Chapter Nineteen

W ell?" Chris scowled over his brandy, which was less fine than he would have expected of a gentleman's club. "I could get finer elsewhere," he said. "That's not the point," Rafe said. "One doesn't go to a club for the quality of the spirits." "Apparently not." Rafe smothered an inelegant sound beneath his palm. "It seems Phoebe's holding up her end of your bargain," he said. "You should be grateful you're here at all—and instead you're denigrating the quality of the brandy." He was right, of course, though that knowledge did not improve the taste of the liquor. Chris had not, in fact, expected Laurence to meet with success in his attempt to gain him admittance to his club—and had not been much inclined to pull any strings still within his grasp to ensure it. But it seemed between Laurence and the viscount, the Beaumonts, and the many and various Toogood husbands, they'd cobbled together enough sway to do it. Or at least no other members, whatever reservations they might have had, had dared to blackball him outright. "Thought you'd prefer a more casual introduction to society," Rafe said. "Instead of a dinner party, at which you might allow yourself to be goaded into violence. The strictures are somewhat relaxed here, where only men are permitted." Chris supposed he was right there, too. There had been little opportunity for anything else, given that he'd spent the better part of a month recovering from a gunshot wound. Brooks had imparted to him that Phoebe had received several invitations to various events in the meantime—though fewer, perhaps, than she might have received had she married someone more socially acceptable—but he had sent her regrets to each of them. "Stop bloody slouching," Rafe instructed. "You look like you're attempting to sink through your seat." Hell . Easier said than done when there were at least a dozen pairs of eyes trained upon him, as if a feral animal had been let loose within the club. "What is one meant to do at a gentleman's club?" he asked, pitching his voice low. He'd experience enough with gaming hells, where men gambled and drank to excess and occasionally, if the mood struck, took the company of one of the whores who prowled the halls to an upstairs room for a bit of a slap and tickle. But the raucous atmosphere of a gaming hell was a far cry from the muted conversation trickling around them, and ladies weren't permitted within—not even prostitutes to provide pleasure to the gentlemen present. Rafe shrugged. "Drink," he said. "Converse with one's peers. Read in the library, if it suits one's interests." He paused. Reflected. "I think there's a card room somewhere." Bloody boring, then. Out of the corner of his eye, Chris watched a gentleman at a neighboring table flick the page of a newspaper. "Mostly," Rafe said, "I expect men come here to escape their wives." "Why?" "Haven't the faintest," Rafe said. "Don't come often, myself. But every gentleman has got a club. It's the done thing." He gave a nonchalant shrug. "Clubs are meant to be a refuge from the home," he said, "for gentlemen who find the company of their wives growing tedious, I suppose." "Don't, I beg you, tell me you find my sister's company tedious ." "Of course not," Rafe said. "Which is why I spend little time here. But if you find Phoebe's company tedious—" "I don't." "I mean to say, it must be strange, sharing your home with a woman after so many years of bachelorhood." It wasn't. Or at least, it wasn't as strange as he had thought it would be. "Phoebe's a friend, after a fashion," he said. "I have no need to escape her." She wasn't intrusive in the way that some were. Her company did not grate upon his nerves. In fact— In fact, he'd found himself seeking her out more often than not. He was surprised she'd not accused him of malingering when he'd come to her in the library complaining of the pain in his side and insisting that she read to him and scratch her fingers through his hair as he liked. Most especially because he had been malingering. It had seemed the safest way to play upon her sympathies and to get what he wanted of her. "Ah," Rafe said. "You see, that's just it. I have little use for a club as a social thing, since I have got Emma for that. My wife is my closest friend." He rolled his eyes as Chris tossed and offended glare across the table. "I value your friendship, such as it is," he said. "But for all our years of friendship, I have never once felt a desire to share a bed with you. So Emma has knocked you down a rung upon that ladder." Thank God for that, at least. Chris took a furtive glance about, and pitched his voice to a murmur to ensure he wouldn't be overheard. "I meant to speak to Em today," he said. "Phoebe's been a bit overwrought about that incident some weeks past." "Incident?" Rafe asked, arching one brow. "You mean to say, the one in which you were shot?" "Concerned her, she said," Chris sighed. "You don't say." Rafe's bland tone suggested some measure of exasperation. "I've no idea why she might be a touch unsettled that her husband came inches away from death." Chris ground his teeth together. "Suffice it to say," he gritted out, "I've taken measures that ought to relieve…er, let's say the worst of the antipathy in which the general public holds me. Probably won't be making friends of them, but at least I ought to have fewer enemies than once I had." "Then what is the problem?" "I've been made aware that a man came round my office some time ago. Said he'd been sent by a man called Russell. I wanted to know if Em had heard anything on that front." Chris finished off the last of his brandy and set the empty glass aside. "The man himself isn't known to me," he said. "But the most recent boy I brought to Em—" "Ah," said Rafe. "Martin." Chris huffed. "Said his name was Albert." "He lied. They all lie. We've come to expect it," Rafe said. "His name is Martin, and he's eleven years old. Quiet little mite, tightlipped about his kidsman." Quiet? Chris snorted. "Suppose you've seen a different side of him, then." "Yes," Rafe said. "And…no. He was coerced into staying with us, it's true, but I suspect a few of the other children presently in residence were once part of his little gang, and they're all appallingly fearful. Won't take part in outings with the other children. One of them—a little boy called Billy—has recurring nightmares about being snatched off the street and taken back. They want to stay," he said, "but they're terrified of their kidsman. Won't speak of him at all in our hearing." Like a bogeyman, Chris supposed. As if to speak of evil might summon it to them. "They're learning," he said. "The kidsmen, I mean." "I suppose they must be. Hard to track down a bastard you can't name," Rafe said. And infinitely more difficult to send them fleeing from the city, or to be rid of them in other, less ethical ways. So long as they could put enough fear into the children to keep them quiet, Chris' ability to purge London of the kidsmen plaguing its streets was necessarily limited. "You think Russell was responsible for your…er, incident?" Rafe asked. "Don't know," Chris said. "Possible, I suppose. There's dozens of people with reason to want me dead." Though he hoped he'd stifled the worst of them. "Wouldn't have paid it any mind if not for Phoebe." What hadn't succeeded in killing him was not worth expending the effort to worry over. "I daresay a few children removed from a gang is hardly reason enough for murder," Rafe said. "You're certain you haven't offended this Russell in some other manner?" No, he damned well wasn't certain. It was just that nothing had sprung immediately to mind. "You don't know how it is on the streets," Chris said. "You'd have no reason to, growing up as you have. But criminals talk. They know one another, share information with one another. Coin is the currency of the upper classes, but information—information is the currency of criminals. All the coin in the world won't save a common fellow from getting pinched by the authorities and transported. How the hell do you think I got pressed into service for the Home Office?" He'd possessed a fortune by then, which he'd made by raking debtors over the coals, by blackmail and extortion and illicit gaming establishments. But it still hadn't saved him when he'd gone a step too far. Rafe lifted his brows in interest. "You think he's coming for you…before you can come for him?" "Safest course of action," Chris said. "An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure." He might have taken only a few of Russell's children off of the streets, but he'd taken a goodly number of children from other kidsmen as well. And if any of them snitched—well, then, Russell's days as a kidsman would be numbered. Chris was a known figure, both by polite London society and otherwise. Anyone who had spent any amount of time within the city was bound to have at least a passing familiarity with him, if not personally, then by reputation alone. Russell's name had only come up relatively recently. It was possible that he was new to the city, that he'd gleaned a bare-bones understanding of Chris through the kidsmen that had come and gone during his tenure. Possibly he'd decided to get rid of Chris before he could be gotten rid of himself. A fool's strategy. Chris had been dodging attempts on his life for more years than he cared to count, and he'd escaped worse scrapes than this. Perhaps not unscathed , but he'd always lived to tell the tale of it. A short sigh from Rafe pulled Chris from the cloud of his thoughts. "Lord," Rafe said. "Order another brandy. You're going to need it." Chris felt his brow furrow. "Why?" Rafe lifted his hand in the air to summon a steward. "Because your brothers-in-law have arrived. I imagine they'll come over for a drink or two. Social fellows, they." Christ . Chris slouched in his seat. "Which ones?" he asked, slinking as far as he could in what was likely a futile attempt to go unnoticed. "Counting Laurence?" Rafe inquired, peering into the distance over Chris' shoulder. "That would make it… all of them."

∞∞∞

Phoebe had made good progress on filling Kit's library, but she feared the cost of it would soon grow too onerous even for his sizeable bank account to bear out. She had not exactly been selective with her choices, but as the entirety of his library had contained only six volumes when she had moved into his house, she had reasoned that he could benefit from some of the more popular titles that a gentleman would be expected to be in possession of before rounding out his burgeoning collection with pieces more rare and prized. She'd exhausted most of the nearest shops of the wares she had wanted, and had found—to her chagrin—that Kit had sent ahead instructions to have her purchases billed to him. Which was rather irritating, as he'd done the same with her modiste and several other shops that she frequented. It was growing difficult to find a shop that would accept her money, and she had a great deal of her own to spend. If she could find a place to spend it. Happily, she knew of just such a place in a tiny little shop tucked away down an alley in Whitechapel. A rougher part of town to be sure, but it was the same shop in which she had found the French translation of One Thousand and One Nights . She hadn't visited in a number of months, but the last time she'd been in, the owner had assured her that had she the desire for any particular book, he could find it for her. At a premium, she didn't doubt, for the service he provided. She spent the afternoon browsing the dusty old stacks, finding rare volumes in Latin and Greek which would naturally find a place within a gentleman's library—even if he could not read them. There were some newer offerings, which had been shipped over from America, as well as a few of the more popular modern novels, which seemed to have been shoved all together on a single shelf, as if they had been a resentful concession to their present popularity. She collected volume after volume of poetry, novels, plays, philosophical treatises, and then on impulse, a copy of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman , which she thought Kit might appreciate for its subversive nature. The author's daughter had gone on to pen the novel that Phoebe was presently in the midst of reading—though bits and pieces of it had hit a little too close to home for Phoebe's comfort, and she was only just approaching the end of the second volume. Frankenstein . A creature loathed and feared by the one who had given him life, and by everyone who made his acquaintance. With a monstrous appearance; the very perception of that monstrosity skewing reality. She had found it quite sad thus far, that the creature, who had not asked to be given life, had suffered such severe judgment for having the audacity to live. She shook herself free of the melancholy thought—it was past time to be going home. Day was swiftly fading, and Whitechapel was no proper place for a lady even in the daylight hours. But she had known well enough the reputation of her destination when she had set off, and she had taken Kit's carriage with a footman in accompaniment just to be safe. He was a bruiser of a man; several inches taller even than Kit with fists like ham hocks and face that looked as if it had seen the wrong side of a few too many tavern brawls. Most likely, she thought, he was one of the employees whom Kit had dragged with him up from the gutters from whence they had spawned. He had not approved of the hours she had spent poring over the books within the shop, and it had been obvious with every sigh, every irritable grunt he had issued, and his ever-deepening scowl—though she supposed it was possible scowling was simply his natural expression. He gave another grunt of displeasure as he looked over the stacks of books Phoebe had spent the afternoon compiling upon the owner's desk. "'Ow many you got there?" he asked, folding his arms over his chest. "I don't know," Phoebe said. "I haven't counted." "Forty-six," the owner said cheerfully, rubbing his hands together with the sort of glee that could only be induced by the knowledge that he'd likely made several months' worth of income in a single afternoon. "Forty-six!" The footman barked the words in astonishment. "What do you need forty-six books for?" Phoebe gave a nonchalant shrug. "To read?" she suggested mildly. "Bloody feckin' ‘ell. Take me all night to get ‘em to the carriage." Phoebe rolled her eyes. It would take two trips on the outside, if the beefy bulge of his arms were anything to go by. At least the shop owner had not been offended by the crude language, but then this was Whitechapel, and he was hardly likely to say anything that would jeopardize such a sale. "If you would be so good as to begin moving the books," she said to the footman, "I'll settle the bill." Another grunt—of assent, she assumed, for he lifted one massive paw and swiped a stack straight off of the counter and into his arms. "Be back fer the rest," he said as he plodded toward the door. The books wanted an astronomical sum, but Phoebe had it to spare. She counted out the coin from her reticule, assured that the footman would return for the remainder of the books, and at last headed for the door. Buried as the shop was deep down an alley, the setting sun burning above the rooftops did not fall into her eyes as she exited, but the darkness of the alley compared with the brightness of the sunset hanging above produced an almost eerie sort of air, as if she had stumbled into the sort of place the light had never been meant to touch. There was a queer odor that permeated the air, like a coalescing stink of too many unwashed bodies too tightly packed together. The rankness of weeks passed without bathing and the rotting of teeth. She had hardly edged out of sight of the dusty window of the shop before a cold, damp hand curled around her arm and yanked her into the darkness that lurked behind a stack of discarded crates. A scream caught in her throat, silenced only by the sharp tip of a blade that pressed against the side of her neck. Hot breath, rancid and moist, floated past her nose as those fingers tightened upon her arm, carving deep gouges into her flesh. "Scream and ye're dead," a hoarse voice hissed at her ear. "Rather ye live to carry a message fer me to that ‘usband o' yers, but a body's a message in itself. Nod if ye understand." Through the veil of fear that had enshrouded her, Phoebe managed a tiny nod, only too cognizant of the tip of the knife notched now just beneath her chin. "Ye tell him," that rough voice said, "ye tell him ol' Russell ‘as got men everywhere. ‘E oughta make ‘is peace with God now. ‘E'll be meetin' ‘im soon enough." A foul chuckle, and then the press of that knife until it pricked her skin and she had to bite back a yelp. "Got eyes and ears on ye. I can get to the both o' ye anywhere I please." Distantly, Phoebe heard the crunch of her footman's boots upon the ground as he headed back toward the shop. Relief washed over her in a wave as that cold, hard hand removed itself from her arm, leaving behind a stinging pain from the gouges carved into her flesh as sharp fingernails pulled themselves from her tender skin. The knife hovered still at her throat, and that voice rasped, "Ye tell him—" In a burst of anxious energy, Phoebe jammed her elbow backwards, catching the villain in the ribs. The knife dug just a little deeper as the man grunted at the blow, and Phoebe yelped at the bright flare of pain there at the hollow of her throat. Another jab with her elbow swiftly on the heels of the first, and the man doubled over with a wheeze. "Help!" she screamed, sprinting away from the man who had accosted her and toward the pounding sound of shoes on the ground, and she barreled straight into the footman, who caught her by the shoulders. "What the devil's ‘appened to ye?" he asked, his bushy brows lowering over his dark eyes. Panting with encroaching hysteria, Phoebe wrenched herself out of his grasp, skittering in a strange, unbalanced stride behind him in an effort to put still more distance between herself and the man who had wielded the blade. Her knees trembled beneath the flounces of her skirt in a sort of helpless knock-kneed quaver. "There was a man—he had a knife—" She took several gasping breaths, peeking round the footman's burly shoulder into the depths of the alley. Deserted. The villain must have used her panic to flee into the shadowy reaches of the alley, and now it was as empty and silent as if he had never been there at all. She touched the tips of her fingers to the hollow of her throat, and the kidskin of her gloves came away stained with blood. "Ain't no one there," the footman said. "Anymore, leastwise. He come away with yer reticule?" "No." Phoebe lifted her wrist to display the reticule still dangling from it. He hadn't wanted her money. He'd wanted to send a message—to use her, her fear and the terror he'd imparted to her, to convey one. The footman scoffed, though he presented his glower toward the alley and not to her. "Sorry to say ‘e's likely long gone. That sort—well, they make their coin roughin' up anyone they can. Like as not ‘e's got a bolt hole on every street, so's ‘e can make a quick escape." He folded his arms across his chest and turned back toward her. "Ye're safe enough now," he said. Safe enough? Her heart still shuddered in her chest. Her face felt cold and clammy with sweat. She'd never been so frightened in all her life. "Please," she said, in an odd, warbling voice. "Please, I would like to go home." "Awright," the footman said. "I'll take ye to the carriage and bring the last o' the books. Coachman'll stay wiv ye until I return." He meant it to be reassuring, she supposed. But she had been frightened out of her wits, and they were still scattered. He could get them anywhere, the villain had said. Anywhere . A shiver slid down her spine. Would she ever feel safe again?