“Where is she?” he snarled, turning into the first room he saw, which showed signs of a tussle - as well as a few empty bottles of gin.
“That Italian bloke ran off wit ‘ere,” the Gypsy slurred indignantly, shuffling into the room behind him. She swiped a gin bottle from the small circular table and took a deep slug, that made Gabe shudder. Straight spirits were for sipping, but Carmen drank her gin as though it were mother’s milk.
“Give me that,” Gabriel commanded, forcibly removing the bottle from the Gypsy’s surprisingly strong grip. “Sit down there and tell me exactly what happened. From the very beginning, mind, not just today.”
And so, with more alacrity than Gabe had expected Carmen began to tell the tale of how Lydia Beaufort had ended up in the clutches of Count Zitelli.
“I was an actress,” the Gypsy confided, either not noticing or ignoring the roll of Gabe’s eyes. He wanted the story to take off from where Lydia entered, not the mad woman’s life’s tale. “Only there’s not much in the way of work when you get a bit older, unless you’re Mrs Sarah Siddons, of course.”
The last bit was added bitterly, clearly Carmen felt a great deal of jealousy toward England’s most cherished player.
“So’s,” Carmen continued, eyeing the bottle of gin in his hand. “I says to myself I needs a profession, and I isn’t the type of woman who’d lift her skirt for any sailor who’d give me sixpence.”
A sailor probably wouldn’t offer her even a penny for a tumble in the hay, Gabe thought, though kept this to himself. He needed Carmen on side, for now.
“So, using my considerable acting skills, I decided to tell fortunes and the lark.”
“One must admire your entrepreneurial spirit, if nothing else,” Gabe replied blandly.
Carmen smiled at this, considering it a compliment.
“So, I makes a nice living,” she said, continuing with her story. “It’s not much, but it’s enough to get me by. Then a few months ago a dark-haired lady turns up at my door, wanting to communicate withs the dead.”
Lydia.
“And you obliged her?” Gabe questioned.
“Not at first,” the Gypsy admitted, “A woman like ‘er doesn’t come along that often, and I needs to pay my rent, sir. So I read the cards, ‘er palm, the works. Told ‘er that the spirits were trying to reach ‘er, but that we needed more time.”
“And time is money,” Gabe supplied.
“It is that,” Carmen nodded enthusiastically, thinking Gabe a kindred spirit. “Then one day, a few weeks ago, that Italian bloke showed up. ‘E said ‘e’d pay me double what the Lady paid me, if I would trick the girl into believing that ‘er destiny lay in the arms of an Italian man.”
“I’ve no doubt you charged him double the double again,” Gabe said dryly, and Carmen nodded without compunction.
“Aye I did,” she said with a frown, “If only a’cuse I felt so guilty. ‘E told me about ‘er mother and ‘er sisters, said to use that to scare ‘er a little. So’s I did. And as soon as she’d left, I sent word t’im to say ‘twas all done. And then I ‘eard nothing else from him ‘till today.”
“And what happened today?” Gabe asked quietly, trying to quell the fear in his chest.
“Well the Italian showed up again,” Carmen said, clutching her shawl tight around her for comfort. “’E was shoutin’ something terrible. Wanted ‘is money back, ‘cuse the plan ‘adn’t worked. ‘E was going through all my fings, lookin’ for money. Then the French girl called at the door.”
Marguerite; Gabe stilled.
“She said ‘er mistress ‘ad left somefing behind the last day. Now I was blasted if I knew what it was, but I left ‘er on the doorstep and went inside for a look, and that’s when Zitelli said to lure back Lady Beaufort or he’d see that I was sent to Newgate for thieving from my betters.”
“The scoundrel,” Gabe supplied, thinking that the Gypsy was lying, and that she had probably been offered coin for luring Lydia back to her den.
“Aye ‘e is that,” she agreed. “Then Lady Lydia arrived, and ‘e took out a pistol and made off with ‘er in a carriage.”
“Where did he say he was taking her, Carmen?” Gabe asked urgently. They couldn’t be more than an hour’s ride ahead of him, and he could catch them yet, a solo rider being quicker than a cumbersome carriage.
“Gretna Green, I fink ‘e said,” Carmen whispered, her eyes lighting up with mischief. “Thoughs I couldn’t be certain. I’d need a little somefing to refresh my memory.”
Gabriel put his hand in his pocket, and reluctantly withdrew a shilling.
“Where did they go Carmen?” he repeated, holding the coin up for her to see.
“To Gretna Green,” Carmen replied automatically, her eyes lighting at the sight of the coin; her gin stocks evidently needed replenishing.
“Thank you for that,” Gabe said with a smile as he stood, and re-pocketed the shilling, causing the Gypsy to howl with outrage.
“Oi,” she spluttered, “That’s mine. You said you’d give it me.”
“I said no such thing,” Gabe retorted, already half way out the door, though he paused and looked her in the eye as he delivered his final sentence. “Consider it payment for my reading of your future - you’re going to be spending the next few years in Newgate madam, for aiding and abetting a kidnap.”
Her curses followed him out the door, but they registered as little to him as the soft drops of rain, which fell from the evening sky. He had to get on the road to Scotland, and find the Count and Lydia before they reached Gretna Green.
Chapter Eighteen
They had been traveling, by Lydia’s estimation, for at least five hours. Outside the window of the carriage Lydia had watched as the City of London faded to small towns and then finally country field dotted with the occasional village.
Zitelli sat opposite her, his pistol firmly gripped in his hand. Beneath his beautiful eyes there were deep purple shadows, as though the Count had not slept properly in days. His hair, which had once been so neatly styled, was now bedraggled and greasy.
“What happened to your valet?” Lydia asked, loathe to speak to him, but desperate to know how it was she came to be here.
“He left,” Zitelli snapped, a sulky expression on his face. “The ambassador blackballed me with all the English banks, and he soon realized that I had no money to even buy food, let alone pay him.”
All of this was uttered with pure self-assured venom, as though the Count could not understand why the valet had left. Lydia could almost see him thinking that the man should have paid Zitelli for the privilege of dressing him!
“So, you set out to woo me because of my wealth?” Lydia said lightly, trying to engage the Count.
“Your wealth, among other things, are what attracted me to you,” Zitelli condescended, a cruel smile on his lips.
“Other things?” Lydia arched an eyebrow, adopting a blasé manner that she knew would infuriate him.
It worked.
“Yes,” Zitelli snarled, “Other things. Not your beauty, your habits. You skulk about ballrooms alone, as though you are too good to speak with anyone. You have no friends, that I could see, and run off alone to consult with Gypsies. You hold yourself aloft from the ton, thinking you are superior, when actually it made you the perfect target, because you are so vulnerable.”
Vulnerable?
The word was like a physical blow to Lydia, for she could see that there was truth in it. In holding herself away from people, she had made herself a target. If she had just confided in someone - anyone - about Carmen, they would have stopped her from visiting the mercenary fortune teller. And if she had acknowledged every hesitant gesture of romance that Lord Sutherland had offered, then she wouldn’t be here at all. Perhaps she would be out with him, riding on The Row, or walking in Green Park. He had tried so very hard to make her see that he loved her, and she had pushed him away at nearly every turn.
Straight into the arms of Kitty Marnell…
“I was having you followed.”
All sense of shame seemed to have left the Count, for he appeared remarkably pleased with this statement. He preened like peacock, delighted with his cleverness.
“I wanted to see if, perhaps, you went somewhere alone so that I could make your acquaintance,” he continued, gleefully, “And I discovered something even better. It didn’t take much to convince the old woman to exploit your desire to speak with your mother.”
“And then you had her steal my miniature?” Lydia ventured, for despite all that had happened, the precious portrait was still not in her hands.
“Now that,” the Count frowned, “I did not do. I do not steal Lady Beaufort.”
He delivered this sentence with such pious outrage, that Lydia felt hysterical laughter swell in her throat. He deceived, he kidnapped, he pointed a gun at her - but heaven forbid anyone should accuse him of theft.
They lapsed into silence again, which was only broken when the driver stopped at a coaching-inn to change the horses.
“Do not move,” Zitelli ordered, the pistol in his hand trained straight at her heart. “Or I will shoot.”
“If I’m dead,” Lydia responded, bored, “Then you won’t be able to lay claim to my fortune, will you Count Zitelli?”
Her reasoning seemed to confuse the Count, who for a minute looked perplexed, though his hand still held the pistol tightly.
“Have you paid the driver yet?” Lydia wondered aloud, “For if he knew which one of us was actually in possession of a fortune, I’m sure his loyalties would quickly change.”
“Witch,” Zitelli snarled, and much to Lydia’s alarm, he lunged across the compartment and grabbed her by the neck.
“You evil, evil, witch.”
Zitelli was so enraged that he was spitting, and if his hands hadn’t been in a death-hold around her neck, Lydia would have reached to wipe her face clean of his bodily effusions. As it was, he had such a tight grip on her throat, that she was struggling to breathe. Which was most alarming.
She fought valiantly beneath his body, which had her trapped against the seat, kicking violently, hoping to dislodge him. The Count seemed intent on killing her, and all vestiges of humanity had left his eyes. Lydia’s hand scrabbled on the carriage bench, searching for something - anything - to hit him with. Her hand closed over her reticule, and she snatched it, lifted it, and whacked it squarely on the back of Zitelli’s thick head.
“Argh,” the Count shouted, and he rolled off her, clutching his skull.
Not one to miss an opportunity, Lydia swung the reticule at Zitelli’s face, and relished at the satisfying crunch that it made, as it connected with his nose.
“What do you have in there, bricks?” the Count slurred, for blood was gushing forth now from his injury.
The paperweight that she had stolen from Lord Jersey’s desk, among other mementos; Lydia smiled, there were some benefits to being sentimental after all. Reaching past the stricken Count, Lydia nimbly lifted his pistol, which, in his rage, he had discarded on the seat. She held it in two hands, and aimed it at the Count who froze. She hoped she looked suitably threatening, for in truth she had no idea how to use the weapon in her hands, but she wasn’t about to tell Zitelli that.
“Open the door,” she nodded at the carriage door, “And get out.”
Zitelli, despite his bleeding nose and the obvious pain he was in, quickly complied. He scrabbled backwards across the floor of the compartment, felt around for the door handle, and when the door was open he near flung himself out to safety - his frightened eyes never leaving Lydia.
Lydia rose regally once he had exited, pistol still in hand, and descended from the carriage unassisted. The yard of the coaching inn was filled with a crowd of farmers and drunks, who had been drawn outside by the ruckus. The crowd eyed the bloodied and battered Zitelli, and the cool and composed Lady Beaufort with wonder.
“Aye up, love,” one man called, as the scene began to register. “What the ruddy hell is goin’ on ‘ere?”
From the deep, Northern accent, Lydia deduced that they were somewhere near Newcastle.
“This scoundrel kidnapped me,” she said mildly, pointing to the Count. “He was attempting to take me to Gretna Green where he was going to force me to marry him.”
“Well, I never.”
“The blighter.”
“Is ‘is coat really pink?”
A chorus of cries went up from the crowd and the men, many in their cups for the night had long fallen, began to surround the cowering Zitelli.
“You gave ‘im a reet good wallop, love,” one man shouted, admiring Zitelli’s broken nose.
Lydia preened.
“Aye,” another man, in a flat cap commented, “I’d like to meet the man who thinks he could make it all the way to Gretna Green with you unscathed.”
“That man, my good sir, would be me.”
Every head, including Lydia’s, whipped around to look for who had spoken. Lydia spotted him first, and her heart leaped at the sight of his tall, rangy figure and his blond mop of hair, which was more dishevelled than usual.
“Who’s this then?”
The crowd turned to Lydia as one, as though they were at a pantomime.
“That, gentlemen,” Lydia said, her cool composure faltering as her heart somersaulted inside her chest, “Is the Marquess of Sutherland.”
“Delighted to meet your acquaintance,” Gabriel said, with no little bemusement to the assembled crowd.
“Is ‘e a goodie or a baddie lass?” a voice called.
Lydia pretended to consider the question for a moment.
“A goodie,” she declared, a mischievous smile tugging at her lips as the Marquess visibly relaxed.
“Well then,” the man in the flat cap, who seemed to have nominated himself as the leader of the pack, spoke. “Why don’t we take this sack of unmentionables inside, and leave you alone with your Marquess.”
The men hoisted Zitelli up, and dragged him inside the inn where, the flat capped man assured Lydia, he would be held until the local magistrate was summoned.
The crowd, rowdy and boisterous, disappeared inside the inn, leaving Lydia quite alone with Lord Sutherland.
“I came to rescue you,” he said simply. He had not moved from the spot that he stood in, and there was quite a distance between them, which made Lydia frown.
“You’re a little late,” she replied wryly, her feet moving soundlessly across the yard. “Though I am glad there’s someone here to witness my actually having held a man at gunpoint. I feel it will cement my reputation as a woman not to be trifled with.”
“That it will,” Gabe nodded seriously.
She stood before him now, the pistol held loosely in one hand. Lydia longed to throw herself into Gabe’s arms, but there was something about his posture, something hesitant in his eyes, that stopped her.
“I have a confession to make,” he said by way of reply to her questioning look. Gabe reached into the breast pocket of his coat, and withdrew from it her miniature, his expression crestfallen.
“You had it all this time?” Lydia said wonderingly, as he handed it to her.
“I did,” Gabe looked so thoroughly abashed that Lydia felt almost sorry for him. “I took it at the Nugent’s rout - I instructed my footman to return it to you the next day, when I sent you the amethyst hair comb, but only this afternoon I saw that it was still in my possession. I’m so sorry Lydia, I did not know what it meant to you.”
“How could you have?” Lydia asked lightly, popping open the small case and looking at the picture of her mother and her sisters. “How could you have known Gabe, when I never told you.”
“Do you think me a beast?”
“No,” Lydia shook her head, solemnly, “I would never think that of you. And I - I…”
She trailed off, w
ondering how best to word what she wanted to say.
“I should have told you what it was, but I was too stubbornly afraid to believe that you might have wanted to know. To think that you might care.”
“I care,” the Marquess said simply, reaching out to place a hand on Lydia’s elbow. “I care more than you know Lydia.”
Placing his other hand on Lydia’s waist, the Marquess began to draw her toward him, so that Lydia - her breath shallow with anticipation - stood with her face just inches from is.
This is it, she thought, her knees like jelly, this is to be my first kiss…
Except it wasn’t. An angry cockney voice jarred the stillness of the night air, causing both Lydia and Sutherland to jump.
“‘Ey,” the voice, which belonged to the carriage driver called, “What the ruddy ‘ell is goin’ on? I’m supposed to be goin’ to Gretna Green, and now I’m told the man who hired me is incapacitated because this Lady ‘it ‘im with a bag of bricks?”
“It was only a paperweight,” Lydia demurred, “I just have an exceedingly good aim.”
“Be that as it may,” the driver retorted, “I’m now down a whole day’s wages, I was supposed to get five pounds for goin’ to Gretna, now I’ll get nuffink.”
“Rest assured you’ll get your five pounds, sir,” Gabe interjected smoothly. “For the lady will still be traveling to Gretna Green, just with a different suitor.”
“Will she?” the driver looked at Lydia, perplexed.
“Yes, will she?” Lydia raised an eyebrow at Gabe’s high-handedness.
“She will.”
The Marquess spoke firmly, and Lydia watched as Gabe slipped the driver a pound note - and urged him to get himself a drink - before turning to Lydia, his expression determined.
“Lydia,” he said in a tone that brokered no argument. “When he returns from having finished his ale, we are both going to get into that carriage, go to Gretna Green and wed.”
Lydia gulped, she hadn’t been expecting this.
Chapter Nineteen
A Lady Like No Other Page 14
