Page 84 of Never a Duke
Rosalind would hate being dispatched like a prisoner of war to an obscure parole town, there to be forgotten for years.
Ned dodged down the alleys and cut through the private squares,The Wealth of Nationsbumping against his thigh as he leaped fences. If he and Rosalind were to be parted, he at least wanted to wish her farewell and tell her…
Tell her that he loved her? Of course he loved her. Loved her wit and spirit, loved her ability to view life with pragmatism and humor. Loved her passion and her smiles…
But telling her so would serve no purpose.
He dodged through wynds and alleys, taking shortcuts he hadn’t used since boyhood, surprised at how easily he could still navigate London with both speed and stealth.
He soon crossed into the alley that would take him behind Rosalind’s house, only to feel the prickling at his nape that told him his shadow was again on his heels. Whoever tracked him had stayed far enough back to remain undetected, or they were expert at prowling London’s streets.
Ned slowed his pace, fished Mr. Smith’s book from his pocket, and opened it to a random chapter. He sauntered along, leafing through pages as if searching for a particular quote, and then turned into the arched recess of somebody’s garden gate.
Ten seconds later, his shadow sauntered past the gate, a nondescript fellow of indeterminant years. Wiry, not much above average height, and moving with the light balance of a man anticipating an ambush.
Ned stepped silently from the shadows and tapped the fellow on the shoulder. “You fell for the oldest dodge in London, though you’re quiet. I’ll grant you that.”
The man turned slowly, hands up. “I carry no weapons.”
“You don’t need to,” Ned said. “Your fists, your feet, your teeth, your hard head…they are all weapons. Did Woodruff set you to spying on me?”
The fellow lowered his hands slowly. “If you mean the Earl of Woodruff, I’ve never had the pleasure.”
His speech was neither refined nor Cockney, though he had the planed-down leanness of the hardworking class. He looked to be a weathered thirty-five and his complexion suggested he’d spent time in the tropics. His attire was clean enough, though in want of ironing, and his gaze as he studied Ned was neither afraid nor arrogant.
“Who the hell are you?” A Newgate connection? The place had been bursting at the seams with youths and boys, all crammed in with the worst of London’s malefactors.
“That doesn’t matter. What matters is that your young lady was taken from this alley not five minutes past. She was bundled into a hackney, a knife at her side unless I miss my guess. The horse in the traces was a piebald, the hackney number 617. Took off in the direction of the Strand, the beast moseying along so as not to attract attention.”
“How do I know you’re telling me the truth?”
The man’s lips quirked. “You don’t, but if I am being honest, then you are wasting precious time.”
And if the fellow was lying…Something about his attire plucked at Ned’s memory. Something subtle and elusive.
“What were you doing in this alley?”
“I was on my way to fetch you, Ned Wentworth, because Lady Rosalind needs rescuing, and I lack the standing and skills to pull that off.”
This stranger also lacked…furtiveness. He was not afraid of Ned, and he wasn’t trying to intimidate anybody. A tail, possibly, set on him by the duchess or the duke.
Ned touched his hat brim. “We’ll meet again.”
The fellow nodded, and Ned left him in the alley, a puzzle to be solved on another day.
***
Rosalind’s first reaction to being abducted had been terror. Reassurances that she’d live to see another day had been little comfort, but the longer she was jostled and bounced along in the malodorous hackney, the more her fear was supplanted by anger.
How many times had Papa seen her tossed into a coach and sent speeding off to a different school? A few months later, Headmistress would toss her into another coach and send her home in disgrace. How many evenings had she climbed into a coach, steeling herself for hours in the company of leering bachelors or nervous widowers?
How many times had Papa summoned her away from Aunt Ida’s, just as Rosalind had resigned herself to a life of rural obscurity?
Men and their damned coaches.
Her abductor hadn’t joined her in the hackney any longer than it had taken to bind her wrists, affix a blindfold over her eyes, and tie what she assumed was a heavily veiled bonnet atop her head. The door had no interior handle that Rosalind could find, the windows did not open. He’d climbed up onto the perch behind, if the rocking of the coach was any indication, and he remained there for the duration of the journey.
London at midday was choked with traffic, and the frequency of the coach’s stops told Rosalind she was being taken across Town, not out into the countryside to the north or west. When the coach door opened, the stink of the river was strong, though Rosalind could not hear water slapping against a pier or dock.
