Angel in Scarlet

by Jennifer Wilde

  I didn’t really want to turn him in. Somehow it didn’t seem quite fair. He hadn’t really hurt anything, and he’d been … well, rather polite to me, soft spoken, gallant. Said I was utterly gorgeous, he had. Came to the theater several times. If I turned him in they were bound to hang him and I would feel terrible about it. You’re one tough lady, love. Hard as nails. The man is a seasoned criminal, broke into your house, scared the wits out of you, and you want to pat him on the back and thank him for calling. He looks so uncomfortable there on the floor. He’s probably in pain. He moaned again, and so, of course, I fetched a cushion and kneeled down and carefully lifted his head, placing the cushion under it, and then I went to get Jamie’s brandy. He would need some when he came to. Putting the decanter of brandy and a glass down on the table in front of the sofa, I moved over to one of the wing chairs and sat down, patiently watching my guest.

  He didn’t move. A good fifteen minutes passed, the clock over the mantel ticking loudly in the quiet house. He was so still, hadn’t moaned again, hadn’t even twitched. I began to worry. Maybe … maybe he had died. Maybe he wouldn’t ever come to. I got up and went over to him and checked and, yes, he was still breathing, but his pulse didn’t seem any stronger than it was before. I had slammed the candlestick against his head with considerable force. His injury might be … might be serious indeed. He might be bleeding under that hood. I would have to remove it. There was no way around it. Of course my curiosity about what he looked like had nothing whatsoever to do with my decision to remove the hood. Carefully, I lifted his head. He moaned again and mumbled something incoherent as I took hold of the top of the hood and pulled. Shiny black silk slipped away, revealing his features.

  I didn’t gasp. I didn’t faint. My heart didn’t leap. Calmly, I stared, and I seemed to have no feeling whatsoever. I saw the lean, foxlike face and noted that it was a bit fuller than before, not quite so sharp and thin. His mouth was wide and full, the lower lip with that cruel curve I remembered, and the sleek black eyebrows slanted up from the bridge of his nose to a high arch and then swept back down. Though still dark, his skin wasn’t as deep a tan as it had been, but his hair was as thick, as black, the rich blue-black of a raven’s wing. There was an ugly mauve bruise above his temple darkening to purple-blue. I must tend to that, I thought, ever so calm, completely objective. I had seen his face so often in my dreams that seeing it now, even after all this time, had no effect whatsoever on me.

  Or so I believed.

  I went upstairs and found a clean cloth and the bottle of rubbing alcohol we kept in a cabinet in the dressing room. I returned to the study and bathed the bruise. The skin wasn’t broken, and there was only a slight swelling. He wasn’t seriously hurt, although he was going to feel wretched when he came to. He moaned. His eyelids fluttered. He opened his eyes and they were so deep a brown they seemed almost black, confused now as they gazed up at me. “Angie,” he moaned, a low, aching moan that seemed to hurt his throat, and then he shut his eyes and drifted back into unconsciousness. I finished bathing his temple and eased his head back down onto the cushion and spread a cloak over him, and I poured myself a glass of brandy and sat back down in the wing chair and wondered how I could possibly be so very calm and objective, feeling nothing whatsoever.

  I sipped the brandy. An hour passed, two, and the memories came and with them the emotions I hadn’t felt earlier and I wanted another brandy, needed it badly, but I didn’t have one. I went into the kitchen and made tea and another hour passed and the feelings I wanted so desperately to deny swept over me, and I knew that love was not dead, was still very much alive inside me. I was sad, so sad, remembering that sensitive girl, that moody youth, knowing it was too late for both of us, for both of us had changed, though the love was still alive. Dawn came and he awoke and I helped him onto the sofa and told him not to talk and made another pot of tea and made him drink it, and I was composed, cool, in complete control of the emotions raging inside. He finished his second cup of tea and set the cup aside and rubbed the side of his head and grimaced.

  “How do you feel?” I asked. My voice was crisp.

  “I suppose I’ll live. I’ve had worse bumps. I had to come, Angie. For weeks I’ve been trying to build up enough courage. They claim Lord Blackie is brave and dauntless, the boldest man in London, but I suffered agonies while I waited for you to come home last night.”

  “Indeed?”

  “I was afraid—afraid to see you. I had stayed away for so long a time, but I couldn’t stay away any longer. What I said about that portrait is true, Angie. Every day I look at the reproduction and I remember and—”

  “It’s too late, Hugh.”

  “You remember, too,” he told me.

  “Yes, I remember.”

  Pink-orange light streamed into the room, growing brighter by the moment. I got up and put out the candles and opened all the curtains. Hugh watched me with brown-black eyes full of unspoken emotion.

  “You must leave,” I said.

  “Not yet. We have to talk.”

  “There’s nothing to talk about, Hugh.”

  “I love you. I’ve never loved anyone else. When I escaped I longed to come to you, to see you just one more time before—” He paused, a deep frown creasing his brow. “It wasn’t possible. I had to get away. I went to sea. I intended to make enough money to get to Italy and gather the proof I needed to establish my legitimacy and bring my case to court, but there is very little money to be made when you’re a lowly sailor. I found that out early on, but I dared not come back to England. Eventually, when I felt it was safe, I returned. I discovered that Clinton was married and living at Greystone Hall—in my house, with my title—and I discovered that you had become the celebrated Angel Howard. I was penniless. I knew I couldn’t approach you until I—until I had a future to offer you.”

  “So you became Lord Blackie,” I said. “You became a thief.”

  “Out of necessity, Angie. I had to have a great deal of money in order to accomplish my goal, and there was no way I could earn it honestly. I became a thief, yes, but I only robbed the rich, the gentry, lifting bright baubles from empty-headed women who wouldn’t suffer from the loss. I never committed an act of violence, never hurt anyone. I feel no remorse.”

  “I don’t imagine you do,” I said.

  He didn’t like my tone of voice. He frowned again, looking then remarkably like the sullen youth I had known. I sat down wearily in the wing chair and caught sight of myself in the mirror across the room. My face was drawn, faint shadows under my eyes, and my hair looked limp, all atumble. It didn’t matter. I was utterly weary. I wanted to be alone. I wanted to forget, and I knew I never could.

  “It took me quite some time to get the money I needed,” he told me. “I lifted many valuable jewels, true, but their value decreased drastically when I took them to the fence—the best fence in London, I might add. When, finally, I felt I had enough, I went to Italy and began my search. It was very expensive. I had to hire people to help me, bribe clerks, pay people to dig through records, and then we found out that the records I needed were lost in a fire. Or so we thought. Some of them had been saved, transported to another place, and I have men searching for them now. I have someone else looking for the priest who performed the ceremony. He is still alive, they say, and I hope he may remember, may have records of his own.”

  “I see.”

  “I ran out of money. I had to come back. Once I have the proof I need, it will take a great deal of money to present my case properly in court. It takes money to fight money, and Clinton is a very wealthy man.”

  His voice was low and full of determination, and I looked at him and saw the resolution in his eyes and knew he still clung to the dream. He still believed he would become Lord Meredith and live in the house he hadn’t been allowed to enter as a youth. He still believed the stableboy would become the master. It was an obsession with him. I understood, and I was sad for him, sad for all the disappointment, all the loss, al
l the bitterness he had lived with since childhood. I fought the compassion welling up inside, fought the urge to go to him and hold him to me and give him the love he had been denied all his life.

  “You intend to go on stealing,” I said.

  “Until I have what I need. Two or three more jobs and Lord Blackie will retire.”

  I stood up, hardening myself. I brushed my amethyst skirt and looked at the clock. It was after seven.

  “You must go now,” I told him.

  “Angie—”

  “I’m not Angie,” I said, and my voice was cool. “I’m Angel Howard now. The girl you knew is—She no longer exists.”

  Hugh got to his feet, a bit unsteady on his legs. The swelling had gone down, but the bruise was an ugly purple-gray. His face was drawn, too, taut, skin tight across those wide, sharp cheekbones. Morning sunlight gleamed on his thick, tousled hair, bringing out deep blue-black highlights. He looked at me with dark eyes. His full pink mouth was tight.

  “I don’t believe that,” he said harshly.

  “It’s true.”

  “I love you, Angie. You’re the only person I’ve ever loved, and I don’t intend to lose you again. You love me, too. You can’t deny it. I see it in your eyes.”

  “You’re wrong, Hugh.”

  “No.”

  The anger was there, the old anger, and he took a step toward me and his knees gave way and I rushed to him and caught hold of his arms before he fell and eased him back down onto the sofa. “Damn!” I said. He was still weak. The blow on the side of his head had clearly done more harm than either of us suspected. I poured a glass of brandy and gave it to him and ordered him to drink it, and I stood watching him with a hard expression on my face. I knew I had to get him out of the house before I gave in to the emotions raging inside, and I knew he couldn’t make it on his own. He leaned back on the cushions, pale now, trying to keep his eyes from closing.

  “Stay here!” I snapped.

  I left the house and hurried down St. Martin’s Lane to the Strand, and I found a cabbie there, dozing on his seat while the horses stood listlessly in harness. I woke him up and ordered him to take me back to the house and wait while I fetched another passenger. He yawned, blinked his eyes and then said “’Op in, luv, ’Oward Finney at yer service.” Minutes later I was back in the study, pulling Hugh to his feet. His face was still pale. He was still unsteady. I curled one of his arms around my shoulders, holding his wrist, and I felt his weight and felt my own knees sag and told him he’d bloody well better walk as I wasn’t about to carry him. He smiled at that and, staggering, we moved into the foyer and out of the house.

  “’Ad a mite too much to drink, didn’t ’e?” the cabbie said.

  “Yes,” I snapped. “Give him your address, Hugh.”

  “The Blue Stag. It’s on Holywell Street, near Lincoln’s Inn Fields, and Holywell is just off Fleet.”

  “Know th’ place well, Guv. Need any ’elp gettin’ ’im in my cab?”

  “I think we can make it,” I said crisply.

  We climbed in and Hugh sank back against the dusty leather seat, sighing heavily, looking woozy indeed. I pulled the door shut and the cabbie snapped the reins and we started back toward the Strand which, after passing the little church of St. Clement Danes, ran into Fleet. Hugh wiped his brow, beaded with moisture, and I was afraid he might pass out again. The son of a bitch would probably die on me and wouldn’t that be a dandy thing to have on my conscience. Why the hell hadn’t he stayed away? Why the hell hadn’t I summoned a constable immediately, without even removing his hood? I had dreamed about him all these years, had longed for him, and now that he was here beside me I found that I didn’t want him in my life again. There had been too many changes in both our lives.

  “Sorry about this,” he said weakly. “I feel a fool.”

  “It’s my own bloody fault for hitting you so hard.”

  “It was quite a whack,” Hugh agreed. “I seem to be having some kind of delayed reaction.”

  “You’ll probably die on me.”

  He managed a chuckle at that and took my hand and squeezed it. The sensations that stirred within as those strong fingers squeezed mine were alarming indeed. I pulled my hand away. I tried to ignore the nearness of him, the smell of him, the wild exhilaration that swelled within me despite all my efforts to stem it. The carriage rattled noisily over the cobbles and swayed and his weight was thrown against me and I felt bone and muscle and closed my eyes and prayed for strength. It was too late, too late, much too late. The girl he had known really didn’t exist any longer, just as I had said, and the youth I had loved with such fervor no longer existed either. We were different people, with only the past and the dream of first love to bind us.

  We passed the church of St. Clement Danes and moved down Fleet and eventually turned and stopped. The Blue Stag was a huge building in Tudor style with plaster and exposed beams and an archway with rooms over it opening into the central courtyard. The carriage stopped. The cabbie hopped down to open the door for us. I asked him to wait for me. Hugh was still unsteady on his feet and his face was still pale, moist. He gave me instructions and I took hold of his arm and led him into the courtyard and over to the door he pointed out. I opened it to discover a dim foyer and a narrow wooden staircase.

  “How many flights?” I inquired.

  “Three,” he said apologetically.

  “Wonderful. Can you make it?”

  “With your help.”

  “Put your arm around my shoulders, lean on me. There, I’ll slip my arm around your waist. Jesus, this is going to be fun. You would have rooms on the third floor.”

  He smiled weakly. “You shouldn’t have hit me so hard.”

  I ignored this attempt at light banter and started up the stairs. Hugh leaned heavily on me, and I was bearing most of his weight. I was exhausted before we reached the second flight but, gritting my teeth, forged on, feeling him grow weaker by the moment. I’d probably have to drag the son of a bitch up the other flights. His arm clutched my shoulders, curling tightly, his body pressing against mine. He had put on a great deal of weight during the past eight years, all of it solid muscle, it seemed, and I felt my knees giving way. I stumbled, almost fell. I hadn’t had a wink of sleep. I hadn’t eaten. I feared I was going to pass out myself. I didn’t. Somehow I got him up the stairs and leaned him against the wall beside his door and opened the door with the key he dug out of his pocket.

  The two rooms were pleasant and airy, the walls a light gray with white wood trim around the doors and windows. A shabby, dark blue carpet covered most of the sitting-room floor, and chairs and sofa were upholstered in faded blue and gray striped brocade. There was a small white brick fireplace, and over the mantel, framed in gilt, hung a large and obviously expensive reproduction of An Angel in Scarlet. Although it lacked the vibrant color and glow of the original, it was quite good, dominating the room. What changes that painting had brought about in my life. Had I not been walking down the street that day, had Gainsborough not seen me as he rode past, my life would undoubtedly have taken an entirely different course. Where would I be now? What would I be doing?

  Hugh sank into one of the chairs and looked at me with dark brown eyes, heavy black locks spilling over his forehead. I felt a new weakness within as I gazed at those sharp, taut cheekbones, that full pink lower lip with its cruel curl. I remembered that mouth on mine. I remembered the feel of his arms holding me tight, drawing me nearer, remembered the warmth of his skin, the weight of his lean, bony body. He watched me. He seemed to be reading my mind.

  “I’ll fetch the doctor,” I said. “I’ll send him here.”

  He shook his head. “I don’t need a doctor poking over me. All I need is some rest.”

  “Very well,” I said. I moved to the door. “Good-bye, Hugh.”

  “I’ll see you, Angie.”

  I gave him a cold, hard look. “No,” I told him. “I don’t want to see you again. I intend to—to forget this ever happ
ened. There’s no place in my life for—for the past. It’s over, Hugh.”

  “I think not,” he said.

  I opened the door and left, moving resolutely down the stairs. The cabbie was still waiting for me and he took me home and I went upstairs and undressed and climbed into bed and, because I was so weary, I managed to sleep a few hours and then I bathed and dressed and forced myself to eat something and left early for the theater. I gave a competent performance that night. The house was only two thirds full. Megan noticed that I was distracted and asked if anything was wrong. I smiled brightly and said I was perfectly all right, I was just missing Jamie, and it was true, I was, I needed him desperately to hold me and keep me-safe from the past.

  I kept very, very busy during the days that followed. I spent a lot of time with Megan and Charles and paid several visits to Dottie, sitting in the shop with her, helping her cut and trim, savoring the security of her presence. I was not looking at all well, she informed me. There were mauve shadows on my lids and I looked too thin, seemed edgy, out of sorts. I said I would be fine when Jamie got back. Dottie shook her head, concerned. The days I could fill, but the nights were hell. Reading didn’t help. I lived in terror he would return, and when, two weeks later, he finally appeared in my dressing room after the performance, I was almost relieved. At least the suspense was over.

  “He said he was an old friend,” Peg told me. “I told him he couldn’t come in here, but he insisted. I was—” She looked nervously at Hugh, and her voice dropped to a whisper. “I was afraid to make a fuss. There’s something scary about him. Do you want me to go fetch Andy and a couple of the stagehands?”