Innocence in Regency Society. Diane Gaston

wandered slowly through the streets, until he found himself back at the door of his expensive new rooms. The place was quiet as he entered, a single candle providing light. He glanced toward the back of the place where the two other bedchambers were located and wondered what might be occurring behind those closed doors. Was Bart holding the frail Sophie protectively, lest the ‘lord’ attack her in the night? Had Sophie offered her body to Bart, as well? Had he accepted?

      Devlin would bet a month’s blunt Bart had not made a mull of things as he had, and that, on the morrow, the little maid would gaze upon Bart’s craggy features with adoration.

      Devlin entered Madeleine’s room quietly. The dim illumination of the street lamp shone on Linette’s sleeping figure, her thumb in her mouth. Devlin smiled and gently pulled out her thumb. The little girl stirred, her long dark eyelashes fluttering. She popped the thumb back in.

      Madeleine’s bed was empty, and he felt a moment’s anxiety, until he spied her curled up on the windowseat, sound asleep, as innocent and vulnerable as her daughter.

      They were both beautiful, these charges of his, and totally dependent upon him. It frightened him, worse than leading men into battle. Soldiers knew the stakes were death, but they had the tools to fight. If he failed Madeleine and Linette, they would be at the mercy of creatures like Farley and would have no weapons with which to protect themselves.

      He would not fail them, he vowed. He would see to their needs no matter what the cost.

      Devlin gathered Madeleine in his arms, her weight surprisingly like a feather. He carried her to the bed.

      ‘Only thing I can do,’ she murmured, resting her head on his shoulder, much like her little girl had done earlier.

      ‘Hush, Maddy,’ he whispered. ‘You’ll wake Linette.’

      ‘Linette,’ she murmured. ‘All I have.’

      ‘Not any more, Miss England.’ Devlin laid her carefully on the bed and tucked the covers around her. ‘Now you have me, as well.’

       Chapter Five

       M adeleine held tightly on to Devlin’s arm as they strolled the pavements of London in the bright morning sun. She pulled the hood of her cape to obscure as much of her face as possible. Still, she felt exposed.

      ‘You will not take me to a fashionable modiste, will you, Devlin?’ The thought of walking down Bond Street filled her with dread.

      Devlin regarded her with an amused expression. ‘No, indeed, Maddy. Would I subject you to such a terrible thing?’

      That made her laugh. ‘Do not tease me. It is merely that I would not want to be seen.’

      ‘Do not worry, goose. You were always masked, were you not? No one will recognise you.’ He patted her hand comfortingly.

      ‘Of course. So silly of me.’

      She took a deep breath. He did not understand. Farley’s patrons did not concern her, but perhaps those she did fear encountering would not recognise her either. Surely the years had altered her?

      ‘Where are we bound, then?’ She gazed up at Devlin, so tall and handsome. His green eyes sparkled in the sunlight, like emeralds on a necklace a young man had once bestowed upon her before Farley snatched it away. If necessity bade her to walk in daylight, it pleased her to be beside him.

      ‘Bart found a dressmaker only four streets from here,’ Devlin said. ‘How he should know about dressmakers foxes me.’

      She laughed. ‘Bart is very clever, isn’t he? He and Sophie. I do believe they can do everything.’

      ‘Unlike me, I suppose.’ He smiled, but the humour did not reach his voice.

      ‘You are the hub around which all revolves.’ She spoke absently, transfixed by a coach rumbling down the street. ‘Oh, look at the matched greys. How finely they step together. They are magnificent, are they not?’

      ‘Indeed,’ he answered.

      She watched the coach-and-four until it drove out of sight. ‘Oh, my.’ She cast one last glance in the direction it had disappeared. ‘What were you saying, Devlin?’

      ‘I was remarking about how utterly useless you find me.’

      She glanced at him. ‘You are funning me again. What would have happened to me and Linette without you, Devlin?’

      Madeleine felt her face flush. She should not have spoken so. To suggest he had any obligation to her was very bad of her. She had awoken in her own bed this morning. The only service she could render him, he’d refused.

      ‘It is I who am useless, not you, Devlin.’ She sighed. ‘I am skilled at nothing…well, nothing of consequence.’

      A curricle drawn by two fine roans raced by. Madeleine stopped to watch it.

      ‘Do you like horses, Maddy?’

      ‘What?’ She glanced at him. ‘Oh, horses. I used to like horses.’

      ‘Not now?’ His mouth turned up at one corner.

      ‘I have not been on a horse since…for many years.’

      ‘You ride, then?’

      She had careened over the hills, giving her mare her head, clearing hedges, sailing over streams. Nothing unseated her. She outrode every boy in the county and most of the men. When she could remain undiscovered, she spent whole days on horseback.

      Had she not been out in the country on her mare, unchaperoned as usual, she might not have met Farley, might not have succumbed to his charm. Never riding again was fitting punishment for her fatal indiscretion.

      She blinked away the regret. ‘You might say I used to ride horses as well as I now ride men.’

      ‘Maddy!’ Devlin stopped in the centre of the pavement and grabbed her by the shoulders. ‘Do not speak like that. I ought to throttle you.’

      She tilted her chin defiantly. ‘As you wish, sir.’

      He let go of her and rubbed his brow. ‘Deuce, you know I will not hit you, but why say such a thing?’

      ‘Because it is true. I know what I am, Devlin. There is no use trying to make me otherwise. It is my only skill. Bart and Sophie can do all sorts of useful things. You, too. You can win at cards and go about in society. You have fought in the war. What could be more useful than that? But me, there is nothing else I know how to do.’

      He extended his hand to her, wanting to crush her against him and kiss her until she took back her words. Though the kissing part might not prove the point, exactly, he admitted. He dropped his hand and, putting her arm through his, resumed walking.

      After a short distance in silence, he said, ‘That’s what you meant last night. Saying it was the only thing you could do.’

      She did not reply.

      Devlin held his tongue. This was no place for such a conversation in any event. Besides, each time some handsome equipage passed by in the street, she slowed her pace a little.

      He chuckled. ‘Horse mad, are you?’

      She pointedly turned her head away from him.

      ‘Now do not deny it, Maddy. You are horse mad. I recognise the signs. I was myself, as a boy. Why, I liked being with the grooms better than anyone else. My brother, the heir, could not keep up with me when I rode, though he’s a good ten years my senior. Nothing he could do but report to Father that I was about to break my neck.’

      He threw a penny to the boy who had swept the street in front of where they crossed.

      ‘Oh, look at all the shops!’ Madeleine exclaimed. ‘I had not reckoned there to be so many.’

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