A Private Gentleman

by Heidi Cullinan

  His gaze drifted back to the alley, to the opium den.

  Just one little bit. The filth and the likely debauchery inside would be motivation enough to contain himself. It would be a good lesson to him to see what true addiction was.

  Yes. Yes, it was practically good that he go over. Just a quick visit. He needn’t even finish his tea, or his pipe, or however they delivered it.

  Shoving his trembling hands into the pocket of his coat, Wes stepped forward onto the sidewalk, heading for the street.

  “I expected better of you, my lord.”

  Wes stopped short and turned around. It was Penelope Brannigan, his wallflower companion from the Gordons’s ball.

  She stepped forward out of the shadow of a door, the toes of her plain, worn brown boots peeking out from an equally ragged hem. Gone was the velvet finery of the ball, but she spoke to him with the audacity of a duchess. “I thought you were convincing yourself you didn’t need it. And you don’t. A cup of plain black tea or some soothing mint will do you much better.”

  Wes looked the woman up and down. At the ball he had been too distracted by his mission and his nervousness, but here now he saw that she was ghastly tall and built broadly. She wore what had to be a man’s jacket over an ample bosom, and her dress was the most faded thing he’d ever seen. It was brown in the way all fabrics were when they aged—brown-gray, or brown-blue, but mostly brown. She wore several petticoats beneath it as well, hinting that she lingered often in the cold.

  A crash from the tavern startled him, and he glanced back toward the window nervously. The shouts inside were starting to sound like a brawl.

  Brannigan nodded behind her at the narrow, unpainted door. “I would very much like you to come sit in my parlor, sir, and allow me to give you a restorative cup of tea and a moment to strengthen your resolve. At the very least I owe you that for setting me up with my favorite new benefactor.”

  Take tea with him. He grimaced and turned back to the street, willing a hackney to be passing by.

  There were none.

  Miss Brannigan stood directly beside him now. “I do not wish to see you sucked into that den, Lord George.” She put a hand on his arm.

  Wes drew back sharply, glaring at her. “M-madam! D-d-d-do n-n-n—”

  The brawl inside the tavern broke through the door and became a scuttle on the sidewalk. Shaking, Wes stumbled backward. The street was suddenly full of people shouting. He found it hard to breathe. People, people everywhere, and sound. And Miss Brannigan haranguing him, and—

  His vision went black, and he felt his breakfast rising like a sea inside his throat—

  Strong hands led him to the mouth of the alley, where he cast up his accounts, then brought up the ghost of them a few times more just for good measure. A fragrant but serviceable handkerchief wiped away the slime from his mouth before a soft voice led him back to the sidewalk, then to the narrow, unpainted door—and into a scene of blissful calm and tranquility.

  The sofa was sagging and threadbare, but a warm quilt lay across it, as well as a pillow. The fragrant scent of rose-hip tea filled the room, as well as a hint of lavender. No gaslight hissed comfortingly in the walls, but the fragrant oil of a lamp bathed the room in a soft glow. Thick if faded curtains kept out the noise of the street as best as could be done, and the soft click, click of knitting needles from a gray-haired lady at the window soothed the jagged edges of Wes’s soul.

  He found himself immediately upon a sofa. “Hush,” she said. “Rest now.”

  Wes tried, but his gaze kept darting around the room, trying to take it all in. There were three other people present, one napping on a chaise, one in the corner with the curtain pulled back, staring blankly out into the chaos of the street. The one in the window was a female, but the one in the chaise was indeterminable in gender and covered with another quilt. The third was a young man staring at a chessboard on the floor in front of the small stove, which kept the room cozily warm and a teakettle’s water heated.

  Miss Brannigan poured Wes a cup of tea and handed it to him, then picked up the quilt and draped it around his shoulders. “There, my lord. Sip that slowly. It isn’t hot, but your stomach likely isn’t up for much just yet. When you’re feeling up to it, I’ll fetch you some stew. And dumplings.” She reached down to speak softly to the boy, who nodded without looking up. Once Miss Brannigan stood and turned away, he moved a pawn on the left side of the board before returning to quiet study.

  Wes tried to stammer an objection, to explain to her he was not a street child to be coddled, but she pushed the cup to his lips, overriding his objection. He kept sipping dutifully until she took the cup away, smiling at him in approval.

  “There you are. Well done.” She was studying him carefully now. “I’d wondered if you were an addict when we met at the Gordons’s, but of course I couldn’t mention it there. Your eyes, though. You were using that night, weren’t you?” She didn’t wait for an answer, only lifted the tea to his lips. Wes drank. “Is the stutter why you seek the opium? At least, why you sought it originally?”

  Wes lifted an eyebrow. Then he nodded.

  She flattened her lips and sighed. “And likely a doctor told you to do it. How I’d like to smack them all upside the face and give them what for. Well, take heart, sir, that there’s a much better remedy and by means far less destructive than opiates.” She paused, seeming to wait for something, and when Wes kept quiet, she leaned forward and spoke in a stage whisper. “This is the part, sir, where you ask me to beg your pardon and demand to know where I get off, etcetera.”

  Wes couldn’t stop a smile, and in truth, he almost laughed.

  She smiled back and reached for his hands, clasping them between her own.

  “I can help you. I know you don’t believe me, that you think I’m just some mad American woman you should run from, but I swear, I can help you. I can see you are a kind, good man, and the world is far too short of them as it is. Please, do not throw your life away to opium. You are not yet lost to it—do not give it any more of you than it has already taken. I don’t care that you’re a lord. You’re human, you’re flesh, and that’s all it takes for it to claim you and turn you into nothing more than a wraith. Don’t let it, Lord George. Don’t let it.”

  Wes stared back at her, oddly moved and completely unable to respond.

  He was saved by a distant shout and thud. Miss Brannigan let go of him and rose, hastily murmuring an apology as she opened a door in the far wall and headed up a flight of stairs, leaving Wes alone.

  He waited a few minutes, digesting it all as he sipped his tea. He watched the woman staring at the street and listened to the one beneath the quilt softly snore. He kept an eye on the boy at the chessboard. He’d found that if he looked too long at him directly, the boy would turn away, huddling tight into himself. Once he relaxed, however, he made three more moves, playing both sides of the board. He played the pieces correctly, as best as Wes could tell, but he used no strategy, and Wes couldn’t tell which side he was trying to urge to win, if any.

  Don’t let it claim you.

  You are a kind, good man.

  Let me help you.

  Wes’s hand shook around the cup.

  He wasn’t an addict. He knew that. And yet he was so moved by her speech. Why? Why did he yearn for whatever it was her eyes and her gentle touch promised? Were he normal, he would have thought he was in love with her. But he knew better than that. What was it, though? What else could it be? Was it just that he, like all men, wanted salvation?

  But he was not an addict.

  When five minutes passed and Miss Brannigan still had not returned, Wes put the teacup down, pulled his notepad out of his pocket and began to write. He wrote to her, on and on and on, filling four pages front and back. The boy at the stove had stopped playing and watched him, but Wes didn’t look back, only kept writing until footsteps came upon the stairs and the door burst open.

  “I’m so sorry,” she said, her face flushed. Her
dress was dirty too, stained with footprints and—good heavens—splatters of what had to be blood. This seemed not to bother her, however, and she sat across from him in a ragged chair. “Now. Where were we?”

  Wes smiled politely and handed her the stacks of paper.

  Frowning, she began to read, but she spoke occasionally, usually without looking up. “Yes, I know physicians are wise creatures, but they don’t always know all the tricks. And”—she paused for more reading—“ah. Good, I see you already know about slowing down. And visualization. Good. But I wonder if they’ve told you about singing—Oh!” She smiled widely and glanced up at him. “Bravo! You’ve accepted that it can’t be cured, not completely. Very well done. It might however, disappear entirely one day with those you are very comfortable with.” Her shoulders slumped. “Social anxiety as well. Ah. I see why you turn to opium.” Another pause as she read, but then she gave him a look that by rights should have come over the top of a pair of glasses from a displeased tutor. “It doesn’t matter that a physician prescribed the opium to you. Outside short-term use for pain, it’s little more than a way to check out from the world, ultimately permanently, if not from the drug then from the debauchery that tends to come with it.”

  She lowered the papers to her lap and angled herself in her chair to point over her shoulder toward the door. “That den is full of dead lives, my lord. Very few of them took their first dip into opium on a lark. Pain, agony, desperation, desolation—every person flying into diamond-studded clouds in that place began as someone with a true life. Now they live for that drug. Mothers, sisters, friends, husbands, wives, lovers—now they are addicts only, every one. It’s my mission to see no more of them. Today, sir, it’s my mission not to see you become one of them. You may think me silly or ridiculous or managing or whatever you like, so long as you think it on this side of the street or riding away from this place.” She rose, tossed his notes into the stove and came back to stand beside him. “Now. May I interest you in some stew?”

  Bewildered, Wes could do nothing more than nod. She bustled off happily toward the kitchen, and for a moment he simply sat there, stunned by the intensity of Miss Penelope Brannigan. Who the devil was she? How did she know such things? Was she brilliant, or was she mad?

  Was she right?

  Then Wes saw the clock on the mantle, startled at the time, and stood.

  He pulled out his wallet, emptied it of all but what he would need for a cab, and withdrew his pad of paper.

  My name is Lord George Albert Westin. But please call me Wes.

  He removed the slip of paper and placed the note on the table, glancing once more around the room, but only the boy paid him any mind, and once he caught Wes looking at him, he turned away.

  Wes turned away as well, moving silently across the room and out the door, where fortune favored him at last with a cab coming up the street toward him, empty. Hailing it, he climbed inside, stammered the Dove Street address to the driver, then settled back, wrenching his mind off the odd encounter with Miss Brannigan and onto his impending engagement with Michael Vallant.

  Albert was late.

  Michael sat in the front room of the Dove Street house, feet tucked up beside him on the sofa, trying to look bored instead of anxious as the day servants cleaned around him.

  It was a difficult task, waiting. To begin, Michael had nothing to do. He hadn’t brought anything to read, never dreaming he would need to pass so much time. He’d also never been in the sitting room at this hour of the day, drapes pulled wide as every pillow was cleaned, every stain scrubbed, every carpet aired. Michael hadn’t realized the room looked so dismal and tawdry until now. To make matters worse, Rodger was hosting one of his balls that night, which meant more people than usual were passing through on their way to prepare the ballroom. Which meant they all saw Michael sitting there, waiting.

  And waiting.

  The only consolation he had was that Rodger had gone off on business, too distracted to do much more than ask Michael five times if he was all right, if he wanted a bodyguard, if he was sure he wanted to do this. Michael had said, “Yes, no, yes,” though he suspected he and Albert would be shadowed by one of Rodger’s men regardless.

  Assuming Albert ever arrived.

  “More tea, sir?” a maid asked him, appearing beside the sofa. She hovered uncertainly, as if she wasn’t even sure she should ask. There was generally no one to tend to during the day.

  “I’m fine, thank you,” Michael replied, smiling thinly. Though as soon as he spoke the words, his stomach gurgled unhappily, and he wondered whether or not he should ask for a sandwich. Generally he ate a meager breakfast as he rose and a small meal at about this time, and he had barely choked down toast and tea this morning. Perhaps it would be best to eat, in case food was not on Albert’s agenda. He turned around to call the girl back—and then the door to the sitting room opened, and there he was.

  Tall, dark, flushed and harried-looking—there stood Lord George Albert Westin in the doorway. He made a small, awkward bow as he approached Michael, and he trembled slightly as he handed Michael a note.

  Michael accepted it somewhat awkwardly, though he supposed he would need to get used to such things with Albert. He began to read, but as Albert stood there, still looking a walking wreck, Michael stopped and motioned to the space beside him.

  “Please, sit. You look as if you ran here from Covent Garden.” He paused, then added, “You didn’t, did you?”

  Shaking his head as he sat, Albert waved impatiently at the small pieces of paper he had shoved into Michael’s hand.

  Michael sighed. “Very well. I’ll read. But please relax, or I won’t be able to digest a single word.”

  Nodding, Albert sat back, endeavoring to look like a gentleman relaxing. Smiling despite himself, Michael read Albert’s note, which was written in a dashed, unsteady hand.

  Please accept my sincere apologies for my late arrival. A meeting this morning detained me, and in lingering longer than I should have I encountered further difficulties which required me to return to Mayfair to fetch something before arriving here. In hindsight, I should have sent a messenger to explain myself. My conduct was most rude, and I hope you shall be able to forgive me. It shall be my most strident goal to keep such an event from ever happening again. Your humble servant, Albert.

  Michael put down the paper and turned to Albert, startling to see how pale and distraught he appeared. Without thinking, his hand went to Albert’s leg, resting on his knee. “Albert! For heaven’s sake—you were simply late. Oh, yes, I was cross, but now you’re here, and—” He stopped and shook his head, smiling wryly. “Well, you take all the fun out of being upset about your tardiness. Please. You have purchased my time. If you chose to use it to make me wait, that is your prerogative.”

  Albert grimaced, then let out a breath and concentrated for several seconds before attempting to speak. “N-N-Nervous.”

  Michael managed to keep a straight face as he raised his eyebrows. “Are you? Goodness, darling. I couldn’t even tell.”

  Albert relaxed, just a little, and smiled. He reached over and placed a hand on Michael’s: large, warm and comfortable. Then he rose, only somewhat unsteadily, and held out his hand to Michael as he glanced toward the front of the house in a gesture which said, clearly, “Shall we go?”

  Michael nodded, accepted his hand and rose.

  Albert had a cab waiting for them, a sleek, closed carriage which was nice enough that he suspected it was the man’s own. Gratefully, the carriage bore no crest of the marquess. Michael wasn’t sure he could have entered the vehicle, knowing it belonged to Daventry. But no, it was simply plain black with a lush blue velvet interior. It smelled of earth and Albert.

  Michael settled back in his seat. “Well? Where do we go today?”

  Albert rested his hands on his knees and gave a shrug and a smile. “Wh-Where would you l-l-like?”

  Back to this. Michael raised an eyebrow. “My lord. I understand you are new
to these sorts of liaisons, but this has nothing to do with what I want. The question is, where do you wish to go?”

  Albert looked helpless. He stammered a few consonants, clutched his hands against his thighs, then shut his eyes.

  Michael waited for a full minute to see if Albert would recover, but it became clear he had shut himself down. Michael sighed. Then he stood, lifted the trap and spoke to the driver.

  “Drive six blocks north, please, and stop at the intersection of Dove and Oxford.” Closing the trap, he remained standing and smiled wryly at Albert. “I hope you brought coin, for I’m going to make you buy me a loaf and some cheese. I’m simply—” He stopped as he realized Albert was shaking. “My lord? My lord. Albert—Albert—darling—” He sat beside him and took the shaking hands into his own.

  Wes still had his eyes closed, but his face was red, and his nostrils flared as his lip curled in disgust. Michael paused, uncertain. As Wes fumbled with his pad and scratched out another note, Michael realized it was self-disgust.

  Didn’t take enough medicine, he wrote in an unsteady hand.

  Michael looked up at his face in alarm. “You are ill? But why didn’t you say?”

  The noise Wes made through his nose was more expressive than a Frenchman’s sigh. He scratched at his paper again.

  Not ill. Only—

  He stopped writing, crumpled the paper and tossed it angrily across the coach.

  Michael sat still a moment, unsure of exactly what to do. He had the sense that this first outing with his patron was about to fall into permanent pieces. What was odd was that he felt so strongly about this not happening. Why did he care? This was Daventry’s son.

  Daventry’s son who could not be more unlike his father. Daventry’s son, who is as broken as I am.