by Amanda Scott
“But it’s coming on to rain, m’lady.”
She glanced up at the overcast sky. It was beginning to look threatening indeed, but she swallowed any worry she might have had and smiled at the coachman. “A little rain won’t melt me, Tom, and I daresay it will hold off long enough for me to get home dry.”
“But I’ve got no footman t’ walk wi’ ye, m’lady!”
“’Tis of no consequence. I don’t need one.”
“But the master—”
“Pooh to the master,” she laughed, giving a snap of her fingers and hoping her coachman would have better sense than to repeat either the words or the gesture to the viscount. “You know he does not interfere with me.”
“He’ll not like this, I’m thinkin’,” retorted the coachman stubbornly, shaking his grizzled head.
She did not choose to think about Ravenwood’s probable reaction. It was of little consequence compared to Meg’s well-being.
“Ye should not walk alone here, ma’am,” said the coachman, making a last effort.
“Oh, don’t make such a fuss, Tom!” she snapped, thinking that to look as if she might lose her temper might be the best thing at the moment. “We are scarcely ten minutes from Charles Street, and this is Mayfair, after all. What could possibly happen to me?”
“But, ma’am, I canna—”
“I cannot stand here debating the matter, Tom.” She glanced over her shoulder to see that, although Vaughan had disappeared, the other two were still speaking. She didn’t think the thief would know her, but Alfpuddle certainly would, and if Tom Coachman kept her standing here much longer, they would both be off and gone, or else Alfpuddle would recognize either herself or the crest on the door of the coach. “You are blocking traffic, Tom, and I do not intend to get back into the coach, so you might just as well go home. You needn’t say a word to Ravenwood if you are worried about what he might do. He will no doubt still be at White’s, in any case, and I shall be home long before he returns. Now go, do!”
Reluctantly he touched his hat and gave his horses the office to start. Cicely stood where she was for a moment, watching until she was nearly certain he would not look back. Then she glanced over her shoulder again to see that the two were still talking. Drawing her shawl closer to her face and shivering in the now-chilly breeze, she wished briefly that she had brought her fur-lined, hooded cloak instead of only her woolen shawl, but then she rejected the notion. Nearly anyone could have a wool shawl, and it would be difficult to tell, particularly in this light, that this one was cashmere. But the cloak, like her pearls, would call attention to her station in life and thus to herself, making it much more difficult to do what she meant to do. For Tom Coachman was right. Ladies of quality did not walk the streets, any streets, alone.
The two men ahead of her straightened, and for a moment she feared they would walk directly toward her. But they turned and strolled slowly away up the street. At the first intersection they paused, and Alfpuddle said something briefly to the other that made him laugh, then he clapped him on the back and turned away up the side street. From the direction he took, Cicely had no doubt he was returning to Uffington House. At any rate, she would know how to find Alfpuddle if she wanted him. And wouldn’t Sir Conrad be surprised to hear about the sort of company his man had been keeping?
Of course it was possible that Alfpuddle had merely been sent by her cousin with a message to George Vaughan and had met the fox-faced man by accident. Anything was possible, she told herself, even things that were prodigiously improbable.
The fox-faced man crossed the street, and she hurried after him, only to walk straight into the line of fire as a passing carriage lurched into a muddy pothole and spewed wet mud all over her skirts. Suppressing a gasp of dismay, she told herself sternly that it would now be that much more difficult for anyone to recognize her.
Her quarry was moving more rapidly, and she saw him glance once or twice at the skies. It was certainly getting darker. She could match his pace easily enough, though she was glad she had chosen to wear half boots and not thin sandals when she had set out that afternoon. The rapid pace was taking her away from Charles Street and into streets she did not know well. Half an hour passed before she recognized the Holborn Hill Road, but that didn’t help her much, because the little man only crossed it, skittering in front of first one carriage and then another coming from the opposite direction.
She realized she had to get herself across the busy road, and there was no urchin waiting to sweep the crossing, let alone to stop traffic for her. Finally, with her heart in her throat, she ventured off the flagway, then jumped back as a low-slung carriage flashed past. A glance across the way showed her quarry rapidly approaching a side street. When he turned into it, she nearly panicked. She must be miles from home! She could not lose him now simply for lack of a little resolution.
Lifting her chin and straightening her shoulders, she gave a quick glance in both directions before dashing across the traffic-laden road. Then, still running and holding the shawl close about her head and shoulders, her reticule banging against her mud-bedaubed hip as she went, she rushed after him, letting out a long sigh of relief when she finally caught sight of him again. The first drops of rain began to fall.
Her quarry turned again, and suddenly it was as though they had entered a maze, where little narrow, twisting lanes seemed to cross and recross one another. And despite the drizzling rain, there were a good many other people hustling along these same streets. It was gloomy and the smells were dreadful. As she tried to keep her man in sight Cicely shuddered at the thought of what the area would be like on a hot summer’s day. The structures lining the streets seemed to be shops of one sort or another with residences above. But shops or not, she didn’t think Ravenwood would approve of her visiting the neighborhood even if she had brought her coach and every footman in his employ.
The thought gave her pause, but then the fox-faced man turned another corner, and she hurried after him again, kicking against a pile of garbage in her haste. But as soon as she had her eyes fixed safely upon the man again, her thoughts returned to Ravenwood. It was true that he had interfered with her very little, and she could not remember that he had ever so much as raised his voice to her. A mild rebuke was the most she could remember, and that had happened only when her behavior had not suited his dignity, when he had worried about what others might think.
But there was no one who mattered to see her here. To be sure, it was not a particularly savory part of the city, but no one had attempted to speak to her, let alone molest her. She looked like any one of the other bedraggled women on the street. Ravenwood might be displeased if he learned that she had not ridden home in the carriage, might even scold her for walking unattended, but there was no reason he should even know she had come to a place like this or that he would be more than moderately annoyed if he did discover it. No doubt that sudden hesitation she had experienced just moments ago was due to her upbringing. The duke had always bellowed and blustered at the least little thing. She remembered that when she had visited the Haymarket during her second Season, he had even threatened to thrash her, and though he had not done so, he had frightened her a good deal.
But Ravenwood had never given her cause to fear him. In fact, she had thought him, for the most part, perfectly harmless. However, there had been a time or two when his jaw had tightened or there had been a certain glint of steel in the blue eyes—
Her quarry turned another corner, and she hurried again, forcing the disquieting thoughts from her mind.
It was far more important that she help Meg than that she worry about whether or not Ravenwood would react unpleasantly if he found out about this little adventure. She knew perfectly well that Meg had never taken so much as a hairpin that did not belong to her. Therefore, someone else had to have put the stolen items in her portmanteau.
Someone else had to have known Meg had been in the Jerseys’ town house. And that someone also had to have access to the house i
n Charles Street. She remembered the day Lord Faringdon and Roger Carrisbrooke had found her at the Lynsteds’ house. Faringdon had said then that Wigan had sent him. No doubt Wigan would tell anyone he trusted where she might be found. Certainly he would tell Sir Conrad. And there was no reason to suppose Sir Conrad would not tell Alfpuddle. And if Alfpuddle had been angered enough by Meg’s continual snubs, who was to say he might not arrange to implicate her in the thefts out of pure spite?
Had Mr. Townsend … No, it had been Sir Conrad himself who had told her about the forty-pound reward for capturing a thief. Could George Vaughan have located the thief for Alfpuddle? But then she realized things had to have happened too quickly. They had, as Brittany had pointed out, been in Berkeley Square for only half an hour, yet the goods—or some of them—had been found that same afternoon. Even if Sir Conrad had called while they were away, Alfpuddle could never have learned about the robbery and Meg’s presence soon enough to have tracked down Vaughan and the jewels in time to see them into Meg’s possession. The only way he could have done it—if indeed he was responsible—would be if he had had a hand in stealing the jewels himself!
They had turned into a wider street when the little man ahead of her suddenly disappeared, and since there was no intersection near where she had last seen him, it was not difficult to deduce that he had turned into one of the shops. Not certain which one it had been, however, she quickened her pace again, peering through one dirt-streaked window after another. But when she came to the right one, there was no possibility of mistaking it, for the windows were relatively clean and a number of candles glowed warmly inside, casting enough light for her to identify the fox-faced man in conversation with a plump, grey-haired woman behind a counter. With a nod, the woman gestured toward the rear of the shop, and the man turned away from the counter. A moment later he had passed from Cicely’s sight through a curtain-draped doorway.
She stepped back away from the shop, peering upward into the gloom and drizzle to try to read the sign over the door. Though she could make out little more than the word “chandler,” she knew that if she could discover the name of the road she was on, it ought to be enough to make Ravenwood listen to her and pass the information along to the proper authority, either Mr. Townsend or Mr. Vaughan.
No, she told herself grimly, not Mr. Vaughan. If, as she very much suspected, Alfpuddle was a thief, then the fact that he and the fox-faced man had both been with Mr. Vaughan made a very good case against Mr. Vaughan himself. It was a fact that some thieftakers cultivated thieves until they “weighed forty pounds.” Perhaps Vaughan was merely waiting for sufficient evidence against the pair to see them hang. But they had all seemed very friendly, and she didn’t think it would be wise to trust Mr. Vaughan.
She stood where she could watch the shop and still be somewhat protected from the rain, which was coming down more steadily now, but though she waited for what seemed a very long time, the man did not come out again.
Not being able to bring herself to stop one of the grimy-looking passersby to ask the name of the road, she began walking back the way she had come, hoping to find a sign that would give her the information. At least, she thought, she was no longer in the awful maze of narrow streets. This one was not only wider but fairly straight and possessed of a moderate number of moving vehicles, including hackney coaches. She stepped forward when she recognized a hack moving in the direction she hoped would take her back toward the Holborn Hill Road. But just as she lifted her hand to signal the driver, there was a flurry of motion, a silvery flash near her arm, and a tremendous hand pushed her back against the wall of the nearest shop with bruising force. As she tried to stop herself from sliding down the stone wall, she caught a glimpse of flying feet and realized her reticule had been snatched by one of those villains known to all and sundry as a cutpurse.
The hackney coach rattled past as she got painfully to her feet. She ached all over from the jarring crash against the wall, but more than that, it was suddenly brought home to her that she was wet, tired, and alone, and that her feet hurt. She had no idea where she was, except that she was a good deal too far away from Charles Street to attempt to walk the distance now, and night was approaching. She remembered that she and Ravenwood were supposed to be dining with the Lynsteds before attending Lady Holland’s musicale.
Though she still didn’t think he would be particularly angry with her once she told him all she had discovered, she knew he would be annoyed if she caused them to be late. And he would not be pleased if she made herself ill again, she thought more dismally. Had she had any notion how far the thief meant to take her, she doubted that she would have attempted to follow. But she had followed, and she had found the chandler’s shop, which seemed to be at least a place with which he was familiar. The men at Bow Street, she was quite certain, had found success with less information than that upon which to act.
The problem now was to get back to Charles Street and to do so as quickly as possible. Clearly she would need a hack. Stepping to the curbstone again, she remembered she had no money. Then she remembered what else had been in her reticule, and her hand groped suddenly at her throat. Her pearls! The pearls Ravenwood had given her for a bride gift! They were gone.
She took a deep breath. This was not the time to worry about it. She must first get home. But the loss of the pearls would annoy him, and it was rapidly dawning upon her that she did not wish him to be annoyed with her. Indeed, it would be most uncomfortable if he was even mildly displeased. She was beginning to think she had done a very foolish thing. And even if they caught the thief, she wondered, how would they prove he had also taken Lady Jersey’s things? And how would that keep them from believing still that Meg was in league with him? And where was Meg, anyway? Surely, if she was alive, she must have sent word of her safety by now. A hack lumbered toward her, and she lifted a hand to hail it, feeling suddenly very depressed and on the verge of tears.
“Where to, wench?” the plump, oilskin-wrapped driver peered down at her through the steady rain. Instinctively Cicely stiffened at his insolent tone, and her own was chilly when she answered him.
“Charles Street, if you please.” She waited, expecting him to jump down to help her into the hack, but he merely stared at her.
“Ain’t that where the nobs live? Over t’ Mayfair?”
“Yes, of course.”
“And just what might ye be thinkin’ o’ doing’ there, luv? Settin’ up housekeepin’ fer a lord, mebbe?” He guffawed at his joke.
Cicely glared at him. “I live there, of course.”
“Oh, out a course! A real flash mort! ’N’ I be the Queen o’ the Nile, meself.”
“Look here, will you take me or not?” Cicely demanded icily.
“Take ’e anywheres ’e want if’n I like the color o’ yer gelt, lass. Lemme cast me peepers o’er wot ’e got.”
“I beg your pardon?” She hadn’t the slightest notion what he was talking about.
“Gelt. Ye ken, luv. Lucre, the ready. Sport yer blunt, else I’ll be off t’ find me a payin’ cove.”
“You mean money, then.” Cicely flushed. “Well, I haven’t got any exactly, but—”
“I see ’ow it is, luv. Expectin’ t’ turn a wee trick fer the ride, were ye? Well, I don’t ’old wi’ it, not wi’ flash morts, and not e’en wi’ a prime bit sich as yersel’. Not that I don’t think ye’d strip well enow t’ gie a man ’is pleasure. Leastwise, not if’n ye was cleaned up a bit. But me missus’d snatch me bald’eaded, so run along wi’ ye. Them lords up t’ Mayfair ain’t goin’ t’ be needin’ a bit o’ fluff like yersel’ nohow. Best ’e stay wi’ yer ain sort.”
Cicely understood enough to stare at him with eyes widened by shock. Before she could collect herself to reply, however, he had flicked his whip and the coach rattled away.
“Wait!” she cried. “You don’t understand.” But it was no use. He didn’t even look back.
She began walking miserably toward—she hoped—the Holborn Hill
Road, watching for hacks as she went. Twice more she managed to hail one, only to be rejected as a passenger by both drivers. The first smiled knowingly when she began by insisting that he would be paid at the end of her journey, and the second laughed outright when she informed him rather tearfully that she was the Viscountess Ravenwood. When he drove off, she stood upon the flagway with tears and raindrops mingling on her cheeks. At least, she told herself, she had retained sufficient presence of mind with the second of the two to discover that she was in Gray’s Inn Lane. That was something, but it was not enough to stem the tears.
Angrily she dashed them away with the back of her hand, only to scratch her cheek with the edge of her wedding ring. She stared at the ring stonily for a full minute, then drew a long breath and began to look for another hack.
This time the driver was fairly young. He, too, wore oilskins over his clothes, and he looked very broad and solid. He grinned down at her.
“Ye’re a sight ’n’ no mistake. Whither ye bound?”
“Please,” she said desperately as she yanked the ring from her finger, “will this take me as far as Charles Street?”
He accepted the ring without looking at it, regarding her instead, his eyes curious and, surprisingly after her experiences with the others, even compassionate. Then he looked down at the ring, holding it flat in his palm, then moving it near one of the carriage lamps to see it more clearly.
“Aye, it will at that,” he said at last, letting out a long, slow breath, “and a good bit farther if ye wish it, ma’am.”
“No, just Charles Street. Number eight And …” She paused, then went on in a rush. “I’d like the ring back when we get there. You’ll be paid for your service, of course, but that is my wedding ring, and I’d like to have it back.”
The driver gave her another long, piercing look. Then, with a grunt, he wrapped the reins around his brake handle and jumped down from the box. Opening the door of the hack, he said, “Just you climb inside, ma’am, and we’ll have ye in Charles Street afore the cat can wink ’er eye.”
