Forbidden Page 27

  Lady Emily must have been terrified that she would remember what had happened. Every day she must have been afraid. Margery rubbed her temples. They ached fiercely. The only thing that made no sense was why Lady Emily would have wanted her mother dead. Emily had been illegitimate at birth and could never have inherited Templemore.

  The voices had faded now. There was a silence. Margery waited, listened. Then she put out a hand, groped for the doorknob and turned it stealthily.

  The door was locked. She felt her hopes sink. She sat back against the wall, curling her legs up, resting her head against the flaking plaster of the wall. The scent of dampness and decay was in her nostrils now. She felt cold.

  After a little while she stirred herself and scrubbed the tears from her cheeks. A tiny flicker of rebellion kindled in her and grew stronger. She was not going to sit around here waiting for Jem to dispose of her in a sack in the Thames. He thought he had won. She was going to show him he had not. She thought of Henry, too, and felt possessed by a fierce, bright determination. Henry would never let Jem’s blackmail succeed. He would do everything he could to find her. She felt it, felt such faith and love in him, as strong and powerful as anything she had felt in her life before. She knew without a shadow of doubt that it would be enough to bring him to her through the dark.

  * * *

  “THIS IS VERY BAD,” Mr. Churchward said. His hand shook slightly as he read the ransom note. “Very bad indeed.”

  No one was inclined to contradict him. The atmosphere in the drawing room of Templemore House was bleak. No one believed that Jem Mallon would release Margery alive even if the earl did as requested and paid the seventy thousand pounds that Jem was demanding.

  It was night, full dark. The curtains were drawn and the candles lit. Around the table sat Henry, Mr. Churchward, the Earl of Templemore, Garrick Farne, Alex Grant and Owen Rothbury who, as soon as they had received Henry’s note, had come to offer their services in the search for Margery.

  The first indication that anything was wrong had been the return that afternoon of the carriage with the groom and coachman badly beaten. They had told Henry that they had been bringing Margery home from Bedford Square when they had stopped to pick up Jem Mallon. He had directed the coach away from Grosvenor Street toward the river on some errand but once they were trapped down a narrow back street with no escape they had been toppled from the carriage, clubbed viciously and sent back, reeling and shaken. Of Margery there was no sign.

  Henry knew he would never forget how he had felt then, no matter how long he lived. Something had fractured inside him. Obligation and duty fell aside leaving his emotions painfully and dangerously exposed, as they had been the night at Templemore when Margery had run from him.

  Then, he had refused to confront his demons. He had turned away from love when Margery had offered it to him. He had not even acknowledged in his own mind that he had loved her on that hot and passionate night when she had given him her body and her soul.

  Instead, he had dismissed what he felt as need, as lust and passion, and he had run from love because he did not dare open himself to hurt as fearlessly as Margery had done.

  It was late to realize his mistake, but he was not prepared to accept that it was too late. He would find Margery and he would tell her he loved her.

  Henry had gone out then, down to the river where the carriage had been ambushed, trying to pick up news, any news, of what might have happened to Margery and where Jem might have taken her.

  Farne and Rothbury and Grant had scoured the town all afternoon and evening for a word, for a whisper of Margery’s whereabouts, but there had been none. Henry refused to give up hope, because to do so would be to abandon Margery and that was impossible, unimaginable, but as time slipped by and there was no word, he felt the fear for her wedge itself in his blood.

  They had called Churchward in to find out if they could draw on his extensive investigations into Jem Mallon’s business in case it offered any clues. It read like a list of all the most criminal and disreputable enterprises in London: illegal clubs, drinking dens and brothels, shops dealing in stolen goods, gangs running extortion rackets and all manner of other lawbreaking.

  “I did try to warn everyone at the time,” Churchward had said unhappily.

  Then the ransom note had arrived, demanding the money and threatening to kill Margery if Lord Templemore refused to pay or anyone tried to find her. Shockingly, Lady Emily Templemore had gone into hysterics then, screaming that it was all her fault, that she had never wanted Margery dead, only for her to go away before she remembered everything. Lady Emily had sobbed as she confessed to paying Jem to kidnap Rose Saint-Pierre twenty years before.

  “I didn’t want him to kill her,” she cried, a sodden hiccupping mass of grief. “I told him I just wanted her to go away, far away, somewhere I would never see her again. It was for Antoine.” She had clutched at Henry’s sleeve with desperate fingers. “I loved him. We would meet sometimes at the Temple of Venus…. I was so afraid he would take Rose back and I would lose him.” Her hand fell. “I only wanted her to go away,” she said tonelessly. “She had everything I wanted. It was not fair….”

  Henry had seen Lord Templemore shrink in on himself as he realized the extent of his half sister’s guilt and the wretched grief and misery that had driven her. The doctor had come to give Lady Emily a sedative and now she slept, Lady Wardeaux at her bedside, and the earl had downed a stiff brandy without a word, his knuckles white on the head of his cane, his face withered and drawn as he relived the loss of his daughter.

  “I’ll find Margery,” Henry had said fiercely to the earl. “I swear it. I’ll find her and bring her back to you.”

  He saw the fear in the earl’s eyes then, and the knowledge they both shared, that Jem would never let Margery go.

  “I’m going out again,” Henry said. He caught sight of himself in the mirror, pale and drawn with exhaustion, filthy from the streets, haunted with fear for Margery. “I’ll start checking the places on Churchward’s list.”

  “I’ll come with you,” Garrick said at once. Alex and Owen stood up, too. They gulped down hot coffee and prepared to go out again into the night. Henry felt each second, each minute, stretching out unbearably. He felt exhausted, yet intolerably awake and on edge. He would not permit himself, even for a moment, to think that he might not see Margery again.

  The street door opened suddenly and three ladies came in from the night, sparking with jewels, wrapped in silk.

  “Joanna,” Alex Grant said, pausing as he swung his great coat about his shoulders. “You should not be here.”

  “Nonsense, Alex,” Lady Grant said robustly.

  “Have you found Margery?” Tess Rothbury demanded.

  “No,” Owen said. “Not yet.”

  “In that case,” Merryn Farne said, “you need our help.”

  “I really don’t think—” Garrick began.

  Merryn quelled him with a look. “Garrick, darling,” she said, “you know that we all care about what happens to Margery. She has been so loyal to us all in the past that we owe it to her now. Let us help you.”

  “All right,” Henry said. He was willing to accept any help if it meant that they found Margery. “We’re going to divide up all the places connected to Jem Mallon,” he said, passing Joanna the list. Tess and Merryn crowded around, looking over her shoulder.

  “It’s a long shot,” Henry said, “but it’s the best we can do.”

  Tess was rapidly scanning the list. “This will take days,” she murmured. “It covers every conceivable illegal activity in London.”

  “I know,” Henry said. He felt his heart sink and forced himself not to lose hope. He took the list back and read it again. His mind felt fuzzy with tiredness. He felt as though he was missing something important, trying to make a link that was just beyond his reach.

  Mallon is part owner of The Hoop and Grapes flash house, he read, in Mr. Churchward’s neat hand. He could almost feel the
lawyer’s disapproval. He also part funds the brothel at The Temple of Venus….

  “I know Mrs. Tong at the Temple of Venus,” Tess said suddenly. “We go back many years. Even if she does not know where Margery is, she might be able to give us the name of someone who does, or tell us where to find Jem Mallon.”

  “She’d never help you,” Henry said.

  Tess smiled sweetly. “Oh, I think she will.”

  Garrick looked at Henry, who nodded.

  “Let’s go,” he said.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  The Chariot: Victory. The force of destiny

  MARGERY SWIFTLY REALIZED that, as she could not get out the door, the only way was up through the skylight and out onto the roof. She did not like heights but that was irrelevant since it was a matter of life and death. She dragged the battered bed beneath the tiny attic window. The light was fading now and night was coming on. As it was high summer, she calculated that it must be almost eleven o’clock. If Jem was waiting until full dark to dispose of her, she did not have much time left.

  By standing on the wooden rail at the base of the bed, Margery was able to reach up to a bar fixed to the ceiling beneath the window. Since this was a brothel she suspected that it had some sort of sexual purpose because there were chains hanging down from it.

  She did not allow her mind to dwell on the use of either the bar or the chains and concentrated on them solely as a means of escape. She had spent many times as a child swinging on the ropes that her brothers had slung between the trees in the Wantage woods. Chains were no different.

  Climbing in a muslin gown and slippers was, however, a lot less easy than it had been in the hand-me-down trews and boots she had worn as a child. Soon her slippers fell off and her skirts were in shreds but she reached the bar on the ceiling and pushed against the dirty skylight.

  It did not budge. She pushed harder, clinging to the bar with one hand and pushing with the other, but she could get little purchase. The window squeaked and shifted but did not open. She knew she was going to have to break it.

  Far below her—she risked a quick look down and felt a little queasy—a brass candlestick stood on the dresser. There was nothing for it. She shimmied down the chains again and they clanked softly together. She grabbed the candlestick and started back up again, the candlestick tucked into the waist of her gown. Suddenly, with no warning whatsoever, the chains started to uncoil. Her weight, small as it was, had obviously operated some sort of long-neglected mechanism and now it cranked into action. As Margery hung on for dear life, the chains unrolled and rattled down, faster and faster, depositing her painfully on the floor. She did not even have time to gather her breath before a hidden trapdoor opened and she fell straight through.

  Gasping, the breath knocked out of her, she lay on the rug in the room below. There was light and sound. Someone was screaming. Margery opened her eyes and looked up at an enormous bed where one of Mrs. Tong’s whores was peering around the large, naked shoulder of the man on top of her and shrieking fit to burst.

  Margery scrambled to her feet. The screaming stopped.

  “Oh, it’s you, Margery,” the redhead on the bed said. “Sorry, didn’t recognize you for a moment.”

  The fat peer hauled himself off the girl like a bad-tempered walrus. “You’re putting me off my stroke,” he said peevishly. “Have you come to join us?”

  “I thank you, but no,” Margery said, averting her eyes. “I’m so sorry to disturb you, Miss Kitty. Please excuse me.” She edged toward the door.

  “Got any of those marzipan cakes?” Kitty called as the man climbed back on top of her.

  “Not tonight!” Margery shouted. She grabbed a thick braided whip off the dresser—the perfect weapon—and slipped out the door.

  From the landing it sounded as though all hell was breaking out in the hall below. Margery leaned over the banisters and her knees weakened with relief at what she saw. She had planned to sneak out by the servants’ entrance, but she had wondered how she might get past Mrs. Tong’s burly doormen if they were in the hall.

  Now she saw that the problem was solved. In the center of the tiled hall of the brothel stood Tess Rothbury. She was facing Mrs. Tong and holding a tiny silver pistol in her hand. On one side of her was Joanna Grant and on the other was Merryn Farne. At the door a mill was in full swing. Henry had already laid out one of the doormen with a blow that had him reeling across the floor. Garrick Farne was dealing with a second. A third stood irresolute looking from Henry to the pistol in Alex Grant’s hand. Henry turned to him.

  “Try,” he invited.

  For one long moment Margery allowed herself simply to look at Henry. His usually immaculate clothes were disheveled, as though he had thrown them on in a hurry. His chin was dark with stubble and his face gray with fatigue. He looked like a man on a mission, one who would let nothing stand in his way. Margery could feel the driving tension in him and the absolute determination. She drank it in and she loved him for it.

  At the sound of the fight in the hall below, all the doors along the landing had flown open and now customers and girls in various states of undress had shot out to see what was going on. Peers whom Margery recognized were hastily pulling on their breeches.

  “Good evening, your grace,” Margery said cheerfully as the Duke of Cumnor hurried past, dragging on his jacket in such a rush that he had both arms down one sleeve.

  “Your servant, Lady Marguerite,” the duke puffed. “Must be going! If my mama were to hear about this there would be hell to pay.”

  “I’ll have the fair-haired one at the back,” Miss Kitty said, craning over Margery’s shoulder to look at Owen Rothbury. “He looks luscious.”

  “I’d rather have the tall, dark and handsome one,” Miss Martha said, with a voluptuous shiver, gazing at Henry. “He’s gorgeous and he knows how to fight dirty.”

  “They’re taken, girls,” Margery said.

  Mrs. Tong, seeing her henchmen fall, seemed inclined to turn tail and run, but Joanna and Merryn between them had grabbed her before she could flee. Tess was speaking in cut-glass tones that carried up to the landing above.

  “Mrs. Tong,” she said, “please do make this easy for yourself. We believe that Lady Marguerite Saint-Pierre is here, held under duress. We have come to take her back.”

  Mrs. Tong had turned pale under her paint. She gave Tess a sickly smile. “Why, you’re a one, aren’t you, madam,” she said archly. “Bursting in here, causing a mill! I don’t know anything about this Lady Marguerite—”

  Margery heard Henry swear but Tess simply looked at Mrs. Tong for a full thirty seconds before she said, “Shall we start again, Mrs. Tong? Think hard now, before you refuse to help. If you do not release Lady Marguerite immediately we will search the entire brothel until we find her, and then we will turn you over to the authorities for your part in kidnap and abduction. I really do not think you would want that—would you?”

  “My, she’s a cool one,” Miss Kitty whispered in Margery’s ear.

  “I know,” Margery said. “I want to be like her when I grow up.”

  She was about to step forward and reveal herself when the brothel door burst open and Jem came in with a couple of men a few steps behind him. Immediately the tableau in the hall shifted. One of the men went down to a punishing right hook from Owen Rothbury. The other turned tail and ran. Henry drew himself up and looked at Jem.

  “You bastard,” he said.

  Jem had a knife. Margery saw the glint of it in the candlelight.

  “Henry!” she yelled.

  Both Henry and Jem looked up instinctively. Quick as a flash, Margery picked up one of Mrs. Tong’s priapic marble statues and dropped it over the balcony. It fell like a stone and caught Jem by the shoulder, knocking him to the floor then shattering into a dozen pieces. Henry pounced on Jem, kicking the knife away and dragging him to his feet, but only so he could knock him down again.

  “Take him away,” he said to Garrick and Alex. “Just get h
im out of my sight before I kill him.”

  Margery ran to the top of the staircase. The last time she had descended it, she had been a lady’s maid and she had crept down to find Henry waiting for her in the hall below. Now she walked down the center of the red carpet, in her bare feet and ripped muslin dress, with the whip in one hand, the candlestick in the other and Mrs. Tong’s girls trailing her like bawdy bridesmaids.

  Suddenly she realized that it did not matter who she was, Margery Mallon or Lady Marguerite Saint-Pierre; to Mrs. Tong’s girls she had always been the maid who had brought them delicious marzipan treats. To Joanna and Tess, and the other scandalous ladies she had worked for, she had been a loyal friend and far more than a servant, and now they had repaid that loyalty by coming for her when she needed them.

  “Thank you for the rescue party,” she said, a little breathlessly as she reached the bottom step. “I do appreciate it very much.”

  Mrs. Tong’s face had convulsed with fury. “How the devil did you get out?”

  “I swung on the manacles in the ceiling and fell through the trapdoor into Miss Kitty’s chamber,” Margery said serenely. She heard Owen Rothbury give a splutter of laughter.

  “Tess evidently taught you well,” he said.

  Then Henry was there, striding through the crowd, dragging her into his arms. Henry as Margery had never seen him before, cool reserve shattered, his eyes blazing dark, shaking as he pulled her to him and kissed her in front of everyone.

  “I thought I had lost you,” he said against her hair, and his voice was so hoarse she barely recognized it. “Margery…” He kissed her again, with raw desperation and need. Margery could feel him shaking, pouring out all that he felt, the yearning and the promise.

  “I love you,” he said, when he released her. “I love you so much.”

  “Oh!” Margery said. Her heart felt as though it was going to burst with happiness. “Henry. I have so wanted to hear you say that.”

  She returned his kiss in full measure before she drew back and cupped his cheek in one loving hand. She saw his eyes close at her touch and heard him sigh.