When Octavius had told Dex and Newingham that he intended to teach Miss Toogood some techniques with which to defend herself, Dex hadn’t turned a hair. Newingham, however, had been shocked. Shocked about the droit de seigneur. Shocked that Octavius intended to give Miss Toogood a lesson in self-defense. Shocked, period.
But Newingham was a pretty easygoing fellow, and after he’d stopped squawking and spluttering he’d agreed to assist with the lesson.
Now that the girls had gone to bed, that time had come.
“The schoolroom?” Octavius suggested.
Miss Toogood lit the candles in the schoolroom, then blew out the taper and turned to face him. She looked a little self-conscious, a little awkward, and he couldn’t blame her. What they were about to do was highly irregular. Scandalous, even. But despite being irregular and scandalous, it was also necessary and important, and he wasn’t going to go to bed until he’d armed Miss Toogood with the skills she needed.
The question was: where to start?
He thought back to Vauxhall Gardens and what he’d done to free himself. “Right, let’s begin.”
“Are you going to teach me how to box?” Miss Toogood asked dubiously.
Octavius shook his head. “I’m going to teach you how to hurt someone enough to make them let you go.”
She looked even more dubious. “Hurt someone?”
“Yes,” Octavius said, the memory of Baron Rumpole trying to drag him into the shrubbery vivid in his mind. “If you’re subject to an advance that’s physical and forceful, then you’ll need to be physical and forceful to escape it.”
She chewed on her lower lip for a moment.
“He probably won’t expect you to fight back,” Octavius said, to reassure her. “The surprise of that alone will give you an advantage. Chances are you won’t need to hurt him much at all.”
Miss Toogood looked somewhat relieved by this statement.
Octavius glanced at the others. Dex was leaning against the closed door, his arms folded, idly interested. Newingham had taken up position by the worktable. He also had his arms folded. He didn’t look idly interested, though. He was frowning, as if he thought that Octavius was being a great deal too blunt.
Octavius ignored him. Bluntness would keep Miss Toogood safer than ambiguity and polite roundaboutation.
“There are three places you should aim for,” he told Miss Toogood. “The eyes, the nose, and the groin.”
Newingham’s frown intensified at the word “groin.”
Octavius took no notice. “Let’s start with the nose. Punch it, if you can, but you might not be able to, in which case you can use your hand like a hammer.” He showed her what he meant, closing his hand in a fist and wielding it like a hammer. “You can use your elbow or the heel of your hand, or even your forehead.” He beckoned to his cousin. “Dex.”
Dex peeled himself away from the door and sauntered into the middle of the schoolroom.
Octavius demonstrated breaking Dex’s nose with a punch, a hammer blow, an elbow, the heel of his hand, and a headbutt. Miss Toogood watched closely. “If you’re going to do it, commit to it,” Octavius told her. “Don’t hesitate. Do it hard. Put all your strength into it.”
She nodded.
“Now, with the eyes, you can punch or use your elbow, but you can also scratch and gouge and try to poke them out.”
Miss Toogood pulled a face, but she nodded again.
“As for the groin . . . men are very easily hurt here. It’s our Achilles heel, if you will. Hit a man hard enough in the groin and you’ll bring him to the ground.”
Her eyebrows lifted at this. “Truly?”
Octavius nodded. So did Dex. Newingham, who was clearly struggling with his sense of propriety, just looked like a stuffed fish.
“It’s the most effective way to disable a man,” Octavius told her. He grabbed Dex’s shoulder for balance and then aimed his knee at his cousin’s groin, halting only a few inches away.
Dex winced and tensed, but stood strong. It was Newingham who recoiled and said, “By Jove, Otto. Is this really necessary?”
“Yes,” Octavius said, and demonstrated the move again. He didn’t give a damn how inappropriate it was. “As you can see, your skirts may get in the way if you have to do this.”
Miss Toogood nodded thoughtfully.
Octavius released his cousin’s shoulder and stepped back. “You can kick a man there, too, or use your elbow if you get the chance, or even punch, but whatever you do, do it as hard as you can.”
Miss Toogood nodded again.
“And if you can’t do anything I’ve shown you, if you can’t punch or kick, use your teeth. Bite him somewhere. Bite hard. Sink your teeth into his hand until you hit bone. Bite his ear off if you have to. Bite his nose off. Make a noise, be as loud as you can. Grab his head and scream into his ear. Deafen him. Make him want to get away from you.”
His voice had risen as he spoke. His final words echoed loudly in the room. There was a slightly shocked silence. Everyone was staring at him.
Octavius refused to feel embarrassed. This was important, damn it.
“Are you right-handed?” he asked Miss Toogood.
She nodded.
“Let’s suppose he grabs your right wrist.” Octavius did just that, reaching out and gripping her tightly. Miss Toogood’s wrist was slender, much more finely boned than his, and it struck him how vulnerable she was—how vulnerable all women were—and just how important it was that she learned to defend herself. “Can you get away?”
Miss Toogood tugged and twisted but couldn’t pull free, and he knew exactly how that felt, thanks to Baron Rumpole.
“If I have your right wrist it doesn’t mean you’re helpless. You can use your left hand and elbow. You can use your feet and your knees. You can bite my hand and scratch my face and kick and scream.” He smiled at her. “Go on, try it.”
“Try screaming?” she said doubtfully.
He laughed. “No. Try using your left hand. What can you do with it?”
After a moment, Miss Toogood mimed scratching his eyes out.
“Good,” he said. “And what else?”
“Hit him on the nose,” Dex suggested helpfully.
After Miss Toogood had metaphorically bloodied Octavius’s nose by a variety of methods, he swapped wrists and had her practice some more. Then he took hold of both of her wrists, one in each hand. “Now, what can you do?”
“Scream,” she said. “And bite. And kick you in the, ah, the groin.”
“And the knee,” Dex said abruptly. “Kick him hard enough in the knee and he’ll fall right over.”
“True,” Octavius said, and wondered why he’d not thought of kicking Rumpole’s knee at Vauxhall Gardens.
The answer was that he’d felt too threatened, that he’d been too panicked.
“You can break a man’s knee that way,” Dex said helpfully. “Give it a try, Miss Toogood. Don’t use your toe; use your heel. As if you’re stamping on something. Put your whole weight behind it.”
Dex demonstrated the movement on Octavius’s left knee, and it was his turn to wince instinctively. Miss Toogood mimicked Dex. The hem of her dress rose as she did so. Octavius noted that she had very fine ankles. In fact, based on that glimpse, he’d go so far as to call them the finest ankles he’d ever seen.
After Miss Toogood had practiced several times, Octavius released her wrists and stepped back, glad that his knees were still intact. “Do you think you could do any of that for real, if you had to?”
Miss Toogood considered this question seriously and then nodded. “If I had to, yes.”
“Good,” he said. “Let’s practice again tomorrow night.”
“Is that necessary?” Newingham, the voice of propriety, asked from his position by the worktable.
“Yes,” Octavius said. “It is.” He met Miss Toogood’s eyes and spoke quietly, trying to convince her without scaring her: “If you should ever be attacked, it won’t be like this. You’ll be afraid and you won’t have time to think things through. The more you practice now, the more likely it is that you’ll be able to fight back.” He almost added, Trust me, I know, to the end of that statement, but managed to stop himself in time; he couldn’t refer to Vauxhall Gardens, however obliquely, without inviting questions he couldn’t answer. “So, another lesson tomorrow?”
Miss Toogood barely hesitated. “Yes.”
“Good.” He was relieved enough to grin. “You did very well, Miss Toogood. Perfectly, in fact.”
He wondered if she heard what he’d come to think of as their private joke in that “perfectly.” He thought she might have. Her mouth tucked in at the corners as if she was suppressing a smile. “Thank you,” she said, and then she looked past him to Newingham and said, “Lord Newingham, I know it’s not my place to thank you for coming to see Edith and Frances, but your attention and your kindness mean the world to them. I hope you won’t take it amiss if I thank you on their behalf?”
Newingham went bright pink with embarrassment, because the only reason he was in Hampshire was that team of blood bays. “Not at all,” he said. “It’s been my pleasure. They’re, uh, they’re good girls.”
“Yes, they are,” Miss Toogood said. “Very good-hearted. But they’re also extremely shy, and you’ve been so kind to them and so patient. I’ve never seen them as happy as they’ve been today.”
Newingham went even pinker. “My pleasure,” he said again, and then, “By Jove! Is that the time? We’d best be going.”
Octavius would have gladly lingered in the schoolroom with Miss Toogood, but Newingham was heading for the door with great determination. “Come along, Otto, Dex! Miss Toogood, it’s been a pleasure. Good night.”
“Good night,” Octavius said to Miss Toogood. He wanted to take her hand and kiss it, but it wouldn’t have been at all appropriate, so he merely nodded to her and followed Dex from the schoolroom.
Newingham hustled them along the corridor and down one flight of stairs, then halted on the landing. “You do remember that we’re the baron’s guests, don’t you, Otto? We’re meant to be spending our evenings with him, not with governesses.”
“We’re unwanted guests,” Octavius reminded him.
Newingham inhaled in a manner that could only be called pompous. “Courtesy demands that—”
“The devil with courtesy,” Octavius said. “You came here to see your nieces—ostensibly. They’re still in the schoolroom, too young to dine downstairs, so why shouldn’t you dine upstairs with them? Rumpole’s not going to complain. In case you haven’t noticed, he likes you about as much as you like him.”
Newingham impersonated a fish for several seconds, opening and closing his mouth, then said, “But it’s the height of rudeness.”
“No,” Dex said. “Merely middling rudeness. But if it bothers you so much, old fellow, you can dine with your brother-in-law. Otto and I will be up in the nursery having dinner with your nieces.”
Newingham gritted his teeth and then said, “I don’t want to dine with Rumpole.”
“Then don’t,” Octavius said.
Newingham scowled at them both. “You’ve got no manners, the pair of you.”
“No manners at all,” Dex said cheerfully. “But we’re very good-looking, so that makes up for it.”
Octavius snorted at this nonsense. So did Newingham.
They descended another flight of stairs and halted on the next landing.
“Billiards?” Newingham said, with no real enthusiasm.
Octavius shook his head. “I think I’ll turn in. That hill knocked the stuffing out of me.” He sent Dex a significant glance.
“Me, too,” Dex said.
“What a pair of old fograms you are,” Newingham said, and then smothered a yawn. He bade them good-night and headed off down the corridor.
Octavius glanced at Dex.
“You’re not really tired, are you?” his cousin asked.
“No.” He rubbed his hands together. “I want to go hunting.”