The Hunger (18 page)

The image of Beatrix which had come to him so often in the hulks fluttered into his mind now. They were riding at a gallop in the dark along Rotten Row and her cheeks were flushed and alive. She might be the reason he had found the will to survive, to complete his mission and escape. It was as if her image was a guardian angel, urging him toward life. He didn’t care anymore that she was a courtesan. His dream of her was constant. How could she not be capable of constancy? Now he had unfinished business with her. There was the matter of a promised ride.

“All right, Symington, you’ve had your way with me.” Beatrix said. “I’ve fed, I’ve bathed. You’ve taken away the laudanum. And you made me come downstairs to find you.” The old fox must have planned it, for all the draperies downstairs were closed against the fading light.

Symington was polishing silver, a task anyone else in the house could have done, but which he always reserved to himself. “You’re looking much better, if I may say so, my lady.”

“You may not.” Beatrix felt like a trapped animal, waiting for the memories or the spinning colors to resume now that her protection was gone.

“Then might I thank you for purchasing the house in Wimpole Mews?” He went on polishing a spoon, though it already gleamed. “It is quite suitable, and very generous.”

“Oh. Yes.” That seemed so long ago. “Is your sister safely there?”

“Yes, my lady. She’s better already for the sunny aspect of the house and Mrs. Cadogan’s cheery chatter.” He cleared his throat and examined the spoon. Apparently finding it wanting, he began rubbing it again. “Your ladyship will want to hear the news of town, of course. Lady Freston is in a family way again. And Lord Langley has returned to town, just this afternoon.”

Beatrix’s stomach fluttered. She couldn’t think. That was bad, wasn’t it?

Symington didn’t even glance at her. “Strange, that. Lord Devonshire’s man says Withering has been agitated, expecting his master home for several weeks. And now he’s back and looking thin and drawn, quite under the weather.”

Beatrix wasn’t listening. Langley would be a reminder of . . . of other times her heart was engaged and she was tossed aside. But she wouldn’t have to see him. She didn’t go out. She’d had no one to Berkeley Square in . . . however long it had been. But still there was the damnable flutter . . .

John climbed the stairs in Thomas Barlow’s house with some effort. It was nearly nine o’clock. He was not yet fit, though he had consumed a huge meal paid for with
counterfeit pounds and had had a full night’s sleep in Petersfield. He must report to Barlow before he could do the one thing which had kept him at his journey all day, in spite of his fatigue.

Mrs. Williams showed him into Barlow’s study and promised him a bite to eat, notwithstanding his protests, or waiting to see if her master invited him to dinner. She was a woman whose kindness was innate. He looked into her weathered face and saw the British character whole. She could be dour and querulous when berating Barlow for disregarding his health in favor of his government service. Yet, like Withering, there was a core of goodness that shone through her eyes. Could she and Withering possibly balance the Roses of England?

Barlow came into the room. He seemed surprised.

“Didn’t you think I’d make it?” John asked.

“We had almost given you up after Faraday was transferred to the
Ravenshead
. I was about to send someone in, regardless of the risk to the mission. Did you get the name?”

John nodded.

Barlow peered at him. “God’s nose, Langley, you’re a pale scarecrow. Are you well?”

“A little knocked about,” John acknowledged.

Barlow sat down, leaning forward. He said nothing, waiting.

John gathered himself. “You will scarcely credit it but Dupré named a woman. Asharti.”

“A woman! Was he bamming you?”

“I think he was sincere. He knew he was dying. He thought I had vital information to impart to her.”

“He’s dead, of course, since you didn’t bring him with you.”

“Yes.” John did not tell Barlow that he hadn’t killed him.

All talk stopped while Mrs. Williams brought John a cold mutton pie and a largish scoop of plum duff, with
apologies that it wasn’t something more. John thanked her, saying he was fairly sharp set, and fell to with a will. When finally John paused for breath, he saw Barlow with a finger to his lips, tap-tap-tapping while he thought.

“Asharti? What kind of a name is that?” he mused.

“I have no idea. She is the comtesse of one Fanueille. Do you know him?”

Barlow’s eyes flickered. John imagined him sorting his vast store of information. “An impoverished minor aristocrat from Provence . . . the title is a fake . . . has risen in Bonaparte’s esteem . . . was given command of a division under Soult. Returned to run the provisioning units—siege engines, salt pork, and the like. He is the minister of foreign trade at the moment.”

“Then he is well placed for his wife to act through him.”

“So. You will go.” Barlow looked up. “You should know the situation has grown more serious.” His brows inched together. “The French have broken the blockade at Brest.”

“How?” The French had been rebuilding their navy at a feverish pace after their crushing defeat at Trafalgar. All those ships escaping to invade were an island’s worst nightmare. So England had been blockading ports up and down the French coastline and the Mediterranean.

Barlow stared into the fire. “One of our ships drifted into its neighbor in the fog. The two tangled and fell off the blockade. The French somehow divined the mishap and slipped through.” He did not wait for John’s question. “The ship that perpetrated this enormity was found to be unmanned. All aboard were dead.”

“How?” John whispered, knowing the answer, not wanting to hear it.

“Drained of blood.”

“I will go, of course,” John said. “When can you arrange a packet? Tomorrow?”

Barlow nodded. “You must find a way to eliminate this
female mastermind. And find out what plague is causing this loss of blood. They have loosed some weapon against us. If this phenomenon reaches England . . .”

John nodded. Now there was but one more thing to do here, or his soul was not worth the price of the Satan’s bargain he had made with Barlow for so many years. “English treatment of prisoners on the hulks casts no favorable light upon our nation,” he said, then hesitated. Better just to say it out. “An increase in the allowance for food, removal of the worst officers, even such small improvements would remove a stain on England’s honor.”

Barlow frowned and offered John a glass of negus. “The Transport Office is notoriously corrupt,” he murmured as he poured. “And every competent officer is needed on the high seas.”

“Can you not talk to Admiral Strickland?” The admiral was one of the very few outside of Barlow who knew what John was. Unfortunate, but inevitable. His good will had been needed to place John on a ship of the line at the right time on a mission back in ’05.

Barlow frowned “He might be enamored of the job you did for the admiralty with that Spanish frigate, but this is beyond his powers. Parliament hardly has the votes for enough tax revenue to supply Wellington. There’s no chance of money for French prisoners.”

John clutched his drink with both hands. He had known it was so. But he would not give up entirely. “I have never asked for payment for the small exercises I perform.”

Barlow looked wary. “We value your services the more because you are a volunteer.”

“There are two favors I would beg.” The admiral would arrange them, but probably not on John’s word alone. Barlow must be the go-between.

Barlow raised his alarming brows. “Besides reforming the entire naval prison system?”

John smiled tightly. “I want parole of two men from the
Vengeance
, Paul Reynard and Louis Garneray. Surely the admiral’s influence extends so far?”

“Perhaps,” Barlow made no commitments. “And the second request?”

“There is a counterfeit ring operating in Portsmouth. The bills are modeled after those issued by the Dorchester Bank. One Lieutenant Rose has set the prisoners to making them, against their will of course, and is passing them in Portsmouth to buy his personal luxuries.”

Barlow’s eyes opened wide in his wrinkled old face for a single moment before they regained their habitual closed expression. He straightened in resistance. “The admiral would not take kindly to counterfeiting but one hates to bother him with such trifles.”

John rolled the dice. “The man I have known for fifteen years would do this thing for me.”

“Then I suppose I must do it.” Barlow frowned.

That was John’s parting gift to his fellow prisoners.

“Go home and get some sleep, and for God’s sake, get your man to feed you.”

John had no intention of going home. It was after ten. He’d hire a carriage to take him to his livery, then it was on to Berkeley Square. It was Wednesday. She might be alone. And he had only one night to claim the ride he was promised.

Eleven

Beatrix heard the pounding on the front door even from the writing desk in her boudoir. She listened to the voices, one in particular. It was him! Symington had strict orders to say she was not at home to any visitors. That would protect her. Did she want that?

The knock on her door was a formality. Symington opened it before she could answer. “Lord Langley to see you, your ladyship.” His look was smug, though his mouth was prim.

Damn Symington! What was he about? She tried to still her breathing, and found an unfamiliar feeling pulsing between her legs. It wasn’t fair! She wasn’t strong enough to face him now. She would lose control if she wasn’t careful.

He entered and just stood, hands clasped before him as though he must control them. Symington slid out and shut the door. She stared, silent. He was thinner. His coat and his knee breeches did not fit him as tightly as they had. The lines around his mouth were deeper. He was paler, too, and there were faint, dark smudges under his eyes. The eyes themselves burned with green intensity.
She had seen that look a thousand, thousand times. She hardly expected Langley to display it so nakedly. What did it mean?
He
was the one who had cast her aside to go to a mill!

He started to speak, swallowed once, and began again.

“I regret that my business kept me so long away.”

God, no! He was going to lie to her. But why lie if he didn’t care about her? Maybe . . .

“I had a touch of the influenza.” He looked away as though that was the lie. But he
had
been sick, she could see that. It didn’t explain the mill.

But she didn’t want him to explain. She daren’t be around him at all. Even now she was acutely aware of his body inside his clothing. Her unruly blood pooled in her loins. He was dangerous because she cared whether he cared about her and because she dared not indulge her body’s reaction, lest she go the way she once had gone, the way Asharti went still.

He was waiting for her to speak, but she couldn’t. Her throat was full.

John looked into her brown eyes and saw the pain there. She had heard that he cried off from their engagement to go to the mill in Petersfield. That much was obvious. He couldn’t even tell her it wasn’t true. But she was not indifferent. He licked his lips. She was not indifferent Neither had she screamed or thrown him out. No, she sat there, saying nothing, looking up at him with those wonderful brown eyes. That was cause for hope, wasn’t it? He cleared his throat.

“I’ve come . . . I’ve come to claim the ride you promised me a month ago.”

“I . . . I don’t think—” Her voice cracked.

“Are you the type to break your word?” If she refused him now, he’d be lost. Worse, she would confirm an opinion of her he wasn’t sure he held anymore.

She swallowed. “No,” she whispered. “When would you like to claim it?”

He took a breath. “Now.”

Beatrix watched silently as Langley saddled Dorrie. His chestnut gelding, Fletcher, stood quietly in the cross-ties, already tacked up. She tried to focus herself by examining Langley’s horse. The gelding had a wonderful set to his shoulder. He must have been gelded late, because his neck arched with muscle. If only her head would clear she could get control. What was she doing here at nearly midnight with the one man she swore she would never admit into her thoughts again? She was taking a night ride with him—something precious to her, intimate. Of course, this wouldn’t be her usual ride, alone in Hyde Park at a full gallop that would scandalize the
ton
if they knew. The poor caretakers replaced the locks she broke on the northeast gate at Marble Arch routinely. No, this would be a sedate clop around the square.

Well, she would redeem her promise, but she wouldn’t put her heart into it. Wasn’t her heart the problem? It was thundering in her chest even now.

He led the horses out onto the mews. Their hooves clopped on stones damp with dew. The fog had settled over the city. “My lady?” he invited, holding both horses’ reins while he bent and cupped his hands.

She lifted her chin and placed one boot in his palms. He tossed her up easily and she turned to sit in her saddle. She lifted her habit to lock her knee over the horn and pushed her other heel down in the stirrup. Her impulse was to canter off, but she would not give him the satisfaction of being rude. This was his ride, and she would trot behind him in his limited concept of what a ride at night could be. He would be timid, if not for himself, then for her. A turn about the square and her obligation was filled.

He swung himself into the saddle. Her gaze lingered
on his thigh against the leather. He might have lost some weight but he was still finely made. Dorrie pranced and her muscular back moved against Beatrix’s most private parts under the saddle. He studied her horsemanship as she settled Dorrie then trotted west along the square, making no remark. Several carriages loomed out of the mist. If there were figures in the shadows, she did not care a whit for them, nor did he.

With a sharp intake of breath she realized he meant to take Mount Street all the way to Hyde Park. At Park Lane, he turned north, past Grosvenor Gate and Brook Gate. At the Marble Arch Gate he hopped down. She chuffed disbelief to herself. He could never gain entrance.