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Clevedon remembered his first impression of Marcelline—his confusion. She’d sounded and behaved like the ladies of his acquaintance. But she wasn’t a lady. She’d told him so.
Hadn’t she?
“That’s romantic,” Clevedon said. “Mrs. Michaels is fond of novels, I know.”
“I daresay that is the case,” Halliday said. “In any event, they were not what one would be led to expect. Mrs. Michaels was greatly shocked when I informed her we had milliners to wait upon. But she told me that she was entirely taken aback when she met them. They did not strike her as milliners at all.”
Servants were more sensitive to rank than their employers. They could smell trade at fifty paces. They could detect an imposter a minute after he opened his mouth.
Yet his servants, keenly aware of their position in the employment of a duke, had believed the Noirots were gentlewomen.
Well, it only showed how clever those women were. Charming. Enticing. Three versions of Eve, luring men to ...
Gad, what the devil was wrong with him? It was reading all the damned magazines, with their serialized sentimental tales.
“You saw them at work,” Clevedon said. “They know their trade.”
“That is undoubtedly why Mrs. Michaels imagined they were women of rank who’d fallen on hard times,” Halliday said. “I must confess that at first I thought it was one of your jokes. I beg you will forgive me, sir, but it did cross my mind that these were some cousins from abroad, and you were testing us. Only for an instant, sir. Naturally, it was obvious there had been a fire, and it was no joke.”
The footman Thomas appeared in the doorway. “I beg your pardon, your grace, but Lord Longmore is here to see you, and—”
Longmore pushed past Thomas, strode past Halliday, and marched up to Clevedon.
“You cur!” Longmore said. He drew back his arm, and his fist shot straight at Clevedon’s jaw.
Meanwhile, at Maison Noirot
Lucie sat in the window, gazing down into St. James’s Street.
She’d been sitting there for hours.
Marcelline knew what she was watching for, and she was dreading what was to come. “It’s time for your tea,” she said. “Sarah has laid out the tea things on your handsome tea table, and your dolls are in their places, waiting.”
Lucie didn’t answer.
“Afterward, Sarah will take you to the Green Park. You can see the fine ladies and gentlemen.”
“I can’t go out,” Lucie said. “What if he comes, and I’m not here? He’ll be very disappointed.”
Marcelline’s heart sank.
She moved to sit next to Lucie on the window seat. “My love, his grace is not coming here. He looked after us for a time, but he’s very busy—”
“He’s not too busy for me.”
“We’re not his family, sweet.”
Lucie’s eyes narrowed and her mouth set.
“He made a beautiful home for us,” Marcelline said, keeping her voice steady with an effort. “Only look at all the fine things he bought for you. Your own tea set and tea table. Your own little chair and the prettiest bed in the world. But there are others in his life—”
“No!” Lucie jumped down from the window seat. “No!” she screamed. “No! No! No!”
“Lucie Cordelia.”
“I’m not Lucie. I’m Erroll. I’ll never be Lucie again. He’s coming back! He loves me! He loves Erroll!”
She threw herself on the rug. She shrieked and sobbed and kicked her feet.
