Carla Kelly (16 page)

Emma moved her foot from the door and suppressed the urge to laugh.
Goodness, Lord Ragsdale
, she thought,
you really are in need of reformation if this is your idea of beauty.
She touched the necklace in her reticule again, thinking how well it would suit.

“I am Lord Ragsdale's secretary, and I have something for you from him,” she repeated.

“You cannot possibly be his secretary,” said the woman who must be Fae. “My lord's secretary is languishing in Newgate, I believe.”

She smiled and stuck her hand through the narrowing crack in the door. “Miss Moullé, he won my indenture in a card game, and we have resolved that I am to straighten out his affairs.”

Her choice of words almost sent her into whoops, so she turned away and coughed, hoping the hilarity that threatened to consume her would pass.
Now what will appeal to you, Miss Moullé
, she thought as she turned back. She reached into her bag and pulled out the necklace.

“He has commissioned me to bring this to your notice,” she said, dangling the gaudy bauble just out of reach.

The door swung open, and Emma felt herself practically sucked inside. The necklace was snatched from her hand at the same moment the maid relieved her of her cloak. In another moment, she found herself arm in arm with Fae Moullé, being propelled into the sitting room as Lord Ragsdale's mistress issued orders for tea, cakes, and more coal for the grate.

As she glanced around the sitting room, it occurred to Emma that Lord Ragsdale did not stint on his mistress. The expensive draperies complemented the costly furniture, which sumptuously set off the deep carpet. She had to consciously force herself not to kick off her shoes and run her bare feet across its softness. Emma suppressed another smile; the only thing that didn't seem to fit in the room was the young man sitting on the sofa.

Fae's shrewd eyes turned a shade anxious as she followed the direction of Emma's gaze.

“Miss …”

“Costello,” Emma offered.

Fae gestured toward the sofa and its occupant, who appeared poised to bolt the room. “This is my … brother,” she said.

If this is your brother, then I am the Lord Mayor of London,
Emma thought as she nodded to the young man. “Delighted,” she said. “How fortunate for Miss Moullé to have relatives in the city.”

A small silence followed that no one seemed to know how to fill. His cheeks flaming the shade of Fae's lip color, the young man leaped to his feet, babbled something about work to do or people to see, and fled the room. Fae watched him go, her face filled with a longing that disappeared as soon as she fingered the necklace.

“How kind of Lord Ragsdale to take such good care of me,” she said, her French accent more pronounced. “Do sit down, Miss Costello, and here is the tea.”

Emma sat in the chair closest to the fire, accepted the tea, and leaned back to bask for a moment in the wages of a sinful life.
Mama would be shocked if she could see me in the love nest of a debaucher,
she thought.
I wonder where Fae keeps all those gloves,
she considered next as she watched the woman scrutinize the necklace with the practiced air of a gem merchant.
I wonder she does not put a jeweler's loupe to her eye,
Emma considered. She sighed and reached for a macaroon, and then another.
It will not be easy to pry Fae Moullé away from these particular fleshpots. I know I would not give up such luxury willingly.
She waited for Fae to speak, hoping to take some cue from her words.

“Miss Costello, you say he won your indenture in a card game?” Fae was asking. “I can't imagine Lord Ragsdale doing anything that smacked of exertion, and card games can be rigorous affairs.”

“It is true,” Emma replied, wondering at a female so lazy that she thought cards a challenge.
How fitting for Lord Ragsdale,
she concluded. “But really, I think he is not the idle man you believe him to be.”

She stopped, macaroon in hand, and wondered why she was defending Lord Ragsdale.
How odd,
she thought as she popped it in her mouth.

“Oh, he is lazy,” Fae countered, leaping to her feet and taking a quick turn about the room. “He usually comes here to sleep off the exertion of an evening at White's.” She paused delicately, then plunged ahead. “At least, that is all he has come for lately. I mean, he won't even exert himself to …”

“I think I understand,” Emma interrupted hastily, her cheeks red.

Fae Moullé only nodded and took another circuit of the room, looking out the window as though she expected to see the young man outside on the street. “Sometimes he is so neglectful that I have to invite my … brother to keep me company.”

You know I do not believe you,
Emma thought as she nodded.

“Brothers can be a wonderful diversion,” she said, preserving the fiction. She thought of her own brothers then, both the quick and the dead, and pushed aside the remains of the macaroon plate. She took another sip of tea and looked Fae in the eye. “I have come to negotiate with you, Miss Moullé,” she began. “Let us first clear up some questions.”

She left Miss Moullé’s establishment as it was growing dark, a smile on her face and her stomach too full of macaroons.
What a turn I have done you, Lord Ragsdale,
she thought as she hurried along, hoping to beat the rainstorm that threatened.
Indeed, it is a pity that I could never study for the diplomatic corps. With scarcely the smallest difficulty, I have rid “Your Mightiness” of a mistress and managed to cheat you soundly in the bargain. Who would have thought the day to have had such promise when it began? I know I did not.

It wasn't the sort of deception that would see her to Newgate, irons, and a berth to Australia. She had merely hinted to Fae that Lord Ragsdale was beginning to suspect that his loving light-skirt was playing a deep game. Fae had squeezed out some noisy tears and just the threat of a spasm, until Emma assured her that Lord Ragsdale had nothing more substantial than suspicions.

She knew that she could have told Fae that it was all over, and Lord Ragsdale's mistress would gladly have packed her bags and let it go at that, relieved that he had not discovered her other male visitors and made an ugly scene. There wasn't any need for Lord Ragsdale to spend another penny. But since he had many such pennies, Emma smiled inwardly and plunged ahead, content to fulfill his request to the letter of the law.

“Miss Moullé, Lord Ragsdale has authorized me to suggest to you that he would not be too unhappy if you left his employ,” she said. “In fact, he is willing to make you an offer …” She paused, and coughed slightly. “… An offer to make up for the sadness such a parting will cause you.”

Fae was fanning herself vigorously, despite the slight chill in the room. Her blonde curls fluttered from the effort. “Oh, I am not sorry!” she burst out, then stopped and considered what Emma was saying. Her eyes took on a more melancholy expression, her shoulders drooped, and she assumed such an air of wounded pride that Emma wanted to applaud the performance. “Perhaps I am a
little
sorry,” she amended. “After all, five years of my life … What, uh, kind of offer did he have in mind?”

Emma looked beyond Fae as though studying the wall. “He told me he felt honor-bound to provide for you in some way, Miss Moullé.” She folded her hands in her lap. “I suppose that is your decision. He especially wanted me to ask you what would make you the happiest.”

Fae leaned forward and rested her elbows on her knees in a most unladylike posture. She stared into the grating, where the flames leaped about. Fae was silent so long that Emma wondered if she had drifted off to sleep. Emma was about to nudge her, when Fae looked at her, her practiced melancholy replaced with glee.

“I have it!” she exclaimed. “Tell your master that I want to open my own millinery shop in Bath.”

“My, that will be expensive,” Emma exclaimed, unable to keep the admiration from her voice. “Think what the inventory will cost, and the expense of a shop and probably living quarters.”

“Of course I will need living quarters,” Fae agreed, getting up with a decisive motion to stand by the fireplace. “And nothing paltry. After all, I am used to Half Moon Street, am I not? And who can make a success of such an establishment unless it is in the most forward part of town?”

“Oh, indeed,” Emma replied. “After all, Bath is not a town for nipfarthing ways, or so I am told.” She shook her head, aiming for the right degree of doubt. “This is an expensive proposition, indeed.”

Fae rose to the bait. “Do you think it is too much?” she asked anxiously.

“I am sure there is nothing Lord Ragsdale would not do, no lengths to which he would not go, to make sure that your leaving is a pleasant experience,” Emma said.
Did I actually say that?
she asked herself, knowing that she was spreading around as much fiction as Fae herself. And Fae knew it too. Emma could tell by the unholy look that came into the woman's eyes.

They looked at each other for another moment, then both burst into laughter. The next few moments were taken up with the most delicious merriment. It seemed to swell from the soles of Emma's feet upward. She laughed until her sides ached and then lay back in the chair, exhausted with the pleasure of such tomfoolery. The maid even stuck her head in the room's entrance, but Fae waved her away, then surrendered to a fresh spasm of jollity, at Lord Ragsdale's expense.

Fae was the first to recover her voice. “Miss Costello, that was outrageous.”

“Yes, wasn't it?” Emma replied, wiping her eyes with her sleeve. “But now you wish to … uh, change professions?” she prompted.

Fae relaxed again and looked up from the carpet, which she had been contemplating. “I don't see a future in this one, especially if other men are like John Staples,” she said simply. “And I fear they are.” She met Emma's eyes then. “And I know how to make hats! Let me show you what I can do.”

Emma spent the next hour in Fae's chamber, admiring the woman's dash and flair with bonnet trimming. “I buy the best from the shops here.”

“I've seen the bills,” Emma interjected.

Fae chuckled. “Then I rearrange them to suit myself,” she explained. “A ribbon here, a bit of trim there.” She placed a high-brimmed chip-straw bonnet on Emma's head and tied the green satin bow under her ear. “There now. See what I mean?”

Emma looked in the mirror, delighted with Fae's efforts. “It makes my eyes so green,” she marveled, turning this way and that for the full effect and trying to remember when she had last worn a hat. She took it off reluctantly. “I know that you will manage very well in Bath, and so, I will tell Lord Ragsdale.”

Fae hugged her. “Bless you. If Lord Ragsdale had sent that sour-puss David Breedlow, I'm sure I would have gotten my walking papers and nothing more.” She frowned at Emma's expression. “But I hear that he is soon to be transported, and one shouldn't speak ill of the dead.”

Emma shuddered. “Just because he is going to Australia does not mean that he is numbered among the dead!” she burst out, freeing herself from Fae's embrace. She was immediately ashamed of the ferocity of her outburst.
What must you think?
she asked herself, embarrassed in turn by the look of surprise on Fae's well-fed face.
I must not cry,
she thought next.
What will Fae think?

But Fae only looked at her and took her by the shoulders again.

“So that's how it is?” she asked softly. “Bah, these English! Sometimes I think the guillotine is more merciful. Oh, Miss Costello, do let us soak this Englishman for all we can. It is a revenge of sorts.”

It was easy then to dry her tears on one of Fae's wonderful rosescented handkerchiefs, eat a few more macaroons, and then put her head together with Lord Ragsdale's mistress to create a list of necessities for the proposed shop. When Emma finally left the house with a kiss and a wave of her hand, she was wearing one of Fae's many pairs of kidskin gloves and clutching a precise account of Fae's demands.
While it will not choke you, Lord Ragsdale,
she thought as she hurried along,
it will give some satisfaction to two powerless women. Fae will have a future, and I will have … what?

The rain began before she reached Curzon Street, but she tucked the list down the front of her dress to keep it dry. She knew that Lord Ragsdale would swallow Fae's demands and count himself lucky to be so easily rid of her. He would buy his horses, spend his money, and probably take another mistress later, after he was married. She stood stock-still in the rain, fully aware that John Staples represented everything that she hated about the English.
I cannot go back in that house,
she thought.
But I must. I owe him at least my services until this indenture is paid off.

She went up the front steps slowly, dreading the people inside, the silence of the servants’ hall when she appeared for dinner, the cold room she shared with a most reluctant scullery maid. She stood on the steps, unwilling to raise her hand to the knocker as she thought again for the thousandth time of the events of that last dreadful day in Wicklow. The weather had been like this, only she had been on the other side of the window glass, watching a solitary figure approaching her father's house. “And I let you in,” she said, her hand on the knocker. “Oh, I wish I had not, for all that you were Robert Emmet.” She spit out the name as though it was a bad taste. “Ireland's hero. Why, why did I do it? Why?”