Chapter 8
A Scarlet Mask
The sign of The Black Swan hung above the street door.
This was not Mayfair. That much was evident even to a lady who had spent the last few years safe at Hounslow Park.
Eveline had missed London and its amusements, but coming to know this part of the city, the East End, was a more delicate matter.
Here the streetlamps seemed less generous, and the carriages stopped with a very studied discretion, which could indicate only two things: costly sins or business no one wished to explain over breakfast.
Or, most likely, both.
Eveline stood beside Lady Ashbury at the entrance of the club, her heart beating wildly. Not even Margot, who had spent the whole evening watching her with the pleasure of a woman about to see a little fire of her own making blaze up, had wholly calmed her.
Statony would shut her away in a convent on the other side of the world if he caught her, and not even Lady Ashbury could save her from such a fate.
The dowager countess was dressed in deep blue silk, a shade that set off the sparkle of her eyes and the authority of her smile, which that night looked more brazen than ever.
The matching mask covered part of her face, but it could not hide that assurance so much her own, which declared she had seen too much to be scandalized at visiting a place of sin.
For that very reason, she was more dangerous than any reckless newly out young lady.
Beside her, Eveline felt too young and nervous.
At least she was absurdly beautiful, according to the words of her mentor in improper matters.
Margot had insisted that her attire must harmonize with the red mask, and in red she had dressed her.
The result of the two of them was so striking that Eveline was beginning to suspect that going unnoticed had never been part of the dowager countess’s plan.
Although, with Lady Ashbury, plans tended to look like one thing and end up transformed into something far more unsettling.
The previous night, the dowager countess had informed the Duke and Duchess of Statony that Eveline would spend the following day and night at her house. She did it with such naturalness that Oliver raised no objection and Alice smiled with a suspicious resignation.
Lady Ashbury had not taken her to her house to embroider handkerchiefs or to discuss the dinner menu.
She had taken her there to scheme a piece of mischief.
A reckless escapade that involved a closed carriage, gowns chosen with care, masks to guarantee anonymity, and a place Eveline had not known until the vehicle stopped in front of The Black Swan, a decadent club.
‘This is madness,’ Eveline murmured as she looked at the door.
‘Yes,’ Margot answered, satisfied. ‘But amusing, and that changes everything.’
‘I am not sure my brother appreciates the distinction.’
‘Your brother appreciates very few things when they interfere with his need to decree. Statony is not here. ’
Eveline turned to her.
‘Why are we here, Lady Ashbury?’
‘Margot. You must call me Margot, no titles here, my dear. And we are here because it will be amusing. I have told you already. Among other reasons.’
‘Margot…’
‘Do not pull that horrified face. I assure you that, if this goes wrong, I shall take responsibility for nearly everything.’
‘For nearly everything?’
‘It is well to leave a small margin for improvisation.’
The door opened before Eveline could demand an explanation that would save her completely.
A large man, broad of shoulder and scarcely impressionable of expression, filled the threshold.
He wore no livery, but his bearing was enough to make clear that one did not enter here on a mere whim. He was the guardian of the place.
‘Good evening,’ said Margot with a smile.
The man examined them from head to toe.
‘Good evening, my lady. I cannot allow you to pass.’
‘What a sad beginning for our friendship,’ Margot noted.
‘Without an invitation or a password, no one enters. Do you have either of the two?’
Eveline swallowed with great difficulty. Was her bit of mischief going to prove so short-lived? Better so.
‘Margot, perhaps we ought to—’
‘I know what you are going to say, and no, we ought not.’ The dowager countess turned her face towards her without taking her eyes entirely off the porter. ‘Tell him who you are.’
Eveline felt the air catch in her throat.
‘Have you gone mad, Margot?’
‘It is a possibility many people have considered at one time or another, but at present I am not. Tell him, or he will not let us in.’
‘If I tell him, I will put myself in danger.’
‘Oh, no. Mr. Briggs will say nothing. He is a man to be trusted.’
The big man at the door narrowed his eyes.
‘How do you know who I am, my lady?’
Margot gave him one of those smiles that could open doors, shut mouths, and ruin reputations with the same delicacy.
‘Because we are friends of Miss Alice, and she told us of this place. Of you as well.’
Mr. Briggs shifted his stance slightly. It was not much, but enough for Eveline to understand that Alice’s name carried weight there, at the entrance of a club where respectable ladies should never be found.
What the devil had her brother’s wife done to be known in such a place?
And why had she told Lady Ashbury and not her?
‘Miss Alice?’ he repeated cautiously.
‘A good friend of yours. Do not try to throw me off. I mean the present Duchess of Statony, if you prefer to be formal,’ Margot added, ‘though tonight we are all making notable efforts not to be. Eveline, my dear, tell him who you are, or we shall be here until the sun comes up, and that does not suit us.’
Eveline closed her fingers over her reticule. If Oliver could see her at that moment, he would probably suffer a ducal apoplexy. If Arden could see her… No. Better not to think of him. The earl had lost any right to occupy her thoughts.
Alice, a friend of that heap of muscle?
The dowager countess gave her a small push to encourage her to do as she had asked.
Eveline approached Mr. Briggs just enough that only he could hear her, and said:
‘I am the sister of the Duke of Statony,’ she whispered. ‘And therefore Alice is my sister by marriage.’
The porter’s face did not change much, but his eyes did. His gaze sharpened. It went from Eveline to Margot and back to Eveline with greater interest.
‘One moment,’ he said, while he considered what he ought or ought not to do.
‘We do not have all night,’ Margot observed.
‘With all due respect, my lady, I suspect my employer would prefer that I take a moment before letting the sister of a duke into his club, and the more so if it is Statony.’
‘Your employer does not want me to grow angry. Do not make me wait longer than necessary. ’
‘Are you certain Miss Alice has sent you?’ he asked with interest.
‘That is so. Why else would we be here without an invitation or the password? She assured us her name would open the door for us. It seems the duchess was mistaken. ’
Eveline knew Margot was lying brazenly, but she would not betray her. Alice would not approve of this outing into the East End.
Mr. Briggs seemed to waver between his instinct for survival and a caution produced by all the years he had spent guarding that door. In the end he stepped aside.
‘Come in. And do not part from each other. You look appetizing, my lady, but the scoundrels will focus on the girl and might try to impose themselves.’
‘How attentive,’ said Margot.
‘It was not an invitation to enjoy yourselves, my lady. It is a warning not to let down your guard.’
‘You have been very clear. Appetizing? I am not a dessert, sir,’ she chided him.
Eveline crossed the threshold behind the dowager countess with the sense of having left the known world and entered one where the rules had worse intentions.
The Black Swan was not the gloomy den she had imagined.
That disconcerted her. There were rooms lit with a low, golden light, dark carpets, gaming tables, heavy draperies, smoke, murmurs, and an aroma mingled of perfumes, liquor, and danger.
The men talked, gambled, and laughed a great deal.
Some women, masked or not, moved among them with a freedom that struck Eveline as fascinating.
No one here looked innocent. Perhaps that was why the place proved so unsettling and exciting at once.
And while they advanced among the club’s members, the master and lord of the place, Gabriel Hope, saw them before they noticed they were being watched.
Mr. Hope had a special sense for detecting trouble.
Those two ladies did not belong in his club.
A young woman dressed in a red bright enough to provoke duels and a mature woman wrapped in blue silk, sensual and looking far too sure of herself…
A bad business. Those two were a story about to explode.
Hope approached with a half smile, too charming to be innocent.
‘Ladies,’ he greeted them, ‘I fear this place is not for you. We do not accept in my club distinguished women who might provoke a riot. You ought to leave while you still have time to do so. ’
Eveline recognized him before he recognized her.
He was Alice’s half brother. She had seen him every year since Henry’s birth, when he came to take tea at Hounslow Park for the child’s birthday.
He was never much spoken of, and no one asked questions.
She knew he was the result of a liaison between Alice’s father and an actress, but did he also run a club in the East End? How interesting!
Gabriel, as far as Eveline recalled, did not even like to be smiled at.
And there he was, smiling at them.
‘A pity,’ said Margot. ‘We have only just arrived and have no wish to leave yet.’
Hope regarded her with interest. Then he slid his gaze towards Eveline.
‘A lady dressed in red never does well to linger long in a place where the men interpret colors with more enthusiasm than intelligence.’