The Perfect Royal Mistress (21 page)

Holding tight to Jeddy’s tiny ebony hand, Nell opened the main door and, lowering her head, managed to make it up the steep staircase, just beyond the bar, without being stopped by Patrick Gound. That at least was one small blessing. She could not bear just yet to explain to anyone why she had returned from Newmarket early. But Jeddy resisted climbing, so that she had to drag her along. “It’s all right,” she murmured. “Come on. No one’ll ’arm you. ’Twill not be the grand room you ’ad with Lord Buckhurst, though. What I’m to do with you I’ll figure out later.”

She opened the door to her old room, aching for a bed and the peace that only sleep brought. Her mind was still a jumble of so many things. Frustration, anger, and regret were tied up like a tightly knotted bow on one of the king’s lace jabots; she felt an utter fool.

Rose looked up from a meal of fish pie set up on the rough-hewn little table beneath the soot-smudged window, a warming shawl around her shoulders. Her eyes were a bit brighter as she glanced up, the gray that rimmed them not nearly so dark now. Seeing Nell, she stood and absently wiped her hand on the front of her dress. “This cannot be good, that you’re back so soon.”

Nell sank onto the edge of the bed and kicked off her soft shoes. “I’ve left ’im.”

“’E wasn’t to marry ye then?”

“’E’s a perfectly content drunk. Bad as Ma, only with fine clothes, and money.”

“And what the devil are we to do with the likes of ’er?” asked Rose, with just the hint of her old cough as she glared at Jeddy, who was loitering at the door. Nell glanced at her sister, then over at the little girl of whom she had begun to feel fond. “Clearly, I’ve got to get a job to support ’er
and
you.”

“Where’s the sense in
that
? Keepin’ a child, another mouth to feed?”

“You’ll care for ’er when I’m out, ’tis that simple.”

“I’m to take a little blackamoor down the Strand with me, like some sort of proper lady, when I actually feel well enough to get out of ’ere? Ballocks to that! I’d be the laughin’stock!”

Rose had been pretty once, full cheeked and smiling, her dark hair long and glossy. Nell understood only too well the sharp edges that their hard life had given her. She looked at her sister with patient sympathy. “With Jeddy, you’ll ’ave a bit of company.”

“Just because you’ve been on the stage, and been bedded by a lord, you’ll not to go gettin’ all ’igh and mighty on me now!”

“I don’t suppose you’re in a position to be lecturin’ me about much of anythin’, Rose Gwynne, straight from the gaol, are you!”

“That was cruel, comin’ from you, Nelly.”

Nell had not meant to say it. She had not meant to belittle her sister, whose release from Newgate prison seemed the greatest miracle of their lives. There was no one in the world to whom she was more devoted, nor cared for more. But Jeddy was an innocent child like she once had been, whose life was charted and determined by the accident of her birth, with no way of ever rising out of it. Especially not if she gave her away.

Groveling before Charles Hart was almost worse than going hungry. But there was no other choice. She knew she must return to work, and there was a limit to things she was qualified to do. If not for Rose and Jeddy, she would have gone back to selling oranges rather than bow down before Hart. But Rose was right—Nell did miss the stage, the adoring crowds, and the power and independence that that life brought.

Nell had no idea how she would ever make herself face Hart, or what she would say if she did manage to find the courage to appeal to him. In the meantime, Richard Bell had come to see her at the Cock & Pye two days after her return to London. “You have been missed!” he exclaimed as they embraced.

“You never did believe I would stay with ’im, did you?”

Richard held her out at arm’s length in the noisy tavern as his smile faded. “No, I didn’t. Do you want to tell me what happened?”

“There was nothin’ of the fantasy I made it into,” Nell said firmly. “Simple as that.”

Richard took her hand again as they made their way to a small table in the back. “You don’t need to be so tough, you know,” he said as they sat opposite each other, and leaned in so they could speak in low tones. “Not with your friends.”

“Oh, but I do. London’s a rough place for a girl like me if your backside is anythin’ softer than shoe leather. So who told you I was back in London?”

He took a long swallow of ale from a pewter tankard before he answered. “Moll Davies, actually. She came to poke about the theater and see if you intended going back on the stage. Word was that the king was at Newmarket when you were there, and that he left the same day you did. Things like that set people to talking.”

“The king’s whore believes
I
am some sort of competition?” A smile broke across Nell’s face. It was the first spark of happiness she had felt for days.

“Should she?”

“I saw ’im. But ’e didn’t offer to whisk me away, if that’s what you mean.”

“Did he tarry with you, at least?”

“I’d warrant the king would tarry with a rosebush if ’e thought it would bring ’im flowers!”

Richard laughed. “That
is
his reputation.”

“I made a mistake with Lord Buckhurst. Now I’m back, and I’ll never make the same mistake again, thinkin’ a man’ll provide for me, I can promise you that. Eleanor Gwynne pays her own way from now on, and mends ’er own mistakes.”

“Like Mr. Hart?”

“Does ’e still despise me?” She bit her lip as her expression became worried.

“Quite openly.”

“But do you suppose ’e would ’ave me back on the stage? I might’ve embarrassed ’im by leavin’, but I’d gotten pretty good for business—”

“I don’t suppose he would, Nell, no. Not the way he talks about you.”

Nell felt the heavy blow in that.

“But fortunately for you”—his eyes glittered with amusement—“it really isn’t up to him. Thomas Killigrew holds the royal warrant for the King’s Theater. And he would very much like you back.”

“Oh, you absolute angel of mercy! ’Tis the real reason you came ’ere in the first place just now, isn’t it?”

“I did think you might have a few financial complications if you’d returned to London without Lord Buckhurst, so I thought I’d see to it for myself.”

“You can’t imagine the ’alf of it! Complications everywhere!”

“When I spoke to Mr. Hart on your behalf yesterday, it seems Mr. Killigrew overheard me.”

“Overheard?”

He grinned impishly as he shrugged. “Well, I
might
have watched to see that Mr. Killigrew was nearby when I mentioned your return to Mr. Hart.”

“Richard Bell!” Nell lunged across the table and threw her arms around his neck. “I do swear I could kiss you!”

“Wouldn’t mind if you did.” He heard himself and how it had sounded. He quickly added, “I only meant that you’re extraordinary, and I’m fond of you, and—”

“I know what you meant, Richard.” Nell was beaming at him, her copper hair loose and full, seemingly lit by the candles on the tables in the very dark room. “So ’ow am I to do it, then?”

“According to Mr. Killigrew, who is thrilled to have the return of his star, you are to be there tomorrow morning for rehearsal. We’ve only just begun a new play, called
The Indian Emperor,
and he wants you to play the emperor’s daughter. It’s the lead, of course.”

“Tell me it’s a comedy.”

“It could well be with you in it, Nell! Seriously, though, I don’t know. We haven’t had a real success since you left us, and they’ve been scrambling a bit with the material. I’m not at all certain yet about this new play.”

“I’m nervous.”

“Don’t be.” He took her hand again. “You’ve got friends in the theater, and a very adoring audience who will cheer your return, no matter what material you perform.”

“I certainly ’ope so,” said Nell, shaking her head.

Nell stood back a step from the stage for a moment, cloaked in shadows, watching the others rehearse. Charles Hart was directing the actors in every nuance of what they said and did. If he could have told them how he wished them to breathe, she thought ruefully, he would likely have done that as well.

Just as Beck Marshall began a short monologue, facing Richard and Mary Knepp, Hart caught a glimpse of Nell from the corner of his eye. “Well, well. Do look, everyone, what the proverbial cat has dragged home,” he said loudly enough to silence the scene. “Or have I mixed up my metaphors, and it is chickens that have come home to roost? Eleanor Gwynne, everyone—” He held out an arm and his voice went louder, a sharp unmistakable edge to it. “The actress too good for the King’s Theater, but not good enough, it would seem, for Lord Buckhurst!”

A collection of embarrassed chuckles sounded from the actors, then quickly faded.

“Perhaps we should speak privately,” Nell offered, stepping forward into the bright sunlight cast from the glass cupola above them.

“There is not a thing I should wish to say or do to you
privately,
Mrs. Gwynne. As you know, were it up to me, I would not have taken you back, no matter how you groveled. Apparently, Mr. Killigrew and I do not share the same standard.”

“I groveled to no one!”

“Unfortunately,” Hart continued, unaffected, “your return was not my decision to make.”

“And you’d do well to remember that!” Nell seethed. She was angry now. It was bad enough coming back. She’d be damned to hell if he was going to humiliate her publicly, as well. “I’m ’ere to do my job, so you’d best let me get on with it, Mr. ’Art.”

All eyes were on the lovers turned adversaries, as Charles Hart moved toward Nell in two long, commanding steps. He was close enough now for her to feel his warm breath on her face. His nostrils flared, like a bull ready to charge. “Things have changed in your absence, Mrs. Gwynne. I may be forced to take you back, and even to give you the leading role, but, as it happens it was I who was left to select and contract our current production, a wonderful
dramatic
story,
The Indian Emperor,
in which you play the tragic heroine. So, we shall see if you are more clever at adapting to drama than you were at adapting to a life of leisure in Newmarket.”

“I think she takes your point, Mr. Hart,” Richard Bell bravely interjected when no one else dared speak a syllable. Charles Hart pivoted back in response.

“
You
think? Since when does this theater pay an imbecile to think? You are here, Mr. Bell, to sweep up the rubbish in the pit and occasionally to fill in the background when there is absolutely no one else.” Then he added, with a cruel flourish, “Rather like in your own life. Now, shall we all get back to work?”

Nell took a copy of the script from Mary Knepp and glanced at it. Reading for her was still almost impossible, but she rarely allowed anyone to know it. Fortunately, she was a quick study, able to memorize her own lines as well as the lines of the other actors as someone ran through them with her the first time. She glanced down at the jumble of words until one jumped out. The emperor’s daughter was supposed to weep. There was no part of herself she was willing to touch to make that really happen, certainly not before a raucous London crowd bent on a good time. This play would be, she knew from the first word, a disaster. Exactly what Charles Hart wanted. Punishing her publicly would be well worth a very brief financial flop.

There would be no choice but to hold her head up and endure it.

Not if she meant to stay at the theater, and pay her own way.