Mina stood very straight and proper in her respectable black gown and fixed a cold eye on him. He was flinging open the doors to all the private parlor rooms. Gus stood next to him, looking perplexed. “The lady I arrived with, where is she?”
Mina regarded him steadily. He looked flushed from drink and ill-temper. She let her lip curl with disapproval and Gus stepped in hastily.
“This young gentleman’s lost his travelling companion, Mrs. Nye,” he said loudly. “Have you seen any young ladies hereabouts?”
Mina lifted her eyebrows. “I’ve seen no one,” she responded coolly.
“What?” the young man exclaimed furiously. “You saw us arrive! I saw you in the corridor—” he broke off his words now, plainly noticing the lack of apron and headscarf. “At least, I thought it was you,” he added sulkily. “Perhaps I was mistaken.”
Mina looked at Gus. “He’s been drinking,” she said coldly. “Mayhap you should ask the bar to stay the liquor where he’s concerned.”
“You bitch!” snarled the newcomer, making a wild grab for her, but Gus came solidly between them preventing contact.
“Now then, young master!” he bellowed. “Less of that! Less of that! This be a respectable woman and mistress here! She’s no replacement for the one you’ve lost!”
“What’s this?” asked a rough voice ominously and Mina watched Nye appear from the shadows, looking irritable and dangerous, in short, his usual self.
“This young fellow,” started Gus affably. “Seems to have misplaced—”
“I’ve misplaced nothing!” snapped the haughty young man, wheeling around to face Nye. “This woman—” Suddenly, he made a choking noise and Mina noticed Nye’s large hand was fastened around his throat. The young man’s face turned purple as he started clawing ineffectually at Nye’s wrist.
“My woman, do you mean?” Nye asked with quiet menace, bringing his face closer. A gurgling sound was all the other could manage by this point.
“Steady Will,” Gus cautioned, but Nye ignored him, turning to Mina.
“What is he after?”
“From what I can make out, he’s drunk and looking for a doxy,” Mina answered coolly. She shot a malicious look at the young man, but his eyes were now bulging, and his sole focus was Nye. Mina thought of frightened, harmless Cecily cowering in the attic bedroom and found she had little sympathy to spare him.
As suddenly as he had seized him, Nye thrust him from him and the other man fell to his knees, gasping for breath and tugging at his cravat.
Nye’s lips twisted with contempt. “Get out,” he enunciated and strode past him, catching Mina’s elbow and towing her across the passageway with him.
“You’re not welcome, my lad,” Mina heard Gus telling the stranger sternly. “Best take yourself and that fancy gig o’ yours and leave.”
“What were you about? Skulking there in the dark?” Nye growled, propelling her toward the staircase.
Mina raised her chin. “You never told me to go near the private parlors,” she said pertly. “You said the taproom and the cellars were out of bounds, nowhere else. I had just finished cleaning the window in the first of them, that was all.”
Nye’s gaze was piercing, and Mina felt herself color. “Then I credited you with more sense than you deserve,” he retorted gruffly, and Mina bristled all over. Though why it should bother her if William Nye thought her a fool was beyond her. She found herself opening her mouth to make a smart retort before thinking better of it. “If you don’t want to be taken for a doxy again, you’d best keep to the parlor or above stairs of an evening,” he spat. Then pushed her in the direction of the staircase and Mina watched him slam through the door into the public bar.
She stood rigid a moment, before turning to look out of the window onto the courtyard. The objectionable stranger was climbing back into his high perched carriage. Mina watched as he scanned the lanes and hedgerows as he wheeled back out of the yard and onto the road. He was certainly taking a much slower pace on his way out then he had on his way in. Doubtless imagining Cecily fleeing him into the night like a poor frightened little rabbit. After a few moments of waiting to make sure he had truly gone, Mina turned and made her way quickly to the kitchen to boil some water for tea. While it boiled, she retrieved her things from the first private parlor and stowed them away in the scullery and then helped cut a few slices of currant loaf which she buttered, not knowing when Cecily would last have eaten. Last of all, she took some milk, remembering that was how most of the girls at school had taken their tea. Then she stole away upstairs to join Cecily.
*
“I have fresh bread and butter for you, Cecily and I’ll make you a nice cup of tea,” Mina told her, setting the bread and butter down on a bedside table and filling the silver teapot with tea leaves and hot water.
“I declare I couldn’t eat a thing!” Cecily’s bottom lip wobbled as Mina helped her undo her pretty bonnet and took her cloak. “I still can’t believe I’m truly out of his clutches.” Her hand clasped Mina’s. “Oh miss, he must have been ever so angry,” she said, tearing up again. “His temper was the most wicked I have ever seen.” “I had thought my guardian, Sir Matthew’s temper was terrifying,” she confided artlessly. “For he grows cold as an icicle. But Mr. Brinson’s was in a wholly different league.”
“And how is it that you are acquainted with Mr Brinson?” Mina asked, hanging Cecily’s bonnet on a peg.
“Oh!” Cecily’s eyes fell. “He—he is an acquaintance of my cousin’s friend. I met him through Vanessa at a party and afterward again, we bumped into him in the park. He—he seemed so
