cocked his beady eye at her. ‘Who’s a pretty girl, then?’ Tassie almost smiled. But she couldn’t ignore the fact that what Moll had said was right. Tassie couldn’t go on pretending to be what she was not for much longer. ‘If only I were a boy!’ she went on in anguish, jumping up to pace the little room while at the same time trying to resist the temptation to chew her fingernails, something she always did when she was distressed. Edward just put his head on one side, his bright eyes blinking, and crunched steadily on the remains of a crust. Tassie drew a deep breath, then flung her big coat on the bed.
Soon after she had joined Georgie Jay’s band, she’d taken to dressing like a lad because it was easier, and when her breasts had started to swell she’d worn loose shirts buttoned to the neck and hoped no one would notice. When her monthly courses began, a kindly serving girl at the farm where they were working came to her rescue and gave her some strips of linen to use, and into the bargain gave her an earthy lecture on how men were fiery creatures, and likely to be aroused beyond reason by the presence of a young, pretty maid. So Tassie tied up her bright golden hair with a piece of twine and pushed it under a cap; as she grew she continued to dress in loose breeches and boots and a rough cambric jacket several sizes too big for her that concealed her swelling curves; and season after season she tramped the dusty roads in the cheery company of Georgie Jay and his band, never complaining of weariness, always hoping that things would remain the same, because in truth she had no other life to turn to.
But she knew, in her heart of hearts, that things were changing fast. Moll had spotted the trouble with Billy already.
Billy was big and strong, but he was simple-minded. His family had been turned out of their cottage when the local landowner wanted to pull it down to make more space for sheep, and Billy had attached himself to the company like a faithful dog, invaluable if there was any kind of hard physical work. Tassie had always felt quite safe with him, as she did with all the others in their little band. But a couple of weeks ago, a little after midnight, Billy had knocked at the door of Tassie’s bedroom. ‘Tass,’ he called out. ‘Let me in, will you? I want ter tell you somethin’.’
She’d opened the door, and instantly smelled that he’d been drinking. Big Billy, with his thatch of wiry black hair, had always been a little over-fond of his ale. So she told him that she would talk to him in the morning; but he’d muttered something and a strange, hot look had spread across his face as he gazed at Tassie, with her hair loose past her shoulders, and dressed only in her thin cotton nightshirt.
He’d tried to kiss her then, grabbing her shoulders and pulling her close. Tassie struggled desperately to push him away, but Billy wrapped one arm around her waist, trapping her, while with the other hand he began to fumble at her breasts. She could feel the hardness of his arousal pressing against his breeches while his hot lips smothered her mouth; and Tassie, gasping, twisted violently and used her knee, very hard, in the place where she knew it would hurt him the most. Billy had whimpered with shock and gone limping off to his room. Tassie hoped fervently that the hateful episode had vanished into the shadows of Billy’s slow mind; certainly he’d not troubled her again in that way, and she didn’t think he would. But it had been an unpleasant reminder that Moll’s warnings were only too true.
And now, they thought they could just pack her off to Moll’s brother in the country! Oh, never. Suddenly she remembered the wallet she’d stolen from the gent in Half Moon Alley. Pulling herself up on the dingy little bed, she sat cross-legged in her boots and buckskin breeches and her man’s shirt, and tossed back her long blonde curls from her face. Then she eased the slim leather wallet from her hip pocket; but her heart sank again, for there wasn’t much in it. A few coins, amounting to little more than two guineas, and a pencilled note, folded up. The coins she put carefully into a little locked box hidden beneath her bed; the note she casually unfolded, preparing to crumple it and toss it aside. But then her eyes opened wide as a curling lock of chestnut hair tied up in a pretty blue ribbon fell on to the bed. Tassie read the note avidly. For my darling Marcus. A little memento. All my love for ever, Philippa.
Well! So her noble rescuer—Marcus—was in love! Tassie instantly held it closer. Philippa’s handwriting was dainty, with lots of curly flourishes, quite the opposite of Tassie’s bold, clear hand; Tassie would be prepared to wager that Philippa didn’t chew her nails as she did, or fuzz the cards at whist, or swear like a trooper when the occasion arose. A prim parlour-miss indeed; the writing was a little faded, but the sheet was still scented with the remnants of some exotic and no doubt expensive floral perfume, which made both Tassie and Edward sneeze. Tassie went over to the window, preparing to hurl the lock of hair and the note out into the darkness. All my love for ever.
Just for a moment, she paused. Just for a moment she wondered what it must be like, to love a man like that; to be loved, in return. Then she pushed the window open and tossed out the lock of chestnut hair and the note into the courtyard, to join the heaps of stinking rubbish down there. ‘Fancy carrying that around with him, Edward.’ She shook her head. Darling Marcus. A little memento…
Edward squawked appreciatively and repeated, ‘Darling Marcus! Darling Marcus!’ Tassie hesitated again; then she pressed her lips together and hurled the wallet through the window as well.
The noise of singing and laughter came up from the tavern below. She went to put more coals on the slumbering fire, and caught sight of her face in the cracked mirror over the hearth. A pale, haunted face, with shadowed green eyes, and clouds of golden curls tumbling to her shoulders. Tassie, the street thief. Tassie the trickster. Who was she really? Why was she all alone, forced to run long ago from a place of hateful cruelty?
She went slowly to count up the coins in her money box, and the old memories came crowding in. The great old house, miles from anywhere. Well-bred, hateful voices, snarling over her: ‘This brat’s trouble, William, I tell you! Nothing but trouble, and some day she’s going to find out the truth…’
Thoughtfully, Tassie put her money box away and picked up her much-worn pack of cards from beside Edward’s perch. Outside she heard the nightwatchman call the hour, ‘Ten o’clock and all’s well..’
No. No. All was most decidedly not well. Sitting cross-legged on her little bed, she began by the light of the flickering candle to practise one of the tricks she’d persuaded old Peg-leg to teach her in return for her help today. The time had come, as she’d always known it would, for her to make her own plans—before somebody else tried to make them for her.
She might, perhaps, have felt even more trepidation had she realised just how ardently Major Marcus Forrester was thinking thoughts of revenge against the ungrateful wretch who’d removed his wallet. He and Hal were at that moment dining at a fashionable chop-house just off the Piazza, where Hal, guessing that his friend’s forlorn financial prospects must be lowering his spirits, talked to him encouragingly of the money that could be made by investing in cotton and shipping. Marcus listened, pretending to take an interest. Then Hal, taking the plunge, started to tell Marcus that his sister Caroline had recently met Miss Philippa Fawcett out walking in the park, and that she was looking unusually lovely, and was there any chance of Marcus calling on her; at which Marcus shook his head swiftly and ordered, Talk of something else, Hal. Anything else.’
And as Hal recounted inconsequential gossip, Marcus’s thoughts drifted far away to Lornings, the beautiful estate in the Gloucestershire countryside that belonged to his godfather, Sir Roderick Delancey. The place Marcus had always thought of as his home. As soon as Marcus, freshly returned to London just over a week ago after a storm-racked Atlantic voyage, had heard the news about Sir Roderick, he’d set out to see him. He’d found him, not at the great hall itself—which to Marcus’s dismay looked totally abandoned—but in the much smaller Dower House, which lay close by.
‘It’s all my own fault,’ Sir Roderick
