Picking pockets as her only means of survival, Octavia Morgan realizes that she has made a terrible mistake when she targets Lord Nick, the most notorious highwayman in England, who vows to ensnare Octavia's passions.
Release date:
December 30, 2009
Publisher:
Bantam
Print pages:
432
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The crowds had been filling the streets since before dawn, jostling for the best places along the route to Tyburn, the luckiest finding spots around the gibbet itself. Despite the light snow and the raw wind, there was a holiday atmosphere: farmers and their wives, come in from the country for the entertainment, sharing the contents of their hampers with their neighbors; children dodging in and out of the throng, chasing each other, collapsing in squabbling heaps to the cobbles; sharp-eyed townsfolk, lucky enough to have houses along the route the cart would take from Newgate, shouting their prices for a seat in the window or on the roof.
It promised to be a spectacle worth paying for, the execution of Gerald Abercorn and Derek Greenthorne, two of the most notorious gentlemen of the road who’d terrorized travelers across Putney Heath for the better part of a decade.
“You’d think if they could catch them two, t’other wouldn’t be ’ard to get,” a rosy-cheeked woman mumbled through a mouthful of pigeon pie.
Her husband took a bottle of rum from the capacious pocket of his great coat. “They’ll not nab Lord Nick, woman, you mark my words.” He took a hearty swig and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.
“You seem very confident, sir,” an amused voice said behind him. “What makes this so–called Lord Nick harder to catch than his unfortunate friends?”
The other man tapped the side of his nose and winked significantly. “He’s clever, see. Cleverer than a barrel of monkeys. Give the Runners the slip anytime. They says ’e can disappear in a puff of smoke, he an’ that white ’orse of ’is, jest like Old Nick, the devil ’isself.”
His interlocutor’s smile was slightly mocking as he took a pinch of snuff. He made no response, however. He was close to the front of the crowd and, standing head and shoulders above the majority of the spectators, could easily see the gibbet over the surrounding heads. All trace of a smile was wiped clean from his face as he heard the low rumble of excitement from Tyburn Road that indicated the approach of the cart with the condemned men. Using his elbows, he pushed through the crowd, ignoring the curses and complaints, until he’d reached Tyburn Tree.
John Dennis, the hangman, was already positioned on the broad cart stationed beneath the gibbet. He brushed snow from his black sleeve and peered through the now fast-falling flakes, watching for the arrival of his customers.
“A word with you, sir.”
Dennis jumped and looked down from his perch. A man, unremarkably dressed in a plain brown coat and britches, fixed him with a gray-eyed penetrating stare. “How much for the bodies?” he asked, drawing out a leather purse. It chinked richly as he rested it against the palm of his other hand, and Dennis’s eyes sharpened. He examined the man closely and saw that although his clothes were plain, they were well cut and of excellent cloth. His linen was spotless, although without frills, and his hat was liberally adorned with silver lace. His sharply assessing gaze encompassed the fine soft leather boots with buckles that he immediately recognized as real silver. Highwaymen—or at least Mr. Abercorn and Mr. Greenthorne—clearly had well-to-do friends.
“Five guinea apiece,” he said without a moment’s consideration. “And three for their clothes.”
The stranger’s lip curled, and an expression of acute distaste flickered over his countenance, but he opened his purse without another word.
Dennis leaned down, extending his hand, and the man in brown counted the gold coins into his palm. Then he turned and beckoned four burly carriers, leaning on their carts on the outskirts of the crowd. “Convey the bodies to the Royal Oak at Putney,” he said without expression, handing them a guinea each.
“Like as not, we’ll ’ave to fight the surgeons’ messengers for ’em, guv,” one of the four said with a leering wink.
“When they’re safely at the Royal Oak, there’ll be another guinea each,” the man in brown said coldly. Turning on his heel, he made to push his way back through the crowd. He’d done what he’d come to do, ensured that his friends’ bodies would not end up on the dissecting table under the surgeons’ knives, but he had no stomach to see their deaths.
He made fair progress until he reached the middle of the crowd; then the noise swelled from the Tyburn Road, heralding the imminent arrival of the prisoners from Newgate, and he found he couldn’t take another step as the excitement rose to fever pitch around him and the throng pressed ever closer to the gallows. Resigned, he stood still, bracing himself against the buffeting as the crowd jumped on tiptoe, pushed and pulled, cursed and shouted, jostling for a better view.
“Take yer ’at off, woman!” The raucous yell was accompanied by a none too gentle shove at the monstrous confection of straw and scarlet-dyed feathers.
The irate owner, a florid-faced carter’s wife reeking of gin, swung round and launched a stream of Billingsgate obscenity that was answered in like form. The man in brown sighed and tried to close his nostrils to the stench of alcohol and unwashed humanity as the atmosphere heated up despite the still-falling snow and the vicious wind. Something brushed against him; he felt a fluttering against his waistcoat, and he was instantly alert. He clapped his hand to his waistcoat, knowing what he would find. His watch was gone.
Furious, he stared round at the sea of eager, panting faces, eyes glowing with excitement, mouths ajar. His livid gaze fell on an upturned face beside him, standing so close to him a wisp of cinnamon-colored hair brushed against his shoulder. It was the face of a madonna. A perfect, pale oval, with tawny gold eyes set wide apart beneath a smooth, broad brow; luxuriant dark-brown eyelashes fluttered, and her beautiful mouth quivered in distress.
Suddenly a loud voice bellowed, “Take care of your pockets! There’s a bleedin’ pickpocket around!” and a chorus of indignation rose in the close air as people patted their clothing, felt through pockets, and discovered that they too were missing sundry items.
Almost instantaneously, the girl standing beside him swayed, moaned, and sank downward. Instinctively, he caught her up before she could be lost in the sea of legs and heavily booted feet stamping on the cobbles. She hung limply against him, her face even paler than before, perspiration pearling her forehead.
Her eyelashes fluttered and she murmured, “Your pardon, sir,” before she collapsed again and began to slip through his hold.
He hauled her upright, maneuvering her into his arms, and turned to push his way out of the crowd. “Let me pass. The lady is swooning,” he declared repeatedly, the harshness of his voice having some effect so that at last he managed to make his way to the rear of the throng, who were now taken up with the spectacle at the scaffold. He’d reached a relatively empty space when the great roar from the crowd told him that the cart had been driven from beneath Gerald and Derek, leaving them swinging from the gibbet. His expression grew grimmer, and his eyelids dropped for a second over eyes that were gray and cold as arctic ice.
“My thanks, sir,” the bundle in his arms murmured in a faint voice as the girl stirred. “I have lost my friends in the crush, and I was so afraid I would be trampled. But I’ll manage very well now.”
Her voice was surprisingly deep and rich. Her velvet cloak had fallen open as he’d pushed through the throng, revealing a simple gown of fine muslin, a discreet white fichu at the neck as befitted a modest young lady of good family. Her hands were buried in a velvet muff. She gazed up at him and offered a tremulous smile when he seemed disinclined to set her down.
“How do you intend finding your friends?” he asked, looking around pointedly at the seething press of humanity. “They could be anywhere. This is no place for a gently bred young woman to wander alone.”
“Pray don’t let me trouble you further, sir,” she said. “I’m certain I shall find them … they’ll be looking for me.” She moved in his hold, and he detected more than a touch of determination in her efforts to free herself.
Suspicion flickered in his brain as he thought of the sequence of events. It had all been very convenient … but surely he was wrong. This sweet-faced, honey-voiced innocent couldn’t possibly have been light-fingering her way through the crowd.
Philip’s face sprang unbidden to memory. Philip as he had been as a child. Angelic, gentle, coaxing, innocent little Philip. Neither of his parents would hear a word against their darling—not his parents, or his nurse, or his tutor, or any member of the household where young Philip ruled supreme.
“Put me down, sir!” The girl’s now indignant demand brought him back to the present with a jolt.
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