Page 25 of To Dare the Devil

“It’s no—”

“Good day to you, my lord,” she said curtly, and took herself off back across the field before he could stop her.

Chapter 8

Yes, Ozzie, dear, I shall be at Lady St Clair’s Spring Ball. Heaven help me. I rely on you to keep my spirits up. I have a gorgeous dress, at least. It’s such a glorious shade of blue, though that feels small comfort when I must pretend not to hear the insults about my dubious bloodline. Ah well, all the usual kindly friends and relatives will seek me out for dances and for that I am grateful. It might be a good deal worse.

Darling, I hardly move in the same circles as Montagu’s sons, but as it happens, I overheard Mama talking to Aunt Prue the other day. Pip’s father had words with him recently and he took it badly, I think. The marquess reprimanded him for spending too much time with demireps and opera singers and not in society. Though you know how he loathes the ton and one can hardly blame him when females are forever laying traps for him. No doubt it’s a relief to avoid it. He had a narrow escape recently; I believe. Still, I think after his father’s words; he is likely to attend rather than face the consequences. I know I would. Montagu is rather terrifying.

―Excerpt of a letter from Miss Kathleen De Beauvoir (daughter of Mrs Minerva and Mr Inigo de Beauvoir) to Lady Rosamund Adolphus (daughter of their Graces, Robert and Prunella Adolphus, The Duke and Duchess of Bedwin).

27th May 1842, Vane Hall, Chiswick, London.

Max eased his bruised frame into the hot water with a sigh of relief. His eye had swollen shut and was throbbing like the devil, but it had been worth it.

Miss de Beauvoir didn’t hate him.

In fact, she’d had cried. A single tear, yes, but she had been visibly upset. Though he was sorry she’d been frightened, her concern had eased something jagged and anxious inside him. He realised now that he had wondered if anyone could ever care about him, even a little. Though he was under no illusion that she liked him. His parents had indulged his every whim, and he’d only need to mention that he wanted something before they gave it to him. Yet they’d not liked him much, either, or so it had seemed so to him. Like most aristocratic children, a parade of nannies and tutors had attended to him with varying degrees of kindness and attention. No one had ever seemed terribly interested in him beyond ensuring that he learned his lessons, dressed well, and knew how to speak to his betters. It had been lonely; he acknowledged now, though he’d never put it into words before, even to himself. He’d been an only child, with any other siblings stillborn or dying before their first year. His mother had not been strong and had become obsessed with her own health, forever trying some new cure or remedy. Ironically, she had outlived his robust father by ten years and had died of influenza the week after someone had tried to take Max’s life, too. Perhaps it had been the shock of his disappearance that had made her so ill? Perhaps, but somehow, he doubted it.

It was a strange notion, to be grateful to the person who had caused you such pain by trying to end your life, but it was true. It was like being reborn with the scales fallen from his eyes. Everything was so clear to him now when before he’d been utterly blind, not only to his own vileness but to how easily he could have made life happier for himself and those around him. A kind word might change everything, giving a moment of your time or saying yes when it was easier to refuse could make a difference. Small gestures counted as much as grand ones, he knew now. They might not change the world, but perhaps they might help someone get through the day, someone who might return the favour when you were alone and wretched.

Looking back at who he’d been was a peculiar sensation, like looking at a stranger. He’d not realised how desperately unhappy he’d been, how empty his life. His own fault, he saw now. Life had given him opportunities for happiness, and he’d run from them, seeing only a trap. Nausea roiled in his guts as he remembered words he could never take back, actions that had consequences he must live with for the rest of his days.

Max closed his eyes and remembered how it had felt to wake in Burt’s dark rooms.

Two and a half years earlier…

20th July 1839, Covent Garden. Parish of St Giles.

The pain was dizzying. Max licked his lips, finding them papery and dry, his throat parched.

“Here, lad,” said a raspy voice as a tin cup was placed to his lips. Lukewarm weak tea was not a drink Max would have thought he could enjoy, but at this moment, it tasted like nectar from the gods. “Woah, slow down, else you’ll choke. That’s it, easy like.”

The voice was wrong, Max thought anxiously. It wasn’t the one he wanted. There had been another, sweeter voice, the one he’d stayed for. He’d held on through the fiery pain and the endless misery just to cling to the sound of that voice, needing to put a face to it. She’d sounded like an angel.

He jolted away, eyes flying open, and tried to sit up, immediately reprimanded by the lancing pain in his side. He cried out and stared around, panting with terror, expecting to see flames and the devil himself come to mete out punishment to one of his greatest sinners.

“Easy, there,” counselled that same scratchy voice, and Max turned towards it to see a thin whip of an old man watching him with interest. “There ain’t no need to look so afeared. We kept you safe and tended you this long. Ain’t no reason to do you in now, is there, eh?”

Max stared at him, waiting anxiously to see if it was a trick, if horns would sprout from his greying temples and his eyes glow red. But the old man just smiled placidly and reached out, ruffling Max’s hair.

“S’all right, lad. You had a close shave and no mistake, but you’ll be well again soon.”

“Where is she?” he demanded, needing the girl, she’d promised to be here when he woke.

“Where’s who? Ain’t no girls here, son. You must have dreamed her.”

“A dream?” he repeated, his heart aching. No. No, not a dream, please. She had promised to save him, to be here and he… But that was foolishness. He didn’t deserve anyone who was that kind, that sweet.

He was alive, he realised, as a fine tremor began in his bones and would not stop. Some beneficent deity had given him a second chance just as he’d prayed for, a chance to do better and make amends for all he’d done wrong. To his consternation, he felt hot tears sliding down his cheeks, unstoppable, and a sob rose in this throat. He turned his face away, ashamed to be seen crying like a baby, but the old man only patted his shoulder and left him alone to weep with relief, misery, and gratitude until he was exhausted and slept once more.

When he next woke, there was a boy watching him.

“Blimey, you don’t half sleep a lot,” he said, a complaining note to the observation. “Burt said I had to keep you company, but it’s a dull job when you just lay there. At least before when you was off ye head, you was more entertaining.”

“Sorry,” Max offered cautiously, biting back the instinctive desire to tell him to go to the devil. He would not be that man again, he reminded himself. His head was pounding, and everything hurt, but this lad had been watching over him, no matter how ungraciously.

“S’all right,” the boy said with a gap-toothed grin. “You’re awake now. So, what’s your name, then?”