A Most Unconventional Match

The boy’s expression brightened. ‘Uncle Nicky talks about you all the time. I wish he was here. Mama cries and cries. She says Uncle Nicky has gone away too—’ Sudden alarm clouded the lad’s face. ‘Uncle Nicky will…come back, won’t he?’

‘Yes,’ Hal assured him. ‘Travelling in Italy. Be back soon. But I’m here.’ Gesturing towards the soldier, he said, ‘Let me look? Maybe I can fix him.’

‘Could you?’ the boy breathed. ‘That would be capital! Then you would be my new best friend!’

If not that, at least the champion of his interests, Hal resolved grimly—until Nicky could take over, of course. Carefully accepting the toy and the arm the boy held out, Hal bent to inspect the mechanism that attached the limb.

Meanwhile, in her studio down the hallway, for the last hour Elizabeth Lowery had been going over the household accounts. She’d found the books in her husband’s desk yesterday, along with enough cash in the chest to satisfy her disgruntled servants, but Sands informed her that he and the cook must soon purchase additional provisions. She would need to peruse the books to determine how much more cash to obtain from the bank.

Sighing as she tried to total a column of figures detailing the costs of tallow candles, flour, lamp oil, coal and a long list of similar household necessities, Elizabeth wished she had paid more attention to her governess’s lessons on mathematics. With her older sister Mereydth and younger sisters Emma and Cecily in the room—the girls two and three years her junior and bubbling over with lively conversation—she’d usually been able to escape Miss Twimby’s attention. Daydreaming through the lesson, she’d merely bided her time until she could abandon her books and return to her charcoal and her paints.

’Twas no use; she’d lost track of the total again. With a huff of frustration, she pushed the book away. Such an interesting pattern the figures made, flowing down the page in her husband’s neat hand. The three at the edge of the page, turned on its side in her current viewing angle, looked like a bird seen at a long distance, its wings curved in flight. While the seven at the bottom reminded her of a tall crane, balanced on one skinny leg, bill facing into the wind as he stood at the edge of a marsh.

She was smiling at the image when a tap sounded at the door. The portal opened to reveal Sands, but before the butler could utter a word, a swarthy, powerfully built man shouldered past him into the room.

‘Needn’t announce me like some toff,’ the man said as he strode in. ‘Smith’s the name, ma’am. I’m here at the behest of my employer, Mr Blackmen. And since my business is with the lady…’ he looked back at Sands ‘…you can take yourself off.’

Despite the intimidating stare the intruder fixed on him, Sands held his ground, looking at Elizabeth. Lifting a hand to signal he should remain, she said coolly, ‘I don’t believe I am acquainted with a Mr Blackmen, sir. Perhaps you have mistaken your errand.’

Smith gave a crack of laughter. ‘Not likely. Old Blackmen, he don’t tolerate mistakes. And you might not be “acquainted”, but I guarantee your lately departed ball-and-chain was. Knew the boss right intimate, Mr Lowery did. If you know what’s good for you and your little boy, you’ll let me tell you what he sent me to say. A personal matter, so you’d best send old long-nose there packing.’

Alarmed—but also angered—Elizabeth hesitated. On the one hand, she didn’t relish being left alone with a man who looked like a ruffian out of a tenement in Seven Dials. But if the matter were sensitive, perhaps she should receive his message in private.

Swiftly making her choice, she nodded at Sands. ‘You may wait in the hall’

The butler bowed. ‘As you wish, madam. I shall be outside the door.’ Despite his advancing years and the fact that the visitor outweighed him by several stones, Sands gave Smith a challenging look. ‘Directly outside the door, if you should need anything, ma’am.’

While the butler bowed himself out, Smith laughed again. ‘As if I couldn’t snap that old coot like a twig if’n I wanted! Got to credit him for gumption, though.’

‘Perhaps you could just deliver your message,’ Elizabeth interposed, unnerved and appalled by her unwanted visitor’s vulgarity.

‘Let me just do that, then,’ Smith said affably. ‘I can see your late husband had a hankering for pretty things.’ He looked Elizabeth up and down, the insolent inspection making her want to slap his face.

‘Didn’t always have the blunt to purchase his niceties, though,’ Smith continued. ‘Which is where my employer came in. Always there to help a gent who’s a little short of the ready, for a modest return, of course. I’d guess your man meant to pay back what he’d borrowed, but then—’ he made a swiping motion at his neck ‘—cocked up his toes afore he could make good on his expenditures. Now, my employer being a soft-hearted man, he gave you a month after the funeral for grieving. But now he’s wanting his blunt.’

Mr Blackmen must be a moneylender, Elizabeth surmised, consternation flowing through her. Why would Everitt resort to borrowing money? Were dealings with a cent-per-center even legal? If they were, could she be held accountable for repaying the debt? And, if so, where was she to obtain the funds?

Desperately trying to mask her distress beneath a façade of cool uninterest, she said, ‘I know nothing of these transactions. You shall have to take this matter up with Mr Scarbridge, my husband’s man of business.’

Smith made a rude noise. ‘Scarbridge—that incompetent? Seeing how deep he’s in River Tick hisself, I doubt he’d know a groat about handling anyone’s finances—if he was to leave off his gaming and whoring long enough to try, that is. No, little lady, my master intends to settle this business with you personal.’

This was too much—she simply couldn’t handle one more disaster. An almost hysterical anger burning through her alarm, she snapped, ‘Do you expect I know any more than Mr Scarbridge does? I’m neither a solicitor nor a banker. You waste your time here, sir! Good day.’

Smith’s genial expression hardened. ‘I wouldn’t be so quick to run me off, Mrs High-and-Mighty,’ he said, advancing on her. ‘Don’t expect you’d be so high in the instep if the magistrate was to come calling, ready to haul you and that boy of yorn off to Newgate.’

Her momentary flash of bravado extinguished, Elizabeth gasped. Newgate! Could this awful Mr Blackmen truly have her imprisoned for debt? Her mind slammed from panic to anger and back like a child’s ball tethered to a string.

What should she do? Nicky was a peer; he would know. Oh, why did he and Sarah have to be away now?

‘No need to get yourself into a pelter,’ Smith said, recalling her attention. He gestured around the room. ‘Got lots of fancy things here—that silver inkpot, them vases on that shelf, those marble heads of soldiers over there by the divan. Fetch a pretty penny, I’d wager. Lowery paid enough for ’em.’

‘Those are classical Greek, my husband’s pride,’ Elizabeth protested.

‘His pride, eh?’ Raising his eyebrows, Smith leaned across the desk and put his hand over hers. With a moue of revulsion, Elizabeth tried to snatch it back.

Laughing softly, Smith seized her fingers, tightening his grip until his nails bit into her skin. ‘You kin lose the fripperies…or yer house. Or,’ he said in a deeper tone, his dark eyes heating as he stared at her, ‘we could deal in another commodity.’

His gaze fixed on her bosom, he lifted his free hand to tug at a strand of golden hair. ‘You’re a fine-looking woman. My master might like that—or I might.’

No one had ever looked at her or talked to her so crudely—as if she were some Covent Garden strumpet procured for his amusement. ‘My husband would kill you for speaking to me so!’ she said furiously.

‘Lucky for me he’s already dead then, ain’t it?’ Smith replied.

Renewed outrage drowning her fear, Elizabeth wrenched her hand free. ‘Get out!’ she cried, her voice shaking with indignation and rage.

Smith made her an exaggerated bow. ‘I’ll leave—for now, Mrs High-and-Mighty, but I’ll be back. You can bet the golden curls on your head on it.’

As if concluding a normal business call, Smith pivoted and walked with a jaunty tread to the door. Opening it, he gave her another mocking bow before shutting it behind him, leaving Elizabeth appalled, outraged…and thoroughly alarmed.

Chapter Three

Hal had just finished his inspection of the Lowery boy’s soldier when a door further down the hall opened and closed. ‘That’s Mama’s studio,’ the child said, excitement in his eyes. ‘Mayhap she’s done now. Let’s go see!’

Hal tried to ignore the sinking sensation suddenly spiralling in his gut. He was rising to his feet when a swarthy man in a freize coat, hat pulled down low over his eyes, brushed past them, a frowning Sands in his wake. Without a backward glance, the man exited through the door the butler hurriedly opened for him.

‘Now!’ the boy said urgently, tugging on Hal’s hand. ‘While Sands is busy!’

Hal tried to summon the words to tell the child that although he might scurry in to visit his mama, Hal ought to wait for the butler to announce him. But when the boy looked up, a pleading look on his face as he whispered ‘Please’, against his better judgement, Hal allowed the boy to lead him down the hallway.

Hal had barely time enough to wonder why such a rough-looking gent had been paying a call on Mrs Lowery before the child had him at the doorway. One rapid knock later, the boy pushed open the door and hurtled into the room.

‘Mama, Mama, look at the general!’ he cried as he ran in. ‘He’s hurt. We need to fix him!’

Halting on the threshold, Hal looked over at the woman he’d not seen in so long. When Elizabeth Lowery glanced up from her son and saw Hal, he felt as if all the air had suddenly been sucked from the room.

She wore a simple black gown, a harsh shade, his mama said, that robbed the colour from a lady. But not from Elizabeth. The midnight hue rather emphasised the fairness of her hair, gleaming gold in the pale light from the window. The flush of peach at her cheekbones set off the cream of her face and the blaze of her eyes, deep cerulean like the noon sky at midsummer. The oval face with its pointed chin was a touch fuller than he remembered, while a few tiny lines at corners of her eyes imbued it with character.

This was no flawless ingénue, poised to begin life, but a vibrant, experienced woman who had lived, loved and laughed. A woman who stole his breath just as easily as she had seven years ago, while the force of the connection he felt to her froze him in place on the doorstep.

Amid the rush of sensation, one disjointed thought emerged: she was even more beautiful now than the first time he’d seen her.

While his pulse thrummed in his ears and he struggled to breathe, Hal dimly noted the child holding the soldier up to her, his words tumbling over each other as he tried to explain what had happened to his toy.

Rising to her feet, Elizabeth Lowery hushed her son with a gesture of her hand. ‘David, you are being impolite. First you must introduce your visitor.’

Hal forced his body into motion and found his tongue. ‘Hal Waterman, ma’am,’ he said, bowing. ‘Nicky’s friend. Just returned from the north and read of your loss. My sincere regrets.’

‘He’s going to be my friend, too, Mama,’ the boy interrupted. ‘He says while Uncle Nicky is in It-tal-lee he can fix the general for me.’