Miss Tolerance tilted her head. “Your behalf, sir? Which inquiry is that?”
“The matter of the Italian fan you are reclaiming for me.”
“If I were undertaking such a thing, sir,” Miss Tolerance said carefully, “I regret that it would not be on your behalf.”
The gentleman nodded. “Your discretion is everything I would wish it, Miss Tolerance, but I assure you: you undertook to act for Lord Trux, who was acting as my agent.”
“If that is the case, then this will be the first time someone has come to me with a job to undertake for a friend where such a friend actually existed! I hope you will not take it amiss, my lord, if I ask if you have any proof that you, and not Lord Trux, are the person with whom I should discuss this matter?”
“I can show you this.” Versellion handed her a slip of paper. “And for the rest, I will tell you some things which Trux, I believe, has not. I believe the information will make more sense of your task, and that must be my best proof of who I am.”
Miss Tolerance opened the paper, apparently written to Versellion by Trux: it contained the details of the inquiry Miss Tolerance had related to Trux the evening before. She returned it to Versellion.
“The matter of the fan may be one of some delicacy, and arose at a point when Lord Trux was pressing for a way to be of service to me. Lord Trux,” Versellion said dryly, “wishes very much to be of assistance to me.”
“How very agreeable that must be,” Miss Tolerance said in the same tone.
Versellion laughed. He had a very flattering manner, Miss Tolerance thought, unsettled. One who fell under his gaze might feel as though she were the only person in the world. “Trux has his uses,” he was saying now. “But to the subject of the fan, Miss Tolerance, it is a matter—”
“Of some delicacy,” Miss Tolerance finished. What could there be about this fan that the Earl of Versellion would set such an inquiry in motion? He was head of one of the most politically inclined Whig families, the target of matrimonial gambits by mothers and marriageable daughters, a man of power and wealth, singularly blessed by fortune. Even if an ancient courtesan chose to publish memoirs which named him as one of her lovers—but that was not the case, or did not fit the facts she knew—what damage could seriously be done him?
“Whatever delicacy you require, my lord, the inquiry will go more smoothly if you are candid with me.”
Versellion frowned. “I have every intention—”
Miss Tolerance shook her head. “You, or rather Lord Trux, have given a story which is false upon its face. I shall be hard-pressed to help you unless you deal straight with me. I was told that the fan was given to Mrs. Cunning by her lover, and it was strongly implied that you were that lover.”
“And?”
“Whatever habits of secrecy politics has bred in you, sir, I hope you will abandon them with me. I may have left my schoolroom under unorthodox circumstances, but I learnt to add. Everything I have learned suggests that Mrs. Cunning retired from her profession almost twenty years ago, and nowhere has it been suggested to me that her last lover was a boy of—you would have been, what? thirteen? fifteen? If you were not the last of her lovers, that would make you younger still at the time. Whatever her morals, I cannot quite believe that Mrs. Cunning would have taken a nine- or ten-year-old boy into her bed. May I presume that it was not you, but your father who had the honor to be Mrs. Cunning’s lover?”
For a moment she believed the earl would dissemble; then he laughed. “My God, Miss Tolerance, you must forgive me. Trux suggested the story, but I should have realized from your reputation that it was ill-considered. You are right, of course.”
“If you do not deal straight with me, sir, it will only take me longer to decipher the truth. Had I not been able to find several persons who remembered Mrs. Cunning, I might have been looking for a woman far younger and in different circumstances.”
Versellion downed the remainder of his whiskey in a quick toss and stood up, pacing rapidly across the room. “I see that now. But I collect you have found Mrs. Cunning?”
“I have a good idea where I might find her, sir, but I cannot be certain until I have interviewed her. I can tell you that from what I understand, the lady is poor and lives upon the proceeds of her needle.”
Versellion looked bewildered. “Her needle?”
“She does piecework embroidery. She may, as well, have an annuity, or she might have sold off her jewelry—”
“Has she sold the fan?”
Miss Tolerance shook her head. “I cannot know that until I speak with her, sir. And I remind you that at this point, all I have is a woman I believe to be Mrs. Cunning. I will know more tomorrow. But my lord, you brought me here with a promise of information which would assist me in your commission. Did you merely intend to identify yourself as my client, or was there some other matter you wished to share with me?”
Versellion turned his glass between his fingers, seeming to examine the amber crawl of whiskey as it splashed along the side of the glass and dripped downward. At last he smiled slightly and looked up at Miss Tolerance.
“You must forgive me. Sometimes I am too much a politician. We are not a breed known for its candor, and I cannot help but weigh what I tell you—”
“My lord, if you do not feel secure in my discretion—” Miss Tolerance started.
He waved the protest aside. “I was told that I could place complete reliance in you,” he said “But I cannot help but weigh what you would need to know to accomplish my commission against—”
“What you would prefer not become a public matter?” Miss Tolerance finished for him. She was becoming impatient, and thought her impatience might have a salutary effect upon the discussion. “My lord, as you have seen, I will reason my way around the problem. But you will make it easier for me—and less costly for you—if you are candid. I have questions to ask.”
Versellion nodded and fixed her with that potent gaze. “Perhaps that is where we should start, Miss Tolerance. With your questions.”
Nettled, Miss Tolerance returned his look evenly. “In that case, my lord, I wonder why retrieving this fan is of such importance to you?”
Versellion frowned. “The sentimental meaning of—”
Miss Tolerance shook her head emphatically. “Politics being such a sentimental business? That will not do, my lord. If the fan was given to Mrs. Cunning by your father, it has been in her hands for most of your life. Why is its retrieval suddenly so important?”
“My father’s reputation—” Versellion began again.
“Stop, please.” Her tone would have done credit to a nursery maid. “You have done me the honor of saying I am astute and it is no good to lie to me, but then you continue to tell tales. Your family is wealthy, you are a member of the House of Lords and a fixture in your party. What kind of warmed-over trouble could your father’s liaison with an unimportant fille de joi cause you now?”
“I don’t know.” From his tone it was clear that Versellion’s patience, no less than her own, was being tried. More quietly, he went on. “Miss Tolerance, you are right in that I do not believe Mrs. Cunning or her liaison with my father to be important. It is the fan itself which I must reclaim. I had rather not say why unless you particularly require it.”
Miss Tolerance shrugged. “My lord, I have no personal curiosity about the fan. My only concern is to accomplish the assignment with which you have honored me, However, I must point out that if the reason you wish to recover the fan is material to its discovery, you will only render my task more difficult and more costly.” She rose, went to the table which held the decanters, and poured a little more into her glass, waiting for his reaction. She was not unaware that she had taken a great risk; one does not lightly upbraid the wealthy and powerful, and despite his charm and apparent affability, she doubted Versellion liked her polite unwillingness to accept false coin for the truth.
She became aware of the ticking of an ormolu clock upon the mantel, and the distu
rbance of the curtains by an evening breeze. At last Versellion spoke again.
“I owe you an apology, Miss Tolerance. Telling politic half-truths is a difficult habit to break, as you see. I should not be surprised at your acuity; everything I have heard of you should have prepared me for it.”
“I am acute enough, sir, to realize that that is the second—no, it is the third time you have referred to what you have heard of me. Are you trying to intimidate me with the wealth of your intelligence about me? I assure you, if you have a question, you have only to ask.”
Versellion smiled pleasantly. “I know only what I have been told, Miss Tolerance. You are the daughter of Sir William Brereton, you were raped by your brother’s tutor and turned from the door of your father’s home, and you live in a brothel run by Mrs. Dorothea Brereton, one of the few … professional … women of her generation with whom it seems my father did not have a liaison. I would be curious to know how you hit upon your unorthodox profession, Miss Tolerance.”
He had rattled off his account of her life coolly, apparently without malice, but Miss Tolerance suspected there was in it an attempt to regain the upper hand. She laughed lightly.
“What a Covent Garden melodrama you’ve been fed, my lord!” It cost her something to be so blithe, but her expression was one of genteel amusement.
“Were my informants wrong?” Versellion frowned. “A politician lives by information.”
“As does an agent of inquiry, sir; the exact point I was trying to make earlier.” Miss Tolerance drained the last of the whiskey from her glass and set it down firmly upon the table. She took her seat again. Her tone was as cool as his own; she had no intention of letting her past be used as a lever against her. “Your information is what the world might believe, but you should always look closer than that.”
“What would I find upon closer examination?” Versellion asked. He seemed genuinely curious, as if she had at last won him from his careful political manner.
“I was not raped, nor was my seducer my brother’s tutor. He was a fencing master, with whom I fled to the continent and lived quite happily for some years. If you seek the origin of my unorthodox profession, my lord, you must find it there.”
“With your seducer?”
“With what I learned from him. When I saw the things he could do with a sword, I wanted to learn. And he taught me.”
“Too well, by the sound of it,” Versellion said.
“In my line of work, one cannot be too well trained in the uses of the smallsword.” Miss Tolerance shook her head as if to clear it. “Sir, if you are satisfied as to my pedigree, I have one more question. You wish the return of the fan for its own sake, correct? If it has so valuable a character, is there any likelihood that someone else is pursuing it as well?”
He shook his head. “I cannot imagine it, Miss Tolerance.” His expression indicated that he could imagine it, but rather hoped not.
Miss Tolerance smiled. “Then, my lord, if you have no more information to share with me, perhaps I may be returned to London?”
Versellion rose. “But you have not answered my question, Miss Tolerance.”
Miss Tolerance tilted her head to one side. “Have I not, sir? Please remind me: what was the question?”
“How you came to do the work you do.”
Again, she smiled. “What else was I to do, sir? Acting as an agent of inquiry seemed to draw upon the skills I had. I was an inquiring child and have grown into an inquiring woman—with a facility for swordplay and a familiarity with Society. Now, sir, I have my notes to write up and some other work to do. If I may ask to be excused?”
Versellion nodded. “I will have the carriage brought round immediately—unless I can persuade you to take your supper with me?” Miss Tolerance shook her head. “Very well. I thank you for making the journey to see me, Miss Tolerance. It has been unexpectedly pleasant. I shall be in Town for the next week or so if you have need to reach me.”
During the ride back to Manchester Square, Miss Tolerance amused herself by considering what she thought of Edward Folle, Earl of Versellion. He was attractive, certainly. Among tonnish mothers looking to marry their daughters well, he was likely the great catch of the season: wealthy, highborn, good-looking, and with good address. His lack of candor did not weigh overmuch with her; if there was anything that her profession had taught her, it was that everyone had secrets to keep. So long as Versellion’s secrets did not keep her from doing her job, Miss Tolerance could control her curiosity. Still, as she had told the earl, she was of an inquiring disposition.
The whiskey had left her pleasantly relaxed. She closed her eyes and fell into a doze which was not interrupted until the brougham moved into the more heavily trafficked streets of London itself. The carriage drew up in Manchester Square and the footman was immediately at the door, ready to hand her out and escort her into Mrs. Brereton’s. Miss Tolerance, loath to deal with the noise and bustle of the brothel, waved away his arm, thanked him, and pressed a coin into his gloved hand with instructions that he and the driver should drink her health with it. Then she turned away from the door of her aunt’s establishment toward the private gate on Spanish Place.
It was a clear night, and the sound of music which emanated from Mrs. Brereton’s house was agreeably subdued. Lights from the Square spilled irregularly onto Spanish Place; it was shadowy but not completely dark. She was thus able to make out the forms of two men waiting by the private gate in the garden wall. The gate was difficult to find in the dark; they could only have been stationed there to wait for her by someone who knew there was a gate there to find. Miss Tolerance drew her sword without haste, held it low, and continued forward.
The first of the men moved toward her; in his hand she saw a glint of steel. Any hope that these were friendly visitors was banished.
“You’ll be Miss Tolerance?” he asked. He must have been forewarned, as the sight of a woman in breeches did not confuse him. Miss Tolerance’s first thought was that Sir Randal Pre must have hired the men to pay her in kind for his humiliation the other night. “You’re to come with me,” the man said.
She shook her head. “I’m afraid that will not be possible, sir. The hour is late and I am very tired. Excuse me.” She took another step.
The man raised his sword and pointed it at her midsection as he might have a pistol. Not a swordsman, she thought. He expects the mere sight of the sword will reduce me to tears. Tired as she was, Miss Tolerance had no patience now for bullying at swordpoint. Perhaps she could chase them off.
She raised her own sword, stepped in to engage his, corkscrewed the point in, and swept her hilt upward, neatly knocking his sword into the air. She caught it in her left hand and tossed it over the wall into her aunt’s garden.
“Christ!” the man growled. “Jack! Take the bitch—but be quiet, and don’t kill her. That’s orders.” He waved his accomplice forward.
Miss Tolerance stepped fast, kicking hard at the first man’s groin, and watched him drop. “Pardon,” she breathed as she turned to meet the second man.
The accomplice gave a cry of outrage and moved in, sword drawn. This one had obviously trained with the smallsword. For a minute or so Miss Tolerance was busily engaged, and the sweet chime of sword against sword rang out in the street, not loud enough to bring people from the Square or from the houses with a face on Spanish Place. There would be no rescue, so it was time to bring the encounter to a close.
The man thrust to her shoulder; she beat his point away and returned the thrust, pinking his left arm. Her tip almost became fouled in the sleeve of his coat, but she pulled back, retreated a step, watching to see if the wound would make him stop. He followed after her, angry enough to thrust for her heart and be damned to his orders to keep her alive.
“Your teacher surely told you to keep your point up!” She parried the thrust. “If you don’t”—she slipped her hilt along the length of his blade, driving his arm up, sword still clutched in his hand—“you will find
your blade is very easily captured!”
She dropped her hand and drove the hilt of her sword down just above the man’s temple. A nasty blow; he would have hell’s own headache in the morning. He staggered back, tripped over the body of his partner, who still lay moaning on the cobblestones, and fell hard.
Miss Tolerance took up the second man’s sword, pitched it across the street and into the shrubs that guarded the house there; in the dark, it would take some time to find them. She turned back again and stood over her attackers, thinking what to do next. She did not particularly want to turn the miscreants over to the inquiries of the Watch, and certainly she had no desire to kill them.
The problem was solved, for the moment at least, by the appearance of a closed coach which turned the corner onto Spanish Place and bore down on Miss Tolerance and the two men. She sheathed her weapon and watched as the two men staggered to their feet and across the street out of the path of the carriage.
“You may tell whoever gave you your orders that I respond much more helpfully to a civil request,” she called. “Good evening.”
She did not turn away, however, but stood with her back against the ivied wall of her aunt’s property, watching as her attackers limped up the street to Manchester Square. It occurred to her to follow them to the corner and enter at Mrs. Brereton’s brightly lit and well-attended front door, where any second attempt by these footpads (or any others) would be easily repulsed. But a tug at the gate suggested that the garden was still secure, and thus her little cottage would be as well. And with a good deal to consider, Miss Tolerance found herself loath to be caught up in the society of the brothel tonight.
After another glance around her, she unlocked the gate, entered, locked it again, and stood listening. She thought she heard, over the festive noise issuing from her aunt’s parlors, a shouted inquiry to her attackers. Was it the Watch, wondering what these two were doing in the Square at this hour, or their employer asking after their success? She was gambling that the two men would not want to tell anyone in authority what they had been about, or that they had been beaten by a woman with a sword. When the shouting ceased, Miss Tolerance turned toward her little house.
Point of Honour (Sarah Tolerance) Page 8