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She startled herself by giving a little sob. It felt as though
there was a huge weight building in her chest and that any moment it would burst
out and she would cry as though her heart would break. She had been so
determined only to marry for love. Now she would be the one begging Henry to wed
her out of duty. She grabbed her hat and spencer. The hat was yellow, frivolous
and completely inappropriate. She did not care.

As she came down the stairs a second time she heard voices in
the hall.

Henry.

He knew. He had come to her. She stopped on the landing, one
hand on the banister, and looked down at him. He was waiting for her in the hall
below, head tilted up to watch her, the sunlight from the fan window falling on
his face. In that moment of stillness Margery noticed several small things about
him. He had taken the time to dress immaculately because this would be his third
marriage proposal to her, and despite the circumstances he wanted to do it
properly. He had also stopped on his way to buy her a small bouquet of flowers.
Behind him was rank upon rank of elaborate arrangements from the flower cart,
but Henry had brought her two tiny sprays of pink roses, just like the ones he
had given her on the night long ago before she had become Lady Marguerite.

For a second the tears stung Margery’s eyes but she blinked
them back. She saw that Henry had a copy of the
Mercury
in his hand and the breath caught in her throat, tight and painful. He
threw it aside and came forward to take her hands as she reached the bottom
step.

“I’m so sorry,” she said brokenly. The grief was back, searing
her chest with hot tears. “So sorry that this has happened.”

Henry shook his head. “You are not to blame,” he said fiercely.
“It is my fault.”

Chessie touched his arm. “You should be in private,” she said,
and Henry nodded. He took Margery gently by the hand and led her into the
drawing room. It was so bright with sunlight that it hurt her eyes. She threw
her hat and spencer down on a chair and turned back to him. She was so anxious
that she could not wait.

“Will you marry me, please?” she burst out.

Henry’s lips twitched into the smile she loved but his eyes
were grave. “It would be my privilege,” he said.

He said nothing of love, but Margery had not expected it. She
trusted him. If, all her life, she felt the ache of loss in not having his love,
she at least knew he was not like her father. He would never leave her. He would
always stand by her side.

She smiled and he took her hands and drew her toward him and
kissed her very gently. And so they were engaged.

CHAPTER TWENTY

The Six of Cups: Memory. The answer to a question lies in the
past

“M
OLL
!”

Margery had been shopping for bridal clothes in Oxford Street
with Joanna Grant and Tess Rothbury, and had just dropped the ladies back in
Bedford Street when she heard Jem hailing the carriage from the other side of
the road.

It was a beautiful July day. Traffic on the streets was light.
Members of the ton were starting to drift away from London to their country
estates to escape the heat. Margery’s wedding was planned for a week’s time, at
Templemore, and she could not wait to return to the country. Holding her head
high and facing down the gossip in the full storm of all the lurid newspaper
headlines had been one of the hardest things she had ever done in her life.

It had been amusing to see Lady Wardeaux torn between
gratification at the match she had wanted for so long and outraged disapproval
at the way Margery and her son had behaved before they were engaged.

“Really, Henry, I do believe that you have a great deal more of
your papa in you than I had ever imagined,” she had said, on seeing the lurid
headlines in the scandal sheets. “That sort of bad behavior comes from the
Wardeaux side of the family.”

Later, when Henry was absent, she had spoken to Margery.

“No lady would ever behave the way that you have done,
Marguerite,” she had said. “And if they had, they would not have been
caught.”

“So, my sin was to be found out rather than to sleep with Henry
in the first place,” Margery complained to Chessie later.

“Well, of course,” Chessie said, smiling. “Ladies behave badly
all the time, Margery, but as long as no one finds out, everyone can pretend
they are not.”

“I never was very good at pretending,” Margery said
gloomily.

Chessie, Lady Grant and Lady Rothbury had been at her side
every moment of the scandal, forcing her to go out when she would rather have
pulled the bedcovers over her head and hidden away, helping her through the
disgrace that had stolen her fragile confidence and forced her even further into
the glare of publicity.

“You should see what the papers used to write about me,” Tess
Rothbury had said one day when they were in Gunters taking hot chocolate
together. “And only half of it was true. The other half I wish I had tried, but
alas I never did.”

Henry, too, had been stalwart in his support, always beside
her. No one dared say a word when Henry was there. But it was her grandfather
whom Margery most regretted hurting. Not once had Lord Templemore reproached
her, but she felt guilty through and through.

“Moll!” Jem shouted again and Margery rapped on the roof for
the carriage to stop. The groom let down the steps and Jem bounded in to throw
himself down on the seat opposite her.

“Hell’s bells,” he said, eying the huge piles of shopping with
disfavor. “How can one small bride require so many clothes?”

“I’m not sure,” Margery confessed. Ladies Grant and Rothbury
were truly terrifying once they hit the shops and she had come away with
bandboxes piled high with an astonishing number of items. Some of the underwear
and nightgowns had made her blush, lacy, transparent, barely there. She imagined
Henry would appreciate them once they were safely wed and allowed to be alone
together again. Now that they were formally engaged, she was strictly chaperoned
to make sure there was no more scandal.

The carriage turned into Bedford Square. Some of the bandboxes
started to tilt at a precarious angle and Margery put out a hand to steady
them.

“I say, Moll.” Jem leaned toward her. She could smell wine on
his breath even though it was only the middle of the afternoon. “Could you lend
me some cash? My pockets are to let.”

“I don’t have any cash,” Margery said, dismayed. Over the past
few weeks she had heard all manner of rumors about Jem’s profligate spending.
His gambling losses were particularly acute. Barnard had also confided in her
that a number of small items of gold and silver had disappeared from Templemore
House. Margery knew exactly where they had gone. She had put temptation in front
of her brother and he had been unable to resist.

“I cannot give you any money, Jem,” she said firmly. “You know
my fortune is all in trust. All I have is my allowance.”

“You could ask your grandfather,” Jem said. His mouth set in an
obstinate line. “He’d pay up. I dropped two thousand pounds at faro last night
and they are dunning me for payment. Tell him there’ll be another scandal if he
doesn’t settle the bill.” His gaze swept over the parcels and bandboxes. He
scowled. “It’s not fair, Moll.”

“No, it isn’t,” Margery snapped. She was furious at his attempt
to blackmail her into getting him some money. “Life isn’t fair, Jem. How many
times have you told me that in the past? That doesn’t mean you should go around
stealing just because you don’t have everything you want.”

Jem turned a dull brick-red. “Never thought you’d notice,” he
said. “I suppose it was that poxy butler. Might have known he would keep a
list.”

“Of course he does,” Margery said. “It’s his job. This has to
stop, Jem.” She leaned forward and put a hand on his arm. “I’m worried about
you. The gambling and the drinking and all those women—”

“Devil a bit,” Jem said. He broke into a grin though his eyes
were cold. “Can’t a fellow have a bit of fun?” He shrugged, the casual gesture
full of bitterness. “Let’s not talk about it anymore.” He turned his face away
and stared fixedly out of the window at the bustling streets.

“All right,” Margery said. She felt miserable. She knew this
was not the end. It could not be, not with Jem. She had known for years that he
was weak in some ways. He could not resist the lure of money. She had chosen to
ignore it because she liked him and because he had always been on her side.
Until now.

There was a shout in the street outside and the carriage pulled
to an abrupt halt. Margery and half the bandboxes and parcels cascaded onto the
floor. The lids came off the boxes. Silks and laces spilled around her in a sea
of tumbling color. She sprawled on the floor of the carriage with her trousseau
frothing about her.

Jem was laughing. He leaned down, extending a hand to help her.
“Here you go,” he said. “Take my hand. We’d better get you home before anything
else happens.”

Take my hand. We’d better get you
home.

Margery froze, gooseflesh breathing along her skin. With no
warning and a terrifying and vivid suddenness, the darkness in her memory
lifted. She was four years old again, and she was in a carriage, and the night
was black, and it was raining and the door of the coach was swinging open and
Jem was looking down on her and extending a hand.

Why, what have we here? Take my hand,
sweetheart. I’ll take you home
.
...

She gave a gasp. For a moment, she thought she was going mad.
She could see her mother’s body sprawled on the seat and smell the gunpowder in
the air. And there was blood. Jem was smiling as he bent to pick up little
four-year-old Marguerite. His body was warm as he held her close and she could
smell his scent and see the way his fair hair fell across his brow.

A dream. A nightmare.

Margery opened her mouth, but no words came.

Jem was still holding out a hand to her. She did not move. She
saw his expression change. Wariness came into his blue eyes, and then sharp
awareness.

“I knew you would remember one day,” he said. He spoke easily,
conversationally, but the look in his eyes was colder than a whetted knife. He
stuffed his hands in his pockets and sat back. “I was afraid that you would
remember one day.”

Terror closed Margery’s throat. She tried to find the words to
deny it but already it was too late. She knew Jem had seen in her face that she
knew the truth.

“It was you,” she whispered. “You killed my mother.”

Jem shrugged. “It was me,” he said.

“Why?”

Jem laughed. The sound ripped the air. It was loud and
incongruous. “For the money, of course,” he said. “You know me, Moll. Why
else?”

Then his hands were about her throat, tight as a vise. The
blood roared in Margery’s ears and she struggled and fought amid the cascading
piles of bridal clothes, but it was no use. Jem was too strong. She felt
consciousness slide away as the darkness came.

* * *

M
ARGERY
WAS
NOT
SURE
how long she was unconscious.
She woke feeling sick, dizzy and disoriented. For a long moment she could not
remember anything that had happened, then the images came rushing back, images
of the carriage, of Jem, his hands about her neck. Her throat felt terrible,
sore and bruised. Her entire body ached.

She opened her eyes and squinted at her surroundings. She was
being dragged up a staircase like a bag of coal, her body bumping on every
tread. There was no carpet on the steps and the wood was old and splintered,
scraping the back of her legs, pulling on her hair. Jem was carrying her. She
could hear him swearing as he heaved her upward. She allowed her head to slump
forward onto her chest to give the impression that she was still dead to the
world. The very last thing that she wanted was for Jem to realize that she had
regained consciousness.

Jem pulled her around a turn of the stair. There was a scent in
the air now. It was elusive, teasing Margery’s nostrils, a heavy perfume, and
out of place against a background of peeled walls and bare boards.

Light flared for a second and Margery screwed up her eyes
against the brightness. Then it was gone. She felt herself lifted and tossed
carelessly aside. She braced herself for a hard landing but instead rolled over
in the yielding folds of a mattress that smelled old, of dust and damp. Somehow
the reek of it filled her with desolation as though she were locked away forever
in a room imbued with lost hopes and despair.

Sound faded. She was alone. She opened her eyes and blinked
painfully. Everything seemed to hurt. Needles of light exploded in her head. Her
throat was rough and dry. She could feel her stomach rising. She lay still,
trying to quell both the sickness and the panic.

When she felt a little better she opened her eyes again and saw
that the room she was in was small and lit by faint daylight from a dirty window
far above her head. She could see a slice of rooftop, a chimney pot and a pale
piece of blue sky, but that was all. She was in an attic, then, with a tiny
dormer window and no way of climbing out. There was a door, though. She slid off
the bed, being very careful to make no sound, and crept over to it, steadying
herself against the wall as the dizziness threatened to engulf her.

She could hear voices. One was Jem. The other was familiar,
too, a woman’s voice, angry and vicious.

“Why would you bring her here, you fool, and in full daylight?
I want no part in this.”

Jem replied, too low for Margery to hear though she strained
her ear against the panel of the door.

“Get rid of her!” The woman’s voice again. “You know plenty of
people who could tip her in the Thames, no questions asked. You could do it
yourself. Just don’t involve me!”

Again Jem’s voice, louder this time, rising with anger. “You’ll
do as I ask, you old bitch, or I’ll drag you into this so deep you’ll drown. Who
do you think finds you the best girls for your filthy trade and makes sure they
stay in line? Who pays for the roof over your head?” His voice quieted again.
“All I’m asking is that you keep her here while I go and rattle the old man’s
cage for some money.”

“Then you’ll give me my cut, too!”

Margery pressed a hand hard against her mouth to smother her
sickness and fear. She recognized the voice now, and the elusive smell of
perfume. The woman was Mrs. Tong and this was the Temple of Venus.

Jem and Mrs. Tong were in business together. She felt sickened.
Jem as pimp to the girls and financier to Mrs. Tong. It was the violent
underside to the trade that she had always tried to ignore.

Horror and cold fear rolled over Margery, setting her teeth
chattering. In her heart of hearts she had always known that Jem was in bad
company. He had run wild even in his teens. He could only have been fifteen when
he had stopped her mother’s carriage in the robbery that had gone so dreadfully
wrong. And now he planned to blackmail her grandfather into paying for her.

She had loved Jem the best of all her brothers. He had
protected her and watched over her and fought her battles for her, and all the
time he had been the one who knew the bitter truth of her identity and her
mother’s death. She wondered if he had protected her out of guilt for taking her
mother’s life. She realized she would probably never know.

She remembered everything about the night she had disappeared.
She could see it running out like a silken thread through her memory, unrolling
in all its horror. Her parents had quarreled and her mother had bundled her back
into the carriage. They had driven off through the night, the London streets
giving way to the dark countryside. All the while her mother had cried, and
Margery had sat still and frozen in a corner, shrinking as small as she could to
escape the misery she could feel but not understand.

She saw it in images and emotions, not as one continuous
memory. There was the sudden shift and sway of the carriage as it had come to a
halt, the sound of a shot and the blast of cold air as the door had swung open.
Her mother was screaming, then nothing, nothing but blackness and the cold and
Jem scooping her up and taking her away to his home where there had been warmth
and candlelight. There had been food, too—a rough broth Margery could remember
even now. She had felt kindness—Mrs. Mallon hugging her tight and saying she had
always wanted a daughter....