The Tattooed Duke (23 page)

Chapter 44

Harlan and the Duke

“N
ow this is more like it,” Harlan said, exhaling a full stream of cigar smoke up into the night sky. A few stars peeked through the thick haze of fog.

“It’s almost like being back out there,” Wycliff said, although the roof now made him think of Eliza right here, and not some grand adventure out there. This was noted and pushed aside.

“Aye,” Harlan agreed. He puffed thoughtfully on his cigar. They had come up to the roof after supper, rather than sitting in the stifling atmosphere of the library. Wycliff had been there all day, studying Arabic, reviewing the account books, and plotting his course. The mission would look different than he had planned.

In fact, all of his plans were now falling neatly into place. But still there were questions, unanswered. He sipped his brandy and asked one of the questions that had been nagging him for a while.

“Did you join Burke’s crew yet?”

Harlan exhaled again, sending another puff of smoke into the air.

“I’m entertaining an offer,” Harlan answered. “He recognizes my translation skills. He also has an expedition planned, and a departure date.”

Wycliff felt his jaw clench, hard. Harlan, his supposedly trusty comrade, was defecting to his longtime rival. The lack of loyalty was breathtaking, save for one fact.

“And yet you’re still here,” Wycliff pointed out. Smoking his cigars. Drinking his brandy. Looking at the stars from the roof of his ancestral home.

“You did save my life. Once,” Harlan remarked.

“When is Burke leaving?” Wycliff asked. He stared up at the few night stars and imagined a sky full of millions. His heart sang in its chains at the thought. But he couldn’t shake the image of Eliza beside him, gazing up at a sky on fire with stars.

“In a few days,” Harlan answered. “Which doesn’t leave you much time. You could just marry Lady Althea and be done with it.”

“I could,” Wycliff said, but the words struggled in his throat, telling him that he absolutely could not. Not when she had tried to trap and outwit him with that child. Not when she was Hades’ Own Harpy. Not when he still had another option.

He would get to Timbuktu. But would he get there first?

Harlan seemed to hear the struggle in his voice, and glanced warily at him.

“It’s the maid, isn’t it?”

“I might be able to come up with the necessary funds in time,” Wycliff replied evasively. He found he didn’t quite trust his old friend, not when he was likely to join a rival expedition. Harlan glanced at him curiously, and then taunted him.

“And then what—will you spend it on an expedition, or set up house with the little missus?”

Wycliff sipped his brandy, savoring the burn, and biting back words he was surprised to find at the ready. Timbuktu. Expedition. Of course. There could be nothing else.

“There’s no missus. There cannot be. She’s married,” Wycliff said.

“That little housemaid has more secrets than you can shake a stick at,” Harlan remarked.

“Aye,” was all Wycliff could say to that.

“You know about her, don’t you?” Harlan asked. “You’re after the Alvanley money, yea?” Harlan fixed his good eye upon the duke. “I put two and two together. Good to see you’re not so far gone that you can’t recognize a woman’s scheme when it’s kissing you and talking honey mouth to your face,” he said, using an Arabic phrase.

Wycliff stared at him, hard. His heart pounded heavily in his chest. The words made him dizzy with anger. His old friend thought him a fool, blinded by the charms of a treacherous woman. Worse: he knew that where he himself suspected a deep, dark, storming real love that could drown him, Harlan saw only an idiot in the throes of infatuation.

Harlan probably thought he wouldn’t turn her in for the money. Little did he know.

Another sip, to give him pause before saying, “Yes. I know. Don’t tell her.”

“Oh, I won’t say a word, old mate,” Harlan said, taking a sip of brandy himself after setting the cigar down. “But I don’t think it’ll work out as you’re planning it will.”

“Whatever does that mean?”

“
Ties,
Duke; the kind of ties that keep a man on land, and get him thinking about heirs and spares and prudent behavior. Before you know it, you’ll be cutting your hair, tying a cravat around your neck, and vexing over your reputation.”

“You seem to have me mistaken for someone else,” Wycliff replied.

“You seem to be refusing to admit that you’re a man in love,” Harlan said plainly.

“I told you, she’s married.” Wycliff nearly growled this unfortunate, immovable, impossible fact. He couldn’t possess her—she wouldn’t let him, so long as her husband might roam the earth. And if he couldn’t have her, then he couldn’t lose her.

“I hope you don’t think that was artfully dodging the question,” Harlan said with a snort, “because that just confirmed everything. You’ve gone and fallen in love with the chit.”

A
fter quitting the roof, Wycliff walked quickly through the halls on his way to the study.

He couldn’t admit Harlan was right. Couldn’t deny it either. That word rattled and banged around his head, knocked on his heart, burned in his gut. He couldn’t admit to loving her, because then he couldn’t very well turn her over to Alvanley for a cool ten thousand pounds, which he would then use to leave her. A man in love wouldn’t do that. He needed to do that.

Wycliff entered the long corridor decked with the portraits of old dukes and duchesses and their dogs and children. They all smiled fondly down upon him, he knew, though he refused to look.

The trip to Timbuktu—and the respect and recognition for his own damned talents and not his lineage—was the summation of everything he’d ever wanted. Over the years, his heart beat for this. He inhaled and exhaled, each breath bringing him closer to his goal. Every shipwreck, plan gone awry, time in prison, night spent hungry under a big black sky, every wild beast hunted and every skirmish and fight with foreign tribes . . . he’d gamely taken all that on for a reason. For Timbuktu. For recognition. For his own damned sense of pride and honor.

Down the great staircase in the foyer he went, his boots pounding on the marble floor. He’d nearly ravished Eliza with a look as she scrubbed these tiles on all fours.

All of his plans, dreams, and quests quite nearly felled by a mere slip of a girl with a pen and feather duster. And eyes like the ocean that saw into his very soul. A pink mouth that gave him untold pleasure from her kiss. A quick mind that perfectly put into words what he was feeling.

Of all that he had seen and experienced in the world, there was nothing quite like Eliza. And he would turn her in, take the money and run. He had to. Or Harlan was right—he would never leave if he wrapped himself up in the ties that bind a man to land, to a future, to a woman.

Wycliff pushed through the heavy oak doors to the library. The last embers of a long-forgotten fire burned in the grate, and he put them to work lighting a candle, which he took to the desk. The book of poems lay open to that one particular page, tempting any spies. How Alvanley knew to name the line that so perfectly, gut-wrenchingly named this moment in his life, Wycliff knew not. That it was poetry pricked his male pride. For ten thousand pounds and a chance at his dream, he would survive.

Removing a fresh sheet of paper and writing things, Wycliff sat down to copy out Lord Byron’s poem in its entirety.

So, we’ll go no more a-roving

So late into the night,

Though the heart be still as loving,

And the moon be still as bright.

For the sword outwears its sheath,

And the soul wears out the breast,

And the heart must pause to breathe,

And love itself have rest.

Though the night was made for loving,

And the day returns too soon,

Yet we’ll go no more a-roving

By the light of the moon.

He added
For Eliza
in his scrawl and signed it
Wycliff.

He folded the page and sealed it shut with wax, pressing the signet ring into it so Eliza would know without a doubt that this was from him.

He’d recently taken to wearing the ring as a reminder of what he would leave behind—his inheritance, his reputation, his past, and one tempting vision of what his future could be.
Eliza.

Funny how his heart still beat hard, with longing, given what he knew.

Treading a dangerous path, Wycliff returned to the attic and slipped the poem under her door.

Chapter 45

Deceiving Mr. Knightly

Offices of
The London Weekly

T
here was the leaf of paper in Eliza’s hand—the latest installment of “The Tattooed Duke.” And then there was the one folded up and tucked into her bodice—a copy of Lord Byron’s poem, handwritten by the duke himself and stuck under her door.

The one that might break Wycliff’s heart, and the one that absolutely broke hers.

No more we’ll go a-roving by the light of the moon
? Eliza could take a hint.
And love itself have rest
? Rest, expire—she took that hint, too. Its meaning was plain to her: he might still care for her. Maybe. But it was, unequivocally, over. No more would they go a-roving. Loving. Anything.

It stung, like the prick of a wasp. Or like the snakebite Wycliff had once described to her. Or perhaps like a bludgeoning.

To make matters even more excruciating, this was the last meeting of
The London Weekly
that she was likely to ever attend. Knightly would find out soon enough about her deal with Alvanley. And then he would fire her accordingly.

It seemed she was in the habit of betraying the men she cared about the most. Funny, that.

This wasn’t quite what she had in mind when she’d donned her disguise and got herself hired as a housemaid of the duke. Her intention had been to remain a Writing Girl, whatever it might take. And now she was walking away from it all . . .

“Well?” Sophie asked when Eliza slipped into the seat beside her.

“Yes, what is . . . I mean . . . how . . . Oh goodness. Where to begin?” Annabelle asked, flustered.

“For Lord sake, ladies, act normal,” Julianna hissed, and Eliza thanked her.

“I can’t. There is too much happening that I am too curious about!” Annabelle gushed, wringing her hands.

“Well here is something,” Eliza said. She reached into her bodice—and then glared at another writer when she caught him eagerly watching her, or rather, her hand. “I have lost his affections, for certain.”

“A poem,” Annabelle said, eyelashes aflutter, when she saw what Eliza handed over.

Julianna snatched it away and read it quickly.

“No more loving. No more roving. I hope you were merciless in your column,” Julianna said sharply.

“It should change once you have the money,” Sophie said in a low voice.

“We ought to invite him to your birthday party, Sophie,” Julianna said.

“He’s already on the list, I think,” Sophie responded.

“Did he reply?” Eliza asked.

“I don’t think so. I’ll send ’round a note tomorrow,” Sophie said, and then she turned full force to Eliza. “
You
are attending, right? It is my birthday.”

“If I can sneak out of the house,” Eliza answered.

“Why do you not just quit?” Julianna asked bluntly.

“Because she is close to him when she is there,” Annabelle said, answering perfectly for her. “And she may never see him again if she leaves. And when you are in love . . . well, just being near the person is a kind of warmth that is hard to forgo.”

“Yes, what Annabelle said. Precisely,” Eliza said. “Because any minute now he will turn me out and slam the door shut behind me. Until that happens, I’d like all my little moments with him, even if it’s me pouring his coffee.”

“I still think you should come to the party,” Julianna said. “I have a dress to lend you,” she offered. It would need to be hemmed, oh, a good seven inches. She could do that while sewing and sipping tea with Mrs. Buxby and Jenny. She realized then she would miss those two.

“I will attend,” Annabelle said. “And I shall need a fellow wallflower.”

“Nonsense,” Sophie said. “Eliza will dance with the duke, and perhaps Knightly will ask you to waltz, Annabelle.” Annabelle blushed furiously at that.

“Roxbury will dance with you both and flirt shamelessly,” Julianna added.

“The flirtations of a rake are not quite as thrilling when the rake in question is madly in love with his wife,” Eliza pointed out.

“Nevertheless you must come,” Sophie said. “And if you could cause some sort of scandal with the duke—say waltzing together, caught together, etcetera—as a hostess, I would be much obliged.”

“And I would as well, as a gossip columnist.”

Eliza’s two fabulous friends peered at her, smiling. She knew they meant well and wished nothing but the best for her. She knew they had adopted Knightly’s credo. She also knew they possessed a security that she did not, with their handsome, wealthy, adoring husbands, as well as a wide circle of friends both haute ton and beau monde.

At the moment everything for her was utterly uncertain.

“This is her heart at stake,” Annabelle chimed in, to her defense. “We mustn’t make sport of it.”

“Thank you, Annabelle,” Eliza said.

“You’re right,” Sophie agreed. “But I still think you should risk attending, and I shall hope Wycliff attends. All sorts of romantic things tend to happen at balls, and I hope that it should happen to you.” Sophie reached out and squeezed her hand, and suddenly everything was all right and she knew her friends only wanted true love for her.

“Ladies first,” Knightly said, striding quickly into the room for the weekly meeting with his writers.

“Was Knightly invited?” Annabelle whispered to Sophie, who whispered, “Yes.”

“Is he attending?” Annabelle questioned.

Knightly glanced curiously over at her, probably because she was talking and not paying attention to him, and most of all not sighing upon his entering a room.

“Yes,” Sophie replied, again in a whisper.

“Then may I also borrow a dress?” Annabelle persisted.

“Yes,” Sophie said again, biting back giggles. The entire staff was watching them now and the room had fallen silent.

“Ladies?” Knightly questioned, raising his brow.

“We are discussing our attire and other plans for a ball later this week,” Sophie answered. Annabelle had gone mute. And pink.

“What rot,” Grenville complained, to the surprise of no one. “That’s why women shouldn’t work. They distract the men from real matters of business by discussing—”

“Matters of courtship and thus marriage and creating the next generation,” Julianna interjected. “Is there anything more noble than that?” she challenged. Eliza sighed. Her friend could never resist an argument. “No, I don’t think there is. And we tend to such matters while also authoring the columns that make this newspaper a sales phenomenon.”

“Speaking of that, Eliza, what do you have for us today?” Knightly fixed his piercing blue eyes on her. They hadn’t exchanged a word—written or spoken—since the confrontation on Saturday. Her final words to him hung in the air:
I shall make it your problem.

“More noble deeds, or nefarious ones?” Knightly asked coolly. He might as well have asked if she wished to continue writing for
The London Weekly,
so loaded was the question.

She smiled mysteriously and handed over the column.

Knightly took the page and began to read aloud: “ ‘No one who had ever seen W.G. Meadows in her infancy would have supposed her born to be a heroine . . .’ ”

He paused and lifted a brow questioningly. Beside her, Sophie sucked in her breath. In this column, Eliza knew she was tiptoeing a fine line between writing about herself and Wycliff. And trying to please Lord Alvanley. She’d spent some very late nights spilling ink, burning her allotment of candles down low, scratching out sentences only to rewrite them.

Knightly continued:

“She was not remarkable in any way, and had little to recommend her. And yet, W.G. Meadows has captured the attention of London, feeding them tidbits of story like feeding a bird from her palm. Who is she? They wonder. The chatter is a low hum all over town. Lord Alvanley put a price on it, to the tune of ten thousand pounds.

And this author has a tidbit of gossip well worth the price. The duke is known to resist all efforts to tame him; Lady Shackley knows this well. Her attempts to lure His Grace into marriage with a young pawn of uncertain parentage was thwarted by the duke’s impressive deductive abilities. We cannot wonder at her desperate attempts to keep him; a woman is lucky to know a man like Wycliff, let alone possess his heart.”

“Are you saying that she faked a child so that Wycliff would be duty bound to marry her?” Julianna asked, in a dramatic gasp. It was unclear if she was aghast or delighted. Probably some combination.

“A pretend secret baby?” Annabelle questioned.

“Yes,” Eliza affirmed. She offered up a silent apology to the duke and a prayer for forgiveness. She had to reveal the trick child to ensure that Knightly would print the column. It was a strategic blow to ensure a greater win. The loss of a battle to win the war. Or so she told herself.

“I
must
send her an invitation,” Sophie murmured.

“And Eliza, you must ensure that the duke attends,” Julianna added. “This could be just the scandal this season has been lacking.”

“It sounds like we’ll have a stellar edition of ‘Fashionable Intelligence’ next week,” Knightly remarked. With that, he was off to the next topic and “The Tattooed Duke” was forgotten. Now all she had to do was wait for Saturday’s publication.

And hope that her column was printed as she had written it.

And that Lord Alvanley’s word was good.

And that Wycliff would forgive her.

And that nothing would happen between this moment and then to upset her carefully crafted plans.