Lord Perfect (9 page)

TEN DAYS PASSED, AND FOUR LESSONS. NOT once in this time
did Benedict darken Mr. Popham's door.

The obvious choice to accompany Peregrine to his drawing
lessons was the footman Thomas, whom Benedict had brought down from
Derbyshire. This was the only servant Benedict could trust to keep
the matter to himself.

Discreetly dressed in everyday clothes rather than
livery, Thomas would adjourn to a nearby coffeehouse while the lesson
went on. At the end of the allotted time, he would collect his charge
at the print shop door.

The task was well within Thomas's abilities because
Benedict had given Peregrine one simple rule: "You will go
quietly to and from your drawing lessons. If any Incidents
occur—before, during, or after—the lessons will cease. No
excuses will be accepted. Is that clear?"

"Yes, sir," said Peregrine.

Benedict let him go, certain the rule was sufficient.
Anything deemed crucial to his vocation, like Latin and Greek,
received Peregrine's full and fierce attention. Mrs. Wingate did not
need Benedict at hand to subdue his nephew.

It was Benedict who needed subduing.

Day Eleven, a Friday, found him dangerously bored and
restless.

It was not as though he had nothing to do. He was
following a troubling criminal case at the Old Bailey. He had a
speech to prepare in support of a proposal for a metropolitan police
force. Though most of Fashionable Society had left London, they had
not left a desert behind. He suffered no shortage of invitations to
dine and dance, attend lectures, concerts, plays, operas, ballets,
and exhibitions.

He was desperately bored, all the same.

So bored that he had twice this afternoon caught himself
starting to pace, a practice he considered suitable only for
hysterical women and other high-strung persons.

Caged animals pace. Children fidget. A gentleman
stands or sits quietly.

Benedict sat quietly in his study, in the chair behind
his desk. His secretary, Gregson, sat opposite. They were reviewing
the last ten days' correspondence. . His lordship had been too bored
to attend to it until now. He didn't want to do it now, either. If he
continued to ignore it, however, the small piles of letters and cards
would grow into great untidy heaps. That was the sort of thing
irresponsible persons like his brothers Rupert and Darius allowed to
happen.

The responsible gentleman keeps his affairs in order.

"This one is from Lord Atherton, sir," said
Gregson, taking up a thick one. "Perhaps you prefer to open it."

"Certainly not," said Benedict. "Then I
should see what is inside, and you know he always puts in thrice as
many words as any subject needs, along with a surfeit of dashes and
exclamation points. Please be so good as to pare it down to the
essentials."

"Certainly, sir." Gregson perused the thick
epistle. " 'I had a most distressing encounter,'" he read.

"No distressing encounters," Benedict said.

Gregson returned to the letter. "'I was outraged to
learn—'"

"No outrages," said his lordship.

" 'Priscilla's mother—'"

"Nothing to do with Lady Atherton's mama, I beg
you, Gregson. Perhaps you had better summarize."

Gregson rapidly scanned the next few pages. "He has
found a place for Lord Lisle."

Benedict stiffened. "What place?"

Gregson read: " 'You will be as relieved as we
were, I am sure, to learn that arrangements have at last been made
for my errant son. Heriot's School in Edinburgh has agreed to take
him.'"

"Heriot's School," Benedict said. "In
Edinburgh."

"In a fortnight's time, his lordship will send
servants to collect Lord Lisle and take him to his new school,"
said Gregson.

Benedict got up from the desk and walked to the window.
He stood quietly. By gazing steadily into the garden below and
watching the chrysanthemums bob in the September breeze, he was able
to maintain his composure. Nothing of the inner storm could be seen
on the outer man.

Certainly he did not say what he was thinking. He rarely
did. Despite years of discipline, his thoughts regarding his fellow
creatures and their doings sometimes had a rampaging quality. In his
mind, in fact, he sometimes sounded like Atherton on one of his
rants.

Unlike Atherton, however, Benedict had taught himself to
keep the rampage inside. What little he expressed he restricted to
dry observations, sarcasm, and a raised eyebrow.

Life is not an opera. Scenes belong on the stage.

Benedict did not storm about the study, berating his
muddleheaded brother-in-law. He merely said, "Send Lord Atherton
a note, Gregson. Tell him that he may spare his servants a journey. I
shall take the boy to Scotland in a fortnight."

Half an hour later, Lord Rathbourne was on his way to
Holborn.

THANKS TO THE crush of traffic, Benedict did not reach
the print shop until well after Peregrine's lesson was over and the
boy was on his way home. Mrs. Wingate had departed as well, Mr.
Popham told Benedict.

Benedict tried to tell himself to communicate with her
by letter. He rejected the idea—as he'd done a dozen or more
times on the way here.

A letter simply wouldn't do. She had taken offense at
the last one, declining her services.

Benedict remembered the scornful way she'd referred to
it, the haughty lift of her chin, the disdain in her blue eyes. He
had wanted to laugh. He had wanted to bring his face close to that
beautiful, angry one and…

And do something he shouldn't.

To Popham he said, "I must speak to her. It is
urgent. Regarding one of her pupils. Perhaps you would be so good as
to give me her direction."

Mr. Popham turned red. "I pray your lordship will
n-not take offense, b-but I am not at liberty to give the lady's
direction."

"Not at liberty," Benedict repeated evenly.

"N-no, y-your lordship. I beg pardon, your
l-lordship. I trust your lordship will understand.
The—er—difficulties. For a widow, that is, especially a
young one, living on her own. Men can make such n-nuisances of
themselves. Not your lordship, certainly—that is to say, but…
er. The difficulty is, I did faithfully promise the lady to make no
exceptions. Sir."

What Benedict wanted to do was reach across the counter,
grab the little man by the neck, and strike his head against the
counter until he became more cooperative.

What Benedict said was, "Your scruples do you
credit, sir. I quite understand. Kindly send a note to Mrs. Wingate,
seeking her permission for me to call. I shall wait."

Then he disposed himself upon a chair at a table and
began perusing a portfolio of lithographs.

"I sh-should be h-happy to, your lordship,"
Popham stammered. "But there is a d-difficulty. My assistant is
making a delivery, and I cannot leave the shop unattended."

"Then send a ticket porter," said Benedict
without looking up from the prints.

"Yes, your lordship." Popham stepped out of
the shop. He looked up the street. He looked down the street. No
ticket porter appeared. He returned to the shop. At intervals, he
went out again, and looked up and down the street.

It was a small shop. Though Benedict was not a small
man, he did not take up a great deal of space physically. However,
being an aristocrat—a species virtually unknown in this part of
Holborn—he seemed to take up a good deal more space than
ordinary people did.

Not only did he seem to occupy every square inch of the
shop, but he made customers stare and forget what they'd come in for.
Several walked out, too awed and intimidated to buy anything. That
wasn't the worst of it.

He had taken a hackney in lieu of one of his own
carriages, in order to travel without calling attention to himself.
But he'd paid the driver to wait, and the vehicle dawdling in front
of the shop was slowing traffic. Idlers gathered about to gossip with
the driver and among themselves. Passing drivers expressed their ire
loudly enough to be heard inside the shop. Popham grew redder and
more agitated.

Finally, when half an hour had passed and the assistant
had not yet returned, he gave Lord Rathbourne the address.

FROM HOLBORN THE hackney driver turned left into Hatton
Garden then right into Charles Street. Here, at a public house named
the Bleeding Heart, Benedict disembarked. He asked the driver to wait
farther down the street, where the vehicle would not impede traffic
so much.

He crossed the street, then paused at the narrow way
leading down into the yard.

The neighborhood was an exceedingly poor one. Contrary
to Mrs. Wingate's beliefs, however, Lord Rathbourne was no stranger
to London's more downtrodden areas. He had been involved in several
parliamentary inquiries into the condition of the lower classes. He
had not obtained his information solely by reading.

He did not hesitate, either, because he feared
contagion, though his wife had died of a fever caught during one of
her evangelical missions into a neighborhood like this.

He paused because reason returned.

What on earth could he say in person that he could not
say in a letter? What did it matter to him whether

Mrs. Wingate took it ill or not? Had he simply leapt at
the excuse to see her? Had he let the rampage in his mind rule his
actions?

This last question made him reverse direction.

He made his way back down Charles Street. He walked
briskly, keeping his eyes on the way ahead and his mind firmly where
it ought to be. This was business. He would write Mrs. Wingate a note
informing her that Peregrine was returning to school and could not
continue his lessons with her. She would be paid for the full
schedule of lessons they'd agreed upon, naturally. Benedict would
thank her for all she'd accomplished with the boy so far. He would
allow himself a word of regret, perhaps, about the abruptness—

Curse Atherton! Why could he not go on in an orderly
fashion, instead of one minute throwing up his hands and proclaiming
the cause hopeless and the next—

A jarring sensation, then a jumble of sensations:
Benedict heard the short shriek, saw the parcels tumbling about him,
felt a bonnet strike his chin and a hand grab his coat sleeve, all at
the same time.

He caught her—it was definitely a she, and he knew
which she it was in the next instant, even before he saw her face.

IF SHE'D BEEN paying attention to where she was putting
her feet instead of gawking at him, Bathsheba would not have missed
the step. He was not looking her way, but straight ahead, his mind
clearly elsewhere. If only she'd kept her wits about her, he would
have passed, and she would not have made a spectacle of herself.

Again.

She saw his eyes widen when he recognized her, and the
unguarded expression she saw in those dark depths sent a jolt of heat
through her.

The look vanished in an instant, but the heat remained,
tingling in her veins and softening her muscles.

He swiftly set her on her feet. He
was a good deal slower to let go. She was aware of bands of heat
where the long, gloved hands clasped her upper arms. She was aware of
warmth radiating from the large, hard body inches from hers. She saw
the textures of wool and linen and took in the strong contrast of
color: brilliant white against deep green. She inhaled the clean
scents of soap and starch, the more exotic fragrance mingling with
them, of a discreet and costly masculine cologne… and far more
insidious, the scent of
him
.

"Mrs. Wingate," he said. "I was hoping
our paths would cross."

"You would have done better to look rather than
simply hope," she said. "Had I not had the presence of mind
to throw myself in your way, you might have missed me altogether."

His grip tightened. She realized then that she was still
holding on, her hand still clutching his forearm. It was like
grasping warm marble.

She let go, dragged her gaze from his, and focused on
her parcels, strewn about the pavement. A passing vehicle had crushed
her basket under its wheels.

"You may release me," she said. "I should
like to collect my purchases before an enterprising street urchin
makes off with them."

He released her and gathered her parcels.

She watched him perform the lowly task with his usual
perfect grace. Even his coat did not appear to stretch at the seams
when he bent, though it fit him like skin. Weston's work, very
likely. And what his lordship had paid for it would probably keep her
and Olivia comfortably for a year, perhaps two or three.

The crowd forming about them watched him, too, with
undisguised curiosity. Bathsheba belatedly collected her wits.

"A footman, out of work," she explained. "One
of my late husband's relatives turned him off, poor fellow."

"He's come to the wrong neighborhood, Mrs. W,"
said an onlooker. "There ain't hardly work enough for ordinary
folk hereabouts."