“Why do you assume all women are weaklings?” she said.
“Because they are,” he said. “I can pick you up with one hand. Can you pick me up, even using both hands?”
“That’s not the only kind of strength,” she said.
“She’s a lady’s maid,” he said. “She’s at the top of the female servant ladder. No heavy lifting necessary.”
“She’s up at all hours and out in all weathers,” Sophy said. “When she isn’t dancing attendance on her mistress, she’s mending and cleaning and taking things out and putting them away. If milady falls ill, it’s her maid who does the dirty work of nursing her while doctors and mothers give orders. The maid runs up and down stairs all day and night, fetching and carrying. She’s keeping an eye on the lower servants, making sure everything done to or for milady is done properly. No weakling would survive for half a day.”
Longmore stared at the horses’ heads. He’d never thought about the woman who looked after his sister, beyond noting that she was plain and her expression reminded everybody of a bulldog.
“I’ll give you that she’s strong,” he said. “The fact remains, she’s only one female.”
“A formidable female,” Sophy said. “Lady Clara was in more danger from Lord Adderley than she is from naval Lotharios in Portsmouth.”
“Clearly, you’ve had little to do with naval men,” he said.
“How little you know,” she said.
So it seemed.
“Enlighten me, then,” he said.
“I’m a dressmaker,” she said. “A milliner. Everybody knows we’re fair game.”
“You don’t seem to know that,” he said. “You’re deuced uncooperative.”
“I spoke ironically,” she said.
“Better not,” he said. “Goes right over my head.”
“Furthermore, I have powerful reasons for being uncooperative, which I explained to you last night. Don’t tell me you didn’t understand.”
“I wasn’t completely listening,” he said.
“You’re going to make me hurt you,” she said.
“You’ll need a brick,” he said.
“My aim is excellent,” she said.
They passed through the Cobham Gate, where they learned—in case they’d any doubts—that the cabriolet had passed the day before.
The sun was lowering toward the horizon. It would set near eight o’clock. They had a long drive to Portsmouth, more than fifty miles. Thanks to the time of year and the moon, it wouldn’t be an altogether dark journey, if the weather didn’t turn on them again.
He wasn’t going to stop this time, even if a hurricane blew their way.
He looked at her. Her hat had deflated somewhat. The ribbons were limper and the flowers not as sprightly as before. No wonder, after she’d tried to beat him with it. He smiled, remembering.
She was an amazing antidote to gloom.
“Tell me about the naval men,” he said. “Did you spill hot tea on them? Trip them over their own swords?”
“Did you know you could kill a person with a hatpin?” she said.
“I did not,” he said. “Do you speak from experience? Have you murdered anybody? Not that I’d dream of criticizing.”
“I’ve only ever wounded anybody,” she said. “It’s amazingly effective. There was a captain who screamed like a girl and fainted.”
“A pity you hadn’t the training of my sister,” he said.
“A few tricks wouldn’t do her any good,” she said. “She’d need a lifetime’s experience—and even then she might have fallen into the trap. Adderley is a beautiful man, and he has a winning manner. But Lady Durwich thought your sister was trying to make another man jealous—that, or she was upset with somebody. Maybe she was jealous—and it was a case of ‘I’ll show you’ or ‘Two can play that game’ or—”
“Is it always like this?” he broke in. “Does your busy mind never rest?”
“If not for imagination, Marcelline, Leonie, and I wouldn’t be where we are today,” she said. “You don’t need to think of such things. Men rule the world, and the world is made for the convenience of aristocratic men. But women need to imagine, to dream. Even Lady Clara. We taught her to dream a little and to dare a little—and I refuse to feel guilty for that—but I was a sort of Pygmalion, wasn’t I? And I should have—”
“Classical allusions,” he said. “Clevedon does it all the time. Now you. Which one was Pygmalion?”
“The sculptor who created the beautiful statue, and—”
“That one, right. She came to life.”
“Yes.”
“How do you know these things?” he said. “Where does a shopkeeper find time to learn who Pygmalion was? Where does she learn to write overwrought prose?”
She turned the politely interested look upon him: the look that made a blank of her almost-beautiful face. “It’s not marvelous to you when a gentleman can speak, read, and write three or six languages, make speeches in Parliament, perform chemical experiments, write botanical papers, and found or help direct half a dozen charities? Don’t you ever wonder where any gentleman finds the time to do all that? I certainly do. Take Dr. Young, for example.”
“Never heard of him.”
She enlightened him.
The fellow had died a few years ago. He’d been a prodigy. A physician at St. George’s Hospital. Active on the Board of Longitude, the Nautical Almanac, the Royal Society. Wrote about geology and earthquakes, about light and life-insurance calculations and musical harmony. Even helped decipher the Rosetta Stone.
Longmore’s mind returned to the conversation with Lady Durwich and what she’d said about the wild DeLuceys. He remembered Lady Lisle, who’d spent most of the years since her marriage traveling in Egypt with her husband. A charismatic female, too, who exuded a similar energy . . .
He turned to study Sophy . . . and discovered Fenwick hanging over the hood.
Longmore scowled at him. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“Listening,” the boy said. “The fings you nobs talk about.”
“Things,” Longmore said automatically.
“Things,” Fenwick said. He rested his folded arms on the hood, making himself comfortable. “It’s like listening to stories. What was the one about the pig man?”
“Pygmalion,” she said. She went on to tell the story, not sparing adjectives and adverbs. The telling took several miles. Then she launched into other tales: Atalanta and the apples, Icarus and his wings, and thence to Odysseus and his wanderings.
Listening to her now was a different experience from reading her stories about clothes. When she spoke, she took on the characters’ personalities. She held spellbound not only the boy but Longmore as well, and he forgot Lady Lisle altogether.
No one would ever mistake Lord Longmore for an intellectual prodigy. Still, being a simple man, he could take hold of a notion and not let go of it. Sophy had dealt with Lady Durwich’s reference to the DeLuceys easily. Distracting Longmore wasn’t difficult, either.
She knew he wouldn’t care at all about her being a Dreadful DeLucey. He wouldn’t care that the Noirots were equally disreputable. The trouble was, since he didn’t care, he mightn’t think it important enough to keep to himself. If she could drive it out of his mind—where, she reasoned, there wasn’t overmuch room—he was less likely to speculate aloud to any of his friends.
The Odyssey got them through the next two changes. Then Longmore decided she looked tired and hungry. As they consumed a hasty meal at an inn, he told her to rest. “The moon’s been up since early afternoon,” he pointed out. “It’ll set in the early-morning hours. I need to concentrate on driving—and the fantastical adventures of Greek heroes are too distracting. And Fenwick needs to sleep.”
He kept the horses to a steady clip, and let them gallop on the flat stretches. Now and then he’d point out sights along the way, some ghostly in the moonlight, like the Devil’s Punchbowl, or gibbets on the side of the road.
But for a good part of the journey they drove in an easy silence. Twice she woke, and discovered she’d fallen asleep on his shoulder. This was no small feat. Even with excellent springs and scrupulous maintenance, no carriage ride was perfectly smooth.
The second time she woke, and hastily drew away, he laughed and said, “I knew you were tired.”
“It’s the rocking,” she said.
“You might as well sleep if you can,” he said. “We’ve a distance to go. I only hope we can reach Portsmouth before the moonset. I’m not looking forward to navigating streets I don’t know in the predawn dark.”
Chapter Ten
Happy, indeed will the visitor be who is so fortunate as to be on the Platform when a first-rate man-of-war is sailing out of the harbour. He will then enjoy one of the grandest sights in the world, in beholding the majestic castle gliding along the water, and hearing the astounding sound of her guns, when in passing she salutes the garrison flag.
—The new Portsmouth, Southsea, Anglesey & Hayling Island Guide, 1834
The moon was setting by the time they reached Portsmouth. Still, all Longmore had to do was keep to the main thoroughfare. Along the High street were many prosperous-looking establishments. For lodgings he had a choice between the Fountain and the George, the two major coaching inns. He decided on the George, because the Royal Mail set out from there. Too, it was the one recommended to Clara’s maid.
After sending Fenwick to gossip with the servants and stablemen, Longmore took Sophy into the inn.
He was sure he’d be relying mainly on Fenwick at this point, since the landlord of a busy town’s busy inn—still awake and bustling even at this hour—probably wouldn’t remember the two women. If Clara behaved as she’d done previously, she’d have kept in the background, letting Davis hire the room and arrange for meals and such. Plain women tended not to make an impression.
The innkeeper had no recollection of two ladies traveling together, and his guest ledger confirmed this.
Longmore moved away, to talk to Sophy. “We might as well stop,” he told her. “There’s little we can do at this hour.”
“But you said the sun would be up soon, near four o’clock,” she said. She took up the pocket watch that dangled from the belt of her carriage dress. “It’s only half past two.”
“And you look like the very devil,” he said. “You need to sleep.”
“I slept in the carriage,” she said.
She’d slept against his shoulder, her hat’s absurd decorations tickling his chin now and again. She’d sink lower and lower, then, at a certain point, she’d wake with a start.
He thought it was adorable—an odd thought to have about Sophy, but there it was. She was a complicated girl. That was what made her so interesting. That and the delicious mouth and smell and perfect figure.
“It wasn’t proper sleep,” he said. “The fact remains, you look like the devil.” Ignoring her protests, he hired a room for her and ordered a meal as well. And a maid. Someone needed to get her out of her clothes and into bed. It had better not be him, or no one would get any rest.
Sophy had only the dimmest memory of what had happened after they reached the inn. Weariness had welled up, a massive wave, which must have been building for weeks. It had simply swamped her. She could barely keep her eyes open, let alone continue arguing with Longmore.
She did remember his fussing over her and ordering everybody about. He’d insisted on a maid for her, and she dimly recalled the maid chattering at her as they went up the stairs to the room he’d hired. He’d had a light meal sent up and Sophy had eaten it, surprised at how hungry she was. She’d washed and undressed with—considering the hour—the maid’s extremely cheerful and patient help. Longmore must have given the girl a large gratuity.
Tired as she was, Sophy hadn’t expected to sleep. The longer they’d searched, the more anxious she’d become about Lady Clara. She’d persuaded Longmore that his sister was safe with Davis watching out for her, but Sophy hadn’t persuaded herself.
Yet sleep she must have done, since the noise woke her. She was so groggy that it took a moment to realize someone was beating on the door.
She bolted upright, heart pounding, to see early-morning sunlight streaming in through the window. How long had she slept?
She stumbled out of bed, found her dressing gown on the chair nearby, and was pulling it on when she heard Longmore’s voice. “Where’s the confounded maid?”
Sophy ran to the door and flung it open.
Longmore stood in the corridor, fully dressed in the same clothes he’d been wearing when they arrived. Had he not slept? He hadn’t shaved, certainly. The shadow along his jaw made him look more dangerous than ever.
“Clara’s here,” he said.
“Here? In the inn?”
“No,” he said. “That is, if she has, nobody’s told me. But she hasn’t left Portsmouth yet. I shouldn’t have wakened you—”
“You shouldn’t have let me sleep,” she said.
“Never mind that. I need your help. People get suspicious when a man seems to be hunting a young woman. They become less than candid. Fenwick lacks your charming methods of extracting information from the unwilling, and I’m having trouble holding onto my temper.”
“You’ve been searching, without me,” she said reproachfully.
He stepped over the threshold and she took two steps back. He looked down at her feet. She did, too. They were bare.
“Where are your slippers?” he said.
Without waiting for an answer, he strode to the bed, found the slippers, and gestured at a chair. She sat. “I can put on my own—”
“You’re not even awake.” He knelt and took her foot and slid it into the slipper. He paused, his hand still on her foot, and stared for what seemed a very long time.
“I’m awake,” she said. “I can do that.”
He came out of his trance and put the other slipper on, then stood. “You shouldn’t run about barefoot in public hostelries,” he said.
“I wasn’t running about—and you shouldn’t have been searching without me.”
“You needed sleep,” he said. “You’ve needed it this age, I’ll wager anything. You keep ridiculous hours.”
“I’m a working woman,” she said.
“You ought to give it up.”
“What?”
“The whole thing’s absurd,” he said. “Your sister married a duke. I told Clevedon . . .” he trailed off.
“What did you tell him?”
“Never mind that now,” he said.
“I certainly will mind it now,” she said.
“Do you want to find Clara or do you want to quarrel?” he said.
“Preferably both,” she said.
“Don’t aggravate me,” he said. “I haven’t time to throttle you. Fenwick and I were up at dawn’s crack—”
“Without me.”
“Without you,” he said. “Some infernal gun went off. I’m informed that it does so twice a day, sunrise and sunset. After that I saw no point in trying to sleep. I took Fenwick to the docks. It took a while for me to find the area we wanted, but we did eventually. We found out which passenger ships had left since the earliest time Clara could have arrived. We’re reasonably sure she wasn’t aboard any of them. But I can explain all that later. I only came to tell you to make haste.”
“Very well.”
She rose from the chair and stumbled to the washstand. In spite of the abrupt awakening, she was still muddle-headed. She filled the bowl with water and washed her face. That improved matters. She was drying her face when she saw his, behind her, in the mirror.
“Can’t you go any faster?” he said.
“It will take me at least half an hour without a maid’s help,” she said.
“I don’t know where she went or what she’s doing,” he said. “All I know is that when I asked for one a moment ago, I was told, ‘Straightaway.’ That could mean hours from now. The place is a madho
use. Most of the servants seem to be in the dining room, running frantically hither and yon, serving breakfast.”
He waved at the carriage dress she’d worn yesterday, which the maid had hung carefully over a chair. “Just throw it on, can’t you? We’re not going to a fashion parade.”
“I can’t just throw it on! How can you be so obtuse?”
“Easily,” he said. “It wants no effort at all.”
Later, when she had time, when she could see straight, she was going to hit him with something bigger than a brick.
She found her chemise and petticoats and corset, and laid them out on the bed. Tired and cross—and maybe because she was who she was and couldn’t resist playing with fire—she pulled off her dressing gown, then the nightdress.
She would have done the same thing had she been with her sisters and in a great hurry to be gone from somewhere. She was well aware she wasn’t with her sisters.
“Damnation!”
She glanced back at him as she pulled on her chemise. He’d turned his back on her nakedness.
That was funny. Her mood lightened a degree. “You could try sending for the maid,” she said.
“Not for worlds,” he said.
“Then look,” she said. “I don’t care. I’m not modest.”
That was no lie. Merely because she made clothes for a living didn’t mean she was shy about being unclothed. Even in front of him. Or, rather, especially in front of him. She was a Noirot, after all.
“I’m not looking,” he said. “I’m not modest either, but I need to keep my wits about me. By Jupiter, you’re the very devil.”
She stepped into her drawers and tied the tapes at the waist. She donned the petticoat and tied it. She arranged the corset on the bed and started lacing it.
“What’s taking so long?” he said. He turned. “What in the name of Satan and all his minions are you doing?”
“It’s one of the new corsets Marcelline invented,” she said. “One can do it up oneself. But the maid didn’t understand how it worked, and I was too tired to explain clearly enough, it seems. She untied the lacing, and I need to—”