“Give me your favor; my dull brain was wrought
With things forgotten.”
MACBETH, MACBETH ACT I, SCENE III
Athing or two they could be doing together came to mind—and they would be naked while they did it. Lasses didn’t wear trousers where he came from, Coll reflected, but then he was in a kilt—which had been called scandalous and barbaric by more Sassenachs than he had fingers to count. Given that, he had no complaints at all about her appearance. Not a one.
With her long legs and slender waist, her bosom half-concealed beneath a superfine shirt, waistcoat, and a blue coat that sat just a bit too large across her shoulders, Persephone Jones looked like a well-dressed waif. A very attractive, brown-haired waif with large blue eyes and a grin that made them dance, but a waif nonetheless. “Before I answer that, I have to ask ye where Mr. Jones might be,” he said, already better than halfway to hating the man.
She gave a dismissive wave of her hand. “Oh, somewhere about. Why do you ask?”
“Because I’m nae a poacher.”
“Ah. A hunter, then. You’re assuming, though, that I can be caught.”
“I reckon I could make a good go of it.”
Her expression speculative, the lass approached him, lifting up on her toes to make herself taller. Even so, the top of her head barely reached his shoulder.
“What sort of hunter are you, MacTaggert? Do you hang your trophy up on the wall for everyone to admire? Or do you eat what you catch?”
Good Lord, she was going to have him poking out from under his kilt in another damned minute. “I’ve a healthy appetite,” he returned.
“Persephone,” a female voice whispered from behind him. “Five minutes.”
“Ah, excuse me, MacTaggert. I have another costume change, and no more time to chat.”
As she passed by Mr. Huddle, the wee man leaned in to whisper something into her ear. At that, she sent another appraising glance at Coll before she vanished into the dim backstage. Coll would have asked what the devil they were gossiping about, but a stone wall rolled in between them, followed by a banquet table, a set of chairs, a giant candelabra, and a throne.
By the time all the furniture had made it onto the stage and the men who’d moved the things had returned to the wings, Charlie Huddle had vanished. More significantly, Mrs. Persephone Jones was nowhere to be seen, either. At least he knew where to find her: on the stage. While the scenery lads marched back and forth, replacing the forest with a fortress, Coll shifted toward the main curtains and parted them with his fingers.
The audience seemed full to the rafters, which made sense now, given both the lass’s talent and the fact that this was the final night of her being Rosalind. Shifting a little sideways, he could just make out Lady Aldriss’s box. Francesca herself sat there, stone-faced, while his sister Eloise dabbed a handkerchief at her betrothed’s nose. The two lasses and their families who’d come to ambush him remained, one of them in tears and the other one’s mother weeping.
Christ on the cross. Aye, he needed to find a wife before Eloise’s wedding, and that date now loomed but four weeks away. But if a lass could weep over losing him after three minutes of conversation, it wasn’t him she was after; it was his damned title. And he wasn’t desperate enough yet to agree to his mother’s suggestions, anyway.
When he’d first realized there was no getting around his mother’s edict, he’d thought to find himself a lass he could wed, bed, and leave behind in London while he returned to Scotland and did as he pleased. While he’d never admit to changing his opinion about that, his brothers’ success at finding women they loved—and who loved them in return—had turned his head a mite. He could tolerate an English lass if love were involved. If that didn’t happen, he could always fall back on his original scheme. Surely even a damned leper with a title could find a bride in four weeks.
In the meantime, he’d found a fine-looking lass to distract him from his bloody conundrum. And even if all he could do was watch her and indulge his imagination, that seemed a much more pleasant way to spend the evening than dodging marriage-minded goslings and the imperious goose in her well-positioned box.
“So, you’re the one who sent Waldring scurrying. Thanks for that,” a voice came from behind him in a very cultured Sassenach accent. “He tends to charm a lady onto her back before any of the rest of us can say hello. You’ve rendered him impotent—at least until that bruise heals.”
Coll stepped back from the curtains and turned his head. Sounding arrogant wasn’t an easy task when a fellow had to keep his voice pitched lower than a mouse’s squeak, but the tall, blond man standing in the shadows managed it, regardless. “And who might ye be?” he asked.
“Claremont. James Pierce, the Earl of, to be precise.”
Narrowing his eyes a little, Coll took in the gray coat, mauve waistcoat, and black trousers. Well-cut and expensive, he’d wager. The man had even brought a bouquet of red roses. And he was the one about whose absence the other two had been thrilled. “I’ve nae seen ye about.” That had to mean something, because he’d been dragged to nearly every proper event held in London this Season.
“I’ve been in the south, seeing to my properties. Well, overseeing the construction of a new wing at Claremont Hall, actually.” The pretty fellow tilted his head. “From the way you’re eyeing a certain attractive lady, I see Waldring isn’t the only one to have attempted to move in during my absence.”
A stone tumbled into the pit of Coll’s stomach. An unnamed disappointment over something he’d scented, but not gotten close enough to taste. “If she’s yers, ye’ve naught to fear from me. If ye’re another of the herd of Sassenach roosters preening in hopes that the hen’ll look in yer direction, then I reckon ye’ve a fight on yer hands.”
The earl smiled. “Ask her yourself.”
As if on cue, Penelope Jones emerged from the gloom, wearing yet another pair of trousers and a green coat. “MacTaggert,” she said, with a grin and a nod.
“There you are, my dear,” Claremont said, sketching an elegant bow and holding out the posies.
“Claremont!” she exclaimed, dabbing a quick curtsy. “I hadn’t expected you back yet.” She took the flowers, gave them a quick sniff, and handed them off to a woman walking at her heels. “I’ve no time to converse, I’m afraid.”
“That is what later is for,” the earl returned, sending Coll a very pointed look over her head—a look that said he’d proven his claim.
Her mouth had smiled, but her eyes hadn’t. Whether that signified anything or not, Coll didn’t know. But as he had a wife to find, and as Mrs. Jones had been a momentary, unexpected diversion, he shrugged. “I’m here for the play,” he muttered, folding his arms and leaning against a sturdy-looking upright as the lass strolled onto the stage and became a young lad once more.
If the lass was spoken for, that was that. A damned shame or not, in all honesty, he hadn’t come down here looking for her. Hell, he’d left Lady Aldriss’s box before she’d ever appeared onstage.
That had been a short hunt; more than anything else, it had served to remind him that he’d been reluctantly celibate for the past eight weeks, plus the week before that, as he, Aden, and Niall had meandered south with every bit of luggage they could pile atop their two wagons.
He’d been full of defiance then, ready for the three of them to challenge Francesca Oswell-MacTaggert head-on, tell her that she and her conditions for continuing to fund Aldriss Park could go to hell, and march back to the Highlands. But damn it all, they needed the blunt she provided. That money allowed the MacTaggerts to look after more cotters than any of the other chieftains in the area could manage. It allowed them to supplement a poor harvest, to purchase sheep and cattle when the fall weather made for fewer young ones in spring, and in short, to keep those dependent on them from starving.
And his idea of a united front against their mother—who hadn’t bothered to write a letter, much less visit in the seventeen years since she’d left her three sons behind—began to crumble the moment Niall had fallen for Amy. Coll gave a shudder. He liked the lass well enough now, but for God’s sake, his mother had meant Amelia-Rose Hyacinth Baxter for him. Thank God Amy and Niall had turned out to be perfect for each other and he’d been left out of the equation.
Once the first had fallen, Aden had no doubt seen what lay ahead, and so when he’d stumbled across Matthew Harris’s sister, he’d staked his own claim. Coll sighed. Which left him. As the oldest, he no doubt should have been the first to wed. It was his duty to lead the way into such perils. But every time he thought to make an effort toward wooing a lass, he recalled how badly his father had mangled a marriage with his own Englishwoman. Angus MacTaggert and Francesca Oswell had managed to remain beneath the same roof for twelve years, but none of them had been peaceful. None that he could recall, anyway.
But that was neither here nor there, because tonight all he’d accomplished was an escape from two more prospective brides and a few minutes of imagining that he and Mrs. Persephone Jones might have spent a sweaty, naked night together. So now he could return to Oswell House and make a list of which lasses might serve, or he could stay where he was and watch a rather inspired performance in As You Like It.
In the end, the play won out, and while he felt a wee bit cheated that all the lads had found their loves while he stood in the wings without so much as a bridal prospect, he could say one positive thing about English tastes—they were all correct when they raved about Persephone Jones.
All the actors gathered onstage for a standing ovation before they flooded past him to the dressing rooms and the rear door. He waited where he was; no sense making an appearance outside until Lady Aldriss and her weeping maidens were well away.
“We’ll be putting out the lights in ten minutes,” one of the behind-the-stage men eventually informed him, “and there’s nothing darker than a theater.”
“Except a lady’s heart, mayhap,” Coll rejoined, hiding his shudder at the idea of being in this cramped space in complete darkness, and the lad laughed.
Back to Oswell House it was, then, where he’d have to listen to his mother bellowing about how she was attempting to save the MacTaggert properties by helping him find him a bride, and all he could bellow back was what he’d been saying for eight weeks: he would find his own damned wife. He made his way through the clutter in the direction the rest of the occupants had headed.
“—don’t think that’s necessary,” Persephone Jones’s sweet voice came from a cracked-open door, and he slowed.
“What I think is necessary is that you stop dancing about and give me what I want,” Claremont’s voice retorted. “You flutter as if you have some virtue to protect. Do I need to remind you that you are an actress? A pretty one, but that’s not enough to see you invited to a soiree. I have purchased gifts for you—several expensive gifts, if you’ll recall. In recompense, you will give me what I want. And that is what is between your legs, Persephone.”
“No.” There was just the faintest tremble at the end of the word. “You have forced gifts on me in an attempt to buy what is between my legs. Take them all back. They’re here in this box. I never wanted them to begin with. You—”
“You damned whore. I—”
Glass shattered. Before he’d quite settled on what he was doing, Coll slammed open the door and stepped into the room. It was smaller than he’d expected, with bare walls, a table and a chair, and a single full-length mirror, but he only noted that peripherally as he grabbed Claremont by the collar and yanked him backward from where he loomed over the lass, his hands on her shoulders.
He caught a quick glance of Persephone’s wide blue eyes and the neck of a broken bottle in her hand before he returned his attention to the sputtering earl. “The lass said nae,” he growled, flinging the other man into the near wall.
Claremont went down onto his knees and immediately struggled to his feet. “This is none of your affair, Highlander. Leave this room before I have you thrown out.”
“Well, while ye’re searching about for someone who can toss me, I’ll go ahead and see ye out myself.” Moving quickly, Coll wrapped one arm under the earl’s shoulder and cupped the back of his head in the same hand, bending the tall fellow nearly double as Claremont tried to avoid having his arm broken.
“You have no idea who you’re dealing with,” Claremont sputtered, staggering out of the room as Coll half-dragged him toward the rear of the building. Charlie Huddle and a few of the remaining actors and stagehands stood by the back door, and with a quick intake of air, Huddle pulled it open and stepped aside.
Coll shoved Claremont outside, following that with a hard stomp to the earl’s backside with the bottom of his boot. “The next time a lass tells ye nae,” he rumbled, “and I imagine that’ll happen to ye often, ye’d best listen.”
With that, he shut the door and latched it for good measure. When he turned around, the assembled men began clapping.
“I never liked that Lord Claremont,” Huddle intoned with a crooked grin. “Glad to see him gone. But he could make some trouble for you, my lord.”
With a shrug, Coll straightened his coat. “It’s nae the first time for that, and it’ll nae be the last.”
“Perhaps,” a female voice sounded from the shadows, “but now you’re going to have to see me home.”
Persephone Jones stepped forward as the lights toward the front of the hall began to flicker and go out, leaving her in a halo of candlelight surrounded by murky darkness. She carried a small portmanteau in one hand and wore a deep purple, low-cut silk gown, a silver shawl, and a purple hat decorated with wee white flowers perched at a jaunty angle on her head. Her hair was no longer brown, but rather a long, flowing ivory curled into ringlets about her face, an angel descended from heaven to tease the mortals.
“I reckon I can do that.” A lass who turned into a different lass every time he looked around—that could be either very arousing or exceedingly frustrating. But it would damned well be interesting, either way.
Coll MacTaggert, Persephone Jones reflected, could have been mistaken for a mountain, if mountains were made of muscle and bone and were possessed of a very attractive, if severe, face softened by a deep Scottish brogue. Turning her gaze and attention from the towering Highlander, she tucked her shawl a little closer around her shoulders and took a deep breath as Charlie Huddle pulled open the rear stage door. She’d requested the helpful mountain’s assistance. It remained to be seen whether he was as efficient at disbursing crowds in public as he was at ousting earls in private.
The second she stepped outside, men young and old pressed in around her, cheering and complimenting and offering flowers or begging for locks of her hair. At least the earlier rain had tapered off.
“If you’ll excuse me, good gentlemen,” she said as she always did, her own private play performed at the back door every night, “but I’ve had a very long evening and I’m quite tired.”
“Thou art the fairest damsel in the land,” one young man shouted above the volume of the others, a bouquet of red roses aimed, weaponlike, at her head, “I should swoon if thee would but give me thy hand.”
That caused a round of booing, which she mentally joined. She performed Shakespeare. Why that made some men think they should recite bad poetry written on the back of a betting slip, she had no idea. “Make way, gentlemen, if you please.”
“’She walks in beauty, like the night of cloudless sk—”
“That’s Lord Byron. I summon Shakespeare,” she interrupted, and some of the vultures laughed at the odd fellow out.
The jostling became worse. Just as she was beginning to consider using her bag as a weapon, a space opened around her miraculously. Persephone glanced over her shoulder, half expecting to see a dragon looming behind her. Rather, it was the Scotsman, his arms outstretched as he shoved would-be suitors away like rag dolls.
“The lass wants ye to make way,” he stated. “Dunnae make her ask ye again.”
Well. Public acts of heroism it was, then. When Claremont accompanied her, the earl liked having all the hangers-on about, so he could be certain they all saw that she left in his company. She took a half step sideways and wrapped her free hand around one muscular Scottish arm. “Thank you,” she said, offering up a smile and silently praying that she wasn’t in the process of making a horrible mistake. Another horrible mistake, rather. Turning this man away could well take a battalion of elephants, which she didn’t happen to have anywhere handy. But she did have friends and admirers about, and she had a good … feeling about this Coll MacTaggert. Or it could be as simple as the fact that she’d been enjoying looking at his fine form for most of the evening, but he had proven helpful thus far.
He gave her a nod and continued plowing a path through the lingering theatergoers until they reached the corner, where her coach waited. She tugged on his arm, and he stopped. “I have a coachman wait here for me each evening,” she said.
Of course, she’d suggested he see her home, but that had been mostly meant as a jest, a small bit of carnal excitement brought about by this wild, kilt-wearing mountain of a man before her, with a little part gratitude added in for someone finally ridding her of Claremont. The earl was more persistent than a mosquito.
This moment would be the test, though. Would he let her leave, or insist on accompanying her? MacTaggert, as he’d named himself—despite Charlie Huddle informing her that he was actually Lord Glendarril—wasn’t at all pretty like James Pierce, the Earl of Claremont. Rather, his slash of straight brows, the confident, open expression of his face, unruly dark hair, and amused green eyes spoke of something Claremont had likely never before encountered as a rival—a man. A very handsome, muscular, virile-looking man. One who was either mad, or simply untroubled by the amount of influence Lord Claremont wielded and the trouble he could cause.
“Is that yer way of sending me off to Hades?” he asked in his thick brogue, one of those brows lifting.
She found herself listening to the sound of his voice, studying the inflection of his words, and told herself it was because she was about to begin rehearsals to play Lady Macbeth and that it had nothing to do with the way his deep voice seemed to reverberate into her bones.
“More politely than that, but yes, it is. I do thank y—”
He pulled open the door and shifted to offer his hand to help her inside. “Ye’d best be off before the hounds catch yer scent again, then.”
Another surprise. This evening had presented her with basketloads of them. Persephone stepped up, but remained standing in the doorway to gaze at him. “You aren’t offended? I mean, I did imply that we might have a more … personal connection.”
MacTaggert shrugged. “Ye knew ye had a nest of vipers out here waiting for ye, and ye saw me hit Claremont. That’s math even a Highlander can do, I reckon.” He grinned. “Besides, now I’m a puzzle to ye, and ye’ll nae be able to stop thinking about me.”
She smiled back, her heart easing as she realized she would not have to do any further clever acting this evening to rid herself of yet another suitor. “You are rather memorable, MacTaggert.”
“That I am.” He closed the door for her as she moved back and seated herself, but he was tall enough to still be able to look in the window. “I’m nae some eunuch or fancy boy, either, and ye are a lass to make a man’s heart beat faster. But I fell into being a gentleman tonight, and I’ll nae be looked at in the same way ye saw Claremont, so I’ll bid ye good evening and sweet dreams. And dunnae be surprised if I come looking for ye tomorrow.”
Well. A man who simply stated what he wanted and didn’t attempt to purchase her affections or her body. He was also clearly a man who could physically take whatever he wanted, and he hadn’t done so. An interesting balance, that, and because she did find it intriguing, she would be wise simply to nod, bid him goodnight, and leave, thankful that she’d escaped unscathed twice tonight. Earls, viscounts, Englishmen, or Scots—they were all trouble.
And though this trouble had done her a good turn, he filled at least two of the spaces on her list of people to avoid. Firstly, he was a man, and secondly, he was a man with a title. Even more troubling—she found him attractive. If she hadn’t, she would never have begun flirting with him backstage. Definitely trouble. “I cannot stop you from looking,” she murmured, leaning toward the open window and attempting to ignore the excited goosebumps lifting on her arms, “but finding me is another thing entirely.”
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 there is such 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 risqué purple 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.” Persephone handed 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.”
As far as landlords went, Jacob Praster was a rather tolerant one. After all, it wasn’t just an assortment of hired hacks who avoided actresses and other people of questionable repute. Landlords, she’d discovered several years ago, before she’d added a spouse to her list of qualifications, could be even more pompous. “I’m quite satisfied with Gus,” she said aloud, heading for the narrow staircase along the right wall of the foyer. “And wherever it is he stables his horses.”
“It was only a suggestion. I happened to see today that one of those fine houses along Chesterfield Hill is for sale. Wouldn’t that make the blue-blooded set blush, to see you living right there among them?”
It might make them blush, but it made Persephone shudder. “Oh, yes. I can just imagine myself walking through Mayfair while all the good people throw rotten fruit at me. I have no desire to be anywhere other than where I am, Flora. Do leave off.”
The maid clucked her tongue, but subsided. They had this conversation at least once a month, but Persephone had long had a hunch that it had more to do with Flora and her dream of living in a castle than it did the location of their current residence. But they all had dreams, and Persephone wasn’t about to tell anyone not to pursue them.
“Heavens, I forgot! How was closing night?” the maid blurted. “Did you tell Lord Claremont you’ve been giving his posies to the church at Charing Cross for their pauper funerals?”
That made Persephone smile. “I didn’t have to, as it turns out,” she said, nodding as Gregory Norman, her footman and a former stagehand at the Saint Genesius, emerged from her bed chamber. “Gregory.”
“Miss Persie. I’ve put the coal warmer beneath the sheets. Rain’s no way to end the run of a play, dash it all.”
“If I had an aversion to rain, I would be performing in the Sahara Desert.”
“Gregory, don’t interrupt,” Flora put in. “Persie was telling me she didn’t send Claremont packing.”
“What? I thought we was tired of his high-handedness.”
“We were,” Persephone edged into the conversation. “As I was attempting to turn him away—and without any success, I might add—a very large Scotsman happened by and overheard Claremont pawing at me, and the next thing I knew, his lordship had made a close acquaintance with a Scottish boot and the floor of my dressing room—though not necessarily in that order.”
“No! Oh, you must tell me all about it! Who was the Scotsman?”
“Do I need to load my blunderbuss and put it by the front door again?” Gregory asked.
With a snort, Persephone strolled into her bedchamber to put her shawl over the back of the chair set before the fireplace. “Not yet. He was actually quite polite for a barbarian Highlander. He’s interested, but intends to wait to be invited.” She shot a glance over her shoulder at her maid’s rapt expression. “Which means, of course, that he expects to be invited.”
“Oh, lud, they all expect you to swoon at their feet, don’t they?” Flora dumped the portmanteau in the seat of the overstuffed chair and began putting the bits and bobs away. “I’ve yet to meet a man who didn’t think he was too handsome and charming to be resisted.”
“Excluding me.” With a nod at the two of them, Gregory left the room, helpfully pulling her door closed behind him.
As he did so, a small black figure emerged from beneath the stack of pillows on the large green and blue bed and stretched, then lazily picked its way to the edge of the mattress and bowed its head in a clear invitation for her to bestow scratches. “And how are you this evening, Hades?” Persephone murmured, bending to plant a kiss on top of the cat’s sleek head.
“That demon jumped at me out of the larder and nearly scared me to death.” Flora gave an exaggerated shiver. “Black cats are witchcraft, you know.”
“So you keep telling me. The two of you would get along much better if you would only keep in mind that this is his house, and he is kindly allowing us in for an extended visit.” Offering the cat a quick scratch behind the ears, she sat beside him to pull off her shoes. Ah, that felt nice. Gleefully, she scrunched up her toes and straightened them again. Who would have expected that acting would be so hard on her feet? Not her, certainly.
“Well, I think he’d be happy to have you as his only guest. I’m fairly certain he wants to see me dead of fright, and Gregory’s told me Hades keeps trying to trip him on the stairs.” Wrapping the hem of her skirt around her hand, Flora removed the steaming kettle from where it hung in the small fireplace and toted it behind the screen that sectioned off the far corner of the room. “I’ve made your bath as hot as I can, but with the chill in the air tonight, that won’t last for long.”
“Thank you. Off with you then, Flora. I can see myself to bed. But please remember to wake me early; I have to be back at the Saint Genesius at the ungodly hour of nine o’clock.”
“Saints preserve us. I’ll do my utmost.” With that, Flora returned the empty kettle to the hearth, moved the empty portmanteau to the floor to await tomorrow’s wardrobe change, picked up Persephone’s shoes for brushing off, and shut the door firmly behind her as she left the room.
Persephone shed her plain gown and shift, pinned up her hair in a loose, twisted bun, and, shivering, hurried behind the curtain to the steaming bathtub. She dipped in one toe to find the water pleasantly warm and climbed in to sink down to her chin. Glorious. Then she shut her eyes for a moment, just listening to the quiet and feeling the warmth soak into her bones.
Considering that she’d expected to still be fighting off Lord Claremont this evening, and doing so with enough delicacy that he wouldn’t attempt to ruin her career, simply being able to sit in the warm water was reward enough for a packed theater every night of the three-week run of As You Like It. It wasn’t her favorite play, and the entire thing became a bit silly toward the end, but she did enjoy wearing trousers and hearing the corresponding gasps from the wig-wearing set in the audience when she first appeared as a boy onstage. And Rosalind was not only quick-witted, but she had the most lines of any female in Shakespeare’s repertoire. Persephone knew that, because she’d counted.
Shocked, those gray-haired, regimented ladies were—shocked that a young lady of any background should wear men’s clothes in public. Shocked that she should be upfront with her wits. Shocked that she should kiss a man right up there onstage, inviting people to look.
And while their shock might be genuine, she’d also noted that they all stayed through the final curtain. And on occasion, they came to see a second performance.
The younger set applauded wildly and sent letters addressed both to Rosalind and to her, wanting her—or Rosalind’s—friendship, or her—or Rosalind’s—love. And Rosalind didn’t receive the same quantity of heated correspondence as did Juliet Montague. The number of men—and a few women—who addressed her only as Juliet, who wanted to be her true-life Romeo or her dearest friend, continued to astound her even now.
Lady Macbeth would be a new experience. She imagined there would be those in the audience who would hate her for bringing down Macbeth, for leading him down a thorny path, but hopefully the number of love letters would subside. For heaven’s sake, she wasn’t certain she wanted to make the acquaintance of Lady Macbeth, much less that of a man who would want the horrid woman’s love or desire.
Of course, she’d teased the handsome Scotsman about being Macbeth, but that had only been because he was Scottish. Admittedly, at first glance he didn’t seem the sort of man to be led about by a woman’s ambitions or sexual favors, as had happened with Macbeth the character, but then again, she didn’t know if MacTaggert the man had come backstage to meet her—or to become acquainted with Rosalind.
Coll MacTaggert, Viscount Glendarril. She read the newspaper’s Society page every morning, and she’d seen him mentioned more than once—something about three handsome Scottish brothers coming down to London to find English wives. If that were so, then he was wasting his time hanging about backstage at the Saint Genesius. Titled men did not marry actresses.
Personally, she didn’t see why he would still be without a bride after eight or nine weeks in Mayfair. Even without the lure of a title, he was stunningly handsome, a literal larger-than-life presence amid the dandies and gadabouts. And if the fourth-hand whispers she’d heard from seamstresses who’d heard from store clerks who’d heard from maids were true, he had recently been seen running from Oswell House naked and carrying a large sword—and the ladies hadn’t noted anything to complain about then, either.
Chuckling, she ducked her face beneath the water and then straightened again. There was something appealing, even refreshing, about a man with enough self-confidence to show his nethers to the world, especially with a large sword to hand for comparison’s sake.
Those were just rumors, of course, and by the time any Society news came behind the curtains of the theater, she had no idea of its veracity. Still, she meant to have a second look at the latest Society pages still to hand in the house, this time with Coll MacTaggert in mind. If he did mean to hunt her down, she wanted a bit more ammunition, herself.
As the water cooled and the cloud-obscured moon rose high enough to peep at her through her east-facing window, she stood and dried herself off. Her nights frequently didn’t end until sunrise, but for the next ten days she would be observing less nocturnal hours. The theater would go on without its principal players for that time, since Charlie Huddle was bringing in a roving troupe based all the way up in York to perform Aphra Behn’s The Rover, or The Banish’d Cavaliers while she and her fellows rehearsed the Scottish play. While she liked the part of the determined Florinda from The Rover, the play was extremely bawdy, and the admirers who presently lurked backstage and at the rear door of the theater were grabby enough as it was.
Persephone pulled on her night-rail, banked the fire, and climbed under the soft, warm covers of her bed, grateful that Gregory had thought to heat them. A moment later, Hades leaped up to curl into a midnight ball on the pillow next to her head.
MacTaggert had said that he found her desirable, even if his words had been a bit blunter than that. The viscount was after a wife, though—if those rumors were to be at all believed—so she wondered if he would bother to hunt after her at all. It could have been simple curiosity or boredom that had led him backstage, and a man hunting after a wife wouldn’t have time to search her out, anyway. Thanks to him, she’d just rid herself of one “protector,” as those men looking to buy her enough things that she would hopefully allow them into her bed called themselves. She wasn’t anxious to have to deal with another man looking to buy her with pretty baubles.
Perhaps, though, the Highlander would attempt to woo her with deer carcasses. Then at least she would have some venison in exchange for … whatever she chose to grant him. He was, after all, easy on the eyes. And while she certainly wasn’t marriageable, she wasn’t dead, either.