The Earl and the Pickpocket. Helen Dickson

choosing to protect herself from Jack’s closeness as much as to hide her fear. Her pride ached, but the fear of what lay in store for her if she remained stealing for Jack threatened to reduce her to a trembling, shaking coward. ‘I haven’t, Jack. I’ve always been straight with you.’

      ‘You’ve had an easy time since I took you in and set you to work, and you ought to go down on your knees and thank me for it. I’ve always had a soft spot for you, Ed,’ he said, ‘you’ve got spirit and pluck. Because I liked you and you were cleverer than the other lads, because you were quick to learn and kept your mouth shut, I’ve treated you like a lamb and let you alone to do pretty much as you please, and if you hadn’t had that honour you’d have perished before now.’

      ‘And I’m grateful, Jack. But I need more money if I’m to make my own way.’

      Jack glared at her, leaning forward. His face was vicious, and his breath stank of sour rum. His deep, grating voice filled the silence that had fallen between them. ‘Are you telling me you’re not getting a fair deal?’

      ‘Apart from that time when I took my spoils to another fencer—what you give me scarce covers the food I eat. You haven’t been over-generous, Jack,’ she said accusingly, emphasising the words to defend her actions, as she fought to prevent the shattered fragments of her life from slipping into an abyss.

      Fire blazed in Jack’s eyes. ‘You young whelp. I’ll bring you to heel or hand you in,’ he threatened savagely. ‘Do you think you can stand against me with your damned impudence? I haven’t heard the others complaining.’

      ‘No, because they fear you,’ she told him truthfully.

      ‘No harm in that. That way they’ll do as they’re told.’

      ‘I know,’ she said, standing up, her voice threaded with sarcasm. ‘Charity and sympathy are not in your nature, are they, Jack?’

      ‘What’s charity and sympathy to me?’ A sneer twitched the corner of his surly mouth. ‘They can be the ruination of many a good man.’ Scraping his chair back, he stood up and eyed the youngster narrowly, thoughtfully. ‘I’ll give you more,’ he offered suddenly—after all, a tasty morsel had been known to keep a whining dog quiet.

      ‘It’s too late.’ Edwina was adamant. She had come this far and would not back down now. ‘I’ve made up my mind. I’ve had enough.’

      Jack blustered angrily, making Edwina’s cheeks flame considerably as she listened to the curses and insults he flung at her. She wanted desperately to retaliate, to tell him to go to the devil and be done with it, but she knew the folly of doing that. It was far better to let him say what he had to and let him go. Then she could think what to do.

      He grasped her shoulder and twisted her round, thrusting his face close. ‘Listen to me, boy, and listen well. Don’t try to run from me, because if you stray I swear I’ll find you and break every bone in your body.’ Seizing her wrist, he doubled her arm behind her back. He laughed caustically when she cried out from the pain of it, thrusting her from him so forcefully that she fell against the table and toppled a chair over. ‘That’s a foretaste of the punishment you can expect if I have to come lookin’ for you.’

      Jack’s parting words seared into Edwina’s memory with the bitter gall of betrayal. The fact that she could have been so stupid as to believe she could go on her way when the fancy took her, that Jack would simply let her walk away, showed her weakness of character, in her mind. Her thoughts traced over the events that had led up to her present predicament, seeking to find the exact moment when she had become Jack’s property, and she knew it had been right from the very beginning.

      She was thrown into a dilemma as to what to do next. Its solution concealed itself in the chaotic frenzy of her thoughts. With nothing to her name but a few coppers, where could she go? There was no one she could turn to, no safe haven she could seek, and if she ran from Jack her fortune would be what she could make herself.

      Feeling a bone weariness creeping over her, she sat and placed her forearms on the table, lowering her head upon them and sighing. ‘Oh, Father,’ she whispered. ‘Why did you have to die? Why did you have to leave me to the mercy of Uncle Henry?’

      Gordon Marchant had been a good father to her. She recalled how, handsome and proud, he’d smiled down at her from the saddle that last morning when he’d left Oakwood Hall, their fine Hertfordshire home, with his brother Henry, prepared to meet his creditor Silas Clifford, the Earl of Taplow, and beg for more time to pay back what he owed, and how she had stood on tiptoe to meet his parting embrace. The warmth and safety of his tone enclosed her for a moment.

      ‘Promise me you’ll have a care,’ she’d said.

      ‘Don’t worry, Edwina.’ His voice was quiet and he released her gently. ‘I’ll be back, and, if not, you can trust Henry. He’ll take care of you.’ Those had been his last words to her.

      Henry had brought him home across the saddle of his horse, his fine clothes stained dark crimson with his life’s blood. Her heart hardened. He had claimed her father had had a run in with a thief on the road to Taplow Court. She had believed him. Henry had smiled and promised to handle everything—and he’d handled it very well…the blackguard.

      Together Henry and the Earl of Taplow had drawn up a marriage contract. The Earl had proposed to disregard his losses and marry her without a dowry. Anger welled up in her, anger at Uncle Henry, at the Earl of Taplow. They had done this to her. She would never forgive them, either of them, ever!

      In her mind’s eyes she saw Silas Clifford. To a seventeen-year-old girl, at fifty he was an old man. He was thin, his skin pale with prominent veins. His hair was white and he gave the impression of deformity without any obvious malformation. In fact, she had found everything about him displeasing. When he had come across her riding her horse along the lane near Oakwood Hall, his attention had been sharply and decisively arrested.

      She recalled how he had called on her father soon after, how he had run his eyes over her, examining her face and figure as he would a prize cow. His hissing intake of breath as he did so had reminded her of a snake, and she had been glad when his business with her father had been concluded and he had gone on his way.

      But following his visit her father had been uneasy and nervous, and to this day she did not know why. Soon afterwards he had been killed and Henry had become her guardian, and with it came the suspicion that he had killed her father. His odd behaviour, and the way he had of avoiding her eyes and refusing to speak of the tragic incident that had occurred on the road to Taplow Court, fuelled this suspicion, until she became certain of it.

      What would her father think of Henry now? It had never occurred to him to doubt the honour of his own brother. Henry had fooled her father. He had taken his trust and trampled it. By running away she had made him pay for his lies.

      Tears of fear, sorrow and frustration welled up in her eyes. ‘Oh, Father, why did you desert me? I have lost everything.’

      It was a cry from the heart, the cry of a lost and lonely child, but the sorrow that shaped it was soon spent. Jack and his kind would not defeat her. The food Adam had bought her still filled her stomach and lent support to her resolve. All she needed was the courage to remove herself as far away from Jack as she possibly could. She had not escaped from her uncle’s clutches only to die a lingering death in the filth and squalor of St Giles, wretched and without hope.

      She would not be beaten. She was young. She had the strength and the power to survive and grasp for herself a better future. She would make it happen because, if she didn’t, no one else would. What was it Adam had said—that a person must have faith and pride in oneself, must believe in oneself? Well, she did believe in herself, and she would start by taking control of her life.

      There would be no more Jack. No more Silas Clifford. No more Uncle Henry. Somehow she must find her way back to her own kind, but first she must have money, and Adam would give her that. She would find the boy Toby and take the reward he had promised for herself.

      Her spirits strengthened,