Darling Beast (Maiden Lane #7)(18)

“Down to the dock to get those eels the wherryman promised me.” Maude set a basket—presumably containing the aforementioned eels—on the table. “Missed me, did you?” Her brows rose as she glanced at the notebook Apollo had reclaimed. “What’s that?”

Miss Stump sent him an ironic glance. “Caliban isn’t nearly as foolish as he was making us believe.”

“Then he can talk?”

Both women looked at him and Apollo could feel the heat burn his neck.

“No, he can’t.” Miss Stump cleared her throat. “Indio’s in his bath. I’d better see if he’s remembered to wash his ears—or if he’s flooded the floor again.”

She hurried into the back room.

Maude began unpacking her eels. “Brought back some water from the river to wash the dishes. It’s by the door, if’n you want to bring it in.”

Apollo pocketed his notebook and went to fetch the water. Had he known that they needed it, he’d have offered to go down to the river.

He set the bucket of water by the fireplace to warm, conscious that the old woman was watching him.

When he turned she pinned him with a gimlet gaze. “You’ve got a tongue and my Lily says as how you’re not stupid, so you mind telling me why you can’t speak?”

He opened his mouth—even after nine months it was an automatic reaction. After all, he’d spent eight and twenty years opening his mouth and having speech emerge—without thought or effort. Such a simple thing. A mundane, everyday thing, speech, the thing that set men apart from the animals.

Lost—perhaps forever—to him now.

So he opened his mouth and then didn’t know what to do, for he’d tried before, tried for days and weeks, and all that had occurred was a damnably sore throat. He thought of that day, of the boot shoved into his neck, of the Bedlam guard leering down at him as he threatened hell, and he could actually feel his throat closing, cutting off hope and humanity and the power of speech.

“Maude!” Miss Stump was there now and he had no idea what she saw on his face, but she was frowning fiercely—at the maidservant. “Stop badgering him, please. He can’t talk. Perhaps it doesn’t really matter why.”

It might make him a weakling, but he took her defense gratefully. A part of him railed against his own cowardliness. A man—even a man without the power of speech—shouldn’t hide behind a woman’s skirts. Apollo ducked his head, avoiding both women’s gazes as he strode to the door. This had been a mistake—he’d known it from the first. He should never have given in to the temptation to come here. To try to associate with other folk as if he were a normal man still.

A small, damp hand caught Apollo as he made for the door, and such was his disquiet, he nearly pulled away.

But he remembered in time and stopped.

Indio looked up at him, his hair in wet spirals, dripping onto his nightshirt. The boy had his brows drawn together, but underneath his stern expression there was hurt. “Are you leaving?

Apollo nodded.

“Oh.” Indio let go of Apollo’s hand and chewed his bottom lip. “Are you coming back? Daff wants you to.”

Since Daffodil was presently asleep on the hearth, this seemed extremely unlikely.

Apollo frowned, not knowing how to reply. He shouldn’t return. It was a danger to himself—and not only in the sense that his identity might be discovered.

“Please do.” Miss Stump’s voice was quiet, but when he glanced at her, her expression was firm.

He held her green gaze a moment more and then looked back at the boy and nodded.

The reaction was immediate and overwhelming. Indio’s face was taken over by his grin and the boy surged forward as if about to hug him. Only at the last minute did he pull himself back and hold out a hand instead.

Apollo’s palm engulfed the boy’s but he shook Indio’s hand as if he were a duke in velvet instead of a seven-year-old in damp linen, with bare feet.

He wished he could say something, but in the end all he did was nod again and walk out the door.

Still, he heard the old maidservant as she spoke to Miss Stump: “You’re a fool.”

THE PROBLEM WITH writing witty dialogue, Lily thought bitterly the next afternoon, was that ideally one should actually be witty in order to write wittily.

At the moment Lily felt about as witty as Daffodil—who was chasing a fly. As Lily watched, the little dog jumped on the old settee and snapped at the fly, missed—again—and nearly toppled off the back.

Lily groaned and laid her head in her folded arms. It was a sad thing indeed when one felt as intelligent as Daffodil.

“Uncle Edwin!” Indio had for once stayed close to the theater and his shout of ecstasy could be clearly heard through the door.

Lily hastily tidied her writing table, straightening the papers and picking up a quill that had fallen to the floor.

A second later the door to the theater burst open and Edwin Stump ducked inside, a wrapped parcel under his arm. He didn’t duck because he was so very big—he stood but a few inches taller than Lily herself—but because he was carrying his nephew on his shoulders.

Maude trailed behind with the remains of their washing in a basket. The maidservant glared sourly at Edwin.

“Oof!” Edwin exclaimed as he tumbled Indio onto the settee and set his package by it. Daffodil immediately leaped on the boy, licking his giggling face. Edwin turned to Lily, his hand pressed dramatically to the small of his back. “I think he’s put on a stone or more since I last saw him.”