A Rogue of One's Own

Across the footwell, Blackstone was watching the dark of night pass by the window, light and shadow playing over his blunt features. He apparently was still not much of a talker.

“How much,” he finally asked, his gravelly voice dispassionate, his Scottish lilt a mere whisper these days.

Tristan named the sum, and Blackstone slowly turned his head to face him.

It was a rather speaking glance the man gave him. Well, yes. It was rather a lot of money.

“I’m almost curious what brought this on,” Blackstone murmured.

“Women,” Tristan replied. Lucie, his mother, and the unknown, unwanted fiancée, to be precise.

“Naturally.” Blackstone was looking out the window again. “The money shall be in the account by noon,” he said after a pause. “Meet my man to sign the papers at Claridge’s tomorrow morning at eight.”

There was no need for further discussion. Blackstone clawed his money back come what may, and Tristan knew the conditions. The last time he had asked for a large sum, he had been two-and-twenty and had just received his marching orders. It had been the second occasion where he had seriously contemplated becoming disowned and emigrating to America, and again, he had held back. He had, however, had the presence of mind to make an investment with an eye on the future before his regiment’s ship sailed. In addition to an ambitious interest rate, his old friend had asked for a few debts to be transferred from Tristan’s ledger into his own—Blackstone loved owning the debts of noblemen, only to call them in at the most inopportune times, inopportune for the indebted noblemen, that was. Ruined livelihoods lay scattered in his wake. Tristan smiled faintly. A viscount had to be mad to do business with Blackstone.

Chapter 8

Lucie’s breakfast was disturbed by a disheveled runner boy ringing her doorbell. The note he delivered was from the Snug Oyster, and Lucie hastily dressed. When the Oxford brothel sent for her rather than have one of its occupants turn up at her doorstep in the black of night, something was afoot. She made her way toward Cowley Road in a hackney rather than on foot.

In the dim light of the brothel’s vestibule, the sweet smell of Far Eastern herbs was already overwhelming. Incense, but employed with deliberate overabundance. As always, it blasphemously forced her mind back to early mornings in the Wycliffe chapel.

It was eight o’clock, and the Oyster was readying for sleep. The woman who had let her in looked tired, the kohl lining her dark eyes dissolved into gray smudges.

“Good morning, Lilian,” said Lucie.

Lilian’s curtsy was wobbly. “Milady. How good of you to come.”

Lucie followed her along the corridor, then down the creaking stairs to the kitchen.

“It’s young Amy,” Lilian said over her shoulder. “She’s had the baby, and now she’s got nowhere to go.”

The kitchen was cold, and dirty bowls piled up on the long table. Red Meg was dispassionately moving crumbs back and forth on the tabletop with a grimy rag. She glanced up when Lucie entered.

“Milady.” She made a halfhearted effort to bow her head. Like most women at the Oyster, no, like most women, she was unsure where to place a lady who would set foot into a brothel.

Young Amy had to be the thin girl staring at her from across the room. An untidy blond braid tumbled over her right shoulder. She was clutching a bundle to her chest, which presumably contained the infant.

Lucie turned to Lilian. “When must she leave?”

“Now. The madam wants her gone.”

“She should already be gone,” said Red Meg, “but she’s been begging to stay until you come, so we’ve let her. Lord knows why, Madam would have our heads.”

It was the usual predicament. A man got a prostitute with child. The madam would give the girl two choices—leave with the baby into an unknown future, or give the baby away. Most stuck with the devil they knew. But every so often, a woman decided to keep her child. Young Amy seemed determined, judging by the death grip she kept on the bundle. She held herself very still when Lucie approached.

“Why did you call for me, Miss Amy?”

Amy’s red-rimmed eyes darted nervously about the room. “Some of the girls said you help,” she said. “You’ve helped girls in the Oyster before, and so I thought . . . I thought you might help us, milady.”

Her voice was scratchy, making Lucie’s own throat tighten uncomfortably. Screamed through the night while giving birth, no doubt. It was a miracle the girl was on her feet.

“And what is it you want?” she coaxed.

Amy hugged the bundle closer. “I heard you know of places where we could stay.”

“You should’ve just been careful,” came Red Meg’s irritated voice.

Within seconds, the girl’s nose turned pink and her eyes were brimming with tears. “I had planned to give her up. But when I held her . . . when I looked at her wee face . . .”

“Have you approached the father?”

Amy’s chin quivered. “He wants nothing to do with us.”

Red Meg let an armful of soup bowls clatter into the sink. “What did yer expect,” she said. “He was comely and rich, and you were daft to think he’d have a care for a whore or a whore’s babe.”

Amy trembled, and the bundle in her arms gave a thin squawk of protest.

“Oh shut it, Megs,” said Lilian. She went to Amy and put an arm around her slim shoulders.

“Milady,” she said, “do you know who writes this? They could write about Amy.” She pulled a paper from her skirt pocket and thrust it at Lucie.

The angry red header was at once familiar. It was a crinkled copy of The Female Citizen, the radical pamphlet whose editor was unknown, but which, for some reason, always found its way into the most unlikely hands.

“Write about Amy?” Red Meg snarled. “Why would anyone write about bleedin’ Amy? No one reads about the likes of us.”

“But it ain’t right,” Lilian said. “The father has money. He promised her things, and now she’s got nowhere to go. And this paper prints stories about whores all the time, look—”

“It’s horseshit,” said Meg. “Printing stories about the Oyster? Making us all look bad, and ruining business? The madam would throw you out on your arse, too. As for Amy, it’s her own fault. She’s thick, not much up here.” She tapped her finger against her gleaming forehead. “Nineteen years old, still believing in fairy tales.”

Amy’s eyes were overflowing with misery. “I can’t give her away, milady. I hear they do terrible things to the babes . . . they sell them, or worse—”

“You do not have to give her up,” Lucie said firmly. She pulled notebook and pencil from her skirt pocket, swiped debris off the table, and set pencil to paper. “Have you packed?”

Nodding and crying, Amy toed a battered brown bag at her feet.

“And have you any money?”

The girl shook her head. “I had saved some, but Madam took it when I couldn’t work no longer.”

“It’s only fair, isn’t it.”

Lucie exhaled an audible huff. Red Meg’s commentary was not going to cease, was it?

She tore the page from the notebook, tucked it into her pocket, and went to pick up the brown bag. It was dishearteningly light. “Come with me.”

The stairs were a struggle. Amy was limping but wouldn’t part with the baby to ease her burden. It took a long time to reach the side entrance. The fresh air outside was like a gulp of clean water after a drought. Back on the main street, it mercifully did not take long to hail a hackney.

Lucie tossed the driver a coin, then began counting more money into Amy’s palm.

“This covers a Great Western Rail ticket. Take the train to Wokingham at a quarter to nine. Wait at Wokingham station—I shall send a cable now and have you picked up and brought to Mrs. Juliana’s Academy for Single Females.”

Amy blinked. “An academy? But I can’t read all that good.”

“It’s simply a respectable name for a discreet halfway house. You may, however, learn how to read and write there, or other skills, if they appeal.”

Amy’s apprehension only grew. “Will there be nuns, milady?”

Lucie shook her head. “It is run by women trying to help.” She handed Amy the note she had written earlier in the kitchen. “Give this to Mrs. Juliana, so she knows you are the one I sent.”

The girl nodded. She was in a daze. She should not be traveling at all.

Lucie hesitated. She could feel the sovereign she had put into her coat pocket last night, heavy like a lump of lead. A sovereign earmarked for a ticket to Bond Street, London, and a set of new dresses. Perhaps a powder blue one, in the style she had seen on the fashion magazine cover at the Randolph. It had grated to admit to it, but the truth was, she had felt drab like a crow at Blackwell’s three days ago, when the shopgirls had spilled into the coffee room. In their colorful, snugly fitted cotton dresses trimmed with crisp white lace, they had brightened the room like a bouquet of fresh spring flowers. They had smelled like flowers, too. It was testimony to how overindulged Tristan was, how he had sat and signed his Ballentine cards with such languor; clearly, being accosted by eager young women was commonplace for him. God help the woman he would marry. His next mistress would simply fall into his lap whenever he took a seat somewhere.