Reckless Rules (Brambridge Novel 4)

by Pearl Darling

  “Never mind, Lady Colchester, please do let me clear it up.” Mr. Robertson stood and dabbed ineffectually at the water with a large handkerchief.

  Victoria glanced at Mrs. Prident, who had continued to stare at her, but who now wore a small smile at the edges of her mouth. She sat down again and sighed. “Dear me, I am so terribly clumsy. I’m almost as bad at maths as well. I was so sure that losing three paupers and gaining two would mean that your overall people count would only reduce to two hundred and eighty-three. I thought you said that there were only two hundred and eighty- one this month, but then I knocked my cup of tea over as I tried to concentrate on the sums and everything has been swept clean out of my head.” Victoria laughed a little tinkling laugh and opened her eyes wide to project innocence.

  “Lady Colchester, you are quite right.” Mr. Robertson nodded earnestly. “Mrs. Prident, would you be so kind as to explain why your figures do not add up?”

  Victoria watched as Mrs. Prident slid Mr. Robertson a look of loathing from beneath hooded eyelids. “Two of the young ladies ran away ten days ago,” she said, unfolding her arms. “Lena Mickel and Tessa Dunbar.”

  “Tessa Dunbar, but she was my favorite! So very young too,” Mr. Robertson exclaimed. “Whatever can have induced her to leave? I gave her special dispensations at every opportunity.”

  “I’m sure you did,” Mrs. Prident murmured.

  “Are your girls in a habit of running away, Mr. Robertson?” Victoria patted at her hair. “I mean, surely with all the money that we are giving you, none of the paupers can want to leave voluntarily?”

  “No one leaves voluntarily.” The usually cheerful Mr. Robertson narrowed his eyes, reducing his florid face to resemble an angry boar. Noticing that both women were watching him, Mr. Robertson guffawed forcefully and slapped the table. “They probably decided that the life of a streetwalker was more remunerative and comfortable.”

  “Streetwalker?” Victoria was confused, it was the first time that she had heard the term.

  “Prostitute,” Mrs. Prident said quietly. “It’s not illegal and many girls drift between being a pauper and a streetwalker. We may see the girls in a couple of weeks.” She shrugged uncomfortably. “Or, we may not.”

  “I thought you said that Tessa was very young?” Victoria frowned.

  “The legal age of consent is thirteen.” Mrs. Prident coughed. “Many girls end up on the streets.”

  “It’s a shame because I had high hopes for Tessa. Mr. Durnish seemed particularly taken with her when he came to interview for new staff for his house.” Mr. Robertson laughed abruptly. “It just means more room for the rest of the poor.”

  “Quite right,” said Victoria, injecting a saccharine sweetness into her voice. However, it was hard to let the incident go. Mr. Robertson’s callousness was shocking. “Although, is there nothing that can be done to help the poor girls in that situation?”

  Mr. Robertson turned to look at her with surprise. “Help them? They don’t want help. They left of their own accord. They’ll probably make a nice bit of money out there and then come back to us for a holiday. You shouldn’t pity them.”

  Victoria tried to catch Mrs. Prident’s eye, but the woman’s gaze was fixed on the wall opposite her and she would not turn her head.

  Mr. Robertson coughed, the folds of skin at the edge of his face wobbling as he gave a gurgling last rasp. “If that is everything, Lady Colchester?”

  Victoria nodded.

  “Then we look forward to seeing you next month as usual.” Mr. Robertson rubbed his hands. “Now I must go back to looking at those accounts. We don’t get paid much by the parishes to house the poor and it is always a job balancing the incomings and outgoings.” He laughed harshly and stopped. “That is err… without the generosity of your funds, Lady Colchester. Of course.”

  Victoria clenched her fingers tightly around her pelisse and stood, “Of course,” she parroted. With small steps she left the room, brushing past Mrs. Prident who had moved to stand outside the door. Looking up into the dour woman’s face, she was surprised to see a tinge of sadness in her eyes. Victoria had had enough; she craved the safety and comfort of her home.

  Outside, her magnificent white barouche stood waiting for her, the horses stamping their feet in impatience. Her coach driver hopped off the elevated front seat with alacrity and jumped across the cobbles to meet her.

  “I’m sorry, my lady, I couldn’t stop him.” The coachman scratched his head. “He was most persuasive. And a little intimidating.”

  Indeed it was obvious to whom the coachman referred. The man sat incongruously on the white leather seats of the barouche, his massive frame dwarfing the delicate seats. He shrugged off his coat and tossed it carelessly onto the opposite seat as she watched.

  The coachman offered Victoria a tentative hand. “My lady?”

  Victoria sighed. If her stout coachman had been unable to remove Bill, then it seemed that Victoria would need to do it herself. Surprisingly, a thrill of anticipation ran through her. She gave her hand to the coachman and allowed herself to be handed into the barouche.

  Stepping lightly over Bill’s long outstretched legs, Victoria turned and swept his coat off the seat and into her arms. She turned to find his deep brown eyes firmly fixed on her derriere.

  “If you have quite finished, Mr. Standish?” Victoria all but threw Bill’s coat onto his lap. She glanced round the quite empty street. It would be an unusual area of the London for other members of the ton to come to. If they saw her alone in a coach with Bill Standish there would be no end of gossip generated. She would be a laughing stock. Her reputation… perhaps finished.

  “Can I help you?” she asked frostily. Bill’s unwavering gaze was beginning to make her rather warm.

  He laid an arm out along the back of the barouche and crossed his legs, lifting her skirt slightly as she did so. She refused to flinch.

  “I wondered what a lady of leisure did all day and now I know,” he said; his deep voice sent a shiver through her. “They visit the poor. I should have guessed. Does it make you feel any better?”

  “Better about what?” Victoria wished she hadn’t asked. She knew what the response was going to be.

  “Better about your position in life? The silver spoon that props up your lifestyle. The reputation that you have to uphold.”

  Victoria glanced away from the almost angry set of Bill’s chiseled jaw. It seemed more than personal to him. His comments were too close to the bone. “I made a significant donation to this establishment. I came to hear what they spent it on,” she said quietly.

  “And what did they spend it on?”

  “I was told new shoes.”

  Bill glanced back at the railings of the building. Several people had gathered in the yard, looking out at the street, watching the occupants of the barouche with interest. He snorted. “I’ve been waiting here for three quarters of an hour. I haven’t seen one member of your so called establishment wearing anything that I would call new shoes.” Bill ran his hands through his hair. “Gods Victoria, most of them don’t have shoes at all. You are wasting your money.”

  “I have not had time to verify—”

  Bill spoke over her reply. “It’s just typical of a woman of your breeding. Give the poor some money and hopefully it will make some restitution for the same amount she’ll spend on a ball dress. Do you know what it is like to be poor?”

  “No, well I—”

  “Well I bloody well do. You don’t want some rich person handing over money to the first corrupt person they meet to assuage their guilty conscience.”

  “He’s not corrupt.”

  “How do you know?”

  Victoria forbore to mention that she had had the man investigated. Not by herself, mind. Unfortunately though that was her normal style, she couldn’t have risked the subject—Mr. Robertson— becoming aware of her in that capacity. To him she needed to remain a benign benefactor.

  “I just do.”

&nb
sp; “There you go again. Arrogant statements about life as if what you say is the last word in ton propriety.”

  Victoria could feel a hot flush beginning to rise just below the nape of her neck. Her coachman sat facing forwards, hands clutching at his reins, ostensibly not listening, but the occasional twitch of his ears belying the fact. He could hardly not listen, given that the silly contraption was an open-topped carriage. She rued the day that she had bought it.

  She drew back her shoulders and sat, twitching her elevated skirts away from Bill’s large boots. “Let me remind you, Bill.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Thank you for what?”

  “You used my real name for once. I don’t believe you’ve called me that since last summer.”

  Victoria swallowed. She didn’t want to be reminded about last summer. “Let me remind you, Mr. Standish. You are the one who entered my barouche without my say so, intimidated my coachman—” she paused as Bill laughed—“and asked questions which you believe you already know the answer to.” She glared at him as he continued to guffaw. “Might I ask whether or not I am really necessary to all of this, and if not, I will go back into the building and wait until you leave.”

  Bill cocked his head and stared at her. Involuntarily, Victoria’s hand lifted itself from her lap, itching to trace the squareness of his jaw. But what about those caramel eyes? By Minerva those eyes! Gritting her teeth, she buried her hand back into the folds of her skirt and glanced away.

  “That will not be necessary.” Bill ran a hand through his hair.

  “Why not? As far as I can see, you should be the one leaving the coach, but instead I am offering to leave it for you.” Victoria frowned. “What are you doing here anyway?”

  “I was passing,” Bill said with no more elaboration. “I thought you might be able to give me a ride back to Mayfair.” He smiled lazily. “You can still do that.”

  Victoria gasped at his daring. “You think that I will give you a lift back after what you have insinuated?”

  “I am sure that you will give me a ride back. After all, your coachman has agreed not to leave without me. Isn’t that right, Oswald?”

  The coachman nodded with a grimace at Victoria. Bill knew the coachman’s name? Victoria only knew it because Carruthers her butler had told her. The man was positively mute most of the time. He had also been generally loyal. She cursed all males to hell and back.

  “Why don’t you sit back, Victoria, and let Oswald take you home in comfort.” It was almost as if Bill couldn’t resist the afterthought. “After all, you do have lovely shoes and a carriage to ride around in. It wouldn’t do not to use them.”

  Victoria opened her mouth to retort but stopped. It wasn’t worth it. Resigned, she sat back in her seat. If anyone saw them in the barouche together she would just say that he had forced his way into the carriage like the jumped up man that he was. It wasn’t far off the truth, and it was something the ton would love to believe. Unfortunately it was very hard for Victoria to believe that Bill was at all jumped up. He might have been a smith before his property inheritance brought him to the attention of the ton, but Victoria could attest to the fact that even before then Bill had acted like a gentleman. It seemed it was just recently that he had become more jaded in his behavior. Certainly last summer…

  No, she wasn’t going to think about that. She had no illusions that she had been the one to leave that behind. It was her choice. He needed to accept that. She didn’t need him as much as she needed other things.

  “Oswald,” Victoria called softly. The coachman winced. But the power that Bill had exerted obviously still held sway. “Do take me home. I presume that Mr. Standish has already told you where we might drop him off?”

  The coachman nodded and, clicking his tongue, shook out the reins. The all white horses set off at a sharp trot. The barouche proceeded in silence through the city and along the banks of the Thames as Victoria stared over Bill’s shoulder, trying to avoid his gaze which she knew was trained unwaveringly on her face.

  “Seeing the water always reminds me of Brambridge,” Bill said quietly.

  Victoria brushed at a wisp of hair that had escaped from her bronze hair pins.

  “The way the light plays on the water. The way that the boats ply up and down. And then I see the press of humanity on either side of the riverbank, and am reminded that London is truly a place of contrasts.”

  “Why, that was almost poetic.” Victoria did not want to let her guard down. She had almost done that before in Brambridge. “But it doesn’t take a genius to make that observation.”

  “But Brambridge is also a place of contrasts,” Bill continued, deflecting Victoria’s barb as if she hadn’t spoken. “Where else could a smith become a landowner and employ his apprentices as footmen?”

  “Oh Bill, you didn’t!” Victoria laughed despite herself. She could imagine the scene, hulking great men cluttering up the hall in uniforms attempting to polish silver with their beefy hands.

  The smile on Bill’s face was like the sunshine on the water. “They wanted to. I couldn’t stop them. Life for a smith, like for those at your establishment, is hard. Work is physical, not predicable, and never constant. But at least you have a purpose and direction.” The smile on Bill’s face disappeared. “They wanted to try life as a soft servant.” He shrugged. “I wasn’t going to stop them. The estate needs employees. Edgar Stanton my cursed cousin deprived the place of that. I’m working on getting the place going again. Brambridge needs it.”

  “I just can’t imagine them all serving you at the dinner table.”

  “Who says that people can’t adapt? Just because they were apprentice smiths doesn’t mean to say that is where they needed to stay because that was their lot in life. Some of them have found the change rather good. Others however, let’s just say I may need to reassign them.” Bill grimaced at what must have been an unpleasant memory.

  Determined to keep the tone light, Victoria pointed to a swan that was taking off on the Thames, its large paddle feet flailing at the water as its great wings flapped mightily to pull it upwards. “Isn’t it beautiful?”

  “Yes, she is,” Bill murmured.

  Victoria turned to look enquiringly at him and just as quickly turned back to look at the Thames where the sun now set in the west. She clenched her fingers in her lap. Bill hadn’t been looking at the swan at all. He had never looked at it. She had turned to find his gaze fixed unfalteringly fixed on her.

  “Something so beautiful should always be as free as a bird,” Bill continued cryptically.

  Victoria continued to follow the swan’s flight. It wasn’t hard to know what he was referring to. The way she held tightly onto her emotions, her position in society, her life in general. He didn’t know what she risked if she let it go.

  He did not speak to her again after that. Indeed Victoria could not bring herself to look at him as he left the carriage at Lord Lassiter’s mansion, clutching onto the brass handrails all the while as the coach made the short ride onwards to Colchester Mansions.

  But it wasn’t short enough for Victoria not to dwell on some of the things that Bill had said.

  Entering her drawing room at a trot, Victoria gathered up her small dog, Ponzi, into her arms and buried her face in his fur.

  “Can I get you anything, my lady?” Her butler stepped quietly into the room and folded his hands behind his back.

  “No, Carruthers. Please close the door behind you. I wish to be alone for a while.” Victoria could sense Carruthers was still standing in the doorway. But as she buried her head in Ponzi’s fur again, the butler withdrew, shutting the door with a soft click behind him.

  The small dog began to squirm as Victoria tried to gather comfort from her soft body. A lick on the nose encouraged Victoria to put the small dog back on the floor.

  “What should I do, Ponzi?” She pulled gently at the tufts of hair around the dog’s ears. “I thought Mr. Robertson’s establishment was one of the more h
onest of the pauper houses. But now I’m not so sure. The shoes have not been delivered to the poor, he doesn’t know how many he is looking after, and his thoughts about those women…” Victoria sank into one of the fragile tub chairs she kept in the room especially for her more difficult visitors. “There but for the grace of God, go I.”

  Ponzi barked and pawed at her leg.

  “Yes, I know I never would have needed to have been a… streetwalker. But I made a similar choice when I jumped out of my gilded cage and entered into marriage with Lord Colchester. If we had entered into intimate relations then I would have been no better than those girls, those women. As it is, I have ended up richer because of it. And I am still alone… still in my own self-imposed cage and I am guilty of everything Bill accused me of. Giving to the poor to make me feel better, bowing to the strictures of the ton to make me feel better just not in the way he understands…”

  Victoria buried her head in her hands, and her shoulders shook. Oh God no—not now. A black wall of despair threatened to rock her very defenses. If she gave in to it she would be useless for weeks. Her brother called it her melancholia. She had no name for it—she didn’t want to name it. To do so would be to give it a voice, a place in her life. The last bout had been when Colchester had died, although many times it had threatened to overwhelm her since then… her brother Henry marrying her best friend Agatha; Earl Harding, the man with whom she might have found comfort, finding his own love. They were leaving her all behind without a backwards glance. And then there had been the moment when she had fled Brambridge, running away from Bill’s continued requests to see her.

  This was where the rules came in. They gave her life a rigid structure. That was why she acted in a strict fashion. They kept her sane.

  Victoria swallowed and looked at the ceiling. What was the first rule of investigation? She swallowed again. She couldn’t remember. Her shoulders shook harder. Ponzi ran from her legs to the drawing room door and pawed at the casement. Victoria tried to move but her legs wouldn’t let her.