and returned home without me being aware of any of it.’
Joan’s blush deepened at the hint that she was an incompetent schemer.
‘My sister tells me that you were extremely fortunate that one of the locals did the decent thing and steered you out of the rookery before a disaster occurred.’ His Grace was frowning fiercely at his novice driver.
‘He weren’t a local, your Grace, he were Mr Rockleigh.’
The Duke of Thornley had been marching to and fro with his hands clasped behind his back and his head lowered in concentration. Now he halted and pivoted on a heel to gawp at his servant. Joan also stared Pip’s way. She’d not believed for a second that her driver had recognised Drew Rockleigh from that one brief meeting, in the dark, over two years ago.
‘Mr Rockleigh?’ Alfred parroted in utter disbelief. ‘Do you mean Drew Rockleigh?’ The Duke looked to his daughter for a reply.
‘Yes, it was him, Papa,’ Joan answered quietly.
‘You knew that ruffian?’ Dorothea snorted. ‘I believed him to be one of them.’ She flapped a hand in disgust.
‘I believe he is now one of them,’ Joan said with genuine sorrow trembling her voice.
‘You may return to your post, Rook, and you, Sister, may also retire.’
‘I certainly did not know the ruffian was your stepson-in-law’s friend,’ Dorothea avowed while trotting towards the door. ‘I swear I got no proper look at him, Alfred...just his back was to me as he leapt down.’
His Grace hurried his sister on her way with a hand flap, but as Joan also approached the exit he halted her with a curt, ‘You stay, miss. I have much to discuss with you.’
Once the door had been closed the Duke again prowled about, much to his daughter’s relief. Joan had been expecting an immediate dressing down, but it seemed her father was still pondering on the startling news that Luke Wolfson’s best friend had been reduced to such poverty.
‘Did Rockleigh know your identity, Joan?’ Alfred enquired, still pacing.
‘He did, Papa.’
‘Did you talk about what prompted his fall from grace?’
‘No...we exchanged little conversation. It wasn’t the time or place for social niceties.’ Joan kept to herself that Drew Rockleigh had roundly castigated her for being abroad in the vicinity of Ratcliffe Highway.
‘I know some business went bad for him, but never would I have imagined he now frequents a notorious slum.’ The Duke of Thornley sorrowfully shook his head.
‘He seems quite able to take care of himself...but it was horrid meeting him there,’ Joan replied. ‘I’m sorry, Papa, that I put myself and my aunt and Pip in peril. But please don’t ask me to stop helping at the school—’
‘I ask nothing,’ the Duke interrupted. ‘I am telling you categorically that you will never attend that place again. And I shall write personally to your friend Vincent Walters to make it clear that I hold him responsible for imperilling you.’ The Duke’s impassioned speech had turned his complexion florid.
‘You cannot! It’s not the Reverend’s fault that I volunteered my services. And in any case he did impress on me that...’ Joan’s voice tailed away.
‘He did impress on you...what?’ his Grace demanded.
‘He said I shouldn’t undertake anything without your consent,’ Joan admitted sheepishly. She didn’t want Vincent Walters added to the list of people she’d caused to be scolded because of her determination to help those far less fortunate than herself.
The Duke appeared slightly mollified to know that the vicar had acted correctly. ‘I will not write and admonish him, then, if you promise to behave as you should.’ The Duke’s mind returned to the topic most engaging it. ‘Did Rockleigh appear much changed to you?’
‘Oddly...no...it took me only a short while to recognise him. Oh, the elements have browned his skin and bleached his hair. His body seemed broader, more muscled...’ The memory of that naked torso slick with sweat and blood streaks caused Joan to blush. ‘Of course his clothes were very grimy,’ she hastened on. ‘But he appeared quite healthy, apart from some cuts and bruises to his hands and face.’ She noticed her father’s deep frown. ‘He prize fights to pay for his keep, you see,’ she explained.
‘Fights? What...in the street?’ Alfred snorted. He recalled that he had once watched his stepson-in-law and Rockleigh sparring at Gentleman Jim’s gymnasium and thought them evenly matched. Rockleigh had won the bout and gone on to take a fencing match against Luke, too, that afternoon.
‘He pays his way by winning purses, so he said,’ Joan added.
‘I suppose something must be done to help him,’ the Duke rumbled beneath his breath. ‘Not so long ago that fellow did us a great service in keeping you safe and keeping confidential another of your hare-brained jaunts; now he has come to your assistance once more. He deserves a reward and methinks that he will be inclined to accept it this time.’
Joan shot a glance at her father. ‘You offered to reward him last time?’
‘I did, indeed!’ the Duke admitted forcefully. ‘What occurred wasn’t Rockleigh’s fault.’ He harrumphed. ‘I was embarrassed and humbled to learn that I’d wrongly accused him of seducing you, when all the fellow had done was put himself to the trouble of returning you home after you turned up on his doorstep.’
Joan flinched from the reminder of her shameful behaviour and from the memory of her father’s attempt to make Rockleigh marry her. He had refused to have her and in the end there had been no need for a forced marriage because the scandal had never leaked out. Only family and the reluctant bridegroom had ever been privy to what had gone on.
‘I will set an investigator to unearth him and arrange a payment.’ The Duke of Thornley was not simply being philanthropic; his busy mind was weighing up how the possession of a wealthy man’s secrets might corrupt a person down on his luck.
A muttered oath exploded between Alfred’s teeth as he imagined all manner of disastrous consequences following on from that dratted calamity in Wapping. He dismissed his daughter with urgent finger flicks, pondering on whether the vicar or Rockleigh or both of them might present him with a problem.
When she’d been about fifteen Joan had been soft on her best friend’s cousin. Vincent Walters, for his part, had encouraged Lady Joan’s attention more than was decent for a fellow of his calling or station in life, in Alfred’s opinion. His late wife had reassured him that there was nothing to worry about. Girls blossoming into womanhood liked to flirt at such a tender age, she’d told him, because they were fascinated by the new power they had recently acquired over gentlemen. She’d maintained that Vincent was simply being courteous and kind in his mild responses. By then the Duchess had been quite poorly and Alfred had not wanted to worry his wife by overreacting. Privately he had let the Reverend know by glowering look and barbed comment that he wasn’t happy about the situation. In hindsight, Alfred accepted it had amounted to little more than Joan fluttering her eyelashes and the vicar and his relations being entertained to tea more often than was usual. Within a few months his daughter had turned sixteen and had made her come out at her mama’s insistence. The doctor had warned that the Duchess
