The Mischievous Miss Murphy (14 page)

“It wasn’t an invitation to tea,” Max agreed cordially, leaning back against his cushions and reaching under a bright red one to extract a fat roll of bills. “The geegaws are nice enough, but give me a man who understands the power of hard cash. I’ve enough here already to take a good-sized flutter on the bangtails. Sit yourself down, Coniston. You’re as skittish as a dog around an Irishman’s boot.”

Tony subsided into a chair, whether on Max’s orders or not he didn’t know. “You’re crazy, do you know that? What if someone takes the time to find you out?”

“Who?” Max snorted. “Which one of the host of English milords who’ve been traipsing through here greasing my palm do you think to be smart enough to find me out?” He arranged the bank notes like a fan and waved them under his nose. “Ah, Tony, me lad, I’m on the pig’s back now, don’t you know. Sure beats being a barker for a bowwow shop. Food’s good here too.”

“You may be in high fettle now, Max, but your luck’s bound to run out soon,” Coniston told him repressively.

Max just shook his head. “Time enough to bid the Devil good morrow when you meet him, I always say. But you never mind that. I hear you’ve been haunting the house on Half Moon Street. Thinking of breaking our bargain, are you?”

“One visit doesn’t constitute a haunting, Max,” Tony responded archly, still chafing a bit over his confrontation with Candie. “Besides, I think the whole thing is a moot point now that Candie’s moved in with my sister.”

Max’s smile was maddeningly cherubic. “Has she now?” he purred. “And what brought this on, I’ll be asking?”

Giving the older man a short, pithy account of what he had learned in Portman Square, Tony tried to get back to his original argument. “You may be having a rare good time tweaking noses here at the Pulteney but, burn it man, you’re putting Candie smack in harm’s way with your antics. Do you mean to land the girl in jail with you?”

Tony’s accusation succeeded at last in rousing Max from his nest of silken cushions. “The Devil mend ye, lad, I’ll not stand by and listen to sermons from the likes of you. Or was that some other Marquess of Coniston who wished to win two weeks’ worth of unhampered seduction time from the girl’s own uncle? I release you from that bet, by the by, seeing as how your own sister has taken up the role of dragon in Candie’s defense. Always lands on her feet, does my sweet Candice.”

Tony propped his elbows on his knees and let his forehead sink into his hands. “Now I know how my Uncle Frederic felt when my father had him locked up in Ringmer for saying Joan of Arc gave him orders to march on London.” Lifting his head, he gave sanity one last shot. “Now that Candie’s safeguarded from my lascivious pursuit, won’t you consider ending this charade? Surely you’ve got enough stuff here to keep you in Irish whiskey for a while.”

The Irishman looked about the suite at his booty, mentally calculating its worth in the nearest pawnshop, and tried to estimate how much more he could hope to garner if he were to stay at the Pulteney for another two days. “Very well, boyo. I’ll do it, please God,” he then intoned seriously, looking Tony square in the eye to show his sincerity.

“That’s the ticket, Max!” Tony applauded enthusiastically. “I knew you’d put Candie’s well-being ahead of anything else.”

Murphy smiled modestly, knowing as Tony did not that he had agreed to nothing. After all, if he chose to stay at the Pulteney, it would obviously be because God’s pleasure had been denied him. It was a classic Irish “out,” but it would serve him well enough if Candie didn’t get wind of it.

Each of the men satisfied that he had bested the other, the two now settled back for a comfortable chat, as they did truly enjoy each other’s company no matter what their differences. In time, Tony touched on his visit to Portman Square, and Ivy Dillingham’s name slid into the conversation.

“Dillingham, did you say?” Max questioned, stroking his chin. “Spinster, as I recall, and so short and fat that if you were to meet her on the street you’d sooner jump over her than walk round her?”

Tony gave a bark of laughter. “That’s Ivy,” he concurred, relishing the vivid mental image Max’s words conjured up. “How do you know the lady?”

Believing the details of that meeting to be best left well buried, Max parried, “Oh, around town somewhere. Not my cup o’tea, you know. Wouldn’t do to go hat in hand to that gorgon, let me tell you, if you were ever in need of charity. Not that she’d turn you away, mind, but, like my mother used to say, if she had only an egg she’d give you the shell.”

“You must tell Patsy that one,” Tony chuckled. “She’d greatly appreciate your opinion of her sister-in-law.”

Shaking his head, Max intoned soberly, “It’s more like a warning I’d give your sister, my boyo. I tell you, the woman is the sort who’d stand at your back while your nose is breaking. No, Lady Montague is no match for that harpy. As her brother, I suggest you keep a sharp eye on her so she doesn’t come to harm. Pity her ladyship can’t find it in her heart to marry Mr. Kinsey. He’d not stand for any nonsense from Miss Dillingham.”

“You noticed that?” Tony asked, clearly impressed with Max’s powers of observation concerning the love-struck Kinsey.

“Boyo, I notice everything,” Max said, winking. “Why else do you think I’m letting you near my Candie?”

Tony did not understand exactly what Max meant by this last statement, unless it was to mean that the man dismissed him as harmless. Hardly a flattering assessment, the Marquess thought, but if it satisfied Max, who was he to quibble? After a few more minutes of conversation, during which Max readily agreed to Tony’s every suggestion concerning vacating the suite at the Pulteney before the day was out, Tony took his leave, holding the door open for the affluent merchant who, like all the others, came bearing gifts.

“Sir, your most obedient,” the Marquess intoned, bowing himself out. He too could “play the game.”

“There goes a right fine fool of a man, so besotted with my Candie I could lead him to her with a halter of snow,” Max whispered under his breath before spreading his hands in welcome to his next victim.

It was almost an hour past midnight when the Marquess of Coniston called again on the mansion in Portman Square, but he was considerate enough not to bother waking Patsy’s ancient butler by hammering on the knocker. It was kinder, he told himself, as well as more expedient to climb the drainpipe that so conveniently ran alongside the bedchamber most likely to have been assigned to Candice.

Mister Overnite, thanks to long years of practice, made short work of both the ascent and his subsequent entry through an unlocked window. Dropping lightly to the floor on stockinged feet, he was rewarded by the sight of Candice Murphy sound asleep in the high tester bed sitting in the middle of the room.

She did not plait her hair for the night, he observed, smiling. Seeing that glorious curtain of white-gold spread out over her pillow did more than a little to ease his conscience at his second-story work. After all, it may not have been
his
pillow, but at least his fantasy had come true in part. Lying there, her pink, pouting mouth softened in sleep, Candie was like his dream come to life, and he was hard pressed not to slide into the bed beside her and wake her with his kiss.

He gave himself a mental shake. No, he was getting ahead of himself. He was not here for seduction. All right, then, Mark Antony, he asked himself facetiously, what are you here for?

“What are you doing here?”

Tony lifted back his head with a snap as Candie’s calmly asked question mirrored his own thoughts. Stepping further into the room, he saw that her huge sherry eyes were alive with mischief, and not a drop of fear, as she lay quite still under the covers.

“I came to tell you I went to the Pulteney and saw Max,” he was startled into saying.

“Of course you did,” Candie agreed maddeningly, propping up her pillows and sitting back against them for all the world like she was holding court. “And now you can rush hotfoot back to Max and tell him you have been to Portman Square and seen me. My, what a wild social life you English peers do lead.”

He was torn between the lingering urge to kiss her and a new, strong desire to throttle her for her sharp tongue. Crossing over to sit on the side of the bed, he stated firmly, “I bearded your uncle in his den at the Pulteney and got his promise to vacate the premises before someone discovers his little charade.”

“Promised you, did he?” Candie remarked, amusement coloring her voice. “And you believed him?
Uncail
tells some shocking rappers you know.”

“I don’t trust your uncle across the street,” Coniston shot back testily. “I just wanted you to know that I did my best. I thought you’d be grateful. After all, he could get you both into serious trouble.”

Candie snuggled back comfortably against the pillows. “Don’t pick me up till I fall, Coniston,” she said, her eyes narrowing just a trifle. “I can take care of myself, thank you very much. And as for my uncle, why, come Judgement Day, Max will run a rig on the Lord.”

Tony decided to abandon this line of conversation for another. “We have other business to discuss, Miss Murphy. For one, how did you manage to get yourself dug in here with my sister?”

“You introduced us, remember?”

“That is something I particularly regret,” he retaliated, feeling more than a little frustrated. “I’ll say this for you though, madam, you surely know how to make the most of a chance meeting in the Park.”

Candie’s sherry eyes now narrowed to slits. “I’ll be polite to a point, Coniston, but not beyond it. I have chosen thus far to overlook the fact that you have broken into my bedchamber. I have even allowed you to malign my uncle, seeing as how it seems to have become your favorite hobby. But you’re beginning to disturb my peace more than a little bit. I need not remind you that all I need do is scream to have this entire household down on you like a shot. How dare you think I’d ever take advantage of Patsy?”

“I’ve misjudged you?” Tony quipped sarcastically. “Silly me. I should have realized you are a paragon of virtue. It must have been meeting you in the guardhouse that threw me off.”

Throwing back the covers so that they enveloped Tony’s head, Candie fairly leapt from the bed and dove into her robe. “You’re a real piece of work, do you know that?” she accused in a harsh whisper. “All this to-do over your sister falling victim to me when you let that odious Ivy Dillingham flap around here like some vulture who scents fresh blood. If it’s protecting Patsy you’re so hot to do, why not start by getting her shed of that predator?”

“That vulture is Harry’s sister. Patsy feels a responsibility toward her.”

“And Patsy is incredibly silly,” Candie pointed out without malice. “Kind, endearingly sweet, and impossible to dislike, but a true featherbrained innocent. She should marry Hugh Kinsey and have done with it. He’d give the Dillingham short shrift.”

Tony shook his head in amazement. “Is there nothing gets round you people? I don’t know why Hugh doesn’t just give it up and take an advertisement in the
Times
.”

Candie stopped her angry pacing and threw the Marquess what was intended to be a quelling look, but if it was intimidation she was after, the result fell far short of the mark. For Mark Antony Betancourt was, even at this ungodly hour of the night and even though she was quite put out with him, still the one man in the world who could turn her limbs to water with a smile.

She clutched her robe more tightly about her, for much as she was used to being seen in her nightgown by her uncle, she was suddenly quite aware of her state of near undress. “Please go now,” she almost pleaded, causing Tony to lift his head and stare at her in amazement.

“What’s wrong, puss?” he asked, rising to walk toward her. “Are you having a belated attack of missishness?”

She glared at him balefully. Wasn’t it enough that he could see her discomfiture? Did he have to comment on it?

“You’re no gentleman,” she said astringently.

“Shall I reply with the obvious?” crooned Tony, still advancing on her. “It’s monstrous inconvenient for a seduction here at Patsy’s, even if Max has seen fit to cancel our bet.” At Candie’s audible gasp, he went on cheerily, “Ah, I see I have struck a chord of response. Not feeling quite so smug and safe now, are we?”

As he spoke he kept moving, not stopping until he had effectively backed her into a corner of the room. “You asked why I am here tonight. I think we are both about to discover the answer.”