Julia Justiss (4 page)

Only an idiot would actively seek out such a woman—and chance letting a tart like Belle, who was alleged to have indulged in public lewdness and fornicated for the titillation of leering onlookers, get her harpy’s claws embedded any further into his mind and senses.

In the morning, he decided as he arrived back at his rooms, he would tell Aubrey that he’d changed his mind.

But after he’d drunk a glass of brandy and retired for the night, he could not sleep. An indeterminate amount of tossing and turning later, he crawled back out of bed.

Cursing himself for a fool, he dredged his supplies from a saddlebag and began polishing his sword.

A
S SOON AS
the final lines were spoken, Belle left Mae with her friends, who’d persuaded her to attend an after-theater party, and proceeded down the stairs, hoping to cross the lobby before the bulk of the audience exited.

She’d just refused Egremont’s offer to escort her home when a young lady in a fashionable evening gown hurried toward them—and halted abruptly, directly in front of Belle.

Stopping short to avoid colliding with the girl, Belle was about to edge around her when she felt Egremont stiffen.

“Helena, what are you doing here all alone?” he said.

“I wanted to look into her eyes when I confronted her,” the girl replied, sending Belle a glance so full of loathing that Belle’s breath caught in her throat. “And why are you with
her?
” Helena asked, transferring her furious gaze to the earl. “Papa’s been dead barely a month. I thought you were his friend!”

Bellingham’s daughter, Belle realized, dread knotting her stomach.

Egremont took the girl’s arm. “You’re upset—and no wonder, after such a shocking loss! Let me see you home.”

Twisting free of Egremont’s grip, the girl turned back to Belle. “Is there no man you do not try to bewitch?”

“Helena, ’tis highly improper for you to be here unescorted,” Egremont said softly, “or to speak with—”

“My father’s
whore?
” the girl shrilled.

Out of the corner of her eye, Belle noted the lobby filling with people—people who slowed, stopped, gazed with openmouthed fascination at the new scene being enacted before them. Nausea growing in her gut, Belle’s mind fled to the mental fortress from which she could watch events unfolding around her, her sense and spirit detached from whatever indignities might be inflicted on her body.

“Given my new expectations, Lord Egremont,” Miss Bellingham said, “’tis unnecessary to be concerned for my reputation. I doubt I shall receive any respectable offers of marriage, no matter how blameless my conduct.”

“Excuse me,” Belle murmured, edging away.

“I’m not done with you!” the girl cried, seizing Belle’s wrist and yanking her close.

Belle flinched, half expecting a blow. Instead, Miss Bellingham continued hotly, “Was it not enough that you lured my father from his hearth and family, embarrassed my mother before the ton and her friends? That we had barely enough to maintain a household while you were lavished with gowns and jewels? Is your greed so vast that you must bewitch father into bequeathing you the very bread out of our mouths and the roof from over our heads?”

She’s heard about the will, Belle realized.

As if from a distance, Belle watched herself calmly wrest her arm free. “Miss Bellingham, I appreciate how grief disorders the spirit, but you are mistaken.”

“About what?” the girl demanded. “The extent of your avarice? The fact that you—”

“I advise you to consult your solicitors,” Belle interrupted. “Lord Egremont will see you home.” She stepped around the girl, Watson advancing to take a protective position at her elbow.

Ignoring the amused and accusing and censorious faces, Belle walked out of the theater and down the steps to her waiting carriage. Not until the door closed behind her, shutting out the murmurs and the avid gazes, did she relax, sagging against the cushions while nausea roiled in her belly and her heart thundered.

She didn’t blame Miss Bellingham. Indeed, the girl had shown considerable spirit in confronting her father’s harlot in public, knowing news of the scandalous meeting would surely become the ton’s latest on-dit. Perhaps she hoped that publicizing the provisions of Bellingham’s will would make it more difficult for Belle to entice a new protector, ruining Belle’s future as she perceived Belle’s supposed greed had destroyed her own.

Or perhaps Miss Bellingham was so filled with rage over the injustice of her situation that she no longer cared that addressing a courtesan would soil her own reputation. That Belle could understand even more readily.

Though she tried to dismiss the disturbing confrontation, the emotions she’d repressed while the incident was taking place refused to be banished. A familiar sense of anguished humiliation made her stomach churn, heated her face, summoned tears that trembled at the corners of her eyes.

Enough! she told herself, struggling to rein in her dis
orderly feelings. ’Twas just that Miss Bellingham’s unexpected attack had caught her off guard, leaving her prey to this atypical excess of sensibility.

She had just about succeeded in squelching the reaction when, with a jerk that nearly unseated her, the carriage squealed to a halt.

L
AUGHTER AND A BABBLE
of loud voices wafted toward Belle as she raised the window shade and looked out, trying to determine the cause of the delay.

Light blazed from the doorway of a house she recognized as one of the more exclusive brothels in the theater district. Highlighted by its glare, several provocatively dressed women had just emerged with a number of fashionably garbed Corinthians, the couples proceeding toward a large barouche whose position in the middle of the street prevented Belle’s carriage from advancing.

Another Corinthian stood on the steps conversing with a sharp-eyed woman Belle took to be the brothel’s owner.

“Hurry up, Fen,” a young buck called to him. “Don’t want our lovelies—” he ran his fingers over the bare shoulders of the wench he held “—to catch their deaths.”

The gentleman on the steps waved a languid hand. “Just settle our, ah, ladies into the coach while I conclude the negotiations with their charming employer.”

“It’ll be fifty pounds and not a tuppence less,” the older woman was saying. “Not with ye taking off the best of me girls at the very start of the evening.”

“A vast sum, ma’am,” the gentleman said, extracting
coins from his purse. “But how can I quibble when the company is so lovely? Now, my sweet, don’t be bashful.”

With that, he pulled from the shadows a slender lass who seemed, to Belle’s eye, to be scarcely in her teens. Shrinking from the light, the girl raised a hand, trying to cover the bare skin revealed by her skimpy bodice.

“Please don’t, sir,” she protested when the man, laughing, brushed her hand away and bent to kiss one nipple, clearly visible beneath the gown’s thin material.

Instantly Belle was transported to another time and place, when another young girl had vainly tried to hang on to the last shreds of her modesty.

A wave of heat swept through her, intensifying the lingering nausea in her gut, and for a moment, she feared she might faint. An inexorable need for cool air to clear her head of the memories and her stomach of the queasiness set her feet in motion. Several moments later, she stood at the top of the stairs beside the madam without any recollection of having traveled there.

But she was utterly sure of her purpose. “I, too, require a lady this evening,” she told the woman. “This one—” she pointed to the cowering girl “—will be perfect. Whatever the gentleman is offering, I’ll double it.”

For a moment, the man on the steps sputtered a protest. Then his eyes widened and his indignation faded to a smile. “Lady Belle, a pleasure! We should be delighted to invite you to join our humble gathering.”

“Regretfully, that is not possible, sir. Watson,” she called to the bodyguard who’d trotted up in her wake, “escort the girl to my coach.”

“Right ye be, Lady Belle.”

The gentleman on the steps opened his lips as if to object, but after glancing at Watson’s impressive bulk, he must have realized that, alone, he could not hope to prevail. His smile more forced now, he bowed. “I must cede to your wishes, Lady Belle. But I consider that you owe me a favor—which I hope to redeem later.” He ran a hot, speculative glance over her cloaked figure.

Dismissing him with a noncommittal nod, Belle turned back to the madam. “My man will return to pay you. Good evening, ma’am,” she said and paced back to her coach.

She found the girl huddled at the far corner, arms wrapped around her torso as if trying to take up as little space as possible. The flickering carriage lamp revealed her small, pinched face and large, fearful eyes.

“What…what be ye wanting with me, ma’am?” she asked.

What reprobate would trifle with this child? Belle wondered. But the girl’s wary pose and the arms braced defensively over her body told Belle more eloquently than words how life had treated the lass, despite the her fragile air and apparent youth.

“What is your name, child?”

“J-Jane Parsons, ma’am,” the girl replied.

“Don’t be afraid. I require no, ah, personal, services from you, nor am I taking you to a gathering at which you will be forced to entertain. You know who I am?”

“Oh, yes, ma’am. Everyone knows the beautiful Lady Belle.” Looking wary, uncertain but resigned, the girl watched her.

Belle smiled wryly. What
did
she intend to do with this child whose services she had purchased on a whim for an outrageously inflated price?

See to her needs first, she supposed. “Have you supped yet, Jane?”

The girl’s large eyes widened further. “N-no, ma’am. Mrs. Jarvis don’t feed us nothing ’til morning—and then, only if we…we pleased the customers.”

The fierce anger that always smoldered deep within Belle fired up again. Swallowing the curse that sprang to her lips, she silently damned all licentious men and the women who pandered to them.

After signaling the coachman to depart, Belle turned back to the girl. “Then first, you shall eat. After that, you may rest, if you like. My companion, Mae, has gone to a party, so my house will be quiet.”

Though the girl’s disbelief was patent in the dubious nod she returned, she said nothing more. The rest of the short drive was accomplished in silence.

Upon their arrival, Belle ordered food and bore Jane up to her chamber. Meekly the girl followed Belle’s bidding that she wash, seat herself near the fire and wrap up in the thick woolen shawl Belle gave her. Her impassive countenance registered no emotion until Watson bore in a tray laden with cold meats, cheeses and fruit.

A gasp escaping her, she turned to Belle and asked if the meal was meant for her. Upon Belle’s confirmation, she applied herself to the food with the fervor of one kept for too long on near-starvation rations.

Occasionally the girl directed a sidelong glance at Belle,
as if she feared at any moment she might change her mind and have the tray removed.

By the time Jane consumed the last crumb, her wariness had vanished. “Thank you, Lady Belle,” she said, her dark eyes glowing with gratitude. “I disremember when I last ate so fine!”

Carefully Jane removed the shawl and handed it back to Belle. “Thank you, too, for the loan of the wrap. Now, whatever it is ye wish me to do, I reckon I’m ready.” Taking a deep breath, she squared her thin shoulders.

The forlorn valor of the gesture went straight to Belle’s heart. “Truly, Jane, I have no other task for you.”

For a long moment the girl stared at her. “No gentleman be waiting to…to sport with me, or with us both?”

Belle couldn’t repress her grimace of distaste. “Certainly not!”

Before Belle could divine her intentions, Jane burst into tears and threw herself at Belle’s feet.

Belle reached down to pull the weeping girl up. “Hush, my dear. Sit down and calm yourself.”

By the time Belle had soothed Jane, the conviction had settled bone deep.

Under no circumstances was Belle going to send this child back to a brothel. Not tonight.

Not ever.

“I’m sorry to weep all over you, ma’am! But…it’s been so long since someone treated me like…like an honest lass.”

“How did you come to be at Mrs. Jarvis’s house?” Belle asked.

“I never looked to do such a shameful thing, I promise
you! Last fall, a stranger come to market day in our village, saying he was a London merchant looking for girls wishful of working in the city. I’m right good with a needle, and clever at dressing hair and such. Weren’t much for me at home, so me and two other girls, we signed up. Mr. Harris paid for our tickets and bundled us off on the next mail coach to the City.”

All too conscious of the fate that could befall a young girl stranded alone, Belle asked, “Were you separated from your group on the road?”

Jane shook her head. “No, ma’am, Mr. Harris watched us real careful all the way to London, then turned us over to a lady—the hiring director, he said. She brought us tea and asked us what work we was wanting. I got powerful sleepy then, but I thought ’twas just the trip being so tiring and all…”

Though Belle felt certain she knew what came next, she prodded gently. “And then?”

Jane gave a shuddering sigh. “I woke up later in a strange room with naught of my own but my shift! Afore I could figure out where I was, Mrs. Jarvis come in. She said she would treat me nice, because there’s men what will pay a lot for girls that look as young as me. Well, I was right horrified and told her straight out that I wouldn’t never do such a thing! I begged her to let me work anywhere else, even in the scullery. She just shook her head and had her servant Waldo come in. A big, evil-looking man, he is. She told me if I didn’t agree to do what she wanted, she’d have Waldo…persuade me. She said that, he being one what likes ’em young, with a fancy for rough sport, she don’t let him use her own girls.”

A shudder ran through Jane’s thin frame. “The way he
looked
at me, Lady Belle! I thought there couldn’t be nothing worse than Waldo. So—” her voice dropped to a whisper “—I…I agreed.”

“Oh, Jane,” Belle murmured, heart aching for her. “Did the other girls suffer the same fate?”

“I dunno, ma’am. They’re not at Mrs. Jarvis’s house, so maybe not all the girls brought to London end up there.”

“Someone should look into this. Whoever is perpetrating this fraud should be transported!”

Jane shook her head doubtfully. “Mrs. Jarvis said if I ever thought to go to a constable, I’d be wasting my breath. I came to London willing enough, and staying at her house were my own choice.”

“Only because you were threatened! I cannot believe such a scheme could be legal. But no more on that now. Do you want to return to Mrs. Jarvis?”

Jane shrugged. “What respectable household or shop would hire me now, however good I be with my needle?”

Belle smiled wryly. “I can’t claim to be a ‘respectable’ household, but the task itself will be honest enough. Would you like to work for me? I have a great many gowns I should like to have remade and ’tis a project beyond my skills. If you have the talent to do so, you would be rendering me a very great service.”

“I should be honored, ma’am!” Jane exclaimed. A moment later, her excited glow faded. “But…I don’t expect Mrs. Jarvis would let me. I bring in a lot of business.”

Belle lifted her brows. “She can hardly
force
you to stay—unless she wishes to face prosecution. This is still
England, and even women such as we cannot be held against our will.”

“Then you think…you think I can stay?”

“Jane Parsons, do you wish to work for me?”

“Oh, yes, ma’am!”

“Then consider yourself hired. However, since it is quite probable that Mrs. Jarvis will not rejoice over your decision to pursue a new profession, let me inform her by message.”

Jane paled. “I expect she’ll be fiercesome angry.”

“Never you worry about it! Now, let’s find you some proper clothing and get you settled.”

But once again Jane hesitated. “The rest of your household…they may not much like having a girl such as me thrust among ’em.”

Recalling the range of checkered pasts among her employees, Belle laughed. “’Tis unlikely anyone taking service in the house of the infamous Lady Belle would stand in judgment of a fellow creature—nor would I permit it. Come along now. In the morning, you can begin on those gowns.”

Though Jane rose, she didn’t follow. “What if Mrs. Jarvis sends somebody to…to fetch me back?”

Behind the question, Belle sensed the girl’s fear of the infamous Waldo. “I assure you, even if she dispatches her henchman, Watson is fully capable of handling him. He was once the best prize-fighter in England.”

At that, Jane cast herself once again at Belle’s feet. “Oh, my lady, I shall be forever grateful! And my skill with a needle ain’t empty boasting, neither, you’ll see! Show me
any style you favor in a magazine or shop window, and I can make you the very thing!”

“I see we shall deal very well together,” Belle replied, smiling as she shepherded Jane from the room.

After turning her new charge over to her housekeeper, Belle returned to pen the note informing Mrs. Jarvis of her employee’s defection. By the time she’d finished crafting that missive, Belle’s satisfaction at liberating Jane had faded.

Though she knew she’d done all she could, she found herself pacing her chamber, the glass of wine she’d sipped while composing her note unable to quell the agitation she’d felt ever since Miss Bellingham had accosted her at the theater.

Also simmering in her veins was the familiar desire to lash out at the world for the outrages it permitted—and particularly at the villains who preyed on innocents.

It was some time before she tired enough to seek her bed.

How fortunate, she thought as she plumped up her pillow, picturing with sardonic anticipation the arrogant, lustful male faces watching—and then challenging—her from the gallery, that tomorrow she had another fencing lesson.