Venus

Chapter 2

Nicholas had no idea where Polly was guiding him, but she was fleet of foot, showing no hesitation about their direction, so he followed where she led and saved his breath for running. The sounds of pursuit, at first alarmingly loud behind them, finally faded; the racing figure beside him turned yet another corner onto another narrow alley and came to a fast-breathing halt under an archway.

"They'll not find us now." Her breath came on a sob; she shivered as the heat engendered by movement abated and the freezing air whipped her smock against her body.

"God's good grace!" her companion exploded softly. "Are you crazed, girl? To come out like that!"

"Had I stayed for my clothes, I would not have come out at all," was the tart rejoinder. "And had I not done so, they would have caught you easily. There is only one way out of that garden, and ye'd never have found it in the dark." She hopped from one foot to the other. The mud in the alley was frozen in hard ridges, and her feet were rapidly becoming numb.

"Just what do you intend doing now?" demanded Nicholas, shrugging out of his coat. "Put this on."

"Coming with you." Polly went on to inform him blithely of the part he was to play in her life. The idea had

hit her with the blast of cold air from the opened casement, complete and perfect-the opportunity she had sometimes despaired of being given. It would require a little cooperation, of course, but surely he would be happy to take what she could offer in exchange. Men were not in general indifferent to her charms-an interest that so far had been nothing but a burden, but in this instance could be put to good use. Wrapping the coat around her shoulders, she stroked the sleeve, wonderingly. "I've never worn velvet before."

"What do you mean, you're coming with me?" He looked at her uneasily.

"Well, I can't go back, can I?" she pointed out with impeccable logic. "Josh'll kill me… if Prue doesn't first." Her dance on the frozen mud became more vigorous. "Besides, I saved your life, so now you can be my… my…" She searched for the right word, then found it. "Protector," she finished triumphantly. "Or do I mean patron? Actors have patrons, don't they? But I suppose, if I am to be your mistress, then you would also be my protector. Anyway, either will do."

"Either will not do!" Nicholas, unable to make head or tail of this assured statement, stared at the prancing figure swathed in velvet. "May I remind you that it was you who made the saving of my life necessary in the first place?"

"Ah," Polly bit her lip. "I suppose that is true. But what am I to do? I cannot become an actor without a patron. I have been waiting for one forever. And now you have turned up so fortuitously-" A violent sneeze brought an end to this confusing recitation, returning Nicholas to his senses. She was going to freeze to death if he left her here, if she had not already contracted an inflammation of the lungs. He didn't want her death on his conscience-time enough when they found shelter to decide what to do with her.

"Where are we?" He peered into the murk, but could see nothing familiar.

"Near Gracechurch Street," was the prompt reply. "Cornhill's up that-a-way." She pointed ahead.

"We'll mayhap find a hackney there. If there's a jarvey

willing to ply his trade on this filthy night." He glanced down at her bare feet. "Can you walk that far?"

Polly shrugged. "Have to, won't I?" She began to run up the lane-an extraordinary figure in underdress and a gentleman's coat, that honey hair streaming in the wind. He'd be lucky to find a jarvey willing to take such a motley creature, Nicholas reflected gloomily. She looked as if she'd escaped from Bedlam! Mind you, he was beginning to feel as if he had done so. He set off at a brisk walk in her wake.

There were few people abroad to witness the strange pair, but Nicholas, alert for footpads, kept his hand on his sword hilt and his eyes peeled for a sight of the Watch, unsure how he would explain matters should he be challenged. They reached Cornhill, where Polly stopped. She dashed a hand across her eyes-a gesture that did not escape Nicholas, coming up beside her. It was too dark to see the extent of her distress, but her posture had lost its previous jauntiness. He looked anxiously up the street. Not even the lantern of a linkboy showed through the fog.

"Lord of hell! You could at least have brought your shoes!" The irritable mutter produced a gulping sound from his companion, but he was too worried about her physical state to care overmuch about wounded sensibilities. Then the sound of hooves pierced the dark. Nicholas stepped into the street. A coach lantern wavered, its light a will-o'-the-wisp in the fog-dark. He ran toward the vehicle, praying that it was a public hackney so that he would not be obliged to throw himself on the mercy of some late-night traveler, who would be justifiably suspicious of an apparently benighted gentleman and a half-clad female.

"Wha' y'want, then, foin sir?" The muffled figure on the box swayed, his words slurred. "Foul night to be abroad." He raised a bottle to his lips and drank deeply, hiccuping.

"Your services," said Nicholas briskly, pulling open the coach door. He turned to yell for Polly before the jarvey could whip up his horses and take off without them, but she was right beside him. He bundled her inside. "A guinea for you if you can take us to Charing Cross, man."

"Ah'm for me bed," the coachman protested in spite of the promised largess. "Wrong direction."

Nicholas put his foot on the step to the box and sprang nimbly up. "Either you drive us, or / do!" The menace was so clear in both voice and stance that the jarvey, muttering ferociously, turned his horses.

Polly sat in the pitch darkness of the frowsty interior, where the smell of onions and unwashed bodies mingled in a noxious bouquet with stale beer and fusty leather. She chafed her sore, frozen feet as the carriage swayed and jolted over the cobbles under the direction of its inebriated driver. There was a time when the vehicle lurched violently, and she fell onto the floor. An enraged yell came from the box, followed by a significant thump. She struggled back onto the seat, pulling aside the scrap of leather curtain that shielded the unglazed aperture serving as window.

"Sir?" Her voice quavered as she craned her neck to peer up at the box. "Is everything all right?"

"That rather depends upon how you define all right." His voice drifted down through the darkness. "Our friend here has finally succumbed to persuasion to yield up the reins."

There was something infinitely reassuring about the dry tone, and Polly withdrew her head, wondering what form the persuasion had taken. At least the motion was rather less erratic now, but the pain in her feet, as sensation returned, brought tears to her eyes. Secure in her isolated darkness, she made no attempt to stop them, and they rolled down her cheeks as the events of the evening took their inevitable toll.

Nicholas accorded the motionless figure of the jarvey, slumped on the box beside him, a brief glance now and again as he turned the horses from Fleet Street onto the Strand. It had required little more than a tap to render him unconscious, and he would be well paid for the indignity once Lord Kincaid had attained the comfort and security of home.

Home was a large house in a quiet street off Charing Cross. Like its fellows on the street, the windows were in darkness at this hour of the night, although a lantern burned,

hanging from an iron hook set into the stone pillar beside the door. Margaret would have been abed these past two hours, Nicholas knew, which, perhaps in the circumstances, was all to the good. He did not feel like explaining his unorthodox companion to his straight-laced sister-in-law, or indeed, to anyone at this juncture. Springing off the box, he opened the carriage door.

"Are you still in there?"

"I cannot imagine where else I would be." It was a brave attempt at a light response, but tears were heavy in her voice. "Where are we?"

"At my house," he replied, holding the door. "Come."

Polly stepped out of the carriage, forgetting her sore feet for the moment in her fascinated contemplation of her surroundings. This was not the London she knew, which was a city of plaster and lath buildings on narrow, crooked streets, the gables protruding so far over the lower floors that they formed a roof across the lanes. Here, the light from the lantern showed her a broad, paved thoroughfare and a mansion of warm brick and white stone. Polly did not think she had ever seen so many windows in one building. The gentleman must be a very important man, as well as a rich one, to have a house with so many glazed windows. Her luck had certainly turned. On one thing she was resolved-this opportunity was not going to slip through her fingers. She was going to stick closer than his shadow to this influential gentleman until he had helped her to achieve her goal.

Nicholas missed the speculative, determined look she gave him; he was too occupied with the insensible jarvey, who seemed to have lapsed into stertorous sleep and was like to freeze if left to sleep off his intoxication. A night standing still on the street would not do the horses much good, either. At last he managed to get some sense out of the man, although he appeared to have no recollection of the past hour or of what had led him so far from his usual beat. He pocketed the two guineas Nicholas, troubled by conscience, gave him, clicked his tongue at his horses, then slumped back against the seat as the carriage moved off. Trusting that

the beasts would know their own way home, Nicholas turned back to his other, rather more bothersome, responsibility.

She stood huddled in his coat, her face white and tear-streaked-a fact that did not appear to mar her beauty in the least, Nicholas thought distractedly; it simply aroused in him an overpowering desire to take her in his arms. She was rubbing one bare foot alternately against the other leg in a futile effort to reduce their exposure to the frozen ground. Nicholas swung her into his arms, telling himself that it was simply the practical solution to her problem.

"Oh!" Polly said in surprise. It was not at all an unpleasant sensation for one who had never before been offered a helping hand in the seventeen years of her existence. "Am I not heavy?"

"Not excessively," replied her bearer with credible insouciance. "Sound the knocker."

Polly grasped the heavy brass door knocker, banging it vigorously. The sound of bolts scraping followed almost immediately, and the door swung open at the hand of a young footboy whose sleep-filled eyes and crumpled livery bore witness to his inability to stay alert while waiting up for his master's return.

"You may go to bed, Tom," Nicholas said, walking straight past him, ignoring the startled stare at the bundle in his arms.

"Yes, m'lord," the lad muttered as Nicholas strode to the stairs.

"Are you a lord?" his burden asked, realizing with a slight shock that despite the intimacies they had shared, she did not know his name. If he was, indeed, a nobleman, then he would be even better placed to help her than she had hoped.

"As it happens. Nicholas, Lord Kincaid, at your service." She chuckled at the absurdity of this dry formula of introduction, and he looked down at her, recognizing that same infectious smile that had so entranced him earlier. He had intended sending her up to the attics to find a bed with the servants, but they would all be asleep, the place in darkness,

and she was still chilled to the bone, not in a fit condition to explain herself to strangers-even if a reasonable explanation could be found. With a half shrug, he entered his own chamber, where a fire glowed in the hearth and the soft light of wax tapers in a many-branched candlestick offered a welcoming light.

Polly gazed, awestruck, at the luxury of the huge feather bed with its embroidered hangings and carved bedposts. "The walls are painted!" she exclaimed as he set her on her feet. She ran across the smooth, waxed oak floor to examine the scenes and designs delicately worked in blue and gilt on the wooden paneling. "How pretty." Suddenly the image of her straw pallet in the airless cubbyhole beneath the stairs at the Dog tavern rose vivid in her mind. How could there be such contrasts in the same city? The delight and excitement in her novel surroundings withered, and the cold, miserable exhaustion she had felt in the carriage returned.

Nicholas saw the shiver and the quick turn of her head as if she would hide something from him. He went over to the bed, bending to pull a truckle bed from beneath. "You may sleep here tonight. Margaret will know what to do with you in the morning."

At that she swung round. "Who is Margaret?"

"The lady of the house," he responded.

'"Your… your wife."

"My brother's widow. She keeps house for me."

Polly wondered why the information should be such balm. "I do not wish her to do anything with me in the morning," she informed him. "With you as my patron, I will be introduced to Master Killigrew at the king's playhouse, and he will see what a good actor I am." She sat on the truckle bed, massaging her feet. "Then, if you do not wish to continue being my patron, once I am established I will find someone else. It is usually so, is it not?"

Nicholas felt his jaw drop. It was not as if the plan was extraordinary. Since the king had decreed three years ago that only women should play female parts in the theatre, the young and attractive, talented and not so talented, had cho-

sen the stage as offering the shortest path to a noble husband or a wealthy keeper. There were men aplenty, both rich and noble, eager to pay whatever was required, not excluding marriage, for the attentions of the most desirable of these frail creatures. Nicholas was in little doubt, also, that one look at this ravishing girl, once she had acquired a measure of polish, and Thomas Killigrew, who managed the king's company, would not care whether she was accomplished or not-and neither would the audience. Indeed, it was not inconceivable that if she played her cards aptly, this erstwhile tavern wench from Botolph's Wharf could find her way, via some nobleman's bed, into the intimate circles of the court of King Charles.

And then the idea hit him-brilliant in its simplicity. What if she could be steered into one particular circle-into Buckingham's circle, to be precise-where she would hear certain things, things that she could be encouraged to divulge to Nick's own faction? Could they possibly make an unwitting spy out of this exquisite vision who had materialized so serendipitously out of the fetid fogs of the back slums? A frown buckled his forehead. He would need to tread very carefully. She would have to be groomed for the part and maneuvered in the right directions. He would put it to De Winter and the others, but in the meantime she could not be permitted to move prematurely.

"It is possible that we may be of service to each other," he said carefully. "However, if you wish for my assistance, you must agree to put yourself in my hands. You may have to do things that you do not care to, at first, but you must promise to trust me, and do as I bid."

Polly looked puzzled. "I do not understand why there should be difficulties. You have only to introduce me to Master Killigrew in the morning. I will do the rest myself."

"No," he said, firmly and decisively. "It is not as simple as that." His eyes narrowed as he saw that beautiful, sensuous mouth harden. "Do you know your letters?"

A tinge of color touched the high cheekbones. She shook

her head, dropping her eyes to her lap. "Books and teachers have not come my way, sir."

"Hardly surprising," he replied matter-of-factly. Learning was an unusual accomplishment for most women, and unheard of for either sex in the world where she had dwelt hitherto. "But how can you expect to become an actor if you cannot read a part?"

"I have a good memory," she said a little truculently. "If someone reads the lines to me, I will remember them."

"And you imagine that someone is going to be prepared to devote that amount of time to an inexperienced slip of a wench?" He allowed a faint note of derision to creep into his voice and saw her flush deepen.

"Then I will teach myself. If you will lend me a book, I am sure I will be able to learn." The note of confidence rang true, and Nicholas wondered if this was another of the actor's tricks, or if she genuinely believed it.

"It will be quicker and easier if you have a tutor," he pointed out mildly. "I will undertake the task in exchange for your agreement to abide by my decisions." It would also give him the opportunity to assess the quickness of her wit, he reflected. If she was as intelligent as he suspected, the task ahead of them, in all its manifestations, would be greatly facilitated.

"What is it that you wish me to do for you in return?" Polly asked with slightly unnerving directness. "You said we would be of service t amp; each other." Slipping his coat from her shoulders, she stood up and began to open her smock. Her fingers shook slightly, but he had seen her naked already, so any embarrassment was surely ridiculous. "Do you wish to lie with me now?" This was the exchange she had expected-her virtue for his patronage. And she would count her fiercely protected innocence well lost, the currency that would buy her access to ambition.

Nicholas knew that he did want her-very much. And that if she removed her smock again, revealing that peerless body, he would be lost. Circumstances had intervened the last time, but there would be no disturbances in his own

house, his own bed, and the task he had assigned himself was sufficiently complicated without added entanglements. "No, I do not for the moment," he denied, his voice a trifle thick. "I think you should get into your own bed quickly." He wrenched his eyes away from the temptation of her breasts and walked over to a low table where reposed a decanter of brandy.

"Do you not find me desirable?" She sounded surprised, and a little disconsolate. "It is not the case, in general."

He whirled on her. It was a mistake since she now stood quite naked, glowing and perfect in the lamplight. "You said you were a maid?" he rasped.

Slowly she nodded, the honeyed river of her hair pouring over her shoulders. "I am, but many men have wished… have tried-" Her shoulders lifted in an expressive movement. "Prue stood my friend in that, else I'd have succumbed to rape long since. When I have taken the gulls abovestairs, they have always fallen asleep almost straightway."

Gulls! Nicholas winced at the appropriate term. He had been gull enough to fall for that beauty and the accomplished performance. He tried to look at her dispassionately as she stood before him and found that he could not. He tried to find anger, but there was none. This exquisite creature, who talked so matter-of-factly about her narrow escape from rapine brutality, had been sufficiently bruised and battered by life's ferocity.

It was an effort, but he managed to turn back to the brandy decanter. He filled two glasses. "Put on your smock and get into bed." He waited with averted back until a rustle and a creak indicated that he had been obeyed, then he turned and brought one of the glasses over to the truckle bed. "This will warm you."

Polly took the glass of Venetian crystal; never before had she handled anything so delicate or so precious.

"Where did you learn to speak as you do?" Nicholas asked casually. It was a question that had puzzled him, but he

also hoped that a change of topic would deflect the awkward intensity that had sprung up between them.

Polly sipped her brandy, a thoughtful frown creasing her brow. "Speak like 'ow? Oi speaks awrigh', dun Oi?"

Nicholas laughed, and she smiled mischievously over the lip of her glass. "You are an impertinent jade, Polly. Answer my question."

"Prue used to be in service with a parson in the country. Long time ago, before she married Josh. They let her keep me with her, although I was too young to work. No one really noticed me much. I used to hide in the corners and listen to the gentry talking. Then I'd practice to make the same sounds." She chuckled. "I'd make the folk in the kitchen laugh when I mimicked the master and mistress, and then I'd get an apple tart or something, so I learned to do it all the time. The family, and any visitors… I'd just listen for a bit, then I'd have it perfect." Her shoulders lifted in a tiny shrug. "Then, of course, Prue had to go and wed Josh. We came back to London, and no one thought it at all funny that I could speak like that-quite the opposite. It used to make Josh madder than a cornered fox. So I stopped."

A perfectly simple explanation, Nick thought, seeing in his mind's eye a lonely little girl of whom no one took any notice, slipping in and out of shadows, listening and observing, performing party tricks for attention and an apple tart. It was not a happy picture. "Prue is your kin?"

"My aunt." Polly drained her glass, holding it out to him. Her eyes closed, and she swayed a little. "I seem to be falling asleep." She slid down the bed, drawing the covers up to her chin. "I was born in Newgate. They were going to hang my mother, but she pleaded her belly, so she was sentenced to transportation instead. Prue took me as soon as I was born, and my mother was sent to the colonies."

There was silence, broken only by the hiss and pop of the fire. Kincaid replaced the Venetian glasses on the tray. It seemed an eon since he had walked into the Dog tavern for his rendezvous with Richard De Winter. It would be dawn in another hour; before then he had to concoct an explana-

tion for the presence in his chamber of this ravishing Newgate brat-an explanation that would satisfy Margaret, who ruled her household with a now unfashionable Puritan's severity.

The Lady Margaret first heard of the night's strange doings from her maid, when she brought her mistress her morning draft of chocolate. "A wench?" she demanded, sitting up in bed and straightening her nightcap. "Lord Kincaid brought a wench to the house?"

"So young Tom says, m'lady." Susan bobbed a curtsy, her demure expression hiding the inner excitement. There would be a mighty explosion over this, and the entire household was waiting with bated breath. The master did not share his sister-in-law's Puritan inclinations, and indeed, was known to mind his lust and his pleasure with the best at the court at Whitehall Palace. But he had some consideration for the Lady Margaret and, in general, kept those activities of which she would disapprove out of the house. Although undisputed master of the house and all within it, he had been hitherto content to leave the management entirely in his sister-in-law's hands, as long as a fair table was kept and matters ran in decent order so that he need never be afraid for the hospitality he would offer his guests.

Margaret sipped her chocolate, torn between the desire to hear all that the maid had to tell her and the knowledge that listening to servants' gossip was bad for household discipline. "And where is the girl now?" she asked, with an assumption of casualness.

There was an instant's silence as Susan bent to poke the fire. "No one's seen her, m'lady." She hesitated, then continued boldly, "But Tom says that his lordship carried her into his bedchamber." Susan kept her back to the bed, afraid that if there was an explosion of wrath, she might receive the overspill. Her statement could be considered insolent in its forwardness, and Lady Margaret corrected insolence with a supple hazel stick.

"I will rise," announced her ladyship, sending Susan bustling to the armoire.

Since it would never occur to Lady Margaret to show herself outside her chamber in even the most respectable undress, it was an hour later before she deemed herself ready. Her graying hair, free of curl, was confined beneath a lace coif. A wide lace collar adorned the kirtle of black saye that she wore beneath a sober gray silk day gown. Not a touch of color lightened the Puritan severity; the unimpeachable lace was her only decoration.

Eyes followed her measured progress down the corridor to her brother-in-law's chamber, but the owners kept themselves well hidden in doorways, or apparently busy with some domestic task that had brought them into the upper regions of the house. The house itself seemed to hold its breath as her ladyship rapped sharply on the oaken door.

This imperative demand for entrance brought Polly awake in the same instant that Nicholas pushed aside the bed curtains, irritably bidding the knocker enter. As his sister-in-law rustled in, his eyes fell on the occupant of the truckle bed; memory returned. He groaned inwardly. Margaret's eyes held the fanatical light of battle, and he had fallen asleep before he had time to concoct either explanation or a plan of action.

"I did not believe it possible," Margaret said, an extended forefinger shaking in accusation, her eyes blazing with righteous fury. "That you would bring a whore into this house-"

"I am no whore!" Polly protested indignantly before she had time to consider whether a discreet silence might be wiser. "You do not have the right-"

"Quiet!" thundered Nicholas, pressing a hand to his temples. The effects of mulled white wine, whatever potion had been intended to render him unconscious, and too little sleep were now combined to produce an appallingly dry mouth and a splitting headache. "Before you accuse, sister, you might wait for an explanation. You do not see the girl in my bed, do you?"

Margaret turned her full attention to the occupant of the truckle bed. Her mouth opened on a slight gasp. The girl's beauty was undiminished by her tumbled hair, sleep-filled eyes, and clearly indignant expression. Such beauty, in Margaret's opinion, could only be the devil's gift, sent to lead the unwary into temptation. The wench was bold-eyed, too, meeting Margaret's scrutiny, unflinching. It was not a reaction to which that lady was accustomed. Lowered eyes were the rule in her household when meeting the inspection of the mistress. She was dirty, too; her smock begrimed, black beneath her fingernails, her hair bedraggled, dark with dirt.

The Lady Margaret made rapid assessment, concluding that whether the girl be trull or no, her brother-in-law had not enjoyed her favors-not yet, at least. He tended to the fastidious.

"She's but a child, Margaret," Nicholas said in soothing accents, gauging his sister's reaction with a degree of accuracy. "An orphan. I found her last night in some danger of her life, through no fault of her own, and bethought me that you said Bridget was in need of a kitchen maid. You would not be so uncharitable as to deny her houseroom." It was a shrewd stroke. The Puritan, while she could be narrow and hard, could not permit herself to be thought uncharitable, although the charity she would offer would not necessarily be of a kind that suited the recipient.

"But I do not wish to be a kitchen maid," Polly expostulated. "I wish an introduction to-"

"Do you remember what we agreed?" Nicholas interrupted swiftly. If Margaret got wind of Polly's theatrical ambitions, she would cast her into outer darkness without compunction. The theatre was the devil's breeding ground!

Polly thought of being able to read and write, of a world far away from taverns and the grasping hands of drunkards, from Josh's belt and the obscene leer in his eye. She thought of the now-broken circle of her allotted destiny, and she kept silent.

"How is she called?" Margaret asked, directing the question at Nicholas.

"Polly," he answered. "What is your surname, Polly?" Polly shrugged. "Same as Prue's was before she married Josh, I suppose. Don't know my father's name," she added. "Prue didn't know either."

Nicholas winced as the pounding in his head reached a new pitch, unaided by this still uninformative if artless recital. "And what was Prue's name before she married?" "Wyat," Polly said. "But I've no need of it." "Of course you have need of it," declared the Lady Margaret. "No decent girl goes around unnamed."

"But I am a bastard," Polly pointed out, with devastating effect.

"You are insolent!" Margaret glared in ice-tipped fury, and Polly looked at Nicholas in sudden alarm. She was accustomed to bearing the brunt of Josh's anger, and Prue's on many occasion, but this lady seemed much more formidable than either of them.

"She but speaks the truth," Nicholas said swiftly. "It is innocence, not insolence, sister."

There was a tense silence while Margaret, lips compressed, continued to fix Polly with a baleful eye. Then, to Polly's heartfelt relief, she turned back to her brother. "Where are her clothes?"

Nicholas scratched his head; he had been expecting this question, but no satisfactory answer had yet come to mind. "There is the difficulty, sister. She has none but her smock."

Margaret looked astounded. "How should that be?"

"It is a little difficult to explain, and I do not care to do so at present." Kincaid opted for the assumption of authority- the master of the house who chose not to be troubled by certain matters. "Send one of the girls to the Exchange to purchase necessities for her. I will bear the cost myself; it need not come out of your household purse. In payment for her services as kitchen maid, she will receive three pounds a year and her keep." A hard look at Polly ensured her continued silence.

Margaret was not happy, but she could not gainsay the orders of her brother-in-law. Her own authority was depen-

dent upon his, for a man was master in his own house. It was a sore shame that Nicholas, unlike his late-lamented older brother, seemed to care little for the sober and devout regime that she and her late husband had fashioned for their household during the days of the Lord Protector. But Nicholas, his brother's heir, had been Baron Kincaid for the last three years, and his widowed sister-in-law was dependent upon him for house and home. Not that he was ever ungenerous in spirit or fact, but Margaret wished for the past, when he was still leading the life of a younger son, seeking what advancement he could at the court, where he was so manifestly at home. Now, with such a one at its head, what had been her household was becoming infused with the dangerous ways of that same loose and licentious court.

Such thoughts were acid and wormwood, as usual. She turned to the cause of all this trouble. "Come," she said shortly to Polly. "It is not decent for you to be in here." She went to the door, calling for Susan, who appeared, wide-eyed, almost before her name had been spoken. "Take her down to the kitchen." Margaret pushed Polly through the door with a grimace of distaste. "I will come down and see what is to be done with her in a minute."

"Sister!" Nicholas spoke with sudden briskness as he got out of bed, drawing a furred nightgown over his shirt. "One thing more." He walked to the window and drew back the heavy curtains, examining the gray day with a slight frown. "I know you do not believe in sparing the rod, Margaret, and while I would not in general interfere in your running of this household, which you do impeccably, in this instance you will stay your arm. If you find fault in her, bring it to my attention. Is it clear?"

Margaret's lips tightened. She was not accustomed to being spoken to in such a manner. "And is she not to be subject to my authority, then, brother? I cannot have, in my household, one who is excused faults for which others are punished."

"You will bring such faults as there may be to my attention," he repeated with gentle emphasis. "I do not imagine

such a slight diversion from the usual will disturb the immaculate order of the house. Your hand on the reins is too secure, my dear sister."

"And do you find fault in that?" She spoke stiffly through compressed lips, her backbone rigid as a steel rod.

"I think you are on occasion a little severe," he said with a sigh. His head was worsening by the minute, and he could not find the energy to speak with his usual circumspection. Margaret had been left to his charge by his brother's last wish, and he would honor that commitment in more than letter, for all that he despised the narrow rigidity of the Puritan. He had discoursed endlessly with Edward on the possibility of a happy medium between a life governed to the last degree by the rules of divinity and sobriety and one where there were no rules except those of excess. But Edward had been a learned Puritan, one with whom it was possible to discourse. His wife, unfortunately, saw only dogma, and Nick, for love of his dead brother, was obliged to keep the peace with the dogmatist. However, on this occasion, if Margaret's sensibilities were wounded by the truth, it could not be helped. He would not subject Polly to the Puritan's severity, certain as he was that that somewhat mischievous personality with its talent for improvisation would be sure to offend without intent within a very short space of time. However, he reflected with a slight smile, if that brute Josh had not managed to beat the spirit out of her, it was unlikely that Margaret would succeed.

The enigmatic smile did nothing to improve matters with his sister-in-law. "You are entitled to your opinion, brother," she said with harsh dignity. "I must, of course, be glad to have my faults pointed out to me. You may rest assured that I shall reflect upon what you have said." She turned on her heel, and left his chamber, closing the door with a gentleness that contained more reproach than the most violent slam.

Nicholas winced, pulling the bell for his footboy. Somehow he was going to have to weave a path through this tangle, and he had best start by discussing last night's inspira-

tion with De Winter. He had failed to make the rendezvous at the Dog last night, but he would be found at court this morning, where there would be opportunity for a brief word, a new rendezvous. Buckingham's suspicious eye had not yet fallen upon them, and for as long as they continued to play the gay courtiers with nothing on their minds but the pleasures of lust and dalliance, it would not do so.

If all went according to plan, the duke's eye would eventually fall upon the most ravishing actor yet to grace the king's theatre on Drury Lane. And that actor would then have another part to play.