Page 39 of The Rebellious Lady and the Phantom Lord
Lucy shrieked when one scrawny youth chunked a rock. It hit the side of the coach with a startling thunk. But Ridley brandished his whip, scattering the urchins back into the dark shelter of the doorways.
Ridley adamantly refused to let Phaedra dismount from the carriage. She did not argue with him, letting Peter go in search of Mrs. Wilkins. He disappeared into one of the more respectable-looking buildings. Phaedra waited several minutes, the first daunting impression of Canty Row beginning to fade, losing its ability to intimidate her. She should never have let Peter go alone. Mrs. Wilkins was supposed to be ill. Most likely the woman would not be able to come out to her.
She had almost made up her mind to follow Peter when the footman emerged. He leaned in the door of the coach. “It is all right, my lady. I believe it would be safe for you to come in.”
Ridley started to howl a protest. but Phaedra had already leaped from the coach. She turned a deaf ear to both Lucy’s frightened pleas and Ridley’s more vociferous ones.
She followed Peter beneath the shadow of one of the tenements, up a flight of rickety wooden stairs. The sour smells of urine and sickness assaulted her in a great wave. She pressed a scented handkerchief to her nose, beginning to doubt both Peter’s wisdom and her own. From a corner of the hallway, she caught a glimpse of the child who had thrown the rock, staring at her with sullen eyes and swilling from a bottle of gin.
She had little time to register her shock before Peter ushered her into a large room. He closed the door, maintaining a watchful post by the threshold. Phaedra adjusted her eyes to the room’s dim atmosphere, then glanced about her with astonishment. It was not in the least what she would have expected.
The room showed signs of the building’s general state of decay, but it was obvious someone had been at great pains to keep the chamber clean. An oil cloth was spread across the wooden floor, its worn surface well swept. The sparse furnishings-a mattress, a table and one chair-bore no hint of the grime of Canty Row. Upon the windowsill stood a clay pot, in which some bright red poppies managed to bloom, catching what little light filtered past the window boards. The flowers provided a splash of color in what was otherwise a drab world.
Eliza Wilkins came slowly forward to greet Phaedra. Her much-mended gown hung upon her thin frame, her features almost ethereally pale. Her blond hair fell past her shoulders, the strands of a lackluster hue. Yet nothing could erase the delicate structure of the bones beneath the transparent skin, the beauty of a pair of soft brown eyes or the proud set of her emaciated shoulders. At one time, Phaedra thought, Eliza Wilkins must have been a very lovely young woman.
It suddenly occurred to Phaedra that as Weylin’s granddaughter, she would likely not be welcome.
“Mrs. Wilkins?” she stammered. “I’ve come- that is, I am?—”
“I know who you are, Lady Grantham,” Eliza Wilkins said.
There was no rancor in her voice, only infinite weariness. She did not look at Phaedra as she invited her to sit down.
Phaedra glanced at the room’s single chair. “No, thank you.”
Eliza Wilkins looked as though she were the one who ought to be sitting. Indeed, Phaedra wondered what was holding the woman on her feet. She stood patiently waiting, Phaedra was sure, for Phaedra to declare her business and get out.
“I was so sorr—” Phaedra broke off again. What was she going to say? That she was sorry for the woman’s misfortunes. Dear God, Wilkins had said that their babe had died recently. Added to Eliza’s grief must be the knowledge that her husbandwas certain to hang. All phrases of condolence seemed woefully inadequate, almost patronizing.
What could she say then-that she had come to help? Phaedra fingered her small purse of coins. That too seemed inadequate in the face of all this. Her gaze once more roved over the barrenness of the room’s furnishings, the sorrow set deep in Eliza Wilkins’s dark eyes.
She became miserably conscious of how she must look, trailing in here with her livery-garbed footman, her silk gown, the lace dusting of her petticoats peeking out. She felt ashamed that she had ever dared fancy she knew anything of poverty, ashamed of being Sawyer Weylin’s granddaughter.
She drew in a deep breath and tried again. “I have heard something of your misfortunes, and I regret that my grandfather should have been the cause of them. I cannot do much, but I would like to help you-if you will let me.”
Perhaps the humbleness of her tone inspired Eliza Wilkins to look up at Phaedra for the first time. “Thank you,” she said. “But the other gentleman has already been more than kind.”
“Other gentleman?”
“Aye, he was a guest at your dinner party last night when my husband tried to—” Eliza’s voice faltered. She concluded, “The French gentleman called upon me only this morning.”
“You cannot mean Armande de LeCroix,” Phaedra cried, incredulous.
“How odd.” Eliza’s eyes became almost luminous with wonder. “I never realized until just now he never told me his name.”
“Then describe him.”
Eliza Wilkins regarded her for a moment, no doubt surprised by the anxiousness of Phaedra’s command. But the woman sketched for Phaedra an exact picture of Armando de LeCroixas Phaedra had last seen him except for her description of the marquis’s expression.
“He had the most gentle blue eyes of any man I’d ever met,” Eliza mused aloud. “Yet so sad. I hope he finds whatever he is seeking.”
Phaedra stared at the woman. “What makes you think he is looking for something?”
“I don’t know. He simply gave me the impression of a man who is not at peace with himself.” The woman gave a brittle laugh. “And God knows, I have met enough men like that. My Tom ...” She let the thought trail off.
Phaedra gaped at her. She tried to imagine the haughty Armande, coming to such a place, seeking out Mrs. Wilkins. It was not so difficult. She was aided by the memory of how gentle his fingers had been only that morning when examining her injured hand. Phaedra recalled how Armande had slipped from the dining room last night, after Wilkins had been taken away. Had it been to find out where the man lived?
But it made no sense. What reason would Armande have to help these people? Phaedra turned to Eliza Wilkins. She wanted to know everything he had done and said. Fortunately Eliza Wilkins was not at all loath to talk about the marquis.
