A Dangerous Fortune(22)
Micky had become a handsome devil, with dark eyes and black eyebrows and curly hair grown a little too long. His evening dress was correct but rather dashing: his jacket had a velvet collar and cuffs, and his shirt was frilled. He had already attracted admiring glances and inviting looks from several girls seated at nearby tables, Hugh had noticed. But Maisie Robinson had taken a dislike to him, and Hugh guessed that was not just because of the remark about Jewboys. There was something sinister about Micky. He was unnervingly quiet, watchful and self-contained. He was not frank, he rarely showed hesitation, uncertainty, or vulnerability, and he never revealed anything of his soul—if he had one. Hugh did not trust him.
The next dance ended and Tonio Silva came to the table with Miss April Tilsley. Hugh had run into Tonio several times since school, but even if he had not seen him for years he would have recognized him instantly by the shock of carrot-colored hair. They had been best friends until that awful day in 1866 when Hugh’s mother had come to tell him that his father was dead and to take him away from the school. They had been the bad boys of the lower fourth, always getting into scrapes, but they had enjoyed life, despite the floggings.
Hugh had often wondered, over the years, what had really happened that day at the swimming hole. He had never believed the newspaper story about Edward’s trying to rescue Peter Middleton: Edward would not have had the courage. But Tonio still would not speak of it, and the only other witness, Albert “Hump” Cammel, had gone to live in the Cape Colony.
Hugh studied Tonio’s face as he shook hands with Micky. Tonio still seemed somewhat in awe of Micky. “How are you, Miranda?” he said in a normal voice, but his expression showed a mixture of fear and admiration. It was the attitude a man might have toward a champion prizefighter famous for his quick temper.
Tonio’s companion, April, was a little older than her friend Maisie, Hugh judged, and there was a pinched, sharp look about her that made her less attractive; but Tonio was having a great time with her, touching her arm and whispering in her ear and making her laugh.
Hugh turned back to Maisie. She was talkative and vivacious, with a lilting voice that had a trace of the accent of northeast England, where Tobias Pilaster’s warehouses had been. Her expression was endlessly fascinating as she smiled, frowned, pouted, wrinkled her turned-up nose and rolled her eyes. She had fair eyelashes, he noticed, and there was a sprinkling of freckles on her nose. She was an unconventional beauty but no one would deny she was the prettiest woman in the room.
Hugh was obsessed by the thought that, since she was here at the Argyll Rooms, she was presumably willing to kiss, cuddle and perhaps even Go All The Way tonight with one of the men around the table. Hugh daydreamed about a sexual encounter with almost every girl he met—he was ashamed of how much and how often he thought about it—but normally it could only happen after courtship, engagement and marriage. Whereas Maisie might do it tonight!
She caught his eye again, and he had that embarrassing feeling that Rachel Bodwin sometimes gave him, that she knew what he was thinking. He searched around desperately for something to say, and finally blurted out: “Have you always lived in London, Miss Robinson?”
“Only for three days,” she said.
It might be mundane, he thought, but at least they were talking. “So recently!” he said. “Where were you before?”
“Traveling,” she said, and turned away to speak to Solly.
“Ah,” Hugh said. That seemed to put an end to the conversation, and he felt disappointed. Maisie acted almost as if she had a grudge against him.
But April took pity on him and explained. “Maisie’s been with a circus for four years.”
“Heavens! Doing what?”
Maisie turned around again. “Bareback horse-riding,” she said. “Standing on the horses, jumping from one to another, all those tricks.”
April added: “In tights, of course.”
The thought of Maisie in tights was unbearably tantalizing. Hugh crossed his legs and said: “How did you get into that line of work?”
She hesitated, then seemed to make up her mind about something. She turned around in her chair to face Hugh directly, and a dangerous glint came into her eyes. “It was like this,” she said. “My father worked for Tobias Pilaster and Co. Your father cheated my father out of a week’s wages. At that time my mother was sick. Without that money, either I would starve or she would die. So I ran away from home. I was eleven years old at the time.”
Hugh felt his face flush. “I don’t believe my father cheated anyone,” he said. “And if you were eleven you can’t possibly have understood what happened.”
“I understood hunger and cold!”
“Perhaps your father was at fault,” Hugh persisted, though he knew it was unwise. “He shouldn’t have had children if he couldn’t afford to feed them.”
“He could feed them!” Maisie blazed. “He worked like a slave—and then you stole his money!”
“My father went bankrupt, but he never stole.”
“It’s the same thing when you’re the loser!”
“It’s not the same, and you’re foolish and insolent to pretend that it is.”
The others obviously felt he had gone too far, and several people began to speak at the same time. Tonio said: “Let’s not quarrel about something that happened so long ago.”