Her Secret Lover

by Sara Bennett

  Chapter 26

  The rain on the journey home was relentless, but as Antoinette came up the drive toward the house, the rain stopped and the clouds parted and the sun shone. She’d had enough money for the train fare and then a public coach to the end of her drive, but after that she had walked, carrying her carpetbag.

  Dupre House rose before her, perfect within its garden setting, the rows of windows glinting in the sun, the elegant facade reminding her that this house was built by a king for his favorite mistress and given to her as a gift.

  A gift she threw away for love.

  Antoinette’s ancestress, the wicked mistress, had captivated King Charles II and given him two children, before she ran off and married another man, abandoning the king, her home, and her children. Charles was naturally upset, and although he allowed the Dupre family to retain the house, there were no titles or other gifts, and he never forgave his errant lady.

  Antoinette had always considered her ancestress to have been lacking in foresight. After all, she could have had everything, and instead she ended by vanishing into obscurity. But now, tired and shattered, gazing up at her home, Antoinette found herself with new insight into her wanton ancestress’s behavior. It was as if she could understand perfectly well why she might give up material benefit for elusive love, although the abandoning of the children was something else again.

  The maid who opened the door was wide-eyed at the sight of her bedraggled mistress and let out a little scream. Antoinette dropped her carpetbag with a relieved sigh.

  “It’s all right, Hettie. I have been sailing. Can you have a bath drawn for me, and a warm brick placed in my bed? I do believe I am going to sleep for a week.”

  “M-Miss Dupre, we’ve been so worried,” the girl stammered.

  “Thank you, Hettie, but I’m home now and everything will be all right.”

  Just then she spotted a familiar figure descending the main staircase. “Bridie?”

  Miss Bridewell looked up at the sound of her pet name, and gave a shocked cry. “Miss Antoinette?” Her expression spoke volumes as she came hurrying to meet her. “You’re wet and…and…”

  “Yes. I was just explaining to Hettie, I’ve been sailing. Come upstairs with me, Bridie, and I’ll tell you everything.” She stopped, glanced sideways at the governess. “Well, nearly everything.”

  “We’re so glad you’re home,” Miss Bridewell declared, giving her a bone-cracking hug.

  Antoinette laughed, her face as bright as the beams of sunlight outside. “Where is Cecilia?” she asked, drawing away and looking about, expecting to see her sister appear and come running toward her like the child she still was in many ways.

  Instantly Miss Bridewell’s face fell and her lips trembled. “You do not know! Then you haven’t seen her? Oh, Miss Antoinette, I tried to stop her. I tried my very best. I knew you would not like it if she went, but you know how she is. So headstrong. Once she’d decided to go I could not stop her. I’m afraid she only listens to you and you were not here…”

  “She’s gone to London.” Antoinette answered her own question in an oddly calm voice, while inside her emotions were as turbulent as the sea.

  Miss Bridewell nodded, watching her and not trusting herself to speak.

  Cecilia had always been difficult, but Antoinette knew if she had been there, Cecilia would have listened to her. Well, she was here now. Antoinette drew on her strength, shaking off her tiredness and the terrible fear, and putting aside the thought of a long, warm bath and a dreamless sleep.

  “Come upstairs, Bridie, and tell me exactly what has happened.”

  As they ascended the stairs to the upper floors, she couldn’t help but look about her at the house. So many windows and bright, light colors made this place very different from dark and gloomy Wexmoor Manor.

  “It is good to be home,” she said, with such intense feeling that Miss Bridewell gave her an uneasy stare. Antoinette smiled to reassure her. “I forgot, Bridie, you don’t know what has happened since you waved me good-bye. I have a great deal to tell you.”

  Although, she reminded herself, not everything could be shared with her middle-aged spinster governess; some things were just too shocking for her delicate ears.

  Once they were comfortable in Antoinette’s sitting room, she insisted that first Miss Bridewell tell her story.

  “The letter came a fortnight ago,” Bridie said. “In it Lord Appleby invited Miss Cecilia to come and join you both in London.”

  “But I wasn’t even there then!”

  “Well, he wrote as if you were. Cecilia would never have gone if—”

  “No, of course not. So she went?”

  “Yes. I tried to persuade her to let me go, too, but she insisted she would be all right. She said you would be there, and she would be perfectly safe with you, Miss Antoinette.”

  “Did you tell her about the letter you sent to me? What was contained in it?”

  “No,” Bridie said miserably. “I didn’t feel it was my place, and the contents were so shocking…Besides, you said she should not know unless it was absolutely necessary, and I wasn’t certain it was absolutely necessary.”

  “I’m not blaming you, Bridie. I’m blaming myself.”

  Antoinette’s need to protect her sister now seemed ridiculously naïve and shortsighted. Surely it would have been better to prepare Cecilia for the worst rather than worry about sullying her ears with shocking tales? She was momentarily overwhelmed by images of Cecilia, a prisoner in Appleby’s arms, but she pushed them aside. No time for hysterics now. This situation required prompt action and clear thinking, not a dose of ladylike prostration.

  “I have your letter,” she said, “but I haven’t been able to use it yet. I was watched everywhere I went and then Lord Appleby sent me into Devon, and I was watched there, too. I have only just escaped.”

  “Escaped?” Miss Bridewell echoed faintly. “Oh, my dear, so my fears were well-founded. He planned to do the same to you as he did to…?”

  Their eyes met. “Yes, I think he did,” Antoinette said quietly.

  “Horrible.” Miss Bridewell shuddered. “What a truly evil man.”

  “Bridie, as soon as I have bathed and changed I must set off for London. Cecilia will be staying in Lord Appleby’s house in Mayfair, and if luck is with me, then His Lordship will still be in Devon, or on his journey back.”

  “Lord Appleby was in Devon, too?” Bridie’s eyes were starting from her head. “Miss Antoinette, please, please tell me you have not lost the one treasure a lady has to offer her husband to that…that cad!”

  Antoinette had the urge to giggle, but mastered it. “No, Bridie, Lord Appleby did not molest me…Well, not much. He sullied my reputation rather than my body.”

  Miss Bridewell sighed, relieved. “A reputation can be repaired,” she said stoically, “but once a lady’s treasure is lost, then it is gone forever.”

  Antoinette said nothing. She thought Miss Bridewell was too optimistic about her reputation, and how her treasure came to be lost would remain her secret until the day she died.

  “The first thing I will do when I get to London is go to Mayfair and try to see Cecilia,” she declared. “Then I will get her safely away. After I’ve done that I’ll find the address in your letter, Bridie, and…Well, you know what I must do then. Once it is known what sort of man Lord Appleby really is, then he will be ostracized. Ruined. The law will turn its cold eye in his direction and he will be brought to justice and punished.”

  Miss Bridewell looked relieved. “That sounds like a perfect plan, Miss Antoinette. I am so glad you’re here. I felt quite lost without you.”

  “Never mind, Bridie, everything will work out, I am certain. We will be rid of Lord Appleby once and for all.”

  “Yes, and we can go back to the way things were before.”

  Antoinette had been thinking exactly the same thing, but hearing it spoken aloud didn’t make her as relieved as she’d expected. There was a feeling of e
mptiness deep inside her, of something lacking. Perhaps she had changed more than she realized, and it would take her a while to settle back into her old comfortable life.

  Miss Bridewell was watching her anxiously. “Are you quite well, Miss Antoinette? I think you should wait until the morning before you leave for London. Surely a few hours’ delay will make no difference?”

  “No, I must go at once, Bridie. Lord Appleby may be back in London tomorrow, and I can’t risk waiting. I will be all right. As long as I don’t have to go sailing.”

  Miss Bridewell blinked at her questioningly. “Sailing? Why did you go sailing? You never told me.”

  Antoinette reached forward and clasped her governess’s hands, forestalling any more questions. “I’ll explain when I return. When everything is comfortable again and Cecilia is safe. I’m sure we will laugh at our adventures then.”

  Miss Bridewell managed a brave smile. “I hope so, Miss Antoinette, I truly do.”

  By the time she reached London Antoinette was beyond tired, but she could not think of sleep when there was so much yet to do. After the steam train had chugged into Waterloo Station, she’d taken a hansom cab to Mayfair.

  She was tempted to go straight to Lord Appleby’s house and knock on the door, but that could be disastrous if she was captured again. It was best, she’d decided, to lurk about in the square and watch the house for a while. With luck she would see Cecilia coming or going, and be able to waylay her.

  The cabdriver was amenable to her plan, after she doubled the fare, so she sat and waited. It was almost an hour before she saw a coach draw up outside the house and glimpsed the fair head of her sister beneath one of her newest and most fashionable bonnets.

  Cecilia appeared as lovely as ever, and Antoinette’s heart ached at the thought of all that sweetness and beauty destroyed by one man’s greed.

  She had climbed down from the cab and was hurrying forward when someone else stepped from the coach behind Cecilia.

  Antoinette recognized him immediately. The well-made jacket and top hat, the cane he used as an affectation, the smirk on his thin lips as he replied to Cecilia’s chatter. Lord Appleby was back, and any chance she had of stealing her sister safely away from his house was dashed.

  Hastily she turned around and hurried back to the corner, where the cab was waiting. That was where her legs failed her and she had to lean against the railings of a grand Georgian town house and close her eyes until her head stopped spinning.

  Her sister was imprisoned in the monster’s den, just as in one of the rather terrible fairy tales Antoinette had read as a child. Antoinette knew that she could not save her, not without putting her own freedom at risk. And Antoinette could not be captured again, because if she was there’d be no one left to bring Appleby to justice.

  Despite her fears for Cecilia, she would have to carry on, and do what she had come to London to do. She would ask the cabbie to take her to the address in Miss Bridewell’s letter, and with any luck the whole nasty business would be over and done with by teatime.

  Her decision made, Antoinette opened her eyes and noticed that she was attracting some unwelcome attention from several passersby and a small crossing sweeper. “Tippling at this time o’ day!” one gentleman muttered disapprovingly. Antoinette hastily returned to her cab, and after giving the driver the new address, settled back to prepare herself for the coming confrontation.

  Perhaps it would help to reread the details?

  Reaching with her gloved fingers inside her bodice, Antoinette withdrew the letter. It was creased and stained with salt water, definitely the worse for wear, but it was as precious as cloth of gold to her eyes.

  Miss Bridewell’s writing was comforting, and Antoinette smiled as she found the relevant paragraph, thinking that soon it would all be over.

  They rattled over the Thames and into that seedy area of London known as Lambeth. It took the driver a little time to find the address, and they passed back and forth over rough roads and down lanes so narrow that Antoinette wondered whether they would be stuck. But eventually they came to a halt outside a derelict building.

  Antoinette gazed up at it in dismay. “This is it?”

  “I’m afraid so, miss.”

  “The Asylum for Misfortunate Women?”

  “Yes, miss.”

  “But…what’s happened to it?”

  “I dunno. Here, I’ll ask. Just hang on.” The cabbie jumped down and crossed the lane to a woman with a child on her hip and another at her feet. She gave him a suspicious look but seemed to answer his questions willingly enough. When he came back he knew the whole story.

  “Burned down, miss, a year ago. All the patients was moved elsewhere, split up like. I can’t rightly tell you where they are now. She don’t know. You’d have to find one of those who ran the place and ask them. Did you want to get out here, miss?” he added dubiously, looking about.

  It wasn’t a pleasant area. Apart from the charcoaled remains of the asylum, there were small cottages and dirty-looking dwellings jammed together and facing the street. Over everything hung a pall of smoke and dust, and the stomach-roiling smell of a glue factory.

  “No, I don’t think so,” Antoinette said firmly. There was no point in wandering around in the ruins. Her bird had long flown.

  “Where would you like to go now then, miss?” the friendly cabdriver asked. “Back to Waterloo Station? You look pretty done in, if you don’t mind me sayin’ so.”

  Antoinette thanked him for his concern, hesitating as she made up her mind. There was nothing she would have liked better than to go home and go to bed and sleep for days. But Cecilia was depending on her, and at any moment Appleby might strike. What she needed was help, and the best person to help her was someone who hated Lord Appleby as much as, or more than, she did.

  Quite suddenly a name popped into her mind.

  “Madame Aphrodite!”

  “Beg pardon, miss?”

  The woman with the dark flashing eyes who had stormed into Appleby’s house and accused him of trying to ruin her. Surely she’d be interested in joining forces with Antoinette? If not…well, she could only refuse.

  It took a little convincing to persuade the cabbie to take a respectable woman like her to Aphrodite’s Club, but once again doubling the fare had the desired effect. Soon they were bowling back over the bridge.

  If Aphrodite would help her it would benefit them both, and besides, a high-class brothel was the last place Lord Appleby would look for Antoinette, if he thought she was in London.

  It was the perfect solution to her troubles.

  Now all she had to do was convince Madame Aphrodite.

  Chapter 27

  Antoinette didn’t know what she expected a brothel to look like but this wasn’t it. Aphrodite’s Club was a plain-fronted, discreet building that appeared rather like a girl’s boarding school than a house of ill-repute. But the cabdriver assured her this was the right address, wished her luck, and left her standing outside.

  She hadn’t really decided what she would say when she came face-to-face with the courtesan, but there wasn’t time to plan. As she climbed the steps to the arched entrance, Antoinette hoped something would occur to her when the moment came. The door was closed, and she reached for the heavy brass knocker, only to snatch back her hand at the last moment, staring in disbelief.

  The knocker was shaped like a man’s member, complete in each and every detail.

  Antoinette hesitated. Was she jumping into more hot water by coming here? But what else could she do? Surely it was worth a chance? Antoinette might find Madame Aphrodite not interested, in which case she would have to think of another plan. But she would not give up. Lord Appleby would not win.

  Her mind made up, Antoinette took the object in her hand, closed her eyes, and rapped hard three times on the door.

  Gabriel had arrived at Aphrodite’s Club the previous day, and he and Madame Aphrodite had spent a great deal of time together in conversation. A couple of t
imes Aphrodite had to cover her mouth to stop herself from laughing too loudly. When he told her about Antoinette stealing his pistol and rowing away from him, for instance, or his disguise as the smelly Coombe. But most of the time she listened in solemn silence.

  “It is difficult to advise you, mon ami,” she said at last.

  Gabriel’s eyebrows rose. “Advise me? I don’t need advice, Madame.”

  “Oh?” She smiled a wicked little smile. “I thought that you did. You seem to want this girl for yourself, Gabriel. First you are jealous of Lord Appleby and then of this unknown protector, this duke. I can hear it in your voice and I can see it in your eyes.”

  “You must be joking! She’s a lying, manipulative little…” But he didn’t finish the sentence; he couldn’t. “You’re right,” he admitted dully. “I do want her. And I’m sure she wants me, too, except she won’t admit it.”

  “I wonder…perhaps she is as muddled and mistaken as you, Gabriel. You are like cats in the darkness, oui? You are attracted to each other, and yet each of you thinks the other is a wild cat that roams the streets when in fact you are both cozy domestic cats, playing at being wild.”

  “Mmm, I’m not quite sure about that, Madame.”

  She laughed and waved her hand. “You know what I mean.”

  “I don’t know what to do,” he said bleakly. “I thought I wanted Wexmoor Manor, but now I can’t see myself being lord and master there if Antoinette isn’t by my side. I didn’t know what I was missing until she came along, and now I can’t stop thinking about her.”

  “Perhaps,” Aphrodite said thoughtfully, “you are in love with her, Gabriel?”

  “In love with her?” he scoffed. “Can you fall in love with someone who points a pistol at you and threatens to shoot?”

  Aphrodite laughed softly and with a wealth of experience. “Oh yes, Gabriel, you can.” And laughed again at his crestfallen expression. “Mon ami, it is not so bad. Perhaps she loves you, too, but is afraid to tell you so. How can she commit herself to a man who keeps telling her all he wants is a letter he believes she has in her possession?”