Priceless
Authors: Christina Dodd
Christina Dodd
To Shannon
Thank you for helping me plot my stories,
For being proud of me,
For loving me as much as I love you.
You’ll enjoy this book
As soon as Mommy decides you’re old enough to read it
.
And a special
merci beaucoup
to Susan
“Bronwyn, someone’s going to see us.”
“I’m sorry, Da. It’s all my fault.”
“Bronwyn’s my girl, she is.” Lord Gaynor leaned back in…
“Da, let me go.” Desperate to escape, Bronwyn tugged at…
“My lord, London has gone mad.” Fresh from Change Alley…
“Olivia wouldn’t come.” Seated in the horse-drawn cart, her skirts…
“To your bed?” She jerked him to a stop. “I…
“Where is she?” Adam tried to get out of bed;…
The charming, fascinating, exotic Cherie entered the large salon. Her…
Adam leaned against Bronwyn’s shoulder as they climbed the stairs…
Adam wiped the sweat from his brow. He’d never seen…
Whirling on her heel, Bronwyn began to dodge through the…
Dressed in her black silk, Rachelle waited in the doorway…
Change Alley had a frantic look about it. Noblemen and…
Like a flash of lightning on this sunny afternoon, Adam…
From the corner opposite her, Carroll Judson said, “A fortunate…
Adam took Madame Rachelle’s hands. “Will you go to Walpole…
“I don’t like this,” Northrup whispered. Shoulders hunched against the…
As Northrup realized the situation, his face paled, his mouth…
Adam was sitting up for the first time in days.
“What difference will it make?” Adam wiped his sweaty palms…
The barn smelled of horses and hay, wax and leather.
It had to be here. It had to be. Bronwyn…
The last time. The last time. The phrase echoed in…
LONDON, ENGLAND 1720
“Bronwyn, someone’s going to see us.”
“Just keep watch.” Bronwyn Edana worked frantically at the keyhole. “I’ve almost got it.”
Olivia wiped tears of fright from her cheeks and peered down the darkened hall of the Brimming Cup Inn. “We shouldn’t be doing this. If the landlord should find us here—”
“Listen to that moaning.” Through the locked door there came the sound of whimpering. Bronwyn whispered, “That person in there is sick or hurt somehow. Do you want to abandon a fellow human being in agony?”
“No….” Olivia didn’t sound too sure.
“Of course not.”
“But Maman and Da placed us in the care of the landlord while they went into London, and the landlord said—”
Bronwyn wiggled the heavy iron nail in the hole and caught the locking device inside. “I’ve got it!” she crowed, then groaned when the nail slipped off. Sinking back on her heels, she answered her sister. “The landlord ignored this lady’s cries for help. He said the gentleman who rented the room was respectable and paid a great price. He only cares about the money, and about making sure that we stay in our rooms like proper young ladies.”
“What if Maman and Da discover what we’ve been doing?”
“They would say we’re doing the right thing.”
Olivia stared at her impetuous sister.
“All right. They’d say to ignore it.” Wiping her sweaty palm on the skirt of her riding costume, she tried to still the tremble in her fingers. “We wouldn’t be at this nasty little inn if Maman and Da hadn’t wanted to visit the moneylender. Once they receive my dowry from Lord Rawson, they’ll be flush with coin once more, and we won’t have to stay in these terrible places.”
“Oh, Bronwyn.” Olivia sighed. “Once they receive your dowry, you’ll be wed and you’ll not be with us in these terrible places.”
A mutinous defiance steadied Bronwyn’s hand. “So Maman and Da will live with the consequences of our adventure—if they find out.”
“But I’m frightened,” Olivia admitted.
The love Bronwyn felt for her eighteen-year-old sister tempered her aggravation. She’d always taken care of Olivia, from the day her parents first presented her four-year-old self with the pretty baby. Still, Olivia was the epitome of conformity.
Right now Bronwyn didn’t have time for conformity.
“You can go back to our room if you wish. I’ll handle this without your help,” Bronwyn said in a hurt tone.
“No!” Olivia took a frantic breath. “No, I wouldn’t leave you, you know that. But—”
Rallying with telltale swiftness, Bronwyn said, “Good. I’ll need you if this is as bad as it sounds.” Leaning her weight against the metal clamp, she heard the click as the bolt shot back. “I’ve got it!”
Her hand on the doorknob, she prepared to enter the room.
“I’ll guard the door,” Olivia whispered.
Bronwyn paused and smiled at her affectionately. “I know you will. I trust you.” She slipped inside the room and moved to the bed. A soft weeping led her, but noth
ing prepared her for the young, badly battered woman tangled in the sheets. Bronwyn’s resolution faltered a moment, and she fought the faintness threatening to undermine her. She leaned close to the woman’s face. “Let me help you.”
One eye struggled to open and focus; the other was swollen shut. The bruised mouth worked, and at last the woman said, “
D’eau
.”
Bronwyn stared. “What?”
“
D’eau
,” she whispered again.
The woman spoke French. Searching her meager knowledge of the language, Bronwyn translated, “Water.” On the stand she found a pitcher, cup, and basin. She called Olivia as she filled the cup, and reluctantly her sister stepped in. “You’ll have to give her the water as I hold her up,” Bronwyn instructed.
“Oh, Bronwyn, I wish we’d driven right through to Lord Rawson’s. I’m so scared.” Olivia almost sobbed in her distress, and Bronwyn struck her lightly on the shoulder.
“Brace up.” She handed her the cup. “I need you.”
At the bed, Bronwyn lowered herself onto the mattress. As she slid a hand behind the woman’s head, the invalid groaned pitifully, as if every movement, every breath, hurt. Bronwyn’s eyes filled with tears, but when she looked up, Olivia had done as instructed. She’d put the cup to the woman’s mouth.
The woman drank greedily between gasps until at last she stopped. “
Merci
,” she said, gazing at Olivia. “An angel.”
“So she is,” Bronwyn agreed, relaxing. French might be this woman’s native tongue, but she spoke English well. “She’s an angel come to rescue you. She’ll go and find a doctor to help you now.”
“
Non!
” A frail hand clawed at Bronwyn’s arm, then fell away. “Tell no one. He will kill me…if you do.”
Bronwyn glanced back, expecting to see a menacing figure. “Your husband?”
“
Non!
I am not so foolish.” Her vehement denial seemed to sap her strength.
As Bronwyn had known it would, her sister’s natural nursing skill took over. Olivia wet a towel and smoothed the hair back from the invalid’s forehead. “What’s your name?”
“I am Henriette.” Her eyes opened, closed. “Does he have you, too?”
“No, no one has me.”
“
Bon
. So beautiful a woman…should not be in brutal hands.” She twisted as a spasm tore through her. “Run away. Do not let him get you.”
“I won’t let anyone get her.” Bronwyn picked up one fragile hand as it lay on the covers. “She’s my sister.”
“Sister?” Henriette gazed at them. “Nothing alike.”
“We’re alike in our spirit,” Bronwyn insisted. “We’ll help you escape.”
“Too late. Light candles…for my soul, I beg.”
“Of course,” Olivia agreed.
“The wicked man murdered me. Promise me you will light”—Henriette caught her breath against the pain—“light candles to guide me.” Her hand plucked uselessly at the air. “Promise.”
Olivia smiled, as sweet as the angel Henriette called her. “I promise.”
Satisfied, Henriette closed her eyes. “
Allez
. Go. He is coming back.”
Bronwyn shook her head. “No one is going to get me, and I can find someone to help you—”
“They will accuse me, because I am French. They will say I did it, but I did not.”
“I don’t understand,” Bronwyn said.
“He murders someone and blames me.”
“What? Who?”
“I do not know who. He says to his servant…he would kill a man by dropping a stock on him.”
“A stock? A stump?”
“
Non
.” Wagging her head back and forth on the pillows in an exhausted effort, Henriette insisted, “Stock.”
Such garbled nonsense made no sense to Bronwyn. “Surely there are better ways.”
“
Non
….” Henriette coughed, and blood trickled from the corner of her mouth.
Olivia sprang forward with the cloth to wipe Henriette’s lips. “Don’t talk,” she urged.
Henriette waved her away. “When he realized I had heard, he took me. Beat me until I die.”
Bronwyn soothed her with a stroke of the hand. “We can’t leave you here.”
“Can’t we tell the landlord?” Olivia asked. “If he knew how badly this woman was hurt—”
Bronwyn exploded as if she had been holding in her exasperation. “This is London, he said, and if I extended my hand in friendship to everyone in need, I’d get it chopped off. He said to sew and take my mind off her moans.”
“This is so awful.” Olivia hid her face in her hand. “What can we do? We’re just two girls. We’re not even married.”
“I’m betrothed. Does that make me reliable?” Bronwyn reached up to her taller sister’s shoulders and shook her slightly. “There’s a way. I have a plan.”
“Not one of your plans,” Olivia wailed.
Bronwyn ignored her, asking Henriette, “Is there somewhere I can take you?”
Intense longing swept Henriette’s face. “If you could,
le bon Dieu
would bless you.”
“Tell me where you would go,” Bronwyn coaxed.
“Madame Rachelle’s salon. Do you know where…?”
“I’ll find out. Olivia, go to the footman downstairs and tell him we want a coach for our mother.”
“Go by myself?”
“Would you rather stay with Mademoiselle Henriette and I’ll go?”
Olivia glanced at Henriette’s swollen face, then at the door. “I’ll stay.”
Staggered by the uncharacteristic bravery, Bronwyn asked, “But, Olivia, what if that man comes back?”
“I’ll put a chair against the door. I don’t like to talk to strangers. I can’t order a coach. Henriette needs me, and I’m better in sickrooms.”
Bronwyn stuck out her jaw. “I’ve been fine so far.”
“You’ve been very brave, but you’re white as a new-bleached petticoat.” Olivia gave Bronwyn a little push. “Hurry.”
Bronwyn smiled at her tenderhearted sister. “I’ll rap three times when I come back, and you let me in.”
Dashing out the door, she clattered down the dark stairs, then halted at the bottom. She was the daughter of an earl, and she should act like one. She straightened her expensive brown wig and pinched her tanned cheeks to bring up the color. With excessive nonchalance, she strolled through the taproom and to the front door. She peeked out and spied a young man, the kind who would call for transportation for her if tipped with a copper. Stepping over the threshold, she called, “You! I need a coach for my mother. She wishes to go into London proper. My mother is an invalid with gout and”—she took a deep breath—“she needs a coach.”
The boy responded to the glitter of her coin. “Aye, m’lady, be glad t’ call a coach.
She backed through the door. “Don’t let it get away. Keep it here.” She turned and hurried back to the room, knocked three times, and listened as Olivia dragged pieces of furniture away. “Hurry,” she urged when Olivia got the door open. “I’ve got her a coach.”
Olivia looked as if she’d been crying. “Henriette can’t walk downstairs. She’s bleeding badly.”
From the bed, the hoarse voice of Henriette interrupted. “Do not let me die here,
je vous en prie
. Take me to Rachelle. To peace.”
“Oh, God.” The large stain of red against the sheets made Bronwyn clutch the door. All Henriette’s blood was seeping away, robbed by some ghastly internal injury. Olivia reached out for comfort; Bronwyn pulled her into her arms. This was so much worse than they’d ever imagined, so much worse than anything they’d seen in their sheltered lives. Yet their sisterly affection fortified them, and Bronwyn mumbled into Olivia’s shoulder, “We can’t give up now. Help me wrap her in the sheet.”
Bronwyn stripped the top sheet from the bed, and they slid it beneath Henriette. Assisting Henriette to sit up, they bundled her into the cloak. As they tucked her veil over her face, Bronwyn realized she and Olivia would have to support her all the way to the street. Bronwyn was grateful for the functional riding costumes they wore for traveling, and for the first time in their lives she thanked God for Olivia’s tall and graceful strength.
Arranging Henriette’s arms around their shoulders, they put their arms around her waist and edged out the door. Henriette took her weight on one foot while the other dragged. At the head of the stairs, Bronwyn instructed, “Don’t forget to watch her skirts as well as your own, Olivia. Henriette, you’re to let us carry you down the steps. Look pleasant, Olivia. We’re going on an outing.”
Henriette relaxed. Olivia showed all her teeth in a contrived smile. Bronwyn did the same. When the landlord of The Brimming Cup hailed them, she turned with a heavy heart.
“Well, ladies, I see ye found a way t’ entertain yerself while yer parents is gone. That’s better than stickin’ yer nose in other folks’ business.” The balding man seemed anxious to make up for his previous rudeness. No doubt Dal hadn’t paid him yet, and he didn’t want her to com
plain. Peering at the veiled lady, he asked, “Yer grandmother? I ’adn’t realized she was ’ere with ye.”
“Why, yes,” Bronwyn agreed, “we brought her in this afternoon while you…handled our luggage. She travels with us.”
“Good. I worried that yer parents would go gallivantin’ into Lunnon proper without leavin’ someone t’ chaperone two such beautiful women.” He spoke to Bronwyn, but his gaze lingered on Olivia. “Quite a ’eavy duty t’ place on a landlord.”
The tense figure under Bronwyn’s hand relaxed infinitesimally. Bronwyn sighed wistfully and widened her eyes with what she hoped would be taken for innocence. “Maman and Da know we’re always safe with Grandmama. She wishes to visit a few of her haunts in London town.”
The landlord held the outer door as they struggled through it three abreast. “It’s a grand city. Ye’ll enjoy yer tour.”
The coach waited, the boy holding the door. The landlord reached out to help them maneuver Henriette inside, but Bronwyn snapped, “Don’t touch her!” The landlord stepped back, offended, as they hoisted Henriette up the step and placed her on the seat. “Grandmama doesn’t like strangers.”
“Grandmama?” The boy scratched his head. “I thought ye said this was yer mother.”
The landlord’s long features sharpened with curiosity. “No, their mother is a younger lady.”
Accusing, the boy insisted, “Ye said it was fer yer mother.”
“Yes…well…”
From inside the coach, a creaky, weak voice said, “Their mother is so flighty, I have raised these girls. They call me ‘Mother.’”
Reminding herself what was at stake, reminding herself
that she was the aristocrat and the landlord her servant, Bronwyn said, “Come, my good man, get these horses moving.” Her imperious air faltered when the beauty patch above her lip dropped to the floor. As the boy shut the door, she glanced out to see him hiding a grin.
At the grand house on Curzon Street, Bronwyn knocked and shifted nervously. What kind of explanation would she give to whoever answered the door?
The door opened, and a young woman with ink-stained fingers stared absently at Bronwyn and asked, “Have you come to see Rachelle?”
The French accent, so similar to Henriette’s own, impressed Bronwyn, and she said urgently, “I have a friend of Madame Rachelle’s. Her name is Henriette—”
The door swung wide. “Henriette?” The woman turned and shouted, “Henriette is back.”