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“Felicia,” he said, his voice as syrupy smooth as devil’s broth.

“Yes?” she said, her voice quite steady and clear. Alas, Felicia was finding the famed Earl of Mayne rather less enthralling than she had been led to believe. But there you are. Reality, particularly when it pertained to men, was always rather disappointing.

“I heard the most dismaying piece of news today,” he said into her ear, easing her bodice back over her breast.

“No, what?” Felicia asked, instantly revived.

So he told her. As her eyes grew bigger and bigger, he brought her to her feet and brushed a few spare leaves from the back of her cloak, and then they began their stroll back toward the lightened areas of the Gardens.

For Mayne understood as well as anyone that his duty, that evening, was to accompany Felicia wherever she wished to go, whispering intimately into her ear, and making it quite clear to all her acquaintances that she was one of his chosen lovers.

And Felicia didn’t have to think twice to know what her duty was, since it came as naturally to her as breathing. She almost began trotting in her haste to return to her friends.

“I just can’t believe it!” she kept saying, half to herself and half to Mayne. “I’ve never heard of such a thing!”

Garret Langham, Earl of Mayne, smiled down at her. Had she the perspicuity to notice it, she would have seen a murderous gleam in his eyes.

No one crossed Mayne.

No one.

Thirty-two

Mother Is a Relative Term

“I’m just not certain that we should have brought Meggin,” Lina said quietly, as she, Tom, and Meggin climbed out of the coach onto Halcrow Street the next morning. “What if this is a disappointment?”

“If Mrs. Fishpole is here, she’ll wish to see her,” Tom said again. “And look at Meggin!”

Meggin had been like a child transformed, ever since they told her after breakfast that they were going to find Mrs. Fishpole. She was dressed in an enchanting little pinafore and gown, with a pelisse to match. She was clutching Lina’s fur tippet, even though it was far too warm for that sort of clothing. But it wasn’t her external appearance that mattered; it was the way her eyes were glowing and her little body was rigid with excitement.

Halcrow Street must have been in the district of London devoted to the cloth-dying trade, because everywhere they looked there were huge tubs of bubbling reddish or bluish water and women dumping in armfuls of old clothing. Each load would send a choking cloud of colored smoke into the air, adding to the pungent stench of rotting vegetables and horse dung.

Mrs. Fishpole wasn’t hard to find. An old man dozing in the sun nodded across the street. “Number Forty-Two, she’s at,” he said. “Though I do hear tell that she’s leaving Londontown and going back to somewhere else. I don’t know but what she might have left already.” And: “I thank you kindly, sir,” as he tucked the coin that Tom gave him into an inner pocket.

They walked up three flights of stairs to the very top level. Meggin was clutching Lina’s hand fiercely and Lina—for the first time in years—found herself praying. “Please let her be there,” she said to that silent presence whom she used to know, but had put away with her childhood things. “Please, please, please, let Mrs. Fishpole still be here.”

Tom knocked on the narrow door, while Lina and Meggin stood behind him on the stairs. There was no answer. Lina clenched her teeth and prayed harder. Tom knocked again, louder, and this time they heard the noise of feet approaching. Finally the door snapped open.

Mrs. Fishpole wasn’t wearing a white apron anymore; she was dressed from head to foot in gray bombazine, and a shabby bonnet was jammed rather precariously on top of her hair. Her eyes widened and she opened her mouth, but at that moment a sturdy little body scrabbled past Tom and butted the gray bombazine skirt. And then it was just a flurry of tears and exclamations.

“My fiancée, Miss McKenna, told me the truth of it,” Tom explained, a good five minutes later. They were all seated around Mrs. Fishpole’s sister-in-law’s table, there being no sitting room or extra room of that nature.

Mrs. Fishpole had Meggin on her lap and her arms around her as if she would never let her go. “I can’t believe I did that,” she kept repeating. “I must have been out of me mind. Clear out of me mind. Mr. Sigglet had been carrying on about the child, and then you appeared, and it seemed like Providence. But I knew within two minutes that I’d made a mistake. And then I was too late.” Her arms tightened around Meggin until it looked as if she might suffocate the child. Not that Meggin seemed to mind. Lina’s fur tippet, which she had carried with her every minute of the day and even slept with, was forgotten on the floor.

“Too late,” Mrs. Fishpole kept repeating. “I’ll never get over it in my life, I won’t. I ran out into that street like a demented woman, but no one could tell me where you’d gone. I’d given my Meggin away, and I didn’t even remember your name for sure. Not even your name!”

“I’m truly sorry to have caused you distress,” Tom said.

“Well, as to that, you shan’t have her, of course,” Mrs. Fishpole said, narrowing her eyes and looking as if she wished that she had her giant rolling pin at hand. “I’ve left my position, and I’ll care for Meggin myself.”

“Mr. Holland made a mistake,” Lina said, smiling at Mrs. Fishpole. “But he meant no harm to you or Meggin.”

“I can see that,” Mrs. Fishpole said grudgingly, “but you shouldn’t as taken her,” she told Tom.

“I gather you were planning to travel to the North Country to find Meggin?” Tom asked. “May I enquire whether you wish to continue to East Riding now that you two are reunited, or will you find another position in London?”

“I’m going back,” Mrs. Fishpole said decisively. “I’ve given it a lot of thought over the past few days. London is no place for us. I’m going back and I’m taking Meggin with me. She’s to be Meggin Fishpole now, and anyone who says differently will have a taste of my tongue.”