Thief of Hearts (26 page)

"No, of course."

"If anything, you'd better take care to guard every aspect of your behavior even more closely than before."

"Why?" Anna cried in dismay. It didn't seem possible that she could be any more circumspect, any more rigid in her deportment than she had been in all the years before she'd married Nicholas. The very thought of trying made her go limp with depression.

"
Because you eloped
." Aunt Charlotte gave her wrist a quick, vicious shake, and the anger in her eyes flared undisguised for an instant. "Three weeks before your wedding! Do you understand how that looks? Do you realize what people have been thinking and in all likelihood saying?"

Anna swallowed, flushing hotly. No, she could honestly say she'd never given that aspect of her elopement a single thought. "I can't control what people think or say. I've done nothing to be ashamed of, and I won't be made to feel guilty because I'm in love with my husband." Her voice shook; she took a deep breath to steady it. "I've apologized to you for my hasty marriage; I thought you'd forgiven me. I'm sorry if anything I've done tonight has offended you or your friends, and I promise to take care that it doesn't happen again."

Her aunt's mollified face ought to have relieved her; instead it added fuel to the fire of a seething, sizzling anger that lay just below her embarrassment. A part of her wanted to murmur, "You're right, Aunt, I'm so ashamed," while another, a reckless, unfamiliar part wanted to shout, "Mind your own business, you hidebound, petty-minded old prig!"

"Good," Aunt Charlotte purred, abruptly all smiles and goodwill. She took Anna's arm in a kinder grasp and steered her out of the alcove toward the door to the hall. "Then we won't need to speak of it again, will we? There's a cold supper in the dining room, dear; shall we begin shepherding the guests in?"

"Yes, let's," Anna agreed grimly. "Otherwise they'll be here all night."

Out of the corner of his eye, Brodie watched them go.

"Well, Nick," drawled Neil Vaughn, smiling his cynical smile and leaning against the wall for support. The alcohol on his breath was stronger now, although to Brodie's absolute knowledge, Aunt Charlotte's blackberry punch was unadulterated.

"Well, Neil," he returned in the same tone. Anna hadn't been able to tell him much about Vaughn; he'd only known Nick a few months, and his past was unclear. His principal interests were gambling and, if Brodie had correctly interpreted Anna's highly oblique reference, woman-chasing.

"I've been seeing Jenny," Neil announced casually. "You don't mind, do you?"

"No, why should I?" But he thought he knew why.

Neil shrugged, dismissing it as unimportant. He took a sip from his punch cup. "So. Was the honeymoon as drab as you anticipated?"

Brodie's hand tightened a fraction around his own cup. "It had a few compensating features."

Neil expelled air from his lungs, his version of a laugh. "Really? Congratulations, my friend. They say it's the quiet ones who surprise you."

He managed an icy smile.

"I hope this doesn't mean you won't be joining me anymore at Mrs. Sprague's."

Now his smile wouldn't come at all. There wasn't a doubt in his mind that Mrs. Sprague ran a brothel. "Not at all," he said on a false chuckle. "But perhaps not in the immediate future."

Neil laughed again. "Name the day, my friend. The moment the charm of legalized copulation begins to pall, you let me know."

Brodie followed Neil's lazy, speculative gaze across the room to where Anna was guiding an elderly lady out into the hall, gentle-handed, smiling kindly at something the old girl was saying. He felt his body harden with suppressed violence, and wondered at himself. He had the strongest urge to drive a fist into Neil's bony, leering face.

"Come out with me for a drink after this is over, Nick."

"Not tonight, I'm dead on my feet." He tried to sound regretful. "Another time, soon." The prospect held no appeal. Vaughn disturbed him. He couldn't get the right rhythm with him, couldn't fathom what his relationship with Nick had been. And for once, he couldn't ask Anna.

Something made him look up. She was there, standing in the doorway. Hands clasped at her waist, watching him quietly across the nearly empty room. Patient, demure. Lovely. Neat and compact and competent in her plum-colored dress with the prim white collar. For a heartbeat in time Brodie let himself think of what it would be like if she were really his wife. Something in his chest expanded, with fright. Because it would be so easy to belong to her. The easiest thing he'd ever done.

"Excuse me," he said to Neil, and went to her. Not smiling.

"I've laid out your gray morning coat with the black trousers for tomorrow, sir. And I'll take away your lounging suits and the checked paletot for cleaning, with your permission."

"The what? Oh, that coat thing. Right-o, Pearlman. It's Pearlman, isn't it?"

"Pearlman, yes, sir."

"That your first name or your last?"

"My last name, sir."

"What's your first name?"

"Ah, Andrew, sir."

"You used to be Sir Thomas's man, you say?"

"Yes, sir, before he became so ill."

"I see. Now Miss Fitch is his man, eh?"

The small, balding valet almost smiled, but caught himself in time.

Nick, Brodie recalled Anna telling him, had had one all-purpose servant, a fellow named Winslow who'd acted as cook, footman, butler, and valet.

He'd let him go just before the wedding, evidently expecting something better in the way of a "man" once he joined the Jourdaine household. "Well, Pearlman," said Brodie, "I've never had a 'man' before; what is it you do, exactly?"

"I, sir? Why…I
do
for you."

"Right, but what? What can I expect of you?"

"Well!" Pearlman seemed pleased to enumerate his responsibilities. "I take care of your clothes, all the cleaning and pressing. I make sure your dressing room is in order every morning, properly swept by the housemaid and so on, and that the fire is lit and burning cheerfully."

"Well, now."

"Yes, sir. I put your body linen on the horse before the fire, to air it properly."

"Good show, Pearlman."

"I lay out your cleaned and brushed trousers on the back of the chair, your coat and waistcoat, and always a clean collar. I see that your razors are set and stropped, and that the water's hot and ready to use."

"You mean to say you shave me?"

"If you wish it, sir."

Brodie considered. "I think I'll do it myself. No offense."

"None taken."

"Anything else?"

"I cut your hair every fortnight or so."

"Good, good. That about it?"

"I… select clothes suitable for the occasion. That is, if you yourself are indifferent to such things, of course."

"Oh, bloody good, Pearlman, that's the best news yet. Select away, my friend."

"Very good, sir," said the valet, coughing into his hand. "And then if you're going out, I hand you your cane, gloves, and hat, and see you to the door."

"Do you, now? Well, that sounds fine. I'm tolerably easy to get along with, not too pricklish in the morning. I should think we'll rub along together all right."

"I'm sure of it, sir." They smiled at each other, Pearlman a bit shyly. "Well, sir, if there's nothing else, I'll say good night. Have you enough candle?"

"I think so. How do you turn that out?" Brodie pointed to the light in the ceiling over the bed.

"The gaslight? Right here, sir, this switch by the door."

"Good God. Amazing, isn't it, Pearlman? We live in an age of miracles."

"Yes, indeed. Well, good night, Mr. Balfour."

Brodie's smile faded. "Good night, Pearlman," he said, and watched the door close behind his new "man."

He put his hands behind his head and gazed up at the square wooden structure that projected over his bed, some kind of curtain-supporter, he supposed. If you pulled on this tassel thing at the headboard, you could draw two curtains around either side of the upper half of your body as you lay in bed. The question was, what the hell would you want to do that for? If it was the
lower
half of your body, he could see how that might, on occasion, be a—

A door closed suddenly beyond the wall to his left, and he sat up on his elbow. He could hear muted female voices through the wall and beyond the dressing room he and Anna were to share. What a foul, rotten trick. He knew now why the idea of them sharing Thomas's bedroom hadn't alarmed her: the wily old codger had a suite of rooms, one for himself and one for his long-dead wife, with a wide dressing room separating them. A mile-wide dressing room, it seemed to Brodie as he sat up and contemplated his bare knees under his nightshirt. Did men really wear these things? He thought he looked ridiculous with his hairy legs sticking out, like the wicked witch in a fairy tale.

The voices rose and fell, soft and alluringly feminine, while Brodie's sour gaze took in the details of his new room. He felt as if he'd fallen into one of those paperweights full of fake snow. He'd never seen so much
stuff
. Everywhere you turned there was furniture: tables, chairs, chests of drawers, an eight-foot-high wardrobe. Washstand, cabinets, a standing mirror, three-legged tables, chests, footstools, plant stands, even a sofa. The fireplace had a carved marble chimneypiece, iron grate, a brass fender, and a huge mirror that went all the way up to the ceiling. Every available surface had more stuff on it pictures, photographs, vases, doilies, plants, pitchers, jugs, basins, bottles, vials. And thank God for the gaslight, because everything was so damn dark. Why had they painted the woodwork
brown
? Who had put this ugly red and green wallpaper on the walls? Why were the windows closed and curtained with layer after layer of flowered shrouds? Jesus Christ, a man could suffocate in here! He got off the bed, it was so high he had to use the damn wooden ''step" to get down, went to the window, wrestled his way through the coverings to the sash, and threw it open.

Ah, fresh air. His view was of the garden in the back of the house. A wrought iron fence separated the spacious yard from the alley, where another gaslight on a pole shone discreetly, discouraging burglars. Suddenly he went stiff and his eyes narrowed; a moment later an unamused smile twisted at his lips. A man lounged in the shadows of the gaslight, and he was no burglar. As surely as he knew anything, Brodie knew he was one of Dietz's men, watching. Well, what had he expected? Dietz was no fool. He might trust him enough to let him into the Jourdaine household, but not enough to leave him on his own. Brodie was a sailor, and Liverpool was the biggest seaport in the world. Setting him free in it would be like handing him a few hundred quid, shoving him out of his cell door, and wishing him good luck.

He shook his head resignedly and took deep breaths of the clean night air. When he turned back, he could see himself in the cheval glass across the way. Looking ridiculous. He went to the bed. Pearlman had laid his dressing gown neatly at the foot. It was paisley, sort of blue and black, probably silk. He put it on. That was a little better. He told himself he didn't look quite so much like a man dressed up as a woman.