Anne Barbour (6 page)

CHAPTER TEN

Mina was mistaken. Zoe was no longer in the park. She had abandoned her companions and was instead loitering on the southern side of Piccadilly, nearly opposite Bond Street, specifically outside the Egyptian Hall. On one side of this impressive example of Egyptian style architecture, complete with hieroglyphs, stood a bookseller; on the other, an apothecary’s shop.

Zoe was interested in none of these structures. Her attention was fixed on a three-story building across the street, separated from Piccadilly by a courtyard. The Albany — a mansion seven bays wide, with a pair of service wings — contained sixty sets of apartments let out exclusively to bachelors and widowers. Females were denied entrance, save for the mothers, grandmothers, sisters and aunts of the occupants, none of which Zoe had been able to convince the porter that she was, and even if she
had
convinced him it would not have mattered, because Lord Quinton had issued strict instructions that though half the females in London might claim to be related to him, he’d be damned if he’d have any of them invading his rooms.

That same porter (after being subjected to a barrage of sighs and eyelash flutters and maidenly blushes) finally admitted that the Black Baron hadn’t yet returned from the prior evening’s carousal. Zoe settled in to wait.

It hadn’t been difficult to discover where Lord Quinton resided. A man so beloved of the gossips could keep few details of his life secret from the press.

Vendors and tradesmen, shoppers and cits crowded the pavement. Street sellers shouted, cart and carriage wheels clattered, horses and donkeys neighed. A coster brushed past Zoe carrying gutted rabbits, their feet lashed together, dangling from a long pole.

She turned her head away and stiffened, much like a pointer scenting game. There in the distance was the Black Baron at last, looking devilish and disheveled and if only she could secure his interest— Well, she would have been wasted in a nunnery, after all.

Lord Quinton, staggering down Piccadilly, wanted nothing more than his bed. In furtherance of his ambition to die done up, he’d spent the previous several hours drinking hard and plunging deep.

Early in the evening, he’d told the younger Loversall she reminded him of a carp. It had been one of his better moments. The memory almost made him smile.

He glimpsed her then, as she darted out into the street, narrowly avoiding collision with a dustman and his cart — impossible
not
to glimpse her, dressed as she was in a white muslin pelisse worn over a white walking dress; a bonnet of woven straw with a ruching of lilac silk ribbon tied quite fetchingly under her left ear. The dustman cursed, his donkey brayed. The little Loversall waved a dismissive hand and continued on her way.

Quin discovered he was not as bosky as he had been mere seconds past. He looked down at the female who once more barred his path. “You are the most abominable annoyance,” he said.

Zoe recalled a recent herd of cows so terrorized they wouldn’t be providing milk any time soon. “You haven’t met Nell.”

Had he the energy to pursue the manner, which he hadn’t, Quin could have called to mind any number of Nells, and Molls, and Sues. “You waste your time, and mine. I have no intention of ridding you of your virtue.”

 “Why not?” Zoe had recovered nicely from her near-collision. “You’ve rid everyone else of theirs. I should not say so, I suppose, but I don’t see any reason why we should stand on ceremony.”

“Being old friends, as we are?” inquired the Black Baron. “Then I shall also speak plain, and tell you I wish you would go away.”

Did he truly wish her to leave him? Zoe decided he did not. Lord Quinton was attempting to hide his true feelings. Probably he considered her above his touch. And so she was, or would be in the normal way of things, but these circumstances were not normal, and she meant to be despoiled.

 “You fail to grasp the situation,” Zoe gently chided. “Which is not surprising because you are in your cups every time we speak. If you were to try and concentrate your mind you would realize I have not even begun to explore my potential. Great-Aunt Amelia eloped with her groom to Bavaria, where she attracted the attention of a prince, and inspired a duel between that gentleman and a Greek. Third-Cousin Ermyntrude escaped an unhappy marriage by dressing as a man and fighting Red Indians in the Colonies. Gwyneth ran off with Gypsies and dwelt among them in their encampments in the woods.” And Fenella had shot her faithless lover and then herself, but Zoe didn’t mention that.

Lord Quinton was rapidly becoming more sober than he liked. The sun had grown damned bright. Since he didn’t care to continue this conversation in the middle of the street, he grasped Whatever-her-name-was by her elbow and ushered her into a nearby coffee house. Odd in him, admittedly, but no one could predict what Quin would or would not do, including Quin himself.

They entered a large room, the front window filled with coffee cups and pots and strainers of a dozen different designs, the wooden floor worn with use, the ceiling low-beamed. Wainscoted walls were plastered with advertisements: Dr. Belloste’s pills for rheumatism, Parke’s pills for the stone, Daffy’s Elixir, Godfrey’s Cordial, Velno’s vegetable syrup for the alleviation of venereal disease. Coffee-pots waited ready by the well-filled antique grate.

Lord Quinton dropped coins into a brass box, then sat down at a small round table placed near the back wall. A waiter brought two cups of hot steaming coffee in shallow delftware bowls. Quin pushed his aside and requested a brandy and water. Zoe announced that she would like a piece of almond cake.

The waiter came back quickly with their order. Quin raised his glass. Zoe took a bite of cake and considered her attack.

She and the Black Baron were going to have an amour, whether he liked it or not. Of course he w
ould
like it— how could any man not like making love to her?

 True, Paolo hadn’t approached the business with noticeable enthusiasm. Could he be one of those odd men who preferred the company of his own sex?

Maybe he would have rather made love to Cesare. Maybe Paolo was making love to Cesare even then. Maybe she would shoot them both.

 
“You
don’t, do you?” Zoe inquired. “Prefer your own sex?”

At least in this moment, Quin preferred no sex at all. “Man, woman or goat, it’s the same to me.”

Strange that he should mention goats. “You have met Romeo?”

Quin’s brow began to throb. “I thought you wanted me to
be
Romeo.”

 “Romeo is a goat.”

“I mentioned goats only because my mouth tastes as if a goat had defecated in it. Have we conversed long enough to suit you yet?” Quin beckoned the waiter to refill his glass.

Zoe said, severely, “You drink too much. People will soon start calling you a fuddle-cap.”

Quin couldn’t have cared less what people called him. “I’m awake, aren’t I? If I’m awake, I haven’t drunk too much.”

“Tsk!” responded Zoe, and took another bite of cake.

She was so small Quin could have picked her up and tossed her out the window. He was briefly tempted, but too much energy would be required. “What do you wish to say to me? I want to go to bed.”

“That is precisely my point!” For emphasis, Zoe waved her fork. “I want you to take
me
to your bed.”

Quin had no more desire to bed Zoe Loversall than to swim naked in the Serpentine, though rumor claimed he’d done the latter, an event he happily did not recall. “Too little too late. I’ve just come from an orgy,” he replied.

 “But you said you only tumbled virgins!” Zoe protested.

“They
were
virgins,” Quin informed her, and so the darlings had been: virgin sacrifices at the temple of Venus, skillfully enacted by seasoned whores.

Moreover, he doubted he’d said any such thing.

Zoe was growing tired of all this talk of virgins. She was also tired of trying to be virtuous, which didn’t seem to be gaining her much ground.

Quin interrupted her reflections. “Does your cousin know where you are?”

 “Don’t tell me
you
are interested in Cousin Wilhelmina also!” Zoe cried.

“Also?”

 “Mr. Kincaid admires her. I’m sure I don’t see why.”

 “You fail to surprise me,” murmured Quin.

Did the Black Baron not realize that, in comparison with Zoe, Mina was as old as Methuselah, if Methuselah had been female? “Cousin Wilhelmina is positively antediluvian, unlike myself. Moreover, I can be as virginal as you like, which I’ll warrant Mina cannot! I should think you’d sympathize with my desire to experience passion. The wild racing of the heart. The sweet singing of the blood.”

By this time, Quin’s head ached so badly that his vision blurred. He saw before him not one Zoe but two. Both of them were chattering. It was almost enough to make a man swear off the grape.

He pushed his chair back from the table. “Your antediluvian cousin Mina is a mere six years older than I am.”

Lord Quinton couldn’t leave her! Zoe grasped his sleeve. “I can hardly make a scandal by myself! That is— You of all people should understand the world well lost for love.”

Quin shook her off. “What I understand is lust. It’s like an insect bite that itches briefly and intensely, and is as soon forgot.”

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Mina walked through the gaming rooms, regal in her gown of blue silk taffeta, cool and aloof; smiling, nodding, pausing to commiserate with a player so plucked his possessions were going to be brought to the hammer. She patted his arm, a coveted mark of favor; Moxley’s patrons knew they could look but couldn’t touch. Such knowledge naturally made them think about touching all the more. Gamblers who were thinking about touching weren’t concentrating on their game, which was a primary objective of the attractive young women present in these rooms.

Moxley, in some ways, had been a clever man. In others, he had not. Had Moxley been more clever, he would not have taken to eating oysters with pretty opera dancers, and as a result suffered a painfully unpleasant death.

Mina could not blame him for it. It had been in Moxley’s nature to be tempted by a slender ankle, as it was in her own nature to marry reckless, feckless gentlemen who died young. Peebles had not been young, but Peebles was an aberration, Mina’s attempt to break her losing streak.

She arrived at the first room, without glimpsing George Eames. Mina concluded he had nothing to report.

As she was gazing at the door, and wondering if she should summon the solicitor, if for no better reason than to complain at him, a familiar tall figure entered the room. Mina’s spirits unaccountably lightened, and simultaneously sank.

Devon made his way toward her. Since his progress was not rapid — Mr. Kincaid was almost as popular with his own sex as with demireps — Mina had ample time to admire the superb tailoring of his brown coat and waistcoat, the excellent fit of his pantaloons.

He’d told her to come to him when next she felt dull. Instead she’d sent him to Zoe.

Not that any of the various emotions she felt could be described as ‘dull’.

Devon looked her over. “That color suits you. You are even lovelier than usual tonight.”

 “I don’t understand,” responded Mina, quelling a surge of pleasure, “why you must empty the butter dish over my head. The truth is that I am fast growing hagged.”

 “If you want truth—” He arched a brow. “I could suggest a little something to help you sleep.”

Mina rolled her eyes. ‘A little something’, indeed.

In truth, she wasn’t sleeping well, her dreams tormented by visions of funerals and weddings and informations laid, culminating with Zoe in her coffin, and Mina dangling from a scaffold for having put here there. “Are you avoiding us? Nell has been demanding to see her Uncle Dev.”  

“I would never avoid you,” Devon replied. “I confess to being less enthusiastic about certain other members of your household.”

Mina could hardly quibble; she hadn’t recovered from the horror of learning her cousin had disappeared from the park, and her outrage when, hours later, Zoe strolled nonchalantly into the house.

Pressed for explanations, Zoe had thrown a tantrum, which inspired Nell to throw a tantrum of her own. At some point during this drama, Mina’s favorite Dresden shepherdess was smashed to smithereens. She had been on the verge of locking Zoe in her room like Nell
—
or locking Zoe in her room
with
Nell — or tossing the pair of them out into the street — when Beau intervened.

“Beau has taken Zoe to the theater. We have a number of disappointed customers as a result, gentlemen who like to ogle Zoe. Unfortunately, Zoe can’t be made to understand she shouldn’t ogle them back. It is only natural they prefer to ogle her, she tells me, because she is so much younger than I.”

 “She
is
lovely,” Devon remarked.

Mina’s heart sank down to her toes. Devon was already half-wrapped around Zoe’s thumb.

This was a disaster! Dared she tell Devon that she’d changed her mind? Could she persuade him to change his?

Why
should
he change his? Zoe might be an abomination, but Devon thought her lovely.

She was also, damn her, young.

At this rate Mina would soon find herself among the Loversalls who had run mad. She said, a little grimly, “I no longer want you to flirt with Zoe.”

Devon frowned. “First you don’t want me to flirt with you, and now you don’t want me to flirt with your cousin. I wish you would make up your mind.”

“I didn’t realize what I was asking. That is—”

“You think I’m not up to the challenge, perhaps.”

“Don’t be absurd,” Mina responded irritably.” You know full well that you could fix the interest of a saint.”

 Devon was less skilled at fixing interest than his companion seemed to think. He certainly hadn’t succeeded in fixing hers. “Since you bring up the subject – why are you so determined to never again gamble with your heart?”

Mina glanced around the room. “I own a gaming hell. It rather takes the glamour out of play. Do you gamble with
your
heart? Shall we have a conversation about ganders and geese?”

 “I don’t advise it,” Devon snapped.

He was cross with her, realized Mina. But Devon was seldom cross. Or he hadn’t been, before the advent of Zoe.

A horrid notion struck her. Beau thought Mina wanted Devon. Had he told Dev so? Had they shared a laugh at her expense?

She couldn’t bear the thought.

Mina turned away from Devon, saw Lord Quinton standing in the doorway. He was, as usual, dressed in black.

As she walked toward him, she remembered her first glimpse of the Black Baron. Chickester had recently died. Mina had been devastated — each time a husband died she was devastated, which was why she had vowed to have no more of them — and at the same time eager to confirm that she, at least, was still alive.

Quin had obliged.

Now, years later, here he was, his feet firmly set on the path to perdition, his beautiful face refined somehow by his dissipations. So must Lucifer have looked, when tempting foolish females to toss away their immortal souls. “Quin,” she said. “I wish to speak with you.”

Lord Quinton surveyed his surroundings. He had no idea — again — why he had come to Moxley’s. He had set out with no direction and now here he stood, confronted by Mina Loversall.

She smiled at him. Quin experienced an unfamiliar emotion. But then, to Quin, most emotions were unfamiliar. Mina added, “My cousin isn’t certain but she thinks you compared her to an insect. It has made her very cross.”

 “She called
you
antediluvian.” Quin’s attention strayed to the drinks table. “And I didn’t compare her to an insect, but a carp.”

He was, Mina realized, not yet wholly foxed. “Quin, I beg you, don’t seduce Zoe.”

 It was not Lord Quinton’s custom to accede readily to female requests. He was the Black Baron, after all. “You misunderstand. I’m not to seduce her, but despoil her. It is an entirely different thing.” And then, because he
was
London’s most wicked profligate, Quin informed his companion that he wouldn’t despoil Zoe if she permitted him to debauch her instead. “Granted, you’re not rigidly virtuous, but I will make an exception in your case.”

Mina was reminded why she had once reaffirmed herself with this man, and why she had assaulted him. “You already debauched me,” she protested.

“Ah. That would explain the chamberpot,” said Quin.