by Cari Hislop
John was gently led to James’s study and left alone to pull himself together. John blew his nose and threw the cloth into the fire. He could feel his heart beating, but his chest felt numb, as if his other organs had been removed leaving a hole. Unmanly tears gushed from his eyes as visions of Joan at the mercy of some rakehell scalded his heart.
“I tried snatching my wife and dragging her to the altar. It was a stupid mistake.” John visibly jumped as his probationary agent appeared at his elbow. “I thought she’d find it romantic. I was deeply shocked to discover she was furious. Admittedly, at seventeen I was hardly equipped to comprehend the vagaries of a fifteen year old female. She slapped my face, pulled my hair and wished me to the devil. I didn’t even get a kiss before we were overtaken. Was that the first time I was thrown into the tower or the second? Ah…those were the days. That’s a nice suit…”
“I don’t care what you did while you roamed the earth in flesh you pestilent… You know whose take her! You can tell me…who has my Joan? Where has he taken her?”
“Of course I know. I’ve just come from the carriage… John Sebastian you’ve got snot on your cravat.”
“Just tell me who’s taken my Joan.”
“There’s no need to shout I have perfect hearing.”
“Tell me…please…help me find my Joan. I can’t live without her.”
“Well since you’ve touched my romantic heart I’ll give you a clue.”
“I don’t want a clue I want a name before she’s ravished by some vengeful monster.”
“Strictly speaking I’m not here to make your life easier…”
“Please…I’m begging you.”
“Very well, I’ll give you a clue…oh dear my messenger is ringing. I was afraid that might happen.” The agent took a flat metal snuffbox from his pocket and held it to his ear. “Agent 1680 Smirke assignment…yes I know…I know I’m not supposed to give clues, but he’s in a terrible state. He has snot dripping all over his… Yes I know you know, but can’t I give him a miniscule hint? He’s so pathetic. Forgive me…no you don’t have to take me off the case. I promise I won’t interfere. I think he’s doing quite well considering his beloved has just been snatched.”
“Are you mad? Why are talking into a snuffbox?”
“Yes I’d better go he’s getting frantic. I remain your eternally obedient servant, Sir.” The agent shoved the snuffbox back into his pocket and smiled. “The Boss is pleased with your progress, but I’m afraid I can’t help you find the girl.”
“You expect me to believe that God was talking to you through a snuffbox? You’re mad!”
“Who said it was a snuffbox? Wipe your nose and go find the girl.”
“If Robert Neilson’s taken my Joan he’ll wish he hadn’t.”
“He’ll soon be wishing…oops…if you’ll excuse me there’s something I need to do for my wife.” John took a deep breath and wiped his nose on his coat sleeve. Anger was slowly devouring his helplessness. He’d find his Joan and then he’d…John sank into pleasurable thoughts of revenge. Robert Neilson was going to suffer.
Chapter 18
Joan wriggled with force in the arms of the swearing footman; the bruising hand over her mouth muffling her rage. Agitated servants shouted at each other as they struggled to keep Joan from putt a foot through a carriage window. The task had been simple in design. They were to coax the girl out to the carriage, push her inside and bringing her back to Neilson’s town house. They’d been assured that the girl wasn’t intelligent enough to fear the unknown. The whole operation was to be as easy as collecting a case of Meissen porcelain. After all, the girl was in the clutches of a notorious rakehell and any sensible person would agree that she’d be far happier in Mr Nielson’s care.
As the carriage flew into the private mews the sweating footman holding Joan momentarily lost his grip. A roar of pain filled the carriage as Joan sunk her teeth into her captor’s fingers. Momentarily free she lunged for the door, blood dripping from her lips. She was wrenched back from the door by her hair and pushed to the floor of the carriage as the vehicle slowed to a stop. She was roughly shoved into the arms of two strong men and carried inside like a roll of carpet kicking and screaming. In through the servant’s entrance and up three flights of stairs; she was dropped to the floor of an upper story bed chamber. She sat up and listened as the men locked the door. She pulled up her knees and waited to be rescued. Her Mr Smirke would find her. He had to find her. They had to get to the church before noon or they’d have to wait another night to wed. The thought of being deprived the pleasure of her guardian’s lips for even an hour made her snarl into her knees. She couldn’t wait for her wicked guardian to find her, she had to escape. Her thoughts were scattered as a key clunked into the lock and scraped against metal. Joan’s eyes widened with disbelief as the beautiful Robert Nielson stepped into the room and closed the door behind him. “Good morning Miss Lark, I’m afraid I owe you an apology. My servants weren’t meant to manhandle you. I want you to feel safe. My house is your house. Have you eaten? Bloody servants…what have they done to your mouth? Did they hit you?” Robert Nielson crossed over to his latest acquisition on the floor and crouched down to get a better view. “Don’t be frightened Miss Lark; you’re perfectly safe. John Smirke will never be able to hurt you here.”
Joan’s eyes filled with tears as she clasped her hands as if in prayer, “Oh please Mr Nielson, please take me back…Lady Jemima and the boys are waiting at the church…this is my wedding dress…Mr Smirke will be half mad with worry. His heart will be breaking. Take me home before he buys a pistol and shoots someone and ends up back in hell. Oh please let me go, I want my Mr Smirke!”
“John Smirke doesn’t have a heart. I’m going to take care of you from now on. I’ll give you a dowry of fifteen thousand pounds. You’ll be able to marry some kindly Vicar and have a brood of healthy brats. You’ll be safe with me; I won’t let Smirke drag you up the aisle.”
“I don’t want to be safe, I want my Mr Smirke.”
“You just need time to adjust to your new home. If this one doesn’t please you, you can live in one of my other houses.”
“He’ll die without my kisses.”
“You’re better off without him. The man must be poxed past his eyebrows.”
“I don’t care if he lives in a box…I’ll die without his kisses…”
“The thought of Smirke kissing you makes me ill. You’ll never be molested by that withered limb of Satan again. After a few months you’ll forget that worm. One day you’ll probably wake up wanting my kisses.” Mr Neilson’s smug calm smile twisted into an agonised snarl as the innocent wide eyed Meissen figurine flew up off the floor with an ear piercing scream and clawed his face. Her chewed fingernails couldn’t break the skin, but she managed to shove several fingers up his nose and one into an eye with savage fury.
“I want…my….Mr Smirke!” Neilson leapt to his feet groaning in pain, he looked down on the snarling Gorgon through one eye and slapped her hard across the face.
“You’ll stay here and think about how lucky you are to be rescued from that fiend. When you decide you’re hungry you’ll apologise for acting like a hoyden. Perhaps after a week alone in here you’ll remember how to act like a lady.”
“Let me go!” Joan lunged for Neilson’s leg and tried to bite his knee. Robert Neilson roughly pushed the snarling Joan off his leg and ran to safety. On the comfortable side of a locked door his swelling eye and sore nostrils pulsated with pain. “I hate you, you great big ugly brute. Do you hear me? You’re ugly and I hate you! I want my Mr Smirke.” The blindingly beautiful Robert Neilson had never known a woman think him anything, but a charming temptation. Being called ugly was almost as uncomfortable as having his face clawed. The girl was clearly unstable, all the more reason to save her from Smirke. Firmly resolved to carry though his plan, Neilson retreated to his own rooms to nurse his wounds and wait for the Smirkes to come knocking.
Joan beat against th
e door until her arms ached and her hands were bruised. Her captor seemed determined to wrench her from her guardian’s arms. She wiped away her tears and looked around the room for inspiration. The subtle carving on the bed and dressing table told a tale of expendable wealth. She fingered the fine linen bedclothes under a thick silk down filled quilt and looked at the coal fire in the grate. Desperation encouraged her natural impetuosity. After carefully heating the fire poker in the heart of the flames she pulled the Wedgwood chamber pot from the bed side commode and walked over to the window facing out over the mews where servants were running back and forth. Feeling hopeful she smashed the chamber pot against each of the twelve panes of glass until a freezing wind was blowing into the room. Feeling cheered she threw the chamber pot into the yard and watched it explode on impact. Servants screamed and scattered like rats. She ran to the fire and heaved the poker out of the flames and rolled it over the bed’s silk quilt top until it burst into flames. Smoke was billowing out the window by the time the door was unlocked by frightened maids. Screaming, they rushed to put out the fire. Joan slipped away unnoticed too exhilarated by success to think beyond finding the main staircase. She was within sight of the front door when she caught the eye of the servant suffering from her sharp teeth. She made a dash for freedom, but was grabbed by the arm and then by the hair. Pushed to her knees and pinned to the ground, she sobbed into her pink silk moaning for her beloved.
Robert Neilson was lying down on his bed with a cold stone over his sore eye when a servant came to report Joan’s attempted escape. Grinding his teeth he stomped downstairs in his dressing gown, his habitual calm smile twisted into a snarl, “I told you to treat my home as your own and this is how you repay me? You try to burn down my house? Are you a half-wit? You could have killed half my household.”
“I don’t care. What’s the point of living if I can’t be with Mr Smirke?”
“I have rescued you from that vile satanic worm and you will learn to be happy and content in my care so help me God.”
“God isn’t going to help you, you’re evil. I love Mr Smirke…I want to be his wife…”
“Put her in a different chamber, but don’t leave her any fire or lit candles. She’ll have to be content with three hot water bottles. One more outburst today and she’ll go without dinner.”
“Choke on your dinner; I’d rather starve than live in your care…Mr Smirke has never once hit me and he’d certainly sack any servant who pushed me to the ground by the hair.”
Neilson’s sore nostrils turned white as he struggled to contain his temper. “How dare you compare me with that vermin? You will apologise this instant.”
“Or what, you’ll beat me black and blue? That will prove my theory you’re a monster. I wouldn’t be surprised if you ordered your footmen to strip me naked and chain me to your bed.”
“You have a lurid imagination Miss Lark. Unlike your insufferable guardian I don’t force myself on unwilling women, and I’ve certainly never had to chain a woman to my bed. If I don’t rescue you, you will be devoured body and soul…”
“I’d rather be devoured by Mr Smirke then rot here with you.”
“Take her upstairs to her new room and don’t hurt her or I’ll sack you.”
Joan screamed as rough hands pulled to her feet by her upper arms, “You can’t keep me here; I’m the legal property of Mr Smirke.”
“Not for long Miss Lark. As you insist on being a hoyden your next meal will be breakfast tomorrow morning.”
“I don’t want food; I want my Mr Smirke…” Her sobs echoed off the high ceilings as she was forcibly dragged up the stairs causing a hesitant ripple of unease in her captor. Robert Neilson held a cold stone to his aching eye and returned to his bed. Miss Lark would be sailing out of England as soon as he had the proper paperwork; he certainly wasn’t going to run the gauntlet of the girl’s teeth on a daily basis. Imagining the girl somewhere far away with deep oceans in-between made him smile with pleasure as he tenderly examined his nostrils. Yes, they stilled ached. If she shoved her fingers up his nose one more time he’d take her over his knee. John Smirke was either mad, desperate or being blackmailed. No sane man would willingly chain himself to the harpy still screaming at the four footmen escorting her to her new room. Robert had the whole plan mentally arranged; he’d acquire guardianship of the harpy and then send her far away to the Colonies where he’d never be accosted. Neilson smiled at the thought of ruining Smirke’s plan to ruin the girl. Revenge had never tasted so sweet, even if it meant he could only see out of one eye for a day or two.
Joan managed to kick and bite several footmen before being thrown into a cold lifeless bedchamber. She landed on her backside and sat there crying into her pink sleeve until shivering; rage pulled her to her feet. There had to be something she could do to escape. She pulled several blankets off the bed and wrapped them around her shoulders. Her breath steamed the windows as she stared at a boring side view of the next house barely more than six feet away. The windows were shuttered, the house obviously unoccupied. She looked down and wondered how far it was to the ground. If she had a rope she could climb out the window and escape. She looked back at the bed linen and down at her pink silk and wiped away her tears. If she died trying to escape, at least her Mr Smirke would know she’d tried to return to him. The comforting thought gave her courage.
Neilson was using his own chamber pot for a more conventional use when his one good eye caught sight of something falling past his window. Buttoning his trousers he ran to confirm his suspicion. Yes, he had seen a mattress falling from the sky. He looked up and watched a thinner mattress flap its way to the ground and then a wool blanket. He ran from the room shouting for a servant, “Is Miss Lark in a room above mine?”
“Yes…” The servants had to chase after their master.
“Where’s the bloody key?”
“It was left in the lock…maybe John footman has it…”
“I thought Mary the chambermaid had it…”
Neilson turned sideways to the door and heaved himself against the wood cursing Mr Smirke under his breath as he bruised his shoulder. The lock tore through the wood and Neilson was inside. His rescued harpy was bending over the bed in her chemise and stays frantically knotting a makeshift rope of pink silk and bed linen to the bedpost. Momentarily stunned by fired lust, Neilson ogled the young woman who suddenly resembled the several blonde Grayson women he’d bedded over the years, except she was exquisitely perfect as if one of his most lurid dreams had come to life to taunt him. The undressed Meissen shepherdess who had one shapely leg out the window before her captor came to his senses. “What the devil are you trying to do, kill yourself? Give me that…” Neilson grabbed the expertly knotted concoction of torn cloth and yanked Joan back into the room. She fell to the floor with a scream, displaying an expanse of silk stockings. “You pretty little idiot, you can’t climb out of the window dressed like that. In the unlikelihood that you survived the descent you’d be dragged into some dark lane and deflowered.”
“I don’t care. I want my Mr Smirke.” Joan covered her chest with her arms as large decorative tears spilled from her eyes. “It’s forty past ten. We only have a common license; we must marry by noon or we have to wait till tomorrow. Please let me go to Mr Smirke.” Conscious of the large audience of servants, Neilson overcame his fear of being bitten and masterfully grabbed Joan by the upper arm and pulled her to her feet as if she were a rag doll.
“What you need is to be bent over my knees and spanked like a child. Accept your deliverance and show some gratitude before I’m persuaded you’re mad and treat you accordingly.”
“You steal me away from my Mr Smirke and threaten me with Bedlam? You’re a monster…a fiend…a fork tongued ugly devil and I hate you.”
“Mr Smirke has doubtless had you mesmerised. In a few weeks you’ll be grateful for my intervention and come to adore me as much as the next woman.”
“Never! My heart is breaking…”
&nbs
p; “Save your hysterics for future amateur theatrics.” Neilson turned his attention to the crowd of servants near the door, “Prepare the gold reception room; remove the curtains and extinguish the fire. It’s high enough that if she jumps she’ll only break her leg unless she lands on her head. Give her one thick wool blanket, a chamber pot and a pitcher of water. Ask Alice, the parlour maid, if she’ll sell me one of her best dresses for Miss Lark.” Neilson choked back a scream as Joan’s teeth savaged his left hand holding her arm. “You vicious little harpy…” Neilson snarled at Joan’s blood covered lips and flung her over his shoulder. She pummelled his spine as she was transported to her new prison and dangled upside down from her uncomfortable perch while the room was made safe and then dropped onto a gold sofa. She found her feet and flew at the departing beautiful giant intent on leaving teeth marks on his leg, but she was slapped hard to the floor where she lay sobbing long after the door was locked.