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PREHAPS IF SHE could understand why he did this dreadful thing, then she could somehow dissuade him, Megs thought.
Godric was still pale. Megs examined her husband while trying to hide her concern, but his gaze was steady, his body solid and strong in the chair. She took a moment to marvel again that at one time she’d thought this man almost infirm. She realized now that he might not be as tall or as bulky as some men, but he was solid, as if he were made of some durable, indestructible material. Granite, maybe. Or iron that would never rust. Something strong and muscular and … and masculine.
Megs glanced down at her hands in confusion at the thought of her husband’s body and nearly missed his next words.
“Have you ever heard of Sir Stanley Gilpin?”
She looked up again. “No, I don’t think so.”
He nodded as if her reply was expected. “He was a distant relation of my father’s, dead now for several years. A third cousin or some such. He was a wealthy man of business in the city, but he also had other interests.”
“Such as?”
“Theater. He owned a theater at one time and even wrote some plays.”
“Really?” She couldn’t see what this had to do with the Ghost of St. Giles, but she forced herself to sink into a chair at right angles to his, laying her hands decorously one atop the other. Fidgeting was, sadly, a particular failing of hers. “What are their titles? Perhaps I’ve seen one.”
“I very much doubt it.” His look was wry. “I loved Sir Stanley like a father, but his playwriting skills were terrible. I’m not sure any of his plays saw a stage beyond the first one, The Romance of the Porpoise and the Hedgehog.”
Megs felt her eyebrows lift, interested despite herself. “The … porpoise?”
He nodded. “And the hedgehog. As I said, simply terrible, but I’ve gotten off track.” He leaned forward, wincing a little, and set his elbows on his knees, staring at his hands clasped in front of him. “I don’t know if you know this, but my mother died when I was ten.”
topped dead and glared at him, her breast heaving. Dear God, she was magnificent when she was in a rage.
He cleared his throat. “Elderly?”
“Elderly?” She mimicked him in a horribly high voice, which he privately thought was a bit unfair—he didn’t sound at all like that. “That’s all you can say? I saw you kill that footpad the first night I was in London.”
“Yes, I did.”
“How many?”
“What?”
Her lower lip was trembling, the sight much more troubling to him than her anger. Megs in a rage was wonderful. Megs fearful wasn’t something he ever wanted to see. “How many have you killed, Godric?”
He looked away from that vulnerable mouth. “I don’t know.”
“How”—she stopped and inhaled, steadying her voice—“how can you not know how many people you’ve killed, Godric?”
He wasn’t a coward, so he lifted his head and met her gaze, silently letting her see the answer in his eyes.
Her throat worked as she swallowed. “But they were all bad, weren’t they?” She couldn’t hide the uncertainty in her voice. She was trying to persuade herself—and failing. “All … all the people you killed, they were like the footpad—you saved others by killing them.”
He could see in her eyes the desire to believe that he wasn’t entirely a monster. So he made it easy for her, though he knew there was no clear line in St. Giles. No true black and white. Yes, there were murderers and thieves, those who preyed upon the weaker … but those same murderers and thieves often sought to feed themselves or others.
One never knew.
Not that that had ever stopped him.
“Yes,” he said. “I’ve only ever killed those who I caught attacking the weak and vulnerable.”
There was glad relief in her eyes, which was as it should be. Megs was a creature of light and joy. She had no business contemplating the darkness that he fought night after night in St. Giles.
“I’m so glad.” She frowned for a moment, absently taking a dozen spills from the jar and stacking them messily on the mantel, but then she seemed to remember something and turned back to him, a few spills still in her hand. “That was what Griffin was blackmailing you over, wasn’t it? He knew that you were the Ghost.”
Godric’s mouth twisted. “Yes.”
