Page 8 of Hit Me With Your Best Scot
He nodded, stepping back. “I reckon I know where to begin. And mayhap when I find ye, ye’ll tell me the tale of Mr. Jones.”
“Because you’re not a poacher?”
“Because if thereissuch a man, and if ye dunnae ken where he is, then he’s an idiot.”
“Then I shall save poor Mr. Jones the bother of being insulted, and inform you that I, the poor unfortunate, am a widow.”
The Highlander grinned again, the sight making her heart give an odd, unexpected thump. Good heavens. He looked like—she didn’t even know how to describe it. An angel of God, perhaps. One of the fit warrior angels who slayed demons and dragons. “My condolences, Mrs. Jones,” he drawled.
Before she could do something idiotic and admit that there never had been a Mr. Jones at all, the coach thankfully rolled into the street, and she lost sight of him in the darkness. A few of her admirers usually chased the coach for a street or two, but tonight the road behind the vehicle remained empty. Perhaps they weren’t willing to risk annoying the Highlander, and she certainly couldn’t blame them for that. Her only surprise was that they’d all had that much sense.
“The usual twice around Burton’s park?” the coachman asked from up above her head.
Persephone shook herself and leaned toward the window again. “Yes, Gus, thank you. We can’t be too careful.”
“I’ll make certain you get home safe, Persie.”
“I don’t know what I would do without you, Gus.”
“You’d have a bit of a walk. That’s for certain.”
Laughing, she opened her portmanteau and pulled out a plain blue muslin dress, a matching blue bonnet, and a hairbrush. Then she tugged the coach’s curtains closed, musing that Claremont had either not cared that she supposedly had a husband, or he’d deciphered that any actress who wished for a modicum of respectability stuck a Mrs. in front of her name, whether she had a Mr. waiting for her at home or not.
Ah, respectability—that fickle thing—seemed even more foolish once a lady realized how easily it could be purchased, and with such a simple lie. But she had realized it, and she’d also figured out the simplest way to keep all those lusty men at the theater’s back entrance from discovering where she lived: a silly wig.
First, she removed her jaunty hat and tossed it into the bag, swiftly followed by her wig of long, silver-blonde hair. Shaking out her own much shorter, honey-colored hair felt marvelous after hours of having the shoulder-length curls pinned tightly against her scalp, and as she brushed it out, she decided to leave it loose.
The risquépurple gown followed the other accessories into the bag, and she wriggled into the far more demure muslin gown before she set the bonnet over her head and tied it beneath her chin. There. Prim and proper once again. Of course, it was just another costume, but this one allowed her to live peacefully in St. John’s Wood without gaggles of men disrupting her and her neighbors’ lives.
Once she’d settled herself, she opened the curtains again and leaned back in the ill-sprung coach to look out the window toward the grand manor sitting alone in the darkness. Even at this hour, the windows of the Holme blazed, a sight even more striking after its owner, James Burton, had purchased all the bordering dairy farms and demolished the houses and barns, leaving a ruined pastoral mess just north and east of where most of the aristocracy laid their heads. If the rumors were true and he meant to build a park there to honor Prince George, that was all well and good, but in the meantime, half the grounds looked like a war had been fought there.
Gus had circled the Holme twice, which gave her time to change her clothes and him the ability to make certain they weren’t being followed. That done, he turned the coach up Charlbert Street to the small house she rented at number four, Charles Lane.
“We’re here, Persie, and nary a soul behind us,” he announced.
She stood and opened the door, hefting her portmanteau as she stepped down to the dirt road. “Thank you, Gus. Might I see you at half-eight in the morning?”
“That’s early for you, ain’t it?” the driver asked, leaning over the side of the coach to eye her.
“Yes, but we’re beginning rehearsals.”
“Then I’ll be here at half-eight. I’d rather drive you about than ferry all the housemaids and kitchen help about while they go searching for hair ribbons and pheasant eggs at all hours.”
Persephone grinned. “I promise never to ask you to take me to find pheasant eggs.”
The rotund coachman doffed his hat. “You keep paying me as generously as you do, and I’d go fetch you those eggs myself.”
With a cluck to his team, he and the coach rolled back into the street and turned south, back toward London proper. Sighing, Persephone walked up to the quaint blue door of her quaint gray house, nodding at her neighbor Mr. Beacham as he arrived home from his bakery, and went inside.
“You let that coachman speak to you far too familiarly, Persie,” said a female voice from the morning room doorway.
“Considering there are more than a handful of coachmen who won’t deign to transport an actress at all, Flora, I have no complaints about his form of address.” Persephonehanded over the portmanteau and her bonnet to the small, round woman who emerged from the doorway.
Flora Whitney grimaced. “You could hire your own driver. And own your own coach.”
“They wouldn’t fit in the house. And Mr. Praster wouldn’t appreciate horses in his hallways, anyway.”
Her maid—and former theater seamstress—waved her free hand. “Mr. Praster has quite a fondness for you. I don’t doubt he would tolerate horses in the dining room if you asked his permission.”
