by Anne Gracie
So who was taking shameless advantage of his aunt? And how?
He struggled through the water-stained missive. Other phrases stood out among the blurs: deeply concerned . . . withdrawn from all society . . .
Whatever the problem, it had worried Lady Beddington sufficiently to write to Max on the other side of the world.
“Max?” The others were waiting.
Max turned his mind to the business at hand. “First up is the report from our China office.”
Twice a year the three of them met in a prearranged location that only they three knew. Shifting the meeting place was a good way to keep an eye on their various bases of operation, scattered throughout East Asia. As always, Max chaired the meetings.
Flynn sprawled in his chair, his green eyes half closed, staring out to sea as if his thoughts were miles away, but Max wasn’t deceived. Patrick Flynn had a brain like a razor. It had taken him from the gutters of Dublin to being the owner of his first ship by the time he was twenty-three, but Flynn was no hand with paperwork.
Blake made notes. They were all good with figures—you had to be to succeed in trade—but Blake was something special. Max watched his friend calculate percentages and odds and profit and loss without so much as pausing in the discussion. Amazing.
He’d been at school with Blake, and yet never suspected he had this skill. Of course, Blake had been wilder then. A gambler, even at school, and wildly successful at it too . . . for a time. Everyone thought it was luck. Nobody then had any idea that Blake Ashton had a gift for numbers.
Not until his luck had run out and, in the aftermath, Blake had come out east . . . where Max had found him, sobered him up and put him to work.
And Max? What did he contribute to the partnership? Nothing very special. Mainly connections to people back home with money to invest. And a habit of seeing the bigger picture, taking a long-term strategic view of things. You couldn’t help but develop that kind of attitude when your uncle and father had frittered away a fortune that generations of forebears had built.
And of course, Max had brought the three of them together—the four, if you counted their silent partner back in London. It was a winning combination.
In a little over four hours they completed their immediate business and Flynn yawned, stretched and said, “So, Ash, lad, what’s the current state of the company?”
Blake made a few notes, checked, then read out a figure that made them all blink. He grinned. “I triple-checked it. It’s correct. We’ve had a good year.”
“A bloody good year,” Flynn murmured thoughtfully.
They packed away the documents, and Max gave the signal for lunch to be brought out. Servants scurried around setting out platters of fresh, juicy prawns and crab—plain boiled with tangy dip for Blake and Flynn, grilled in their shells and fiery with chili for Max. As well there were skewers of spiced, nutty chicken, dumplings of various kinds, slivers of melt-in-your-mouth duck, a tangy salad of green mango and herbs, golden noodles in a luscious sauce and mounds of fragrant rice.
And champagne, because Max had expected a good result—though not such a spectacular one. And possibly a life-changing one.
They ate on the terrace overlooking the bay. Ignoring the view of the brilliant blue sea and the ships dancing at anchor, they ate more or less in silence, dividing their attention between the food and the extraordinary result of the meeting.
The company was more solidly grounded than ever, and there was profit to spare. Huge profit. Last year he’d paid off the last of the debts. All that was left to pay was the interest. And the pound of flesh.
He’d been given ten years. He’d done it in nine.
Time for major decisions.
But though he was elated at the company report, and was enjoying the food and champagne, Max’s mind kept drifting back to that letter and what it had said about his aunt. Or what he thought it might have said.
Deeply concerned . . .
She was his only close relative—he didn’t count the mother he hadn’t seen since he was ten. She was dead now anyway. His aunt had more or less brought him up, and she was getting on now. What was she? Seventy? Older? She never would tell him her age.
He could almost hear her say it: “If men have the impertinence to ask, serves them right if they get lies in return.”
Max had been gone a long time. Years. And if his only relative was his aunt, all his aunt had was Max.
And Lady Beddington was worried enough about her to write to him.
His aunt had had a fall last . . . Good Lord, was it almost a year ago already? She’d broken her wrist, and since then her letters had been dictated to a servant. That hadn’t worried him at the time. Accidents happened.
Recently, though . . . Her last few letters had been odd. A bit repetitious. More formal than usual. Nothing he could put his finger on. But now . . .
“Ah, that was a grand meal,” Flynn said, pushing away his plate. He burped and gave a sigh of contentment. “Too many of those little dumpling thingummies.”
Suddenly Max realized what had disturbed him about his aunt’s last few letters. They were too bland, too polite. His aunt was never polite. Not the burp-after-a-meal kind of impoliteness—her conversation was pithy and irreverent, full of entertaining gossip and scathing commentary.
Her last letter was so bland as to be dull, and she’d even finished with advice for him to take care of himself and to “wrap up warmly.”
Wrap up warmly? She never fussed like that. Even when he was a scrubby schoolboy.
The aunt he knew would die before writing that kind of drivel.
Deeply concerned . . .
“So,” Flynn said, “where do we go from here?”
He meant we-the-company, but, “I’m going to London,” Max said abruptly. It was a full year before he’d promised to return—a year less of the freedom he’d cherished in the last nine years—but it couldn’t be helped.
Flynn’s eyes gleamed with interest, but he said nothing.
“London,” Blake exclaimed. “Whatever for?”
“I’m worried about my aunt.”
“Why, what’s the matter?”
“Her letters are too polite.” Max scanned the ships in the bay. Five of the eight currently at anchor belonged to them. “Any of them bound for London?”
Blake nodded. “Devon Lass is. And Dublin Lass too, but she’s slower.”
“A grand little lady all the same,” Flynn said. Dublin Lass was his first ship and he was very fond of her.
“Devon Lass it is, then,” Max said. “Sailing on tonight’s tide?”
Blake nodded, his expression bemused. “Yes, but . . . you’re sailing tonight? Because your aunt’s letter is too polite?” He glanced at the empty bottle of champagne. ”Are you sure that wine isn’t tainted?” Blake hadn’t touched alcohol in years.
Max gave him a dry look. “You’ve met my aunt, Blake. Would you describe her as polite?”
“Hardly.” He glanced at Flynn. “Full of piss and vinegar, Lady Beatrice. Burn your ears with some of the things she comes out with. Marvelous old bird.”
Max said, ”So, her last letter was full of polite nothings and ended with the advice to wrap up warm! Wrap up warm?”
Blake frowned. “Don’t she realize it’s the tropics?”
“She didn’t dictate that letter. Something’s wrong! So I’m going to London to find out what it is. And fix it.”
“I’m of a mind to come with you,” Flynn said.
“You?” Max stared at him in amazement. “Good God, why?”
“I’ve been thinking for some time that once the company was doing all right, I’d like to settle down before I was thirty.” He spread his hands. “The company is doing grand. And I’ll be thirty next July.”
Blake’s mouth dropped open. “You mean marriage?”
Flynn gave him a tranquil smile. “I do.”
Max asked casually, “To an English girl?”
Flynn gave him a s
idelong glance. “And why not?”
Max shrugged. “I just thought . . . you being Irish . . .”
“There’s nothing in Ireland for me any longer,” Flynn said softly. His whole family had been wiped out by cholera when he was eleven, the others knew. “An English lady will do fine for me. A proper fine lady.”
“You might find it difficult,” Max said bluntly. “A lot of English aren’t fond of the Irish.”
“Well, I’ll not be marrying any of them, then,” Flynn said, unperturbed. “I’ve got where I am by always goin’ for the finest available, and I don’t see why I should change my ways in finding a bride. I want the finest lady available. An English lass. A blue blood. With a title—or a daddy with a title.”
He glanced at the others. “You don’t think I can afford it? Didn’t young Ashton just tell us all we’re rich?”
Max shrugged. “You have the blunt, I know. But English aristocrats don’t take kindly to rich men of no particular background sniffing around their delicately raised daughters—let alone rich Irishmen.”
“You don’t think I’m good enough, is that what you’re saying?” An edge of belligerence entered the conversation.
Max snorted. “Don’t be stupid. If I had a sister I’d give her to you gladly. You’d make any woman—any lady—a fine husband, I know. But I know what kind of man you are. Nobody in England does. How do you imagine you’re going to meet any fine ladies?”
Flynn chuckled. “I’m thinking I’d get my good friend Lord Davenham to introduce me around. And then there’s our silent partner—what’s his name?—the Honorable Freddy Hyphen-Hyphen?”
“Monkton-Coombes.” Another friend of Max’s from school.
“Aye, a fine gentleman of ancient family, you said. So that’s two of you. Of course, you might need to give me the odd tip on how to go on like a gentleman—dress and such.”
Max regarded his friend with what he hoped was a grave expression. Flynn was a quite good-looking fellow when he was cleaned up. Currently, however, he looked more like a pirate than a gentleman, even down to the gold ring in his ear. His thick black hair hung down over his eyes, and black bristles covered his chin, making his admittedly good teeth gleam when he smiled, a crooked slash of white.
Flynn’s dress would never be described as restrained elegance; he favored the flamboyant over . . . well, over anything, Max reflected. Today Flynn wore tight black breeches, a red muslin shirt with flowing sleeves and an emerald green waistcoat embroidered with striking red-and-black designs. Somewhere in his sea trunk Flynn even kept a purple coat, which he produced for special occasions.
“Freddy will be delighted to introduce you to his tailor, I’m sure,” Max agreed smoothly.
Blake choked, and tried to turn it into a cough. Blake had gone to school with Freddy too.
“Excellent.” Flynn turned to Blake. “And what about you, Ash? Want to make a threesome of it? Come to England with us, find out why Max’s aunt has turned all polite on him—apparently ’tis a terrible affliction, politeness in aunts—and help find me a fine lady bride?”
“Thank you, but I won’t ever return to England,” Ash said, turning abruptly away. “There’s nothing for me there.”
Max frowned. “But your mother and sist—”
Blake cut him off with a freezing look. “There’s nothing for me in England.”
Flynn said, as if changing the subject, “Right, then, all we need to do now is decide where we’re meeting next and when. So since you and I will be in England, Max, not to mention our fourth partner, the Honorable Hyphen-Hyphen, let’s make it London in October.”
“Dammit, I just said—”
Max cut Blake off. “The motion on the table is that we meet in London next October. All in favor?”
“Aye,” Flynn said.
“Aye,” Max said. He glanced at Blake, who hadn’t voted. “Carried by a majority of two. London in October it is.”
* * *
“Daisy, do you have a veil I could borrow?” Abby asked later the next afternoon. She’d worked all morning at a nearby tavern, scrubbing in the scullery, and was due back again in the evening, but in the meantime she had an hour or two to herself.
Daisy picked through her collection and pulled out a length of charcoal gray gauze from her bundle of bits. “Will this do?”
“Perfect. It’s even better than black, for it matches my dress.” Abby had changed out of the clothes she wore at the tavern and donned a simple gray woolen dress with a three-quarter-length darker gray coat. It was very plain and governessy, but it was the best she had.
She swathed the gray gauze lightly around her hat, allowing it to drape down at the front, and, once she was satisfied, pinned it in place. She put the hat on and turned to Daisy. “Does it look all right?”
Daisy nodded. “Where you going?”
“I’m going to pay a call on that old lady I met the other night.”
Daisy gave her a narrow look. “Going in through the front door, I hope.”
Abby laughed. “Yes, all perfectly respectable, I promise.” She picked up a note she’d written earlier and tucked it into her reticule.
On her way back from the tavern she’d detoured to stroll past Lady Beatrice’s house. She’d bent down beside the railings separating the property from the footpath, near the steps leading down to the servants’ region, and fiddled with her shoe as if something were wrong with it.
She couldn’t quite see into the house, but it was a pleasant day and a window had been opened to let in fresh air. She heard people talking—a burst of laughter—and there was something cooking, something delicious—roast beef, if she wasn’t mistaken. She blissfully inhaled the aroma. How long since she’d eaten roast beef? Any kind of beef. Her stomach rumbled. Too long.
Footsteps sounded behind her and Abby walked on. The old lady wasn’t alone in that house; there were servants—at least three from the voices she’d heard—and if they were cooking roast beef in the middle of a weekday, they weren’t short of money.
Now, dressed in her respectable best, and veiled like a widow in mourning, Abby made a second reconnaissance.
She marched up the front steps of Lady Beatrice’s house and rang the doorbell. She could hear it jangling in the hall. A moment later the door opened.
A butler scrutinized her with languid indifference. His formal black coat strained across a well-rounded stomach. Flesh bulged over his tight, slightly grubby white collar. His hair was oily and combed over a thinning scalp. His face was flushed, his eyes were red rimmed and his large-pored nose glowed.
A drinker, Abby thought, and going steadily to seed. She lifted her chin and waited.
“Yes, madam? How can I help you?” He addressed a point above her head and slightly to the right, giving Abby the impression that she was perhaps three levels above a cockroach in importance.
“I am here to see Lady Beatrice,” she announced crisply.
Her accent was better than her clothes. His beady, bloodshot eyes tried to pierce the veil. He bowed halfheartedly. “Lady Beatrice is not available.”
“Please check with Lady Beatrice before you make such a statement. She will want to see me.”
“Lady Beatrice is not at home.” He made to shut the door.
Abby put her foot in the doorway. “Then when she returns will you please give her this note?” The butler made no move to take it. He smelled of unwashed linen. And unwashed butler.
Abby changed her approach, adding in a confiding manner, “I am an old friend, in London for only a day or two, and I would so like to catch up with her. She hasn’t written in ages, and I’m sorry to say, after my late husband fell ill, I didn’t do as much as I should have in keeping in touch with all my friends. But Lady Beatrice will be glad to know I am thinking of her.” She handed him the note.
He took it disdainfully between a gloved thumb and finger, a soiled glove that had once been white. “When her ladyship returns, I shall see that she gets it. Though I ca
nnot say when that might be.” He bowed again, then shut the door.
* * *
“I’m going back to that house over the back,” Abby said, donning the breeches she’d worn two nights before.
“No! You mustn’t! It’s too dangerous!” Jane exclaimed.
“I have to, Jane. I’m sure that old lady is in desperate trouble.”
Abby explained how she’d tried to pay a call on Lady Beatrice but the butler had denied she was home. “And she might not want callers while she’s ill, that’s true, but I cannot feel easy about it. There are three or four servants there, possibly more, eating their heads off at her expense and leaving her in the most dreadful state.”
“But what can you do about it?”
“I left a note with the butler to give her.”
“Why?”
“Just to see if she gets it. She told me all her friends had forgotten her, and that nobody calls, but after the way that horrid butler behaved, I don’t believe nobody calls. I think he sends everyone away. So I’m going over there now to check whether she received my note.” Abby picked up a jar. “And since there is some of Damaris’s delicious soup left over, I thought I’d take some. Even cold, it has to be better than that horrid gruel.”
“I’ll heat it,” Damaris said quietly. Thanks to her ingenuity, the girls had a small fire, quite illegal in the run-down tenement house. It was just an old ceramic plant pot, cracked and discarded, that she’d brought home one day. As the others watched, she’d built a tiny fire in it, using a few chips of wood and some paper. It was a tiny, portable fireplace, and the way Damaris cooked—rapidly, in one pot with everything shredded—it was enough to keep them fed, if not warm.
Jane clutched Abby’s arm with worried fingers. “What if you get caught this time?”
“There’s no danger, truly. I did it the other night without any problem, and the second time will be easier.” Abby squeezed her sister’s hand. “Don’t be angry, Jane, dear. If you’d only seen what a desperate plight Lady Beatrice is in . . .”
“But what can you do about it?” Daisy said. “You can’t go carrying soup over the rooftops every night.”
“I know,” Abby agreed. “But once I’m certain of the situation, I can report—”