Thief of Shadows

Page 1

Chapter One
Oh, gather ’round, my dears, and keep the candles burning bright, for tonight I’ll tell you the tale of the Harlequin Ghost of St. Giles…
—from The Legend of the Harlequin Ghost of St. Giles
LONDON, ENGLAND
MAY 1738
The body in the road was the absolute cap to the day.
Isabel Beckinhall—Baroness Beckinhall—sighed silently to herself. Her carriage had come to a standstill in the worst part of London—the dirty streets of St. Giles. And why was she in St. Giles as dark descended? Because she’d volunteered to represent the Ladies’ Syndicate for the Benefit of the Home for Unfortunate Infants and Foundling Children at the final inspection of the new home, more fool she.
Never volunteer. Not even when pleasantly filled with warm scones and hot tea. Warm scones were obviously the work of the devil or perhaps of Lady Hero Reading, one of the two founding patronesses of the home. Lady Hero had refilled her teacup and looked at Isabel with guileless gray eyes, asking prettily if Isabel would mind meeting with Mr. Winter Makepeace, the home’s dour manager, to look over the new building. And Isabel had blithely agreed like some scone-filled, mindless cow.
And the damned man hadn’t even shown!
“Moo,” Isabel muttered to herself just as the carriage door opened to admit her lady’s maid, Pinkney.
“Ma’am?” Pinkney asked, her blue eyes wide and startled. Of course, Pinkney’s blue eyes were nearly always wide and startled. She was one of the most sought-after lady’s maids in London and a paragon of the latest fashion, despite being barely past one and twenty and somewhat naïve.
“Nothing,” Isabel said, waving aside her bovine utterance. “Did you find out why it’s taking so long to move the dead man?”
“Oh, yes, my lady,” Pinkney said. “It’s because he’s not dead.” Her pretty dark blond brows drew together. “Well, not yet anyway. Harold the footman is having a time pulling him aside, and you wouldn’t credit it, ma’am, but he’s a comic actor.”
It was Isabel’s turn to blink. “Harold?”
“Oh, no, my lady!” Pinkney giggled until she caught Isabel’s steady gaze. “Er”—the maid cleared her throat—“the not-yet-dead man is. A comic actor, that is. He’s dressed as a harlequin, mask and all…”
Isabel was no longer listening. She’d opened the door and climbed from the carriage. Outside, the gray day was growing grimmer with the advent of nightfall. Fires flared to the west, and she could hear the rumbling of rioters from that direction. They were very near. Isabel shivered and hurried to where Harold and the other footman were bent over a figure on the ground. Pinkney had probably mistaken the costume or the man or the mask or—
But no.
Isabel drew in a sharp breath. She’d never seen the notorious Ghost of St. Giles in person, but she had no doubt at all that this must be him. The prone man wore black and red motley. His floppy brimmed black hat had fallen from his head, and she could see that his brown hair was tied back simply. A short sword was sheathed at his side and a long sword lay by one broad hand. A black half-mask with a ridiculously long nose covered the upper half of his face, leaving his square chin and wide mouth revealed. His lips were parted over straight white teeth, the upper lip a little bigger than the bottom.
Isabel snapped her attention up to her footman. “Is he alive?”
“He’s still breathin’ at least, m’lady.” Harold shook his head. “Don’t know for how long, though.”
A shout came from nearby and the sound of smashing glass.
“Put him in the carriage,” Isabel said. She bent to pick up his hat.
Will, the second footman, frowned. “But, m’lady—”
“Now. And don’t forget his sword.”
Already she could see a mass of people rounding the corner down the street. The footmen glanced at each other then as one lifted the Ghost. Harold grunted under the weight, but he made no complaint.
A crowd gathered at the end of the street and someone gave a shout.
The rioters had spotted the carriage.
Isabel picked up her skirts and trotted after her footmen. Harold gave a great heave and dumped the Ghost and his sword into the carriage. Isabel scrambled rather inelegantly inside. Pinkney was staring wide-eyed at the Ghost sprawled on the floor of the carriage, but for the moment Isabel ignored him. She tossed the hat on top of him, lifted her seat, and withdrew two pistols from the hidden compartment underneath.
Pinkney squeaked in alarm.
Isabel turned and handed the pistols to the footmen at the carriage door. “Don’t let anyone climb the carriage.”
Harold’s jaw tightened. “Yes, m’lady.”
He took the pistols, gave one to Will, and mounted the running board behind the carriage.
Isabel closed the carriage door and knocked on the roof. “Fast as you can, John!”
The carriage started forward with a lurch just as something hit the side.
“My lady!” Pinkney cried.
“Hush,” Isabel said.
There was a lap robe on the maid’s seat, and Isabel tossed it over the Ghost. She sat back on her own seat, clutching the window as the carriage rocked around a corner. Something else knocked against the carriage. A grimacing face appeared suddenly at the window, its tongue smearing lewdly against the glass.
Pinkney screamed.
Isabel stared at the man, her heart racing but her gaze steady as she met his eyes. They were bloodshot and filled with maddened rage. The carriage jolted and the man fell away.
One of the pistols fired.
“My lady,” Pinkney whispered, her face white, “the dead man—”
“Not-quite-dead man,” Isabel muttered, eyeing the robe. Hopefully anyone glancing inside would see a robe thrown carelessly on the floor, not the hidden Ghost of St. Giles. She braced herself as the carriage swung wildly around a corner.
“Not-quite-dead man,” Pinkney obediently repeated. “Who is he?”
“The Ghost of St. Giles.”
Pinkney’s robin’s-egg-blue eyes widened. “Who?”
Isabel stared at her lady’s maid in exasperation. “The Ghost of St. Giles? The most notorious footpad in London? Goes about in a harlequin’s costume, either ravishing and murdering or rescuing and defending, depending on whose stories you believe?”
If Pinkney’s eyes got any bigger, they might fall out of her head altogether.
“No?” Isabel waved a hand toward the window and the shouting and screaming outside and said sweetly, “The man that mob wants dead?”
Horrified, Pinkney stared at the robe. “But… why, my lady?”
The second pistol fired with a deafening BOOM! Pinkney jumped and looked wildly out the window.
Dear God, they were out of ammunition. Isabel prayed the footmen were safe—and that they could hold off the rioters without their guns. She was an aristocrat, but just last year a viscount had been dragged from his carriage, beaten, and robbed in St. Giles.
Isabel took a deep breath and felt under the robe until she found the hilt of the Ghost’s sword. She drew it out as Pinkney eyed her askance and put the heavy thing across her lap. If nothing else, she could hit someone over the head with it if need be. “They want him dead because this morning he cut Charming Mickey O’Connor down from the gallows.”
Pinkney actually brightened at this. “Oh, Charming Mickey the pirate! Him I’ve heard of. They say he’s handsome as sin and dresses better than the king himself.”
Of course her lady’s maid had heard of a well-dressed pirate.
“Quite.” Isabel flinched as something hit the window, cracking the glass. “They probably chased him all the way from Tyburn gallows, poor man.”
“Oh.” Pinkney bit her lip. “Pardon me, my lady, but why have we picked him up?”
“Well, it does seem a pity to let anyone be torn apart by a mob,” Isabel drawled, not letting the girl see the fear that made her heart beat hard. “Especially a young, handsome man.”
Pinkney looked timidly at Isabel. “But, my lady, if the mob wants him and he’s in our carriage… ah…”
Isabel drew on all her strength to smile firmly. Her hand tightened on the hilt of the sword across her lap. “That’s why we’re not going to let them know we have the Ghost, are we?”
Pinkney blinked several times as if working through this logic; then she smiled. The child really was quite pretty. “Oh, yes, my lady.”
The lady’s maid sat back as if quite confident that they were all out of danger now that everything had been explained.
Isabel twitched aside the curtains to peer through the cracked glass. She wasn’t nearly as sanguine. Many of the streets in St. Giles were narrow and twisting—the reason that her carriage had been traveling so slowly earlier. A mob could move much faster afoot than they. But as she looked behind them, Isabel saw that the mob was beginning to fall away. John Coachman had found a straight stretch of road and was urging the horses into a trot.
Isabel let the curtain fall with a heartfelt sigh of relief. Thank God.
The carriage drew abruptly to a stop.
Pinkney shrieked.
“Steady on.” Isabel gave her maid a severe look. The last thing she needed was Pinkney having the vapors if they were about to be attacked.
Isabel peeked out the window and then hurriedly shoved the sword back under the carriage blanket.
And only just in time. The carriage door opened to reveal a stern-looking dragoon officer in scarlet uniform.
Isabel smiled sweetly. “Captain Trevillion. How good to see you—after we’ve outrun the mob.”
The captain’s craggy cheekbones darkened, but he still cast a sharp eye about the carriage. For a moment his gaze seemed to linger on the blanket.
Isabel kept her eyes on his face, her smile firmly in place. Casually she lifted her feet and rested them atop the robe.
The dragoon’s gaze snapped back to her. “Ma’am. I’m glad to see you and your party safe and sound. St. Giles isn’t a place to be loitering today.”
“Yes, well, we didn’t know that when we started out this morning.” Isabel raised her eyebrows in polite inquiry. “Have you caught that pirate yet?”
The captain’s thin lips tightened. “It’s only a matter of time. We’ll get him and the Ghost of St. Giles. The mob has them both on the run. Good day to you, my lady.”
She nodded, not daring to breathe until the dragoon had slammed shut the carriage door and given the word to John Coachman to move on.
Pinkney sniffed scornfully. “Soldiers. Their wigs are always terribly out of fashion.”
Isabel slumped back against the squabs and gave her lady’s maid a quick grin.
Half an hour later, the carriage was pulling up before her neat town house.
“Bring him inside,” she ordered Harold when he opened the doors.
He nodded wearily. “Yes, m’lady.”
“And, Harold?” Isabel descended the carriage, still clutching the sword.
“M’lady?”
“Well done. To both you and Will.” Isabel nodded to Will.
A shy grin split Harold’s broad, homely face. “Thank you, m’lady.”
Isabel permitted herself a small smile before she swept into her town house. Edmund, her dear, late husband, had bought Fairmont House for her shortly before he’d died and had gifted it to her on her twenty-eighth birthday. He’d known that the title and estates would go to a distant cousin and had wanted her properly settled with her own property, free of the entail.
Isabel had immediately redecorated on moving in four years ago. Now the entry hall was lined in warm golden oak panels. A parquet wood floor was underfoot, and here and there were items that amused her: a dainty pink-marble-topped table with gilded legs, a laughing boy faun holding a hare in black marble, and a small oval mirror edged in mother-of-pearl. All items she loved more for their form than their worth.