Miranda Neville

by The Ruin of a Rogue

  “I’m confident of my ability to keep you safe,” Lithgow said, once the maid had turned into Sackville Street, “but I would hate to expose you to gossip. My reputation is not of the best,” he continued with a wry twist of the lips, “and Caro would have my head if I hurt her dearest Annabella. Perhaps I should take you home at once.”

  “No,” she said. “I will be safe with any friend of Caro’s. I want that book.”

  The streets grew narrower and dirtier, the houses shabbier, and the passers-by poorer. As she picked her way gingerly through piles of rubbish, she reflected that Maldon was going to have something to say about the state of her shoes. Frogsham’s turned out to be a small shop on a road little wider than an alley. When she entered with some trepidation, the first thing that struck her, once her eyes grew accustomed to the gloom, was an enormous stuffed owl, perched high and regarding the shambles below like an unblinking tutelary god over a bewildering mélange. Pictures, tapestries, statues, and Lord knew what else lay higgledy-piggledy on shelves, hanging from the walls, and heaped on the floor.

  “Is this really a bookshop?” she whispered.

  “Frogsham sells books and so much else,” Lithgow replied.

  The proprietor, a wizened little fellow wearing a tasseled velvet hat like a nightcap, greeted him by name in an odd accent. Anne could scarcely understand him, but the essence of his inquiry seemed to be “Are you looking for something in particular, or just looking around today?”

  “I thought you might have a book on Bath by Richard Warner,” Lithgow said.

  “Third shelf down.” Frogsham pointed into a corner. Behind the tall figure of a turbaned Moor, Anne perceived a small, neatly arranged collection of books.

  Her eyes flew to Lithgow and he nodded his encouragement. Edging round the lowering Othello, she peered at the row of books and found not only the desired volume neatly bound in calf, but an intriguing quarto on the antiquities of Northamptonshire that must surely be worth a look. Alas, the author apparently believed antiquity to begin with the reign of Elizabeth. Finding nothing else she had to have among the books, she turned her gaze on the confused miscellany around her.

  “Do you have anything Roman?” she asked the shopkeeper.

  “There’s a basket of heads over there.”

  Despite this alarming statement, she discovered nothing but a group of decapitated miniatures—men, women, and children in marble or terra-cotta, sporting the unmistakable hairstyles of the classical past.

  “What do you think of these? Are they Roman or Greek?”

  Lithgow studied them gravely. “Roman in style, but whether they are ancient I couldn’t say. I’ve seen forgeries by the thousand in Italy, produced for the tourists.”

  “I shall take the risk and buy one.” She decided she liked this shop, an adventure compared to the modish emporia of Bond Street. She selected a pretty child, not sure if it was a boy or a girl, and a rather handsome young man. Then her eye caught an item in weathered bronze on the next shelf. “I think it must be a pendant,” she said, “judging by the loop at the top, but I can’t imagine what it signifies.” The curved cylindrical column had a slight bulge at the bottom and matching spheres on either side at the top.

  “I have no idea.” Lithgow smiled. “Roman jewelry can be very odd.”

  “It’s rather ugly so I won’t take it. But I will buy the book and the two heads.”

  “Let me handle Frogsham,” he said softly.

  In Anne’s experience a price was a price. If she decided she wanted something, she paid whatever was asked. Lithgow and Frogsham, however, commenced an extended bargaining session over what was, in the end, quite a small amount.

  “Oh dear,” she whispered at the conclusion of the negotiation. “I don’t have any money with me.”

  Marcus had foreseen this. He’d escorted rich women all over Europe and found one thing they had in common, regardless of nationality: They never carried ready cash.

  “Usually when I go shopping the merchant sends me the account,” she continued, “but I’ve never been in a shop quite like this.”

  “Frogsham is not a man to issue credit, but allow me to take care of this trifling sum.”

  “I shall repay you, of course.”

  “No need.”

  “I insist.”

  Marcus never expected to see those few shillings again. Wealthy ladies tended to forget insignificant debts and he had no intention of dunning her. The excursion had been a success. Frogsham, the rogue, had happily overcharged him for the Warner that Marcus had himself placed on the shelf the day before. But he’d beaten the man down on the heads, one of which probably was Roman. Thank God Miss Brotherton had decided against the pendant. She might not recognize a phallus, but he didn’t count on the same innocence from Lady Windermere.

  With a wrinkle of her aristocratic nose, she accepted the package crudely wrapped in newspaper. Miss Brotherton had no notion of life outside the rarefied confines of Mayfair though she had, he fancied, quite enjoyed the exposure to Frogsham’s specialized pawnshop.

  He let her precede him into the narrow lane and guided her to the broader thoroughfare of Warwick Street. A gentleman should always walk on the traffic side, to protect his lady from the dirt cast up by passing vehicles, but she got ahead of him, just in time for the appearance of a coalman’s dray careering at excessive speed. The cart hit a bump and lurched onto the pavement for foot travelers, within feet of the oblivious heiress. Marcus threw his arms around her and dragged her to safety. “Take care,” he yelled at the disappearing tradesman.

  She trembled in his arms. “That man nearly hit me,” she said. “I could have been killed.”

  “I trust it wouldn’t have come to that.” He held her closer, discovering a slender waist under the sensible cloth of her winter redingote. Very nice. He stroked her back to soothe her, barely resisting the temptation to explore the curves of her hips and behind.

  “Thank you for saving me.”

  The driver of the cart, hired in advance and alerted by Frogsham’s errand boy, had performed his task with impeccable timing. She clung to him and he made no effort to relinquish her. One object of the charade had been to get this skittish virgin accustomed to his touch.

  Yet along with satisfaction at the success of the ruse came the thought that if he should, by a miracle, succeed in winning Miss Brotherton’s hand, it wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world. He didn’t want to let her go. Along with the promised half crown, that coal hauler was going to win a rebuke for doing his job too well. Any closer and Marcus would have been too late. Anne Brotherton could have been badly hurt, and the notion annoyed him far beyond the threat to his plans.

  Silky hair, revealed by a bonnet knocked askew, tickled his face, and a clean lemon scent filled his nostrils. Virtue and innocence were qualities he rarely encountered, and he had the absurd urge to protect them. To protect her. Absurd because he himself posed the greatest threat. He strengthened his embrace.

  She was the one to break away. “My parcel!” she cried. It lay in a pool in the gutter.

  With considerable damage to his boots, Marcus waded into the muddy swill and retrieved the sodden package.

  “I don’t think you want to carry this,” he said. “My gloves are already ruined so save yours.” Gingerly he lowered his nose. “And it smells. We’d better return to Frogsham and have it repacked.”

  “My book!” she wailed. “It will be all wet.”

  “Don’t despair. It’ll dry off and be readable, if not beautiful.”

  “I hope so. I am so eager to read it so we can talk about our impressions.”

  His poise restored after the ridiculous attack of sentiment, he smiled winningly. He trusted that when she struggled through Mr. Warner’s dry prose she’d think of Marcus sacrificing his boots so she could enjoy it.

  Chapter 4

  Lord Algernon Tiverton took his punctilious leave from Lady Windermere’s drawing room, allowing Anne and Cynthia to suc
cumb to the giggles they’d repressed during an endless fifteen-minute morning call. The younger son of a marquess, he’d been introduced to Anne by his aunt Lady Ashfield.

  “He can barely restrain his passion,” Cynthia cried dramatically.

  “Hah! His only passion is for his own ancestry. Like every other man in London he looks at me and sees gold, and not interesting Roman gold artifacts. Just piles of dull modern guineas.”

  “The man’s a fool if he fails to see what you are really like.”

  Anne looked affectionately at her loyal—and deluded—friend. Cynthia was a pretty woman with delicate features in a heart-shaped face. Fair hair fell in a cascade of curls from a deceptively casual knot. Without extraordinary elegance, she made the most of her small, rounded figure. Even in a morning dress of light worsted over an impeccable pleated chemisette and ruffled collar, Anne judged her alluring. Her own appearance was much less satisfactory. Clad in a heavy gray twill, designed for winter in the freezing corridors of Camber, she looked dowdy. There was nothing she could do about an angular body and a small bosom, but a skilled dressmaker could work wonders.

  “Do you want to go shopping?” she said.

  “If you mean Hatchard’s,” Cynthia said warily, “I’ll let you go alone and visit the furniture warehouse instead.” Cynthia spent an inordinate amount of time and money on both furnishings and her wardrobe.

  “I need a new gown or two, for the winter.”

  “My dearest Anne! What has brought about this miraculous reversal of habit? No, don’t tell me. I can guess. You have fallen in love with Lord Algernon! Fear not. Clinging skirts and a revealing bodice will penetrate his aloofness and he will sweep you into his arms and carry you off to whatever country fastness he occupies to live happily ever after.”

  “A garment such as you describe would more likely send him scurrying out of town, alone.”

  “An excellent result, but I don’t think that’s the real reason for your unprecedented interest in fashion.” Cynthia gave her a hard look. Further interrogation was forestalled by the appearance of servants delivering the post.

  Anne tore open a missive from the Duchess of Castleton. Cynthia, evincing little interest in her own correspondence, fiddled with the arrangement of white hothouse roses that filled a large Meissen vase on the mantelpiece. “What do you think, Anne? Do they look better this way?”

  Anne glanced over the top of the letter. “Yes.”

  “Or maybe with less of the maidenhair. I’m not sure I like it.”

  “Definitely.”

  “You aren’t paying attention.”

  “White roses are always pretty and I detest maidenhair. Why did you buy it?”

  “Denford sent them. To celebrate becoming my next-door neighbor. He takes up residence at Fortescue House today.”

  Lady Windermere’s air of disinterest was unconvincing. Anne couldn’t ignore the opening, despite an innate reluctance to interfere in the affairs of others.

  “Caro isn’t pleased to hear that the duke is back in London and paying you marked attentions.”

  “Pish. Caro always worries about me and Denford.”

  “Listen to what she writes. I do not trust Julian’s motives in pursuing Cynthia and I fear for her tender heart. She is less worldly than she likes to appear.”

  “I know what I’m doing.” Cynthia finished removing the despised fern and stepped back to regard the flowers with a satisfied smile. “Denford and my husband are at odds. I don’t know why and I don’t greatly care.”

  “Although Lord Windermere is abroad, he may still hear gossip.”

  “I hope so,” Cynthia replied with a brittle laugh. “I know quite well that Denford is using me as part of a scheme to embarrass Windermere and I intend to use him for the same reason.”

  “I wish you would be careful.” What more could she say? Cynthia was both her hostess and her senior. It wasn’t Anne’s place to read her a lecture.

  “I think the pot calls the kettle black, Miss Annabella. Admit that you have a tendre for the wicked Lord Lithgow. I knew it as soon as you mentioned new gowns.”

  Anne made a play of shuffling the pages of the letter. “I don’t think so. I find him agreeable company. Very easy to talk to. And he is a man of substance too.”

  “You find any man substantial who will talk about Roman ruins.”

  Anne smiled at Cynthia’s teasing and as usual said less than she felt. There was something about Lithgow’s company that added a pleasant frisson of danger. When she tried to analyze it she could only suppose it was due to his somewhat unsavory background. Yet even when he’d embraced her to save her from the runaway cart she hadn’t felt he was taking advantage. She felt safe in his presence, safe from the pressure of courtship. He never lavished her with the overblown praise that she loathed in her suitors. Aside from that one time when, ridiculously, he’d called her elegant, he was friendly and sincere. Perhaps he meant it. Perhaps he did find her elegant.

  If so, he’d find her even more so if she were more fashionably dressed.

  “What else does Caro have to say?”

  Anne turned over the page. “She wants us both to come to Castleton for Christmas.”

  “We could do that, I suppose.” Anne feared Cynthia’s lack of enthusiasm stemmed from the fact that Denford was unlikely to be invited.

  “She writes a lot about Castleton’s twin sisters.”

  “I know she’s happy to have sisters. I’ve always wished I had them myself.”

  “She is like a sister to me.” Though they hadn’t spent much time together, she and Caro had always been each other’s dearest friends. While she shouldn’t resent her cousin’s happiness, she felt a certain abandonment. The prospect of achieving a warm family life with a suitor of her guardian’s choosing seemed remote. A sliver of jealousy, selfish and irrational, chilled her heart. Ashamed, she shook her head, returned to the letter, and gasped.

  “What?”

  “Speaking of Lord Lithgow, listen to what Caro writes. While I am on the subject of my old friends—underlined for emphasis—I want to counsel you to beware if you come across Marcus Lithgow. I cannot tell you what happened between us without breaking Thomas’s confidence and revealing secrets about his family, but I am quite disillusioned with him. Marcus has behaved very badly to me and Castleton, who dislikes him very much. Do not trust a word he says. Underlined again. I wish I could tell you everything but it is not my secret.”

  “Goodness! How very dramatic!”

  “Caro has always enjoyed a drama,” Anne said, a little sourly.

  “What can he have done?”

  “No doubt he did something to annoy Castleton, which wouldn’t be difficult. Since they left London every letter is ‘Thomas did this,’ ‘Thomas says that.’ Evidently he’s managed to turn her against her old friends.”

  “You must be right,” Cynthia said. “I still don’t understand how Caro can be happy with Lord Stuffy. They are so different.” This was an old and oft-repeated conversation. Neither of them quite fathomed their lively friend’s attachment to the poker-backed duke. And they both missed her.

  “Another thing. Lithgow hasn’t made the least effort to charm me. I’ve had what feels like every man in London making up to me and he doesn’t behave like any of them.”

  “Still,” Cynthia said, “there must be something there to make her write like that.”

  It was ironic, Anne thought, that Cynthia gave any credence at all to the warning against Lithgow when she refused to listen to Caro’s admonitions about Denford. “It’s unlike Caro to be cryptic. How can I find out? Could you ask Denford? Since you are so close.”

  “Or you could ask Lithgow.”

  With mixed feelings Marcus discovered that the Duke of Denford had moved in next door to Windermere House. Julian disclaimed any interest in the Brotherton heiress. He’d spent several months making up to the wife of his former best friend, Windermere, for some unexplained and doubtless nefarious reason.
But Julian was quite capable of playing more than one game at the same time, and it seemed logical that a man who found himself with a title, a couple of huge mansions, and very little ready money would solve his problem by courting the heiress next door. A friendship of more than ten years had taught Marcus that trying to outfox Julian was fruitless. One reason he never played cards with him.

  When he called at Windermere House a couple of days after their Soho adventure—never appear too eager was one of his hard rules of seduction—Julian was cozily ensconced in the drawing room, amusing both ladies greatly. Anne Brotherton rose to greet him with a shy smile he found encouraging.

  “Miss Brotherton.” He took her outstretched hand and held it a bare second longer than necessary. She made no effort to pull away. “I came to inquire after the health of a certain book.”

  “Thank you. I am glad to report that the volume is dry, though its scent may never be suitable for polite company. Cynthia refuses to let me read it downstairs. I have to keep it in my bedchamber.”

  “I trust it wasn’t so dry as to send you instantly to sleep.”

  “The content is perhaps more fascinating than the prose. Nevertheless I am grateful and will think of your gallant rescue whenever I consult it.”

  With a more worldly lady, Marcus would have offered a saucy double entendre. Anne Brotherton’s words were flirtatious but her expression remained grave. He wondered if she ever played games of chance. She would have the advantage of being hard to read.

  “It’s a fine day,” she said. “I do believe the sun is struggling to emerge from those clouds. Would you care to see Cynthia’s garden? It’s quite fine.”

  Intriguing, especially since the sun seemed likely to fail in its efforts. Following her downstairs, he listened to her observations on the history of Bath, showing she had indeed been reading the evil-smelling volume, much more carefully than he had when it was pristine. She collected her pelisse and did not flinch when he placed a careless hand on the small of her back to guide her down the steps into the garden, which was a decent size for the middle of London but not, in its early winter barrenness, of any special beauty.