It was ridiculous to get an attack of the nerves over the arrival of a maid. Emily knew that, yet she couldn’t keep herself still as she paced the front parlor.

Despite her anxiety, she couldn’t help but feel a satisfying rush of victory at having wooed the girl from the employ of the Earl of Blackstone. She picked up a spoon from her tea tray and angled it so she could see her reflection. Even with the distortion caused by the bend in the silver, her hair was her most prominent feature. Emily’s strategy had always been to try to subdue her curls, whereas Angela seemed to know how to work with them, to showcase them to best advantage. Between her new gown and a coiffure from Angela, Emily hoped she’d look fetching at the ball.

Not that it mattered. The point of going wasn’t to draw admiration, but to inform the Earl of Blackstone that Mr. Manning was a slaver. It hardly signified what she wore for that—sackcloth would do the job as well as satin.

But if that arrogant, entitled peer looked at her and regretted that she had refused his suit, could she help it? She smiled at herself in the spoon.

“What are you doing, dear?”

Emily dropped the spoon but missed the tray, so the wayward utensil clattered onto the parquet. She smiled brightly at Mrs. Smith, who was guiding Grandmama to a chair by the fire.

“Nothing! I’m just passing the time until the new maid arrives.”

“Don’t be nervous, dearest.”

“I’m not!”

Sally raised her eyebrows and looked pointedly at the spoon on the floor.

Emily sighed. “It’s just that we’re a rather unconventional household. Between Grandmama and the situation with Billy, things around here are a little…unsettled.”

“Your girl hasn’t been a lady’s maid before, correct?”

“That’s right. She was an upstairs maid at the estate I visited last month,” Emily said. “And I’ve poached her!”

“She’s coming here to take a more senior position, in a household where there are no men to ogle her—or worse. You’ll give her a half day every week?”

“Of course!” Emily walked to the window and looked up the street. “And she has a sister in service in town. I shall make sure her half day coincides with her sister’s.”

Sally handed Grandmama her embroidery. Although Emily’s grandmother had mostly lost her memory, her motor skills were sharp as ever. “She’s lucky to be here.”

Sally’s interpretation of the situation buoyed Emily. “I think the best thing to do when she gets here is to simply lay our cards out on the table, so to speak.”

“Is that wise? Will she prove as loyal as Molly?”

“I don’t know!” Emily allowed her anxiety to come through. “I can’t imagine that anyone would take her word over ours if she told our secret. I hate to sound snobbish, but she is a servant, and I am a gentleman’s daughter.”

“Agreed, but then you must stop wringing your hands!”

Emily willed the offending hands to remain still, the ticking of the clock on the mantel the only sound until a tap on the door a minute later. It opened to admit Molly, and the much-anticipated Angela, whose gray wool dress and brown hair scraped into a severe twist made her look like a very young headmistress at a school for wayward girls. She bobbed a wordless curtsy and swallowed.

Realizing that Angela was nervous, too, eased Emily’s tension, and she greeted the newcomer warmly, exhorting her to sit down and take a cup of tea. “You, too, Molly. I’d like for all of us to spend a few minutes getting to know one another.”

The maids sat next to each other on the settee, and Emily introduced Angela to her grandmother and to Sally. If Angela was surprised to see a dark-skinned woman in Emily’s household, she didn’t let on.

“We’re all so very glad to have you here. Me especially.” Emily patted her own head and smiled. “My hair hasn’t been the same since I came home from Clareford Manor.”

Angela ducked her head at the compliment.

“I do hope his lordship wasn’t too upset when you gave your notice.”

Now why on earth had she said that? Of course “his lordship” hadn’t noticed that one of his upstairs maids had left his service—in fact, he very likely had not even been informed. And yet Emily wanted him to notice that she had some power to disrupt his empire. How absurd.

“He wasn’t in residence, miss. I suppose the butler will inform the estate manager, but I don’t imagine I’ll be much missed.”

Emily cleared her throat. “I wanted us all to be together because I wanted you to understand a few things about our household.” She took a fortifying breath. Nothing for it but to dive in. “First, Mrs. Smith is a former slave.” The only sign that the news made an impression on the new maid was a slight widening of her eyes. “She is now employed as companion to my grandmother, who is…” Emily glanced at her grandmother, the very picture of industry, bent over her sewing as if she were alone in the room. “Well, she’s not all there. Do you understand what I mean by that?”

“I think so, miss. Age often seems to rob us of our memories, doesn’t it?”

“Yes, exactly. But she’s quite happy, so we do our best to keep her entertained. Mrs. Smith in particular has a way with her.” Emily pursed her lips. There was no point dancing around the real matter. “There’s more. Mrs. Smith has a son, William—we call him Billy. He is still enslaved, or as good as. His former owner, a very bad man by the name of Manning, owned an estate near my father’s house. Manning gave him to another man, an industrialist who put him to work in a cotton mill. He’s called an apprentice, but he is not free to leave.”

Angela looked at Sally. After a moment of awkward silence, she said, “You must miss him something awful, Mrs. Smith.”

Emily’s anxiety abated a little more. “It’s important that you know, Angela, before you take up employment here, that Billy has been trying to escape. He may have already. When he achieves his freedom, he will come here to live with us. The legal status of slaves on English soil is murky. Some would argue that harboring him in our home, as we plan to do, transgresses the law.” She stopped there. There was no point embroidering, in trying to make the raw facts seem any less stark.

Angela simply looked at Emily and said, “There’s the law of man and then there’s the law of God, isn’t there, miss? I signed one of those petitions myself, back in Essex. A man came to town, giving speeches every night for a week. He asked us to sign. Didn’t seem to think it mattered that we were servants without property. So I put my mark on his paper with pride.”

Relief flooded Emily. She could trust her new maid. “Thank you for saying that, Angela.” She stood. “Now, if you’ll forgive me, I’ve got to be going. We have a meeting place worked out—a place where Billy will come when he attains his freedom. One of us visits it every day at three o’clock to wait. And on the day he comes…” The catch in her throat embarrassed her.

“On the day he comes, you’ll be there to take him home,” Angela finished, rising along with Emily. “I’ll accompany you.”

“Oh, no, take the rest of the day to get settled. Molly can show you to your room.”

“It’s not right for you to go by yourself, miss.” Emily couldn’t help but think she sounded a little like Lord Blackstone. “I’m your maid. I should be with you.”

“Very well, then. I shall enjoy the company.”

And she did. Emily was surprised how quickly the journey passed. They spoke of Angela’s duties, negotiated her half day, and discussed how Emily would wear her hair at the ball. By the time they alit from the hack on Fleet Street, Angela had changed her mind twice.

“I’ll have to see the dress, of course, but from what you say, I think a simple chignon will be best. Especially if you wear the pearls. If I have a flaw, it’s that I tend to get carried away with the designs I imagine in my head. But with curls, simple is often better.”

Emily led the girl to the front of the crowd assembled on Fleet Street across from the church. “This is where I generally wait.”

“Look at that!” Like all newcomers to London, Angela was transfixed by the wooden figures perched in a niche above the clock. Two enormous wooden giants stood, each holding a club, ready to strike the bells on the quarter hour. That they were barely clad—many said scandalous—only added to their mystique. Emily knew it was futile to try to converse with the girl until she’d seen the automata in motion, and after a few minutes, the giants obliged. Emily kept her eyes out for the pickpockets who preyed on unsuspecting tourists.

After the performance, Angela turned to Emily. “Have you met Mr. Smith? Does he know what you look like?”

“Oh yes! We grew up together.”

Angela eyed her. Emily sighed. She hadn’t wanted to get into the details, but if she was actually going to be friends with her maid, which it seemed she was, there was no avoiding it. And there would be no getting around the scar. Angela would see it this very night.

Lowering her voice, she whispered the story, glancing around as she spoke to make sure they weren’t overheard by anyone. “He and Sally were owned by Mr. Manning, who, as I said, owned the estate nearest my father’s house. My mother was dead, and my father was an army captain often off campaigning, so I spent a great deal of time at the household. Billy was like a brother to me. When he could escape his duties, we played. Ran a bit wild in fact, climbing trees, swimming in lakes.”

There was that slight widening of Angela’s eyes again. The girl had been well trained. Emily was beginning to understand that this was Angela’s “shocked face.” Might as well get it all out. She led the girl away, until they were standing apart from the crowd. “One night I tried to help him escape.” Angela eyes widened only a little more. “Sally was afforded some leeway because she was growing older. But Billy had a miserable life. As he got older, his workload grew more onerous. By the time he was sixteen he was working fourteen hours a day. He was routinely beaten for offenses such as not chopping wood quickly enough. I could go on, but I won’t.

“The point is, it eventually became apparent to me that he had to get away or he would die. He would literally be worked to death. We made a plan for him to escape and make his way to London. I was to follow later. Billy and I planned to meet here at St. Dunstan’s—we’d come every day at three until one day, we both did.” She glanced at the clock. “It’s famous because of the automata, and it’s one of the few places we knew in London.” She paused. Quite deliberately, she avoided thinking about that night. Angela didn’t need to know what happened afterward. The events replayed themselves at night, when she was trying to fall asleep. But for them to intrude in the day? No, she could not permit it. She shoved them down. There were things that needed doing, and letting the past paralyze her wasn’t going help.

“Our attempt was unsuccessful. We were caught. In his rage, the worse thing Mr. Manning could think to do was to separate Billy from his mother and me. So he sold him.”

“And you think he will still try to escape and meet you here as you’d originally planned?”

“I know it.” And she did. Though they hadn’t been able to speak, he’d given her a look as Mr. Manning’s footmen hauled him off—a look that said that he’d see her beneath the giants of St. Dunstan’s.

“And you come here every day?”

“Yes. Sometimes Molly or Sally comes if I am unable to, or if I’m away from town.”

Angela nodded decisively. “I can help, too. Mr. Smith won’t recognize me, of course.” The maid looked around the crowd. “There are lots of people here, but even so, surely he would stand out?”

“There are a great many free blacks in London these days, but yes, that’s what I’ve always assumed. A dark-skinned man hanging about is very likely to be Billy.”

“Perhaps I could hold a sign, as if I am meeting a passenger coming off the mail coach, someone I don’t know!”

Angela was getting into the spirit of things, and Emily couldn’t help but laugh at her enthusiasm. This was the same feeling of camaraderie that had arisen when Catharine Burnham took her to Madame Marceau’s. It felt so good to have allies.

Now they were laughing? It wasn’t enough to stand aimlessly in the middle of Fleet Street, putting herself on display? No, apparently she had to draw attention with a delighted peal of laughter. A warm, low, inviting laugh that made a man feel like he was being excluded from a great, intimate, life-changing joke.

At least she’d brought a maid this time. St. Dunstan’s was respectable enough. But since it was so popular with tourists, pickpockets swarmed the area. It wasn’t a place for a young lady to loiter alone.

His eyes rested on the maid’s features for a moment. No doubt this was the new lady’s maid Miss Mirren spoke of. She seemed familiar, but he couldn’t place her. The girl must have felt his regard because her gaze swung to his. Her laughter died as her eyes widened. Miss Mirren’s attention followed, and her expression mimicked her servant’s. He’d been caught out. Fair enough. It wasn’t as if he’d been trying to hide. He’d been standing in plain sight, growing increasingly agitated. Pushing off from the doorway he’d been leaning against, he made his way to the women.

“Lord Blackstone.” The maid sank into a deep curtsy. It seemed he did know her from somewhere, given that she’d addressed him by name, but damned if he could remember where.

He glanced at Miss Mirren before speaking, hoping she might provide a clue. She looked enormously pleased with herself, pressing those damned lips into a straight line as if she were trying not to laugh. He bowed. “Ladies.”

“Fancy meeting you here, Lord Blackstone.” Miss Mirren’s eyes narrowed. “I can’t imagine what on earth has brought you to St. Dunstan’s.”

“I can’t imagine what on earth has brought you here,” he countered, refraining from adding, “again.”

The slight pause that followed was filled by the maid, who answered, “Shopping, my lord.”

He didn’t know whether to laugh or to scold the girl for talking out of line.

“Angela, my new lady’s maid, has been taking me to task over the appalling lack of variety in my ribbon collection, and we are out to remedy the situation,” Miss Mirren said.

“You’re out buying ribbons.”

“Yes.”

“Here on Fleet Street,” he drawled.

“Of course not.” Miss Mirren smiled blandly. “This is merely a convenient place to rest for a while. To take in the wonders of London.” She gestured at the clock.

“Convenient to all the ribbon shops nearby.”

“Angela was recently in your employ at Clareford Manor. I have poached her!” Miss Mirren practically shouted.

“I beg your pardon?” If her intent had been to confuse him, and thereby to change the subject, she had succeeded. He looked again at the maid. Yes, of course, he recognized her from his recent stay at the manor.

“She’s very good with curls.”

Miss Mirren eyed him smugly, as if Angela’s employment was a great victory in a tactical war he hadn’t known they were waging. Curls notwithstanding, he would gladly cede Angela if it meant Miss Mirren would no longer be parading around Fleet Street by herself.

It was time to find out what the devil she was doing here. “Miss Mirren, might I have a word with you?” He shot what he hoped was an authoritative stare at Angela. “Alone?”

The girl began to step away but was halted by Miss Mirren. “I don’t think that would be proper, my lord.”

“Not proper?” he echoed. Of course it wasn’t proper for them to be alone unchaperoned. It wasn’t proper that they should share intimate memories and secrets in his library in the middle of the night, either. And it certainly wasn’t proper for them to kiss passionately and press their nearly naked bodies against each other in the lake.

It was all highly, highly improper.

And by God, he wanted to do it all again.

“Not proper at all. And we have ribbons to buy.”

Just like that, she’d dismissed him. Short of making a scene, there was nothing to do but make his bow.

He watched her walk away, hips swaying gently beneath her skirts. Turning toward one of the bookshops on the street, he discreetly adjusted himself to ease the ache in his groin. He wanted her—and not just physically. He wanted to tell her more about his miserable childhood, craved more of her gentle absolution.

Oh, God. He wanted to tell her about her father.

The chilling thought abruptly halted the desire swirling through him.

He had an errand to run. And after that, he would continue with his plan. He would marry Miss Mirren in order to safeguard his mission—and no less important, to protect her from herself. He would give her the sanctuary of his name, whether she wanted it or not.

The errand in question took him to the Methodist Central Hall. He placed a newspaper on the desk in front of a young man working in the office and pointed to an advertisement.

“A Day of Speeches to Reopen the Question of Abolition. I’d like to buy a ticket, please.”

“I’m sorry, sir, but the program has sold out.”

“What does that mean, sold out? How many tickets have you sold?”

“Five hundred, sir.”

“Five hundred! I thought the days of overflowing abolitionist meetings were over.”

“Indeed, but a group of speakers convinced us to offer them our space, and the event is proving popular.”

“Any names of note?”

“No less than Clarkson himself. But I suspect many are coming to hear the mysterious veiled lady.”

Blackstone tilted his head back and closed his eyes for a moment. He was already in a church. Perhaps he should pray for patience. “The mysterious veiled lady?” he finally managed to ask, schooling his features into a mask.

“A female abolitionist. She plans to deliver her speech anonymously. Everyone’s very anxious to see her. Or not see her, I suppose I should say.” The man laughed at his own jest while Blackstone clenched his fists. “We are looking for a larger venue, though, so if you’d like to check back in a few days I may have good news.”

“Thank you, that won’t be necessary.”

He wouldn’t be attending—and, he vowed, neither would the mysterious veiled lady.