“Wherein Mr Russell loses his temper.”

 

Aubrey noted with a sigh of relief that the crowd had dispersed from outside the building where his rooms were located, but had barely set a foot on the first step that led to the front door when Tommy appeared. The Earl looked rather distressed and uncharacteristically angry, and Aubrey could do nothing but utter a curse of protest as the man grabbed hold of him and propelled him inside. He was pushed, none-too-gently, through the door into Tommy’s own lodging, where Owen and Ben were also awaiting him, grim-faced and serious.

“What the devil is going on?” Aubrey exclaimed, smoothing out his crumpled sleeve and staring at what looked rather like a hanging jury about to deliver their verdict.

“We might ask you the same question,” Ben said, his voice dark.

“Might you?” Aubrey replied, by now feeling really rather angry. “Well, you’d better ask something rather more pertinent than that, for I haven’t the slightest idea what you’re all in such a pelter about!”

“Dash it all,” Tommy shouted, much to Aubrey’s disquiet. Tommy rarely, if ever, lost his temper. “If that ain’t the outside of enough,” he added in fury.

“Calm down, Tom,” Ben recommended, laying a restraining hand on his friend’s shoulder and turning to Aubrey with a frustrated expression.

“Come on, Aubrey, for the love of God, come clean. We’re your friends, dammit! At least we thought we were,” he added, looking more aggrieved than Aubrey had ever seen him. “I’d always thought, if you ever found yourself in a hobble ... well, you’d confide in me, at least, even if you didn’t want to face these gudgeons!”

Aubrey gaped at his friend, seeing that he was truly upset.

“Ben, I swear to God, I haven’t the least idea what any of you are on about!” he shouted in frustration. “Of course you’re my friends, what on earth would lead you to believe otherwise?”

“Well, if you think it’s friendship to leave me in the middle of the street with some doxy and her brat? Promising her you won’t abandon her in one breath, and me that you’re in the devil of a fix and I’m to return her to the Rat’s Castle, of all places, in the next!” Tommy said with considerable heat as Aubrey began to experience a sinking feeling. “And then,” the enraged Earl continued, “I come home to find that old witch Meekham having a regular set to with your valet!”

“What?” Aubrey exclaimed in horror, seeing, with a rather sickening feeling of inevitability, exactly where this was leading.

“Yes!” Tommy replied, raking a hand through his hair in exasperation and disarranging his carefully pomaded curls, which only served to illustrate the depths of his distress. “The old witch pitched a regular fit, and it’s only because I pleaded your case that all of your belongings are here instead of outside on the street!”

Aubrey knew that he’d turned as white as a sheet, he was very conscious of the drain of blood leaving his face, and he felt really rather light headed and altogether like he might cast up his accounts at any moment. He took a breath and realised that he wasn’t just upset, he was in a blinding rage. Anger took over where shock left off and he turned on Tommy.

“And you think,” he said, his voice dangerously low. “You think that the brat’s mine and the girl came here - having been left destitute, I might add - in search of me.”

He stared at each of his friends in turn who all began to shift a little uncomfortably.

“Well dash it all,” Owen exclaimed, the only one of them who’d held his tongue so far. “I told them I didn’t believe it of you, but even I have to say, it looks bad, Aubrey. Got to admit it.”

“Well then,” Aubrey replied, his voice shaking with anger. “As it appears that I have been condemned in my absence, I’ll not trouble you with my reprehensible presence any further.”

“No, Aubrey, wait!” Owen exclaimed moving to take his arm but Aubrey shook his hand off with such fury that his friend took a step backwards.

“Go to the devil!” Aubrey exclaimed, before striding for the door and slamming it with considerable force on the way out.

***

Aubrey walked with no particular sense of direction for several hours before he was calm enough to consider what to do next. He thought briefly of putting up at a hotel for the night to lick his wounds in private, only to dismiss the idea. That was the kind of thing a guilty man might do, and he had no reason not to hold his head up.

So, in the end, he found himself once more on his cousin’s doorstep in Mayfair, just as the man himself stepped down from his carriage.

“Well met, Aubrey,” Falmouth replied, sounding cheerful until he caught sight of Aubrey’s face. “You look like a man who needs a drink,” he said with a frown, before guiding Aubrey once more into the sanctuary of his study.

Aubrey sat down in silence, and didn’t speak even as Alex pressed a very generous glass of cognac into his hand.

The Earl stood looking down at him, his face troubled. “I’m assuming this has something to do with a rather distasteful rumour that’s begun to circulate the ton,” he said with no preamble. “Not that they mentioned it to my face,” he added. “Not once I told them that any man who even implied that you’d ever act in such a dishonourable fashion would face the full force of my displeasure.”

Aubrey let out a breath he didn’t know he’d been holding and looked up at Alex with gratitude.

“I was afraid you wouldn’t believe me,” he admitted. “Thought you might believe I’d been pitching you Banbury stories about that girl Jenny this morning to cover my tracks.”

Alex snorted and shook his head. “I find myself rather insulted by that, you young fool! I’ve known you all your life, and whilst I’d not have been so terribly surprised to find you’d gotten yourself an obligation, accidents do happen after all,” he added as he settled himself in the chair opposite. “The idea that you’d abandon the child and its mother…” His face grew hard and he shook his head. “Idea would never enter your head. I know it damn well wouldn’t, and so I told anyone in earshot, and it no uncertain terms.”

“Thank you,” Aubrey replied, feeling utterly gloomy, but relieved, at least, that Falmouth could be relied upon. “Would it be alright if I stayed here tonight? It appears I’m no longer welcome at my lodgings after today’s little scene.” He gave a snort of disgust. “You know Lord Rutherford lives there, too, he’s got at least three bastards that I know of!” he added with considerable venom.

“Yes,” Alex nodded with disgust. “But I imagine their mothers didn’t turn up on the doorstep and create quite such a scene as young Jenny unwittingly managed.”

Aubrey snorted and took a large mouthful of cognac.

“Don’t trouble your head about it,” Alex replied, sounding more avuncular than Aubrey had ever heard him before. “I’ll go to your lodgings with you tomorrow and we’ll set things straight. You’re welcome to stay here tonight, or for as long as you wish, of course.”

Aubrey sighed as some of the weight he’d been staggering under fell away. The idea was also an appealing one, as he could spend more time with Violette without having to concoct excuses for doing so. Though Celeste had been rather helpful in that regard, and they had managed to steal a few private conversations that had made him hopeful that she might look upon him with favour one day. Perhaps her feelings for Eddie were not so indelible as to leave an permanent mark upon her affections after all?

“By the way,” Alex began, leaning forward in his seat. “There was something I wanted to tell you.”

Before Aubrey could discover what that might be, Celeste hurried into the room.

“Oh, Aubrey, bonsoir,” she said as he got to his feet and greeted her, but she was looking somewhat distracted. “Alex, you are really very provoking. You knew I ‘ad to pay my debt to LuLu Rutland this afternoon and you promised to leave me the money.” She wrung her hands together, and stared at her husband with big, reproachful eyes. “I was never more mortified in my life when I went to pay ‘er only to find I could not!”

Aubrey chuckled and couldn’t resist teasing his friend just a little.

“What’s this, Celeste? Rolled up?”

Celeste returned him a look of cool dignity but refused to answer. It appeared Alex had no such sensibility.

“My lady has recently discovered the delights of the Faro table and Piquet,” he said with amusement. “I expect to be all to pieces before the year is out.”

“Oh, Alex!” Celeste replied in disgust. “I ‘ave promised to never play for such high stakes again,” she said, looking really rather embarrassed now. “And I’ve never lost before.”

“You’d never played so deep before,” Alex replied, his tone mild.

Celeste put her hands to her cheeks, which were looking quite rosy by this point. “Oh, arrête!” she exclaimed with real unhappiness now. “I feel quite sick every time I think about it. Three ‘undred pounds, Aubrey! Such a shocking waste.”

Aubrey relented, understanding immediately the reason for her distress. Though it was a trifling sum to her husband, Celeste’s situation hadn’t been so very different from poor Jenny’s, not so long ago, and back then three hundred pounds would have seemed a King’s ransom.

“There, there, mignonne,” Alex said, drawing her into his arms. “No need to come home by the weeping cross, we did that last night.”

“Then why did you not leave the money, Alex?” she scolded him, sniffing a little. “I was never more vexed with you!”

“I did, you goose!” he exclaimed with a laugh. “I left it on your dressing table just as you desired me to.”

Celeste blinked up at him and suddenly looked a little pale. “B--but it wasn’t there,” she said. “I looked everywhere.”

A taut silence filled the room and Aubrey experienced a jolt of such foreboding that he caught his breath. He caught Alex’s eye and knew he’d had the same dreadful thought.

Both men ran to the door, Aubrey reaching it first and wrenching it open.

“Where’s Violette?” he demanded to the first servant he saw, who stared at him in shock for a moment.

Within the space of a few minutes, Falmouth’s grand house had been searched from cellar to attic and no sign of Violette was to be found. Nor could any of the servants remember having seen Violette for several hours, though no one had seen her leave either.

Aubrey returned to Alex’s study to find his cousin white faced with anxiety and Celeste clinging to him, whispering quietly. He realised that this must bring back some unpleasant memories to the Earl, as Celeste had once stolen money from him to run away when she’d believe he’d meant only to make her his mistress, not his wife. It had been a dreadful misunderstanding, of course, but Alex had been like a man possessed in the months of her absence, moving heaven and earth to try and find her. His family had been as desperately worried for him as they had been for Celeste, for it was obvious the man could not go on without her.

Aubrey had sympathised deeply at the time and had been out of his mind with worry for Celeste, but to once again be forced to search the streets of London for Violette made him realise just how deeply the man had suffered.

It was cold and it was dark and she had nowhere to go. At least she had money this time, but she’d been robbed before. His heart clenched, his chest growing so tight he could barely draw a breath, and he turned to withdraw from the study to give his cousin and his closest friend some privacy. He had to leave. Now.

“Wait.”

Aubrey looked around to see Alex staring at him with the deepest sympathy.

“We’ll find her,” he said, his tone brooking no argument.

Aubrey nodded but couldn’t find words to reply.

“Do you know where she’d go?”

He racked his brain to think of anywhere new, but could only return to the hell hole that was beginning to be the setting for his most vivid nightmares. “The Dials,” he replied, his voice hoarse. “She’ll go to the Seven Dials.”

Alex nodded and didn’t waste time with words. “Then we’d best make haste.”