Page 22
“Picnics, parks, gardens, shops?”
“I haven’t… We haven’t ignored those things. One of our walks is through a park.”
It was his turn to look skeptical. “I’ll wager you’ve never been to one of Mr. Green’s balloon ascensions at Vauxhall.”
“No, but…ladies may stroll in the parks without any special guidance.”
“Because you went to Babylon Street to find your pickpocket, you think pickpockets don’t go to parks? Don’t go where ladies carrying purses go?” He watched to see whether she’d blush again over his reference to that purse.
“Is that what pickpockets see? Walking purses rather than women?”
That was a question he’d best not answer. “I thought your plan was to publish your guide to the world?”
“When it’s been revised and edited.” She slid the little book into a pocket of her skirts.
“So, someone will read it?”
“Yes, but not…”
“Not a man you might have written about?”
“If I did write about you, none of your acquaintance would recognize the portrait.”
“Still a man might not want to appear ridiculous in one of your stories like a figure in a print shop window.” He removed his waistcoat and laid it on top of his coat. His shirt had been pristine when he’d put it on, now he feared there would be a spot of blood from the unchanged plaster. His sham courtship was proving costly.
“You’re bleeding, and yet you worry about the sort of figure you’ll make in a guidebook for ladies?”
“A man has his reputation.”
“Really, men think that we women are the helpless ones. Let me send for some water and towels.” She strode to ring the bell pull, and the ever-prompt Jenny appeared and was duly sent off, wide-eyed, to retrieve the needed items.
Lark pulled the ends of his shirt from his trousers, conscious that Viv’s gaze had come back to him. He didn’t want her thinking about his useless valet. “You don’t feel an obligation to those you portray in these accounts?”
“What obligation should I feel?” She turned away and opened the package, laying out the linen and plasters with brisk efficiency.
He had a moment to doubt the wisdom of letting an angry woman change his bandage. “Shouldn’t you ask permission of your subjects?”
“London is my subject. My stories are…illustrations of…of the types one meets.”
A knock on the door signaled Jenny’s return. She set towels and a water basin on the table. “Should I stay, miss?” she asked, looking at Lark with his shirt hanging out.
“No thank you, Jenny. I’m just changing Mr. Larkin’s bandage. Could you ask Mrs. Brandle to make a small picnic for us?”
Jenny bobbed a curtsy, and retreated.
“Am I a type?” Lark asked.
“I don’t know. Yet. Show me your side.”
He turned and lifted his shirt, fixing his gaze on the window. From her silence he knew at once what she was seeing. The unchanged bandage was ugly. There came a ripple of water in the bowl and a whisper of muslin. Viv’s skirts brushed his legs in the same instant that she pressed a warm, wet towel to his side. He stiffened in response, and she put a steadying hand to his waist. His heart lurched, and he sucked in a breath.
“What do I know of you after all?” she asked. “I suspect that for all your lofty connections to a duke, you are, in fact, an actor, capable of playing a part at a moment’s notice—helpful gentleman, rejected suitor, ardent lover—whatever the moment calls for.”
She was dangerously observant and very near, though not as close as he wanted her to be. He stood in an intoxicating little cloud of her presence, as disorienting as a thick fog. Under the flowery fragrance was another slight thread of a scent, warm and elusive, woven into the layers of fresh silk and linen, that was simply her. “Why an actor?”
“You could have been coming from Wych Street or Drury Lane when we met.”
She was obviously in no fog. Her thinking was clear and analytic, her memory precise. He didn’t like it. “You only think that because you fell asleep during my thrilling life story.”
