The Virgin's Auction (5 page)

They entered and James took in the rough atmosphere with a jaundiced eye. It was one of the establishments that sat on the fringes of wealthy London, catering to the vices of the rich and the
cits and giving them a thrilling chance to rub shoulders with the hoi polloi of the working class and the more questionable elements of the city. His nostrils picked out the faint reek of opium and hashish above the tobacco smoke.

George captured the attention of a barmaid who wended her way through the crowd to their side, fending off grasping hands with deft slaps, her own hand as swift as a striking snake.

He explained the situation, pressing a coin into the palm that appeared expectantly. The blowsy woman bustled off to find assistance. A runner and two thickset men were dispatched, with more coins on one side, and respectful tipping of hats on the other.

Obligations thus discharged, George and James were about to leave the tavern when James heard a loud call of “Gentlemen!” from a raised dais at one end of the room, and turned.

The barkeep was standing there, next to the cloaked figure of a woman.

“Gentleman, I have for you here a special treat. You
knows as I don’t like to interrupt the drinking and gaming. I don’t like to see the flow of money into me own pockets cease,” there were chuckles from the patrons at this sally, “but I simply cannot resist the urge to share with you this here
delicious
morsel.”

With that he reached out and quickly swept the hood back off the woman’s head, so that it fell on her shoulders. Her face was revealed to the room. There was an audible indrawn breath from multiple throats.

Such a sweet, pretty face. No. Beautiful was a better word. With large eyes and delicately arched brows over fragile cheekbones, a rosebud mouth and a strong, determined jaw. Her shining golden hair, unfashionably long, was caught up at the back of her head in a simple knot then fell from there to lie in waves and loose curls about her shoulders, tousled from the hood enough to look like she had just risen from her bed.

The crowd fell silent, waiting for the bartender’s next words.

“Now, sadly, I cannot share her with all of you. It breaks my fragile heart, but this tender little darling is looking for just one man. One man with the purse,” he rubbed his fingers together meaningfully, “and the cock,” he clutched his own and there was a quick, lewd cheer, “to give her one
hell
of a virgin night!” This time the gleeful yell came from many throats, and there was a general surge towards the dais.

“Yes, my lads. We have here a sweet, untouched little virgin. Pretty as they come. She has descended to us from Nob hill, put her delicate little feet in our gutter, and is looking for a real man to match her real woman.”

With a swift flick of his fingers he opened the clasp at the woman’s throat, grabbed the edge of the neckline and pulled the cloak completely away from her body. He flung it aside theatrically. 

From head to toe she stood revealed in a white dress. The décolletage was low, showcasing her lush breasts pushed high by the bodice. Sleekly the gown followed the graceful line of her body, artfully draped to sweep in to her tiny waist before blossoming into a more generous width of skirt. At the sudden display of an exquisitely womanly shape, there were exclamations of wonder and lust. Her clothes were not enough to shield her from their imaginations.

Even James was not unmoved. He thought of himself as civilised, but that delicate confection standing on the tavern’s excuse for a stage woke in him a response that was more than a little feral. Sardonically he measured it as two parts lust, one part an instinctive protectiveness towards the vulnerable, and a last part the competitive desire to best all others and win a desirable sex object.

These shows were not to his taste. If the woman was truly a virgin – which he usually took leave to doubt – then she was to be pitied rather than desired. No good prospect lay before her.

Something about this one occasion roused more than pity and disgust. He examined the woman as best he might, standing less than two dozen feet from her in the crowded and smoky room.

Her face pale and still, only her eyes moved. They
roved the room searching for – what?

S
he looked straight at James. He felt that look almost like a touch, a palpable connection. There was a pleading there in her gaze, a desperation. Suddenly he was certain this one was indeed a virgin, alone and helpless in a roomful of men who saw nothing of her but an object for their lust; nothing of the person within. One of them would take her, use her roughly, maybe brutally, and then she would be discarded, broken.

This seemed suddenly the most heinous sort of crime against a woman of such peerless beauty. Such a creature was a treasure who should be worshipped, initiated gently to the arts of love. Brought to
a knowledge of the true potential her body held for its own and others’ pleasure. What a courtesan she would make!

He thought there was no one in this room capable of teaching her that better than he. For bedroom sport was quite the favourite of all the sports in which he indulged, and he knew how to cherish a woman and awaken her to herself. Oh, an experienced lover was usually his preference, but even those were often unacquainted with the true heights and depths of the bedroom arts.

He was tempted, he was sorely tempted by her, and had not spent quite all his money at the table with George. He could very well answer that plea he saw in her eyes and bring her a delight the likes of which she had never known.

He could rescue her.

James took a step forward.

She jumped when the cloak was swept away. Her arms ached to wrap around her torso, covering herself. It was as if she was naked. All those hungry, creeping eyes. The wet mouths hanging open. The stench of men pressed tight into a small space.

Instead she bunched her hands into fists at her sides, gritted her teeth and lifted her chin in challenge.

She scanned the crowd. Ranks of faces, the well-scrubbed shoulder-to-shoulder with the smudged and scarred. No friendly, sympathetic smile. She looked further, to the back of the room.

There stood two men in black evening coats, literally cut from a different cloth than every other man here. Starkly dre
ssed in the fashion of Brummell; clean cut, athletic figures, heads held high; they looked like another species entirely.

The seats around them were all emptied by the surge towards her dais. They were alone.  

She fixated on them rather than look at the prospect directly before her, the ugliness of the heaving, jeering mass almost more than she could bear, the tavern keeper’s loud voice a meaningless drone in her ears.

Those two men were civilisation personified, belonging to a fresh,
crisp morning’s walk in the park. They should be well-mounted on gleaming horses. They would doff their hats politely; dismount to offer a lady an arm as she promenaded. She could picture it and shut out everything else. Her racing heart slowed a little, no longer feeling as if it must leap out of her chest with terror.

She examined the first of the two men, trying to view him as if met in the street. His black hair was fashionably tousled, a style that suited the broad, clean lines of his face. His eyebrows were two dark slashes under a wide forehead. His jaw line was firm and strong. What colour his eyes were, she could not tell at that distance. She only knew they were dark, and seemed somehow both cool and hot as they looked right into her.

“So, gentleman,” roared the bartender, breaking into her trance. “Who will be taking this flower home with them? Who will enjoy a night of passion with this pure, delicate lady? Who will show her what a real man can do?”

Again there were eager shouts.

“Tell me what I’m bid. A hundred pounds is a cheap price for such a marvel. Who’ll give me one hundred?” She was horrified, forgetting the nature of an auction and thinking for a dreadful moment that this might be the price for her virtue, thrown away without winning their escape.

“One hundred!”
came a call from several throats.

“Gentlemen, too close,” cried out the bartender. “We’ll go to two hundred. Who’ll see me?”

The calls came for two hundred, then three, then four. Reason returned to her as the total jumped upwards. Now – perhaps always – it was a sum too rich for most of the room, who cheered for the spectacle of it. Higher climbed the figure. Five hundred. Now six. Seven. There were three men still in, all from the group of nobles. They grinned at her drunkenly, staring at her cleavage more than her face. Their companions egged them on, yelling for more.

Eight hundred pounds.
Eight hundred and twenty. Thirty. Eight hundred fifty. Nine hundred. So close. The moment was upon her.

Down to two men.
One wore a virulent mustard frockcoat trimmed with puce, the fashion of his youth. The other was in a much quieter coat of navy blue, with a dandyishly high shirt collar skimming his pocked cheeks.

Melissa’s gaze leapt desperately from one to the other. Which would it be? Both of them were at least half-soused. Their clothes were stained by the night’s revelry. Neither was young. The man in the mustard coat was plump and
jowled.

Then Melissa looked at the man in black. He was still watching her with those dark eyes and a slight frown. Unlike the other men in the room, she could read no lust in his face. His
head was up, jaw clenched, mouth tight.

In her heart was a hopeless plea.
Take me away from
this
. To him, to God, to whichever force might listen in this room here tonight. Her body was perfectly motionless, rigid with a tension that felt like it might break her in two. She felt she was choking.

The man in black took a single quick step towards her. She heard the bartender as he began to wind down, the pauses between his calls finding
only the murmurs of the crowd, quietened too by the suspense of the moment. The call was nine hundred and fifty pounds. It was the mustard-coated man’s turn to bid, but he was silent.

Melissa stared fixedly at the figure in the navy coat. He was grinning in triumph, crooked yellowing teeth bared.

Nine hundred and fifty pounds, thought Melissa. Pray God it is enough. She closed her eyes, despairing.

“So, gents.
Is this the man for our tender little virgin? Is this the man as will take her away for a night of hot pleasuring?” All was still, as if like her the whole world held its breath, other than the relentlessly cheerful tavern keeper. “No more bids I hear? That’s a yes then is it? Then she’s s-”

“Twelve hund
red pounds.” The voice was calm; deep, and clear as a bell.

Melissa’s eyes flew open. Who had it been? Who had made that bid?

The bartender was pointing at the black-coated man in triumph.

“You, sir,” he pronounced happily, “Are a
real
man. Now has I further word from the floor?” He inclined his head towards the previous high bidder. He was met with a scowl and the shake of a head. That man would bid no more.

“Then that’s done it,” the bartender continued.
“Twelve hundred pounds. A fair price for as fine a piece of womanflesh as I’ve ever had the pleasure of seeing.” He beckoned the black coated man forward. The crowd slowly began to return to their seats now the entertainment was over, their conversation loud and jovial.

A gaggle of the nobles remained standing by as the black-coated man approached.

“Carstairs,” one of them said slyly, “It’s not like you to be buying virgins. Thought you liked your meat better seasoned than that.” He tittered at his own turn of phrase, reeled slightly and caught himself.

“Ah, but who knows
when a man’s tastes may change?” replied Carstairs. He reached into an inner pocket of his coat for his billfold and peeled off a series of large notes, passing them to the bartender.

What kind of man carries twelve hundred pounds on his person?
she thought wildly. She searched his face.

He turned to her and held out one hand.

“Come,” he said softly, with the faintest glimmer of a smile.

Melissa hesitated, fighting the urge to take to her heels and run, to get as far away from this place as humanly possible. Might she be able to escape?

Mr Carstairs raised a single eyebrow and waited.

She had to go through with it. The money the tavern
keeper had pocketed must be passed on to Mr Tell, not returned to a disappointed Mr Carstairs, cheated of his virgin night.

Her virgin night.

She must do this.
For Peter. Oh, for Peter. The memory of him gave her the strength she needed.

Trembling a little, she placed her small hand in Mr
Carstairs large one. He transferred it to the crook of his elbow as he turned. Suddenly Mr Tell was at her side, dropping her cloak into place on her shoulders. She gathered it around her, glad of the concealing folds, pulling the hood up to shield her face.

“I shall need to know your direction, sir,” said Mr Tell, his hard eyes measuring Mr
Carstairs face with a glint of menace, undiminished by his lesser height and weight.