Page 18 of A Sham Engagement

He took a step toward the door. “I’m sure you’ll be able to find someone else from your wide circle of friends to attend the opera with this evening. I wish you well. Good day to you… my lady.”

Louise surged to her feet, the peignoir, that had not been tied, gaping open to reveal her opulent body and heavy breasts. If she’d done that just a day ago, Jack would have been across the room and sweeping her up in his arms, unable to resist. Now, that overblown body suddenly seemed repulsive to him, the stomach too full, the breasts too pendulous.

But she still deserved his compassion. He bowed. “I’m sorry, Louise, if I’ve hurt your feelings.”

She sprang at him, hands clawed, but he caught her by the wrists. “Calm yourself and think sensibly. I can’t continue to see you when I’m engaged to be married.” This was beginning to look like a wise decision. Her previous rages had never been directed at him, and this new experience of facing a woman spurned disturbed him.

“You’ve made a huge mistake,” she snarled. “Throwing me over. And you’ll live to regret allying yourself with a nincompoop of a girl for the rest of your days.” She gave a wild laugh. “You’ll be back knocking on my door less than a month after you marry, begging for the crumbs off my table. You mark my words.”

Jack released his hold on her and she sagged down, pulling the peignoir about her nakedness. Were those tears in her eyes? He’d never seen her cry. Never thought she could. Might this mean she’d felt more for him than he’d ever suspected?

She glared up at him. “Get out of my house. Now.”

He needed no further telling.

Chapter Eight

Once more out in the street, Jack halted beside a lamp post, one hand out for its support, and the scruffy man who’d been leaning on it hurried away, pulling his matelot hat down over his eyes. He’d been expecting Louise to only be annoyed, because he’d always imagined their little affair to be nothing more than a casual dalliance. It certainly had been on his part, as had all his affairs, since… He shook his head, to clear it of thoughts of his past. Her reaction suggested she might have seen it otherwise.

Without wishing to, he’d hurt her and those tears had been real. He’d been so anxious not to hurt a girl he didn’t know, he’d not even considered how his mistress might feel to be cast aside. And cast her aside was what he’d done, callously as though she didn’t matter to him. The thought that other men might have done the same in her past troubled him. Was he just as bad as they’d been? Too late now though.

“Matches, milord?” A waif of a girl with a small, pinched face broke in upon his self-flagellating thoughts, edging closer to him with her tray of matches. Her mousy hair hung in rats’ tails, and gray eyes gazed at him from shadowed sockets. She looked in need of more than just a penny for a few matches. The image of another child leapt into his head. A clean child with plump cheeks and freckles on his nose. There, but for the grace of God…

He fished in his pocket for loose change and came up with a crown. If he gave her that, would she even be able to spend it? Would someone steal it from her or accuse her of having stolen it herself? What he needed was smaller coins, and what she needed was food. On the opposite side of the street a man in a dirty apron had set up a pie stand. Just a barrow really, but it had “hot pies” written on the side of it, and their appetizing aroma wafted across the traffic. Something should be done to help this child, despite the urgency of his visit to Miss Wetherby’s parents. “Wait here,” Jack said.

Dodging a few carriages and the plentiful horse droppings that decorated the cobbles, Jack made it to the other side of the street and approached the man. “Two pies please.” A few moments later, having left a rather discontented pie seller who’d had to give up most of his change in return for the crown, he was back beside the match girl, who stood just where he’d left her, eyes round with awe as she saw him returning holding two pies.

He held one out to her. “Careful. It’s hot.”

She took it in a far-too-thin hand, the skin almost translucent over the bones, eyes wide with awe. “Fank you… milord.”

Well swept steps rose behind them past a basement’s railed area to a splendid front door. The house of one of Louise’s well-to-do neighbors. Sweeping his coat tails out of the way, Jack sat down and indicated for the child to do so too. With as much delicacy as a duchess taking her seat at a dinner party, the child sat a few feet away from him and began to eat the pie. He watched her in silence until she’d finished. As she licked the last of the crumbs from her fingers, a resounding burp escaped her. She clapped her hand over her mouth, eyes brimming with embarrassment and even a hint of mischief. A hint that within that sorry exterior lurked a real, fun-loving child. Someone must have taught her manners at some point. A mother, perhaps.

Smiling, Jack held out the other pie.

“Don’tcher want it, milord?” Her voice had gained in volume, perhaps strengthened by the consumption of the pie and the suspicion that he meant her no harm.

He shook his head, although in truth, the pie’s alluring scent had him salivating. He hadn’t eaten his breakfast, after all. “I bought it for you.”

She took the pie. “I’ll save it fer later, if that’s all the same wi’ you.” And it vanished into a fold in her clothing.

Jack reached into his pocket for the change he’d received from the pie man. He found two shillings and handed them to her. “Here, take this and buy your mother, or your family some food.”

“I ain’t got no fam’ly.”

He sighed. He didn’t really have time for this, as his aim this morning had been to call on Sir Nicholas, and Miss Wetherby, of course, and settle the conditions of the betrothal. He’d already been made late thanks to his visit to Lady Raby. Things seemed to be conspiring to get in his way. But his conscience wouldn’t allow him to ignore this child. “No mother?”

“No.”

“No father?”

She shook her head.

An orphan. Another waif he could help. Damn Miss Wetherby and her family. What was more important? Settling a betrothal or saving a child from starvation on the streets? He should take the time to help this waif and the Wetherbys would have to put up with him being late. Her stick-like limbs wrung his heart, and her gray eyes, devoid of hope, didn’t help. He kept his voice as gentle as he could, despite his fury that a child so young could be left to fend for herself. But apart from the streets, what else was there for her other than the workhouse? “What’s your name, child?”

She sniffed and wiped her nose with the back of her hand. “Josie.”

“Just Josie? No surname?”