As the carriage rocked along the street, they removed their gowns. Hetty struggled into the ill-fitting clothes that reeked of horse.
“I’m sorry. They belong to the stable boy,” Genevieve said. “They were the only ones that would fit you.” She gave an apologetic shrug. “You are so tall and slim.” She held out a pair of scuffed shoes. “These will be too large for you. You’ll need to stuff the toes with paper.”
Hetty admired Genevieve’s nimble fingers as she tied a credible cravat without a mirror. Her clothes were more suited to the gentry. She wondered whom the duchess had coerced into giving them up and had a ridiculous vision of her ordering a local clerk to remove his clothes. She stifled a nervous giggle, tugging on her black tricorn as Genevieve tucked her dark hair beneath the hat.
A watchman called, to whoever would listen, that the weather remained fine. The coach halted for them to alight at the stand in New Bond Street beside the water trough. A night coach passed them, and link boys lit the way for a chair carrying some important personage.
The bare wisp of smoky cloud hiding the crescent moon slowly drifted away. A cool breeze stirred the trees and fanned the stench of fresh horse manure, stinging Hetty’s nostrils. She shivered in the thin clothing, more from apprehension than cold.
No available hackneys were waiting at the stand. A peddler strolled up to them with a box of clocks strapped around his neck. Hetty waved him away as her frustration grew. She and Genevieve walked up and down. The minutes turned into half an hour.
“It’s growing late. We will have missed him.” Hetty rubbed her arms.
“I see one!” Genevieve darted out to wave it down. Hetty followed, unable to move very fast as the shoes slid off her heels.
“Don’t have smallpox or the plague, do you?” the jarvie asked before they climbed in.
“Certainly not,” Hetty growled. “Berkley Square, if you please.”
“Toffy kind o’ place for the likes of you, ain’t it?”
Hetty squared her shoulders. “Mind your manners, my man, or you won’t get a tip.”
“No offense meant.” The jarvie pushed his hat back and drew his whip.
They rattled past elegant stone and brick houses as they approached Berkley Square.
“There he is!” Guy walked up Brutton Street, a tall hat on his head, his long dark coat flowing about his ankles. “Follow that man!” she called to the jarvie.
“What kind o’ smoky business is this?” he asked.
“Nothing for you to worry about,” Hetty said. “Just think about the extra money you’ll earn.”
The jarvie turned the hackney and drove after Guy, who had disappeared into New Bond Street. An empty hackney passed him and slowed. Guy waved it on, content to go on foot to his destination. They caught sight of him again as he turned from Grafton Street into Albemarle Street. He walked past the grand façade of the Royal Institution and disappeared into the Grillion Hotel.
“What do we do now?” Hetty asked as the jarvie pulled up outside the hotel. “He’ll be here to meet a friend and may be there for hours.”
Suddenly, the hackney doors were flung open, and a man thrust a pistol into their faces. “Out.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
Atall manstood there, another beside him. Both men’s faces were obscured by shadows.
Hetty stilled the clink of coins in her pocket as she climbed down, having heard of some people being robbed, sometimes just for their handkerchiefs. Genevieve followed her to the pavement, unusually silent. Hetty couldn’t be sure that a scolding tirade wouldn’t erupt from Genevieve’s lips and get them both shot.
She hurriedly spoke before the duchess could. “We has nothin’ of value ’ere,” she croaked, her voice lowered to a bark by the fear that tightened her throat.
The tall man grabbed her by the arm while the other attempted to drag the struggling Genevieve into the light cast by a street lamp. “What business do you have here?” the tall man demanded.
“They look like pigs, they do, miss,” the jarvie offered from his seat. “From Bow Street I’ll be bound.”
The light fell on the tall man’s face. Hetty gasped. “Is it you, Lord Strathairn?”
“What the devil?” He whipped off her hat. “Miss Cavendish. Why are you dressed like that and talking that way? Those clothes reek of the stable. And why are you following Lord Fortescue?”
“We are most worried aboutGee,” Genevieve said, finding her voice.
“I’m sorry, Lord Strathairn.” Hetty finally remembered her manners. “I’d like you to meet Duchess Châteaudunn. Lord Fortescue’s sister.”
