The Pleasure Merchant (28 page)

“Mr. Cranley has been a very naughty boy.” Another smack; another cry. “He
deserves
it. Why don’t
you
stick it in further? Make him gobble it down. He’s hungry enough—after all, he ate up half of the pineapple cake I had baked specifically for my ladies’ tea tomorrow.”

“As you desire, my lady.”

I winked up at Reed, who towered over me though I was fairly tall, before looking at the longcase clock in our entryway. It was half one. The Cranleys had come for supper, and as usual they were finishing the meal by spit-roasting a very particular meat.

“Mr. Blythe told me to tell you there’s some cold things in the larder, if you’re hungry,” said Reed, stifling an enormous yawn with a broad, dark hand. “Chicken, some very good steak and kidney pie, salad, and half a bottle of champagne. Oh, and cake.”

“How thoughtful of him.” Mr. Blythe never forgot me, no matter how busy he was. He really was the best of men.

“There you are, Mr. Cranley!” cried Mrs. Cranley. “
Yes!
Oh, dear me, Mr. Blythe, I’m awfully sorry. He’s gone and—”

“No trouble at all. So have I, though somewhat more tidily. Swallow, Mr. Cranley. Get it all, now. Ah, there’s a good fellow.”

“But your poor sofa! Oh, Mr. Cranley, just look at it. It’s everywhere!”

“The maid will see to it, there will be no trouble at all, I assure you. Focus instead on taking your time withdrawing it… he’s had a devil of a time tonight. No need to add injury to insult.”

Remembering I was not really supposed to be listening in, I put away my watch. “I think I shall go have a tuck in, then. Can I bring you anything? Cup of tea? Cake?”

“No, no, but I appreciate the offer.”

“Very well. Good night, Reed. Thank him for me when you see him?”

“Thank me for what?”

Mr. Blythe was buttoning the drop-front of his trousers as he came into the hall. His wig was askew, but other than that, he was perfectly composed. You would never have known that just moments before he had spent down a gentleman’s eager throat, save for the flush upon his cheek, which could have been just as easily the result of less exotic exercise.

“Supper,” I blurted, not at all elegantly.

“Oh, have you eaten? I thought I just heard you come in.”

“I did. I’m just going. To the kitchen, I mean.” I realized a meal would give me the chance to tell him of my evening. “Are you… can I bring you anything? When you’re all finished?”

“No… or rather, yes,” he said, looking me up and down. His bright, piercing gaze must have detected something unusual in my appearance. He was by both nature and practice a most perceptive man. “Why don’t you bring some sort of collation to my chambers, I could use a snack. But go ahead and start when it comes up. I won’t be long, but I don’t like to keep you waiting.”

Mrs. Cranley emerged, a nine-inch dildo of pure ivory strapped to her loins, over her petticoats. She looked more disheveled than my master, sweat was running traces through her face-powder. “Mr. Blythe,
do
come back. Mr. Cranley is in tears over the mess he’s made of your lovely sofa, and I cannot console him.”

My master rolled his eyes at me, then turned around as he re-settled his wig. “My dear Mrs. Cranley, I purchased that sofa for its durability, and the ability to launder its cushions. I assure you, worse messes have been made of it.”

She put her hands on her hips. “Come and tell
him
that. You’d think he’d never seen spunk before, the way he’s carrying on.” She noticed me. “Oh, good evening, Rasa. How nice to see you! We’d heard you’d gone out for the night. Pity, we were hoping you might join us.”

I enjoyed participating in the Cranleys’ bimonthly appointments. They were a pleasant couple, and delightful to gratify—not only because their desires were so amusing, but because they always clearly articulated whatever it was they thought would make them happy on any given eve. That was rare enough, even with our clientele.

“I’m sorry to have missed it,” I said earnestly.

“Next time, then,” she said, and tapped the large head of her dildo. “You’ll want to come. I have a powerful urge to thrust this up your master for all the cheek he gave me tonight, and he’s never so relaxed as when you’re the one greasing him up.”

Amazing, that after all this time, I still had the ability to blush, but blush I did.

“She’s sweet as posy, isn’t she?” observed Mrs. Cranley. “Wherever did you find her, Mr. Blythe? Did you pluck her off a rosebush, I wonder?”

“No indeed,” said Mr. Blythe. “Roses have thorns, and my dear Miss Rasa is too kind to prick anyone… unless they asked for it, of course. Now, come along with me, my lady—I believe I hear Mr. Cranley trying to scrub away that stain. He’ll do more damage than if he just lets it dry.”

I watched them go, heart pounding. The sight of my master’s broad shoulders tapering into his muscular backside… it never failed to affect me.

Mr. Blythe was not a man many would call
handsome
. For starters, he was more than five and forty, going grey, and on top of that, he was far too hairy to be the hero of a romance. His features were not regular enough to make up for any defects in his figure, and his expression was perpetually sardonic, even when he was being genuinely kind. Even so, there was something about him that drew the eye.

And, in my case, the heart.

It was not just me, I promise you—though I cannot do him justice on the page, I tell you truly that men and women alike were completely fascinated by Mr. Blythe. He was possessed of an uncanny pull or gravity, as if he were a moon and mankind itself a tide.

“I’ll just go, then,” I said vaguely, to Reed.

“Shall I have someone send up your supper?”

“No, I can manage. I’ll fix a tray.”

“Good night, then, Rasa.”

A knowing smile hovered at the corners of Reed’s full-lipped mouth. I frowned back at him, annoyed, but Reed didn’t care twopence for that. He broke into a grin, shrugged, and smugly settled back into his chair.

“I’ve been there,” he said, eyes flickering to the parlor door, “and I don’t envy you.”

“I can’t imagine what you might mean,” I said, and stalked out of the foyer.

But I picked up my skirts and
fled
to the kitchen once I was out of his sight, cursing Reed, and Mr. Blythe, but mostly myself.

Lately, something had changed, and I found it increasingly difficult to suppress my sensations whenever my master was about. At least Mr. Blythe had failed to notice my burgeoning affections. Surely he would have asked about it, had he suspected anything, and I could never lie to him.

I laid out the meal in my master’s chambers, then went to refresh myself in my own. A quick check in my glass revealed why Mr. Blythe had wished to meet with me after his clients departed. I looked flustered. The king of composure himself, he had early on taught me how to conceal and redact. I had learned my lessons well, if I do say so myself—though I could only do so much. Given the obvious state I was in I should have asked me in to chat, had I been he.

“Ah, there you are,” he said, a plate of pie and chicken already on his lap when I entered. “I expected to find you already nose deep in all this. Or perhaps you wish to speak with me before you eat?”

The pie in particular looked very tempting, but my stomach fluttered at the thought of taking a bite. I was not on edge for being alone with him in his rooms, not entirely at any rate; no, I was more concerned with telling him of Tom, and my failure. I did not think he would be angry with me, but neither did I wish to disappoint he whose esteem I cherished most.

“Very good champagne over there,” he said through a mouthful of chicken wing, indicating the location of the bottle with the bone, “pour us both some, and unburden yourself. I hate to see a hungry woman. What is it? Are you in some terrible danger? Or are you… in love?”

“Neither,” I lied, my education at his hands serving me very well indeed. “It’s only… I was recognized tonight. When I was out with my friends.”

“By whom? A client? They know they’re never to approach you after—”

“Not a client.” I did not usually interrupt my master. “Do you remember, earlier this year, when a Mr. Bewit hired you to put him up for Brooks’s? The boy in the shop, the one I hoodwinked into getting at that wig. Tom Dawne is his name.
He
recognized me.”

“The boy… yes, all right, I remember,” said Mr. Blythe, chewing thoughtfully. “Must have a mind like a bear trap. It’s been half a year and you were gussied up in pants and a tricorn at the time, weren’t you? You looked a treat.”

“Yes, it’s extraordinary.” I sipped at my champagne. It
was
good. “He says I’m a shocking duplicate of the real Callow Bewit. In fact… he thought I
was
Callow Bewit, when he first saw me, I mean. He came up to me, threw his arm over my shoulders, and hailed me as a comrade. Only after he got a good look at me did he realize his mistake.”

“How interesting,” said Mr. Blythe. “When Mr. Bewit mentioned he had a son about your age, I asked about the boy, and after hearing he was long-limbed and chestnut-haired I knew
exactly
how to affect the whole operation. It was so perfect, was it not? Of course, it was a risk, bringing Mr. Bewit’s name into it at all… but it was too tempting to hide the man’s involvement in plain sight. Having Mr. Mauntell accuse his rival would be the quickest way to turn all suspicion away from the source, to my mind. Once anyone took the time to think about it, it would beggar belief that a man would hire someone to impersonate his own son in the course of ruining a rival, for who would voluntarily attach their name to a scandal?” He chuckled over his own cleverness. “Queer though,” he continued, turning thoughtful, “how did your shop boy come to know the real Callow Bewit?”

I swallowed a gulp of champagne, doing it a disservice by not really tasting it. “Yes, well… turns out, he’s been working for Mr. Bewit. The wigmaker dismissed him after the whole affair. Apparently he felt his apprentice’s involvement tarnished the shop’s reputation.”

“Mr. Bewit never told me that.” My master was as discomfited as I about this turn of events. “I could have done something about the affair, if I’d only known. Well! I’m really quite astounded to hear it. The poor boy—dismissed! What a terrible shame. He must be close to your age, he would have been late in his apprenticeship. How devastating for him.”

“It was. That’s why I was so anxious to tell you.” I kept my eyes firmly focused on where my fingers gripped the stem of my wineglass. “I fear Tom’s reputation is not the only thing tarnished by this. You must think me a terrible bungler. I can’t see what I would have done differently, but—”

“You mustn’t blame yourself,” he said gently. I looked up. “Mr. Bewit was
my
client. If anyone is to blame, I am. By all accounts you performed your part brilliantly. You looked astounding well in those trousers, as you always do, and I watched you practice your rôle before you set out to pay the call. Really, my dear girl, you mustn’t be so hard on yourself.”

“If I had managed the deception more artfully—”

“Nonsense. What would you have done differently? If you can think of something, well, you know for the future. But really, all we can do is be as careful and precise as possible. Mistakes happen. I have made my fair share of errors, with far worse consequences than any you might have made here. At any rate, it seems as if this unfortunate apprentice made out like a bandit. He’s in service to a gentleman now, and is probably much more comfortable than in some shop.”

I was feeling better now, and much hungrier too. As I rose to get myself a plate, I said, “You’d think. At first it seemed fine enough, to hear him tell it. He’s insinuated himself deep in Mr. Bewit’s confidence. But now that the real Callow Bewit’s come home, he’s found himself gone rather out of fashion.”

“I see. Well, perhaps we could get him his apprenticeship back.”

“I offered, but Tom—”

“
Tom
, is it?”

I looked over my shoulder to see Mr. Blythe smiling at me knowingly. I blushed, mortified that he would think me susceptible to the charms of a mere pup. I esteemed the lad’s pluck, but while he was handsome enough, and possessed of a perfectly fine figure, Tom’s manners had revealed him to be the sort of young man who knew vastly less about the world than he thought he did. The clumsy, artless way he’d wrangled a second meeting, when he could have just asked! Had I not felt so responsible for his misfortunes I should have laughed in his face.

“He told me to call him that,” I snapped, trying not to flounce back to my chair with my plate in one hand and the rest of the bottle of champagne in my other. With as much dignity as I could muster, I poured us both another glass, and tucked in. “What I was trying to say is that he isn’t sure what he wants. He said he needed time to decide, so we’re meeting again, on Thursday.”

“Are you now.” Oh, how his amusement rankled! “I hope it’s not for supper, I had promised Mr. Raleigh you would attend his bacchanal. He says no one in London peels a grape like you. Or looks so fetching in a tunic and stola.”

“Yes, I remembered. Tom and I aren’t meeting ‘till ten.”

Mr. Raleigh had been my master’s master’s client, before she retired. An aging scholar of ancient Rome, his revels had been quite the event a quarter century ago. Now, at eighty, a bottle of claret, a light meal, and a pretty girl draped in purple was all he wanted in the world, and he was usually tucked in and asleep in bed by half nine. “Of course, if you think it will go later… or you need me… I could always cancel?” I tried not to sound too hopeful.

Mr. Blythe set aside his plate and leaned forward. “I think it’s a good thing, your going out with a young man, even if he’s not entirely to your taste.”

“Oh?” My heart seemed to stop, then start again much too quickly. “Why is that?”

He sighed. “I fear you don’t get out enough.”

“I go out with you four times a week even when it’s not the season!”

“Oh, I know things here keep you busy… I simply mean you don’t get out enough with young people your own age.”