She’d threatened him with dancing next. Santiago could dance, at least in the manner that suggested he was thinking of entirely more horizontal activities, but he hadn’t a clue where to start with all the holding hands and skipping about he’d witnessed at the Russell ball. Some of the sets seemed to go on for half an hour or more.
For a moment he thought wistfully of the tango he had learned in Buenos Aires. Too few girls, too many men, and so they had twined around each other in the sultry heat. But there would be none of that here in England.
You could just leave, he thought as he climbed the rickety wooden steps to his office. He could find someone to run the London office for him. Simply slip onto one of his own ships and sail away, be just another sailor, a smuggler, a pirate, with no responsibilities except to his own pocket. He could forget that mausoleum of a house, and the liveried carriage, and all the gold-edged invitations, and nobody would know who he was ever again.
Be Santiago for the rest of his life. Not even Mr. Just Santiago.
Or he could face up to his responsibilities, stop running away like a child, and be the man his father had never been. It couldn’t be hard. All he had to do was not be a dreadful human being and he was already ahead.
He thumped the two heavy volumes of the Peerage down on his desk and shoved them to one side to get some actual work done. Somebody around here had a shipping empire to run and he didn’t see anyone else doing it.
And yet…
His fingers drummed on the desk. The entries were not in alphabetical order, Tiffany had explained, but in order of precedence, which was ancient and intricate and, he suspected, completely made up. But there was an index, alphabetical by title.
Dammit. He’d already drawn the first volume towards him and was flipping through the index. There. Page 27.
His grandfather’s styles, achievements and titles were listed at length. His father’s, less so. Merely his name, and dates of birth and death, the latter being somewhat approximate.
Santiago’s own birth had been recorded too, with a neat list of names borrowed from his father. There were no further details. What would the Peerage know of a street rat, a guttersnipe, a pirate and a smuggler?
‘One day, son,’ his exiled father had told Santiago, ‘you’ll go back to England, and the old man can see what he’s got for an heir. A grubby little urchin the colour of mud.’ He’d cackled into his tankard. ‘And he can’t pretend you’re not his heir, because I’ve sent all the proof of legitimacy. He’s stuck with you. With a little street rat who doesn’t even know what pounds, shilling and pence are.’
‘Then tell me,’ said Santiago, who had been very small and hadn’t yet learned what a snake his father truly was.
‘Tell you? And spoil it? You’ll be the downfall of that whole lineage, my boy—the ruin of everything he’s worked for! He’ll spin in his grave! Now, go and tell your mother to stop praying. If she wants to spend so much time on her knees, I’ve got something else she can do…’
A knock on the door brought him back to Limehouse, and his dusty, bare office. ‘Guv?’ It was Penderghast, the dock foreman, ambling in with the post. ‘Your boy’s cheating at dice. The lads think it’s funny now, but they might change their minds.’
‘Duly noted.’ It all looked fairly routine, until he reached a letter on fine paper written in a delicate hand. Was there a faint scent coming off it?
‘And that cove’s hanging around again. Shall I tell him to piss off?’
‘Ask him if he wants a job managing a boisterous and overpaid messenger boy,’ Santiago murmured, not looking up.
‘Guv?’
‘Nothing. Let me know when the Revenue men arrive, yes?’
‘Are we expecting them?’
‘There’s a ship in the dock half full of coffee, of course we’re expecting them.’
He waited until his foreman had lumbered off again, impatient to open Tiffany’s missive. What sweet nothings had the siren inscribed to him?
Dancing lessons with M. Lemaigre, Jermyn St, above Granet & Chapelle tailors. After luncheon at two today. TW. PS you will also need a tailor but do not patronise said, no availability, Nora might know someone. PPS This cannot be your address. Move somewhere fashionable.
Well. Hardly a love letter. He wondered whether to cry off the dancing lessons, then figured it meant he might get to see Lady Tiffany’s bosom in motion, and decided it was probably worth it.
* * *
On Monday, Tiffany attended an At Home at Lady Greensword’s townhouse, where she pretended not to be bored silly by the boasts of the lady’s two nephews as they related the excitements of their Grand Tour. Behind them hung a painting of Venice. Tiffany amused herself by making the little boats bob about, one at a time, while no one was watching. Well, Aunt Esme had told her that she needed to practice control, and it was almost certainly the closest she’d ever get to seeing real boats in Venice.
At the same time, Mr Santiago had been sent to dancing lessons, the outcome of which she itched to hear. But Tuesday was taken up with a visit to the modiste, during which Elinor spent a full hour choosing between two equally dull shades of peach cambric, and Tiffany barely managed to slip out unseen in order to hand a hastily scribbled note to a street urchin who promised to run to Limehouse with it.
On Wednesday the reply to her note came back that Mr Santiago had attended his dancing lessons and found them most invigorating—these last two words underlined. He had been listening to her!
Thursday morning involved a promenade on Rotten Row, during which Elinor kept up a lamentable habit of including her in the conversation so that she couldn’t fade into the background. She had smuggled out a note to Mr Santiago that he must—as an absolute imperative—find a decent tailor and pay him very well before he could even think of appearing in Society. She added that he must also find an excellent valet, because a gentleman could not possibly dress himself, and that no, Billy would not be an acceptable substitute. The boy hardly even wore shoes most of the time.
PS. I may not be able to respond as I am to attend the theatre and such an event is always followed by tiresome visits from gentlemen I was not able to repel. Last time the house positively reeked of lilies.
His reply came on Friday, attached to an arrangement of daisies.
My dear Lady Tiffany, One cannot possibly imagine your repelling any gentleman at all. Unless some sort of mythical tentacled animal is involved, in which case I find such an event entirely plausible.
‘Well!’ she said, as Elinor physically strained towards her in her eagerness to read it.
Had he just complimented or insulted her? Did he mean he was repelled by her? The thought wounded her, which was ridiculous because she had no attachment to the man. He was a tradesman with pretensions, and he was blackmailing her.
‘Theophania?’ insisted Elinor, and Tiffany made the words on the page become completely illegible. It was easy to do, now she wasn’t trying to suppress it. Aunt Esme called it a glamour, and said some witches couldn’t do them at all. She said Tiffany had a natural affinity for illusion and manifestation, and all she really had to do was allow herself to explore it.
‘It’s from Aunt Esme,’ she said, laying the note down beside the daisies. ‘Merely thanking me for my help choosing embroidery colours.’
‘You spend too much time tending to that old woman,’ scolded Elinor. ‘Does she even know anyone in Society? You must cultivate friendships with suitable young ladies of your own age. You don’t want to be a sad old maid, do you?’
Aunt Esme isn’t sad. Neither is Gwen, or Madhu or Nora. But Tiffany couldn’t say that out loud.
Later, in her room, she composed and burned half a dozen replies to Mr Santiago. Eventually she wrote to her aunt to tell her that Mr Santiago was unconscionably rude and that perhaps she could do no more for him.
Do not forget the bargain you have contracted
Came the reply that a raven dropped on the floor as it flew through Tiffany’s bedroom the next morning.
No. How could she? If she did not teach him how to go about in Society, then he would tell everyone she was a witch. And if that sort of rumour spread, then it didn’t matter if no one believed in witches anymore. The scandal of having any kind of rumour attached to the family would have Elinor packing her off back to Dyrehaven—or worse. It was not out of the realms of possibility that she might be sent to Bedlam.
Mr Santiago might be blackmailing her, but of the two threats, Tiffany found Elinor by far the most terrifying.
And… You are bored, Lady Tiffany. Damn the man for being right! Teaching him how to be a gentleman was much more fun than being a lady.
Esme’s note went on.
I have found a tailor who may also be willing to act as valet. He was not born a gentleman either so he will be a perfect fit I think. Do come on Monday.
Tiffany had no idea what that meant. She spent the next two days alternately deciding not to go to her aunt’s on Monday and then deciding to attend, just to spite Mr Santiago.
Sunday’s church sermon was all about doing one’s duty. Tiffany wouldn’t have put it past her aunt to have influenced the vicar, but she conceded the point, and told a thin-lipped Elinor that she had promised to visit her aunt the following day.
‘Who is this aunt?’ said Elinor, who was always grumpy on Sundays because the servants only undertook light duties. ‘I have never heard of her.’
‘She is most elegant,’ said Tiffany. ‘I believe she attended Lady Russell’s ball earlier in the year.’
‘She did?’ This appeared to mollify Elinor. ‘It is strange we did not meet her there.’
‘I am sure you were simply too in demand,’ Tiffany replied, wondering if she was laying it on a bit thick.
On Monday, she marched forth with Morris to the townhouse in Mayfair, and entered to find the carpets in the drawing room rolled back and the furniture pushed against the walls. Nora, Gwen and Madhu stood on one side of it, with Santiago—in another disreputable coat, because evidently this tailor had not attended him just yet—and a somewhat mute and terrified Billy on the other.
‘Ah, Tiffany! Capital. Do take off that spencer, my dear, and perhaps change out of your half boots. It is time to practice dancing properly.’
‘But I have been practising with Monseiur Lemaigre,’ said Santiago. His hair looked ruffled, as if he had been running his hands through it. She did not know another gentleman who would do such a thing.
‘And does Monsieur Lemaigre offer clever conversation at the same time?’ said Aunt Esme. ‘When one dances at a ball, one does not do so in silence. One converses pleasantly and wittily with one’s partner.’
Santiago ran one hand through his hair, and Tiffany couldn’t help her sigh of annoyance. He glared at her. ‘My exhaustion amuses you?’ he demanded.
‘Ex— I don’t know what you mean,’ she said. She had been avoiding looking at him directly, but now she did, she could see the tiredness around his eyes. The loose cloth around his neck looked as if it had been pulled at in exasperation half a dozen times and his waistcoat was quite wrinkled. He really must acquire a valet.
His dark brows rose. ‘Really, my lady? You don’t think that your lessons might be in the slightest bit tiring?’
‘Well, I managed them, and I am but a weak and feeble woman,’ she replied.
‘You are neither of those things, but also, you are not running an international shipping business from the other side of the city.’
‘Limehouse is not even in the city, and if it’s such a tedious journey, perhaps it is time to look into that fashionable address I suggested to you?’
‘I have a fashionable address!’ he snapped.
Tiffany laughed. She couldn’t help it. ‘Limehouse is not fashionable,’ she said. ‘Limehouse is not anywhere.’
‘I—’ Suddenly realising he’d said too much, Santiago cleared his throat. ‘I was not speaking of Limehouse,’ he muttered.
‘Oh?’
There was a slight silence, during which Tiffany realised everyone else, the witches and Billy, had been watching them back and forth. Billy’s eyes were wide. Madhu looked like she wanted to smile. Gwen and Esme shared a lightning-quick glance.
‘I … inherited a property,’ Santiago said reluctantly. ‘It is … in one of your “fashionable areas”.’
Tiffany felt her mouth drop open. ‘And yet you continue to live above your warehouse, like a … a tradesman?’
‘I am a tradesman,’ Santiago fired back. His eyes flashed darkly.
‘I thought that was the problem!’ Tiffany threw up her hands.
A sudden trill of music made them both jump. Aunt Esme had seated herself at the pianoforte and played the opening chords of a quadrille.
‘If you are going to converse, you may as well dance,’ she said. She played the first bar, and looked at them expectantly. ‘Form up.’
To Tiffany’s surprise, the three witches did as she asked, Nora taking the gentlemen’s side. Billy hesitantly stood next to her and said, ‘I dunno all the steps.’
‘Have you not been in attendance when Mr Santiago has his lessons?’ said Esme. ‘Madhu, please partner Billy. Everybody?’
She played the opening chord again and the three ‘gentlemen’ bowed, with varying degrees of success. Grudgingly, Tiffany had to admit Santiago’s was actually not bad. She curtseyed in response, and as they were at the head of the set, accepted his hand.
He was not wearing gloves. Hers were very fine. She felt the heat of his fingers through them.
‘I do not understand why trade is so unacceptable in Society,’ he said, as they began to dance.
‘Then you understand nothing of Society.’
‘I understand that there are a hundred things I may be sneered at for,’ he said.
‘We do not sneer.’
‘You are sneering now!’
‘I am dancing, Mr Santiago,’ said Tiffany, allowing herself a smile as she circled away from him, and wiping it back off as she turned back.
‘Many aristocrats make money from trade,’ said Santiago.
‘No. Many aristocrats make money from business interests.’
‘It is the same thing—’
‘It is not the same thing.’ How to explain it? ‘We employ people to take care of business for us. We do not sully our hands with it ourselves.’
‘You think my hands are sullied?’ They briefly squeezed hers before he let her go again and Tiffany felt herself flush.
‘I—’
‘If I employed someone to take care of my business for me, this would be acceptable?’
‘I— Well, yes. I mean…’ He would have still come from trade, but it would be more acceptable if he didn’t manage it himself. ‘I mean, Mr Santiago, that members of the aristocracy do not live above the shop, as it were. They never attend the shop.’
‘But I thought the aristocracy made its money from vast estates in the countryside?’
‘Yes, of course.’ She was on surer ground here. ‘My family owns several.’
‘And the tithes from the people who work the land pay for your family to live in luxury?’
He was making it sound exploitative now. ‘Mr Santiago, you are sounding positively French.’
He grinned at her. His teeth were very white. They made his skin look even more golden.
She reminded herself that the men of Society did not have golden skin. No, they have skin like uncooked dough. No! That wasn’t the point.
‘We take care of the people who work for us,’ she explained, before he could start singing the Marseillaise and running off to support Bonaparte. ‘And we take care of the land.’
‘I see. The land surrounding your country house? Dyrehaven, is it not? I looked it up,’ he added, before she could ask how he knew. Well, she had been the one to give him a copy of the Peerage after all.
‘That is my brother’s house, yes. And yes, of course, he supervises the estate manager and—’ Too late she realised his trap. He was cleverer than Elinor at manipulating her!
His dark, dark eyes glinted and he smiled a pirate smile at her. ‘Then he does not live above the shop so much as right in the centre of it?’ he said.
‘All right, you have made your point.’
‘Have I?’ he murmured, and at that point they peeled away from each other to walk around the rest of the set. Tiffany didn’t know if the others had been conversing as she and Santiago had. She had almost forgotten they were there. The pianoforte itself seemed to fade away as they walked the length of the drawing room, eyes on each other even as the other dancers moved between them.
His lashes were so thick and dark it looked as if he had lined his eyes with black paint, the way actors did. And his eyes themselves, like the darkest pot of chocolate before the milk was added. They held hers as she returned to him, and then he took her hands.
She wanted to rip off her gloves and feel his hands. Would they be as rough as they looked? Would they be strong and capable? Would they be warm? What would they feel like against her skin?
His lips were parted as he gazed down at her. One lock of hair fell over his eyes, that lock she had wanted to brush away before. Her fingers twitched to do that now. She was so close she could see the tiny imperfections in his skin, the darkness at his jaw, the pink indent of the scar on his cheek. She suddenly, shockingly wanted to know how it tasted.
‘Tiffany?’ said someone, from a great distance.
His breath stirred the curls at her temple. She could feel the rise and fall of his chest when she leaned forward. His eyes were so deep and dark she could drown in them…
‘Oi! Lady Tiffany! Have you gone deaf?’
Nora’s foghorn voice had Tiffany leaping backwards and stumbling. What had she been doing? Shamelessly pressing herself up against Mr Santiago, practically purring like a kitten, seconds from licking him all over?
‘Are you all right?’ That was Madhu, taking her arm and leading her to a chair.
‘I know what’s wrong with her,’ said Nora, somewhat slyly.
‘Please excuse me,’ said Santiago, bowing briefly and leaving the room with unseemly haste.
‘And him,’ cackled Nora.
‘Nora, please,’ said Esme.
‘’Tis pleasant to see young newlyweds,’ said Gwen and there was an embarrassed silence.
‘I am quite well, thank you,’ said Tiffany, who felt as if she’d been melted from the inside. ‘Nothing that a cup of tea won’t fix.’
‘I will go and put the kettle on,’ said Madhu, and the dancing lesson appeared to be over.
* * *
Santiago paced the kitchen corridor, trying to think of bilge-water and suppurating wounds and all the times he’d nearly died in terrifying storms at sea. Anything to take his mind off the heaving of Lady Tiffany’s bosom, the pinkness of her parted lips, the yearning in her eyes.
He’d seen how tightly fashionable evening breeches were worn. If he’d been wearing those now, absolutely everyone would have seen his reaction to her.
Dear God. Did she go around looking at every man she danced with like that? No wonder she was supervised so heavily by her sister-in-law. There must be a crowd of desperate suitors beating at her door day and night!
He slapped his own cheeks to try to regain control, but every time he blinked he saw the heave of that soft white flesh, the tremble of each white-gold curl, the plumpness of her lips…
Someone cleared their throat. ‘Mr Santiago? If you will excuse me…’
It was Madhu, making her way past him with her gaze averted. He stepped back, and waited until he could put the table between them before he followed her into the kitchen.
‘Is everything all right?’ he said, as she filled the kettle from the jug and set it on its hook over the fire.
‘Yes, of course. Everyone needed a rest. Your dancing lessons are coming along well,’ she added politely.
‘Are they? There are so many steps. I don’t know how I’m supposed to learn them all.’
Madhu shrugged. ‘Just follow everyone else. That’s what I do.’ She ran her hand over the tea caddy and closed her eyes briefly, and did Santiago imagine it or did something change in the room?
Of course. She was a witch. They were all witches. That was why he’d had such a ridiculous reaction to Lady Tiffany. She looked like a siren, with all that white-gold hair and her bloody heaving bosom. She was probably casting a spell on him!
A scratch at the back door interrupted his budding righteousness, and they both turned to see a young man standing there. He was impeccably dressed and carried a stack of large boxes.
‘Good afternoon,’ he said, in a voice that sounded even younger than he looked. ‘I am Robinson.’ He gave a small bow. ‘I believe I am expected?’
Madhu gave him a lightning glance and said, ‘The tailor?’
‘Yes, ma’am. I have brought samples of my work.’
‘You are very young,’ said Santiago. The boy was beardless as a girl.
‘I am skilled enough, sir. Is the gentleman in residence? Nora—that is, Miss Leatherheart said I should come today to meet him.’
Madhu deliberately let her gaze stray to Santiago, who straightened. Clearly he didn’t resemble a gentleman yet.
‘I assume I am the gentleman in question?’ he said.
‘Well, unless it’s Billy…’
Robinson looked him over, assessing Santiago in a manner that suggested he could see every sinew and the bones they connected. ‘My apologies, sir,’ he said, as if he wasn’t assessing Santiago like a piece of horseflesh. ‘I did not expect to find you in the kitchen.’
‘I came for tea,’ said Santiago, as if that was an excuse. ‘Mr Robinson, perhaps we should go upstairs.’
‘Yes, sir.’
Santiago led the way, because Madhu was still making tea, and found the others where he had left them. He avoided the gaze of Tiffany, who was fiddling with her reticule and not looking at him either.
Nora was playing cards with Billy. ‘Oh, there you are,’ she said to Robinson. ‘You found the place all right then?’
Robinson gave a small bow. ‘Yes, thank you, Miss Leatherheart.’
She laughed. ‘It’s Nora to you.’
Robinson gave a polite smile. ‘Above stairs, ma’am, it is Miss Leatherheart.’
‘Quite right too,’ said Mistress Blackmantle, looking over Robinson in much the same way he had looked over Santiago. ‘Nora says your tailoring is excellent.’
‘It is, ma’am. I have brought some samples. I can have them altered for the gentleman tonight if he wishes.’
‘There is no rush,’ said Mistress Blackmantle, before Santiago could say the same. ‘I had in mind a small soirée here in a week or so. Mr Santiago, would that suit you?’ Again, before he could answer she went on. ‘Evening dress, then, as the priority, but he will definitely need outfits for daytime. Strolls in the park, afternoon calls, and so on. I expect that after my event you will be the talk of the town.’
‘Is that a good thing?’ said Santiago.
‘It depends,’ murmured Tiffany.
‘Shall we say ten days’ time? A week Thursday?’
Robinson had put down the boxes and taken out a notepad and pen. ‘Thursday the eleventh. Yes, ma’am. I have some pieces I can make up for morning and afternoon wear too. Two of each?’
‘Yes, and linen.’
Santiago might as well not even be here. He found his gaze straying to Tiffany, and made himself stop. She was a witch. She had bewitched him!
‘Would you also be willing to act as Mr Santiago’s valet for the evening affair?’
‘Ye-es,’ said Robinson, glancing with a very practised eye at Santiago’s clothes. Which had looked perfectly fine when he’d put them on, and indeed were some of his favourites that he flattered himself made him look quite smart. Not that he’d been trying to impress Tiffany, because she was a witch and she was bewitching him and he was wise to it. That wasn’t the point.
Not the point at all.
‘I can,’ said Robinson, ‘but sir will require a valet for the daywear too.’
‘What? Is “sir” me?’ said Santiago. ‘I assure you I can dress myself.’
Mistress Blackmantle laughed. Lady Tiffany laughed. Even Robinson permitted himself a small smile.
‘No,’ said Tiffany, somewhat patronisingly. ‘If you wish to enter Society at the highest level, then no, you cannot dress yourself.’
‘Everyone would know,’ said Mistress Blackmantle.
‘It would be a physical impossibility,’ said Robinson.
Santiago sent him a questioning glance. The boy was surely just trying to get himself a job?
‘These clothes are not designed for a gentleman to dress himself in,’ said Robinson. ‘That is their very point. Servants dress themselves, sir. Shopkeepers dress themselves. Gentlemen do not.’
‘So…’ Santiago frowned. ‘The fact that I can’t dress myself in these things is the point?’
‘Exactly,’ said Tiffany.
‘Stupid, innit,’ said Nora. ‘That’s gin rummy, kid, pay attention.’
Billy uttered a word that Santiago would wager had never been heard in a polite lady’s drawing room. Only Tiffany looked surprised, and even she less than he would have expected.
‘Now,’ said Mistress Blackmantle. ‘You will require a valet, Mr Santiago. How about taking on Robinson on a trial basis? To ready you for my soirée and perhaps some daytime events following on from it?’
Santiago only had the vaguest idea of what a valet actually did. Helped him dress, cleaned his clothes?
Can he make me look like a gentleman? Or even with all this fine tailoring and a man to help me into it, will I still look like a pirate and a smuggler, a guttersnipe from the worst stews of South America?
I wonder if it will ever stop feeling like I am pretending?
‘Do you not have other employment, Mr Robinson? As a fine tailor’—whose wares they still hadn’t seen—‘and valet, why are you not in demand?’
There was a delicate pause. From the corner of his eye, he could see Nora’s face screwing itself up.
‘I’m afraid my face didn’t fit, sir,’ said Robinson blandly. ‘I have been doing piecemeal work, sir, and therefore have no employer to give notice to.’
‘Shall we say a trial period of a fortnight?’ said Mistress Blackmantle, as if Santiago wasn’t there.
‘That would suit me, ma’am. Sir?’
‘I … yes?’ said Santiago helplessly.
‘Half a crown a week?’ said Mistress Blackmantle.
Robinson’s flawless brow creased a little. ‘Were it just valeting I should say yes, ma’am, but I shall also be tailoring. Would ten bob a week be acceptable?’
‘For the owner of Santiago Pacific Trading, I should think so,’ said Mistress Blackmantle, then as an afterthought glanced at Santiago.
Ten shillings a week was a lot of money. He could see Billy’s eyes getting wider and wider from across the room.
But if he was to look the part…
He glanced quickly at Tiffany. She gave a very quick, very decisive nod.
‘That would be acceptable,’ said Santiago, and then he was a gentleman with a valet.