Chapter Fourteen
Gabriel scrambled up from where he’d been sitting on the top step.
For a moment he stared at the person Phoebe had been transformed into in open admiration.
Gone was the young lady born with the proverbial silver spoon in her mouth, daughter of an earl and recipient of a substantial fortune, and in her place was the rather plain and ordinary looking brother of Tom and Joe Booth.
Cecilia had even managed to smear some dirt across her cheeks.
He took off his cocked hat and swept her as flamboyant a bow as was possible while standing at the top of rickety stairs and hampered with only one working arm. “Master Will, you make a fine boy, I must say.”
A pleasing touch of color rose to her pale cheeks.
His heart did a little leap. Could it possibly be that she liked him, or was it just his flattery?
And by like he meant more than just as someone who was offering her a touch of adventure and possibly a point to her hitherto pointless life.
That he was doing both, he had no doubt at all.
Of course a young woman brought up in a country stately home and then in the most fashionable and expensive part of London needed a purpose in life more than marrying and producing heirs for some pompous member of the nobility.
A man who, in between siring those heirs, would most likely be carrying on with any number of mistresses, much as Ambrose was.
He had it all mapped out in his head and possessed the absolute conviction that he was quite right.
About almost everything.
But the one thing he wasn’t sure of at all, and which had him doubting himself, was whether she liked him or not.
In the way he wanted her to, of course, which he was beginning to realize was not just as a friend.
And of course, there was the uncomfortable possibility that if he expressed his liking for her she would take him for a fortune hunter.
He rather regretted having revealed to her his need for money for the ever-increasing expenses of his project.
If he hadn’t told her any of that, and had omitted everything about his own humble beginnings, she might be expected to view an advance from him in a more favorable light.
They might have been on a more even footing had he been less precipitate in his confidences.
However, he was determined not to be amongst the men who would, without a doubt, be after her fortune for their own personal gain.
So really, he’d rather scotched it for himself. Hindsight was not always a good thing.
All of these jumbled thoughts shot through his head as he bowed and straightened up again, but he pasted a cheerful grin on his face and held out his left hand to her.
After a momentary hesitation, she set her own hand, now wearing brown, fingerless knitted gloves, into his, and they descended the dangerously creaking stairs together.
At the foot, before pushing open the door, he paused and looked back at her, suddenly serious, for this was important. “Are you sure you’re ready to become Will Booth? With every ounce of your being? To walk and talk like a boy from the back streets, to forget the girl inside you?”
Phoebe nodded. Her wary eyes gave away her lack of conviction, though. But then, this was her first time in disguise, her first time anywhere but in the cossetted parlors of Mayfair, and probably the first time she’d ever worn boys’ clothes.
She’d soon learn. “Welcome to my world,” he said, with a grin, and pushed open the door.
Three Kings Yard was still a hive of activity.
Understandable as it comprised the service area for all the houses that fronted onto not just Hill Street but some of Brook Street and Grosvenor Street as well.
The stench of ammonia wafted out of the many stables, mixed with the general smokiness of the London air.
Horses whinnied, hooves clattered on the cobbles or kicked stable doors in impatience.
Men shouted at one another or whistled as they worked, a wagon of hay was being unloaded into one of the buildings, someone not in view was hammering nails and singing.
Tradesmen hurried past with deliveries that would be taken through back doors into the big houses so as not to offend the delicate gaze of their occupants.
It looked chaotic, but he knew it was not.
He loved the vitality of it, but Phoebe’s face had paled and she shrank back against the door.
He caught her hand. “Come along. No one will pay us any attention, no matter what Cecilia said about being thrown out if someone sees me. We blend in. In fact, you’ll find you’re next to invisible.
Think how you didn’t notice people who look like we now do before I pointed them out.
You’ll see I’m right.” And he pulled her after him out into the mêlée.
She stayed close. In all probability she’d never seen anything approaching this before.
Being a boy, he’d most likely been less sheltered as a child than she had, especially after the death of his mother, and the stables at both Wentworth Castle and the townhouse had been among his favorite haunts.
He’d spent long hours, when he’d managed to escape his governess, in the company of both Alf Newhouse, his parents’ head groom, and Alf’s grandson, Jed, who’d been his chosen playmate for his childhood years.
Jed, who was now a groom at Wentworth under his grandfather’s command, had played a large part in encouraging him in his discovery of social injustices, if that was what he could call how he felt nowadays.
He looked back at Phoebe. She might look the part in her borrowed disguise, but her mouth was open and her eyes had gone round as saucers. He slowed and pulled her closer. “Try not to look as though you’ve never seen this side of life before. It makes you stand out.”
She shut her mouth in a hurry. “I’m sorry. I’ll try.”
He transferred his grip to her wrist, the better to keep her close, as he led the way across Davies Street, which wasn’t much different in appearance to Three Kings Yard, and into the narrow, cobbled entrance to Brooks Mews.
This was less well-kept than the Yard, its central drain being clogged with wet straw and droppings and even a dead rat that he had to steer Phoebe clear of for fear of her squealing when she saw it.
The least attention they drew, the better.
And boys were not known for their squeamishness.
Plain brick buildings with arched entrances to stables and carriage houses opened on both sides, and an army of mostly men were busy working. A boy ran past them after a small terrier with a dead rat in its mouth, and Phoebe, as he’d feared, gave a little, muted squeal.
“You’ll see much worse than that today,” Gabriel said, feeling a certain amount of relish that he was to be the one to educate her. Much as he was discovering he liked her, the desire to open her eyes fully to the downside of London life had not departed but only grown greater.
She turned indignant eyes on him. “I have seen rats before, you know. I didn’t spend all my time at Coakham Hall in the schoolroom or sitting sewing. I can assure you that I very much dislike sewing and most other pursuits Aunt Fanny refers to as ‘maidenly.’”
He chuckled, but hurried her on, very much aware that time was of the essence. Despite Cecilia’s view that no one would miss her and her new friend for hours, one could never be sure.
From Brooks Mews they turned into the narrow thoroughfare that was Avery Row, then out into the more salubrious Grosvenor Street, with its fancy carriages and strolling tulips with their fine ladies on their arms. Here was a place where he very much felt that they stood out, but they fortunately didn’t have to stay there for long.
Ducking between the carriages and avoiding the worst of the mud, they crossed Bond Street and dived into Little Maddox Street, where most of the houses boasted shops on the ground floor—milliners, dressmakers, tailors, and Dickenson’s Drawing Gallery where his stepmother sent Cecilia every week in order to hone her nonexistent artistic skills.
“Where on earth are we?” Phoebe asked, seemingly having forgotten not to stare because she was now peering into every window they passed as though she fancied going in and asking for a fitting.
They were approaching a crossroads. Gabriel pointed to their left.
“Hanover Square, but that’s not where we’re going.
” On the corner, the impressive porticoed bulk of St George’s Church reared up—the venue of choice for most society weddings, and indeed, where Ambrose had not so long ago wed the Honorable Isabel Huntsville.
A marriage that had not turned out in the way the duke, their father, had hoped for his son and heir.
Phoebe stopped in her tracks, and Gabriel had to halt as well.
“Now I recognize where we are. We attend church here on a Sunday.” She paused.
“Good heavens. It looks quite different for some reason.” She gave her head a shake.
“Can it be because I have the sense that if I were to try to go inside dressed like this I might not be quite so welcome?”
Gabriel chuckled. “I imagine you might be turned away at the door. Now you’re beginning to understand.
That’s why we’re in disguise—so you can feel how it is to be unimportant, to have to move out of the way if someone who thinks they’re superior comes along.
I doubt the rector would recognize you now and would look down his long nose at you in disgust as a brat from the gutters. ”
She gave a slow nod. “I think I’m starting to understand.”