Fair Cyprians of London Boxset

by Beverley Oakley

  “Our paths crossed.”

  “She’s dead now.”

  Hope clenched her teeth. “I’m sorry.” She wouldn’t ask how. The less questions she asked of Wilfred, the better. He’d told her in such a cold way as to disarm her. That was the way Wilfred operated. Always going for the weak spot. Hope had liked Letitia on the few occasions they’d found themselves together.

  “Typhoid. She and her brother were infected, he worse than she, so her death was a shock. Poor Felix has been inconsolable. That’s why his friends thought they needed a novel idea to cheer him up.”

  Hope could see where this was going now. Though not why. She gripped her reticule more tightly, if only for something to occupy her hands, and stared stonily at him.

  Wilfred sighed, shifted in his chair, then said with sudden irritation, “Despite what you think, I’ve asked you here because I want to help you.” He paused. “If you’ll help me.”

  A small laugh escaped Hope before she could catch it. “You want to help me? Frankly, I find that very hard to believe.” She cleared her throat. “Naturally, though, if there’s anything you want, you don’t even have to ask me. You never did—before.”

  “No need for the snide tone. You were foolish, Hope. You put me in an impossible situation! What was I supposed to do?”

  Hope rose. She’d not expected to upset him so easily though Wilfred had never found it easy to control his temper. She glanced at the door, glad it was the middle of the day with a house full of servants scurrying about the back corridors. “I certainly will not help you if it has anything to do with Mr Durham.”

  He glowered, not rising, his fingers tapping the tabletop. “Sit down, Hope. I’m surprised at your attitude. I thought you rather liked Mr Durham. Or is it on principle you intend to refuse any request I make of you, Hope?” His nostrils flared. “Your sister is in London, rubbing shoulders with high society. She’s a lovely, sweet little thing. So blonde and delicate and obedient. So different from you, Hope. Not surprisingly, there are high hopes she’ll make a fine match, though, of course, there’s little enough with which to launch her. You don’t want to be the one to stand in the way of Charlotte’s happiness, do you?”

  Hope was already halfway to the door, but she stopped, calculating whether it was foolish to make any kind of response.

  “I thought that might make you see sense.” Satisfaction dripped from his tone. If Hope could have scooped it up and thrown it back in his face, she would have.

  “Don’t think you can blackmail me, Mr Hunt.”

  “Mr Hunt, is it now, when we were on such familiar terms?” He was gloating, now that he saw he had the advantage as she turned. “Come, Hope, don’t be churlish. Come back to the table so you may hear what I have to say. It’s hardly onerous, and you’ll earn yourself a pretty penny into the bargain.”

  “I don’t want to involve myself in any bargains with you, Mr Hunt. I’ve been burned once before, in case you’ve forgotten.”

  “Through your own carelessness, as I said. Now.” He reached across to pull a piece of parchment from the escritoire, dipped his nib into the inkwell and began to write. “You won’t be doing anything you haven’t done a thousand times before,” he muttered, not looking up as his pen ran across the page. “And you’ll be making an old acquaintance very happy, not to mention ensuring your sister has as successful a debut as such a lively, enchanting beauty could wish for. Indeed, that is how your dear Charlotte is these days. Lively and enchanting. The belle of London Town.” He sent her a beatific smile. “You might say, she’s the real hope of the family.”

  When he’d finished writing, he snatched up the paper, waved it in the air a few times, then folded it and placed it in an envelope.

  “There you are, Hope. Your instructions,” he told her when she reluctantly returned. “It’ll hardly be a chore considering Mr Durham is such a handsome, personable gentleman. At least, my sister thinks so, though the noble, honourable type tends to stick in my craw, to tell the truth.” He leaned across and forced her fingers over the parchment. “Come on; smile, for God’s sake. There’s always something for you to complain about, isn’t there? And now I’ve given you an assignment you should enjoy since Annabelle recounted to me the look she intercepted that made her cry into her pillow so many nights since.”

  Hope turned her head away. How well she remembered the look that Annabelle Hunt had intercepted.

  Madame Chambon had failed to unleash the sobs of despair that had been so close to the surface yesterday, but they were perilously close to being unleashed now.

  Chapter 3

  The noise from 23 Half Moon Street could be heard from the pavement as Hope stepped out of the hackney into the yellow glow of a gas lamp. She paid the jarvey, took a few steps towards the wrought iron gates that surrounded the elegant townhouse, then paused.

  This was the moment of truth. She could carry on boldly, right up to that front door and confront the ‘what might have been’, effectively ending all those beautiful daydreams with the truth of what she’d irrevocably become.

  Or she could turn around now and effectively tell Madame Chambon to go to hell. And Wilfred, too. Yes, there’d be a glorious split second of satisfaction before she’d be cast out in the three-seasons-old dress she’d been wearing when Wilfred had delivered her to Madame Chambon’s exclusive Soho brothel.

  Daydreams. That’s all her thoughts of rebellion were.

  Just like her fond imaginings of what might have developed between Mr Durham and herself if things had been different.

  Even with all the spirit in the world, Hope had long ago accepted that only Madame Chambon stood between her and starvation.

  “Good evening, Madam, please come in. We’ve been expecting you.”

  She supposed it was hardly surprising it wasn’t the butler who opened the door and invited her in with an extravagant flourish that almost caused the young man before her to lose his balance. The no doubt disapproving family retainer would have been dismissed for the evening, as suggested by the sounds of revelry within. Hope was surprised. Had Mr Durham changed so much or was he nothing like the rather serious gentleman she’d thought him? She’d been attracted by his earnestness tinged with a suggestion of suppressed passion—his character had seemed in direct contrast to her own wild, rebellious spirit—so that when he’d taken her hand at the Hunt Ball and drawn her into the shadows that last night, she thought wistfully, the greatest excitement had rippled through her.

  His gaze had been intense and filled with longing. As if he were yearning for something he feared he could never have. That’s what it had felt like to Hope, tremulous and aching with the knowledge they could never bridge the divide that separated them. She, the penniless vicar’s daughter, revelling in her special evening before she was shipped off to her governess position, and he, the son of the great Durham family of Foxley Hall, the venerable manor that had looked down upon the rest of them for the past four hundred years.

  But that was all in the past, and there was no look in the eye of the clearly bosky young man currently leering at her that suggested a longing for what he could never have. More like a brash assessing as to whether he might sample the wares before Hope was led like a lamb to the slaughter—the surprise cheering-up gift for Mr Durham, as she’d been informed.

  Bile stung the back of her throat. What would Mr Durham think?

  And did she have the courage to do what she wanted, which was to turn tail and run?

  Instead, Hope clasped her reticule to stop her hands from trembling and adopted her most dignified manner as she inclined her head. She’d honed deference to a fine art at the risk of a backhander from Wilfred, and as the price for survival working for Madame Chambon.

  “Well, well, I was told Madame Chambon’s girls rivalled the Goddess Aphrodite for beauty and pleasure-giving,” the young man went on, standing aside to admit her. “You certainly do not disappoint.”

  Hope stepped into the passage, trying to put d
ull resignation ahead of pure panic. Her palms were slick with dread, and she hoped she was successful in concealing the rapid, shallow breathing that might make her more of a victim. Evil relished vulnerability.

  The young man closed the door and cast a look of appreciation the length of her stylish scarlet velvet bustle skirt, following the line of her wasp-waisted cuirass to where it lingered on the swell of her breasts above the tightly fitted bodice.

  “You are not the gentleman I’m here to see,” she said in quelling tones. “My time is precious. Thank you, sir.”

  He blinked rapidly a few times, seemed to gather his wits, then preceded her up the passage, saying over his shoulder, “Now don’t go speaking so harshly to Felix, will you? That’s why you’re here. To cheer him up. I’m Ralph Millament, by the way.”

  Cheer him up. She swallowed painfully.

  “I say, are you coming?”

  Mr Millament blinked owlishly through the three yards of gloom that separated them, for Hope had dug in her heels. She couldn’t do this. Not for all the tea in China, all the fashionable gowns from Madame Soulent’s, and three years worth of good food and reliable shelter. It was too much. How could she even trust Wilfred to keep his word when he’d proven himself such a cad?

  A door just behind her was thrust open, filling the corridor with noise as two gentlemen nearly barrelled into her in pursuit of a young lady who disappeared, giggling and shrieking, into another room.

  Somehow, in the process, Hope was knocked like a skittle towards Mr Millament who’d started towards her. He caged her hand on his arm and marched her quickly up the stairs saying, “Poor fellow’s been in a blue funk since he lost his sister, though he’s always been the serious type. Not quite like this, though. No; nothing like this. My friend Beavis and the other chaps wanted to find a lovely lady such as yourself the last time he was under the great black cloud of despair, but Felix would hear none of it, so this time we thought we’d take it upon ourselves. We’d hold a great party and invite a girl just for him.” He sent Hope an appreciative look. “My, I would say you are his idea of perfection.”

  Hope was about to ask why he thought that having a prostitute brought in would cheer up his friend if he’d previously rejected the idea, only Mr Millament had just thrown open the door to a scene of such total disarray that at first Hope thought the room was unoccupied.

  It was a man’s bedchamber. Hope had seen enough of those to recognise one when she saw one. The large four-poster looked as if it had seen a great deal of action lately, the counterpane half on the floor; the sheets twisted.

  A chair near the washstand was upturned.

  Hope turned to look at Mr Millament, who patted her on the shoulder. “Bit of a ruckus earlier. Nothing to worry about, my dear. Just go in and see what you can do to bring a bit of comfort to that poor lost soul over there.” He sent her a wry smile. “The old fellow had a run of bad luck last night, and now his bride-to-be is in high dudgeon. Saw it all at Lady Mildew’s rout last night and it was not a pretty sight. He’s definitely in need of something to lift his spirits.”

  He’d started to go on but Hope raised her hand for silence, saying, “If he’s about to be married, I’m not going in.”

  “Lord, come back. I’d have thought morality was the last of your considerations. Besides, it was a figure of speech.”

  Hope was surprised to see real concern in his eyes.

  He shook his head vigorously. “All right, he hasn’t asked her yet, though she’s been in the wings for as long as I can remember. Don’t know if he can bring himself to take the final plunge, for all she’s not going to give up. Poor Felix. He’s in dreadful shape. You really are our last hope.”

  He pointed to the bed, and Hope saw what she had not before. There was a man, prone, lying face down upon the mattress, half under the covers. How she could have missed that was impossible to speculate for the man was quite naked. His long, muscular legs, lightly dusted with dark hair, ended in a very manly pair of buttocks.

  Mesmerised, Hope’s gaze travelled from his buttocks—where her eyes lingered—up the length of his spine. There was just the right amount of flesh covering his bones. He looked like a man in the prime of good health, though she could not see his face. His ears were instantly recognisable though. There was the slightest point to the tips. Perhaps a characteristic that would go unremarked by anyone who hadn’t gazed from the back pews each Sunday at the neighbourhood’s most eligible bachelor; first with interest, then with growing appreciation, and finally with excitement at the fact he seemed conscious of her.

  He’d confirmed this the fateful night of the Hunt Ball, telling her he’d been awaiting the right opportunity to approach her, which seemed ludicrous since he was the catch of the neighbourhood and she just the vicar’s daughter. A penniless one, at that.

  She turned back to Mr Millament but he had gone, closing the door softly behind him, and Hope’s fond memories of the past were exorcised by the shocking reality.

  And of what she had to do.

  She stared at the figure on the bed. She sniffed. An unfamiliar, not unpleasant aroma tinged the air. No, she had smelt this before. Once she’d been amongst a party of Madame Chambon’s girls invited to a Soho den of iniquity where a strange substance had been smoked through a water pipe in one of the rooms she had mercifully been spared from having to enter. Grace, who’d accompanied her, had been required to dance an exotic dance with veils, to recreate a dream that had visited one of the men smoking this drug. Opium.

  She put her hand to her throat. Mr Durham was an opium eater? Isn’t that what dangerous Lord Byron had called them in his poem a generation earlier?

  Her horror turned to tentative relief. If he believed himself in the grip of an hallucination, surely he’d believe her appearance was just a dream? When their encounter was over and he had no memory of it—she hoped!— she could live with her pride intact, and her heart not quite so eviscerated.

  The man groaned. She supposed it was Mr Durham. She only had his naked back, buttocks, and pointed ears on which to make a judgement for he still lay face downwards on the pillow.

  Hope took a step forwards, and was visited by an excitement so out of character, she thought she must be the one hallucinating on just the smell of the drug.

  Why, if Mr Durham thought all this just a dream, she could indulge her own wildest fantasies. Ones she’d never had when she’d last seen him, for, as a young girl just out of the schoolroom, her wildest fantasies had gone no further than what might happen in a less-populated corner of the local Assembly hall.

  Of what might happen during that fateful assignation he’d organised in a hurried whisper the night of the Hunt Ball. The assignation at which she’d failed to appear.

  Now that Hope had become acquainted with the desires of London’s Upper Ten Thousand—well, it felt like it, though it was really only a handful of the gentlemen who fell into that category—she’d learnt what men enjoyed. Mr Durham, as a pink of the ton, would no doubt have followed the conventional model of masculinity: taken a wife based on financial and family considerations whom he’d consider it only right to revere for her virtue, and a mistress to pleasure him in bed. Hope must have no illusions that the gallant gentleman who’d laughed away her embarrassment at losing her slipper during the waltz, who’d nearly kissed her, would have been any different.

  So, if Hope was going to save Mr Durham from his demons as Mr Millament had exhorted her to do, she supposed her erstwhile admirer would enjoy imagining a dream along the lines of doing more than just kissing the debutante who’d failed to meet him at his proposed secret rendezvous.

  She took a tentative step forwards, and craned her head as far over the bed as she could to ascertain the intensity of Mr Durham’s slumber.

  He did not move.

  She sat down on the mattress, felt it dip beneath her weight while she eyed the prone gentleman for any sign of movement.

  There was none.

  Now that
she was this close, it was very tempting to stretch out a hand and stroke his dark brown hair back from his face. Was he as handsome as she remembered? Or had the demons wrought a dissipation she’d see written in bloodshot eyes and a ruined constitution? Hope had observed that happen often enough to the privileged gentlemen who bought her time and her body.

  When there was no response, only his soft, steady breathing, Hope stood up and went to the writing desk that was littered with a dozen drafts of a letter he’d not finished beyond, “My dearest Annabelle…” “Annabelle, my dear, I’m sorry….” “Forgive me, Annabelle, but…” “Lovely Annabelle, I’m afraid that…” Hope didn’t have to do more than glance across the surface of his desk to see these, but other crumpled letters written on his signature pale blue writing paper littered the floor.

  A niggling worm of disquiet unsettled her even more. Annabelle? Of course, there was more than one woman named Annabelle whom Mr Durham would know.

  Was this lovely Annabelle the cause of his demons? She wondered what Mr Durham had done that he would wish to beg Annabelle’s forgiveness. Was he desperately in love with this woman he’d wronged?

  Who was Annabelle?

  A freshly minted debutante or was she, in fact, Annabelle, the squire’s daughter and if not Hope’s nemesis, then certainly a determined and competitive miss who’d had no fondness for the vicar’s daughter during their years growing up. More to the point, was this Annabelle to whom these pleas for forgiveness being directed, in fact Wilfred’s sister?

  A soft groan from the bed made her whip around. She mustn’t be caught snooping. There were dire consequences for the girls about whom such complaints were made by their gentlemen customers.

  Nervously, she ran her hands down the figure-hugging lines of her polonaise, toying with the dozen tiny buttons and wondering if she had the courage to undress.

  Of course, she’d undressed a hundred times before. Or rather, she’d mostly been undressed. It’s what the gentlemen liked, though clearly, Mr Durham was not in a position to do anything.