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‘Which he can see you can spare! You are so rich, I don’t suppose you have ever known what it is to be hungry, to be desperate, to have nowhere to go.’
‘Now, now, miss,’ said the verger. ‘We don’t want raised voices in here. Please moderate your tone....’
‘Moderate my tone!’ She whirled on the plump, cassocked man. ‘Your creed demands you feed the hungry, not toss them in prison. You should be offering him food and shelter, and help, not punishing him for being in want!’
Lotty and Dotty stared at her as though she had gone quite mad. Actually, everyone was staring at her. She pressed her hands to her cheeks, shocked at herself for speaking with such fervour, and disrespect, to a man of the cloth. For raising her voice at all. Whatever had come over her?
But then, the shocked silence that echoed round them was broken by Lord Havelock’s crisp, biting voice.
‘Quite,’ he said with a decisive nod. And then turned to the verger. ‘And I really don’t care for the way you just spoke to Miss Carpenter. Look, Morgan, you have your property back, can you not...let him go?’
Mary took a step that placed her next to him. Side by side they faced the rest of the group.
He really was rather a...rather a wonderful person. She’d been able to tell he hadn’t liked the notion of throwing the pickpocket in gaol, from the way he’d refused to relinquish him into the verger’s custody. But she’d never expected him to spring to her defence, as well. It was just about the most...amazing, surprising thing that had ever happened to her.
‘Thank you, my lord,’ she breathed, darting him a shy glance. And noting that the way the sunlight glanced off his bright bronze curls made him look like... Well, with his strong hand clamped firmly behind the little boy’s scrawny neck, he could have been a model for a guardian angel. The rather fearsome kind who protected the weak and downtrodden against oppression.
‘Not at all, Miss Carpenter,’ he replied grimly. ‘I believe you have the right of it. This boy’s nothing but a bag of bones. When,’ he said, turning his attention to the dirty scrap of humanity he held in one fist, ‘did you last have anything to eat?’
The boy squinted up at him. ‘Can’t remember. Not yesterday, that’s for sure. Day before, mebbe...’
At that, even Morgan looked taken aback. ‘Look,’ he began, ‘I had no idea...’
The boy’s face twisted into an expression of contempt. ‘Your sort never do. She’s right...’ he jerked his head in Mary’s direction ‘...got no idea what it feels like to have nuffink. Or what you’ll do just to earn a penny or two....’
‘If you had the means to earn an honest living, would you, though?’ Havelock shook him by the coat collar. ‘Or would you just keep right on thieving?’
The boy snorted in derision. ‘Who’d give me a job? I ain’t got no trade. No learnin’ neither.’
‘If you can learn to pick pockets, you can learn an honest trade,’ said Lord Havelock witheringly. Then he frowned. ‘Don’t suppose anyone would want to take the risk, though.’ He closed his eyes, drew a deep breath and sighed it out.
‘My town house could probably use a boot boy,’ he said. ‘You’d get a bed to sleep in, meals provided and a wage, if you kept your nose clean.’
The boy promptly straightened up and wiped his nose with the back of his hand.
‘I got no wiper, but I’d try and keep it clean if I got all what you said.’
‘Morgan? Will you let the matter drop if I take charge of the boy?’
‘I... Well, if you are prepared to attempt to rehabilitate him, I suppose I can do no less.’
Dotty and Lotty heaved a sigh, showing they were as relieved as Mary to see the boy escape the full force of the law.
‘Then if you will excuse me, ladies,’ he said, bowing first to her cousins, and then to her, ‘I had better take him there myself. Straight away. And hope that his arrival won’t induce my butler to leave,’ he grumbled.
He was scowling as he led the boy down the aisle. He didn’t slacken his hold on his collar, either. Which was probably wise. Who knew but if he let the lad go, he wouldn’t run straight back to whatever gutter he’d sprung from, and the associates who’d probably led him into his life of crime in the first place?
Damn Morgan for foisting this guttersnipe on him. Obliging him to leave, just when he was beginning to coax Miss Carpenter out of her shell.
Still, he supposed this little test had proved that she was capable of coming out of it when sufficiently roused. She’d been shaking like a leaf, but she’d managed to speak out against what was clearly a gross injustice.
For the sake of a child.
He pulled up short, turned and glanced back at her.
To find her gazing back at him, with a rapt expression on her face.
She hid it at once, by bowing her head and turning away, but he’d caught something in her look that had been encouraging. It was approval. And warmth. And, not to put too fine a point on it, something that verged on downright hero worship.
There would be no trouble getting to speak to her next time he paid a call. He could use the pretext of telling her how the boy had settled in to his new life. And take it from there.
‘I want me penny,’ said the boy, the moment they emerged from the great church door into the drizzle that they’d gone inside to escape.
‘Your what?’
‘My penny,’ said the boy. ‘That other cove said as how you’d give me a penny if I lifted his purse, then ran straight into you and let you catch me.’
‘I,’ said Havelock firmly, ‘am not going to give you a penny.’
‘I might have known. You swindler...’
‘I’m going to give you something better,’ he interrupted.
‘Oh, yeah?’ The boy’s face brightened.
‘Yes. I’m going to give you that job I promised. A man has to keep his word, you see? Especially when he gives it to a lady.’
Chapter Four (#ulink_6d70facd-7a7d-5127-9c4c-d5144ad4bc40)
Overnight the drizzle drifted away, leaving the sky cloudless. When the girls awoke, there was a layer of frosted ice on the inside of their bedroom window.
They shivered, red-nosed, into their clothes and rushed downstairs to the warmth of the parlour.
The moment she got downstairs though, Mary wished it wasn’t quite so cold in their room, or she could have found some excuse to stay there. For her aunt was still upset with her over what the girls had told her of their outing to Westminster Abbey.
‘I cannot think what came over you,’ said Aunt Pargetter as she poured Mary’s tea. ‘To have raised your voice to Mr Morgan...’
‘I am sorry, truly sorry, if my behaviour has offended you.’
‘It didn’t offend me,’ said Lotty, wrapping her fingers round the cup that contained her own, freshly poured, steaming hot tea.
‘Nor me,’ added Dotty. ‘I only wish I’d had the courage to speak up for the boy when that nasty verger threatened him with gaol. He couldn’t have been any older than Will.’
‘It wasn’t a matter of courage,’ Mary protested. She wasn’t a courageous person. Not at all. ‘I just...’ She shook her head. To be truthful, she had no idea why she’d picked that particular moment to finally speak her mind. She just... She’d had to endure so much, in silence, for so long. She knew what it felt like to have nothing. To be at the mercy of strangers. And yesterday, it was as though a lifetime of resenting injustice, of knowing that the strong naturally oppressed the weak and trampled down the poor for being of no account, all came to a head and erupted without, for once, her giving a fig for the consequences.
‘I just couldn’t help myself.’
‘I’m not denying you were right to feel as you did,’ said Aunt Pargetter. ‘But to risk driving away such an eligible suitor, by openly challenging him like that...’
‘Mary did just as she ought,’ said Mr Pargetter, folding up his newspaper and getting to his feet. ‘The consequences must take care of themselves.’
A tense silence hovered over the breakfast table after he’d left the room. Until Dotty cleared her throat.
‘You know,’ she said, ‘it didn’t do Mary any harm in Lord Havelock’s eyes.’
‘No,’ added Lotty. ‘He looked at her as though he thoroughly approved of her standing up for the boy.’
‘Hmmph,’ said her aunt. ‘Well, I suppose that is something.’
And though her aunt let the subject drop, the atmosphere remained tense throughout the rest of the morning, as they all waited to see if either of the gentlemen would call upon the house again.
Either Dotty or Lotty kept a vigil by the window, while Mary kept close to the fire, steadily working her way through a basket of mending.
Until at length, Lotty let out a squeal of excitement.
‘It’s him! Them! Both of them! They’ve just got out of their carriage!’
Her cousins rushed to the mirror to check their appearance, before dashing to the sofa and striking relaxed poses. Which were only slightly marred by the way their chests rose and fell so rapidly.
It puzzled Mary to see the girls greet Mr Morgan with such enthusiasm, when his callous behaviour the day before had shocked them all so much.
She could have understood it if they’d flown to Lord Havelock’s side, and showered him with praise, and pulled him down on to the sofa between them.
Instead, he was left standing just inside the door, watching them with a kind of amused disbelief.
Couldn’t they see how...superior he was to Mr Morgan, in every way? When she thought of the way he’d lifted that boy out of the verger’s reach...
Just as she was reflecting that she’d never seen a man use his physical strength to protect the defenceless before, he turned, caught her watching him and smiled at her.
Her stomach gave a funny little lurch. Her heart sped up.
She hastily lowered her head to stare at the sewing that lay in her lap.
She wasn’t interested in him, not in the way Lotty and Dotty were interested in Mr Morgan. She just...she just couldn’t deny it was flattering to have such a handsome, personable young man smile at her like that.
She hadn’t been able to forget the look he’d shot her as he’d left the Abbey with the pickpocket still held firmly by his collar, either. Or the feeling that had come over her when he’d defended her from the verger’s censure. It had washed over her again, several times the night before, while she’d been trying to get to sleep.
And it positively surged through her when he took a chair, carried it to her side and sat down.
‘I bring good news,’ declared Mr Morgan once the flurry of greetings had died down. ‘The Serpentine has frozen over. Hard enough for us to go skating, if you ladies would enjoy it?’
Dotty and Lotty beamed and clapped their hands, saying what a wonderful idea it was. Just as though the incident the day before had never happened.
‘You will be coming with us, won’t you, Miss Carpenter?’ said Lord Havelock, with a hopeful smile.
She shook her head.
‘I cannot skate,’ she said with what felt suspiciously like regret.
Regret? No! She didn’t want to spend any more time than she had to with these two men. They both made her uncomfortable—Mr Morgan because of his harsh manner and Lord Havelock because of the tendency she had to say far more than she should when she was with him. And for feeling that she could say it to him. And most of all—she had to be honest with herself—because she found him so...attractive. Which made him downright dangerous.
‘I will teach you,’ said Lord Havelock, somehow turning up the warmth in his smile in such a way that she wished it wouldn’t be such a terrible idea to draw closer to him and warm herself at it.
‘Oh, Mary, please! You have to go,’ begged Dotty.
‘Yes. For we cannot go out and leave you here on your own,’ pointed out Lotty.
And they both really, really wanted to go.
There was nothing for it but to surrender with good grace.
With cries of glee, the girls took her upstairs to ransack their wardrobe again, going back down only when all three of them were swathed in gloves, scarves, boots and several extra layers of petticoats.
Her cousins sat one on either side of Mr Morgan in the carriage, which meant that she and Lord Havelock were sat next to each other, with their backs to the horses.
Once they’d tucked luxurious fur rugs round their legs, they set off. Even though the carriage was very well sprung, and they had far more room than the three squeezed together on the opposite seat, every so often the jolting of the carriage meant that their legs bumped. Whenever she felt the warmth of Lord Havelock’s thigh pressing against hers beneath the concealment of the fur, everything else faded into the background. The chatter of her cousins, the buildings at which she was pretending to look through the window—none of it reached her senses. Once or twice, he made an attempt to speak to her, but she wasn’t able to give a coherent reply. It was a relief when they arrived, and the gentlemen got out so they could help the ladies down.
Lotty and Dotty stuck close to Mr Morgan, which meant Lord Havelock was left to escort Mary.
She laid her gloved hand on his outstretched arm and let him lead her to the frozen expanse of water, besides which several enterprising people had set up various stalls to earn what money they could from this unexpected cold spell.
The men hired skates from a booth where a ruddy-cheeked woman helped to fit them over their boots.
Dotty and Lotty rushed on to the ice, shrieking with laughter and clutching at each other for support as they almost fell over. Mr Morgan went to their rescue, offering them one arm each. Clinging to him, the trio set out, wobbling and giggling, across the frozen lake.
Which left her alone with Lord Havelock.
‘Come, you need not be afraid,’ he said with a sincerity that made her wish she could trust him. Made her wish she could let go of her habitual distrust of the entire male sex, just once.
‘I won’t let you fall.’
It wasn’t falling she was worried about. It was the increasing frequency with which she was having foolish, feminine thoughts about him. Foolish, feminine reactions, too.
She gave Lotty and Dotty a wistful look. They weren’t tying themselves up in knots about the wisdom of plastering themselves to a man and relying on his strength and balance to keep them from falling over. They were just enjoying themselves.
There were skaters of all ages, shapes and sizes twirling about on the ice. All looking as though they were having a splendid time. Life didn’t offer many opportunities like this, to try something new and exciting. And the ice probably wouldn’t last all that long. She might never get another chance to have a go at skating.
When had she last let herself go, the way they were doing? Living in the moment?
Having fun?
When had she got into the habit of being too afraid to reach out and attempt to take hold of the slightest chance at happiness?
She reached out and took the hand Lord Havelock was patiently holding out to her, vowing that today, at least, she would leave fear on the bank, launch out on to the ice and see what happened.
What happened was that the moment she set her feet on to the slippery surface, she very nearly fell over.
With a shriek that sounded remarkably similar to the ones erupting from her cousins’ lips, she grabbed at Lord Havelock, who was maintaining his own stance with what looked like total ease.
