Chapter Thirteen
Mel woke upin a warm cocoon of blankets, but when she ventured to get up, the cold beating in from the narrow windows hit her like a blow. The other rooms would be no warmer. There was no closed stove to warm any of the three lower levels, and Kemble had decreed they could not light any fires because the smoke would give away that someone was living in the tower.
She shrank back into the blankets, but it wouldn’t do. Like it or not, she needed to get up. They had promised Madam Hera two more nights at the Golden Adonis, rather than leave her short staffed. Kemble would be handing over his responsibilities to his assistant. Rosina had already done the same with her manager duties, but Mel had promised to support the new Madam Thalia until after tomorrow night’s New Year’s Eve celebrations.
Mel grabbed her underthings and retreated back under the blankets until she was clad in at least her warmest stockings, her stays, and two layers of petticoats. As quickly as possible in the icy room, she put on her gown and walking boots, and wrapped herself in a shawl before venturing out into this level’s sitting room.
It was not any warmer than the bedchamber, but her temperature went up just seeing Kemble. The atmosphere between them was very different when the two of them were the only ones in the tower. Or perhaps it was just that she haddecided to act on the attraction she had always felt for him. Perhaps it was that she had previously seen him as a possible enemy and then as an ally, and now she was viewing him as a potential lover.
She smiled at him, wondering how he would react if she put her cup down and asked him to take her to bed. Was she imagining the hint of wickedness in Kemble’s return smile?
How did one seduce a man? She had spent her entire adult life—not excluding the three years of her marriage—trying to discourage male attention. She had no idea how to reverse course.
A series of rhythmic thumping sounds came from overhead.
“What is that noise?” she asked.
“I believe the marquess has heard that we have escaped, and his men are attempting to break into the tower.” Kemble sounded very calm about it. “I heard the bell, and then shouting. I think they have given up and are taking an axe to the door. It is double layered, with the inner planks at right angles to the outer ones, so it is going to take them a while to chop through.”
The pair of them had slept on the same level of the tower. Kemble had chosen a bedchamber on the same side as the bridge from the mansion, whereas Mel’s room was on the other side, with several thick stone walls and a stone floor between her and the antechamber from which the sound came.
“I should like to have been a fly on the wall when the marquess was told about our performance in the Burlington Arcade,” said Kemble.
“The plan is that none of us will fall into his hands until we have enough attention on us that touching us will be dangerous,” Mel reminded him.
“I am well aware. At least Isaac and Jerome are now out of his reach. They must be down the Thames and out into the North Sea by now, heading for the open Atlantic.”
“Tonight, I intend to hint that your youngest brothers are on their way to Liverpool, to take ship for the Americas,” said Mel.
“Mrs. Blackmore,” said Kemble, grinning, “I love how your mind works.”
At least he loved something about her. In the recesses of her mind, she heard her parents’ voices, her governess’s, her husband’s. “Melody, I do not understand. How can anyone think the way you do? The way your brain twists and turns. It is unnatural.”
“Misdirection will be useful in this case, Lord Kemble,” she explained.
“Yes, I agree, and call me Allan,” he invited, and then bent to pleading. “Would you? When it is only you and me?”
“Call me Mel, then,” she said, suddenly shy. Which she had never been in her life. “Allan,” she added.
“Not Melody? Such a pretty name.”
“My sister is Harmony,” Mel confided. “Her name suits her. She is a person who makes life easier for those around her. I have never felt that my name fitted at all. I am not musical, and I am more inclined to chaos than to sweet music.”
“Have people told you that?” Allan asked. “If so, they are idiots. From what I understand, you have spent the past few years of your life solving problems and serving justice. Melodies are not always simple or sweet. But they are satisfying to the soul.”
Is Allan flirting with me? If so, Mel liked it. “Thank you. I think.”
He changed the subject. “Melody, let’s put on our warmest coats and go out for a bite of dinner at the nearest cook shop.”
*
Mrs. Blackmore—Melody—was differenttoday. Warmer. Softer somehow. Allan could swear that the expression in her eyes earlier had been at least interest, if not attraction, and she’d told him something personal about herself, and invited him to use her Christian name.
“Muffle up,” he said, wrapping his own scarf around his neck and pulling it up around his chin. “We’ll take the short tunnel out to the streets near the mansion, and it wouldn’t do for either of us to be recognized.”
“There’s a nice place just north of the abbey,” Melody suggested. “Do you know it?”
Allan shook his head. “Show me,” he suggested. He offered her his arm. After days of drizzle and sleet, this evening was fine—or as fine as London got in the winter, when smoke from an uncounted number of chimneys clung to the rooftops and drifted through the streets. Coal smoke, too, most of it, scratching the throat and the lungs. The muffler at least filtered out some of the worst of the coal detritus.
