Fallen Angel

A reply had come from Pencarrow House by noon: Nicholas Pencarrow would be pleased to call on her at three o’clock p.m.

At half past two Brenna made her way upstairs to prepare her hair in the most unappealing style she could arrange, buttoning her velvet dress up to the collar and placing upon it the shapeless blue oversmock, which she often wore at the orphanage. At five to three she was sitting stiffly in the wing chair near the fire in the small dining room, hands primly in her lap, when she heard his carriage pull to a halt outside. She resisted the urge to go to the window. He’d seen her at the curtains once before and she had no wish for him to think her remotely inquisitive about him. Instead she stood facing the door and waited until it was opened by Polly, the serving maid.

‘The Duke of Westbourne, Miss Brenna,’ the young girl announced breathlessly, shepherding him in before going out again and closing the door.

Brenna’s widening eyes came up to his, all the handsomeness of each reckless libertine who’d ever pursued her across countless nightmares rolled into one. At Worsley with blood on his face and a split upper lip he had still seemed well favoured. Today, dressed in tapered trousers, a double-breasted jacket and silk hat and gloves in hand, he emanated pure masculine grace and style—and something else a lot more unsettling.

He registered her fright and the dress all at once. Today she seemed different and his glance was drawn to her fingers, which turned a handkerchief nervously this way and that.

‘Miss Stanhope,’ he began quietly as cold violet eyes stole up to his, a flinty hardness in their depths, which he could not comprehend.

She fears me, a warning voice came from deep inside. ‘I am Nicholas Pencarrow and I thank you for receiving me.’

‘You did not have to come,’ she spoke now for the first time, her velvety voice exactly as he had remembered it.

‘But I wanted to,’ he replied. ‘May I sit down for just a moment?’

Nodding, she indicated a chair furthest from where she sat. She seemed older today, her hair bound up into unbecoming braids at each ear and drooping down across her neck. He couldn’t recollect ever seeing anybody’s hair put up quite like that and wondered why she should have fashioned it in such a way, knowing he was to call. The truth hit him suddenly even as he pondered it. She wanted him to see her like this: the clothes, the hair, the lack of a welcome, they were all mixed somehow in a puzzle he could not even vaguely begin to comprehend.

Nicholas shifted in his seat and began softly. ‘I wanted to thank you personally for your help last month outside of Worsley.’ Wary eyes flickered briefly to his and then away. ‘If you had not come when you did, I am sure I would not be here today.’ A frown crossed her face as though she struggled for a fleeing social politeness.

She does not want me here. She wishes she had left me in the woods. Nicholas’s mind rebelled at the thought as he continued slowly, ‘The man you shot was taken to the doctor and his leg was lost. I’m afraid he knew who you were. The Worsley constable said your name without thinking. I hope that will not be a problem.’

Palpable fear flickered momentarily in Brenna’s eyes. ‘Yet he’s in prison?’

He nodded. ‘And I’ll make sure he stays there a long time.’

‘What happened to the other one?’

‘He is dead.’

‘Oh.’ Silence stalked the room, a heavy silence, uncomfortable and unbroken, and as she sat there he knew she would not speak.

‘Do you go out often?’ His voice was soft as he tried to lighten the subject and piece together some of the parts of her life of which, as yet, he knew so little.

‘No,’ she answered quietly, a slight frown forming on her brow.

‘Then would you not accept an invitation to my ball next month?’

‘No.’ The reply came definite and flat, a ‘thank you’ added afterwards almost in an unconscious notice of manners.

‘Is there anything you would like to accompany me to in London? The opera? The ballet? The symphony?’ Brenna’s head came up at the mention of the last and for the first time he saw interest, though she shook her head even as he thought it.

‘You like music?’

‘Yes.’

‘You play the piano well.’

It was said not as a question but as a statement, and she looked up, puzzled. ‘How could you know that?’ she asked unsurely, and suddenly it hit her. He had been finding out about her. A giddy spiralling slam of terror crossed her face as she stood.

‘Your thanks are acknowledged, your Grace, but I shall now say goodbye. Polly will see you out.’ Her words left room for no others as she rang the bell and turned towards the window and Nicholas’s perusal of the back of her was abruptly cut off as the young servant bustled in. Amusement creased his eyes at the dismissal. This girl had no notion of the respect normally accorded to him by polite society.

And he liked it.

Gathering his hat and coat, he made towards the door, stopping as he reached it. ‘I shall leave my card on the table here, Brenna. If, by chance, you should change your mind and have a want to see the symphony, I would be most willing to escort you.’

She stiffened at the liberty he took in using her Christian name and turned as she determined him gone, catching her reflection in the mirror above the mantel as she did so. White faced and drawn, even her eyes seemed bruised and guarded.

Is this what I have become? she wondered, as her fingers unlaced the ugly plaits and she pulled her thick hair free. Tears stung her eyes and for a second she longed to call him back and be seen even momentarily in the way she would have liked him to remember her by, but common sense stopped her. If people knew even a tiny part of her secret, the patronage of her orphanage would flounder and the protection of the children would be at risk. With determination she tucked her hair behind her ears and faced the mirror.

‘Forget the Duke of Westbourne,’ she told herself sternly and was disturbed by the dash of anger that threaded her eyes.

Chapter Three

Nicholas entered the orphanage in Beaumont Street just after eleven o’clock. He’d had his secretary make an appointment for him to view the place in the guise of becoming a financial patron using a secondary title of his, the Earl of Deuxberry. He hoped Brenna Stanhope would forgive him the deception if she saw him, knowing otherwise he may not even get a foot in the door.

The corridor was crammed full of children’s paintings, and the sound of a piano and voices could be heard coming from a room towards the back of the house. As he entered he was met almost immediately by a tiny grey-haired woman, who thrust out her hand in introduction.

‘I’m Mrs Betsy Plummer, the Matron here,’ she said kindly, ‘and I presume you are Lord Deuxberry.’ She inclined her head as if unsure of the protocol involved when addressing the titled peerage, looking up as a question came nervously to her lips. ‘We understand you may be interested in lending your patronage to Beaumont Street? Lord knows we could do with some.’ She reddened at the realisation of her blasphemy.

Amusement filled the Duke’s eyes and then query as music sifted through the thick walls. ‘The music is lovely.’

‘Yes. That’s Miss Stanhope on the piano. She’s the lady who opened the place, you see.’

‘May I be allowed to watch the lesson?’

‘Well…not normally,’ she faltered, frowning heavily. ‘But perhaps there is a way around it. If you’re very quiet, we could observe from the upstairs balcony. That shouldn’t disturb them at all.’

Following the woman up a narrow staircase, he entered a room filled with sunlight, a balcony overhanging the hall beneath them.

‘This is far enough. Miss Stanhope is very particular about her privacy.’

Nicholas looked down in the direction of her gesture, and the sight of Brenna, hair down and playing to the children, assailed him with all the force of a salvo fired at close range.

She was beautiful and completely changed from the deliberately dour woman who had greeted him two days ago in her London drawing room. Today, curly dark hair fell in a glorious curtain to her waist and her violet eyes sparkled with playfulness as she rose from the piano and formed the children into a circle, taking a hanky from the sleeve of her navy blue gown and wiping the nose of a carrot-topped toddler who clung to her skirt.

‘Oh, my goodness, Tim, I hope it is not you next with the sickness. Laura is quite enough for now.’ The boy smiled as she ruffled his hair and joined up all their hands. ‘Let’s sing “Ring a Ring a Rosie”, shall we? I’ll start you off.’ Breaking into the circle, she began to chant the words of the ditty, falling down at the end just as all the children did.

‘Excellent. Only this time let’s not fall on me.’ A laughing voice came from the very bottom of the pile and, reassembling them, she went to begin again. Nicholas felt a hand pulling him back and reluctantly drew his eyes away from the sight before him.

‘I’ll take you to the office now. Perhaps I could show you some of our hopes for the place and for the children.’

The door shut behind them as the music faded, though Nicholas stood still for a second, breathing in deeply to try to mitigate the effect Miss Brenna Stanhope seemed destined to wreak upon him. God, she was so lovely and so different from any other woman he had ever come across. Working for a living, and here? His eyes flickered to the mouldy ceilings and rusty pipes, as the reports of Sir Michael De Lancey’s financial problems came into mind. Where was the music and dancing and laughter with her peers that a beautiful woman like her should have. She was only twenty-four and hardly the matron her lifestyle espoused her to be. Dark violet eyes and dimples and a face that should be etched upon the surface of some ecclesiastical ceiling came so forcibly to mind that he had to shake his head in an attempt to regain a lost semblance of reality. With an effort he made himself follow Mrs Plummer into an office.

‘Does Miss Stanhope come here often?’ Nicholas asked, trying to appear indifferent to the answer.

‘Yes, indeed. She teaches three days a week and spends most evenings here. Her uncle has funded much of it, you see, but has fallen on harder times, so now we have to put out our feelers, so to speak.’ She looked slightly nervous again. ‘We try to keep our costs down to the minimum but, as you can appreciate, the whole task is a bit daunting given the age of this building and the needs of this community…’ Mrs Plummer was finding her tongue with growing gusto and it was almost ten minutes later when Nicholas was able to interrupt.