Jassy lowered her head and nodded with understanding. Tamsyn squeezed her shoulders and left her, and she knelt back at her mother’s side, trying to ease the fever that raged through her.
“Oh, Mother!” she whispered softly, not caring now that they were alone that tears slid down her cheeks and dropped upon the blanket. “Mother, we shall get out of this! I’ll make you well, I swear it!”
She swallowed painfully. At the moment Linnet slept, as ethereal, as beautiful, as a hummingbird.
Jassy rose slowly. She kissed Linnet’s hot cheek and then hurried out of the room.
Down below, the coach was already in. Jassy hurried to the kitchen to help the cook, but Jake, John’s obnoxious doorman, bellowed out that she was to work in the taproom, serving ale.
The inn was dense with smoke, rowdy with talk. Each of the planked tables was full, some with common folk, some with gentry.
Jassy hated the taproom. It seemed always to be filled with a score of Master Johns—louts who grinned lasciviously and tried to pinch some part of her anatomy. Nor was she allowed to slap the wandering hands that touched her; Master John would have booted her out on the steps.
It seemed that she moved from the kitchen to the bar to the tables endlessly, carrying great trays of roast beef and duckling with savory gravies, and scores of tankards. Her shoulders and sides ached from the heavy work. At one point during the night Molly passed her in the hallway from the kitchen to the taproom and gave her cheek a friendly pinch.
“Ah, luv, you look pale, you do! I know yer worryin’ ’bout your ma, luv. Don’t you fret, now. Cook just slipped me a bit of good wine and some soup; it’s hid by the sideboard. You can get it up to her soon.”
“What’s this!”
Master John was suddenly behind them. “Ah, her majesty, the Lady Jasmine!” He bowed mockingly. “Missy—I see you off this floor once again and yer ma’s in the street!” he warned Jassy, waggling one of his fingers before her face.
“Ah, Master John!” Molly batted her lashes at their taskmaster, pleading nicely. “Please, sir, the girl but—”
“The girl shirks work!” John roared. “If she’s off this floor before midnight, she can look for her supper elsewhere!”
He physically turned Jassy about, pushing her forward. Jassy almost screamed. She thought that she might well have stabbed her mother, and then herself, before she could have abided his touch. She clenched her teeth tightly together. She was still so desperate.
Molly, with her red country cheeks and snapping dark eyes, caught up with her again.
“I’ll get up there and feed her the soup and the wine, Jassy, I swear it. You just keep out of the way of mean ol’ John, eh?”
Gratefully Jassy nodded. “Bless you, Molly!”
It was then that Jake told her she must bring another round of good ale to the two gents nearest the fire.
“And no uppity nose-turning from you, miss!” Jake warned in a growl. “Them two are class, they are! You serve them right!”
She knew what “serve them right” meant, and she wondered with a rush of hostility why he hadn’t sent Molly to serve the two. If they laughed and pinched Molly, she would blush and say just the right things.
Jassy walked quickly to the table. The two men, she noted, definitely were “class.” More than gentry, she thought, by the quality and cut of their breeches and coats and hose.
Despite herself, she discovered that her heart fluttered just a bit as she neared them, for the gentleman on the right of the fire was handsome, very handsome indeed. He was blond and as light as dreams of heaven, with a wonderfully slim and genteel face and bright, sparkling blue eyes. He glanced up as Jassy set the first tankard down, and he bestowed upon her a smile that actually made her feel as if her senses reeled.
“Ah, and lass, where have you been all my life?” he teased.
Jassy flushed; he was kind, he was gentle. He was the type of man that once she might have dreamed of loving—in a very vague way, of course. A man to sweep her upon a mighty steed, the very knight of her dreams. He would take her back to the world she had once known, or onward to the shining castle of her imagination. It would be a new world. A world where servants moved to the slightest whim, where sheets were clean, where food was plentiful. And he would be the man she had imagined, a man to be a husband, a father, a golden, shining defender in every hour.…
She lowered her lashes again and stiffened her spine. What in the Lord’s name was the matter with her? Men of stature did not come here to flirt with serving wenches to sweep them away to lives of dignity and grandeur. They wanted what Molly called a “dashing roll in the hay” and nothing more.
She raised her head again proudly. One day she would escape this bondage. She would escape poverty, she would travel where it was wild and free and where she would disdain all those who thought themselves above her.
“Thank you,” he told her, referring to his ale. He watched her somewhat gravely, and it seemed that he flirted no more. She liked his eyes; she liked the way that he looked at her, as if he saw far more than a wench or a servant.
And she smiled slightly in return, for he was genuinely kind, and she barely noted what she was doing as she set the other tankard down. His fingers grazed against her hand, holding her there as he watched her. Still, what ensued next was not her fault.
“Robert! Quit ogling the lass and listen well, for this is not a matter that can be dealt with lightly.”
The blond man smiled at her with such a touch of admiration that Jassy barely heard the other man’s words and therefore could not be offended.
“Be that as it will, Jamie, we’re just setting to dinner now, and you’re telling me about the Injuns, as it were!”
“Robert!”
With that explosive sound he sent a hand waving with such energy that it caught Jassy unaware. She moved, startled, and the tankard she had not set down properly was caught in the movement. Ale spewed and then fell all around them.
“Damn, girl! Look to what you’re doing!”
It wasn’t her shining golden knight who came out with the impatient curse but the man across from him. The man that Jassy had barely even noticed as yet.
She did now, for he was on his feet, glaring at her. She had spilled ale not only over his elegant laced white shirt, but also on the documents he had been studying.
He was tall, she noted at first. Very tall, which was hard to miss, since she was slender and small. In his anger he was towering over her. Beneath the deceiving elegance of his shirt, she noted next, his shoulders were very broad, and though his hips were lean, his thighs, tightly hugged by his breeches, were as muscled and powerful as his boots were high and shiny.
His hair was as black as his boots, nearly indigo with its sheen, barely darker than his flashing eyes, cast into a rugged face that was tanned from much exposure to the sun. He was probably not much older than the handsome blond man who had been so kind; somehow he seemed the fiercer man, alive with a striking tension and a volatile energy that seemed to exude from him. He therefore appeared older, more the hardened and arrogant man than his smiling, handsome companion.
He did not stare upon her with admiration. His dark eyes smoldered with annoyance, and something that wounded her pride even worse—a total dismissal and disregard.
Without thinking about her position, she lashed out at this man who had attacked her so unfairly.
“Sir! ’Twas your arm that jolted me! The accident was not my fault.”
“Jamie!” the golden man protested softly. “Take a care, please! ’Tis a tyrant runs this place; ’tis likely he’ll beat the girl.”
Jamie seemed to ignore him. He did not appear to care about his shirt, but he was eager to save his documents, and heedlessly he dragged Jassy to him by her skirts as he sought to use that means to dry the parchments.
“Leave me be!” Jassy cried, as indignation and rage rose within her. She pummeled against his shoulder in sudden, wild fear, for those s
trange, dark eyes had fallen upon her again—and lingered this time.
“Stop!”
He halted her assault simply, catching her wrists, dragging her down to the bench beside him. He might have been a devil, she thought, he was so very dark, so arrogant, so supremely confident of himself. He did not think that she would dare to fight him.
“Bastard!” she hissed in a soft, sure warning. “Let go of me!”
He laughed in amusement. She longed to move her hands, but his hold on her carried an unearthly strength, and she was suddenly quite certain that his air of total confidence had not come to him without just cause. He was a powerful man; she could feel it in the vibrant heat that passed from his thighs through her skirts; she could feel it in his very hold upon her. It meant nothing. He did not strain. But he held her fast and studied her boldly, frowning curiously as his deadly dark, satanic eyes came to her own, fell to encompass her features, her lips … her breasts and hips.
Something warm seemed to sizzle through her. Her heart began to thunder; she tried to jerk away from him, wanting only to do battle, thinking of nothing but his touch upon her and her desperate desire to escape him.
But then her heart sank.
Master John was bearing down upon them.
“My lords, my lords! What is the problem here? Forgive the girl—she’s new. And I warrant that she will be well punished for her clumsiness!”
He was about to drag Jassy from the bench, but the beautiful golden-blond man came to her rescue. “Master John! I’d not hurt the girl.”
Master John looked at Jassy as if he’d like to beat her flat down to the floor.
“Indeed, sir,” the gallant blond man continued with a hauteur that could only belong to the nobility, “I should find myself in a position to see that all my friends and acquaintances were to avoid this place were I to believe that you chastised your servants too severely.”
The dark-haired man finally looked at John after it seemed that the blond had kicked him beneath the table.
He sighed impatiently. “Indeed, sir, I should feel compelled to warn many from this place! Alas—and I had so enjoyed the ale and the fire!”
John appeared quite near to apoplexy. For several seconds he just stood there, his face growing redder and redder.
The dark-eyed man spoke again, this time with a deadly authority. He rose to his full height again, hands on his hips, towering over them all. “Should I hear that any harm has befallen the girl, I swear I shall return and break both your legs. Do you understand?”
“Aye!” John said quickly, barely breathing.
“Good!” The man sat again, eyeing John.
“Get back to work, girl!” John commanded Jassy.
And she did so—swiftly. She was eager not just to escape her horrid master, but also longed with all her heart to escape the dark-haired stranger.
John caught up with her quickly, whispering into her ear. “You think you’re something, eh, Lady Jasmine of the Attic? Not to me, you’re not!” Her heart catapulted downward as he laughed bitterly. “So I can’t touch you! Well, I’ll tell you this! You’re docked, girl, you and her up them stairs!”
Docked! Less money when they were paid a pittance to begin with! And all over that lout of a stranger!
“Just leave me be!” she said gratingly.
“To the kitchen!” Jake ordered. “Bring out the platters of food for His Majesty’s soldiers just arrived.”
She headed for the kitchen. Molly crossed by her quickly there. “I reached yer ma, luv. She drank some broth.”
“Bless you!” Jassy murmured, and even as the cook loaded the heavy trenchers onto her shoulders, her episode with the gentlemen faded from her mind and worry came back to it. Tamsyn’s one word flooded her thoughts.
Quinine.
Linnet needed quinine to combat the fever.
She could buy some from the chemist across the lane—if she only had the coin to do so.
The cook was gossiping with one of the newly arrived coachmen even as she burdened down Jassy’s great tray. The coachman, sealed at the big kitchen table, tipped his hat to Jassy and offered her a friendly grin. She smiled vaguely in return, balancing her tray. Cook flashed her a quick smile, too, but gave her attention to the visiting coachman.
“Lord love us, I don’t believe a word of it, Matthew!” she said, but she laughed delightedly.
“Well, ’tis true! Jassy, you should hear this one!”
“Matthew, she’s a sweet young thing!” Cook protested sternly.
“But it’s a great story! All about Joel Higgins, who worked in the London livery. He was such a handsome, strapping youth! He told me about this old woman, see, and she was willing to pay for his services—but he weren’t that hard up! So he made her think he were willing to give when he weren’t, and when the old battle-ax had her clothing a-gone, he took her purse and disappeared, saying he just had to wash up. Imagine her—a-laying there waiting while he stole away her purse!” He laughed heartily, enjoying his own story. “A good comeuppance for the old girl, eh?”
“Ah, and Joel will meet up with the hangman, that he will!” Cook prophesied dourly. “And, Matthew, you watch your mouth around my young help. Hmmph! Jassy, I be needin’ you in here, I am, and he’s got you out on the floor. Well, damn the man, then, if his sides of beast ain’t roasted the way he’d have ’em! Sorry, girl, ’bout your ma.”
“Thank you,” Jassy murmured, gritting her teeth against the weight of the tray balanced on her shoulder. She paused, though, when she should have turned with her burden and hurried. “Cook, have you by any chance—”
“Lord love ye, girl! I’d gladly loan ye a coin if I had me one! I sent me last money home for me own old mother! You’ve my prayers, though, girl. The Lord God will provide, you just look to Him!”
The coachman sniggered. “Aye! The Lord God provides—more’n likely He helps those what help themselves!”
Jassy had already given up on the Lord, and she would fall beneath the weight of the tray soon. She gave Cook a smile and hurried out.
The night wore on. She felt that endless hours passed. At long last she was released to go back to the attic.
She ran instantly to Linnet’s side, then put her forehead against the bed, crying softly as she heard her mother’s great rasping attempts to draw breath.
Quinine. Tamsyn said it might ease her.
There was a soft rapping at her door. “ ’Tis me—Molly, Jass.”
Jassy came back to her feet and hurried to the door, throwing it open. Molly studied her ravaged face.
“Is she no better, then?”
“No better at all.”
“Ah, lass!” She paused for a moment, hesitating, studying Jassy.
The girl should have had more, Molly thought. All of them had thought it. Cook, her, the upstairs maids. The girl was better than this life. Better than endless scrubbing of cold stone floors. Better than her raw, ragged hands, better than her rag of a dress. They’d all had dreams for her. She was their prize—more lovely than a human had a right to be, even if it was hard to see that loveliness, clad as she was in rags, her glorious golden hair all trussed up in an ugly net. She was fine. A rose among thorns, a blossom of spring against the dead of winter.
She was doomed. To this life; to hell on earth.
Molly sighed. “Jassy, I know your ma never much wanted you falling to our ways, but, well, that tall handsome lord was asking questions about you. He said that his lodgings were at the Towergate, across the row, and that he meant to stay up late.”
Jassy inhaled sharply. An illness seemed to sweep through her stomach.
The blond man. The kind, handsome blond man had wanted her.
She stiffened. As kind as he had been, he wanted a whore for the night. She could have created an entire daydream around him; she could have envisioned him as all that life had to offer.
Her shoulders dropped. Linnet rasped away behind her. She clenched her fists together.
/> “Jassy!” Linnet called out.
“Mother!” She swung around and fell down by the bed. “I am here!”
Linnet’s head tossed about. Jassy touched her forehead and discovered that it burned. Linnet’s eyes opened for a moment, but they were glazed. She did not see her daughter. “Help me,” she whispered feverishly. “Oh, help me, please …”
Her voice faded away; her eyes closed.
“Oh, God!” Jassy cried out. She caught her mother’s hands and held them tightly, then she stood and whirled about, almost blinded by her tears.
No! she thought, and it was a silent scream of agony. I will not let her die here! I will beg, borrow—or steal.
And that was when the idea caught hold of her.
Steal … yes.
Surely God would understand, and He was her only true judge. She had turned her back on Him, but maybe now He was helping her to help herself.
She could steal the money that she needed. And keep her daydream. If the blond man did not suspect her of a foul deed, she could suddenly cry innocence and escape him. He was so kind. He would understand.
And if he caught her in the lie … well, again she would depend upon his kindness.
And if that didn’t work …
She swallowed bitterly. She could go through with the bargain. She could not let Linnet die.
“Ah—thank you, Molly. Thank you for so much.”
Molly cleared her throat. “He’s an exciting one, he is!” she said, trying to sound cheerful. She flushed slightly. “I—I tried to exchange myself for you; I’d have gladly given you the coin. But he wanted you, he did, were he to have any at all.”
“Thank you.”
“Shall I stay with her for you?”
“Oh, bless you, Molly! Will you?”
Molly nodded.
Jassy hurried to the washbowl, poured out the remaining water, and tried to scrub her face. She was shaking so badly!
Molly wandered in and sat down. “Best hurry, child,” she said tonelessly.
Jassy knelt down by her mother’s side once again and picked up her frail hand. It burned to the touch, and there was no response.