a day when I’m good,” he said.
“But I keep getting lost.”
“Three or four times a day!” she said, and turned to instruct her maid to sit with the child for a few minutes. “I will be back, Nicky, and you shall have some food. I promise.”
Annie looked at the apparition in some disbelief as her mistress disappeared from the room. She sat on the edge of the bed a good twenty feet away from him, and gathered her skirts close about her as if she were afraid that they would brush against a mote of soot floating about in his vicinity.
Estelle swept down the marble stairway to the hall below, her chin high, her jaw set in a firm line. At one glance from her eyes, a footman scurried across the tiles and threw open the doors of his lordship’s study without even knocking first. His mistress swept past him and glared at her husband’s man of business, who had the misfortune to be closeted with the earl at that particular moment.
“Can I be of service to you, my dear?” his lordship asked, as both men jumped to their feet.
“I wish to speak with you,” she said, continuing her progress across the room until she stood at the window, gazing out at the gray, wintry street beyond. She did not even listen to the hurried leavetaking that the visitor took.
“Was that necessary, Estelle?” her husband’s quiet voice asked as the doors of the study closed. “Porter is a busy man and has taken the time to come half across town at my request this morning. Such men have to work for a living. They ought not to be subject to the whims of the aristocracy.”
She turned from the window. She ignored his cold reproof. “Allan,” she said, “there is a child in my bedchamber. A thin, dirty, frightened, and hungry child.”
He frowned. “The sweep’s climbing boy?” he said. “But what is he doing there? He has no business being in any room where his master or one of our servants is not. I am sorry. I shall see to it. It will not happen again.”
“He is frightened,” she said. “The chimneys are dark and he cannot breathe. He gets lost up there. And then he is whipped when he gets back to the sweep.”
He took a few steps toward her, his hands clasped behind his back. “They do not have an enviable lot,” he said. “Poor little urchins.”
“He is like a scarecrow,” she said. “He cannot remember if he has eaten today. But he is not allowed to eat too much for fear he will get fat.”
“They get stuck in the chimneys if they are too fat,” he said, “or too big.”
“He gets beaten three or four times a day, Allan,” she said. “He does not have a mother or father to protect him. He comes from an orphanage.”
He looked at her, his brows drawn together in a frown. “You ought not to be subjected to such painful realities,” he said. “I shall have a word with Stebbins, Estelle. It will not happen again. And I shall see to it that the child is not chastised this time. I’m sorry. You are upset.” He crossed the room to stand a couple of feet in front of her.
She looked up at him. “He is a baby, Allan,” she said. “A frightened, starving little baby.”
He lifted a hand to rest his fingertips against her cheek. “I will have a word with the sweep myself,” he said. “Something will be done, I promise.”
She caught at his hand and nestled her cheek against his palm. “You will do something?” she asked, her dark eyes pleading with him. “You will?
You promise? Allan”-her voice became thin and high-pitched-“he is just a little baby.”
“Is he still in your room?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said. “I have promised him food.”
“Have some taken to him, then,” he said. “And keep him there for a while. I will come to you there.”
“You will?” Her eyes were bright with tears, and she turned her head in order to kiss his wrist. “Thank you, Allan. Oh, thank you.”
He held the door of the study open for her, his face as stern and impassive as usual, and summoned a footman with the lift of an eyebrow.
He sent the man running in search of the butler and the chimney sweep.
A little more than half an hour later the Earl of Lisle was standing in his wife’s bedchamber, his hands clasped behind his back, looking down at a tiny bundle of rags and bones huddled over a plate that held nothing except two perfectly clean chicken bones and a few crumbs of bread. The bundle looked up at him with wide and wary eyes. The countess’s eyes were also wide, and questioning.
“You are Nicholas?” his lordship asked.
“Nicky, guv’nor,” the child said in a high, piping voice.
“Well, Nicky,” the earl said, looking steadily down at him. “And how would you like to stay here and not have to climb chimneys ever again?”
The boy stared, openmouthed. The countess clasped her hands to her bosom and continued to stare silently at her husband.
“I have talked with Mr. Thomas,” the earl said, “and made arrangements with him. And I have instructed Mrs. Ainsford, the housekeeper, to find employment for you belowstairs. You will live here and be adequately fed and clothed. And you will continue to have employment with me for as long as you wish, provided you do the work assigned to you. You will never be whipped.”
He paused and looked down at the boy, who continued to stare up at him openmouthed.
“Do you have anything to say?” he asked.
“No more chimneys?” the child asked.
“No more chimneys.”
Nicky’s jaw dropped again.
“Does this please you?” the earl asked. “Would you like to be a part of this household?”
“Cor blimey, guv’nor,” the boy said.
Which words the earl interpreted as cautious assent. He assigned his new servant to the tender care of the housekeeper, who was waiting outside the door and who considered that her position in the household was an exalted enough one that she could permit herself a cluck of the tongue and a look tossed at the ceiling before she took the little ragamuffin by the hand and marched him down the back stairs to the kitchen and the large tin bathtub that two maids had been instructed to fill with steaming water.
Estelle smiled dazzlingly at her husband and hurried after them. Her white dress, he noticed, standing and watching her go, his hands still clasped behind his back, was smudged with dirt in several places.
She looked more beautiful even than usual.
Estelle was lying in her husband’s arms, feeling relaxed and drowsy, but not wanting to give in to sleep. It had been a happy and exciting day and she was reluctant to let it go.
The best part of it was that Allan had come to her after she had gone to bed, for the first time in two weeks. He had said nothing-he almost never did on such occasions-but he had made slow love to her, his hands and his mouth gentle and arousing, his body coaxing her response and waiting for it. They were good in bed together. They always had been, right back to that first time, when she had been nervous and quite ignorant of what she was to do. Even when there was anger between them, there was always passion too. But too often there was anger, and it always left a bitterness when the body’s cravings had been satiated.
It was best of all when there was no anger. And when he held her afterward and did not immediately return to his own room. She liked to fall asleep in his arms, the warmth and the smell of him lulling her.
Except that she did not want to fall asleep tonight. Not yet.
“Allan,” she whispered hesitantly. They almost never talked when they were in bed. And very rarely when they were out of it, except when they were yelling at each other.
“Yes?” His voice sounded almost tense.
“Thank you,” she said. “Thank you for what you did for Nicky. I think he will be happy here, don’t you? You have taken him out of hell and brought him into heaven.”
“Our home, heaven?” he said quietly, jarring her mood slightly. “But he will be safe here, Estelle, and warm and well fed. It is all we can do.”
“He has a new home in time for Christmas,” she said. “Poor little orphan child. He must be so very happy, Allan, and grateful to you.”
“He has merely exchanged one servitude for another,” he said. “But at least he will not be mistreated
