“You look as though you’ve been ravished,” he said, as he was in a mood to make unwelcome observations.
He had the satisfaction of seeing her eyes widen and—this was a lovely sight—color slowly spill into her fair cheeks.
She ignored him and turned her head toward the carriage window, watching sedate streets roll by.
“We’re going to need to pawn another button soon,” he pressed irritably, undaunted by her silence. Shame was wearing upon him a bit. They had one shilling. One shilling.
“Perhaps you should have asked the countess for money.”
“Oh, she never has money. She has debts that would make your eyes water. She’s quite the little gambler. Her husband takes care of all of that. The earl is unimaginably wealthy, so everyone is happy in the end, because gambling makes her happy.”
“You certainly know a good deal about her.”
“I certainly do.” He smiled.
There was a pause. She cleared her throat. “Do I really—”
“Look as though you’ve been ravished? I’m afraid so. Your hair is listing a bit.”
She frowned a little, and her hand went up to her temple as if to smooth it back. “I can’t walk up to the doctor’s door and just—”
Colin reached out and tucked the strand of hair behind her ear.
It was an impulsive, whimsical…and very wrong thing to do. Because something odd happened to time then: it slowed when his fingers touched her hair. His hand lingered as though caught in a net, seduced by, even shocked by, the cloudy-soft feel of it, by the cool silky edge of her ear.
And he knew he really ought not, but his mind was not at work here, only his senses, so he did: as he tucked her hair away, he very deliberately and delicately traced the contour of her ear.
His fingertips hovered near her earlobe for an instant.
And then his hand fell heavily back into his lap. Rather like Icarus tumbling from the sky.
Absurdly spellbound, they stared at each other.
Colin could not have guessed how long the silence lasted. The color had spread from her cheeks to her throat, and he wanted desperately to know if that soft expanse of skin across her chest was rosy, too, and whether he’d once again stood her nipples on end. He couldn’t see in the dark of the carriage.
“Better?” Her voice was husky.
“No,” he said.
She smiled a little at that, wryly, and turned her head. Seconds later he saw her swallow.
And it occurred to him distantly that now that he’d touched her, he was probably only going to continue searching for excuses to touch her, which was probably mad and foolish, and this baffled him and made him restless, and did nothing but color his mood darker.
The hackney halted before the doctor’s stately yet reassuringly ordinary home. Five steps ramped up to a solid, respectable, brass-knockered door, behind which, hopefully, they would find the doctor and answers.
The hackney heaved and squeaked as the driver took himself to the ground, and then he was at the door and pulling it open and extending a hand to Madeleine, who took it and disembarked with alacrity.
The driver peered in curiously at Colin, who had tipped the hat farther down over his face and slumped in the seat, arms crossed over his chest, legs stretched out.
“He’s ill,” Madeleine explained in hushed tones. “We’ve come to see the doctor.”
“Oh.” The driver looked worried now. “Contagious, is it, madam?”
“No. It’s more of a…” She lowered her voice even more, though there wasn’t a soul within earshot or another sound apart from wheels and hooves of a few carriages returning from Hyde Park. “…masculine problem.”
Colin sighed. Then again, she’d perhaps hit upon the one thing guaranteed not to inspire questions.
Hilarity, perhaps. But questions? No.
But when the driver met this revelation with dumbstruck—perhaps even horrified—silence, Madeleine continued. “Will you be so kind as to wait while I see if the doctor is in?”
“Of—Of course, madam.” The poor man was stuttering.
The hackney door closed and the window curtain shimmied back into place.
Colin immediately sat bolt upright and swept the curtain aside again to watch Madeleine walk briskly up the steps. He smiled a little. He wondered if Madeleine Greenway ever meandered.
“Argh!” Colin reared back in shock when the coachman’s face loomed in the window, and dropped the curtain.
The man tapped on the door.
Colin dragged his hat down over his face again, crossed his arms again, and ignored him.
“Hssst,” the coachman said, his lips to the window. “Sir.”
Colin pretended not to hear, which went against everything bred into him. The Everseas were rogues, but they had politeness the way other people had diseases.
“Guv,” the driver said a bit more loudly.
He was going to have to address this. Colin sat slowly, cautiously up, trying to make it look as though simply doing this was painful, though God only knew what conclusions the man would draw. His heart was thumping in earnest now.
Christ, he hadn’t a pistol. They really needed to remedy this.
“Yes?” He made the word gruff. An attempt at a voice disguise. But he didn’t open the coach door. If the man attempted to drive off with him, or pull him out of the hackney, Colin could lash out with one long leg and get him in the knees. Good trick, that one. He’d learned it from Marcus.
The coachman had his face pressed to the window, and his lips fogged it as he spoke. “Go see McBride in Seven Dials. ’E’s in a right scary road, but trust me, guv: ’e’ll ’ave summat fer every masculine complaint. The doctor ’ere”—the driver’s thumb jerked behind him, and Colin desperately wished he could peer behind the man to know whether Madeleine had vanished into the house—“canna do more than McBride, I can assure ye of that.”
Message delivered, the jarvey gave a little nod of encouragement and satisfaction, and clambered aboard the hackney again. It swayed as it took his weight.
And all was quiet again.
Colin closed his eyes, eased a long breath out, and pondered the exchange. God, but the past few weeks had certainly played merry hell with his pride. It was a funny old world, full of heartbreak and injustice and violence. And unexpected kindness and warmth and advice.
And delicious, dangerous attractions.
He wondered what would have happened if he’d lifted his head up to show his face to the coachman, and just in case he wasn’t recognized straight off, perhaps propped two fingers up above his head to indicate horns of the Satanic variety. Would the driver have beamed and stuttered his admiration for Mr. Colin Eversea and offered them free hackney rides all over London? Or would he have pulled out a picket pistol and dragged him off to the authorities for his reward?
He would have liked to ask the driver if he knew how much was being offered for Colin Eversea’s capture.
Funny old world.
Colin swept the coach window curtain aside again and saw Madeleine coming down the steps. She was tucking a hair behind her ear. And somehow…that very simple gesture communicated immediately to his groin, and he felt the most peculiar, sharp breathlessness.
When she reached the bottom step, she looked toward the hackney window and gave him a slight shake of her head. Colin gave a start, unwrapped his bundle of clothes and rapidly worked one of the silver buttons free from his waistcoat. He knew a bit of regret when the thread snapped.
Beautiful waistcoat, that. Expensive. Not that he’d actually paid for it yet—credit had paid for it—but nevertheless.
The driver was down from the carriage to the ground in a thrice—a heave and a squeak told Colin this—eager to help the handsome woman aboard once more. But Colin had the door open before the driver could reach her, and before she could react, he’d seized her hand, pressed the button into her gloved palm, and flung himself back against the seats.
She star
ed blankly down at it. Then comprehension dawned, she turned and said sweetly to the driver, “I fear we’re without coin. But would you be so kind as to take this? ’Tis silver.” She showed it to him.
“I’d take you to Surrey for this button,” the coachman said fervently.
“Would you?” She sounded genuinely interested.
“No, but ’tis a fine button. Where can I take you next?”
“To Edderly Hospital. We’ll wait for the doctor there.”
The sun was on its downward slide now, and the outlines of buildings were beginning to fade back against the sky. The jarvey lit the coach lamps before he set out, knowing it would be dark by the time they reached their destination.
And the dark had once signaled a time for play to begin for Colin, and play for him wouldn’t have ended until the sun rose again. Now he both welcomed and resented the dark because he felt safer in it. The entire world had once been his, everywhere in it, from dawn until midnight.
He looked across at Madeleine Greenway. Her head was nodding like a rose needing topping. And in the dark, in the narrow lanes and streets, threading through other passengers beginning their evenings out or workman returning home, it would take nearly an hour, perhaps longer, to reach the hospital in Southwark, and they would need to cross the river by way of Westminster Bridge, always a slow proposition at the best of times.
“Sleep,” he ordered Madeleine. A moment later he added, by way of a test: “And allow me to hold the pistol.”
Despite the dropping head, she still managed to bristle. “I’ll sleep when—”
“When? Where? On the streets? Who knows when you’ll find a sheltered place to sleep again? Sleep now. What good are you to either of us if you don’t sleep?”
She was unable to argue with this, both from a perspective of logic and fatigue.
“Close your eyes, Mrs. Greenway. And what harm could I possibly do with a pistol? I’m really more of a knife sort, if you believe the broadsheets, which have heretofore been your source of information about me.”
She looked back at him, her dark eyes glowing like some wild creature’s in the semidark of the carriage. He met her gaze evenly.
And then she reached into her pocket and handed the pistol thing across to him.
“It was my husband’s,” she said.
And with that stunning little non sequitur of a revelation, she lay back against the seat, tipped her head against the window, and apparently fell asleep, judging from the hair fluttering up and down near her mouth with her even breathing.
And he held the pistol that had been her husband’s.
Colin’s thumb worked over the inlay. Handsome, if not the most demure of designs. Now that he was able to look at it closely, he saw it was a mermaid, nude from the waist up, with hair that waved like seaweed down to her waist.
So Madeleine Greenway had married a man who had mermaids on his pistol. He thought this perhaps showed her husband had a sense or humor, and for a disorienting instant, he thought he had a sense for the man. The sort you would have enjoyed having a drink or playing the odd game of cricket with. She spoke like a lady; she might have been a merchant’s or wealthy farmer’s daughter, someone who had been educated and had married reasonably well.
Why now the secrecy?
He wished he could plunder her mind for secrets while she slept. Was she a thief for hire? An assassin? Or simply a “planner,” as she said? Orchestrating his rescue had indeed been a breathtaking feat, worthy of admiration—and hanging, if she’d been caught. It wasn’t as though they were merciful to Guy Fawkes when they caught him messing about with explosives.
But though her work had thwarted the justice handed down to him by English courts, it hadn’t been treason. This woman, through ingenuity and unimaginable daring, had managed to right a grave injustice. She’d been hired to do it.
Then again, she hadn’t particularly cared about his innocence. She’d cared about her fee.
They crossed the Westminster bridge—picked their way over it, actually, quite slowly—which had been lit entirely by gaslight a few years earlier. He parted the curtains a few inches; each tall lamp seemed to have collected its own shimmering nimbus of dust and smoke, the remains of a still summer day, and threw blurs of light down onto the incomparable-smelling river.
They could use a good rainfall. Pity Mrs. Greenway wasn’t awake to discuss the weather.
The coach, like every hackney, stank in a multitude of ways, but in all likelihood so did he, Colin thought morosely. In another day, he would have acquired enough beard and grime to be unrecognizable to even his blood relations. He could prop himself against the wall next to his friend in St. Giles and live out his days in anonymity.
Not enjoying the run of his thoughts, he decided to test a theory, and to be a devil. He leaned forward very, very slowly, stretched out his hand to touch Mrs. Greenway’s knee.
Her hand snapped out and caught him by the wrist before her eyes even fully opened.
When her eyes did open, she seemed almost surprised to find herself holding a wrist.
He smiled. “Good trick.”
“What were you about, Mr. Eversea?” The heaviness in her voice told him she wasn’t fully awake. He doubted, however, she’d ever been fully asleep. The acerbic tone was already in evidence.
“I wanted to hold your hand in the dark, Mrs. Greenway. I thought it might be romantic.”
She dropped his wrist as though it were a dead rodent.
He laughed.
“What were you doing?” she demanded again.
“I didn’t believe you were sleeping, and I decided to test my theory.”
“I was sleeping,” she insisted primly. She cleared her throat a little, gave her head a little experimental turn to loosen the stiffness.
He was quiet for a moment, watching her profile. Gaslight caught her; her face was half aglow.
And suddenly he was quietly, unaccountably angry.
“I’m not a whimsical killer, Mrs. Greenway. Apparently I need to be full of ale and temper and confronted with a Redmond in order to murder. You’re quite safe with me. You can sleep.”
She shook her head and made an impatient sound. “Please don’t jest about…that.”
What was he supposed to do about that? “I didn’t kill Roland Tarbell,” he said stubbornly. Quietly.
She studied him. “I allowed you to hold my pistol.” Her tone was softly wry. Placating.
Well. He exhaled. It wasn’t precisely a gushing confession of trust. But it was something.
“I slept in front of you,” he countered.
“Like a felled tree,” she confirmed with some relish. “Are you actually hurt, Mr. Eversea, that I wasn’t sound asleep?”
“No,” he lied. Well, more accurately, he was more irritated than hurt.
They were quiet together again, and Colin valiantly struggled not to succumb to the gloom of his own thoughts and the peevish turn of his temper. He wanted someone—anyone—to trust him again. Someone besides Harry the footman.
And then, at last, the lights of the bridge were behind them.
“I seldom sleep very well,” she offered so softly she might have been talking to herself.
He paused, surprised. “Ah.”
He would have preferred fervent declaration of belief in his innocence. But with that one sentence, Mrs. Greenway had given him a glimpse into her nights, and into herself, and that door into her was just a little more ajar now. In truth, he wasn’t entirely certain he wanted that door all the way open, because God only knew what he’d find behind it, and the reason for her troubled sleep.
At least he knew she was not without a conscience.
And apparently he would not entirely win her trust before she entirely won his.
“Here’s your stick.” He handed the pistol back to her.
She hesitated before she took it. And then her smile was a quick and bright curve in the dark, and she did take it.
“Thank you
for minding it.”
He touched the brim of his hat wryly.
Moments later they turned into St. Thomas Street, and then the handsome iron gates that enclosed the courtyard of Edderly Hospital were before them.
Colin had never visited the hospital, but he’d known people to go in and come out more or less cured, and many others to go in and never return, and such were the ways of medicine.
He kept his coat on, as it was dark and so was the night and blending was desirable, but he kept his collar up and pulled his hat down before he stepped down out of the carriage after Madeleine.
The jarvey had already helped her out.
The hackney driver offered up a few shillings by way of change for the button along with a kind, grave farewell: “Good luck wi’…everything…guv.”
Colin was puzzled about the careful treatment given the word “everything” until he recalled he was supposed to have a masculine problem. The poor jarvey probably thought he was overreacting to the issue just a bit, given that they were now standing before an actual hospital.
Then again, if one kept company with a woman who looked like Madeleine Greenway, correcting masculine problems might indeed seem urgent.
“Thank you, sir,” Colin repeated just as gravely. Still not meeting the man’s eyes.
And then the driver took another passenger who never looked once at Madeleine or Colin, and the two of them prepared themselves for their wait for the doctor.
“You will recognize him if you see him, even in the dark? Dr. August?” Colin murmured to Madeleine.
“Tall, handsome, well-dressed, gold-topped walking stick, if I know him; air of absorbed self-importance, a small unfashionable beard,” she recited quietly.
“How handsome?” he wanted to know. “Harry the footman handsome? Or Colin Eversea handsome?”
“No one is Colin Eversea handsome,” she said absently. “Not even Colin Eversea.”
He suppressed a delighted grin. “And the small unfashionable beard. Like mine?” Colin stroked his chin.
The Perils of Pleasure Page 15