Chapter Ten #3
They didn’t serve tea or coffee here. He’d poured a little bit of the ale into a glass for her and she was staring at it.
She’d never tasted ale. It was admittedly pretty, deep gold under a creamy crown of foam.
“ ‘Ginny’?” Marchand finally quoted. Amused.
“None of my siblings could pronounce Guinevere, let alone spell it, when we were little, so it stuck.”
“I see. Miss Woodville . . . how long have you lived alone with your siblings?” He seemed to have been doing some wondering
about things during the silence.
“Since I was almost sixteen years old. Eight years.”
“And you raised them with no other adults around?”
“Well, not precisely. The neighbors regularly looked in on us and have been very good to us. So did various relatives, when they could. But they knew we didn’t want to be separated.
And everyone knew I’d be equal to the job of running the house.
It was my mother’s wish, after all.” She said this both proudly and defiantly.
“I suppose we were lucky, after a fashion. We never felt abandoned.”
“Your mother specifically requested that you look after your siblings?”
She was feeling interrogated now, and a trifle defensive. He was clearly trying to understand how her life had come to such
a pathetic pass.
“Yes. Well, I’m the oldest. My sisters are twins—four years younger than I am. They’re very precious and sweet girls, quite
innocent but level-headed. And Hogarth is clever but a bit timid in many ways. He’s also very sensitive. But I am the capable one. I always have been. And I’m not timid. My mother knew I would be able to manage it.”
He nodded thoughtfully. “Did your parents tell you that you were these things or did you decide that you were these things?”
The question surprised her. “Well, yes, they told me this. But my sisters are precious, Mr. Marchand. Hogarth is shy. I am capable.”
“I believe you.” But he said it only after a hesitation.
She bristled at the note of skepticism. It always seemed only a matter of time before Marchand made her bristle.
“And there’s no other money attached to Hogarth’s new title? No property that can be sold, no other income?”
These were admittedly probing and personal questions, but she supposed the two of them were past being precious about that sort of thing.
“There’s one other property entailed. We may eventually be able to earn rent from it, but it could be some months before we find a tenant, provided we ever do.
The land surrounding it would be decent for raising sheep.
That is, if we were able to actually buy some sheep.
We do have all sorts of animals at home, but no sheep.
And we also have a big house and very little money left. ”
He took this in. “I overheard your conversation with Lord Cambrough, of course. And I’m struggling to understand why you’re
the one negotiating the wedding settlements for your sisters, and not your brother or your solicitor.”
“I’ll be better at it,” she said shortly.
“But your brother is a grown man. He’s an earl. He’s the one who ought to be managing the estate. And he’s the one who ought
to be negotiating the settlements. As the head of the Woodvilles, he ought to be looking after his family, and that includes
you. If he can arrange for membership in Lucifer’s Fall, he can certainly handle that responsibility. Is he impaired in some
way I missed when I met him?”
She thoroughly resented this question and punished him with a moment of sullen silence.
Mainly because, in her heart of hearts, she knew he was right.
She had completely forgotten what it was like for a man to want to take charge of something.
“But I promised I would look after him, Mr. Marchand. Remember, he was just a young boy when my parents died. And . . .” She
took a breath. “He’s been afraid of heights since my parents’ high-flyer accident.”
Marchand’s head went back then came down in a nod of comprehension. “I see.”
“He’s not impaired. But surely you understand why I’m protective of him.”
Marchand poured a little more ale into her glass, his brow still furrowed.
She sipped it and wrinkled her nose. Which made him smile slightly.
She drank a little more to please him. She would not ever crave ale, she decided, but it wasn’t horrible.
“I want you to know,” he said quietly, finally, “that I think the Earl of Sydenham is a bastard.”
She went still. Stunned.
“Treating someone else’s grave financial predicament as a game is despicable. He ought to have either forgiven the debt, rejected
your request outright, negotiated the amount down, or offered a fair exchange on the spot. Not send you on an absurd hunt.”
She recalled how uncomfortable Marchand had looked when the earl had introduced his little plan about the vase. Viewed one
way, she supposed Marchand’s blunt offer to exchange money for sex was more honorable, even if it was still on the face of it odious. He seemed to understand that her body was the one commodity
with which she could freely barter.
How absolutely surreal it felt to entertain these sorts of thoughts.
But with his words, some of the tightness in her chest eased. It was a relief to hear that someone else recognized the gross
indignity of her circumstances. Even if that indignity more or less had its origins at Lucifer’s Fall.
“I never liked him,” she admitted. “The Earl of Sydenham always maintained my father stole my mother away from him.”
Marchand snorted softly. “Can anyone truly be stolen from anyone else?”
“My thoughts exactly! I once overheard him say to my father, ‘I’m an earl, and you’re only a viscount.
She’d have to be a looby to choose you over me, ha ha, I suppose I dodged a bullet.
’ Even when I was very small their banter made me uncomfortable.
It didn’t seem funny at all. My mother loved my father, clearly. She chose him.”
“Men and their honor, Ginny,” Marchand said simply. Dryly.
She fell quiet.
“Mr. Marchand, I would like to go to the park to see if that man named Cook and his friend have the vase.”
“Absolutely not. Those men want to rob you.”
She was never going to love the way he issued orders. “But what if they do have the vase?”
“Even so, I am very certain they want to rob you,” he repeated dryly. “And they don’t have the vase. I can say that with about
one hundred percent certainty.”
“But if they do have the vase, I can have it as soon as today,” she insisted, a little desperately.
“They’re going to try to rob you, Miss Woodville.” He was exasperated now. “I know that corner of the park. It’s near all the gentleman’s clubs. It’s
an excellent place to do some robbing, if you’re of a mind. I’ll hand that to them. And if there’s anything I’ve learned definitively
from my storied career, it’s when a man is up to no good. If we both go, they’ll rob both of us, or kidnap you. Maybe a little
of both. Or worse. You will not be going. And I will not take you there.”
How had her life come to this? Was she really a hairbreadth away from a possible kidnapping because of a vase?
“Do you genuinely think there’s a possibility of all of that robbing and kidnapping?”
“I wouldn’t say it if I didn’t. You might be sheltered, Miss Woodville, but surely even you know there’s a higher chance of being robbed than finding a Ming vase in a park.
I need you to believe me.” The last words were terse and adamant.
She could tell he was very nearly offended that she was arguing the point.
“But there’s a chance of finding it.” She could hear the anguish in her voice.
Whereupon he fell abruptly, grimly silent.
They sat that way for a time. Staring down each other yet again.
“Honestly, Mr. Marchand, who would look at you and think, ‘I can successfully rob that man’?”
This made him give a short, humorless laugh. “You’d be surprised at how many bloody stupid people live in London.”
But fear had her in a vise again. She simply could not relinquish what seemed like her only chance to repair this Hogarth-wrought
disaster. She could all but feel again the wind of the abyss whistling beneath her feet.
“Mr. Marchand . . . I . . . I don’t know what else to do.” Her voice broke.
He did not reply. The grim line of his mouth tightened.
His expression remained implacable.
She drew in a long breath, and exhaled at length. “Very well. If you won’t go with me, Mr. Marchand. I’ll go on my own.”
She said it softly and evenly.
It was a test, and they both knew it.
He didn’t like it one bit. Surprised anger flashed in his eyes.
His expression now was thoroughly forbidding.
The little hairs at the back of her neck buzzed as if in anticipation of a lightning storm.
’E be a dangerous man. One of the worst men in London, Mrs. Haddock had called him. He probably was, for many reasons. Not the least of which was that he was the reason that she, Guinevere Woodville, was discovering she had a taste for danger.
He’d been right when he’d accused her of being a gambler. Because she’d essentially just made a reckless wager. And as she
waited for his reply, she teetered on the dizzy verge of an exultation she was afraid to examine too closely.
It had little to do with the vase, and everything to do with the man.
Because she knew what his answer would be.
And she thought she knew why.
He drained his ale. He referred to the time on his pocket watch.
“I’ll go with you,” he said quietly.
“There are vendors here. Look, Mr. Marchand!”
In St. James’s Park they passed tables ladened with meat pies, fresh flowers, fruit, baskets and pottery, various tonics in
dark bottles, and bundles of dried herbs. The latter made her think of Mr. Delacorte. All of these wares were presided over
by cheerful, beckoning merchants. Potential customers clustered about. It looked quite benign, even festive.
Ginny’s mood was improving by the second, which it probably had no right doing, given her circumstances. But she was outside