Lady of Sin (8 page)

For an instant his sensibility was
almost
certain, despite how his rational mind rejected the possibility out of hand.

“Mardenford is lucky to have you as his hostess. His son is lucky to have your love.”

“I am the one who is lucky. Ambrose is like a son to me, and James like a brother. It is good to have such a family, and a place where one is at home.”

He realized that she did not know that Mardenford was in love with her. She did not see that this brother wanted her in a way the law permitted no brother, even one through marriage.

“You were hardly without family before. The bond of the Duclaircs is famous.”

“I know my good fortune in the loyalty and love of my brothers and sister. This is different, however. Peaceful. I grew up in a family full of high drama. When I was a girl, there were scandals and heart-wrenching sorrows and big secrets. They thought that I was too young to know, but I knew everything. I love my brothers and sister, but that world was a stormy sea, throwing my little boat hither and fro. In comparison, my husband’s family was the most placid lake.”

“I expect the contrast had an appeal.”

She smiled with a girlish chagrin. The way her lower lip quivered had his heart humming with recognition and excitement.

Damn, the similarities were undeniable and alarming. He had spent three days tossing them over in his mind, convincing himself he was imagining things. But now . . .

“Oh, yes, the quiet, the stability, had enormous appeal. It first attracted the coward in me. Later I appreciated that there was more there than the perfect reflection of a perfect order on that unrippled surface. The lake was placid, but that does not mean it was shallow.”

Her expression became reflective and private, just as it had the afternoon in her drawing room when the memories overcame her. She was not only speaking of the world into which she had married. She was also referring to her husband, and her marriage.

A profound empathy entered him, just as it had at the party. The woman that night had not spoken much, but her whispers had alluded to another life and another time and an old love.

An intimacy wrapped them, as it had in her salon. She did not look at him this time, so he was not sure she experienced it too. He did not reach for her again, although he wanted to.

He was glad she had found that quiet lake as a girl. He knew something about the waves that had buffeted her little boat, and could imagine how they seemed to threaten her.

In setting her anchor in that lake, she had found safety. She alone of the Duclaircs had remained untouched by scandal. She alone was received in all the best houses. Such things mattered to most people, especially in the world to which she had been born.

He made a decision. He had no stomach for this investigation, and would not have pursued it at all except for the way those boy’s eyes haunted him. If Charlotte saw no resemblance, that would be the end of it.

If she
truly
saw none, that was. He would know if she lied.

Nathaniel stepped out of the carriage and scowled at the old brick house with broken, chipped shutters. A lot of noise came from within. An inebriated woman sat at an open window right in front of them, grinning in sodden, private mirth.

“It is a flash house,” he muttered. He shot Charlotte a glare of exasperation. “I
told
you I should bring the boy to you.”

“I am aware of what you
told
me. Is it likely he is in here?”

Nathaniel had paid a costermonger a guinea for the location of this house. According to the informant, Finley had bought stolen property here, and had a partnership with the bawd whose women used the upper floors.

Charlotte had been in St. Giles rookery before, but she had never entered a flash house. The government insisted they did not exist, but everyone knew they did. A combination of gin house, brothel, hideout, and cheap lodgings, there were hundreds of them in London, all little centers of crime that flourished with impunity in neighborhoods like this.

Nathaniel looked up and down Bainbridge Street. Charlotte assumed that with his height he could see more than she could. From her vantage point at the carriage window it was a sea of people in poor clothing, making so much noise it was a wonder the din in the house could be heard.

His survey did not improve his humor. “I cannot leave you out here with only your coachman to watch both you and the horses, and I cannot bring you in. I will take you home and then I will—”

“Mr. Knightridge, do you really think I will come to physical harm in that house? With a man of your size and strength beside me? In the middle of the day?”

“It is impossible to say. It would only take four drunken men with knives to cut me down.”

“Dear me, I have indeed been negligent with my own welfare. When I insisted on coming, I just assumed it would take at least
six
drunken men with knives to—”

“I spoke conservatively, to leave a margin of safety on your behalf.”

Despite the sparring, he appeared truly indecisive on how to proceed. She found that rather charming.

“I have been on this street before, Mr. Knightridge, in the interests of certain charitable endeavors. I have witnessed most of what occurs in that house, only not all in one place. While I believe you are truly concerned for my safety, I suspect your hesitation has more to do with my seeing indelicate things. Since we cannot stand here all afternoon, let us be done with this and see if the boy is in there.”

Face stern, not liking it one bit, muttering things that sounded like “infernal woman” and “stubborn, troublemaking harridan,” Nathaniel helped her down and guided her to the door with a very firm grasp on her arm.

They walked in just behind two men who pushed by and barged ahead of them. Stale air laden with smells both human and alcoholic greeted them in the dark, filthy entry.

The noise came from the second level. Arm hovering behind her in protection, Nathaniel brought her up the tread-worn stairs and they peered in.

The room served as the gin house. A crowd filled it, sitting on old chairs and a long table and even the floor. A woman propped in a corner had gone unconscious, and from the looks of her dishabille had been trifled with in her stupor.

There were young children here, drinking like the adults. Several boys no more than fifteen also huddled in a corner with their gin cups, gambling amongst themselves with dice.

Nathaniel caught the eye of one and held up a shilling.

The boy casually left his friends and walked over to the doorway. He assessed their garments, lingering a moment on the reticule Charlotte had tucked firmly under her arm.

“Are you Finley’s boys?” Nathaniel asked.

“Old John’s dead. There ain’t no Finley’s boys no more, and we n’er were.” He cocked his head toward the others. “We’re our own gang.”

“Where would I find the boys who used to be with Old John?”

“There’s some ’ere. Up above.” He grinned salaciously. “They be busy, though.”

Nathaniel glanced at the ceiling. His mouth’s line turned hard and flat. “I doubt any of the ones above are whom we want. The boy we seek is about ten years of age.”

The youth grinned again. “Lot you know. Had me first ’fore I was ten.”

“This one is very dark in eyes and hair. Like a foreigner. Have you seen him here?”

“I know ’im. Seen ’im with Finley sometimes. Not up there or here a’tall. Not for days.”

Nathaniel was only too glad to hand over the shilling. He began moving Charlotte back toward the stairs.

“That one may be at the inn,” the youth said to their backs. “Hear tell the young’uns stayed there.”

“What inn?”

“Not a real inn. We cud show ye. Cost three o’ these.” He held up the shilling. “Have to walk, though. The lane is narrow.”

Nathaniel smiled, but his eyes could have melted steel. “I am not entering a dark alley with your gang, boy. Only you. The others stay here. You can share the money with them later. Try anything, put this lady in any danger, and I will break you in two.”

Finley’s lair was on a skinny lane nearby that stunk of manure and waste and rot. The old half-timbered structure really might have been an inn centuries ago; and in a different setting and with a coat of whitewash it would have been picturesque. Its roof was pitched high and its base tilted down at one end, where the ground had settled over the ages and split its foundations.

Nathaniel paid the boy and sent him off. He insisted on keeping Charlotte close as they entered. He had been alert and attentive while he guided her through the fetid neighborhood behind their guide. His arm remained behind her back the whole way, as if he feared she might get snatched by someone passing amidst the bumping crowd that flowed along the lanes.

“It is used for storage,” he said as they stepped in off the street. He blew dust off a wooden box so the lettering showed. “Wine from France. No tariff stamps, so it must have been smuggled.”

“It is a wonder it hasn’t all been stolen. The neighbors must know Finley is dead.”

“Perhaps they fear he will reach out from the grave.”

They followed a narrow path between the boxes, looking for evidence of children. Nathaniel was able to see over the stacks and he surveyed the walls.

“There is a door back there. Let us see where it leads.”

It opened on wooden stairs much newer than the building. Even so, Charlotte had to accept Nathaniel’s firm grasp on her arm to get down.

Blackness engulfed them at the bottom. She smelled the damp. A quick touch told her this space had been carved out of the ground, and its earthen walls plastered. Hard-packed dirt served as a floor.

Nathaniel had to duck his head to fit under the low ceiling’s timbers. “Wait here. There is a window over there, between those joists. I will open the shutters.”

The dark swallowed him. Between the sounds of his boots, she heard a rustle to her left. Her skin prickled. She stepped back so she could make an escape if rats emerged at her feet.

The shutter swung. A diagonal column of light flowed into the basement from the tiny, high window. The dusty beam illuminated an astonishing array of objects.

It glanced over the side of a fine mahogany cabinet, then skimmed the surface of a table set with china. Charlotte’s gaze followed its path onto a Persian carpet, until the spot where it ended on a pair of knees.

Knees?

Her eyes adjusted to the light’s diffusion. She made out the form of a crouching person and a jumble of humps around it.

“Old John lived well in his lair.” Nathaniel had returned to her side. His hold on her arm returned as well, this time with a squeeze of warning. His attention fixed on the humps. “Carpets and fine furniture. He probably ate with silver too. He made a little palace down here.”

He stepped between her and the knees. His position also blocked the stairs.

“Come forward now,” he said. “We are not going to hurt you.”

Faint whispers hissed from the corner. The humps moved. The knees resisted.

“Go on now,” a boy’s voice said.

The shadows reassembled themselves into little people. Five children stepped into the light.

Two were girls no older than twelve, so pale and thin that their eyes looked huge. Two were young boys about eight years old. They tried to appear fierce, but they had not mastered the hardness it would take to hide their fear.

The tallest bowed his head as he whispered some words in smaller ears. This boy looked to be the oldest, maybe ten or so, and he had very dark hair.

“Where are the older ones?” Nathaniel asked.

The dark head rose. Black eyes gazed toward them. The light flowed over a long, soft face.

Time froze for two instants while Charlotte stared. Recognition sounded in her blood, quickly replaced by a familiarity less specific but more disconcerting.

Her rational mind quickly assessed both reactions. They had been evoked by the most general resemblance, one extremely vague. Had she not been anticipating something, she probably would have never seen it.

In truth, now that she looked harder, there was no true resemblance at all.

“What older ones?” the boy asked.

“The ones I saw you with outside the Old Bailey.”

“Gone,” a girl said. “Gone to seek their fortunes, ain’t they?”

“Harry here would’n go, ain’t that right, Harry? They would’n take us all, so he would’n go,” a boy piped in. He gave Harry an adoring look.

“Is that your name? Harry?” Nathaniel asked.

“Is what Old John called me.”

Charlotte could have done without the unfortunate coincidence. Nathaniel would be hard enough to manage without the evidence that this boy bore the same name as the defendant he had failed.

“Come up above,” Nathaniel instructed. “We need to decide what to do now.”

He turned to Charlotte and handed her up. They waited beyond the door while feet trudged toward them.

“You were mistaken,” she took the opportunity to say. “There is no resemblance.”

The two girls filed past, eating Charlotte’s ensemble with their eyes. The young boys swaggered next, imitating the bravado of the streets.

Harry emerged last. He gave them both a good look, displaying the seasoned assessment of an experienced pickpocket.

The little troop arranged themselves on boxes, waiting, a motley assortment of boredom, masked fear, and challenge.

“We cannot leave them here,” Charlotte whispered. “Even with Harry’s protection, they will be devoured. And the girls . . .”

“For once we are of one mind, Lady M. I fear their danger is even worse than you surmise.”

He stepped forward and addressed the children. “How have you been living? Who has fed you?”

Smiles and snickers replied to the question.

“There have been charitable contributions from good folk like yourselves,” Harry said blandly.

The other boys giggled and gave Harry playful nudges.

“Oh, aye,” a girl said. “And merchants are generous as saints to poor children.”

“Saints,” the other girl repeated solemnly. They both broke into peels of laughter.