Sylvester planted a foot in his chest and sent him sprawling. "You will inform whoever employed you that he will discover I don't take kindly to unprovoked attacks. That is a most solemn promise." He lifted his foot again, and the man on the ground cowered, covering his head.
"All right, guv, all right. We was only doin' what we'd been told."
"By whom?" The gray eyes were like the arctic wastelands as he stared down at the man, his foot still menacingly raised.
" 'E was all wrapped up, guv. 'Ad 'is face 'idden in a muffler. I swears it," the man babbled, burying his head. "In the Fisherman's Rest on Dock Street. 'E comes and says 'e wants a little job done. 'E 'ad an 'usky voice, raspy like. Brings us 'ere and points out yer 'onor to us and says get on wi' it. There'll be a guinea apiece. We was only doin' what we was told to do."
"Yes, I'm sure you were." Sylvester believed the man. Whoever was behind this wouldn't be foolish enough to reveal himself to his tools. But the Fisherman's Rest was a clue.
"We wasn't expectin' no woman from 'ell," one of the others muttered, groaning as pain stabbed in his kidneys.
"Something of a surprise for all of us," Sylvester agreed blandly. "Now, don't forget my message." Turning on his heel, he strolled to the waiting vehicles, where an argument seemed to be in full flood between Edward and Theo.
"You cannot possibly drive in an open carriage looking like that," Edward stated.
"Don't be absurd. Who's going to see?"
"Oh, Theo, come into the chaise with us and let Edward drive with Lord Stoneridge," Emily said, her head at the window of the chaise. "We want to know what's happened."
"Now, what's the matter?" Sylvester inquired somewhat wearily.
"Edward's being so silly," Theo said. "He says I shouldn't drive in the curricle, just because my gown's a bit torn."
"A bit!" Edward said, pointing at Theo's gown of pale-yellow muslin. "It's ripped all the way up to your waist."
"Well, how could I do a high kick without tearing it? I could have pulled it up to my waist first, I suppose, and regaled the entire neighborhood with the sight of my drawers."
"Theo!" protested Emily.
"Of course, they're very pretty drawers," Theo continued, ignoring the flapping ears of tiger and coachman. "They have lace frills and pink ribbon knots, and I believe -"
"That'll do!" Sylvester interrupted this devastating description before it drew an even larger crowd. He scooped her up and bundled her into the chaise. "You may satisfy your sisters' curiosity on the way back to Curzon Street, where you will change your dress."
His tone was scolding, but his eyes were alight with laughter, and something else. Something akin to admiration.
He instructed the coachman to return to Curzon Street and climbed into the curricle beside Edward.
"Was it footpads, sir?" Edward asked directly as the pair of chestnuts sprang forward and the tiger clambered hastily onto his perch at the rear.
"Up to a point," Sylvester said. "I'm sure they'd have happily robbed me of my last sou."
"But there was more to it, you believe?"
He nodded. "Another one of those 'accidents' that seem to be occurring with dismaying frequency."
"Who?"
"God alone knows. I'd rather hoped it was some disaffected tenant. But clearly it's not that simple. But don't say anything to Theo. I have enough of a problem second-guessing her as it is, without giving her a cause to get her teeth into."
Edward smiled. "She needs to be occupied."
Sylvester groaned. "Why can't she occupy herself like other young women? Emily and Clarissa enjoy doing the usual things. Shopping and exhibitions and balls and suchlike."
"Theo's not like them."
"No," Sylvester agreed glumly. "She's not like any woman I've ever met. If I don't watch her every minute, she'll be riding ventre a terre in the park at the fashionable hour, or attending a prizefight, or presenting herself at Manton's Gallery for some target practice. I can't think what her mother and grandfather were thinking when they encouraged her to be so damnably independent."
Edward bristled. "I believe they both understood they'd have had to break her spirit if she was to be molded in any conventional form," he said stiffly. "And she's a very special person."
Sylvester glanced sideways at the young man's rigid countenance. He smiled and said pacifically, "Yes, she is."
Edward visibly relaxed. "Do you intend to discover who's behind these attacks, sir?"
"If I'm to stay healthy – not to mention alive – for much longer, I think I'd better." Sylvester passed a brougham with barely an inch to spare.
"If I can be of service," Edward suggested tentatively. "I know a one-armed -"
"Oh, for God's sake, you young fool, a one-armed man can ride, shoot, drive, fence, fish, and make love as well as a man with two arms," Sylvester declared. "If I need your help, I'll call upon you, fair enough."
The impatient tone was much more reassuring than sympathy or an anxious disclaimer. "Fair enough, sir."
They reached Curzon Street before the chaise and were drinking claret in companionable silence when the girls arrived.
"Is that the ninety-six?" Theo said, lifting the decanter, inhaling the bouquet. "Some bottles in that delivery were corked."
"This one's fine," Sylvester said. "Go and change your dress. We're all famished."
"I'm also very thirsty," Theo responded with a twinkling smile, filling a glass. "All that exercise, you understand."
She was radiating mischief and energy. Sylvester had rarely seen her like this, and he realized with a shock that she was happy, and in the few weeks since he'd known her, he hadn't often seen her truly happy. At least not outside the bedchamber.
And she was happy because that encounter had exhilarated her, had enabled her to do something she was good at, something that pleased and satisfied her and made her feel useful.
She was never going to settle for the life of a society matron. Maybe motherhood would use up some of her surplus energies. Thinking of their passion-filled nights, he couldn't imagine it would be long acoming.
"Take it with you," he said. "You may have ten minutes to change."
"You wouldn't go without me?"
"I wouldn't put it to the test."
"What! After I saved your life?"
"Don't exaggerate. Nine minutes."
There was a distinct glimmer of laughter in the gray eyes, a complicit quiver to his mouth, and Theo felt the warmth of her own response leaping to meet him. These moments of private understanding in public places had been rare occurrences since their arrival in London, and she'd missed them.
Smiling to herself, she went upstairs to change.
The Pantheon on Oxford Street was big and busy, a ballroom and concert hall, with a supper room frequented not by the haut ton but by respectable, wealthy burghers and their ladies. Sylvester had judged that Rosie would feel more comfortable in its relative informality than in the fashionable Piazza, where disagreeable matrons and haughty young bucks would regard such a family party with disdain.
The Countess of Stoneridge also seemed more at home in the Pantheon than at Almack's, he noticed ruefully, as she kept the table in gales of laughter with a series of wickedly accurate comments on their fellow diners.
It was Theo who noticed Clarissa's abstraction first. "What are you looking at, Clarry?" She twisted in her chair to gaze over her shoulder.
"Don't stare, Theo," Clarissa exclaimed, blushing.
"But who…? Oh," she said with complete comprehension. "I see."
"Oh, do turn around, Theo," Clarissa said.
"He is very beautiful," Theo said. "Take a look, Emily. A veritable parfit gentil knight."
Emily turned around and, like her sister, had no difficulty identifying the cause of Clarissa's abstraction. "Oh, yes," she said.