Chapter Thirteen
Cecilia linked arms with Phoebe and led her down the stairs and into a room from which doors opened onto a wide, stone-slabbed terrace.
Phoebe didn’t have high hopes of the garden from what she’d seen out of the window, but it was clear Cecilia, and probably Gabriel too, wanted to get her out of the house to somewhere more private.
A thrill of excitement ran through her, partly due to being almost alone with Gabriel again, and partly out of her own well-camouflaged longing for a bit more adventure in her dull London life.
The camelias were a splash of much-needed color in the garden, so the three of them headed that way, Gabriel following the two young ladies down the wide stone steps that led down from the terrace. The only other splash of color was the abundant daffodils bobbing their heads along the borders.
“We’ll just stand here, admiring the flowers, where we can be seen clearly from the parlor windows,” Gabriel said. “Then no one will get suspicious.”
Phoebe, full of curiosity at this elaborate subterfuge on the part of the faux siblings, dutifully admired the gorgeous, rose-pink camelias.
“How lucky, then, that they’re worthy of close examination.
” She was feeling much more herself now she was away from that over-crowded parlor.
Large numbers of people in a small amount of space was something she would never be comfortable with, no matter how much Aunt Fanny tried to make her.
Cecilia heaved a sigh. “They are indeed, but that isn’t why Gabriel arranged with me to bring you out here.” She looked up at her tall brother. “We can’t stay out here for long, so you’d better hurry up and explain to Phoebe what you have in mind.”
Phoebe looked up at Gabriel. She’d been assiduously trying not to look at him up to now, as each time she did her heart gave a little unruly leap and she could feel color rising to her cheeks.
Every time she saw him he seemed to have grown more handsome.
But there was no avoiding it now. She managed to keep her voice steady. “You did this with a purpose in mind?”
He nodded.
Oh, if only that purpose had something to do with liking her. But of course, it didn’t. It never would because she wasn’t pretty like her cousin. Not to mention the cricket bat incident. She steeled herself.
He shot a sideways glance towards the parlor window on the first floor. “When we were walking in the park, you said you wanted to come with me into St Giles and see for yourself the state people are forced to live in.”
Phoebe nodded, her heart beating so hard she was sure he would be able to hear it. “I did. And I would still like you to take me there.” How deliciously exciting it was to be plotting a clandestine visit somewhere that would horrify her aunt.
Gabriel nodded, as though he’d required her to reiterate her desire to see St Giles before he could do anything.
“So, it falls to me to help you do that,” Cecilia said, bending closer to pretend an examination of one of the blooms. “He’s taken me there, and I must tell you that it’s opened my eyes to suffering that’s unimaginable if you haven’t seen it for yourself.
” She paused. “It’s changed the way I look at life…
at my life and the way everyone I know lives. It will do the same for you, I think.”
Take aback by this statement, Phoebe stared.
Gabriel had taken a child with him? Cecilia might not see herself as a child, nor look like one, but even to nineteen-year-old Phoebe, fifteen was still a child.
Although, in a way this was somewhat reassuring.
She could only assume that St Giles was not as bad as Gabriel had painted if he’d felt happy to take his younger sister there.
He would surely not have done so had it meant exposing her to danger.
However, the possibility that St Giles might still be nothing but a den of dangerous thieves persisted.
He had indeed made it sound terrible. She took another peep at him.
Did he not have a certain wild recklessness about him that might totally disregard danger both to himself and everyone else associated with him?
A wild recklessness that was undeniably attractive.
After all, he was the Mayfair Highwayman, which in itself required a high level of daring.
For if he was ever caught he would be hanged or transported for life.
She returned her gaze to Cecilia, who, apart from what she’d just said about it changing her outlook on life, didn’t appear to be unduly bothered by having made such a visit. “How do you intend to help?”
Gabriel picked a single camelia and stood twirling it in his long fingers.
“Why, if you forge a friendship with my sister, then you have carte blanche to come here to visit her. And from here I can easily take you with me. My stepmother pays her children very little attention, still less now she’s expecting a fifth, so won’t even notice yours and Cecilia’s absence.
And your aunt will merely think you’ve found a more than suitable friend in the daughter of a duke and wish you to spend time with her. ”
Phoebe had to admit, it did sound like an admirable idea.
“Aunt Fanny will be most impressed,” she said, for a moment envisioning her aunt’s delighted expression.
“But what about the disguise you mentioned? What do I have to disguise myself in?” From the look of the poor people she’d been keenly observing from her aunt’s parlor window she didn’t much fancy donning their clothing.
And she would surely have to in order not to look out of place amongst them.
Cecilia beamed. “Obviously you can’t leave here dressed in the sort of clothes poor people wear. That would be ridiculous.”
Phoebe wasn’t so silly as to not have realized this, but she forbore from saying so in case Cecilia took offense.
Gabriel nodded. “No. I’ll make sure we have our disguises waiting for us in a room I keep in Three Kings Yard, which this garden backs onto. It’s where the mews is. I won’t point now, but in the far corner there’s a door the servants use to go back and forth between the house and the stables.”
Phoebe let her eyes slide sideways toward where he’d inclined his head.
Wisteria grew on the back wall, and sure enough, right in the corner, partly concealed by the trailing branches, was a small, unobtrusive door.
Was that a narrow, sunken path leading along the side of the garden, well-hidden by the bushes?
She gave a small nod.
He handed her the camelia with a flourish.
“When you come to call on Cecilia, after a certain amount of time you’ll go into the garden with her and she’ll lead you out through that door.
It’s hidden from view because no duchess wants to look into her garden and see the servants and delivery men walking up and down in it. ”
“Especially not Mama,” Cecilia put in, with a wrinkle of her nose.
Gabriel nodded again. “Exactly. So no one will see you leave. And I’ll be waiting for you. Cecilia will wait in Three Kings Yard for you to return and then take you back into the house.” His brows knit. “But only if you’re happy with doing this.”
Was he a little anxious to make certain she wasn’t being pushed into it?
Phoebe looked from one to the other of them.
They might not be true brother and sister but they seemed nevertheless very similar in character.
Both had the same light of adventure in their eyes.
Perhaps her own might even be reflecting that.
Imbued with a flush of kindred spirit, she stood up that little bit taller. “Yes. I’ll do it.”
*
Aunt Fanny left Wentworth House in a state of euphoria that both her charges couldn’t help but notice.
Not only, to the amusement of Mattie, had she herself received an offer of a drive in the park from the widowed Duke of Hexham, who had perhaps decided that a sensible matron might be a better bet than a flighty debutante, but both girls had received invitations too.
Mattie had been invited for another walk in the park with Mr. Wade on the morrow, and Phoebe had made firm friends with the duchess’s eldest daughter to the extent that she’d been invited back to spend most of the following day with young Lady Cecilia.
“I think the only thing that could have made Mama happier would have been if your Lord Gabriel were the duke’s son and heir,” Mattie whispered to Phoebe once they were home and out of her mother’s earshot.
“She’d be planning the wedding already.” She paused.
“On second thoughts, you can bet she’s doing that right now anyway, and for me and Mr. Wade, who is undeniably handsome, but not quite the sort I intend to marry, being so short.
He’ll do for now though, as it’s always nice to have a gentleman pay one attention. ”
Phoebe kept silent on that, but found it strange that Mattie, almost overnight, had become an expert on courtship and gentlemen.
Not that she thought she was herself. No, not by any means, but surely she knew as much as Mattie did, having already been escorted to the park by Gabriel.
Of course, she couldn’t disclose that she would be going somewhere a lot further than the park with just him, and with no maid in attendance, despite the temptation to hint at having more experience than her cousin.
Luckily, both Mattie’s and Phoebe’s invitations were for the same day, so Aunt Fanny was unable to suggest that Mattie should accompany Phoebe to Wentworth House, a fact that clearly irked her.
She probably thought a friendship with a duke’s daughter of more consequence than a walk with a viscount’s son.
As a result, with only Atkins as an escort, Phoebe walked the short distance to Grosvenor Square at eleven in the morning and was rushed upstairs by an over-excited Cecilia to a somewhat-faded parlor.
It was luckily empty of any member of her new friend’s family.