Darling Beast (Maiden Lane #7)(5)

His apprehension was borne out when the woman backed farther away from him and caught her young son’s hand. “Come. Let’s go find where Daffodil has run off to.”

“But, Mama,” the boy whispered loudly. “What about the monster?”

It didn’t take a genius to understand that the child was referring to him. Apollo nearly sighed.

“Don’t you worry,” the woman said firmly. “I’m going to talk to Mr. Harte as soon as I can about your monster. He’ll be gone by tomorrow.”

With a last nervous glance at him, she turned and led the boy away.

Apollo narrowed his eyes on her retreating back, slim and confident. Green Eyes was going to be in for a shock when she found out which of the two of them was tossed from the garden.

Chapter Two

The king had a great army and with it he marched across field and mountain, subjugating all the peoples he met until at last he came to an island that lay in an azure sea like a pearl in an oyster shell. This he conquered at once and, seeing how beautiful the island was, sent for his queen, and caused a golden castle to be built there for their home. But on the first night he slept in that place a black bull came to him in a dream…

—From The Minotaur

For a man who owned a pleasure garden, Asa Makepeace certainly didn’t live in luxury—if anything, he sailed perilously close to squalor.

Apollo finished climbing the three flights of rickety stairs to Makepeace’s rented rooms the next morning. Makepeace lived in Southwark, which was on the south bank of the River Thames, not terribly far from Harte’s Folly itself. The landing held two doors, one to the right, one to the left.

Apollo pounded on the right-hand door, then paused and placed his ear to it. He heard a faint rustling and then a groan. He reared back and thumped the wood again.

“D’you mind?” The left door popped open to reveal a shriveled elderly man, a soft red velvet cap on his head. “Some like to sleep of a morning!”

Apollo turned his shoulder, shielding his face behind his broad-brimmed hat, and waved an apologetic hand at the man.

The old man slammed his door shut just as Makepeace opened his own.

“What?” Makepeace stood in his doorway, swaying slightly as if in a breeze. “What?” His tawny hair stood out all around his head like a lion’s mane—assuming the lion had been in a recent cyclone—and his shirt was unbuttoned, baring a heavily furred barrel chest.

At least he was wearing breeches.

Apollo pushed past his friend into the room—although not far. There simply wasn’t much space to move. The room was swarming, teeming, breeding with things: towers of stacked books stood on the floor, a table, and even the big four-poster bed in the corner, a life-size portrait of a bearded man leaned against one wall, next to a stuffed raven, which stood next to a teetering pile of chipped, dirty dishes, and next to that was a four-foot-tall model of a ship, rigging and all. Colorful costumes were piled haphazardly in one corner and papers were scattered messily on top of nearly everything.

Makepeace shut his door and a few sheets fluttered to the floor. “What time is it?”

Apollo pointed to a large pink china clock sitting on top of a stack of books on the table before looking closer and realizing the timepiece had stopped. Oh, for God’s sake. He chose a more direct way to show the time by dodging around the table, crossing to the only window, and yanking the heavy velvet curtains open.

A cloud of dust burst from the fabric, dancing prettily in the early morning sunlight streaming into the room.

“Ahhh!” Makepeace reacted as if skewered. He staggered and flung himself back on the bed. “Have you no mercy? It can’t be noon yet.”

Apollo sighed and crossed to his friend. He pushed one leg over ungently and perched on the side of the bed. Then he took out his ever-present notebook and a pencil stub.

He wrote, Who is the woman in the garden? and shoved the notebook in front of Makepeace’s eyes.

Makepeace went cross-eyed for a second before focusing on the writing. “What woman? You’re mad, man, there isn’t any woman in any garden unless you’re talking about Eve and that garden, which would make you Adam and that I’d pay to see, especially if you wore a girdle of oak leaves—”

During this ramble Apollo had taken back the notebook and written more. Now he showed it to the other man, cutting him off mid-rant: Green eyes, overdressed, pretty. Has a little boy named Indio.

“Oh, that woman,” Makepeace said without any show of embarrassment. “Lily Stump. Best comic actress in this generation—perhaps any generation, come to think of it. She’s impossibly good—it’s almost as if she casts a spell over the audience, well certainly the male members. Uses the name Robin Goodfellow on the stage. Wonderful thing, made-up names. Quite useful.”

Apollo gave him a jaundiced look at that. Asa Makepeace was more commonly known as Mr. Harte—though very few knew both of the man’s names. Makepeace had taken the false name when he’d first opened Harte’s Folly nearly ten years ago. Something to do with his family being a religious lot and disapproving of the stage and pleasure gardens in general. Makepeace had been vague about it the one time Apollo had quizzed him on the subject.

Apollo scribbled in the notebook again. Get her out of my garden.

Makepeace’s eyebrows shot up when he read the note. “You know, it’s actually my garden—”