Vice v-7

by Jane Feather

  "Lord Quentin was so kind as to say that I've made the house merrier." Juliana took a piece of bread and butter, confiding cheerfully, "I'm not accustomed to being told such things. Mostly people say I make life uncomfortable for them."

  The duke pursed his mouth consideringly. "Perhaps it amounts to the same tiling for some people."

  "How ungallant, my lord duke!"

  "I suppose some people might actually enjoy chasing all over town after you at three o'clock in the morning."

  "Oh! How could you speak of that now!" she exclaimed, her eyes flashing with indignation. "That is most unchivalrous!"

  Tarquin smiled faintly. "My dear, as you said to me so aptly once, you reap what you sow." But to Juliana's relief he turned to Quentin with a change of subject. "No word on when you must leave us?"

  "No, the archbishop seems perfectly content to keep me kicking my heels in London while he ponders my bishop's request."

  "Well, I shall be loath to see you leave," the duke said civilly. "So I hope the pondering continues for a while longer."

  Juliana soon excused herself and left the brothers to their breakfast. It seemed sensible to wait until the duke had gone about his morning's business before making her own move, so she lurked in the upstairs hallway, listening to the comings and goings in the hall below, waiting for the duke's departure.

  He left shortly before noon, having first called for his horse. Juliana ran to her bedchamber and watched from the window as he rode up the street on a powerful piebald hunter. That left only Quentin. She hurried down the stairs and asked Catlett to call her a chair

  "My lady, surely you would prefer to take His Grace's conveyance?" Cadett said disapprovingly.

  Juliana remembered that Quentin had told her the duke's own chair was at her disposal. If she used it, she would be under the protection of Tarquin's own men. She could always say she assumed that was as good as having his own escort, if he challenged her on her return.

  "Yes, thank you, Catlett," she said with a sweet smile. "I wasn't sure whether His Grace was using the chair himself."

  Somewhat mollified, Catlett bowed and sent the boot boy round to the mews for the sedan chair. The bearers brought the chair into the hall, where Catlett assisted Juliana inside; then he instructed the bearers to "Look alive, there. And be careful of ‘Er Ladyship. No jolting." Leaning into the chair, he inquired, "Where shall I tell them to take you, m'lady?"

  "Bond Street," Juliana said off the top of her head. She'd redirect the chairmen when they were outside.

  They trotted off with her up Albermarle Street, oblivious of the man standing in a doorway opposite. They didn't notice him as he set off after them, almost at a jog in his haste not to lose them, sweat breaking out profusely on his forehead with his exertion, his waistcoat straining across his belly, his habitually red face turning a mottled dark crimson.

  Juliana waited until they'd turned the corner onto Piccadilly. Then she tapped on the roof with her fan. "I've changed my mind. Carry me to Russell Street, if you please," she said haughtily.

  The chairman looked a little surprised. Covent Garden addresses were not for the likes of Lady Edgecombe. But he shouted the change to his companion carrying the rear poles, and they set off in the new direction.

  George hailed a sedan chair and fitted his ungainly bulk inside. "Follow that chair. The one with the coronet."

  The chairmen hoisted the poles onto their muscular shoulders, taking the strain of their passenger's weight with a grimace. Then they set off after the chair emblazoned with the ducal coronet, their pace considerably slower than their quarry's.

  Juliana alighted at the door of the Dennisons' house. She smoothed down her skirts and glanced up at the house that had once been her prison. First a refuge, then a prison. She could see her own third-floor window, where she'd lain in bed at night listening to the occupants of the house at work. What would have happened to her if the innkeeper hadn't sent for Elizabeth Dennison? She would never have known Tarquin. Duke of Redmayne, that was for sure. Her hand drifted to her belly. Did she even now carry his seed?

  Briskly dismissing the thought, she said to the chairmen, "You had best wait for me here."

  The lead chairman tipped his hat and adjusted the pads on his shoulders where the poles had rested. His companion ran up the steps to hammer on the knocker. Juliana followed him with the same haughty air of before, silently challenging them to question what she could be doing in such a place.

  Mr. Garston opened the door and looked for a moment completely startled. Then he bowed as he'd never bowed to Juliana Ridge. "Pray step within, m'lady."

  Juliana did so. "I've come to see Miss Lilly and the others." She tapped her closed fan in her palm and looked pointedly around the hall, as if finding its furnishings wanting in some way. To her secret delight Mr. Garston seemed a little intimidated, a little unsure of how to treat her. It was small revenge for their first meeting, and the subsequent occasions when he'd barred the door to her.

  "Would ye care to wait in the salon, m'lady?" He moved with stately step to the room she remembered so vividly, flinging open the double doors.

  The salon had been cleaned and polished, but the smell of wine and tobacco, and the girls' perfume, still lingered from the previous evening, despite the wide-open windows. It was a decadent combination of odors. Juliana wandered to the window and stared out at the scene in the street outside. Sunshine did much to mute the grimness: the one-legged child, hobbling on a crutch, thrusting his upturned cap at passersby with a whining, singsong plea for a penny; the woman asleep or unconscious in the gutter, a bottle clutched to her breast. Two gentlemen emerged from Thomas Davies's bookshop opposite, at Number 8. They had the air of learned men, with their flowing wigs and rusty black frock coats. Both carried leather-bound volumes, and they were talking earnestly. They stepped over the woman without so much as looking down and brushed past the crippled child, ignoring his pathetic pleas as he followed them down the street. Pleas that turned rapidly into curses when it became clear they were not going to put a penny in his cap.

  As the child hopped, muttering, back to his position in the shadow of the bookshop doorway, Juliana frowned in puzzlement. There was something not quite right about him. She stared, leaning out of the window into the narrow street. Then she saw it. The child's leg was bent up at the knee and fastened with twine around his thigh. He was not one-legged at all. But he must be in the most awful discomfort, she thought, compassion instantly chasing away the moment of distaste at the fraud. Presumably he had a beggars' master, who had hit upon this cheat. Perhaps he was fortunate he hadn't been mutilated permanently.

  Shuddering, she turned from the window as the door opened on a babble of excited voices.

  "How is Lucy, Juliana?" Rosamund, her pretty face grave with concern, was the first into the room. The others followed in a gay flutter of filmy wrappers and lace-edged caps. They were still in dishabille, as Juliana remembered from her own days in the house. They wouldn't dress formally until just before dinner.

  "She was sleeping when I left. But I think she's recovering quickly. Henny is looking after her." Juliana perched on the arm of a brocade sofa. "His Grace will not permit her to have visitors, because she needs to rest," she explained tactfully. "So I'll have to act as your messenger."

  Fortunately no one questioned this polite fabrication, and Lilly launched into a description of the Dennisons' reaction to Lucy's plight and the request that they consider taking her in when she was well enough to work again.

  "Mistress Dennison was pleased to say that since Lucy appeared to have His Grace's favor, then they would consider it," Emma said, sitting on the sofa and patting Juliana's arm confidingly.

  "What a difference it makes to have an influential patron." sighed Rosamund, shaking her curls vigorously.

  "Actually, I don't think it has much to do with the duke," Lilly declared acerbically. "It's just that Mistress Dennison would be delighted to thwart Mother Haddock."

/>   There was a chuckle at this; then Lilly said, "So what was this plan you had, Juliana?"

  "Ah." She opened and closed her fan restlessly. "Well, I thought that if we all banded together, we could look after each other. Protect each other so that what happened to Lucy couldn't happen again."

  "How?" asked one of the girls with a mop of dark-brown curls and a sharp chin.

  "If everyone in the various houses agreed to contribute a small sum every week from their earnings, we could have a rescue fund. We could pay debts like Lucy's . . . bail people out of debtors' prison."

  The circle of faces looked at her in dubious silence. Then someone said, "That might be all right for us . . . and for girls in some of the better houses, but for most of them, they don't earn enough to keep body and soul together after they've paid their whoremasters for the drink and the candles, and coal, and a gown, and linen. Molly Higgins told me she spent over five pounds last week because she had to have wax candles for her clients and new ribbons for her nightcap because she can't look shabby if she's to attract the right kind of customers. And the five pounds didn't include the present she had to give to madam to keep her sweet."

  "But if they didn't have to buy all those things from their masters, then they would be better off,'' Juliana pointed out.

  "But those are the terms on which they rent the places where they do business," Emma pointed out with an air of patience, as if explaining self-evident truths to an infant.

  "But if they all refused to accept those terms, and if we managed to collect enough money to lend them for those necessary supplies, then they wouldn't be dependent on the whoremasters and bawds."

  "It seems to me that you're talking of a vast deal of money," a dark girl said, nibbling a fingernail.

  "Money's the key to everything," Rosamund replied gloomily. "I don't see how we can do it, Juliana."

  "It's not money so much as solidarity," Juliana persisted. "If everyone agrees to put in what they can, you'd be surprised how it will mount up. But everyone has to take part. Everyone has to agree to stand by each other. If we do that, then we can stand up to the bawds and whoremasters."

  There was another doubtful silence, and Juliana realized she had her work cut out. These women were so accustomed to a life of exploitation and powerlessness that they couldn't grasp the idea of taking their lives back. She opened her reticule and drew out her remaining twenty-pound note.

  "I'll start the fund with this." She put the note on the table in front of her.

  "But, Juliana, why should you contribute?" Lilly asked. "You're not one of us. In fact, you never have been."

  "Oh, but I am," she said firmly. "My position is a little different, a little more secure, but I'm still in a situation I didn't choose, because I was alone and friendless and vulnerable. I was as much exploited as any one of you. And I'm as much dependent on the goodwill of a man who wouldn't call himself my whoremaster, but in essence that's exactly what he is."

  Juliana glanced involuntarily toward the window as she said this, suddenly afraid that she might see the Duke of Redmayne standing there. If he heard himself described in such terms, his reaction didn't bear thinking about. But, then, he wasn't a man to appreciate the unvarnished truth when applied to his own actions.

  "We should discuss it with the girls in the other houses," Lilly said. "If no one else wants to take part, then it won't work. We couldn't do it all ourselves."

  "No," Juliana agreed. "It must be a real sisterhood."

  "Sisterhood," mused Rosamund. "I like that word. I like what it means. Will you come with us to talk to the others, Juliana? You sound so convincing … so certain. And it was your idea."

  Juliana nodded. "But not today." She didn't explain that she thought she'd been out of the house long enough. An extended absence would inevitably come to the duke's notice, but a short airing in his own chair would probably draw no more than a sigh and a raised eyebrow in their present state of accord.

  "It would be best if we could gather everyone together," Emma said. "We should send round a message with a meeting place and a time."

  "Where should we meet?" All eyes turned to Lilly, who seemed to have the role of natural leader.

  "The Bedford Head," she said promptly. "We'll ask Mistress Mitchell if she'll lend us the back room one forenoon. She won't be busy then."

  Juliana had seen the Bedford Head during her nightmare with Lucien. It was a tavern in the center of Covent Garden-not a place she was eager to revisit. However, needs must when the devil drives, and the Garden was bound to be less wild in the morning.

  A footman entered with tea and cakes and the message that Mistress Dennison requested Lady Edgecombe's company in her parlor when she'd completed her visit with the young ladies.

  "A request, not a demand," Juliana mused with a wicked grin. "That's a novelty."

  A chorus of laughter greeted this, and the mood lost its solemnity. The conversation became as light and fizzy as champagne, with much laughter and fluttering of fans. Juliana had once wondered if their gaiety was genuine, not merely a performance to hide their real feelings, but she'd soon become convinced that it was perfectly real. They allowed little to upset them. Presumably because if they stopped too often to reflect and look around, they'd never laugh again.

  She'd never enjoyed female company before. Her friends in Hampshire had been restricted by Lady Forsett to the vicar's solemn daughters, both of whom had regarded Juliana as if she were some dangerous species of the animal kingdom, shying away from her whenever they were alone in her company. Of course, she had developed the reputation as a hoyden when she'd fallen from the great oak at the entrance to Forsett Towers and broken her arm. It had been a youthful indiscretion, but one that had blackened her among the ladies of the county. The cheerful and undemanding camaraderie of the women on Russell Street was therefore a delightful new experience.

  Outside George Ridge was engaged in idle conversation with the duke's chairmen. Initially they'd regarded the large young man, sweating in his lavishly trimmed coat of scarlet velvet, with contempt and suspicion. But it didn't take them long to figure out that he was the classic pig's ear struggling to make a silk purse of himself. Their manner became more open, although none the less slyly derisive.

  "So what kind of a house is this?" George gestured to the front door with his cane.

  " 'Ore'ouse, like as not." The chairman spat onto the cobbles and resumed picking his teeth. "An 'igh-class one, mind ye."

  "The lady didn't look like a whore," George remarked casually, feeling for his snuffbox.

  "What? Lady Edgecombe?" The second chairman guffawed. "Proper little lady she is … or so that maid of 'er's says. 'Is Grace keeps a wary eye on 'er. Told Mistress 'Enny she needed a bit o' motherin'. 'E didn't want no 'ighfalutin abigail attendin' to 'er."

  "That so?" The first chairman looked interested. "A'course, Mistress 'Enny's yer brother's mother-in-law, so I daresay she'd tell ye these things."

  "Aye," the other agreed with a complacent nod. "Tells me most everythin'. Except," he added with a frown, "what's goin' on wi' that girl what 'Er Ladyship brought to the 'ouse yesterday. Mr. Catlett said as 'ow 'Is Lordship weren't best pleased about it. But Lord Quentin, 'e told 'im 'e 'ad a duty … or summat like that." He spat again, hunching his shoulders against a momentary sharp breeze coming around the street corner. "Blessed if I can get a thing outta 'Enny, though. Mouth's tighter than a trap."

  "So what's Lady Edgecombe doing visiting a whorehouse?" George wondered aloud. Both chairmen looked at him suspiciously.

  "What's it to you?" There was a belligerence to the question, and George thought that perhaps he'd got as much out of them as he was going to.

  He shrugged. "Nothing, really. It's just that I thought I saw her in the Shakespeare's Head last even. With a group of men. Perhaps her husband . . . ?"

  Both men spat in unison. "The viscount's no 'usband fer anyone. Can't think what persuaded 'im to take that poor young thing to wife. A dog's
life, 'e'll lead 'er."

  "But 'Is Grace is keepin' an eye out," his companion reminded him. "Eh, man, the affairs of the quality is no concern of ours. Couldn't understand 'em in a million years."

  "Aye, that's a fact."

  They both fell into a ruminative silence, and George finally offered a brief farewell and walked away. The mystery was growing ever deeper. Was Juliana really married to the viscount, who'd tried to sell her last night? Or was she embroiled in some whore's masquerade? The latter seemed the most likely, since it was impossible to imagine the real Viscountess Edgecombe taking part in that business in the tavern. A man of the viscount's breeding would never expose his wife to such ghastly humiliation. Whores were paid to participate in such playacting. But if the duke's servants believed she was truly wedded to the viscount, then something very deep was afoot. The woman, Mistress Henny, an old family retainer who'd been assigned to look after Juliana, was a very convincing detail in the narrative. But why would Juliana be part of such a deception?

  Money, of course. She had left her husband's home without a penny, hadn't even taken her clothes. Somehow she'd fallen under the duke's influence, and he was requiring her to earn her keep by playing this part. He'd come to her rescue last night, so he must be deeply involved. But did he know that the strumpet he was employing was wanted for murder? Perhaps someone should tell him.

  George turned into a tavern under the Piazza and called for ale. Perhaps he should confront Juliana before exposing her to her protector. Maybe she would be so intimidated by seeing him and understanding how much power he now held over her, that she would capitulate without a murmur. So long as she wasn't legally married, then nothing stood in the way of his own possession. She hadn't appeared to recognize him last night, but she'd been in great distress then and probably unaware of anything around her. He would ensure that next time she looked him full in the face and acknowledged his power.

  George drained his tankard and called for a bottle of burgundy. He was beginning to feel that he would soon steer a path through this muddle and emerge triumphant. All he had to do now was to waylay Juliana when she was alone and with no easy exit. He would easily convince her to see which side her bread was buttered.