Ginny said this a trifle acerbically. Because while she was indeed grateful, she was also very embarrassed. Mr. Marchand had not only quickly recognized her grave social peril, he’d had the presence of mind to solve her problem with a deft bribe to a stranger.
When she relived the moment she’d said “wiiiith...” to Lord Cambrough with desperate, feigned cheer, she nearly shriveled with mortification.
She’d actually marched a good thirty yards down the street arm in arm with the woman Mr. Marchand had paid to lie. She was a widow, Mrs. Tuffet explained during their walk.
Mr. Marchand eventually caught up to them, collected Ginny, and bustled her around the corner after they waved good-bye to the helpful stranger.
Ginny had watched the woman go somewhat wistfully. What an injustice it seemed that a husband usually had to die before a woman could run about town freely.
She was now sitting across from Mr. Marchand in a grubby little pub. It seemed unlikely that anyone with whom she was acquainted would wander in. Although it was becoming clearer and clearer to her that anything could happen at any time, so there seemed no point in relaxing her guard, ever.
Her heartbeat, in truth, had not yet recovered from the abject terror of watching Lord Cambrough’s expression subtly change when he suspected she might be wandering around by herself in Fleegle’s Emporium of Wonders. Gently bred young women simply didn’tdothat,particularlyin a not-quite-savory neighborhood. Unless, of course, they were helplessly eccentric, in the process of going mad, or up to something truly, unforgivably, disastrously disreputable.
Like gallivanting around with one of the princes of London’s demimonde.
If Henry had entered the shop a few moments earlier and seen her with Marchand, speaking with Mr. Fleegle...
... if he’d then told Francis what he’d seen...
The cascade of potential ramifications chilled her blood.
Most young men possessed of titles and pedigrees stretching back to William I—like Lord Cambrough—wouldn’t enthusiastically marry into a family of eccentrics. While there was a slim chance Felicity’s engagement would survive the disappearing dowry, a disreputable sister on top of that would likely be the final nail in its coffin.
She would rather die than destroy her sister’s happiness.
Lord Cambrough’s family wouldnevermix socially with a man like Marchand. Her reputation would be tainted forever if her association with Marchand was known.
But it seemed to her that her two overlapping worlds, the secret one in which she was suddenly living, and the one she’d lived in every day for the last twenty-four years, were blurring at the edges, bleeding into each other. Because it struck her as irrational that the man sitting across from her, the one whohad just rescued her from certain social devastation, could be the agent of her social destruction simply by virtue of being who he was—an impresario of a gentleman’s gaming club. She might as well be sitting across from a lit grenade, for how dangerous this association was.
Yet she’d never felt safer.
Mr. Marchand seemed pensive, and she was drained by the scrabbling farce her life had become.
But surprisingly she rather liked sitting in the grubby pub. It was novel. It was dimly lit. The table wobbled, and it had been carved with Epithet Jar words and various initials. She traced one with her gloved forefinger.
Marchand was enjoying an ale.
They didn’t serve tea or coffee here. He’d poured a little bit of the ale into a glass for her and she was staring at it. She’d never tasted ale. It was admittedly pretty, deep gold under a creamy crown of foam.
“?‘Ginny’?” Marchand finally quoted. Amused.
“None of my siblings could pronounce Guinevere, let alone spell it, when we were little, so it stuck.”
“I see. Miss Woodville... how long have you lived alone with your siblings?” He seemed to have been doing some wondering about things during the silence.
“Since I was almost sixteen years old. Eight years.”
“And you raised them with no other adults around?”
“Well, not precisely. The neighbors regularly looked in on us and have been very good to us. So did various relatives, when they could. But they knew we didn’t want to be separated. And everyone knew I’d be equal to the job of runningthe house. It was my mother’s wish, after all.” She said this both proudly and defiantly. “I suppose we were lucky, after a fashion. We never felt abandoned.”
“Your mother specifically requested thatyoulook after your siblings?”
She was feeling interrogated now, and a trifle defensive. He was clearly trying to understand how her life had come to such a pathetic pass.
“Yes. Well, I’m the oldest. My sisters are twins—four years younger than I am. They’re very precious and sweet girls, quite innocent but level-headed. And Hogarth is clever but a bit timid in many ways. He’s also very sensitive. ButIam the capable one. I always have been. AndI’mnot timid. My mother knew I would be able to manage it.”
He nodded thoughtfully. “Did your parentstellyou that you were these things or did you decide that you were these things?”
