‘Veil, miss!’
Averil pulled down the coarse veiling as she climbed down. A porter came out as Grace lifted the valises out.
‘Can I help you, madam?’ It sounded like, Go away, we don’t welcome your sort here.
I am a fallen woman, Averil realised. Or, at least, I am falling. ‘Thank you. Captain d’Aunay’s chambers, please.’
The porter went back inside with a curt nod, leaving them standing on the cobbles. After five minutes Averil squared her shoulders and walked towards the door; she could hardly stand there until Luc happened to go in or out.
A dapper little man appeared on the step as she reached it. ‘Madam? The captain is not at home at the moment.’
‘He told me to send to him here if I ever needed help,’ Averil said.
‘Ah. Yes, indeed, ma’am. Will you follow me?’
They walked after him down a passage that seemed to Averil as long as a rope walk. The man opened a black door and ushered them into a sitting room. ‘If you will make yourself comfortable, ma’am, I will see if—’
‘Hughes!’ The shout was unmistakeably Luc’s voice. ‘Something for my damned head and get a move on. I think I’m dying.’
‘He’s awake. Excuse me.’ The manservant vanished through a door at the rear of the room.
They could hear his voice, low and soothing, then, ‘A what? Who?’
‘Hangover,’ Grace observed. ‘Does he drink much?’
‘I have never seen him even tipsy,’ Averil said. On St Mary’s she had seen him drink and keep up with Sir George’s not inconsiderable dinner time consumption, but he had shown no ill effects. In fact, he had made love to her afterwards.
There were more growls from the direction of the bedchamber. Oh, dear. He did not sound like a man who could be persuaded to part with a large sum of money in exchange for a novice mistress’s inept caresses. The nerves that had been a flock of butterflies in her stomach turned into bats.
Hughes reappeared, seized a decanter from the sideboard and vanished again. Finally he put his head around the door. ‘If your woman would care to join me in the scullery, ma’am, the captain will be out in a moment.’
Grace got to her feet, stopped, whisked off Averil’s bonnet, patted her hair into place, hissed, ‘Bite your lips. Good luck’, and followed him out.
Averil sat watching the door as though a tiger might emerge from it. Every carefully rehearsed sentence fled from her head. When the door did open she was ready to faint through sheer nervous anticipation.
Luc stopped in the doorway and studied her without speaking. His hair was wet and looked as though he had poured water over his head and then run his fingers through the black locks. There were purple smudges under his eyes, which were bloodshot. He was wearing a shirt, open at the neck, and pantaloons; his feet were bare.
‘You look dreadful,’ Averil said without thinking and stood up. He looked like death and she loved him. She wanted to take him in her arms and fuss over him and soothe his headache and kiss away the strain around his eyes and never leave him. Instead she clasped her hands tightly together and just waited.
‘I have seen you looking better,’ he rejoined. ‘And worse, come to think about it. I am damnably hungover. I am probably still half-cut. Tell me what’s wrong, just don’t shout at me.’
‘I won’t.’ Averil bit her lip. ‘Hadn’t you better sit down?’
He gestured at the chaise and sat in the chair opposite. ‘Does Bradon know you’re here?’
‘No!’ Luc winced. ‘Sorry. No. I have run away and left no note. I cannot bear to marry him.’
‘And so you have come to me.’ The colour was returning to his face and the bleak look in his eyes seemed to fade. Whatever potion the manservant had given him must be working.
‘Yes. But—’
‘Ah. The but. Tell me the worst.’
The door opened to admit Hughes with a tray. ‘Coffee, Captain. Your woman said you would take coffee also, ma’am.’ Leaving her to pour, he left as quietly as he had entered.
She stirred in sugar, careful not to strike the porcelain and make a noise, passed a cup, black, to Luc and added cream to her own.
‘I want to go home, to India. Bradon is a man that my father would not wish me to marry, once he knows the truth about him.’