The Perfect Crimes of Marian Hayes (London Highwaymen, #2)(60)

“Ah.” Rob looked embarrassed, of all things. “My part comes after things have been fenced.”

“You’re being mysterious.”

He rubbed his palm over his face. “Not deliberately. My job is to make sure the money is properly distributed.”

“Meaning you give it away.”

“Not to put too fine a point on it, but yes.”

“To the worthy poor,” she guessed.

“I don’t much care if they’re worthy,” Rob said. “None of my business.”

“And you give all of it away?”

“No, no, of course not,” he said hastily. “We keep some back for expenses—horses, bed and board, and so forth. And anyone who works with us gets a share, naturally. A few years ago, Kit held on to enough to buy the shop. I buy some things for myself, sometimes, too.”

“Like what?” she asked.

“Clothing.” He was blushing furiously now and she was delighted. “Not a lot! But I won’t go about in shabby clothes if I can help it.”

“I’ve been admiring your coat.”

“Shut up, you,” he grumbled.

“I have! I noticed it yesterday.” In truth, all his clothing was made of good fabric and tailored to fit him. She was charmed to realize that he indulged what was either vanity or rich tastes in this one small way. But she also noticed that he seemed to regard this coat—which was a simple brown woolen thing—as an extravagance.

“I wonder,” she said carefully, “what your plans were for the five hundred pounds you meant to have from me and Percy.”

His gaze darted over her shoulder to the window and then back to her. “The same as I do with everything else.”

“You would have just given it away.” She found that she was surprised, not that he meant to give it away, but that he hadn’t a grand plan for how to give it away. “I thought that perhaps you had debts to pay, or more likely that a friend had debts to pay. Or that you meant to do something more . . . more official, I suppose. Such as start a school or fund an orphanage.”

He made a face. “There are plenty of people funding those things. Irritatingly noble-minded individuals who want to inflict their prayers onto the people they deem worthy of their largesse. I’d rather get money into the hands of somebody who needs to pay his landlord.”

This seemed a frightful waste. How could one know that the recipient of these funds wouldn’t spend it all on the bottle or other vices? Rob put a good deal too much trust in his fellow man. “Aren’t you worried that the money will be spent on drink?” she asked.

“If you recall, I spend money on drink from time to time.”

“I see,” Marian said, even though she didn’t. She was trying to, though.

“For that matter, you spend money on drink as well. And so does everyone you know.”

“I suppose that, by your logic, my money isn’t any more mine than it is anybody else’s,” she said.

“I wouldn’t go quite that far,” he said, “but that’s about right.”

She nodded. It still sounded fairly mad to her, but she could see how it didn’t to Rob. When Rob had first explained his philosophy to her, calling robbery a targeted tax on the wealthy, she hadn’t quite known whether he was being entirely serious. But that was before she had really known him. Oh, she had known the Rob who wrote to her; she had known that he was clever and oddly sympathetic and a terrible blackmailer. But she hadn’t yet known that he regarded robbery as a sort of vocation.

“You look like you’re about to launch into a speech telling me why I’m wrong,” Rob said, in the tone of a man who had heard many such speeches and enjoyed none of them.

“No,” she said. “That would be a waste of my breath. You clearly know what you’re doing. I was only wondering whether there was a way to rob your targets without anyone risking their necks.”

She found that she very much disliked the prospect of Rob endangering himself. It might not be an exaggeration to say that she would not know a moment’s peace if she believed Rob to be in a prison awaiting the hangman.

He gave her an odd look. “But darling, that’s half the fun.”





Chapter 28




This trip had been a mistake. Even though they had spent the entire day side by side, Rob somehow missed Marian anyway. He missed her preemptively; he regretted any future where he couldn’t simply turn his head and see her.

And now he was standing outside her door, his fist raised, already knowing that whatever happened inside would only make it worse.

When he tapped at the door, he held his breath. Perhaps she already had gone to bed. Perhaps she had more common sense than he did—she could hardly have less—and recognized this for the terrible idea that it was. But she answered the door wordlessly and he slipped in before anyone could see him.

The only light came from the hearth, and the room was warm enough that he knew she had paid for extra firewood. Her hair was unpinned, falling down her back in smooth waves, as if she had just brushed it, and she wore a faded woolen wrapper. She looked soft and touchable in a way she seldom did, all her hard edges temporarily put away, and he almost couldn’t believe that he got to see her this way. He was sure nobody else did.