[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
ruined. Not even Mick Braden, wherever he was, would marry her in her state of shame.
The thought of her childhood sweetheart filled her with disgust. How he had failed her. She could admit
it now he was probably right here inLondonsomewhere, dallying with a tavern wench, getting his
leisurely fill of bachelorhood before sallying forth to Kelmscot, where he no doubt thought that she was
still waiting patiently for him.
What a fool she was. If not for her fanciful hopes in him, she might have become another man s wife and
none of this need have happened, she thought bitterly. Harriette Wilson could teach her how to fend for
herself.
Her simmering anger grew potent, acrid, dangerous.
She had too much pride to throw herself on the notorious Cyprian s charity, but she could approach her
as one businesswoman to another. If she promised Harriette Wilson a percentage of the proceeds from
her future protector, she mused, the woman would surely agree to teach her the courtesan s arts. What
else did she have to lose?
Moments later Bel was gathering up her few possessions, her hands shaking slightly with the brashness
of her decision. She knew she wasn t thinking clearly but was too coldly, deeply enraged to care. She
thanked the good people who had looked after her for the past three days and asked the streetwise jade
where Harriette Wilson lived.
With her cloak wrapped tightly around her, she set out to find her fate on a day of mottled cloud and
sun. It would be a long walk from the City to the clean, luxurious environs of Marylebone, north of
Mayfair, where they were building roads and lavish terraces in the new Regent s Park. Anger was balled
up tightly within her, keeping her warm. She hadn t eaten for a couple of days, but her physical hunger
did not match her sharper one for revenge.
Protector. Sweet word.
He didn t have to be handsome. He didn t have to be young, she thought as she strode swiftly through
the streets, not looking back, her arms folded tightly around her. He didn t have to shower her with finery
and jewels.
He only had to be gentle and not make it too unpleasant for her, and he had to help her get Papa out of
the Fleet and stand by when she faced that unspeakable brute.
If fate sent her such a person, she swore bitterly to the heavens, now that she was fallen, she would
Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html
make it very worth his while.
O Melia, my dear, this does everything crown!
Who could have supposed I should meet you in Town?
And whence such fair garments, such pros-per-ity ?
O didn t you know I d been ruined? said she.
Thomas Hardy
Bait the hook well! This fish will bite.
Shakespeare
CHAPTER TWO
contents-previous |next
In the bracing sea breezes of Brighton Hawk found that he could breathe. Whether it was the distance
from the crowds ofLondonand all the places that reminded him ofher, or the influence of the calm
majestic sea, grief began to loosen its stranglehold over his heart.
The nights were relegated to his quest, but during the balmy April days he found solitude whenever he
wished it, walking barefoot on the sand with his trousers rolled up around his calves. Far from the
Promenade and the bathing machines, there was only the sough of the sea and the cries of the gulls. He
felt himself healing, growing stronger.
Most mornings he liked to row straight out from the shore untilEnglandwas hardly in sight. He fished.
One day, warmed by the high spring sun, enticed by the placid, pale jade water, he took off his boots,
pulled off his coat and waistcoat and dove off the side of his little dinghy.
The water was frigid and it stole his breath as he plummeted straight down through the tossing waves,
shot like an arrow from a bow. The water was painfully cold, but it cleared his head to the point of an
almost visionary lucidity. He swam deep, savoring the dull silence, the blue-green light below the surface.
He thought of Lucy drowning in the pond and tried to imagine what that had been like.
Holding his breath until his lungs ached, he felt alone as always, yet free, floating, felt himself slowly
coming untangled from her thrall, until at last he burst up to the surface, gasping, with no pearl in his
clutches but the vague, strangely comforting notion that perhaps he had been more in love with hisidea of
Lucy than with the woman herself. It was both a virtue and a fault in him that he lived too much in his
head, he knew.
Feeling more himself than he had in months, at length, he rowed back to shore with long, vigorous
strokes, shivering in the brisk wind. He was staying at the Castle Inn on the west side of the Steine.
Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
