No Place for a Dame (30 page)

No man would ever be carried away by any passion she could inspire…

She turned to blink away suddenly threatening tears and, as she did so, noted a rough-looking man sitting near the room’s only window, covertly studying her and Neville. Realizing he’d been seen, he nodded and lifted his tankard in salute. His smile did not reach his eyes.

She forced her thoughts away from Giles to the matter at hand. Coming here had been a mistake.

“We should go.” She tugged on Neville’s arm.

He looked down at her in surprise. “Go? My dear fellow, we’ve just arrived! Why would we want to go? It’s most convivial! Look at that fellow over there with the peg leg sawing away on his fiddle! Have you ever seen a jollier man? No, and do you know why? He isn’t concerned about his station or consequence, his titles or his inheritance. Or his mother.”

“Because he doesn’t have any,” Avery said, feeling increasingly uneasy. She wasn’t sure what sort of place she had imagined Neville had been bringing them to, but it wasn’t one as low as this. The fiddler sawing away did so with more grim determination than pleasure, his smile a rictus. Over the entire mob hung an air of manic desperation fueled by huge quantities of gin. A young man, a cit by the look of him, suddenly let out a yell and the girl straddling his lap leapt to her feet. He grabbed her wrist and Avery saw she held an enameled watch fob.

From seemingly nowhere, a pair of men appeared. The girl snatched free and the men hoisted the young cit under his arms and carried him away. It was all done so quickly and with such little fanfare that no one who wasn’t watching would have realized what had happened. And no one was.

As she stood there, a boy of no more than nine years shoved a jug in her hand, winked saucily, and shouted, “Have a pull, mister. It’s on the ’ouse.”

“No, thank you.” Avery started to hand the bottle back but Neville grabbed it from her, tipped it over the back of his wrist, and took a long draught.

“Are you elbow shakers?” the boy asked when Neville had returned the jug. “You look like a pair of prime coves. I’m guessing you are.”

How many times had the boy said the exact same words to how many other green lads who’d come slumming from the west side of London? Neville looked at her askance.

“I think he’s referring to dice.” She didn’t want to see Giles. Ever again. But she didn’t want to be here, either.

“Oh! Of course!” Neville exclaimed, enlightened. “And of course we are.”

“Then yer in luck. There’s a game starting soon in the back room.” The boy jerked his head towards a smoke-clotted doorway.

“Splendid,” Neville said. “Come on, Quinn. Let’s see whether our fortunes blow hot or cold.”

It seemed ridiculously dangerous. And heaven knew, she felt they were already in enough danger. “I don’t have a fortune, Neville. I don’t have any money at all.”

“I’ll stand you fifty pounds.”

The boy’s watchful gaze flew wide and he and the jug abruptly disappeared.

“You don’t understand. If I lose it, I have no means to repay you. None.”

Neville clapped her on the shoulder, nearly knocking her over. He beamed boozily down at her. “Then I shall make a gift of it.”

“I couldn’t accept that—”

“Of course you can.” Neville draped his massive arm over her shoulders, pulling her towards the back room.

It was darker than the outer room, lit by a half dozen cheap candles, but just as crowded. The players, a motley assortment of merchants, clerks, and hard-eyed habitués, stood three deep around a hazard table, their eyes riveted on the ivory dice tumbling across it. The dice came to a halt and a third of the table erupted into whoops of pleasure. The other players snarled or cursed or fell into grim silence, while a jovial few called out for more bottles of “blue ruin.”

“Please, Neville,” she said in a voice pitched for his ears alone. “This place is dangerous. Don’t you see? Everything around you, all these convivial, natural people you admire… it is stage dressing. The only ones here who are not drunk are thieves and captain sharps. It’s designed to make young men such as you feel at ease, feel…
free
.”

“Young men such as me?” he echoed, looking highly amused. “What of young men such as yourself?” His booming voice drew attention. Avery figured that their best chance of leaving here in the same state in which they arrived lay in not drawing attention to themselves.

“Come along,” Neville said, accepting the bottle being passed to him across the table. “Where’s the brave lad that shouted such gallant encouragement to me horses? We’re here to have fun, Quinn. So let the fun commence!”

He filled an empty glass and tossed back half of it. She regarded him with a sick feeling of dread and helplessness.

“Yer bold friend here has the right of it, young sir,” a well-dressed man with an unctuous smile said, sidling up to them. “We’re all here for the same thing: a spot of merriment, a song or two, a little gambling, then back to our snug beds by dawn. Where’s the harm in that?”

She didn’t like him, nor did she trust him. He might
look
like one of Neville’s peers, but she knew he wasn’t.

Unfortunately, Neville did not share her misgivings.

“That’s right!” he said. “Where’s the harm that? I’m sick of having to listen to simpering girls and boring old antiques. And Mother. I deserve a night to do whatever I want, with whomever I want!”

“Indeed, you do.” The man refilled Neville’s glass.

“And unless you wish to find your way back alone, I’m afraid, Quinn, old man, you’ll have to stay and enjoy yourself, too.” Neville’s smile was almost apologetic. Almost.

Where in the bloody hell had the girl got to?

Giles had been hunting for Avery for an hour, ever since informing Sophia that, as flattering as her offer was, he was not interested in renewing any sort of relationship with her.

He had sought Avery at once, like a man seeking fresh water after drinking something polluted. He asked around, but the last anyone had seen of her had been some time earlier when, having delivered the news that she was now officially a member of the Royal Astrological Society, Sir Isbill had left her in a state of what he’d called, “euphoric inarticulacy.” Thinking she might have been drawn to the night sky, Giles’d even climbed Isbill’s bloody cupola, damn near freezing his hands on the metal ladder in the process. She wasn’t there.

He was becoming concerned.

A footman appeared at his side. “Lord Strand?”

“Yes?”

“There’s a boy at the front door. He claims to work for you and says it is most urgent that he speak to you.”

Boy? Oh, Lord. It must be Will. The damn dog had probably run away. He considered having the footman tell him to go back to the house, but that seemed unduly harsh if he’d lost something he cared about deeply.…

He followed the footman to the front hallway where Will stood beside a liveried footman who frowned down at him, a heavy hand holding the boy in place. Will looked openly belligerent and, upon spying Strand, he shrugged neatly out of the footman’s grip and darted down the hall to meet him halfway.

“What is this about, Will?”

The boy cast a quick, furtive glance at the footmen behind him.

“It’s Mr. Quinn, m’lord.”

Strand checked. “What about Mr. Quinn?”

“He and that big cove is gone ter The Crown and Cock in the Garden.”

The Crown and Cock was a notorious flash house. “When was this?”

“Hour or so back. I seen ’em leave and I followed after ’cause you said as I was to keep an eye on things and I figured Mr. Quinn counted as a thing.”

“Quite right,” Strand forced himself to reassure the anxious-looking boy. “You followed them inside?”

“Nah. It’d mean my skin to have one of me dad’s mates clamp his peepers on me in that place. I hung about outside, thinking they’d have their bit of fun and be out again right quick. But after a while when they didn’t come out, I reckoned I best come inform you before they get rolled proper.”

“Get my coat,” Strand said to the footman. “Quickly.” He looked down at Will. “You did right. Is Phineas with the carriage?”

“No. He’s in a public house down the road. Should I go get him?”

“Which would be faster,” Strand asked as the footman reappeared at a trot, carrying his greatcoat, “to fetch him and drive or walk?”

“Walk,” Will said without hesitation.

Quickly, Strand donned his coat and accepted his hat. The footman, alert that time was of the essence, had already opened the door. Strand grabbed Will’s shoulder and wheeled him around, pushing the boy ahead of him.

“You get Phineas and have him drive down there and wait for me.”

“But how’ll you get there, m’lord?”

“I’ll run.”

Chapter Thirty-One

W
elcome, m’lord!” The flash house’s owner, a small middle-aged man with the obsequious manner of an abused schoolteacher and the eyes of a reptile, greeted Giles within a few feet of the front door.

Tension surging through him, Giles schooled his expression into one of foppish disdain. Avery was here. In this vile hole.

“Allow me to introduce myself,” the man cooed. “I am Oliver Uttridge, the owner of this tavern and, may I say, I am honored to have entertained the Marquess of Strand.”

Strand was too canny to be flattered that the man knew his name. Uttridge would have been watching the entrance from some hidden vantage point, keeping an eye on the clientele. He would know the name of every gambler of the ton, as well as how often they played and, more important, how often they lost, and, most important of all, if they paid their debts promptly. Not that it would matter if they didn’t. There could be certain advantages in having a peer in one’s debt.

“Hopeful or vain?” Strand drawled.

“Excuse me, m’lord?” Uttridge asked, nonplussed.

“You must be either hopeful or vain, to already claim you’ll have entertained me,” Strand said playfully, surreptitiously scanning the crowd. He did not see Avery—or Demsforth—anywhere, and with his height and breadth Demsforth would be instantly noticeable. “Which is it?”

“Ah!” Uttridge called up a laugh. “Call it confidence, m’lord. I am certain we’ll be able to find something to your liking. Or someone.” The man didn’t quite wink, though Strand surmised only because at the last minute he thought better of it. “Just tell me your preferred pastime.”

Where the
hell
was Avery? Flash houses like this were usually warrens of vice, some rooms used as a brothel, others for drinking and gambling. And other were used for darker reasons still—

He should play the hand, take the time to finesse the matter. He couldn’t. The idea of her here, at the mercy of God knew what sort of man or woman, compelled him to act impulsively. Something he never did. But then, Avery had never been in danger before.

“Actually,” he said, “I did not come to partake of your entertainments. I am here looking for a young friend of mine.”

Uttridge frowned, seeing his chance to lighten the Marquess of Strand’s pockets fade along with the opportunity to add to his flash house’s cachet. “Oh?”

“Big, blond buffoonish-looking boy. Probably towing a plump little bespectacled mouse in his wake.”

A flash of recognition flickered across Uttridge’s narrow face. He
had
seen them. Strand bit back his eagerness. The more Uttridge thought he wanted to find them, the longer this would take.

Uttridge held up his hands, the picture of consternation. “My lord. I am so sorry. I hope that you, of all men, will understand.”

“Understand what?”

“That even if I knew of such a pair, I would not be able to tell you their whereabouts. The patrons that drift over from the west end of town come here to lose their identities, not to have them discovered. Even
if
the young man is a friend of yours.”

He’d given himself away. Now Uttridge would hold his information ransom. Assuming he even had any. Avery and Demsforth could have parted long ago by a different door. Will might simply not have seen them leave.

Or they could be somewhere within, unconscious and hurt, having been set upon for whatever valuables they carried. In which case Uttridge would most definitely not want Strand to find out since he had claimed friendship with the pair.