Regency Masquerades: A Limited Edition Boxed Set of Six Traditional Regency Romance Novels of Secrets and Disguises

by Brenda Hiatt

  Falcon ignored the implication. “Triss!” Her visitor could not possibly be anyone else.

  Her joy at the news of his arrival must have shown, for the other woman raised an eyebrow and gave her a peculiar look. “This one’s nothing so grand as the one you just left, dearie. Now there’s a fine gentleman—young and handsome, too.”

  I barely know him, Falcon almost said, but she stopped herself just in time. Such a reply would only seem to confirm what the landlady was already assuming. “It’s not what you think,” she said instead and hurried up the stairs with Benita behind her. She supposed she should only be grateful that the landlady had not made Triss await her in the seedy parlor with the other “gentlemen callers.”

  Carlos had stationed himself at the top of the stairs like a military guard and greeted Falcon respectfully. She nodded to Benita to signal her permission for the maid to stay and talk to him. She knew that Benita would regale him with a detailed account of everything that had transpired.

  Triss was settled in a chair in the first bedroom, sharing what remained of the meager repast Falcon had delivered earlier and actually indulging in a cup of tea. Where the cups and teapot had come from Falcon did not know, but she guessed that Maggie had bullied the landlady into providing it. From the exaggerated sound of Maggie’s lilting brogue and Triss’s rumbling Cornish accent, she suspected that they might have “doctored” their tea with something a bit stronger.

  Well, at least they have found something in common, she thought with a rush of affection. Such a pair of lovable rogues! She was smiling as she entered the room.

  “B’gorra, if it isn’t herself returned to us at last,” Maggie said. “Greetings, lass. Do ye see who is here?”

  Triss lumbered up from his seat to greet Falcon warmly, quite as if a week had passed instead of a day since he’d last seen her. But when he spoke to her his voice was gruff.

  “Missy, you promised ’ee wouldn’t do anything before I got ’ere—what ’ave ’ee got to say to that? As I understand it, you’ve been traipsing about the city already, to the West End, to Bow Street and who knows where else? Who is this fellow Lord Danebridge? What do ’ee know about ’im? ’As ’e got a Lady Danebridge?”

  Had he? It was a perfectly reasonable question, Falcon realized. Trust the sergeant to ask it! She had seen no evidence of a woman’s presence at the house in Fitzharding Street, but that did not signify much of anything. Lord Danebridge had not mentioned a wife, but that hardly signified, either. In truth, she did not know.

  “He has done us a tremendous service today, for which we must be very grateful,” she said. “Nothing else matters. I expect we shall have little contact with him from now on.” Why had she not asked Lord Danebridge if he had a wife? She had speculated much about him, but she had not envisioned him with a family.

  “He has recommended a respectable lodging house in a better part of the city, and he has helped me to take what steps I could to try to recover my stolen trunk. You did tell Triss what happened, Maggie?” There was no good reason for her to feel so ruffled over the idea of Lord Danebridge having a wife. Surely it meant nothing to her. She tried to put it out of her mind.

  “Aye, I told him all about it, child. He’s been afther explainin’ just how he came to send us to this place, but he might want to try it again now for your benefit.” Maggie’s previously cordial expression had been replaced by a scowl.

  “Now just a minute, woman! Tis not as if I ’ad any way of knowing the place ’ad changed so.” Triss made a sour face at Maggie and then gave Falcon an apologetic look. “There’s no question of ’ee staying ’ere, missy. No, indeed. Tis not at all the same as it used to be, not at all. I’d no idea ’twould be like this, despite what some people ’ere may think.”

  He pointed to his vacant chair, offering it to her. She shook her head and instead settled herself most improperly upon the bed.

  “I am not blaming you for the loss of my trunk,” she said. “We should never have been so foolish as to all go inside at once while there was still anything valuable left in the street. It might have happened anywhere.”

  “Beforetimes this was a respectable house, even though the neighborhood was not the best,” Triss said. “Many of our returning soldiers stayed ’ere, and I stayed ’ere when I come on leave. A Scottish woman ’ad the running of it—Mrs. Keirie, and a fine woman she was, too.” He cast a resentful glance at Maggie as if to say there was no comparing the two. “The place was clean, and the rates were reasonable. You know I would never ’ave sent ’ee ’ere otherwise, missy. We can’t stay, there’s no question.”

  “We’ll stay tonight, because we have already paid for it. We’ll make a place for you out by the stairway with Carlos. We stayed here last night and while it was not exactly quiet, at least nothing untoward occurred. Fret over it no more, Triss. Our biggest problem is funds. Without the trunk… well, we have very little. I have to hope that somehow it will be recovered, or at least some of the items that were in it will. I could sell my mother’s jewelry…”

  “Now, missy, you don’t want to be doing that. I think mayhap there’s another way out of this conundrum, not that I’m certain, mind ’ee. You could go to your family’s solicitor. ’E ’as offices ’ere in the city, I recollect, and perhaps ’e could ’elp.”

  “With money, you mean. But I would have to reveal who I am! And he would most certainly want to notify my relatives.”

  “They are your people,” Maggie said. “Would that be such a terrible thing?”

  “I want nothing to do with them! If they had not cast my father off, everything might have turned out so differently. As it is, I fear that they would try to stop me from carrying out my mission.”

  “Perhaps ’e don’t ’ave to tell them,” Triss suggested. “A solicitor should be able to keep a confidence, being ’ow ’e’s in the law. Mayhap there’s funds that’s rightly yours. ’E might be able to help ’ee with the other matters, too, besides the money.”

  Falcon shook her head in frustration. “All I want to do is go to the Tower and find Private Timmins.”

  Triss shrugged. “Seems to me that it’ll be ’ard to see the business through if ’ee ’aven’t any funds to live on, missy. What’ll ’ee do if your trunk isn’t found?”

  Falcon sighed. Had she not wrestled with that question from the moment the trunk had disappeared? The best solution she had thought of was to hire out as a teacher of Spanish or as a governess, but she had no references or experience and she feared such responsibility might tie her down too much to pursue her real purpose.

  “I suppose I have no choice—I shall have to go to this solicitor. I suppose, too, that I should feel grateful that we have even the slightest possibility of obtaining help. But it seems we are grasping at a straw.”

  She felt anger—a deep, frustrated anger at her lack of control over so many circumstances. But she could not unleash it at the people in this room. None of it was any fault of theirs. “Do you know this solicitor’s name or his direction, Triss? How will we find him?”

  “I brought with me every piece o’ paper I ever ’ad that deals with your father or your family. Somewhere there’s instructions your father gave me once in case he was killed in a battle, telling me what to do for ’ee and your mother. I think this fellow’s name and direction are in there.”

  “All right, if you can find it we will call on him tomorrow, before I have time to regret the decision.” Exposing herself to the solicitor was a calculated risk; she could only hope that it would prove worthwhile.

  In the morning Falcon sent Triss and Carlos to hire a hackney to transport the little party to the lodgings in Charles Street. While the two men were gone, the women gathered together the last of their personal belongings and finished packing the baggage.

  “I hope they won’t be long,” Falcon said, placing her mantilla carefully over her hair and arranging the folds. The small room boasted no such luxury as a cheval glass, but a small looking glass stood
in a frame upon the dresser, and she let it guide her efforts as she spoke.

  “What will we do if there’s no rooms available at this new lodging house?” Maggie asked with a testy edge to her voice. “You haven’t been there or sent word ahead of us, child.”

  “If there are no rooms, I’ll simply ask the landlady there to recommend another house to us.” Falcon refused to be concerned. There were larger problems to solve than where they would take their next rest.

  The thump of footsteps on the stairs outside the room followed quickly by a light knock on the door interrupted them. Maggie opened the door to reveal their current landlady.

  “Yer gentleman’s below with vehicles to move you out,” the woman said. “It’s a good thing, too. You haven’t paid to be here today and besides, I need the rooms back for my regular, um, residents.” She paused with a crafty look on her face. “That is, unless you cared to make a new arrangement?”

  “No.” Falcon spoke emphatically. “We are leaving as quickly as possible.” Then she softened. “Thank you for taking us in unexpectedly. I know it was an inconvenience.”

  The woman looked surprised. For a fleeting moment a smile that seemed genuine actually crossed her face, softening her features so that she looked rather pretty. “I’ll send the gents up,” she said, turning to go.

  Falcon could hardly believe the speed with which Triss and Carlos had located a hackney. She began to issue instructions to the maid and Maggie, sorting out the band boxes and parcels that were light and small enough for them to carry. Burdened with the long, leather-covered box that contained her father’s precious regalia, she headed out to the stairway, only to stop in surprise at the top.

  “You!” she exclaimed in confusion. “I thought…” Coming up the stairs was not Triss or Carlos but Lord Danebridge, followed by two of his servants.

  The truth dawned upon her and she closed her mouth. No wonder the landlady had said she would “send the gents up.” Triss and Carlos had no need to be sent; they would simply have come up! Apparently they had worked no miracle of speed in obtaining a hackney, either.

  “Here, let me take this,” Lord Danebridge said, removing the large box from her arms before she could protest or tighten her grip.

  “But—”

  “Good morning to you, señora. My carriage awaits below along with a good-sized hackney coach to carry your servants and luggage. I spoke with Mrs. Isham at the lodging house in Charles Street after I left you yesterday, and she will have rooms all prepared for you by the time we have you packed up and transported to her door this morning.”

  “But—”

  The baron looked about the dingy passageway and arched an eyebrow significantly. “I trust you have not changed your mind? That is, you have no wish to remain here?”

  How could he have any doubt? “No, of course not. Tis just that… I mean, I was not expecting you to…” Falcon sighed. She did not wish to seem ungrateful, but she was rather taken aback by his appearing this morning without so much as a by-your-leave. “Do you always just charge in and take command of everyone?”

  He grinned, which only aggravated her more. “Sometimes ladies-in-distress are too proud to ask.”

  “And sometimes they can fend for themselves, especially if given a small amount of aid. I believe you already did far more than was necessary yesterday. To do this today certainly exceeds the bounds of what is proper.”

  He gave her a long and unsettling look. “That depends entirely upon who is defining the boundaries.”

  Was he challenging her? She could not read the expression in his gray eyes, but she would have sworn there was a light in them. She could not tear her own gaze away. That same inner trembling she had felt with him the day before began to seize her, and he had not so much as touched her. Was this man dangerous? Her instincts told her no, but could she trust them? Lord Danebridge affected her in such odd ways and seemed so easily to rob her of control.

  He cannot know that, she reminded herself. She raised her chin just enough to send an answering challenge. “In polite society, I believe it is the lady who establishes boundaries in her dealings with a man. And while I want you to know that I appreciate your thoughtfulness in making arrangements for our lodgings and in placing your carriage at my disposal, I prefer not to be delivered to Charles Street like a plaything in your care. What would the landlady think? I have made my own arrangements for transportation, thank you.”

  It wastes money to pay for a hackney, chided the annoying voice in the back of her mind. You are putting pride before practicality.

  I don’t care! she almost shouted out loud. I am not willing to pay the hidden cost of accepting his offer.

  Standing before her with the large box of regalia, Lord Danebridge inclined his head. “As you wish.”

  A moment of awkward silence followed while she wondered if he would say anything more, whether or not she should take back the box from him, and, if she should, exactly how she might do so gracefully.

  “You needn’t…”

  “Allow me to…”

  He smiled when they both began to speak at once. She found it impossible to resist smiling back.

  “Do you go first,” he said. “If we are not careful this might become a habit.”

  Her smile disappeared. “Oh, no. I hardly think so! I merely started to say that you needn’t trouble yourself about our luggage.” She extended her arms to receive the box.

  Instead of returning it to her, the aggravating man turned and handed it to one of his servants standing below him on the stairs. The rest somehow happened all at once—he turned back to her and seized her hand as she was lowering her arms, and Maggie came out of the bedroom behind her just in time to see him press a kiss on the back of her gloved wrist.

  “Well!” Maggie was shocked.

  “Well!” Falcon was, too, but not for quite the same reasons.

  Lord Danebridge appeared to be perfectly comfortable and quite pleased with himself, if anything. “Since we are already here, allow us to assist you in bringing down your baggage,” he said calmly.

  Whether or not the baron cared to be introduced to her companion, Falcon thought Maggie would expect to be introduced, and Maggie’s opinion counted for more at this moment.

  “Lord Danebridge, allow me to present Mrs. Meara, my traveling companion. Maggie, this is Lord Danebridge.”

  He bowed gracefully. “Of course, from the inn in Wiltshire. We did not have the pleasure of a formal introduction, but I have not forgotten.”

  He smiled so warmly that Maggie’s frown wobbled a bit, as if she was having trouble maintaining it. Falcon was relieved to have his attention diverted from herself for at least a moment. His kiss had been a bold, unexpected move, and she was still trying to understand what it had meant and calm her racing pulse. Her entire hand tingled as if she had held it too near to a candle flame.

  “If tis carrying luggage you’ve come for, look right in that room where I’ve just come from, your lordship,” Maggie said. “There’s plenty more than the one box.” Her tone implied that if he had come for anything else, he had better reconsider.

  Of course, there was no room in the passageway for anyone to move. Lord Danebridge took a step closer to Falcon, who backed up abruptly and bumped into Maggie. The Irishwoman, having no place to go, retreated into the bedroom.

  Falcon followed her, deep in thought. Is he only being helpful, she wondered, or does he have the wrong idea about me? Does he think that because I have no protector, I am fair game?

  “What exactly did you tell this Mrs. Isham when you made the arrangements for our lodging?” she asked the baron, who followed her in turn. “I would not want her to misunderstand my situation.” Nor do I wish you to do so, either.

  “Have no fear. I assured her that you are a respectable acquaintance of one of my cousins and that I was asked to give you what assistance I could. She was only too happy to oblige.”

  Falcon hoped it was the truth. She did not know if
she could believe him, but she could do very little about it one way or the other.

  Lord Danebridge’s second servant came into the room and took up the portmanteau, while the lord himself picked up two band boxes stacked one above the other. As he straightened up, he noticed the harp case sitting with the small leather-covered book trunk. “Is that a harp?” he asked Falcon, his eyes alight with curiosity. “How I should love to hear you play it!”

  “That is not likely to happen,” she replied ungraciously, still annoyed at his high-handed behavior.

  “Do you not play?”

  “It is in sad need of strings and probably some other repairs.” She softened for a moment. “It was my mother’s.”

  Just then Benita came in from the front bedroom. “Doña, Carlos y el Sargento Triss ya estan abajo con el carruaje.” She had been watching for the others to arrive with the hackney and had spied them below in the street.

  “Thank goodness,” Falcon said, unable to conceal her relief. “Here, let us bring down what we can.”

  The women followed Lord Danebridge and his other servant down the stairs. When they reached the street, they found that Carlos and Triss had stopped the baron’s first servant from loading the leather-covered box onto the lord’s carriage.

  “See ’ere, we’ve ’ad one piece o’ luggage nipped already,” Triss was saying to the fellow quite reasonably. “You just wait with that ’til I learns what be going on.”

  Explanations followed quickly and the luggage was stowed precariously aboard the one hackney. Falcon was pleased that Lord Danebridge said nothing but allowed her to arrange matters to her own satisfaction. With the luggage plus the five people who now made up her party, the hackney would be overloaded, but she did not care. They should be all right as long as their driver did not take any corners too quickly.

  “Would you allow me the honor of calling upon you this afternoon, after you have had time to get settled?” the baron asked when all the luggage had been brought down and they were finally ready to depart. “I will want to know how you find the accommodations, you know. Perhaps we could take a drive in the park? That is what fashionable people do in London in the afternoons.”