Diana the Huntress (7 page)

‘Tired?’

She heard the question despite the row going on about her, and manufactured a yawn.

‘Very,’ she said. ‘I am sorry to be such a dull dog, but I confess I am weary and must be fatiguing you with my company.’

‘Not at all. Since we cannot hear what is left of the play, I suggest we return to our beds.’

Diana fell silent as they strolled back to Conduit Street. Her earlier enjoyment of Lord Dantrey’s
company
had fled. He was so cool and remote. She did not know what he was thinking. She was becoming increasingly nervous in his company. He did not seem the type of man who would give up his time to entertain a raw youth from a country village. She stole a glance at him, her eyes level with his chin. His face was rather grim and his eyes hooded. She felt a shiver of fear and found herself praying he would never guess she was a girl. She toyed with the idea of landing on Lady Godolphin’s doorstep in the morning. But such a long and dreary life awaited her. There was the mysterious Jack Emberton, of course. Perhaps just one more day, thought Diana. She would escape from her overpowering companion by going out for a walk early in the morning. The streets would be quiet. No gentleman was ever seen out of doors before two.

By the time they reached the hotel, she was as tired as she had affected to be. She thanked him politely and offered to pay for her theatre ticket, an offer which he dismissed with a wave of his hand.

‘We shall find something to amuse you tomorrow, Mr Armitage,’ he said. ‘Good night.’

Diana blushed and straightened her knees quickly, turning her curtsy into a bow.

‘Good night, my lord.’

She felt his eyes on her back as she wearily mounted the dirty stairs to bed.

FOUR

Diana spent a restless night and awoke to the sound of the watch calling seven o’clock. The frowsty air in the room impelled her from the bed to open the window, letting in a blast of cold, sooty air.

A thin fog veiled the streets. Diana leaned her elbows on the sill. The street below was deserted. Now it would be safe to explore London, she thought. She would walk the empty streets and find that freedom for which she craved.

She made a hasty toilet and hurried down the stairs. She was hungry but meant to find breakfast at a pastry cook’s when they opened.

She crossed the road from the hotel and hesitated. Which way to go?

All at once, she had a strange feeling of being watched. Diana set off at a half trot, turning right into New Bond Street, along past the shuttered shops and
then right into Oxford Street, along to High Holborn, and then towards the City where the dome of St Paul’s seemed to float above the fog.

Slowly, Diana began to relax and feel more like the man she was pretending to be. A thin rain of soot was falling, making her thankful she had worn Peregrine’s old blue morning coat. She tilted her hat at a rakish angle, thrust her hands in her breeches pockets and began to whistle. A cobbler was taking down the heavy wooden shutters in front of his stall. ‘’Morning, sir!’ he called cheerfully, and ‘Good morning!’ grinned Diana, striding out in the direction of the Tower.

Sleepy servants appeared yawning on doorsteps, for they kept earlier hours in the City. Somewhere behind her came the muted clop-clop of a horse’s hooves. Once or twice she turned around, but the rider was veiled in the fog.

Diana came out on to Tower Hill, near the Tower of London. She stopped short and stared with delight. Standing in front of her, on dry land, was a ship, complete with masts and rigging. As she watched, the fog thickened until it was possible to imagine the ship was riding on the sea.

She drew closer, fascinated, remembering childhood dreams of running away to sea.

‘Hullo, young master.’ A short, wizened little man in a travesty of a naval uniform appeared around the side of the ship. ‘Would you care to come aboard and have a look around? Don’t cost much.’

‘How much?’ asked Diana nervously. The hundred pounds which had seemed such a great sum in
Hopeworth now seemed very little. Limmer’s was dreadfully expensive. What on earth would she do if she were expected to gamble?

‘A shilling, young master. Only a shilling. The name’s Pomfret.’

‘Very well, Mr Pomfret,’ said Diana. ‘I would very much like to see this ship of yours.’

‘’Tain’t mine. Property of His Britannic Majesty’s navy.’

He led the way up a gangplank. After about ten minutes’ lecture, Diana came to the conclusion that Mr Pomfret must be a very lowly sort of sailor indeed, possibly confined to only one small part of the vessel, for he did not seem to know which mast was which, or even which end of the ship was the bow and which the stern.

But he told colourful tales of the time he had been taken by the pirates and Diana, who only half believed him, leaned dreamily on the rail, looking out over the billowing sea of London fog.

‘Now I’ll show you the men’s quarters.’ Mr Pomfret nipped down a companionway leading to the lower decks and Diana clattered after him, her old-fashioned square-toed boots making quite a noise on the stairs.

‘First of all,’ said Mr Pomfret cheerfully, ‘we’ll have a noggin. Here we are. My two other mates. Bosun, James Smith, and coxswain, Amos Duffy.’

The bosun and the coxswain were both squat, powerful-looking men. They were both very smelly. James Smith had one eye and Amos Duffy had one leg. Diana almost expected to find out that her guide had
only one ear. She wondered wildly if the crew of this landlocked ship was made up of men with parts of their bodies missing.

All of a sudden, she wanted to leave. But Mr Pomfret had drawn up a chair for her and Amos Duffy was pouring out a glass of rum.

‘Just come up from the country?’ asked James Smith, clapping Diana on the back as she choked over the rum. Diana nodded speechlessly.

‘And did young master’s fambly come along o’ him?’

‘No. I am here on my own,’ said Diana.

The three men exchanged glances. ‘Here, have another noggin,’ cried Mr Pomfret, filling up Diana’s glass again.

‘I really must go,’ said Diana, half rising. Amos Duffy’s beefy hand pressed her back down on to her chair.

‘Now then, lad. You wouldn’t be offending us good gents by refusing to drink with us?’

‘No, no,’ bleated Diana, feeling treacherously weak and feminine. ‘It’s just that I … oh, very well. I shall drink this one glass and then I really must be on my way.’

The rum burned its way down to her empty stomach and the fumes rose to her brain, dulling some of her inexplicable fear. For what on earth could happen to her on Tower Hill in the very heart of London?

Mr Pomfret hitched his chair closer to Diana’s. ‘I’ll tell you something, young master,’ he leered. ‘Blessed if I can remember when I took such a fancy to a young man. So here’s what I’m going to do.’ He fumbled in
his greasy waistcoat, extracted a shilling and held it up. ‘This here shilling wot you gave me, I’m giving it back. Here, take it.’

‘No, please keep it, Mr Pomfret,’ said Diana.

‘Take it or we’ll be mortal offended,’ growled Amos Duffy.

Diana looked helplessly from one to the other and then took the shilling. ‘Now, if you will excuse me …’ she rose determinedly to her feet.

‘Sit down!’ barked Mr Pomfret. ‘Welcome to the King’s navy, lad.’

‘I d-don’t understand,’ said Diana.

‘That waur the King’s shilling you took. So you’re in the navy now, lad!’

Diana sank down in her chair and blinked back the rush of tears to her eyes. She was a flat, a gull, a country turnip.

She, Diana Armitage, had been pressganged!

Fear cancelled out the effects of the rum. Her large eyes looked to left and right, calculating her chances of escape. Amos Duffy had risen and was standing between her and the door. James Smith had a large horse pistol sticking up conspicuously out of the top of one sea boot.

What if she should reveal the fact that she was a woman? But Diana dismissed that thought almost as soon as it was formed. She was sure the three men would be delighted to play another sort of game with her.

And then a light step sounded on the deck above.

‘Help!’ screamed Diana. ‘Help me!’

‘Stow your racket.’ The pistol was pressed to her ear. ‘Tie him up and put a gag in his mouth,’ growled Amos. ‘You gets above, Pomfret, and see who’s about.’

Diana was gagged and bound and dragged over to a corner, tossed in it face down, and covered with a blanket.

She lay shaking with fear. Prayers tumbled out against the gag. God was punishing her for betraying her sex. For the first time, Diana realized the full enormity of what she had done. She had fled her respectable home to consort with a famous rake. She had brought ruin on the Armitage family. All she could pray was that these ruffians would not guess she was a lady until she could manage to get the ear of some officer. For if they discovered her sex, Diana was convinced they would rape her first and kill her afterwards.

Her muffled prayers, she was sure, were rising up above the masts of the ship, above the London fog to the ears of a harsh God who would probably not lift a finger to save her since everyone knew you had to be punished for your sins.

And then she heard a familiar voice. Light, cool and drawling, Lord Dantrey was audible outside the room, saying, ‘It is no use cringing and leering at me, Mr Pomfret – if that is your name. I am no country lad to be pressganged by such as you. I am convinced you have my ward here. And if you have, I shall see to it that you are put in the pillory at Charing Cross along with whoever is in this business with you.

‘Or, if I can put it in a more delicate manner,
produce my ward, Mr Armitage, this instant or I will blow your evil brains out.’

Diana heard the hammer of a pistol cock. She tried to cry out against the tightness of the gag.

She wrenched herself over on her side, dislodging the blanket from her face so that she could see what was going on in the room. Amos was standing behind the door with a stout stick raised in both hands. His intention was obviously to club down Lord Dantrey as soon as he appeared through the door. Her eyes enormous in her white face, Diana kicked blindly with her bound legs, trying to do something to take Amos’s attention away from the door.

The door swung open. Lord Dantrey swung about and seized Mr Pomfret by the collar of his pea jacket and thrust him forwards into the room, and Amos brought the club fairly and squarely down on the unlucky Mr Pomfret’s head. Mr Smith rushed forwards but halted at the sight of the pistol in Lord Dantrey’s hand.

Lord Dantrey’s eyes fell on the four glasses on the table and then roamed over the room, finally noticing the wriggling figure in the dark corner.

‘Go and untie him.’ Lord Dantrey waved the pistol at Amos. Grumbling about only doing the King’s duty, Amos set about freeing Diana. ‘Come here and stand behind me, Mr Armitage,’ ordered Lord Dantrey. Diana stumbled to her feet, clutching hold of the table to get her balance.

‘Now, gentlemen,’ said Lord Dantrey, ‘sit down at that table and do not dare move an inch. I shall lock you in as a precaution. Mr Armitage, pray relieve Mr
Whateverhisnameis of that nasty-looking pistol. You will find it in his boot. You should have fired at me as I came through the door, not tried to club me. Thank you, Mr Armitage. Let us go.’ Drawing Diana with him, Lord Dantrey retreated into the corridor and locked the door behind him.

‘Not a word, Mr Armitage,’ he said coldly. ‘You may explain yourself when we return to Limmer’s.’

Still, Diana tried to babble her thanks, but he would not listen. He mounted his horse and pulled her up behind him. ‘It was you who was following me,’ said Diana to his well-tailored back, but he did not reply, setting a steady pace out of the City towards the West End.

Diana was not very afraid of Lord Dantrey’s temper. She had been tricked like any greenhorn, but she had told Lord Dantrey that she, David Armitage, lacked town bronze. Also, he was not her father and so he could not strike her or beat her in any way.

When they had dismounted and the ostler had taken Lord Dantrey’s horse round to the mews, Lord Dantrey looked down at Diana and said quietly, ‘Let us go to your room.’

Lord Dantrey’s face was white against the fog and his eyes were like chips of emerald set in gold.

Diana folded her lips in a mutinous line. It had been clever of him to claim her as his ward. But he had no authority over her. She was her own mistress – master. She would
not
be bullied. Surely, anyone who had survived the lash of the vicar’s tongue on the hunting field could cope with anyone else’s sermonizing.

But her knees trembled when they were finally upstairs in her room. For the first time in her young life, Diana began to think that the lot of a female was not
quite
so unhappy. Women were not pressganged. They were not expected to gamble for vast sums of money, or drink heavily, or fight for their lives.

Lord Dantrey drew off his York tan gloves and placed his hat and cane on the table beside the bed. Despite the cold of the morning he, like Diana, had not put on a topcoat. Even the normally democratic London soot had left his cravat shining white. Diana had seen fair-haired people whose locks glinted with silver, but his almost white hair glinted with threads of gold which was …

‘Well, Mr Armitage?’

‘It was very kind of you to rescue me,’ said Diana, her voice made gruff with embarrassment. ‘I was caught like the veriest flat. But how was I to know that such practices would be condoned in full daylight on a ship that appears to have been built for no other purpose than pressganging.’

‘They do not often run up against trouble,’ said Lord Dantrey. ‘They make very sure of their target. The shabbiness of that disgusting coat, added to the fact that you no doubt told them you had come up from the country, made them feel you were an easy mark. It was as well I followed you. I shall put a token protest to the authorities, but I doubt if they will give it much heed.’

‘It’s disgraceful,’ said Diana. ‘But why did you follow me, my lord?’

‘Because I was already regretting having invited you to London. Also, it is a long time since I have held a woman in my arms and I am not one to scorn such easy pickings …
Miss Armitage
.’

‘You
know
?’

‘From almost the first. You must be Diana.’

Diana miserably hung her head.

‘I thought so. You are too old to be Frederica and the four married ones are famous for their beauty’ … Diana winced … ‘and for the great love they have for their respective husbands. Why do you masquerade as a man?’

‘Because I have a great love of the chase,’ said Diana, sitting down in a chair beside the bedroom fire. ‘Papa said I might hunt provided I disguised myself.’

‘Shocking, but understandable,’ he said, coming to stand over her. ‘But what of the rest? Where does your father believe you to be?’