Chapter One
âAre you sure this is the place?â Lady Caroline Fallowfield peered through the window of the hired hack, her nose wrinkling in disgust.
Though from all she had heard, this did look exactly the sort of low haunt Lord Sinclair frequented these days.
âOh yes maâam,â Arbuthnot assured her.
âAnd heâs still inside?â She could not imagine anyone willingly spending their evenings in a hovel like this. When theyâd crossed the bridge into Southwark, she had imagined she might end up somewhere quaint and full of character. Not this ramshackle building, its roof slumped over mouldering piles which looked ready to slide into the Thames should the next tide turn with too much vigour.
âYes maâam,â Arbuthnot said again. âIâve had the nipper keeping a close watch.â He pointed to the ragged urchin running up and down outside the Crossed Oars, aggressively accosting every passer-by.
âHow can he possibly keep watch while he is so busy begging?â
âEasy,â he said with pride. âAny road,â he added with a shrug, âitâs better for him to have a good reason for hanging about the Oars. If heâd just stood in a doorway, watching like, then somebody would have took him for a spy and moved him on. Regâlars are always afeard of someone laying information.â
âI see.â She smiled at him. Arbuthnot had turned out to be something of a treasure. The matter in hand was so delicate she had not wanted to employ a private investigator. But Arbuthnot owed her a favour. She had made sure he had medical help, and then compensation for the injuries heâd suffered when her late husband had forced him into the ring against a much younger, fitter opponent. She shuddered at the memory, which was so hard to blot out, of the event her husband had also forced her to attend. It had been sickening to discover that a great many so-called gentlemen could derive so much pleasure from watching one man beating another to a pulp.
âIâll go in first,â said Arbuthnot, and rapped on the roof, to get the driver to set the horse in motion. When theyâd rounded the corner, Arbuthnot heaved his bulk out of the carriage. âIâve told the jarvey to wait ten minutes,â he said, leaning back into the carriage, his body almost completely blocking out the bitter wind blowing off the river. âThen heâll go round again, and drop you off right outside. Iâll have found his lordship by then. Wherever he is in the place, Iâll be standing right near, so you can go to him straight off.â
She nodded again. Arbuthnot would stand head and shoulders above whatever crowd might be in there. His plan meant that she would not have to waste time searching for Lord Sinclair.
She pulled her collar up round her throat against the chill which swirled inside as he slammed the door shut. For a moment, she wondered if she could go through with it. But then she reminded herself, as sheâd done over and over again on the way here, that walking into a room full of drunken lightermen and mudlarks would be nothingânot after enduring four years of marriage to a monster.
It was just that it hadnât seemed quite so daunting when Arbuthnot had been in the carriage with her. Now heâd got out, she felt very alone, and small, and defenceless.
She glared at the depression in the opposite seat where the gigantic prizefighter had been sitting. Thatâs what you got if you ever began to think you could rely on a man, she reminded herself. He rendered you weak, and dependant, and vulnerable.
She firmed her lips and lifted her chin. There was nothing that rabble could do to her that her husband had not already done. And done with more finesse. Sheâd survived him, and she would survive this.