It Happened One Midnight (PG8) (16 page)

This prompted much discussion among the little crowd.

“Imagine, a card deck immortalizing this season’s most beautiful women. Who wouldn’t want that?”

“Who wouldn’t want to lay Lady Grace Worthington down on a card table?”

This resulted in unworthy-of-them chortling.

“I’ll raise you Lady Margaret Cuthbert.”

“She raised me just the other day while we were waltzing.”

Appalled and delighted hooting ensued.

“These are ladies, gentleman, so if you’ll refrain from this sort of talk . . . until we’re a bit drunker.”

“Or Olivia Eversea.”

A hush greeted this. There was no question that Olivia Eversea was beautiful by anyone’s definition. It was just that it was difficult for anyone to imagine winning her, let alone playing her.

“Redmond told me he thought it would be brilliant to let the turn of a card determine his choice of bride.
I
think he’ll draw the Queen of Spades. Whoever she may turn out to be. You’re all welcome to wager otherwise. But please be discreet.”

They all absorbed this in delighted shock.

“Redmond is
actually
planning to get leg-shackled?” Linley asked.

“He always did have a diabolical panache,” one of them said enviously.

“Where will the girls be posing?” someone else wanted to know.

“An artist will sketch them on the premises of Klaus Liebman Printing on Bond Street. Remember, he has the finest, most modern of chromolithography printing. Liebman himself will have the final say over who is featured in the deck.”

“But . . . how will he get the girls to go to him?”

Argosy made a show of looking at his watch. “From what I understand, a young woman need only provide evidence of an Almack’s voucher if she’d like a chance to be featured. For we all know that is a sign of
true
pedigree. I believe he may have personally invited only one.”

“
Who?
” they chorused. For surely she was the standard against whom all others were measured.

Argosy shrugged.

“Where can I get a deck?” Linley wanted to know. “Maybe I want to choose a bride from it, too.”

“You can place your orders with Liebman himself now, from what I understand.
And
your bets. The decks should be completed and available from all the best merchants in a month. But demand ought to be fierce, so I would place my order now, if you wish to be among the first to see the results.”

He stepped aside and gestured at the book.

And as the idea was irresistible, they queued to lay wagers.

Having more than adequately fulfilled his assignment, Argosy strolled out of White’s whistling.

“
T
HIS SORT OF
thing,” the formidable Miss Marietta Endicott said after a long silence, “one might expect of the Everseas, if you’ll take my meaning, and also forgive me, Mr. Redmond.”

“She’s not my by-blow, Miss Endicott. I swear it.”

Never in his life did he dream he’d have to say those words to Miss Marietta Endicott

The Redmond family name—and Miss Endicott’s admiration for Jonathan’s skill at darts, which she witnessed whenever she took a pint at the Pig & Thistle—were what got him an immediate audience with her in the middle of the school day. He’d watched the heads of young girls crane as he walked through the long hallway to Miss Endicott’s office. Giggles and whispers and reprimands followed in his wake.

Tommy remained with Sally and the Redmond’s driver across the bridge on the opposite side of the river, lest anyone notice and wonder why a carriage bearing the Redmond crest was there. Certainly no one in his family had any immediate business with the school.

Miss Endicott still looked unflatteringly dubious. “Do you know anything about this girl’s family, her true age, her temperament, Mr. Redmond? Can she read and write?”

He reflected upon the carriage ride there, during which he’d learned that six year olds never stop moving. As if they’ve just discovered all of their limbs, and fingers and toes and tongue, and need to break them in, like a new pair of shoes. The conversation had gone something like this:

Don’t kick, Sally.”

She stopped kicking, and beamed at him, as if she’d been kicking specifically to get him to say things to her.

And then she inserted her finger in her nose.

“Don’t put your finger in your nose,” he ordered.

She pulled it out of her nose and wiped it on her dress.

“Don’t wipe your . . .”

He wondered if all children required constant calibration. It was like learning to manage the ribbons of a high flyer drawn by unpredictable horses.

And then there was the “Baa, Baa, Black Sheep” incident. Sally had pleaded, and she’d looked so bloody hopeful . . . but he’d been adamant. In the end those incredibly unfair eyes were at last what did him in. It was like being held at gunpoint by a doe. Those eyes . . .

And he’d sung “Baa, Baa, Black Sheep.” For two. Bloody. Hours.

He cleared his throat. “She is an orphan. I believe her to be about seven years old. She is a cheerful and even-tempered child, with unobjectionable manners. She likes picture books. She enjoys singing. She . . . has a dimple.”

Miss Endicott’s face was a picture as he described her.

And then a slow, amused, faintly wondering smile appeared on her face. Her steely blue miss-nothing schoolmistress eyes pinned him, and he was awfully tempted to squirm.

He felt himself flush. He swallowed. “She was retrieved from a . . . circumstance in which she was ill-treated.”

“Ill-treated in what way?” Miss Endicott was relentlessly crisp.

He hesitated.

Miss Endicott raised a prompting brow.

“She was beaten, Miss Endicott,” he said quietly.

Her features became utterly immobile. And then her head went back, and came down in a nod of comprehension. They engaged, for a time, in what appeared to be a staring contest. Miss Endicott’s lips were pursed in thought.

She longed to ask questions, Jonathan could tell. But she was also shrewd enough to know that his family was instrumental in the continued survival of the academy.

“I shall have to meet her.”

“You can meet her within the hour, if you like.”

“That would be acceptable.”

“I must, however, request that my involvement in her circumstance remain entirely secret.”

“I am nothing if not discreet, Mr. Redmond.”

Which made him wonder just how many other interesting secrets she knew. Then again, when one’s academy is stocked with aristocratic pupils, utter discretion was critical.

“And I suppose we can find room for one more girl. But how do you propose to pay her room and board?”

“Doesn’t my family provide a scholarship for the occasional girl from a, shall we say, more challenging background?”

“The scholarship is awarded at my behest, Mr. Redmond, and my judgment is expected to be impeccable. If your protégé—”

“I hope you do not intend to refer to her as such in the future, Miss Endicott, as it’s critical that my involvement remain unknown. Even to my family.”
Especially
to my family, was what he really meant, and Miss Endicott, the epitome of astute, grasped this.

Another short silence ensued. As did another short staring contest.

“Very well, Mr. Redmond. If the young lady in question should be found suitable, she will be admitted.”

He had a suspicion, however, that Miss Endicott had already found her suitable.

Chapter 14

A
FTER A LENGTHY CHAT
with Miss Marietta Endicott—Sally wanted to know if Miss Endicott knew how to sing “Baa, Baa, Black Sheep,” and to her astonished delight, the woman was familiar with the song—Sally became a pupil of Miss Marietta Endicott’s Academy.

Sally gave both Tommy and then him a kiss on the cheek. And Tommy watched a faint flush paint his cheek.

Imagine
. Jonathan Redmond, of all people, blushing over a kiss from a girl.

They watched her go off with Miss Endicott, skipping a little, delighted by the idea of having other young ladies for friends, as well as the promise of tea cakes.

She never once looked back at them.

“Out of sight, out of mind,” Jonathan said ruefully.

“They’re resilient, little ones,” she said softly. “Be grateful for that, Mr. Friend.”

But because she couldn’t help it, she watched Sally until she disappeared entirely from view, as if she could make sure, very sure, she would at last be safe from harm. This was one child who would be warm, fed, safe, and one day, hopefully, cherish a family of her own. Just one child. But still.

She exhaled a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding. In a sense, a breath she’d been holding for days. She felt both loss and triumph.

When she turned, she found Jonathan staring at her, an expression she couldn’t decipher fleeing from his face. She might have called it rapt. Or surprised. Or thoughtful. Some fascinating hybrid of the three.

“Shall we?” he said simply. And swiveled on his heel. She followed, and they plunged out into the cool bright day. She inhaled with relish the rare clean scent of country air, as if she could store it in her lungs and savor it while she was in London.

“Save some air for the rest of us,” Jonathan ordered mildly.

She laughed. “I’ve forgotten that I do love the country.”

“So do I,” he said simply. But there was a world of meaning in those words. Pennyroyal Green was his
home,
the place where his ancestors had lived and died for centuries. Eversea and Redmond bones probably fertilized the ground all over the countryside.

What must it be like to feel so
part
of something?
she wondered.

“Mr. Friend . . . will you sing ‘Baa, Baa, Black Sheep’ to me?”

There was a cold silence. “I thought we agreed never to speak of that again.”

Tommy laughed, and she gave a little skip. “Oh, if the ton could have heard you. You have a fine voice.”

“That I’ll agree with,” he said easily. “I’ll escort you back to the carriage, Tommy, but I’ll have the driver take you back to London. I’d like to stop in to see my sister, perhaps ride back to London tomorrow.”

She smiled. “You’re fond of your sister.”

“My sister is a trial. And she is currently immensely with child.”

“In other words, you’re fond of your sister.”

He laughed.

Laughing with him was strangely a bit like drinking champagne. She wanted more of it, and the more she had of it, the giddier she felt.

Interesting to know definitively that Jonathan Redmond was a man who naturally
cared
. Who put himself in the way of fists out of some sort of moral reflex. Who put his reputation and family name at risk by going to Miss Endicott about Sally. He’d gone well out of his way for both Tommy and a little girl who’d picked her nose, wiped it on her dress, kicked him, smiled at him, and forced him to sing “Baa, Baa, Black Sheep” for nearly two hours.

She cleared her throat. “Thank you for what you did for Sally.” She said it softly and rather stiffly, because her gratitude was immense and humbling, and she was unaccustomed to being humble.

He seemed to understand this. “Friends help each other when they can, isn’t that true, Miss de Ballesteros? I’ll stay up nights thinking of ways you might repay me.”

He shot her a wicked sideling glance.

Her mouth quirked. “You’ll make a splendid uncle. You’re very good with children.”

“Bite your tongue.” Somehow his words lacked conviction.

A bird sent a spiraling song into the companionable silence.

“You’re good with them, too, Tommy. Or at least it seems so to me.”

It was Tommy’s turn to shrug.

He reached up and slowly dragged his hand through the leaves of a low-branch. “Why are they so important to you? Do you want a family?” He said it idly.

As if it weren’t a question of monumental import. As if the answer wouldn’t reveal everything important about her. As if it wasn’t the thing she wanted more than anything else in the world.

“I like children,” she said noncommittally. Hesitating to commit herself to an answer that left her open to more questions, to more vulnerability.

He had a way of uncovering her secrets. Perhaps he’d know that one eventually, too.

He looked at her askance, recognizing a dodge, but content to leave it lie for now.

Because he liked walking with her, he realized, on this cool sunny day in this village he knew and loved, just as he loved his own family. He could have found his way back to the carriage in the dead of night by simply listening for the sound of the wind in familiar trees, the timbre of the river’s rush over a particular patch of stones, the rise and fall and texture of the ground beneath his feet.

The world felt somehow larger with her in it, somehow a bit brighter and easier.

She was probably the only woman he knew, apart perhaps from Violet, with whom he felt utterly himself. Ironic, and what did it say about him, given that she seemed to be a conduit for chaos. Though at the moment she, too, appeared to be at peace and content just to be in his company.