by KJ Charles
That wasn’t entirely clear. “You’re the family’s servant?” The man seemed too well dressed for a household position, but why else would he be entrusted with such a sensitive task?
“I’m a merchant,” Mr. St. Vincent said, voice even. “My help was asked as a trusted friend of the family. As a favour.”
Theo filed that away for future reference. Mr. St. Vincent’s relationship to the family was of no great interest to him; what mattered was that if the fellow had been asked to deal with a matter of such delicacy, he would surely want to succeed. He would be very ready to do whatever was needed, which would doubtless include paying for assistance. And if there was money in it, Theo was interested.
“Well, that puts matters in a different light,” he said. “Obviously, in law, the lady is entitled to place whatever advertisement she wishes, but her father’s concern is most natural, and I should not wish any match made in the pages of the Matrimonial Advertiser to be less than happy. I can, I think, aid you a little more than somewhat. The only question is— I hesitate to ask it in a matter of such importance, but you will understand that my work is demanding and my time precious. Of course it is my earnest wish to help, but as a mere publisher, supporting myself wholly by my labour—”
“How much?”
“Two guineas.”
“Five shillings.”
“One guinea.”
“Ten shillings, and don’t argue with me,” said Mr. St. Vincent with finality.
Less than Theo had hoped, better than he’d feared. “Done.”
“Right. Who is he?”
“I’ve no idea.” Theo held up his hands against the other man’s look. “I’m not given names. People want discretion.”
“What about letters? How are they exchanged?”
“They come to the public house I use—”
“The Three Ducks.”
Theo shifted in his seat at the implication he thought he heard. “It’s the closest by. And Ducks, you see, so people remember it. Because of Swann. My name.” Mr. St. Vincent’s expression suggested he had not needed that explained in quite so much detail. Theo pulled himself together. “I don’t see the letters coming in or handed out; the publican does all that. Was the lady writing to Troilus as well as advertising?”
“It appears there was some direct correspondence recently, thanks to the bootboy. Miss Cressida has loyal friends, and a talent for suborning the staff.” There was just a slight curve to his lips as he said that, a glimmer of reluctant amusement. “A letter from Troilus was found among her possessions, but bore no address.”
Theo applauded Troilus’s caution; he wouldn’t risk putting his own address on clandestine correspondence either, for fear of finding those men with cudgels at his door. “Well, if Miss Cressida sent letters via the Ducks, it’s possible the landlord may recall who came asking for them. I can take you there to find out.”
“And?”
“And what?”
Mr. St. Vincent gave him a look. “Are you proposing to charge me ten shillings merely to take me to an inn?”
“I can do more,” Theo offered hastily. “Just let me see.” He glanced around, identified the pile of waste paper he had yet to discard, and went to scrabble through it. “A moment, a moment—here!” He held up the object of his search. “Troilus’s most recent advertisement. This will appear in tomorrow’s Advertiser.”
“‘CRESSIDA,’” Mr. St. Vincent read aloud. “‘My sentiments of admiration and respect can be confined no longer. You have my heart. May I dream to have your hand? Reply to your TROILUS in The Times.’ The wretch.” His hand closed on the paper. “You will not publish this.”
“I can’t stop it,” Theo said. “The papers have been printed and collected.”
“Recall them.”
“I can’t!” The thought alone was enough to make him sweat at the expense it would entail. “It’s impossible. And anyway, surely you don’t want me to?”
“I believe I expressed myself clearly,” Mr. St. Vincent said.
“No, but hear me out. It seems as though your lovebirds have done very well at finding ways to communicate. If you cut off this route, will they not find another you don’t expect? If I were him, I’d put this in half a dozen papers, actually. Make sure she sees it. In any case, if this advertisement appears, you will know Miss Cressida’s next move. Even if you fail to intercept her response, you can watch the columns of The Times.”
“I see,” Mr. St. Vincent said slowly. “Yes. Very well.”
“And it’s his writing,” Theo added. “That is the hand in which all his advertisements have been written.” The adequately formed script of an adequately educated man, lacking any individuality, as though the writer had not cared to write much since he left the schoolroom. “If it comes to a matter at law, or of identification . . .”
“I see. Good. You’re earning your fee, Mr. Swann,” Mr. St. Vincent said, with a hint of surprise. Theo had a vague urge to kick him. “Now you can earn it a little more.”
“Absolutely. I shall be delighted. How?”
“By taking me to an inn, of course.”
Martin paced down Little Wild Street with Swann at his side, keeping one eye on his companion. He believed the man’s story, for what that was worth, but he had no intention of paying the ten shillings before they were fairly earned. He did not trust Theodore Swann as far as he could throw him, although that would probably be a reasonable distance, the puny wretch that he was.
A down-at-heel sort of man, Theodore Swann. Worn, ink-stained cuffs and a coat whose better days had long passed and not been particularly good in the first place. Perhaps four inches shorter than himself, and built on much less sturdy lines, with a thin, pale, bony face, narrow shoulders, and flyaway light-brown hair. His voice was decidedly more educated than his appearance suggested; his grey eyes, the colour of wet weather, were calculating; his manner was wheedling. He was quite clearly a grasping, untrustworthy, venal man who carried out a trade that Martin regarded with baffled disdain.
He looked as though he’d fuck like a tomcat.
It was an absurd thought, a dangerous thought, and what was worse, it wasn’t impossible. There was that intangible something about Swann that had Martin’s own awareness tingling, but more, too—that advertisement sitting on his desk, and the fact Swann had very clearly known what it meant. And of course he used the Three Ducks inn.
Granted, it was no distance from the shabby, cluttered office on Little Wild Street to Vere Street, where the Three Ducks stood. It was quite natural that the Matrimonial Advertiser’s letters should be delivered to the public house there. But Martin knew exactly what sort of place the Three Ducks was, and he had little doubt that Swann did too.
Little doubt of that; no doubt at all that Swann would use anything he might find about Martin for his own ends, which made it all the more imperative he keep his thoughts to himself.
He could do that. Very few people ever suspected his tastes ran to men, so far as he could tell, and it would surely not be hard to keep his hands off a fellow whose face suggested he’d sell his own grandmother. Even if there was that something about him that set Martin’s imagination off and running.
Because of course Swann did sell people, or at least offer a market for them to sell themselves. Men advertising for rich women, women advertising for men to keep them or buy them. The business turned Martin’s stomach, and it was Swann’s living.
And now it was Martin’s problem, because of Miss Jennifer Conroy.
He found it difficult to think about the Conroys clearly. He had no idea how to unpick the decades-old knot of anger, resentment, obligation, love, and hate that tied him to the family. But Miss Jennifer was just seventeen and the object of an obviously unscrupulous man’s attentions, and Martin had no doubt what he felt about that.
He’d been thirteen when Miss Jennifer was born. He’d carried her, sung to her, read her stories, played pat-a-cake with her chubby hands, and rioted arou
nd her nursery being a horse, bear, dragon, or anything else required by her imperious demands as she grew, because the unquestioning, uncomplicated love of a child had been an anchor to something good and right in his life, even as he’d grown to manhood and his anger had grown with him.
It had ended when he was eighteen. He’d left the Conroys then, and it would hardly have been appropriate for a grown man of no family or fortune to play with a child-heiress, even had he not been busy making a life for himself. He’d become a free man with responsibilities. But he had never forgotten those games, that little golden time of simple childhood, and the thought of Miss Jennifer hurling herself into the arms of some greasy, greedy fraud was appalling. A married woman was subject to her husband’s whim or command. Her property became his to use or waste, her body his to command and chastise; her husband was legally her master. Martin wondered why any free woman would subject herself to it, given a choice.
Miss Jennifer would doubtless marry, because that was what young ladies did, but at least she would not have to tie herself to some brute from necessity. Her wealth was a honeypot that would attract an extensive range of potential husbands from which she might have her pick. Unfortunately, like all honeypots, it attracted wasps too.
They had reached the Three Ducks while he wool-gathered. Swann glanced up at him. “I could fetch Mr. Royle out here, if you prefer?”
Martin considered that. It might be wise not to enter a known sodomites’ den at all, and certainly not with Theodore Swann. His eyes were a little too searching for that, his manner a little too much on the lookout for advantage, and Martin just a little too aware of his lean body. On the other hand, his throat was dry, it was uncomfortably hot, and they were about the Conroys’ private business, which was not to be conducted in the street.
“We’ll go in.”
The interior of the Three Ducks was dark and cool. There were only a few men in there, all white, of course, and doubtless most of them hoping to find willing flesh. Everyone looked around as the door opened. A couple saluted Swann; a few more gave Martin long, speculative examinations. He sensed curiosity rather than hostility, but found that hardly more welcome. He was very, very tired of being the object of curiosity.
Martin took a seat at one end of a heavy wooden bench sticky with years of spilled beer, as Swann went to the bar and returned with a couple of pints of ale. “Mr. Royle will be with us shortly. He may be able to tell you something of who came for the letters. A name like Troilus might be sufficiently unusual to have snagged his attention.”
Martin sipped the thin ale and grimaced. Swann gave an apologetic shrug.
“Why do you do it?” Martin asked at last, just to break the silence.
“What?”
“Your paper. Why advertise marriage?”
“Why not? It pays. People want to find husbands and wives, so why should they not seek them?”
“It’s . . .” Martin searched for the word. “Lowering. Commercial.”
“Well, we are all commercial. This is the age of commerce. A man is worth his value at the bank.”
“I know what a man is worth,” Martin said, the words tasting as sour as the beer.
Swann’s eyes snapped up to meet his gaze. “Well, yes, but . . . That is, are you married or affianced?”
“No.”
“Would you like to be?”
Martin gave him a look. “If you intend to play Cupid with me—”
“I shouldn’t dream of it. Unless you pay me to, in which case I shall be delighted. But the fact is, most people would like to be married, and this is the modern world. We must all make our own way. I simply provide a service by which people may encounter one another and form their own arrangements.”
“As this Troilus is trying to do.”
Swann turned his palms up. “He wants a rich wife. Do you blame him for that? You may fault his way of going about it, but you can hardly argue with his ambition. You said yourself that Miss Cressida’s riches ought to secure her a good husband—which, put the other way, is to say that a well-born man will choose her because of her riches. Well, then, where is the difference? She is to be married for her money either way. The only difference is whether she chooses for herself or her father does it for her. And as I say, this is the modern world. May not a lady have a voice in her own future?”
Martin sought for a riposte. He couldn’t immediately find one, a fact that did not make him feel any more kindly disposed to Swann. “Her parents want a husband who will treat her well. Who will offer affection, and value her for more than her money.”
“Oh, I see. So they don’t intend to marry her to the highest-ranking man they can snare?”
“It’s none of your damned affair what they intend,” Martin snapped, since he well knew that a title was the peak of Mrs. Conroy’s ambition.
Swann shrugged. “All I say is, marriage is a business same as any other, and everyone’s got the right to pursue his own advancement. Or hers.”
“And yours with it, since you make a profit from their efforts.”
“You don’t make a profit from your business?” Swann asked with wide-eyed concern. “Perhaps you should have someone help you with that.”
Martin was saved from responding by the approach of a greasy fellow in a greasy apron. He introduced himself as Royle, the landlord, who collected and distributed letters on Swann’s behalf.
“Troilus, Troilus,” he muttered. “Aye, I recall the fellow, he came a few times in a fortnight or so. Tall, thin drink of water. Right miserable, too, not a pleasant word spoke.”
“Do you have a name?” Martin asked. The landlord shrugged. “Can you describe him?”
“Tall. Thin.”
Martin sighed. “Face?”
“Aye, he had one,” Royle said, and broke into a wheezy laugh. Swann cackled. Martin glowered at them both. “I dunno. Nose in the air sort of cove.”
“Hair?”
“How should I know?”
“Because you saw him,” Martin said. “Don’t play the fool with me.”
“Aye, I saw him, but I didn’t see under his wig, did I?”
“Wig?”
“Aye, wig. Horsehair. The usual thing.”
“He was a servant?” Swann demanded.
“Didn’t I say?”
“No,” Martin said, with restraint. “You didn’t.”
“Oh, well. Footman, I reckon, or some such.”
He could describe nothing else, didn’t know where the footman had come from or gone to, had nothing else to offer that might help, and wandered off after a little more fruitless conversation to give the bar a desultory wipe with a dirty cloth.
Martin and Swann looked at each other. “Servant.”
“Acting on his own behalf?” Swann mused. “Or doing his master’s bidding?”
“If Troilus is a gentleman . . .” Martin began slowly.
“That’d be bad, wouldn’t it? For the family, I mean.”
“How do you work that out?”
“Well, one—” Swann counted on a finger “—he likely isn’t the sort of gentleman you’d want for a son-in-law, or he’d have put his suit to Old Mr. Cressida, not managed things this havey-cavey way with secret letters. He must know he’d be given his marching orders if he went about matters directly. But, two, if he appears and sounds a gentleman, he’s more likely to win the lady’s agreement. Wouldn’t you say?”
Martin had been assuming Troilus was some hopeful clerk, likely to be a threat to Miss Conroy’s reputation because of their clandestine correspondence rather than a serious danger to her heart. The picture Swann had painted was significantly more worrying. “Yes. I see.”
“And the other thing is . . .” Swann counted off a third finger. “If he can pay a servant, he can probably pay for other things. Like a special licence, say—no, she’s too young for that. But certainly money will make things easier for him. It always does.”
Martin gave him a long look. “You seem to have tho
ught about this a great deal, considering you claim not to know anything about Troilus.”
“I’ve never thought about him in my life,” Swann said indignantly. “I can tell a hawk from a handsaw, that’s all. You tell me there’s a rich lady and a fellow wooing her for her money, and then you wonder why I can imagine what happens next?”
“All right, that’s fair.” Martin subsided a little.
“I’m a scribbler, when I’m not running the Advertiser,” Swann added. “Making stories is my trade.” He hesitated. “And I know plenty of others in the same trade. Gossipmongers. If your young lady is wealthy as you say, word might have spread of this. If I knew the lady’s name, I could ask—”
“No.”
Swann held his hands up in surrender. “Your choice. Very well, then, I suppose you’ve to wait for her reply in The Times and see where you go from there. So, Mr. St. Vincent.” He tipped up his pint mug, drank, licked ale from his lips with a pink, pointed tongue. “What else will you have from me for your money?”
The question caught Martin completely unaware. He’d been focused on the problem at hand, and on Swann’s words and the agile mind they revealed. He hadn’t been thinking of Swann’s thin, sinewy body at all for the last few minutes, but he bloody was now.
He knew exactly what he’d like from this ratty, unscrupulous little sod, in this dark den with its darker back room and a landlord whose business and freedom depended on discretion. His hands on Swann’s sharp hip bones, or tangled in his hair, or pressing down on that lean back that would look so pale in the shadows, and feeling Swann push against his strength.
It was what he’d like, and he was sure it was what he could have for, at most, an extra few shillings. Swann, bought and paid for.
He shoved the bench away from the table with a grinding scrape. “Just find a way to earn it.”
Theo glared down at the blank page. It looked back at him with studied disinterest.
It was four days since Martin St. Vincent had brought his distracting presence into the office. In the interim, Theo had done his best to earn the promised ten shillings. He’d kept a weather eye out for any letters, to his office or the Three Ducks; examined the other newspapers and rival matrimonial gazettes in case the errant couple were advertising in more than one forum; even gone through back issues of the Matrimonial Advertiser looking for clues and finding none. He hadn’t seen hide or hair of St. Vincent in all that time.
