Jonathan Barrett Gentleman Vampire (83 page)

She gave herself a shake. “It’s all right. I was just surprised. You did nothing wrong, Jericho. In truth, yours is an excellent idea that allows Jonathan to partake meals with us again. I’m just being foolish.”

“But—”

“Nothing . . . wrong,” she emphasized. She eased her grip on his arm and patted it. “You stay exactly where you are. Give Jonathan more if he so desires.”

I stood. “Elizabeth, I think I should—”

“Well, I don’t,” she snapped. “It’s food to you, is it not? Then it’s time that I got used to the idea. For God’s sake, some of our fieldworkers enjoy eating pigs’ brains, so I suppose I can watch my brother drink blood. Sit down with us.”

Taking my own advice, I chose not to argue with the lady and obediently took my seat at the table.

In silence Jericho gestured inquiringly at the teapot. I cautiously nodded. Elizabeth looked on, saying nothing. She resumed her meal at the same time I did.

“How did you obtain it, Jericho?” she asked in a carefully chosen tone better suited for parlor talk about the weather.

He was understandably reluctant to speak. “Er . . . while the cook was making the tray ready, I excused myself and went down to the stables.”

“There’s such a quantity, though. I hope the poor beast is all right.”

“I drew it from several horses.”

“And just how did you accomplish the task?”

“I, ah, I’ve had occasion to give aid to Dr. Beldon when he found it necessary to bleed a patient. It was easy enough to emulate.”

Heavens, but he was full of surprises.

“The taste is agreeable to you, is it not?” Elizabeth’s bright attention was focused on me.

Anything less than an honest answer would insult her intelligence.

“Very agreeable,” I said, trying not to squirm.

“How fortunate. What a trial your life would be were it not.”

“Elizabeth . . . .”

“I was only making an observation. You should have seen your face when Jericho gave you that first cup. Like my cat when there’s fresh fish in the kitchen.”

Jericho choked on his egg. I thumped his back until he waved me away.

We three looked at one another in the ensuing silence. Very heavy it was, too. I wondered just how much of an effect that drop of brandy was having on her.

Then Elizabeth’s face twitched, she made a choking sound of her own, and we three suddenly burst out laughing.

* * *

“If anything, I feel cheated,” I said sometime later, when we’d recovered from our shared fit. At ease once more, we lounged ’round the table, content to do nothing more than let peaceful digestion take its course.

“Of the time you lost?” asked Elizabeth.

“Yes, certainly. It’s like that story Father told us about the calendar change that happened a couple years before we were born. They were trying to correct the reckoning of the days and made it so the second of September was followed by the fourteenth. He said people were in riot, protesting that they’d been robbed of two weeks of their lives.”

Jericho, with both his natural and assumed reticence much weakened by the brandy, snickered.

“How absurd of them,” she said. “However, that was a change made on paper, not in actual terms of living. Yours has definitely caused you to miss some time from your life.”

“So instead of two weeks I may have been robbed of two months. Unfair, I say, most unfair.”

“Even if it spared you all that seasickness?”

“Ah . . . .”

“It’s just as well that we will be staying in England, since it is likely you can expect a similar long sleep whenever you venture out to sea.”

I shook my head and shuddered in a comical manner. “No, thank you. Though I might have to make a channel crossing if Nora is still on the Continent. It won’t be pleasant, but it’s short enough not to put me to sleep.”

“Providing you can find a ship to take you across at night. Otherwise we should have to stow your traveling box in the hold like any other cargo.

Which seemed preferable to being conscious while over water. “I’m sure something can be arranged, but it’s all speculation anyway until I can talk to Oliver. Have you sent him word that we’ve arrived?”

“Not yet. I wanted to see if you were going to wake up first.”

“I’ll write him a letter if you’ll have it taken over tomorrow.”

“Why not go tonight yourself and surprise him?” She knew that Oliver’s London residence was not far from our inn, but the miles in between could be treacherous.

“It’s been three years and my memory of the city has faded. I may have his new address, but I don’t think I could find it alone. You have the innkeeper find a trusty messenger in the morning.”

“We could send one now—”

“Not without an army to protect him, dear Sister. London is not Glenbriar and is extremely dangerous at night. I don’t want either of you ever going out alone after dark. The streets are ruled by thieves, murderers and worse; even the children here will cut your throat for nothing if it suits their fancy.”

Both bore identical expressions of disbelief and then, as they understood I was utterly serious, horror for the realities of life in the world’s most civilized city.

“I mean that. Even in the day never go about alone, and always keep your wits about you and your money hidden. The cut-purses here are bold as brass. Once we’re settled we can hire some large trusty footmen and get a carriage, but until then . . . .”

“What about yourself, sir?” asked Jericho. “Will you not find your activities restricted as well since you’re limited to the hours of night?”

“I suppose so, but I’ve got that Dublin pistol and sword cane, and those duelers . . . but remember, I also possess certain physical advantages because of my change. I should be safe enough if I keep on guard and stay away from the worst places. It’s not as though we’re imprisoned by the scoundrels, y’know. Once we settle and are introduced into society we’ll have lots of things to do in good company, parties and such. Oliver’s a great one for parties.”

“So you’ve often told us,” Elizabeth murmured. Her eyes were half closed. Oh, yes, but that must have been very good brandy indeed.

I rose and pushed my chair under the table, making it clear that our own celebration was concluded. “Bedtime for you, Miss Barrett. You’re exhausted.”

“But it’s much too early yet.” She made an effort to straighten herself.

“For me perhaps, but you’ve had hard going for a long time. You deserve to recover from it. Besides, I’ve more than once boasted to Oliver about your beauty; you don’t want to make a liar of me by greeting him with circles under your eyes, do you?”

She looked ready to throw another seedcake at me, but they’d all been eaten.

“Jericho, is there a maid handy who can help her get ready for bed?”

“I can get ready myself, thank you very much,” she said. “Though I would like some hot washing water. And soap. And a drying cloth.”

Jericho stood. “I can see to that, miss. There’s a likely wench downstairs who’s supposed to help the ladies staying here. I’ll send her up straightaway.”

Faced with two men determined to see to her comfort, Elizabeth offered no more protest as I escorted her across the hall to her room. She did not say good night, but did throw her arms around me in a brief, fierce embrace. I returned it, told her that all was well again and to take as much rest as she needed. She snuffled a little when she closed the door, but I knew the worst was over for her. Sometimes tears are the best way to ease a sorely tried soul; hers was well on the mend. She’d be fine by the time the hot water arrived.

I felt in want of a good wash as well, and Jericho troubled himself to provide for me, unasked. He moved more slowly than usual because of the brandy, but his hand was as steady as ever while scraping my chin clean with the razor.

“Your beard did not grow much during the voyage,” he said, wiping soap and bristles on the towel draped over his free arm. “I only had to shave you but once in two weeks. Even then it hardly looked like half a day’s growth.”

“Good heavens, really?” My chin and cheeks were capable of producing a vigorous crop in a short span, and during exceptionally demanding social seasons Jericho insisted I shave every night.

“It must have been a very deep sleep to do that,” he added.

“Deep, indeed. But never again. Too frightening.”

He quietly agreed.

Hardly before I knew it, he’d finished my toilet and assisted my dressing for the evening. More than half the night remained to me, and I’d expressed a desperate need for fresh air despite the perils of the streets. Perhaps in my own mind I’d been at sea for only two nights, but that was still too many. Over solid ground at last, I sorely desired to
feel
it under my feet again.

“But this is my heavy cloak,” I said as he dropped it over my shoulders.

“It’s cold now, Mr. Jonathan, nearly December. The people here say they’ve had some snow and there’s always a chance for more.”

“Oh.”

He put my hat in place and handed me my sword cane. It was so like the last time on the ship that I had a mad thought that the voyage had never happened, and we were in some harbor town close to Long Island. Or that I’d dreamed the whole thing. It seemed more likely than the truth. How perfectly absurd it was to make a two-month crossing in but two days. It was most unnatural.

“Please be mindful of the time,” he said. “You’ve an hour more of darkness now, but there’s no reason to take risks.”

True. If I got caught out at sunrise, a near-stranger again in this huge and hasty city . . . . I gave him my solemn promise to take all care, then exacted one from him to get some rest and not wait up.

Then I was downstairs and crossing the muddy courtyard of the inn, my stride long and free after the confines of the ship. The hour was early enough, at least for London, not more than eleven of the clock. Being used to the quiet of the country now nearly half a world away, I found the continued noise and bustle of the dark streets hard to take in. My memories of previous visits had to do with the daytime, though; at night it was as though another, more wretched city emerged from a hidden concavity of the earth to do its business with a luckless world.

That business was of the shadowy sort, as might be expected. I kept a tight hand on my cane and my head up, alert to everything around me lest some pickpocket try making a profit at my expense. They were bad enough, but almost genteel compared to their wilder cousins, the footpads. Lacking the skill for subtle thievery, such rascals found it easier to simply murder their victims in order to prevent outcry and pursuit. I should have pressed my case more firmly to Elizabeth and Jericho about the violence here.

My pace brisk and eyes wide, I was well aware of the half-human debris skulking in the black shadows between the buildings. I avoided these by walking close to the street, though that put me to the risk of getting spattered by mud and worse from passing carriages and riders. Most of the thoroughfares were marked out by hundreds of white posts that separated the traffic from the pedestrians. No vehicle would dare cross that barrier, so at least I was safe from getting run over.

I could have made myself invisible, soared high and easily floated over these perils, but that would have meant forsaking this glimpse of the city. Dangers aside, I’d missed London and wanted to get reacquainted with every square inch of it.

With some exceptions, of course. No man who was not drunk or insane would venture into certain streets, but there were myriad others of a more wholesome nature to draw one’s interest. As I traveled from one to the next, I marveled anew at the lines of glass-fronted shops with their best wares displayed in an effort to tempt people inside. All were closed now, except for the taverns and coffee shops, but I had no need for what they had to sell.

Nor was I particularly eager to sample the goods offered by the hundreds of whores I encountered along the way. Most were my age or much younger, some of these desperately proclaiming their virginal state was mine to have if I but paid for it. A few were pretty or had put on enough paint and powder to make themselves so, but I had no desire to stop and bargain for their services. By doing so I’d make myself vulnerable to robbery should they be working with a gang of footpads. I brushed past, ignoring them in favor of the more pressing errand I had in mind.

I briskly crossed through one neighborhood after another, some fashionable, some so rank as to be a lost cause and others so elegant that they seemed to have been birthed in another land altogether. It was to a particular one in this latter category that I eagerly headed.

Though she had moved to Cambridge to live near me while I pursued my studies, Nora Jones often returned to London to enjoy its pleasures. I just as often followed her whenever possible, for those pleasures were doubled, she said, by my
company. We’d take her carriage across London Bridge to Vauxhall Gardens and stroll there, listening to the “fairy music” played by an orchestra located underground. Their sweet melodies magically emerged from the foliage by means of an ingenious system of pipes. Sometimes I would take supper in an alcove of the Chinese Pavilion, and later we would content ourselves with a tour of the Grand Walk. She never tired in her admiration of the innumerable glass lamps that made the whole place as bright as day. Other outings might mean taking a box at the theater or opera or going to Vauxhall’s more formal rival, Ranelagh, but always would we return to her own beautiful house and in sweet privacy partake of more carnal forms of diversion.

To this house I now sped, holding a faint spark of hope in my heart that she might now be there.

Since my change I’d written Oliver many times asking him to find her, and he assured me he stopped by almost weekly to see if anyone answered the bell. None had, but his last missive to me on his most recent lack of success was months old. There was every chance that she could have returned in the meantime.

Memory and anticipation are a tormenting combination. The familiarity of the streets brought Nora’s face and form back to me with the keenness of a new-sharpened knife. I found myself speaking her name under my breath as though it were a prayer, as though she could somehow hear and be there when I arrived. Gone was any shred of anger I’d harbored against her for the manner of our parting. It had been a cruel thing to try to make me forget our love, crueler still to leave me with no warning or knowledge about the legacy of her blood, but I had no care for that anymore; all I cared about was seeing her again.