Page 58

—The Husband Hunter’s Guide to London

At eleven it became clear that Roz’s baby was determined to make an entrance into the world that night. A heavy wet snow had begun to fall. Emily sent express messages to her mother and brother. Her father and Phil saw their guests off and retired to the drawing room.

On the advice of Aunt Sarah, summoned at the end of dinner, Roz walked up and down her room for several hours, stopping to breathe through the pains, until her labor entered a new, more intense phase. Aunt Sarah then directed housemaids in the preparation of the bed for birthing. They moved Roz to the bed, fed her pieces of ice, and helped her through the cresting waves of pain.

Emily held Roz’s hand, marveling at her sister’s endurance. Roz, who had seemed so delicate, showed a strength Emily had not imagined a woman could possess.

Aunt Sarah put a sturdy arm around Emily’s shoulder and gave a squeeze. “The body has its own wisdom, if we will but heed its messages,” she said. “Roz’s body will take over now, and lead her.”

The doctor came from an evening engagement some time after one, shaking snow from his hat and coat, and praising their efforts. He pronounced everything going according to Nature’s plan. Emily had a thought or two on Nature’s plan and how it seemed disproportionately demanding of women, but she ran back and forth to her father and Phil, reporting Roz’s progress.

At five, as pale early light brightened the windows, a silver, shimmering little boy, slippery as a fish, and fair and mild as Roz herself, entered the world and gave his first lusty cry. A tearful Roz reached to hold him close at once and called for Phil.

She was made to wait while Aunt Sarah and the doctor supervised all that must be done for baby and mother. To Emily’s surprise, as the signs of birthing were whisked away, Roz, too, shed her pains, as if she had not spent the last hours sweating and shaking, red of face and dropping from weariness. The great effort that had overtaken her body had passed. The storm had faded in joy. Her face was radiant as the brightest day after the clouds cleared.

When admitted to her chamber, Phil climbed onto the bed next to his wife and put his arm around her as she held the babe. He slipped a finger into his son’s tiny grasp, and they sat stunned and wondering at the life their love had made.

At seven Emily returned to Candover House to change and go in search of her love.

* * * *

The snow was already melting and turning the streets to mush when Emily banged on the door of the chemist’s shop in Bond Street so proudly named by Miranda Kirby. Persistent knocking and pressing of the bell eventually drew Miranda to the window. When she saw Emily, she opened the shop door.

“Miss, come in out of the chill. Whatever brings you here at this time?”

Emily stepped inside, rubbing her cold hands together. “I need your help to find Lynley.”

“My help, miss?”

“You and your betrothed know the spymaster, don’t you?”

Miranda colored brightly, but closed the shop door with a bang. “But, miss, you’re not to know about the spies or Mr. Goldsworthy.”

“Mr. Goldsworthy, is it?” Emily asked. “Take me to him.”

“Oh, miss, you have no idea what you’re asking.” Miranda twisted the ends of a blue shawl in her hands.

“What about your young man, Mr. Wilde? Will he take me to Goldsworthy?”

Miranda took a breath. “Good idea, miss. I’ll fetch Nate. You wait right here.”

Miranda disappeared through a pair of crimson velvet curtains at the rear of the shop, and Emily heard her footsteps hurrying down a passageway. A door opened and closed somewhere at the back of the building.

Emily looked round the little shop with its orderly arrangement of jars and tins of lotions and salves. The place smelled of citrus, lavender, and deeper, muskier scents. She lifted a jar of lotion from the shelf, and raised it to her nose. It smelled of almonds. The label claimed the most amazing results from the regular application of the lotion inside, and it occurred to her that she already possessed a powerful means of persuasion should the spymaster resist her plan to rescue Lynley.

Goldsworthy’s name was the key to the bold idea that had sprung into her head. She knew exactly how to move him to help her in the manner in which she wished to be helped. He would resist. It would be just like a man to pat her on the head and send her off and claim that he would take care of the situation. But women, whose bodies men disdained as soft and weak, were stronger than men ever gave them credit for being.

She replaced the lotion on the shelf and went around behind the shop counter. In a drawer under the counter she found just the pen, ink, and paper she was looking for. She began to write, though the ink was cold and the pen, badly mended. The words came rapidly.

She had much more to say, but the distant door at the rear of the shop banged again, and voices raised in argument came her way. She put down her pen, shook the paper dry, and folded the sheet. Miranda and Wilde stepped through the crimson curtains.

“Good morning, miss. What’s this Miranda is saying about your wanting to see Mr. Goldsworthy?” He frowned at Miranda.

“Good morning, Mr. Wilde. Do not blame Miranda for my actions. You must be aware that Lynley left town yesterday, and that he has not returned.”

“Sir Ajax is well able to handle himself, miss,” Wilde said through tight lips.

“I’m sure. Nevertheless. He is mortal, and he may not have anticipated certain complications in this case. I want you to take me to Mr. Goldsworthy, who if nothing else, has a duty to look after his own.”