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He laughed. ‘As if everyone does not know it. My father has made certain of that.’ He signalled to one of the serving girls, who brought them a bottle of brandy and two crystal glasses.
He poured for her. ‘I am in need of a favour, Penny. An odd one, but I am persuaded you will be the perfect person for it.’
As methodically as he could, he described Morgana’s plan, trying to make it sound as if it were not completely irrational. After he finished he downed a whole glass of brandy in one gulp.
Penny leaned towards him. ‘Do you mean to say a baron’s daughter has taken in some of Fortuna Rice’s girls and she wants to train them to be high-flyers?’
Sloane poured himself more brandy. ‘You have grasped it, Penny.’
‘And you want me to teach them how to seduce men?’
He gave her a sly smile. ‘If you know such things.’
She slapped him playfully on the arm. ‘Of course I know such things! You know I do, darling. I am an expert!’ She straightened in her chair and fussed with the lace on her bodice. ‘I am to go to Mayfair, into this lady’s house?’
Sloane’s eyes narrowed. ‘I suppose I could bring them here—’
‘No!’ she cried. ‘I want to be invited to Mayfair. Now tell me, Cyprian. How much is she willing to pay?’
He wagged his finger at her. ‘Do not rook her, Penny, or you will answer to me. If you tutor these girls, your debt to me is forgiven. That should be payment enough.’
She grinned and her eyes danced. She looked almost like the ambitious and beautiful young doxy he’d met ten years earlier. ‘I declare I might have taken this on at no charge at all. It sounds a splendid lark.’
‘But I warn you, you must speak of this to no one.’ He leaned forward for emphasis. ‘No one. Or you will, indeed, answer to me.’
Early the next morning Sloane sent a message to Morgana that he would bring her tutor to her at eleven o’clock.
Morgana and Miss Moore spent the morning drilling the girls in how to walk, sit, stand and curtsy as a lady might do, but all Morgana could think of was that Sloane would be calling—with the tutor, of course.
Soon the clock struck eleven. Ten more excruciatingly slow minutes passed before the knocker sounded and Cripps came in to announce that Mr Sloane and ‘a female person’ were in the front drawing room.
‘Very good, Cripps.’ Morgana rushed out of the room. She left her grandmother and Miss Moore with the girls. With Sloane, the pretence of a chaperon was unnecessary.
When she entered the drawing room, he turned to face her. He was resplendent in dove grey pantaloons, shiny black boots, and a coat in a blue so dark it was almost black. He quite took her breath—and her speech—away.
‘Miss Hart.’ He stepped aside to reveal the woman he had brought with him. ‘May I present Madame Bisou.’
The woman looked perfectly respectable in a plain brown walking dress and spencer. Only the flaming red hair peeking out from under her sedate matching bonnet gave hint to her profession.
‘Madame Bisou.’ Morgana offered her hand. ‘I am grateful you have come.’
The woman appraised Morgana as she accepted the handshake. She gave Sloane a significant look. ‘Cyprian, I begin to understand how you came to make this request.’
His face filled with colour, and Morgana rushed to speak. ‘Mr Sloane is acting as my friend only because I have given him little choice, Madame.’
‘Little choice indeed!’ Madame Bisou exclaimed. ‘As if Cyprian does anything he does not wish to do.’ She put her hands on her hips. ‘Now, what is it you require of me?’
Morgana begged them to sit while she explained.
When she finished Madame Bisou’s eyes danced. ‘I am well able to teach your girls how to be pleasing to men. I have some experience in such matters, do I not, Cyprian?’
Sloane returned her glance with an ironic gleam in his eye. ‘You do, indeed, Penny.’
Madame Bisou made a face at him, and Morgana realised with shock that the madam must have once been intimate with him. Was she still? Morgana felt the same sick feeling she experienced when realising her father must have used The Whoremonger’s Guide.
No. Not the same feeling. This felt worse somehow.
She regarded Madame Bisou, her eyes narrowing. Surely the woman was older than Sloane, who must be in his thirties. There were faint lines around her eyes and at the corners of her mouth. Her skin had lost the tautness and clarity of youth. Still, she had an aura about her that made Morgana certain that if the two of them walked down the street, gentlemen would turn to look at Madame Bisou and not at her. But that was what she had desired in a tutor, was it not?
‘Shall I do, Miss Hart?’ Madame Bisou sounded amused.
Morgana shook herself. What business was it of hers with whom Sloane shared such… intimate behaviours? If anyone should be concerned it would be Hannah, but then Hannah would never know of this.
‘I suspect you will do very well, Madame,’ Morgana responded, avoiding a glance at Sloane. ‘Shall I take you to your students?’
Madame Bisou clapped her hands. ‘Oh, yes. The sooner, the better.’
Sloane stood. ‘I doubt you require my presence. When shall I collect you, Madame?’
Madame Bisou looked to Morgana.
‘In two hours, Sloane, if that would not be inconvenient?’ Morgana still did not look straight at him.
He bowed, but stepped to the open door of the library to say a brief hello to Morgana’s girls. Morgana hesitated a moment before ushering Madame Bisou into the room, pausing to watch Sloane head towards the hall.
Sloane walked out of Morgana’s house at the same moment his secretary approached his own door.
Mr Elliot looked greatly surprised, no doubt wondering why his employer called upon a single lady before noon, alone at that.
‘Good day, Elliot,’ Sloane said in a deliberate tone.
Mr Elliot blinked rapidly. ‘Good day, sir. I… I was just returning from town.’
‘Seeing to my business, I suppose?’ Sloane walked over to where Elliot stood.
Elliot still avoided his eye.
Sloane rather enjoyed the young man’s discomfort. It belied his usual efficiency. But Sloane also realised that Elliot was not a fool. Even if Elliot concluded he was making a conquest of Morgana, what Sloane suspected anyone would conclude, he believed he could count on the young man’s discretion. Still, it did not hurt to emphasise the point. ‘Is there something you want to ask me, Mr Elliot?’
‘Oh, no, sir.’ Elliot sputtered. ‘That is—it is none of my affair, I am sure.’
The two men walked together into Sloane’s house. ‘It is no affair of mine as well, but you will not speak of me visiting Miss Hart’s house.’
His secretary looked wounded. ‘Of course I will not, sir!’
Sloane nodded. ‘Very good.’
He headed to his library, thinking a small glass of port might pass the time while he waited to collect Penny.
To his dismay, Elliot followed him into the room. ‘There is something I ought to speak with you about.’
Sloane already had the bottle of port in hand. He gestured for the young man to sit and poured a glass for them both.
Elliot began, ‘Sparrow, your butler, sir, informed me that one of the footmen informed him that Miss Hart’s footman was talking of something havey-cavey next door. It seems there are some suspicious females present in the house.’
Sloane paused just as he was about to lift his glass to his lips. He tried to sound casual. ‘Havey-cavey?’
Elliot shrugged. ‘That is all I know. I shall discover more in time. I thought I ought to tell you of it, because you indicated reservations about moving next door to Miss Hart.’ He stopped and gave Sloane a considering look. ‘But perhaps you know of it…’
Because Elliot had seen him leave Morgana’s house. Sloane stared at his secretary a long time. It had taken only a day for news of Morgana’s strange guests to reach Elliot’s ears, something he must deal with post-haste.
Elliot regarded him with a steady look. ‘You do know of this,’ he said simply. ‘I beg you would instruct me how you wish me to proceed.’
Sloane appraised the young man. Elliot was alert and intelligent. Because the young man lived with him, it would be difficult to put much past him. Sloane was unaccustomed to trusting another person, but Elliot could be of great assistance. He could help keep an eye on Morgana when Sloane could not, an extra protection.
Elliot was beholden to Sloane, who, as a favour to a former smuggler, had taken on the man’s son as secretary, providing him with a chance at a respectable profession. Even if Elliot was disposed to be loyal in return, was it fair to ask him to share the risk of Morgana’s courtesan school being discovered?
Who was he fooling? If the courtesan school was discovered, Elliot would sink with the rest of them. Better for him to be warned.
‘Drink your port, Elliot,’ Sloane said. ‘And I will endeavour to explain.’
A quarter of an hour later, Sloane had told Elliot the whole story. When he finished, he refilled Elliot’s empty glass.
‘That young maid wishes to be a courtesan?’ Elliot asked incredulously.
Sloane sipped his own drink. ‘She is bent on some sort of harlotry, Miss Hart insists. That is how this whole courtesan school came about.’
Elliot stared into his port. ‘I wonder why she should wish to do such a thing.’
Sloane leaned back in his chair. ‘Living with her father, I expect. He was one of the King’s diplomats in Spain during the war. I suspect she pretty much did as she pleased in his house.’
Elliot looked baffled. It took several moments before comprehension dawned on his face. ‘Oh, you meant Miss Hart. I was speaking of the maid.’
‘The maid?’ It was Sloane’s turn to be bewildered. He took another sip. ‘In any event, if this business reaches the ears of the ton, it shall be the downfall of us all. I may find your assistance useful from time to time. May I depend upon you?’
‘Indeed, sir,’ Elliot responded, but in a distracted manner.
Elliot proceeded to inform Sloane of the financial business he had transacted in town. The complexity of the investments Elliot had set up were a bore to Sloane, but the profits continued to be gratifying. He kept watch on the mantel clock.
He returned to Morgana’s house early to collect Penny.
Miss Hart’s butler admitted him. ‘I shall announce you directly, sir.’
‘In a moment.’ Sloane handed him his hat and gloves. ‘What is your name, man?’
‘Cripps, sir.’ The butler placed his hat and gloves on the marble-topped hall table and turned back to him.
Sloane gave the man a steely stare. ‘It has come to my attention, Cripps, that the servants under you are passing tales about this household to my servants.’
Cripps returned his look impassively.
Sloane continued, ‘This will not do. You have shirked your responsibility to protect this lady’s privacy.’
A muscle in Cripps’s cheek twitched, but he remained stiff and erect.
The man gave away little. Sloane decided to increase the stakes. ‘I am a wealthy man, Cripps, but I can also be a dangerous man to cross. Treat this lady and her guests well and you and your staff will be rewarded. Bonuses to them all from me.’ He leaned forward menacingly. ‘Harm her with loose tongues or otherwise and you will incur my wrath.’ He paused for Cripps’s reaction.
The butler did not change expression.
‘I assure you, you do not wish to displease me,’ he emphasised.
Cripps finally responded in a low voice. ‘I will do my duty, as I always do.’ His face remained bland. ‘Shall I announce you now, sir?’
Once with the students, Madame Bisou dropped her French accent and her flirtatious ways. Oddly, she reminded Morgana of one of the Spanish noblemen her father had entertained in Spain. The gentleman had been incredibly shrewd, extracting from her father exactly what he wanted, and exactly what her father had originally refused to give him. Morgana discovered later that the nobleman had manipulated the French just as effectively.
Madame Bisou had the same kind of cleverness and charm. She drew in the girls with a very friendly, motherly manner, and held them in her palm while she spoke of her origins.
‘I was not always Madame Bisou,’ she began in the spellbinding voice of a practised story-teller. ‘I was born Penny Jones, and my mother died giving birth to me. As a child I walked at my father’s side while he hawked dirty old clothes on Petticoat Lane. “Old clo,” he’d cry over and over. “Old clo.”’ She looked heavenward. ‘I can still remember it. Hearing the other street vendors’ songs all day as well as my father’s. I used to sing them myself and dance, and passers-by would throw me pennies. Pennies for Penny.’ Her smile left her face. ‘It was not long before men paid for more than my dancing.’ She gave them all a significant look. ‘By day I’d follow my father in the street and by night in the pubs, until one night he had no more coins for his gin.’ Her voice got very low and Morgana could see each of the girls and Miss Moore, too, straining to hear. ‘That night he sold me to a man in the pub for a few shillings. I never saw my father again.’
‘That’s dastardly,’ cried Katy. ‘What happened next?’
Madame Bisou gave a ghost of a smile. ‘The man sold me at a profit to a bawdy house. After he had his way with me, that is. He sold me to a mean old abbess who beat her girls if they gave her any trouble. She kept all the money.’
There was a collective exclamation of outrage, and the madam went on to tell how she fooled the procuress and wound up with enough money and power to take over the house and drive the woman away.
Katy and Rose cheered with enthusiasm at this triumph.
Madame Bisou looked each of the girls in the eye. ‘I know how to get gents willing to die for me,’ she said dramatically. ‘And that is what I will teach you. I’ll show you how to make them beg to do what you want them to do. I’ll teach you how to trick them into paying you much more than they thought they would. And how to have them stumble over each other to see who can buy you the biggest ring, the most expensive necklace or the most beautiful bracelet.’
Morgana was as mesmerised by the tale as the others, but she could not think of any gift she would want from a man, no dragon he could slay for her, no bauble he could purchase. Still, being such a temptress would be heady stuff indeed.
Cripps knocked on the door and announced Sloane, who entered the room to collect Madame Bisou. Katy and Rose begged her to stay longer. She laughed, saying she would return very soon. None the less, they detained her with more questions.
Sloane leaned over to Morgana. ‘How did she do?’
Morgana looked into his smoky grey eyes. ‘She told us the terrible story of how she came to be as she is today.’
‘The terrible story?’ The corners of his eyes crinkled. It so distracted her, she forgot what she’d just said to him.
‘Oh—yes.’ She swallowed. ‘You know, how her father sold her for a pint of gin.’
His eyes shone. ‘It is a hum, Morgana. Penny was an innkeeper’s daughter who found life too tame and struck out on her own. I suspect her father still owns his pub somewhere in Chelsea and makes a fine living.’
Morgana burst out laughing, holding her hand over her mouth so the others would not heed her. ‘Oh, she is splendid, Sloane. She had us all completely at her mercy. I think Mary had tears in her eyes. If she can fool us, then she must know how to fool men!’
His expression changed to a stern one. ‘Is that what you desire, Miss Hart? To fool men?’
She was too happy to allow him to scowl at her. She mimicked the madam’s low, attention-capturing cadence, as well as her accent. ‘Yes, it is, Sloane. We must fool some very rich men into giving all their money, n’est pas? And then toss them away, keeping all their money in our pockets.’
