Fair Cyprians of London Boxset: Books 1-5: Five passionate Victorian Romances

by Beverley Oakley

  “Then you saw the letter?” Crispin felt himself come to life. “Faith was going to give you the correspondence between Lady Vernon and Lord Harkom to verify the truth of this. She’s taken an enormous risk to uncover the truth, managing to extract it from Lord Harkom. I’ve just come from there.”

  Miss Eaves pressed her lips together. She seemed unable to answer.

  Crispin could barely keep still. “Miss Eaves, you must tell me how long ago she left! Miss Montague is in great danger. I’d heard whispers that suggested such a thing was happening, but there was nothing to substantiate it until tonight. The letter is no forgery, Miss Eaves. Surely you could tell that for yourself!”

  “Mr Westaway, I…” She bit her lip, her confusion apparent. “I don’t know what to tell you except that she told me she was going to find Lord Delmore.”

  Crispin turned on his heel. “If you see her again, detain her,” he said, over his shoulder, his tone urgent. “Persuade her not to go anywhere unless she is accompanied.”

  He was about to slip into the crowd when Miss Eaves detained him with a hand on his sleeve. When he looked into her frightened face he noticed her skin was very pale and there was a tremor in her voice as she said, “Miss Montague left the room about half an hour ago. I followed her, when my uncle called me over to meet a new arrival just as Miss Montague was descending the front steps.” She pressed her lips together and rolled one shoulder, and Crispin felt a stab of very real terror, justified as Miss Eaves finished, “Lady Vernon seemed to be waiting for her from just inside the carriage that had drawn up. I caught only a glimpse before Miss Montague was inside. And…” she hesitated “… in the glow of the lamplight, I believe I saw Lord Harkom. Certainly, at the time I believed it was Lord Harkom, for I returned thinking with such scepticism of her renewed defence that she’d ever had a willing association with him.”

  Crispin was already heading towards the door. “And nor has she, he said angrily. “Miss Eaves, if you see anything or hear anything that could help this case, please send a message directly to my lodgings. Dear God, I just hope and pray I find her in time.”

  Chapter 32

  The blindfold was cutting into Faith’s eyes painfully by the time she was released. When she stumbled, she realised it was as much due to the fact the flooring was unstable as that she was disoriented.

  The cry of seagulls and the smell of brine and tar made it clear that she was on board a boat.

  Or something larger, for the room was commodious with a large porthole that looked over the ocean. Dawn had broken, and the fact that her head hurt unconscionably compounded the realisation that she’d been drugged.

  She swung around to confront her captors, and was not surprised to see Lord Harkom’s golden hair lit by the late-afternoon sun that shone through the glass and, seated upon a chair at his side, the hunched, crow-like form of Lady Vernon.

  “My, my, Lady Vernon; it’s been a long night for you,” Faith remarked drily. “You’re not usually an early riser, so I’m sorry to put you through such discomfort.”

  Lady Vernon grimaced which Faith took to be a smile. “I was not going to be denied the pleasure of seeing you go where you deserved. My goodness, but you’ve caused us a great deal of trouble, Faith. Finally, you’ll be getting your just desserts.”

  Faith looked towards the porthole where the choppy sea was partly obscured by the crew in striped jerseys leaping from the rigging onto the deck. She could hear voices. Shouts that at first she thought were in French, before she realised some of them spoke a language she didn’t recognise. “You won’t get away with this, Lady Vernon. Nor you, Lord Harkom. Your activities have been exposed.”

  “On what evidence, my dear Faith?” He looked satisfied as he paced back and forth across the room. “Whatever correspondence you found is now back in my possession. Besides, who might you have told who would actually believe you? A liar and a whore.”

  Faith shivered as she imagined the groping that must have been involved when she was unconscious. She swallowed, her fear obviously showing before Lord Harkom said, “I haven’t violated you, if that’s what you’re worried about. There’d be little pleasure for either of us in doing that if you were not awake to enjoy it.” With a glance at Lady Vernon, he added, “All good things must wait, and I have a special parting gift for you before the boat sets sail. I’d have liked to have kept you, my dear, in the style you could have enjoyed, had you been a little cleverer. In fact, I had thought you came to my residence to negotiate a special agreement with me.” He sighed. “However, your quick mind and ability to master the politics of a situation will stand you in good stead when it comes to learning a new language. Turkish, in fact. Yes, you have an eager patron a few hundred miles north of Constantinople waiting for you. He’s paid a king’s ransom for a girl fitting just your description, and since I have decided you’re more trouble than you’re worth, I’m taking you there, myself.”

  “Or face capture, yourself, in England!” Faith shot back.

  “Oh, the passage of time and the fact there is nothing to connect me with any wrongdoing will stand me in good stead.”

  She’d managed to keep her fear under control when she was speaking, but having to listen to him spout his evil, unleashed the shivering she’d kept in check until now. She clasped her arms about herself for she had no opera cloak or other means of warmth, and her evening dress was very bare about her bodice.

  “So, Faith, have you anything to say for yourself?”

  The light from the porthole spilled in a luminous circle in the centre of the room, and into this Lord Harkom stepped, as if he were a golden prince rather than the Prince of Darkness she now knew him to be.

  “She’s not going with you, Harkom.”

  Faith turned with a start; the familiar voice so unexpected and so welcome. A tall, brown-haired gentleman in evening clothes, with tired eyes, high cheekbones, and a sensitive mouth, locked eyes with her.

  Crispin.

  She’d thought of him so often during these past twelve months. Too often, in her imaginings, their welcome was curt and full of recrimination at the way each had failed the other. But now, as he stepped into the full beam of light to stand face to face with Lord Harkom, he looked every bit the handsome hero of her dreams.

  “It’s over, Harkom.” He turned to Lady Vernon with an exaggerated bow, following a brief smile of encouragement for Faith before he went on, “Your activities have been revealed. Thanks to Lady Vernon's correspondence, we've been apprised of your involvement in the trade of friendless young women from English shores to the Ottomans. You will shortly be in custody, and Miss Montague will be leaving with me.”

  He took a step forward and, with hope and happiness flooding through her, Faith moved towards the hand he offered.

  “A little peremptory, I think, Mr Westaway.” As Lord Harkom spoke, the boat gave a shudder and a jolt which sent Faith stumbling briefly into Crispin’s arms, before her nemesis snatched her against him, pressing her face against his shoulder with one cupped hand. “Well, well, this is unexpected. It would appear we’ve already set sail for foreign shores. Sorry, Lady Vernon; just a minor disturbance to our plans. I’m sure you’ll find your sea legs soon enough.”

  Faith, after a brief struggle, realised it might not be a good time to vent her outrage. Lady Vernon, for her part, seemed equally outraged, for she drew her bony frame to its full height and sent a querulous look towards the door.

  “I have hardly prepared for sea travel, Lord Harkom. Go and see what’s happened! We can’t have set sail yet.”

  “Oh, I very much fear we have, Lady Vernon.” Lord Harkom shook his head with a look of feigned regret. “I didn’t think it would come to this. I’d very much hoped it wouldn’t. But I’m not a man to leave anything to chance.”

  “Except that your stupidity invited this whole debacle.” Lady Vernon pointed at Faith before turning to Lord Harkom. “Lord only knows what you were doing when you invited this conniving cre
ature into your bedchamber, and with an unlocked chest, too! That’s what’s behind all this.” She began to shake as her fury mounted. “We have the letter back. The two letters back. Originals, and the only evidence of our involvement. We’ve been so careful. I’ve been so careful. This was not necessary. I want to go home now. Give the orders that we are to turn back.” Her arm trembled as she pointed at the sea through the porthole.

  Lord Harkom gave Faith a squeeze and lowered his face to put his cheek against hers. “All in good time, Lady Vernon; all in good time.” He dropped a kiss upon Faith’s brow. “I want to enjoy this one first. I want Westaway to feel the pain I felt when his father married the woman I loved.”

  “What do you want from me to guarantee that no harm comes to Faith? That she is granted her freedom.” Crispin spoke softly but clearly, and Lord Harkom barked out a laugh.

  “It’s a bit late for that, don’t you think? You’ve been resting on your laurels a whole year, and you clearly didn’t give poor Faith here a second thought.”

  “Faith is very good at hiding her tracks,” Crispin said pointedly. “I searched for you, you know.” The fact he spoke directly to her made Faith’s heart beat wildly as she held her breath and kept eye contact with the striking man before her. “I’ll admit that after we were parted, I was angry and disappointed. My father told me it was what I deserved. What I should have expected.”

  “Just as we expected he would,” Lady Vernon said, on a sniff. She’d walked to the porthole and stood staring dolefully out at the white-capped waves that surrounded them, turning to say over her shoulder, “A brothel is hardly the environment a gentleman such as he would like to think nurtured his son’s intended.”

  “But more than he deserves,” Lord Harkom ground out. “Did your father suffer to see his only child so horribly compromised? I hope he did. Has he been disappointed by what he was dealt? I’m sure he has. After all, what can one expect of the son of an innkeeper’s faithless slut of a daughter and a country yokel.”

  “You’ve concocted this story without a shred of evidence.” Crispin held himself proudly. “Meanwhile, the two of you are clearly guilty of a crime that would see you rot in prison. You’ve been soliciting girls and selling them into slavery.” He regarded Faith with a sad smile. “Faith was lured into doing what she never would have done of her own volition.”

  “And she has served our purposes well.” Lady Vernon gave a short laugh. “The only fly in the ointment was Mrs Gedge. She wanted to be kept updated regarding Faith’s progress at every juncture. She wanted reports that she actually was getting her lessons; that she was being turned into a lady. Yes, she wanted Faith to be every bit as accomplished and desirable as her own Constancia had been so that she could entice Mr Westaway with her charms.”

  “Not that that went very well, initially,” Lord Harkom resumed. “I’ll admit I was mightily taken by the girl’s beauty when I spied her at Madame Chambon’s, but it was only after I learned that there was any connection to Lord Maxwell that she became of such interest to me.”

  Faith gasped. “That’s why you tried to take me, unwillingly! After I returned from being painted at the end of the first week. The first painting.” She swung around to confront Lady Vernon. “You decided that I’d failed in my mission to Mrs Gedge, so you might as well make use of me by selling me to Lord Harkom.”

  Lady Vernon sniffed. “And then, all of a sudden Mrs Gedge was offering me more money to make a final onslaught for the second painting. Suddenly, she’d elevated the prize money, and my reward, and you, Faith, were becoming too interested, yourself, in the young man you’d initially intended to seduce and leave. Ah yes,” she sighed. “It was becoming very interesting and filled with possibilities. I could collect from Mrs Gedge—spectacularly, I might add, after the newspapers obligingly ran their story—and claim a reward from Lord Harkom who had his own particular vendetta against Mr Westaway.”

  “So, Miss Eaves was part of this, too?” Faith couldn’t believe she’d been so gullible, but Lady Vernon dismissed this notion. “The silly little thing lives to tell the truth. Women who deceive and are otherwise immoral deserve to be revealed for who they are so that men can respect the rest of the fairer sex. Yes, she ran that story believing it was in the interests of advancing women’s rights. And that such apparent transparency was needed in the interests of maintaining the integrity of the arts world. Oh, she was delightfully sincere and oh, so obliging.”

  Lord Harkom laughed. “An unexpected piece of largesse, that was. As was discovering that Westaway surely had fallen in love. With you, Faith! The woman who’d been recruited to break his heart. And, that not only had you broken his heart, you’d made him a laughing-stock, severely damaged his career prospects, and thoroughly damaged his relationship with his father. Why, you were just perfect. But then you disappeared. You were good, Faith. No one could find you, and I’d almost given up hope when suddenly, here you are.” He turned. “And here Westaway is. Ready for the final reckoning.” His nostrils flared, and he patted his pocket before drawing out a small pistol. “The crew are disinclined to tie you to the masthead, and the captain maintains the fact that this is a regular sailing. But just be aware of what you risk if you try to overcome me, Westaway. Your father killed the woman I loved, and I am more than happy to kill you.”

  Crispin shook his head. “You lie. What could my mother possibly have seen in a cruel and twisted madman?”

  Lord Harkom ignored him. “Yes, he snatched her away from me and, not being satisfied with that, he broke her heart and then he killed her.”

  “My mother died of fever,” Crispin countered.

  “The woman you believed was your mother. The woman who agreed to travel to France, pretending to be in the early stages of pregnancy, so that there’d be no questions asked after she returned with the brat that was foisted on an innkeeper’s daughter by Westaway senior. The bastard he thought was his, but who was cuckolded when the child—you—arrived a good month earlier than you should have done. Yes, your real mother, the innkeeper’s daughter, was already a month gone to her country yokel lover when she agreed to be a broodmare to your father. It solved a very great problem for her, no doubt. Yes, she garnished her pocketbook and lived very comfortably, until the money ran out and she wrote to me informing me of the situation, after having been apprised of my vendetta against your father.” He pointed the revolver at Crispin and shook his head. “Look at you, Westaway. Parading about in those clothes like a gentleman. It’s a joke.”

  Crispin didn’t seem to heed him. He neared Faith and held out his hand. “Let her come to me for now,” he said, smiling at Faith. “You can torture us later. I’ve been waiting for this a long time.”

  To Faith’s surprise, Lord Harkom released her and she ran into Crispin’s arms. She barely registered Lord Harkom’s desultory clap. “What sport the two of you will provide as we proceed to tear young love asunder. Yes. Hold her, kiss her, enjoy her for this short time, while my heart breaks to think of such a lovely thing being so tarnished by what I have in store. Yes, when we reach shore you’ll be parted, never to see one another again.” He looked through the heavy doors and then outside at the raging seas. “For the next two days, you are my captives and will be completely beholden to me. So, you may have a few minutes under my watch to remember the closeness that you once apparently enjoyed. After that, I shall enjoy tearing the two of you apart once more—just as your father did to me and your mother.”

  Faith lay on her back upon the covers of the large bed in the stateroom to which she’d been assigned and stared through the porthole at the choppy seas beyond. Her cheeks were damp from tears, but there was no point in wiping them away. More would simply join them.

  It had been a long time since she’d wept. Her upbringing had made her strong. Her father punished softness. And that meant tears. Faith had never enjoyed closeness to either parent or, in fact, her siblings. They’d bickered and lashed out at each other, and she’d seen he
r removal from the family home to work in the big house as a reprieve from such pettiness.

  She’d not even cried when she’d been falsely accused of stealing. Injustice was a natural part of her experience.

  Her education at the hands of a man of kindness and ethics had given her a new realisation of life and human beings. Perhaps it had set her up for unhappiness by making her realise that even she had prospects for it. Professor Monk had given her enough examples of people from humble beginnings who had changed the world and received their just rewards to give her hope that she, too, might find a meaning for her life.

  Now, as the boat was lifted and tossed upon the waves of the English Channel, Faith imagined the worst that Lord Harkom had in store for her. He might even make Crispin watch.

  She shuddered, and a sob lodged in her throat.

  “Faith.”

  Terrified, she half rose, ready to fight with everything she had at her disposal.

  It was Lady Vernon, her gimlet eye trained on Faith.

  “You’re to get yourself ready to receive Lord Harkom this evening. I’ve brought you a change of clothes and a few other necessaries to clean yourself up. You’re hardly looking your best.”

  “He can take me as I am,” Faith muttered, but the prospect of clean water for washing and a change of linen and new gown was too enticing. She felt dirty and unkempt.

  “So, Lord Harkom keeps women’s clothing and ivory brushes on hand for such contingencies?” Faith asked Lady Vernon, as she’d worked on her coiffure and changed into the dark-blue confection with its ruffles and ribbons that was presented. It did not require a corset, and nor were there combinations. It was the perfect item for easy divestment, she thought cynically. Lord Harkom wouldn’t need to do much work to have her where he wanted.