Greetings of the Season and Other Stories (15 page)

“
Que mal
you didn’t get a ring from this one,” Marcel mumbled through battered lips. “You’d be a richer widow tomorrow.”

Mr. Bigelow peeked over the desk he was hiding behind to see what was happening. He saw Marcel’s back and he saw Marcel’s knife shifting from the Frenchman’s right hand to his left. So he picked up the desk chair—the only chair in the room—and brought it down on Marcel’s head. The fight was over.

Johna snatched up the knife and waved it under Marcel’s streaming nose where he lay on the stained carpet. “If you’re not gone by tomorrow morning, or if you ever bother us again, his lordship will…will have your guts for garters.”

Selcrest raised his eyebrows but he nodded, taking the knife from her hand. “Count on it, you miserable scum.” He turned toward Bigelow. “I don’t know your name, sir, but I am in your debt.” They shook hands, then the viscount softly inquired, “Are you quite finished here, my lady?”

Johna ignored the dripping sarcasm. “I do believe that I have made my position clear to Monsieur Marcel. Mr. Bigelow, I shall be leaving with his lordship. You shall find a buyer for this hellish place tomorrow or you shall find a new client. I do not care what pittance you accept, just get rid of it.”

*

“Is your throat very sore, Jo?” Somewhere between the Black Parrot and her place by his side on the curricle’s seat she’d become Jo to him.

“N-not terribly, Merle.”

“That’s good. And it’s also good that my hands are busy with the reins.”

“It is?”

“Oh,
yes, or I’d strangle you too.”

6

“How could you be so blasted stupid?” Selcrest yelled as soon as they were alone in Johna’s drawing room. He’d held as tight a rein on his temper as on the horses during the drive back to Albemarle Street. Then came the interminable wait for the servants to bring tea—with honey for her bruised throat—and brandy for his bruised nerves. Selcrest’s mood wasn’t improved by the sideways glances he received from the footmen and maidservants. Nor by the niffy-naffy butler’s inquiry: “Another steak, milord, for your eye?”

He couldn’t see out of it, so the thing must be deuced ugly. He’d worry later how the devil he was going to get past his mother and Higbee this time. Right now his swollen phiz couldn’t be half as ugly as the red welts he could see on Johna’s slender neck. Ugly? Those marks turned his stomach inside out. Hell and damnation, he should have butchered the bastard who did this to her. Merle kept pacing, trying to keep his blood from boiling. “Dash it all, woman, what were you thinking, going to a place like that? And going alone?”

“I thought I was doing the right thing,” Johna managed to whisper through trembling lips. Turning her head to watch him walk from her sofa to the mantel to the window and back was making her neck ache even more. “And Mr. Bigelow was with me.”

“The pinchbeck pettifogger who got you into the mess in the first place? The man’s a tosspot if I ever saw one.” Merle took another sip, frowning into his glass of spirits as he remembered the solicitor’s quaking hand. He slammed the glass down onto the mantel and resumed his circuit. “And a scurvy lot of help he was, hiding under the desk. I didn’t even know he was there until he crowned that maniac. And you tell me what’s right about a lady traipsing through London’s worst stews. Nothing, that’s what! If you had a problem, why the hell didn’t you come to me, Johna? My mother is looking out for you. That makes you my responsibility!”

“No, your mother has done a world of good for my sister and myself. That’s enough. You are not obliged to do anything more, certainly not act as guardian to us, or trustee. And I suppose I didn’t think my actions through,” she conceded. “I was so disgusted, I just wanted to get the deed done.” Johna was close to tears from the pain, from the shock, from the anger she read in his one-eyed scowl and relentless pacing.

“I know you are furious with me for landing you in such a hobble. And I know I broke our agreement that there would be no scandalous behavior. So what now? Will you wash your hands of us or denounce me to your mother’s friends? I’ve blotted my copybook, but poor Phillipa doesn’t deserve to be ostracized. That’s what will happen, you know, if you…if you turn your back on us.”

Merle strode over to the sofa and bent down so he could look her in the eye. Hers were damp; one of his was swollen shut. “Are you that big a peagoose, or do you think me that much a snob? Can’t you see that I don’t give a rap about the scandal, Jo? My God, you could have been killed.”

“Oh, and you too, coming to save me. I’d never have forgiven myself. And your poor eye.” She was crying in earnest now, so it was only natural for Merle to take her in his arms for comforting. She fit so perfectly, it was only natural for him to kiss away her tears. And then her fears. “It’s all right, sweetheart. Everyone is safe now. Nothing is going to happen to you or your sister. I won’t let it.”

Amazing how a kiss could cure a sore throat and a stiff neck and shattered composure. Johna sighed.

“What, did I hurt you?” He jumped back. “I never meant—Lud, only a ham-handed cad would paw at you at a time like this. I beg your pardon, my lady.”

Johna sighed again, in contentment. “You do care.”

“Care? I…
”
It was obviously a new and troubling concept for the viscount. He tried to fix Johna’s disarranged hair, tucking a black lock behind her ear. It felt like silk running through his fingers. Care? Oh, Lud. “I care that my mother would be devastated if anything befell her protégée.”

Johna touched his cheek and smiled. “You care. I know you do.”

Merle turned his head and kissed her palm. “I care enough that if you ever give me such a fright again, I’ll thrash you within an inch of your life.”

So she sent for him that night, when Marcel tried to burn down the Black Parrot.

*

If Marcel was going to lose his investment, so was Ogden’s widow. He waited till early evening, before the club was officially open for business, then tossed some Blue Ruin at the heavy, faded draperies that kept the gaming parlor shielded from the street. But the pervading dampness and years of leaks made the fabric hard to burn. That and Marcel had used the watered gin. So he went back to the kitchen.

There was so much grease on every surface, so many dirty rags, he had no trouble getting a good fire going, before he got going. Marcel left a message on the front door, right under the parrot’s beak: “Ogden’s widow owns these asses.”

So the constables knew right where to come, to report the fire. “He must have meant ashes, ma’am.” Johna sent a note to Bigelow, another to the viscount. Merle was easily found at Selcrest House, at home like Johna was, hiding his bruises. She could cover the marks with a high-necked gown or scarf, not unreasonable with the November chill. There wasn’t much Selcrest could do with a swollen, empurpled orb, except lie. He’d already told his mother and Higbee that a sparring partner at Jackson’s had landed a flush hit, but he couldn’t tell that to the chaps who’d been at the boxing parlor that morning. A riding accident? Footpads? Neither reflected well on Lord Selcrest, so he stayed in, waiting for the morrow when the swelling would go down and cosmetics should cover most of the violent colors. Perhaps by then he’d come to his senses, too. He arrived within minutes of receiving Johna’s message. “You are not going, period.”

“It’s my business. I have to go.”

“You called on me for help, dash it, now let me help.”

“I asked for your help, as you demanded this afternoon. Help, not supervision. The constables said some of the occupants in the building were injured, although there were no fatalities, thank goodness. I couldn’t have borne that, someone dying because Marcel hated me so much. But I own the building, therefore it is my duty to see that the people in it get care. I can make sure they are taken to the hospital if they need it, or found a place to spend the night.”

“What, you are worried about the dregs of humanity who live and work at a place like the Black Parrot? I admire your sense of duty, but that rabble can find their own way around the back alleys and gin mills. It’s too dangerous for you to go. Didn’t you learn anything this afternoon?”

“The constables said Marcel was likely halfway to France by now. His note was practically a confession of guilt, so he wouldn’t chance being caught and hung.”

“One cockle-headed cook isn’t half as dangerous as the rest of the neighborhood. You saw it at its best, by daylight. By night every kind of slime crawls out from under their rocks to prey on unwary strays. You’re not going, and that’s final.”

*

The fire wasn’t even smoldering when they arrived. Most of the crowds dispersed when the constables from the sheriff’s office joined the Watch, the fire inspector, and two runners from Bow Street. A small knot of women surrounding Mr. Bigelow were passing a bottle of rum, for their tiny coal-filled brazier wasn’t putting out nearly enough heat in the raw night.

Bigelow separated himself from the group when he recognized the viscount’s curricle. He carried a lantern over to the open carriage, where Selcrest’s tiger had gone to the horses’ heads to keep them calm amid the threatening cloud of smoke. Bigelow waited for the viscount to help Lady Johna down. “According to the fire inspector, the structure appears sound. He won’t know for sure until daylight, of course, but the interior is pretty well demolished.” He shook his head. “No one will buy the place now. Costs too much to renovate these old buildings.”

Johna was staring at the handful of women who were inching closer. The shape of one in particular caught her eye. “That’s fine, I’m not selling. I’ll turn it into a home for unwed mothers instead. It will be a memorial to my husband.”

“But…but Sir Otis would have hated the idea!”

“Yes, I know. That must mean it’s a worthy cause. The Otis Ogden Hospital and Foundling Home.”

Selcrest patted her hand, which he was holding firmly by his side. “And I’ll help finance the renovations.”

One of the women, the one who had put the idea in Johna’s head in the first place, called out, “That’s the ticket, lovey, then I’ll have somewheres to go.”

“That’s all right for Mimi, for later,” the oldest of the drooping females said, “but what about the rest of us, lady, for tonight?”

All of the women came forward now. They ranged from younger than Phillipa to tired middle age. The card-dealers had soot-darkened faces, some with tear streaks running down their cheeks.

“Is anyone hurt?” Johna asked.

“Lorraine found some salve in the pantry,” Mimi told her. “It works fine.”

Lorraine was also the spokesperson for the others. “Marcel took everything with him, without leaving our fair share. All our clothes and such is burned and ruined. We ain’t got nothing, and nowhere to go.”

Johna started to say, “I have roo—” when the viscount’s arm clamped down on hers.

“No!”

“Then perhaps you could give them shelter until other arrangements can be made. Surely there’s more than enough space to spare at—”

“No,” Merle hissed in Johna’s ear. “Think of your sister!”

“I am. I wouldn’t want her left out in the cold.” Selcrest dragged her a few steps away from the others. “Deuce take it, Jo, they’re prostitutes!”

“Not dealers?”

“They might cut the deck for an occasional hand, but that’s not their purpose for being here, or for all those little rooms upstairs.”

“They still need help.” Obviously, Johna was going to have to do it herself; his lordship couldn’t lower himself to expend his pity on these unfortunate females who had to put up with the likes of Sir Otis on a nightly basis. She shook his arm off.

While she was thinking what was best to do, another one of the women peered in the viscount’s direction, clutching a thin blanket around her shoulders. “Silky, is that you?”

“Silky?”

Everyone turned to stare at Lord Selcrest: Johna and the lightskirts, Bigelow and the minions of the law, two would-be customers at the Black Parrot, three passersby, and his own tiger. The only ones not gawking at him were the horses.

Lorraine pinched the speaker’s arm. “Hush up, Kitty.”

But Kitty waved the bottle of rum in the air and giggled. “At least I didn’t call him Shorty.” She giggled again. “Or Speedy.”

Two of the other tarts and one of the Runners thought this was hysterical. So did Johna. The great and noble, high-and-mighty, stuffed-shirt lordship had feet of clay after all! And he’d just fallen off his pedestal. She joined the others’ laughter.

At least no one could see Merle’s scarlet blush. He grabbed Johna’s arm and none too gently turned her toward his curricle. “You wait in the carriage. I’ll make arrangements for your new friends.”

When Selcrest came back to take the reins from his tiger, he told the grinning servant, “If one word of this night’s work gets out, I’ll make a rug out of you.” After he settled next to Johna on the narrow seat and gave the horses the signal to start, Merle stared straight ahead. “Don’t ask. You don’t know those females, you never saw them. And if you don’t stop giggling, I’ll leave you here with them.”

*

Merle wanted his family—and Johna’s—to leave for his country estate on the instant. They’d avoid any gossip, have an extra week or two to prepare for the holidays, and put Johna out of harm’s way in case that thatchgallows Frenchman tried more mischief. The paperwork was completed for Denton’s commission, so there was nothing holding them in London.

“Nothing? What, did you forget that I am throwing a ball in two weeks? The acceptances are in, the food is ordered, the orchestra—”

“Confound it, Jo, it isn’t safe! The man is a Bedlamite, setting fire to places where people live.”

“Then I’ll hire some extra watchmen. And thank you for the invitation”—it was actually more of a summons—“but Phillipa and I intend to spend Christmas in Berkshire.”

“I think your sister will have something to say about that. If Denton is shipping out in the New Year, don’t you think you should let them spend Christmas together with Mother at Seacrest?”