Duke of Midnight (Maiden Lane #6)(92)

Maximus turned on the sputtered protests of innocence and outrage. They were a waste of time.

He descended the stairs again without the guidance of the elderly maid.

Outside, the boy was patiently waiting with the horse. “Good lad,” Maximus said to him. “Would you like to earn a little more today?”

The boy nodded eagerly.

“I need you to run a message for me.” Maximus gave the boy his address and the message to tell Craven, making him repeat it back word for word. Then he sent the boy out.

Maximus mounted his horse and made a show of riding away.

When he was out of sight of Illingsworth’s house, he dismounted and led the horse back around to an alley that had a view of Illingsworth’s front door.

There he settled down to wait and see what Illingsworth would do with his ultimatum.

“I KNEW THAT lovely shade of hunter green would exactly suit you,” Lady Hero said that night as they walked toward the theater at Harte’s Folly.

“Thank you.” Artemis glanced distractedly around the pleasure garden before reminding herself that Apollo would hardly be out in the open here. No doubt he’d found some place to hide behind the scenes.

She smoothed down the skirts of her new dress sadly. It had been originally started for Lady Hero, but when Hero had realized that she would be needing dresses of an entirely different cut very soon, she’d insisted that Artemis have it. The modiste had delivered it to the Home for Unfortunate Infants and Foundling Children that afternoon, along with the two other dresses made specifically for her. Miss Picklewood had decided that the orphanage was the best place for Artemis to stay, just until she could journey to Miss Picklewood’s dear friend Miss White. It seemed that Miss White was in need of a lady’s companion.

Artemis sighed. She was grateful—truly she was—but the prospect of returning to her old life, even with a different mistress, simply made her depressed.

Or perhaps it was leaving Maximus that left her so despondent.

She looked down at the wonderful dress. Wherever would she wear it when she was accompanying an elderly lady in Bath? Perhaps she could sell it. She stroked it again, rather longingly. Of silk damask, the dress had a low, round neckline, edged with a tiny border of exquisite lace. The lace also decorated the full ruffles at the end of the elbow-length sleeves. The whole was simply sublime, and Artemis thought wryly that she’d never worn such a lovely thing in all her life.

She wished Maximus could see her in it.

Artemis looked around the sparkling pleasure garden in something like despair. Lights in tiny blown-glass globes had been strung from the fantastically shaped bushes and trees, creating a magical effect. She could already hear strains of stringed instruments floating in the air. The footmen were dressed whimsically in yellow and purple suits, some with lavender flowers or ribbons in their ornate wigs.

It was such a wonderful place, Harte’s Folly, and after tonight it would be lost to her.

Besides her, Phoebe, Lady Hero and her husband, Lord Griffin Reading, and Miss Picklewood, there was also Isabel and Winter Makepeace, her hosts at the orphanage, and Lady Margaret and her husband, Godric St. John. She didn’t know the gentlemen very well, but the ladies she’d considered her friends. They were all members of the Ladies’ Syndicate for the Benefit of the Home for Unfortunate Infants and Foundling Children. Penelope was a member as well, of course, but she hadn’t yet arrived.

But then Penelope was almost always late, Artemis thought a little wistfully.

Phoebe was chattering with her sister as they reached the theater and waited for everyone to come up from the dock—for Harte’s Folly was just off the south bank of the Thames, and the best way to reach it was by way of hired barges. Miss Picklewood caught Artemis’s eye and seemed to know her mood, for she had a look of understanding on her face as she inclined her head.

On impulse, Artemis bent her head to the elder lady’s as they entered the theater’s wide doors. “Thank you.”

“Oh, my dear, you have no need to thank me.” Miss Picklewood blushed. “I hope you know that I’ve never condemned you for your choices. Well do I know the peculiar loneliness of ladies such as ourselves.”

“Yes.” Artemis looked away. “I wish it could be otherwise.”

Miss Picklewood snorted. “It could if Maximus made it so.”

Artemis was about to reply when they were hailed by Lord Noakes, just entering the theater with his wife. “Miss Picklewood, Miss Greaves, well met. I wasn’t aware you were back already from the country, Miss Picklewood.” He glanced speculatively at Phoebe.

Lady Noakes’s pinched face looked nervous this evening as she clutched her husband’s arm.

Miss Picklewood, an old hand at social innuendo, merely smiled. “I’m simply stopping for a bit before returning to my friend. I do so love Harte’s Folly, don’t you, my lord, my lady?”

“Oh, indeed,” Lady Noakes twittered before glancing at her husband and abruptly falling silent.

Lord Noakes nodded easily. “But isn’t the duke escorting you ladies tonight?”

“We’ve no lack of escort,” Miss Picklewood said, gesturing to Lord Griffin and the other gentlemen now joining them with their ladies. “I fear that the duke had other things to attend to tonight.”

An odd, twisted smile crossed Lord Noakes’s face. “I hope he isn’t off chasing phantoms.”