Season's Regency Greetings (6 page)

Again he surprised her. He took her hand and held it. “Nothing to hide at all, my dear Miss Ambrose. Would it surprise you that I have been doing that very thing? I have been confining myself to the area of my rooms near Lincoln's Inn and Old Bailey for nearly eleven years. We are more alike than my silly niece would credit.”

Her bewilderment must have shown on her face, because he stood up and pulled her up, too. “If you're not too tired, or too irritated at the ignorance and ill-will in one little dower house, I believe I want to explain myself. My dear, do you care for sherry?”

“
If it's good sherry.”

“
The best that smugglers can find! I'd forgotten how excellent my brother's wine cellar is. Do join me in the sitting room. Miss Ambrose.”

She didn't really have a choice, because he never released her hand. Mystified rather than embarrassed now, she followed him into the sitting room. He let go of her hand to pull another chair close to the fireplace, and indicated that she sit. She did, with a sigh. The fire was just warm enough, and the pillow he had placed behind her back just the right touch. He poured her a glass of sherry from the table between them, handed it to her, then sat in the other chair and propped his feet on the fender.

“
I told you I am the black sheep, didn't I?”

She had to laugh. “And I am, well, a little colorful, too.” He joined in her laughter, not the least self-conscious, which warmed her heart. He surprised her by quickly leaning forward to touch her cheek. “Your skin is the most amazing shade of olive. Ah, is that the Egyptian in you? How fine! And brown eyes that are probably the envy of nations.” He chuckled. “I don't mean to sound like a rakehell, Miss A.” He looked at the far wall. “I suppose I am used to speaking my mind.”

“
I suppose that's your privilege,” she said.

He took a sip of sherry. “I do say what I please. I doubt anyone in the
ton
thinks I am a gentleman.”

“
You're the brother of a marquis,” she reminded him. “Surely that counts for ….”

“
It counts for nothing,” he interrupted, finishing her thought. “I am not playing the game I was born to play, Miss Ambrose, and some take offense.”

She sat up straight and turned to face him impulsively. “How can you say that? I have been reading of the good you have done!”

“
You are too kind, my dear.” He poured another drink. “When I was in York today, I spoke to the warden at the Abbey. You're from a crusading family, yourself, aren't you?”

She nodded. “Papa and Mama lived in Egypt for nearly twenty years. I am not their only ‘extra child,' as Papa puts it.”

“
The warden was sufficiently impressed when I mentioned that a member of the Ambrose family was visiting the Marquis of Falstoke.”

Cecilia smiled and swirled the sherry in her glass. “And now they are doing good in India, and plumbing the depths of Sanskrit.” She looked up, pleased to see Lord Trevor smiling at her, for no particular reason that she could discern. At least he does not look so tired, she thought. “We came to England in 1798, when I was sixteen. I went four years to Miss Dupree's Select Academy, and now I teach drawing and pianoforte.”

“
You weren't tempted to go to India with them?”

“
No, I was not,” she said. He was still smiling at her, and she decided he was a most attractive man, even with his untidy hair and rumpled clothing. “I like it right here, even with … with its occasional difficulties.” She set down the wineglass. “And that is all I am going to say now. It is your turn to tell me why someone of your rank and quality thinks he is a black sheep.”

“
It's a sordid tale,” he warned her.

“
I doubt that. Slide the hassock over, please. Thank you.”

He made himself comfortable, too. “Miss Ambrose, the fun of being a younger son cannot be underrated. I did a double first at Oxford, contemplated taking Holy Orders, considered buying a pair of colors, and even thought I would travel to the Caribbean and invest in sugar cane and slaves.”

She relaxed, completely at ease. “That sounds sufficiently energetic.”

“
I didn't have to
do
anything. Some younger sons must scramble about, I suppose, but our father was a wealthy man, and our mother equally endowed. She willed me her fortune. I am better provided for than most small countries.”

“
My congratulations,” she murmured. “You know, so far this is not sordid. I have confiscated more daring stories from my students late at night, when they were supposed to be studying.”

“
Let me begin the dread tale of my downfall from polite society before you fall asleep and start to snore,” he told her.

“
You're the one who snores, according to Davy,” she reminded him.

“
And you must be a sore trial to the decorum of Miss Deprave's Select Academy,” he teased.

“
Dupree
,” she said, trying not to laugh.

“
If you insist,” he teased, then settled back. “I suppose I was running the usual course for second sons, engaging in one silly spree after another. It changed one evening at White's, while I was listening to my friends argue heatedly for an hour about whether to wear white or red roses in their lapels. It was an epiphany, Miss Ambrose.”

“
I don't suppose there are too many epiphanies in White's,” she said.

“
That may have been the first! I decided the very next morning, after my head cleared, to toddle over to Lincoln's Inn and see about the law. My friends were aghast, and concerned for my sanity, but do you know, Miss A, it suited me right down to the ground. I sat for law through several years, ate my required number of dinners at the Inn, and was called to the Bar.”

“
My congratulations. I would say that makes you stodgy rather than sordid.”

He smiled at her, real appreciation in his eyes. “Miss Ambrose, you are a witty lady with a sharp tongue! Should I pity poor Janet if she actually tries your kindness beyond belief and you give her what she deserves?”

She was serious then. “She is young, and doesn't know what she says.”

“
Spoken like the daughter of the well churched!” He leaned across the table and touched her arm. “Here comes the sordid part. Miss A.” And then his face was more serious than hers. “I went to Old Bailey one cold morning to shift some toff's heir from a cell where he'd languished—the three D's, m'dear: drunk, disorderly, and disturbing the peace. It was a matter of fifteen minutes, a plea to the magistrate, and a whopping fine for Papa to pay. Just fifteen minutes.” He stood up, went to the fireplace, and stared into the flames. “There was a little boy in the docket ahead of my client. I could have bumped him and gone ahead. I had done it before, and no magistrate ever objected.”

Cecilia slid her glass aside and tucked her legs under her. Have you ever told anyone this before? she wanted to ask. Something in his tone suggested that he had not, and she wondered why he was speaking to her. Of course, Mrs. Dupree always did say that people liked to confide in her. “It's your special gift, dearie,” her employer had told her on more than one occasion.

“
There he stood, not more than seven years old, I think, with only rags to cover him, and it was a frosty morning. It was all he could do to hold himself upright, so frightened was he.”

She must have made some sound, because Lord Trevor looked at her. He sat down on the hassock. “Did he … was he represented?” she asked.

He nodded, his face a study in contempt. “They all are. We call ourselves a law-abiding nation, Miss A, don't we? His rep was one of the second year boys at Gray's Inn, getting a practice in. Getting a practice in! My God!”

Impulsively she leaned forward and touched his arm. He took her hand and held it. Something in her heart told her not to pull away. “He had copped two loaves of bread and, of all things, a pomegranate.” Lord Trevor passed his free hand in front of his eyes. “The magistrate boomed at him, ‘Why the pomegranate, you miscreant?' ” He put her hand to his cheek. “The boy said, ‘Because it's Christmas, your worship.' ”

Cecilia felt the tears start in her eyes. She patted his cheek, and he released her hand, an apologetic look in his eyes. “Miss A, you'll think I'm the most forward rake who ever walked the planet. I don't know what I was thinking.”

“
I
am thinking that you need to talk to people now and then,” she told him.

He tried to smile, and failed. “His sentence was transportation to Van Diemen's Land. Some call it Tasmania. It is an entire island devoted to criminals, south of Australia. Poor little tyke fainted on the spot, and everyone in the courtroom laughed, my client loudest of all.”

“
You didn't laugh.”

“
No. All I saw was a little boy soiling his pants from fear, with not an advocate in the world, not a mother or father in sight, sentenced to a living death.” He looked at her, and she saw the tears on his face. “And this is English justice,” he concluded quietly.

She could think of nothing to say, beyond the fact that she knew it was better to be silent than to let some inanity tumble out of her face, after his narrative. She glanced at him, and his own gaze was unwavering upon her. She realized he was seeking permission from her to continue. “There must be more,” she said finally. “Tell me.”

He seemed to relax a little with the knowledge that she was not too repulsed to hear the rest. “Is it warm in here?” he asked, running his finger around his frayed collar.

“
Yes, and isn't that delightful? I never can get really
warm
in this country!” she countered. “Don't stall me, sir. You have my entire attention.”

He continued. “I could not get that child out of my mind. In the afternoon I went back to Old Bailey, found the magistrate—he was so bored—and went to Newgate.”

Cecilia shivered. Lord Trevor nodded. “You're right to feel a little frisson, Miss A. It's a terrible place.” He grimaced. “I know it must be obvious to you that I am no Brummel. Nowadays, when I know I'm going to Newgate, I wear my Newgate clothes. I keep them in a room off the scullery at my house because I cannot get the smell out.” He sighed. “Well, that was blunt, eh? I found Jimmy Daw—that was his name—in a cell with a score of older criminals. I gave him an old coat of mine.”

Lord Trevor hung his head down. Cecilia had an almost overwhelming urge to touch his hair. She kept her hands clenched in her lap.

“
My God, Miss A, he thanked me and wished me a happy Christmas!”

“
Oh, dear,” she breathed. She got up then and walked to the window and back again, because she knew she did not wish to hear the rest of his story. He stood, too, his lips tight together. He went to the fireplace again and rested his arm on the mantel.

“
You know where this is going, don't you?” he asked, surprised.

She nodded. “I have lived a little in the world, my lord. I'm also no child.”

“
The magistrate met me in my chambers the next morning—it was Christmas Day—to tell me that those murderers, cutpurses, and thieves had tortured and killed Jimmy for the coat that I left for him, in my naïveté.”

She could tell by looking at his eyes that the event might have happened yesterday. “That is hard, indeed, sir,” she murmured, and sat down again, mainly because her legs would not hold her. She took a deep breath, and another, until her head did not feel so detached. “I did not know about Jimmy,” she said softly, “but I told you that I have read about your work—or some of it—in the papers. I know you have made amends.”

“
With a vengeance, Miss A, with a vengeance,” he assured her. “That frivolous fop I bailed out the day before had the distinction of being my last client among the titled and wealthy. I am a children's advocate now. When they come in the docket, I represent as many as I can. Yes, some are transported—I cannot stop the workings of justice—but they are
not
incarcerated with men old enough to do them evil, and they go to Australia, instead of Van Diemen's Land. It is but a small improvement, but the best I can do.”

“
How did … how did you manage that?”

He smiled for the first time in a long while. “Like all good barristers, I know the value of blackmail, Miss A! Let us just say that I lawyered away a juicy bit of scandal for our dear Prinny, and he owed me massively. God knows he has no interest in anyone's welfare but his own, but even he has a small bit of influence.”

It was her turn to relax a little, relieved that his tone was lighter. She could not imagine the conditions under which he labored, and she had the oddest wish to hold him close and comfort him as a mother would a child. “Lord Trevor, I think what you are doing is noble. Why do you say that you are the family's black sheep?”

He sat down again and took another sip of his sherry, then looked at her over the rim of the glass. “It is your turn to be naïve. What I do, and where and how I do it, has cut me off completely from my peers. It is as though I wear my Newgate clothes everywhere. No one extends invitations to me, and I am the answer to no maiden's prayer.”

“
And people of your class are a little embarrassed to be seen with you, and you don't really have a niche,” she said, understanding him perfectly, because she understood herself. “That life has made you bold and outspoken, and it has made me shy.”