You did come to London for me.Jack suddenly felt the room was too hot.
“Aye, I wanted to see ye one more time. To thank ye for everything ye did for me and Mags and Kinmarloch. And to thank ye for yer restraint when I had nane. On yer last night in Dunmore.”
He cleared his throat. “And I would be lying, Helen, if I didn’t tell you that I have regretted that restraint every day since I left the Highlands.”
She stared, her eyes burning into him. Her jaw jutted.
Then, suddenly, she slumped and laughed. Not a real laugh. Some hollow, brave imitation of a laugh.
“Ye are the same as ever, Jack Pike. Are ye going to compliment my brown dress now? Are ye going to tell me that ye have been dreaming of my beautiful face and my large bosom? That ye love my kissing?”
“Don’t mock me or yourself that way, Helen. It doesn’t become you.”
Her shoulders straightened, and she went rigid. “Aye. Nae much does. Become me.” Her face was made of stone. “Thank ye, Jack Pike.”
“For what?”
“For reminding me that I hate ye.”
“You don’t hate me.”
“I dinnae know what else to call it.”
He stood. “I’ll help you get your rooms.”
Helen rose, too. “And the introduction?”
He did not answer her. He felt in his pocket for his purse. Good. It was heavy.
“Stay here.”
He went out into the hall and sent his butler away on an errand to another part of the house. Jack then ushered Helen and Duncan and Mags out of the house and into the street. He hefted the bag Helen had been carrying. Duncan carried another bag and a pack. Jack herded them away from the house as quickly as he could, given Mags’ limp. He found a hack two streets away and got all of them into it. Duncan’s knees scraped the opposite seat and he had to sit at an angle so that Mags and Helen had room.
“All three of you. Here. In London,” Jack said, once the hack was underway.
“Aye,” Helen looked away, out the window, at the street.
“I’m the honor guard.” Duncan put his shoulders back which made his head brush against the ceiling of the carriage.
“The earl or the countess of Kinmarloch always travels with an honor guard,” Helen said, still looking out the window, her voice flat.
“But, Mr. Pike, of course, a lady cannae travel unaccompanied with a man,” Mags explained.
“So you, Mags, are chaperoning Helen, rather than the other way around?”
“Aye.”
“I see.”
They hadn’t far to go. Jack had the Scots stay in the hack. He went into a building near where the new circus was being built. He found the man who leased rooms and asked for ones near the back, away from the noise of Piccadilly. He came back to the hack and got his charges out and into the building, Duncan eliciting stares from passersby on the pavement.
“You did bring some trousers, I hope, Duncan,” Jack said as he followed the giant into the rooms.
“Aye.”
“Wear them as much as possible. Your height alone attracts too much attention in London. Never mind the full kilt.”
“Is there a reason we dinnae want to attract attention, Jack?” Helen was walking around the drawing room. No. Stomping. “Are we a secret? Is that why ye have bundled us off so fast? We might embarrass ye. In front of the people ye know in London, I suppose.”
