Arabella blinked, astonished. They like each other.
It was an extremely disconcerting realization.
AS BEFORE, ADAM walked between them, Miss Knightley on his left, her maid on his right. No, not her maid; her friend, Polly. He looked around as they made their way back through Whitechapel. His gaze slid over men lounging in doorways and dirty children playing in the gutters—and a young woman who was clearly a prostitute. Adam observed her obliquely. Her face had been pretty once, now it was ravaged. Her hair was as golden as Grace’s. He heard Miss Knightley’s voice in his ears: Better, or merely luckier?
He looked away.
This was no place for anyone; and most certainly no place for a child—and yet Arabella Knightley had been a child here. The sights, smells, and sounds that assaulted his senses—the piles of rotting refuse, the foul language, the drunkenness, the rats feeding openly in the gutters—were what she’d grown up with. She’d run through these filthy streets, breathed these noisome smells, seen the depths to which people could descend—and instead of turning her back on it, she’d chosen to come back, to help.
His admiration for her, his respect, was beyond words. She was remarkable.
To his right, Adam heard language that made him blench. He glanced involuntarily at Miss Knightley. She seemed utterly unperturbed. Dressed in the ragged dress and dirty apron, with her sable hair hidden beneath a shawl, she was indistinguishable from the other women on these streets. If she wanted to, she could vanish, blending with the people around them. He’d never find her again.
The thought made alarm surge inside him. He reached for her hand and tucked it firmly into the crook of his arm.
She glanced up at him, her eyebrows raised slightly in enquiry. “Mr. St. Just?”
Adam shook his head, and tensed as half a dozen boys barreled out of an alleyway ahead of them. He stepped in front of Miss Knightley, shielding her as the boys jostled past, shouting to one another.
“Oi!” Polly said indignantly, aiming a kick at one of them. “Clear orf!
Miss Knightley came out from behind him. “Mr. St. Just, you don’t have to protect me.” Her expression was amused.
Yes, I do. It was instinct; he didn’t have a choice. Adam stared at her, at the dark eyes and the fine-boned face, and was shaken by the fierceness of his need to keep her safe.
“They’re just boys,” Miss Knightley said. “There’s no harm in them.”
“Unless you don’t mind your pocket being picked,” Polly said darkly.
Miss Knightley shrugged and smiled. She began walking again.
Adam swallowed. I have to protect her. He strode after Miss Knightley, took her hand again, and placed it firmly on his arm.
She glanced at him. He clearly saw her amusement.
Adam ignored it. He offered his other arm to Polly.
They stepped over a particularly foul gutter. The stench made him almost gag. How had Arabella Knightley survived this? For that matter, how had Harry Higgs and his wife survived it? How could anyone come from this Hell on earth and not be as mean-spirited, as crude, as their surroundings?
And yet Harry Higgs—who’d never left these slums—was an admirable man: intelligent, forthright, and in his own way, honest.
Judge a person by who they are, not what they are. It was the lesson Miss Knightley had been teaching him the past few weeks. Harry, with his execrable English, was as worthy of respect—if not more worthy—than any member of the ton.
Adam looked at Arabella Knightley again, at her dark lashes, the delicate indentation in her chin. His father had been wrong seven years ago. You should have urged me to marry her, Father. She’s more a prize than any duke’s daughter.
ADAM SAT IN the hackney with Miss Knightley—now dressed in a figured muslin gown and pretty chip bonnet—and her maid opposite. His hair itched and his skin felt as if tiny creatures crawled over it. The odor of the used clothes he’d worn lingered around him. He wanted—most urgently—to bathe.
The emotion rising in him as the hackney rattled through the more genteel parts of London was one he’d never experienced before. Adam let his gaze rest on Arabella Knightley. What he felt for her was more than mere desire, more than respect and admiration—although all three of those things were present. It wasn’t a tendre, but something much more full-bodied. Richer. Deeper.
He’d been searching for a bride; he’d found her. The woman he wanted to marry—was going to marry—was seated across from him in this shabby hackney. She was beautiful, but more than that she was strong and determined, clever, resourceful, compassionate, intelligent. In all respects, an exceptional person.
He heard his own voice of seven years ago—Marry Arabella Knightley? Certainly, if one wishes to live with the smell of the gutter—and grimaced. What a fool he’d been, then and a thousand times since: every time he’d looked down his nose at her, every time he’d disdained her upbringing.
He glanced at the signet ring on his right hand. Nobilis Superbia. Noble pride.
Blind foolishness, more like.
Adam returned his gaze to Arabella Knightley. Those dark eyes were looking at him. He thought he saw a faint question in them, as if he puzzled her.
Adam cleared his throat. “Miss Knightley, I . . .”
He became aware that Polly Highsmith was also observing him. The words dried on his tongue.
“Yes?”
He abandoned his declaration of love and embarked on a different subject. “Er . . . you’ll stop being Tom, won’t you?”
“Stop?”
“Yes.” He might admire Tom’s choice of victims and the punishment he meted out—but the risks Miss Knightley took were appalling. “If you’re caught—”
“I’ll be leaving London when I come into my inheritance. And when I leave, so does Tom.”
“Leave?” It was an ominous word. Adam felt a twinge of alarm. “Leave forever?”
“That’s my intention.”
“But . . . why?”
“Because I like the ton as much as the ton likes me,” she said dryly.
In other words, not at all.
“But . . . Mr. Higgs and the school—”
“I
