climbed inside.
The hairs on the back of Christopher’s neck prickled. Despite all his logic, something about this felt wrong. He had to know if Sylvia and this man meant trouble for him and his family. He had to know Sylvia was all right.
He edged the horse deeper into the hedge’s shadow and watched the coach rumble and sway down the lane. Nothing about the house revealed Sylvia’s purpose in coming here. If it was an assignation, why had the man left so soon?
He recalled the farm labourer hoeing a field a mile or so down the lane. He would know who owned the house. Careful to keep out of view of the windows for the first few yards, Christopher retraced his tracks to where the lone man toiled, his hoe swinging in rhythmic arcs. The peasant looked up when Christopher drew close. He leaned on his implement and touched a hand to his forelock. The lines in his weathered face deepened as he squinted up.
‘Who owns these lands?’ Christopher asked, with a sweep of his arm.
‘Today, milor’?’
Christopher frowned. ‘What do you mean?’
A grin revealed rotting teeth and further creased the labourer’s crumpled face. ‘They used to belong to le Duc de Verendelle, then they belonged to the peasants, then to Bonaparte. Now?’ He spread his arms wide. ‘I don’t know. I just do what I have always done, milor’.’
Christopher understood the man’s confusion. Since Bonaparte’s departure for St Helena, the government of France under Louis XVIII had yet to organise itself. Lands were still being parcelled out to their former owners. ‘Then the land does not belong to those who occupy la grande maison?’ He nodded back in the direction of the house.
The grin widened, black eyes twinkled. ‘No, milor’. Though it is true that many a furrow is ploughed there. They do not work the land.’
‘Speak plainly, man.’
‘Why, milor’, ’tis a bordello. Only les filles de joie live there now.’ He grimaced. ‘Though I have only heard tell of it. It is not for the likes of me. Only men like the mayor and rich merchants can pay their prices. And men like you, milor’.’ The leathery face leered up at him.
Prostitutes? Christopher’s mind reeled. He couldn’t imagine it. A vision of the day he met her flashed into his mind. If that was the true Sylvia, then he could picture it very well. A cold hand seemed to fist in his chest. He was a stupid fool to follow her like some callow youth.
He flicked a sou to the peasant and, not wishing to arouse suspicion, he continued in the same direction as before. As he rode, he cast his mind over her entrance into the house. The Irishman had held her tight against him. She appeared willing enough.
Damn her to hell. He needed to know, to hear that this was what she wanted from her own lips.
He doubled back and once more observed the house from the shelter of the hedge on the other side of the lane.
Blank-eyed, the shade-covered windows stared back at him. He tied the horse to a hazel tree and circled the house. At the back, he discovered a stable from which the sounds of at least one horse emanated. Smoke drifted from a chimney on the low wing jutting at right angles from the main house. Probably the kitchen.
None of the back windows were open. Fresh air seemed unpopular in this establishment. Apart from breaking a window, he did not see any way in.
Hell fire. If the old peasant told the truth and it was a brothel, who more likely to seek its services than a hot-blooded gentleman? He jogged back to his mount. Pulling the horse behind him, he marched boldly up to the front door and rang the bell.
The man who answered his summons barely reached his chest, but the aggression in his stance and the brutality in his pugnacious face marked him for a bruiser. ‘Yes?’
Christopher raised a haughty eyebrow in true Garth style.
The glowering gnome raked Christopher with an appraising look, then pushed the door wide. ‘Welcome, monsieur. Tie your horse to the post and come in. May I take your coat and hat?’
‘I’ll keep them, thank you.’ He retained a firm grip on his cane. The sword hidden within might be needed. The swaggering ox ushered him into a murky parlour. ‘I will tell madame you are here.’
Christopher strolled to a shabby couch and made himself comfortable. He grimaced at the filthy furnishings. They had certainly seen better days.
The madame, a red-haired, gargantuan woman of indeterminate age, bustled in.
He maintained his nonchalant expression as her avaricious eyes took in his dress, his jewellery and his physique. He resisted the temptation to tug at his cravat.
He obviously passed muster, because she smiled coquettishly. ‘I am Madame Gilbert. How can we be of service to you, monsieur?’
He waved a languid hand. ‘I was told you have some of the best women this side of Paris. I find myself in need of some female company.’
‘You were informed correctly, monsieur. Most of my girls used to work in Paris before the troubles and well know the taste of aristos. Do you have any preferences? They are all excellent, clean and experienced in all the arts. The vice Anglais, if you desire?’
Christopher kept his expression bland at the mention of an aberration favoured by Englishmen who had developed a taste for the birch switch at public school. He had never gone away to school.
‘I prefer blondes,’ he said. ‘Slim and young.’
The madame nodded and waddled out.
Christopher leaned back against the sofa and forced himself to appear nonchalant as he imagined Sylvia’s surprise, or anger. Hell, perhaps this wasn’t such a good idea.
A hunched-up witch of a servant arrived with wine. Christopher refused it. He needed his wits about him and he had no faith in the cleanliness of the down-at-heel place. She departed, muttering under her breath.
Two buxom females slouched into the room followed by the madame, her eyes greedy.
‘This is Berthé,’ the woman announced, pointing to the one with rouged lips and straw-coloured hair. She wore a tawdry red velvet gown that skimmed her nipples and knees.
‘And this is Yvette.’ A slighter and younger version of Berthé with light brown hair and brown eyes had on a black lacy corset and filmy yellow skirt. The women flaunted their attributes and batted their eyelashes. Worn and tired, neither of them were Sylvia.
He shook his head at the fat woman. ‘Nice enough in their way. But I want something fresher, more innocent in appearance, younger.’
Avaricious
eyes gleamed from between rolls of fat. ‘A virgin, monsieur?’
‘A virgin would be a special treat,’ he replied, trying to hide his disgust. ‘But younger, smaller and…’ he curled his lip as his gaze ran over the two women who postured before him ‘…a true blonde.’
The woman licked her red lips. ‘If I had such a girl, she would be very expensive.’
Christopher pulled out a handful of gold. ‘But, madame,’ he said in an icy voice, ‘do not presume to think to cheat me.’ His hand moved suggestively to the cane at his side. ‘I am as accomplished with one sword as I am with the other.’
She eyed his crotch and then his swordstick. She nodded as if coming to a decision. ‘I have a girl who might suit you. I would as soon let you be her first as some fat merchant. You will teach her well, I think.’
‘If I’m to be her tutor, perhaps you should pay me?’
Her fat face reddened.
Christopher put up a placating hand and smiled. ‘I jest, madame.’
‘Ah, a jest,’ she said. ‘So English to jest about business.’ A suspicious expression crossed her face. ‘Your name, monsieur?’
‘Lord Albert, at your service.’ He inclined his head. The name of the obnoxious dandy had jumped into his mind and the woman seemed satisfied. Christopher breathed a sigh of relief when she didn’t ask for his calling card.
The pudgy hands slapped together. ‘Yvette, go. Berthé, make sure mon petit chou is ready for milor’.’
‘Surely the gentleman would prefer a more experienced woman?’ Berthé said in surly tones.
The madame glared. ‘Do as I tell you.’
With dragging steps, Berthé left the room. Jealous rivalry amongst whores seemed ludicrous.
‘Where is she?’ Christopher asked. ‘Am I to approve of her first?’
‘This one is special. You will see. But first we must conclude our business.’
The exorbitant price to which he agreed seemed all the worse since he strongly suspected he wouldn’t get his money’s worth. Deep in his heart, he wouldn’t believe Sylvia had stooped to this.
The Rake's Inherited Courtesan Page 14
