Chapter 17 #3
My mind darted to possible occupations for his friend: a solicitor, an art gallery owner, an estate auctioneer, a thief, a funeral parlor owner, a resurrectionist, or a medical student. Any of them might want to know when someone died. Death was an opportunity for the vultures.
“I bought copies of today’s papers, too.” James tossed them onto the table.
scotland yard flailing! trumpeted the Times.
murders thwart the detectives announced the Standard.
“The police are taking a beating,” James said. “I assume you’d have said, but have Billy and Tommy come back?”
“Not that I’ve seen,” I said.
James split the pile of newspapers in half, setting the stacks on either side of the table.
“What should we look for?” I spooned tea leaves into the pot and poured hot water from the kettle.
“Something fancy. An opera or a theater opening.” James grinned. “I don’t know the schedule offhand.”
I snorted.
“A party would be best,” he said. “People drinking spirits or champagne, and they’re talking or dancing.”
My mind leapt to the day I’d taken the necklace from Mary while she talked.
“Another possibility would be to take it from the marquess’s house,” he said. “Do you know where they live?”
“Somewhere in the West End, I assume.”
“Hm.” He poured out hot tea for us into two mismatched cups, clinked the kettle back on the stove, and brought two more lamps over, lighting them with deft hands.
He paused, and I looked up. He’d caught me staring.
Feeling warmth creeping along my neck, I picked up my cup and bent my head over the first page of the newspaper.
Two hours went by, broken briefly when one of us would find an interesting news item—the ridiculous, the startling, or the peculiar.
Someone had broken into a butcher shop in Bethnal Green, taken several shanks of meat, and left behind an old boot.
A mud lark had found a battered shield that appeared centuries old, but it turned out to be a “Billy and Charley,” one of the fake medieval objects metal-cast by two confidence men in the 1850s.
There had been an outbreak of cholera at the King’s Bench, the notorious debtor’s prison, not far from Elephant and Castle.
Then my eye caught a notice about a ball to be held at Lord Charleton’s house in St. James.
In the third paragraph was a list of half a dozen titled people, including two of Queen Victoria’s daughters, Princess Alice and Princess Helena, with their respective husbands.
I scanned the remainder of the article for other names but found none.
“James, look.” I turned the paper toward him. “What about this?”
He looked to where I pointed. “Aye, that’s likely. Let’s see if there’s a list of other people invited. Hand me some of the next few days, will you?”
We were silent, turning pages, seeking only news items related to the Charleton ball.
James let out a soft whistle and I looked up. “Found the list.”
I stood and went around the other side of the table to peer over his shoulder. There were perhaps two hundred names.
No doubt the people who weren’t listed would be mortified, their absence a sign that they were several rungs down society’s ladder.
Together we searched the small print, with me reading from the bottom and James from the top. Three inches down, James’s forefinger tapped, and there it was: The Marquess and Marchioness Hargrave.
“Oh.” I let out a breath.
He grinned. “There.”
I returned to my chair and sank into it.
His eyes were sparkling in the lamplight with satisfaction and something like relief. Relief for me, I realized. “A ball gives us options,” he said. “It’s much easier to slip in the house, with so much coming in.”
“Food and wine,” I said, recalling the delivery at the Willitses’ house.
“Not to mention musicians, furniture, flowers, tables, chairs, servants hired especially for the night. The servants’ entrance will be wide open, and no one will be suspicious of a new face.”
“But James, it’s in less than a fortnight.”
He shrugged. “At least we know.”
“I don’t suppose I can go in the front door,” I said, my mind ticking through possibilities. “Even with proper clothes.”
“Perhaps you could,” he allowed, though dubiously. “You’d give your name to the footman to announce you, but the guest list will be large enough no one will know everyone, not even Lady Charleton herself.”
“I’d be better going in as a hired servant. As a maid, I could circulate, bringing food or drink up to the dining room.”
He hesitated. “How adept are you at removing a necklace from a woman’s neck without her noticing?”
I shrugged. “I can practice. But could I go in as a servant, do you think? I’ve only ever acted the part for a dodge, and I don’t know how I’d go about being hired.”
“Emma does,” he said. “She was in service before Ma died.”
“She was?”
“Sarah can probably help you, too.”
I hesitated. “I’d rather not involve her.”
“All right.” He stood and brought our cups to the sink with its single tap at the bottom of a pipe.
“You can look in the ‘Situations Vacant’ columns in the papers. But there’s also servants’ registries where you can enroll.
Mrs. Massey’s and Mrs. Hunt’s are the two best. But give me a day or two to get a forged character for you, saying you’ve worked elsewhere, somewhere away from London they can’t readily check.
Then you can see about being hired by the company that’s catering the event. ”
I found myself staring at his broad back, bent over the sink. How does he know such things?
He returned to the table. “Seems you have a good option to present Maggie,” he said as he shuffled the newspapers back into an orderly pile. “Less complicated than Yale locks and safes, to be sure.”
I stepped around the table to face him. With his shirt open at the neck, I could see the broad V of his collarbone, the pulse in the notch, the shadow of whiskers darkening his jaw.
I came near enough to feel the heat of him.
“Kit.” There was a note of warning in his voice, but I ignored it and reached for him.
His hands came to my wrists, stopping my hands before they could settle around his neck.
His eyes were dark and fixed on mine, though his voice was hoarse.
“God knows I want this.” He gave a small shake of his head. “But not for helping you.”
It wasn’t just for helping me tonight, or for all the ways he’d looked out for me, or even the way he looked as if merely the sight of me on his threshold pleased him so.
How could I explain it? A feeling stirred up under my heart, tipping it over like a wheelbarrow spilling sideways.
It was for the way he threw back his head when he laughed at a story, the way he told me the truth about being afraid in prison like it wasn’t shameful, and the way, after years of me taking care of Sarah, he made me feel like I wasn’t the only one in the world who looked out for people more than they knew.
I admired how he’d carved out lawful work for himself, and I liked the shape of his hands, the bulk of his shoulders, the way he could wink at me so quick no one else saw it—
But all that came out of me was, “It’s not,” in a choked voice.
Perhaps he saw some of the rest of it in my face, for his expression changed, and he let go of my hands to run his rough fingers into my hair, holding me apart, just looking.
I had kissed men for badgering but never for wanting to, and it seemed he knew it, for his mouth brushed mine tentatively at first. The lightest kiss, but it tumbled joy onto my heart wide and high as the wake of a steamship.
He drew back and I could look at him. I touched my fingers to his cheek and ran my thumb over his mouth, and he caught my hand, pressing the soft part of my palm to his lips.
Then his mouth was hungry on mine, and as he kissed me, heat ran from the crown of my head down to my feet, razoring like lightning over my skin.
When at last we drew back from each other, I looked for some light of humor in his eyes. A glint of triumph or a spark of glee that he’d won me over.
Instead, there was a tenderness and wonder that turned my bones to water.
“Why now?” he muttered. “I’ve wanted to be with you for years.”
“But you never told me,” I protested. “You never said a word! You kept it secret as a load on a die.”
He gave that sideways tilt of his head that meant I had a point.
“You think I was going to hand my heart over to you just so you could stomp on it? Benny was sweet on you forever, and he got nowhere. When Caleb tried to kiss you, you smacked him so hard you bloodied his nose. You’d have nothing to do with the lot of us.
Then again, we were all young and stupid. ”
“You’re old and wise now?” I teased.
The skin around his eyes crinkled, and he drew my fingers to his mouth to kiss them. It reminded me of the gloves. “Do you know, I’ve never had something bought from a department store before you gave me those gloves.”
“Oh, I stole them,” he said, his face deadpan.
“You did not,” I said, swatting him as he laughed. “You see the way you joke!”
His smile faded, and he looked at me questioningly. “Do you mind it?”
“No,” I admitted. “I like it.”
“All right then.”
He bent and kissed me again until I pulled away to ask, “Why do you? Make a joke? Emma does the same when she’s upset.”
His expression turned thoughtful. “I suppose it began after Father died. Ma was . . . just so sad.”
I remembered Emma had said her mother’s heart was broken.
“We both tried to make her laugh,” he said. “No one wants to see their mum cry like that, like she couldn’t stop.”
“I never saw mine cry,” I said.
“Never?” he asked.
I shook my head. “She’d snap and scold, but she didn’t cry.”
“I’ve never seen you cry,” he said.
“I guess I don’t much see the use of it.” I rested a hand on his chest, feeling the warmth of his skin through the linen of the shirt. “Sarah cries sometimes.”
He put his warm hand over mine. “Are you worried about this dodge?”
A half laugh escaped me. “I always worry. If I stop worrying, that’s when the bad things happen. So long as I’m watching and worrying, they don’t.”
“You know it’s not so. People are out there causing all sorts of trouble your worrying won’t stop.” He tipped my chin up so our gazes met. “Are you considering getting out? Of having this be the last time?” His tone was even, but the look in his eyes told me my answer mattered.
“Sarah wants me to.” The words stuck in my throat like a clump of dry bread. “And I would, but I don’t have enough to stop.”
“What’s enough?” His voice was practical. “A hundred? Two hundred?”
“I don’t know.” I was trying to be honest. “It’s been years since my mother died, leaving us with nothing, and I still have dreams that I’m running from door to door, hammering to get in because I need food for Sarah, and none of the doors open.”
He studied me. “But that’s not the truth now, is it?”
“No,” I admitted. “I’ve enough put by to take care of us, if something happens, if Sarah gets sick or I can’t work for a while.”
He opened his mouth as if to correct me but closed it again, as if he thought better of it. “Well, for the next two weeks, until this dodge is done, let me worry for you, if it must be done.”
“Will you worry over Sarah for me, too?” I asked wryly. “She despises when I do it, but she likes you, so she’d probably take it with better grace.”
He laughed and bent to kiss me again, his mouth warm and tender and full of longing, like he had years to make up for.
We might have remained there for hours, but I drew back shakily. “I should go.”
“Yeah?” he whispered, his forehead touching mine.
“Yeah,” I echoed. “It’s getting late. I need to tell Maggie I’ve figured out how I’ll get that bloody necklace for her.”