Chapter 17
Hugo was also relieved to receive the letter from Kitty’s father, who seemed happy with what he was doing, something he had worried about.
“Your father is a sensible man,” he said. “He says that if you hate the idea of marrying me, we can discuss matters, once we are back in London, so long as nobody finds out you are a girl.”
“I don’t want you to feel obliged,” said Kitty. “I think I’d like being married to you, but I think I need you to be less impersonal, so I can find out. And to see if I like you writing steamy poetry to me as more than just an exercise.”
“And I can scarcely do that, brat, until your rib heals; and until I can remove the bandaging, or rather, until your mother does so, I have to look on you as a little brother.” He did not mention that he had to work very hard to see her as a little brother, and to be impersonal towards her.
Kitty pulled a face.
“I’m not sure if I like that or not,” she said. “I want to feel special and loved, but I’m also a little nervous of… of more adult feelings. I… I feel sort of nice around you.”
“Well, that’s a beginning,” said Hugo. “Most people in courtship don’t get to discuss those sort of intimate feelings,” he added.
“Well, it’s silly not to,” said Kitty. “There would be no point in wanting to get married if one did not feel the sort of feelings which lead to children.”
“Unfortunately, I suspect many women get married without realising that they should feel such feelings, whence the concept that women put up with the sexual act in order to get children.” He frowned. “This is an improper conversation to have.”
“Wouldn’t you rather have a wife prepared to be frank than a little ninny who has no idea what to expect?” asked Kitty.
“I suppose so. We are in a rather unique situation.”
“Yes, and even with the constraints of looking on me as a younger brother, it gives us the opportunity to get to know each other far better than many people do, in courtship. I would just like to know that you can manage to see me as Kitty, a woman, as well as Kit, a brother.”
“You are an attractive woman, and I am ignoring that, if you were fishing for compliments.”
“Of course I was fishing for compliments! Nobody’s going to give them if I don’t fish, my brother calls me names, my mother guards against me being vain, and it would be a bit odd if one’s father or brother noticed if one was attractive in that way.”
“Oh, I can see objectively if Elvira is in good looks, but you are right, I do not notice her in the way I notice you. Satisfied?”
“Yes, and we can explore that later, laying it aside for now.”
“Which is easier for you than for me, as I am… experienced in such feelings,” he said, ruefully. “It is something which, once experienced, is very hard to put aside.”
Kitty giggled.
“What, all the smouldering passion alluded to in novels?”
“Something like that.”
“Dear me, it needs feeding just enough to keep going, without getting out of hand.”
“Yes, brat, and I can feed it myself so don’t try to help.”
Kitty giggled.
“You’ll have to teach me how to, as well,” she said.
“Oh, I shall,” said Hugo, suddenly uncomfortably aware of her.
There might have been a smoother course to life for Kitty and Hugo had not a chamber maid named Minnie had her day off the day Kitty had been attacked in the bar, and was therefore unaware of how the young gentleman had been hurt, since nobody bothers to discuss common knowledge.
Minnie was described by her employer as ‘half smart, half dead stupid,’ which is to say, she had a vivid imagination, usually the province of the intelligent, but since nobody was interested in her imaginings, Minnie was in the habit of keeping her imaginings to herself, and letting them run on a freer rein than had she been permitted to relate her fantasies, and get well-squashed by her peers over the wilder aspects.
What Minnie knew for certain was that a very expensive man, who expected his linen to be washed every day and paid for it to be so, and his injured brother, were in adjacent rooms, and, at that, the best rooms in the inn. He was not a lord, which was a disappointment, but he was immensely rich, and the stable boys went on and on about his horses. Of course, he might be the heir to a title; but surely he would still be a lord, thought Minnie, who was unaware of the title ‘the honourable’ and would have assumed those people entitled to it would use it all the time in any case. It passed her by that a mere ‘Mister’ could be a member of the ton, and as Mr. Hugo Bottringham did not feature in such lurid publications or scandals which attracted Minnie’s notice she did not think he could be very important.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if his wealth was come by somehow shady,” said Minnie, to Barbary, the tween maid, who had no choice but to listen to Minnie.
“Well, why should it?” said Barbary.
“He ain’t a lord, but he’s rich; how would he be rich if he isn’t a lord without being havey-cavey?” said Minnie.
“Well, there’s them industrialists,” said Barbary, vaguely. “They make money out of cotton and things, and so on.”
“Well, he ain’t one; he’s undoubtedly a gent,” said Minnie. “Probably a younger son who’s fiddled some books somehow.”
“Go on with you,” said Barbary, laughing in scorn.
Minnie was quite happy to go on. She introduced a pea under Hugo Bottringham’s mattress, well aware that this should bruise him black and blue if he had any truly noble blood. She knew it, for she had read it somewhere. Secondly, she knocked on his bedroom door after Hugo had retired, wearing only her night gown.
The door opened, showing the occupant, Hugo, also in his nightgown, a dressing-gown pulled on hastily over it, and slippers on his feet, Hugo having packed an overnight bag more efficiently than Stephen.
“Yes?” said Hugo, quellingly. “Is there a fire?”
“Oh, no, sir, I just came to keep you company,” said Minnie, in what she fondly believed to be an enticing tone.
Hugo stared.
“Make yourself scarce, you little baggage,” he said. “And don’t even think of disturbing my brother, or I’ll have you turned off, he needs his sleep to heal.”
He shut the door, firmly thrusting Minnie out of the room with it.
Minnie stood a moment, unable to believe it. He had rebuffed her advances!
She went back to bed, which she shared with Barbary.
“Didn’t want you, eh?” said Barbary.
“No, he must be a molly,” said Minnie.
“Go on with you!” jeered Barbary. “He can afford better than you.”
“Men always have their way with women who offer,” said Minnie, darkly, “I shouldn’t be surprised if he was having his wicked way with his own brother; incense, they calls that.”
From this mental stance, Barbary was unable to dissuade Minnie,, and was, moreover, too tired from her own day’s hard work to care to bother to try much.
Minnie was still smarting next day under the rebuffal of her fatal sexual charms, which were greatly exaggerated in her own mind, being a mildly pretty washed-out blonde with protuberant pale blue eyes and bad skin. But gentlemen, in her mind, could not resist blondes, and those with pale hair and skin especially. She was washing the floor in the reception room when she heard a newcomer announce that he was from Bow Street.
“I’m looking for a pair of brothers, agitators and sabateurs; one of them may have been wounded in a running fight with one of my colleagues,” he said. “Name’s Ethan Pringle, and I have reason to believe this pair is headed this way.”
“Nothing I know about,” said the landlord’s son, who was on duty.
Minnie sidled round to take Mr. Pringle’s valise.
“I knows someat about them,” she said.
Ethan Pringle suppressed a sigh. Almost invariably, that tone of voice and that expression led nowhere but a bit of spite.
“Then you’d better tell me what you know, my girl,” said Pringle.
“Is there a reward?” asked Minnie.
“Yes; not being put in gaol as an accessory,” said Pringle.
Minnie glared at him.
“Well, then!” she said. “You’ll be grateful for what I tell you, for they’re staying here, a pair calling themselves Bottringham. One of them’s wounded, the younger one, and I reckon the other one’s a molly, because he wouldn’t bed me, and he’s probably doing his brother, because you never can tell with desperate criminals, and what’s more, they’re redheads and you can’t trust redheads,” she finished, triumphantly.
“Very good, my girl, you’ve done your dooty,” said Pringle. “I’ll carry on from here.”
Settled into his room – a cheap one, overlooking the stable yard – and furnished with the number of Mr. Bottringham’s room, he went and knocked. Hugo answered.
“Gawdsruth, you’re Beau Bottringʼam,” said Pringle, losing any semblance of the accentless speech for which he strove.
“I’ve been called that,” said Hugo. “Do I know you?”
“No, sir; but I have to act on information given,” said Mr. Pringle. “Even when it’s silly. Matter of dooty. I do beg pardon.” He knew an upper-class accent when he heard one, even if he had not recognised a well-known member of the ton who had, moreover, spoken up against the dangerous games of young bloods who tipped honest folks off the road. Mr. Pringle had every respect for this toff.
“Oh, dear what has that silly little lightskirt been telling the law?” said Hugo. “Come in; let me pour you coffee, it’s fresh, and you can tell me if she dragged you all the way from London to discover why I’m too fastidious to touch her with a barge-pole.”
“I don’t mind if I do, thank you,” said Pringle, easing himself down into the chair Hugo pushed towards him, pouring coffee from a pot on the occasional table into the single cup for Pringle, and helping himself to the old mug he used to rinse his mouth when cleaning his teeth. Pringle went on, “My name is Ethan Pringle, and I’m an officer at Bow Sreet. I’m searching for a pair of brothers. One of them may be wounded by one of my colleagues. What they do is act as agitators, whipping a crowd into a vicious frenzy, over things like bread prices and so on, which anyone might be unhappy about, but not likely to riot and cause trouble without being talked into it. Only having once set off a riot, these two slip away to rob nearby houses, and they don’t care if they use violence. One of them slit the throat of an elderly lady who disturbed their nefarious depredations off her belongings.”
“And that fool girl Minnie decided to embarrass my poor charge and me by pretending to think we were these hardened criminals?”
“Yessir, at least, I think she’s half convinced herself you might be the Hardcastle brothers. And obviously, you ain’t, but, with the other young gentleman being wounded, I have to ask if you know him to be, well, all right, or if you took up a wounded man in the spirit of chivalry.”
“Mighty flattering that you think I might,” said Hugo. “The chub’s older brother is a member of my set, very pretty driver, strips to advantage at Jackson’s, does not irritate Angelo with foil or rapier. And young Kit got into trouble chasing a man who tried to abduct my sister, having lost him, and fetched up here, and was assaulted by some drunkard. The ale-draper will tell you about it, if you ask. I have no idea how that information passed Minnie by, but the chub was hurt here, and with a number of cowardly witnesses who did not raise a hand to help. I had come to assure Kit that m’sister was unharmed by the abortive attempt, and found him fighting valiantly but not effectively against a much larger man with the determination and lack of judgement of inebriation. A schoolboy could scarce be expected to stand up to that.”
“No, indeed,” said Pringle, relieved not to have to try to arrest a nob, as the wounded lad apparently was. “Thank you for clearing that up.”
Hugo found it mildly diverting, and told Kitty all about it.
Kitty frowned.
“That wretched girl, Minnie!” she said. “The silly creature is such a dreamer as well as promiscuous! Asked me if there was anything wrong with you that you turned down a tumble. When I figured out what she was talking about, I told her that you were unlikely to find a woman that promiscuous in the least appetising since you would not know with whom she had consorted and whether she had any diseases. And she told me she had not consorted with anyone, just slept with a few men who looked fun. I gave up at that point. She makes things up about people, you know; I don’t think she means to lie, but she leaps from ‘a person like that might do so and so,’ to believing utterly that she has seen evidence of her own imagination.”
“A liability in an inn, where she might take someone’s character away,” said Hugo, vexed. “Though I am loth to have her sacked, if she is not deliberately dishonest.”
“Indeed, for what is the worst that she can make up about us?” said Kitty. “That I am in disguise, and we are eloping.”
“Indeed,” said Hugo, laughing, unaware that Minnie’s suggestions about their relationship could put him in jeopardy of being hanged, if Pringle took any notice of it.
Pringle had no intention of taking any notice of the spite of a silly girl unless he was forced to see anything, and no molly would be that stupid. And Pringle knew fine well that Mr. Bottringham was no molly; he had too much of a reputation as a lady’s man. Ho, thought Ethan Pringle, it was more likely that the lad was a lass in disguise and Mr. Bottringham was hiding his current inamorata thus. And, thought Ethan Pringle, it was none of his damned business. Ethan Pringle’s business was the Hardcastle brothers, who were a true menace to society, not any upper crust lovers and their shenanigans, whatever side they liked their bread buttered.
He was following a tip-off that the Hardcastles had taken the first stage they could get, heading up the Great North Road. It was likely a wild goose chase, but he had followed it up on his own time and paid his own fare, and for a room in this hotel, having fallen in with someone who said two young men had got off here, and one of them unwell. Well, wherever they were, it was not in this inn, for he had looked at the guest list, and nobody fitted the bill.
