Chapter Eight
Spirits fueled by coffee richly enhanced by cream, a scone baked in heaven’s ovens, not one but two serendipitously found
heart-shaped stones, and one sparkly grain of hope, Ginny embarked on her search for the vase the following morning.
Her plan, and she thought it was a good one, was to seek out the late earl’s solicitor to request another look at his will,
in case any special bequests had been made. The Woodvilles had been provided with a copy of it, but she didn’t recall a mention
of a Ming dynasty vase. Perhaps he would know where such a valuable piece had gotten to.
His offices were in Bond Street, and Dot had informed her that hack drivers knew they could frequently find passengers at
the Grand Palace on the Thames.
So she went out into the little park in front of the Grand Palace on the Thames to wait for one to pass.
She lifted the little latch on the wrought iron gate, and froze.
The park already had an occupant.
“Oh, it’s you,” she said.
“Why, good morning to you, too, Miss Woodville.” Mr. Marchand was sitting on a bench.
His dark brown wool coat fitted to distracting perfection the wedge formed by the taper of his shoulders to his waist. His
buckskins hugged the contours of the kind of thighs that could crack a walnut, should a person risk getting close enough to
tuck one between them. The shining toes of his boots reflected a plump white cloud overhead. He was, as usual, almost too
much to absorb.
“I’ve been wondering about something for a few days, Miss Woodville. As a young, unmarried woman of aristocratic lineage,
shouldn’t you be trailed everywhere you go by some sort of glowering dowager who would rap me with a fan for even attempting
to speak to you?”
She sighed. “Yes,” she admitted glumly. Because that was indeed usually how it was done.
Amusement glimmered in his eyes. “A lady’s maid not in the family budget?”
She stared at him in icy silence. He was too clever, and he also sounded faintly sympathetic, which stood all the bristles
of her pride on end. There was no reason he ought to know any more of her business than he already did. But this was, in fact,
exactly the reason she didn’t travel with a companion everywhere. And though she perpetually felt a little underdressed without
a chaperone, she was also getting a little too used to it, and beginning to appreciate its benefits.
“What do you think I did with the rest of yesterday evening?” he asked.
“Debauchery,” she said firmly.
“I was in by curfew,” he replied piously. “Debauchery requires a considerably greater investment of time.”
“I imagine you would know,” she said politely.
But he didn’t look at all debauched. He looked bursting with vigor, and his face even gleamed from a fresh shave. He’d either
done that himself or taken himself off to the barber at an ungodly early hour. She’d seen her own bleary-eyed father at the
breakfast table the morning after a particularly exciting party, his hand trembling as he attempted to spoon sugar into his
coffee. She knew exactly what excess looked like.
Those faint shadows remained under Mr. Marchand’s eyes, however. She hoped his conscience kept him awake and prodded him with
pitchforks.
He cast his gaze upward. “Looks like a pleasant day for vase hunting. You said last night that you always have a plan. So
what is your plan?”
She could think of no reason not to tell him. “I thought I would call upon the earl’s solicitor to ask if he knew of any bequests
of a vase from the Ming dynasty. I don’t recall seeing any in the copy of the will with which we were provided, but I didn’t
memorize it.”
“Mmm. The solicitor. Clever way to start.”
She didn’t know why she felt a surge of satisfaction at his approval.
And then he ruined it. “I know a cleverer way.”
“You’ll save both of us time if you’re not coy about it, Mr. Marchand.”
“Coy?” He was amused. “I know exactly where the vase was last seen.”
She stared at him. “How . . .”
“A vase fitting that precise description has apparently been seen at the home of a longtime lady friend with whom the late
Earl of Highgrove, ah, enjoyed close relations. Her name is Mrs. Henrietta Parker. She, in fact, has many friends in London,
all of whom speak highly of her and visit her often, and several recall seeing such a vase there.”
She suspected “longtime lady friend” with whom the late Earl of Highgrove “enjoyed close relations” was a long way of saying
“his mistress,” and she could feel a blush coming on. The euphemism was almost worse because all those words gave her more
time to picture everything they entailed.
“Shall I assume you spoke with one of her visitors?” she said stiffly.
“Several of her visitors,” he said cheerfully. “Over port last night.
“I know everybody,” he explained almost pityingly, to her stunned silence. “And I was discreet in my inquiries. So no one
knows a wayward sister of an earl is on the loose and looking for a vase.”
“Were you one of her visitors?” She told herself she asked only because she was curious.
“I haven’t had the pleasure of her acquaintance. She is about seventy years old, about the same age as the late earl when
he expired. Lest you begin to feel too optimistic, I’m told she embarked on a trip to Italy some time ago, but was expected
to return this month.”
“When this month?”
“I don’t know, Miss Woodville. I made inquiries. I’m not a mage. But we’re now three weeks into the month.”
Then she realized something. “If the late earl gave the vase to her, and she’s sentimental about it, and it is indeed worth hundreds of pounds, I likely don’t have a prayer of getting it from her.” Panic began to creep like toxic smoke under the door of her optimism.
“Come now. Surely, you’re a better negotiator than that. You find out what somebody needs or fears, and you go from there.
I thought you were ruthless. Desperate times call for whatever measures will work.”
He issued this startlingly cold-blooded point of view matter-of-factly. As though “need” and “fear” were the sole motivating
factors in anyone’s life.
Upon swift reflection, she supposed that wasn’t far from wrong. Hadn’t he identified what she’d needed and feared and used
it to try to negotiate her into his bed for one night? Likely, he’d viewed it as giving her something that she wanted. Quid pro quo.
Nice men did not do that sort of thing.
Safe men did not do that sort of thing.
And yet. She was beginning to get an inkling of how someone might become the kind of person who did do that sort of thing.
“If you choose to pursue this avenue, I will accompany you to Mrs. Parker’s home,” he said. “As it’s not St. James’s Square,
the possibility of being stabbed or abducted is marginally higher.” He said this dryly. But one never knew.
She noticed he was not asking her whether she would like to be accompanied.
Still, she saw the wisdom.
And who else could she possibly ask?
Last night he’d saved her from manure and put her into a hack by herself, and she supposed in his world that counted as chivalry.
“If all of this is just a ploy to lure me into the dark, confined quarters of a hack with you, Mr. Marchand . . .”
“Once again,” he said patiently, “I have never needed to lure any woman anywhere in order to do anything with them, nor have I
needed to stalk them. I assure you, eager volunteers abound. I expect it’s only a matter of time before you throw yourself
at me, Miss Woodville.”
She huffed out a disgusted breath.
In truth, she was very disappointed to realize that she found his frank way of saying shocking things—as if they were ordinary,
everyday, inalienable truths—a little erotic. Every moment spent anywhere near him was a revelation. For instance, now she
knew she could dislike someone profoundly even as the things they said started up an indecorous tingle in her nether regions.
“Secondly, why would I subject myself to the mortal peril of being proximate to your knitting needle? Heaven forfend.”
He’d elevated “sardonic” to an art.
They both turned at the sound of hooves and wheels on cobblestones. It sounded like a hack.
“I have business elsewhere in town this morning, Miss Woodville. If you still feel you need to visit the solicitor, might
I suggest at least taking along Dot, if she’s available? Because men can be awful, as you know. I will meet you in front of
Mrs. Parker’s residence at two o’clock this afternoon. Here’s the direction.” He held out to her a folded scrap of foolscap.
He’d been prepared with it.
He was very efficient, for a devil.
Marchand whistled sharply when the hack pulled into view. It stopped.
She gestured to him that he should go ahead and take it.
“What, I ask, do you have to lose, Miss Woodville?” He tipped his hat to her, pulled open the door of the hack, and rolled
away.
When a hackney cab delivered Ginny to the house on Finster Street at two o’clock, Mr. Marchand was already waiting at the
blue wrought iron front gate. He looked tall and forbidding, the heart-stopping angles of his face distinct even from a distance.
A breeze pushed gossamer shreds of clouds across a pale blue sky. Though it was a rare sunny day, the shades were drawn on
every window of the town house, except for those upstairs, which were bare of coverings. Their blank darkness seemed oddly
sinister. The walk hadn’t been swept in some time; sun-crisped leaves skittered across it and others had banked in front of
the door.
By contrast, curtains fluttered in the open windows of several nearby houses, and their walks were tidy, too.
“I’ve never been in this part of London before,” she mused. It was charming. She could imagine herself living here.
“It’s where all the mistresses live,” Marchand told her, spoiling her fantasy and reminding her too vividly of his recent
indecent offer.
“Is that so?”
“Yes, and all the rogues live on another street, and all the merchants on another, and all the aristocrats on another. It’s a very efficient system.”
She sighed.