A Wicked Conceit by Anna Huber (e novels to read TXT) 📕

flower is before you let them in.” He flicked a glance at me. “It’s a bluebell. That way you’ll know I really sent them.”

Mr. Heron swallowed. “I will. Thank you.”

“Now that that’s settled,” I interjected. “How are we going to depart without being accosted?”

Gage moved back across Rookwood’s office, peering out through the window and down to the shadowy close below. “I have a plan. But we need to put it into action now before those louts decide it would be a better idea to wait for us on the stairs than in the close.”

He explained quickly as we retraced our steps to the back entrance. Then he drew his pistol while Mr. Heron unbolted the door and threw it open. Once he was certain no one was lurking on the dark landing, he crossed to the door on the other side and rapped on the worn wood.

“We’re no’ Rookwood’s, ye bloody midges,” an angry woman hollered from the other side. “That’s the other door.”

“Mrs. Tolliver, it’s me, Mr. Heron.”

There was a beat of silence and then the sound of footsteps approaching. The lock clicked open, and a gray head and a pair of wary dark eyes appeared in the crack in the door. “What do ye want?”

“Can you let my friends leave through your shop? There are men lurkin’ in the close, and they’re goin’ for help.”

Mrs. Tolliver’s scrutiny shifted to me and Gage, and it was obvious she recognized us, for her mouth puckered with disfavor. “Ye sure ye should be trustin’ ’em? Heard they been protestin’ that book Rookwood published.”

“Aye, and who can blame ’em,” Mr. Heron surprised me by remonstrating with her. “What wi’ Mugdock libelin’ ’em, and no proof to his claims. ’Tis pure fiction.”

I studied his profile, wondering precisely how much he knew and whether he was privy to Mugdock’s real identity. Rookwood had led us to believe not, but perhaps that had been to protect Heron.

“Aye, weel, yer Bonnie Brock’s friends, arena ye? That much is true?”

“Acquaintances,” I replied, not really certain I could categorize our relationship as a friendship. We were more reluctant allies.

Her gaze dipped to my rounded abdomen concealed by my mantua as she cackled. “Right.”

I stiffened.

“Come on, then?” She gestured us forward. “Before those midges return for another try.”

I followed the woman inside as Gage shook Mr. Heron’s hand. He lingered in the doorway as the publisher’s assistant retreated to his office and closed and bolted the door.

“Lock that door, noo,” Mrs. Tolliver groused, pushing past me to do so herself. “I dinna need ’em burstin’ in here, stealin’ Mr. Tolliver’s materials.”

I glanced around me to discover we were in the back room of a shop. The walls were lined with deep, open cupboards, each stacked with dozens of rolls of fabric in various shades of wool and linen.

“Ye could give my husband some custom for this favor I’m aboot to do ye,” she told Gage as she bustled forward again. Her appraising gaze slid over his current frock coat of green superfine and the brown trousers revealed beneath his open greatcoat. “If ye were to sport a suit made from his cloth tha’ would drive the apers our way.”

“Consider it done,” Gage replied. “I’ll send my man with my measurements within a few days’ time.”

“Oh, I can gather those just by lookin’ at ye,” she declared as she circled him, her gaze roaming to places I’d have preferred it hadn’t gone. “But he’ll need to select the fabric.”

Gage’s eyes twinkled with suppressed amusement. “Of course.”

“Wait here a moment,” she instructed us, brushing through the cloth hanging over a doorway into what I presumed was the front of the shop.

“Mr. Tolliver may be the woolen-draper,” I murmured to Gage. “But there’s no doubt Mrs. Tolliver runs this shop.”

He cracked a smile. “Somehow I feel lucky to escape here with the promise to purchase the fabric for just one set of clothes.”

“She’s probably hoping your guilt will work on you.”

“Come on, then,” Mrs. Tolliver ordered, suddenly reappearing. “There’s no customers. No’ that they can make it to the door through that lot o’ midges. Bunch o’ ghouls.”

We followed her into the front room where a man, presumably Mr. Tolliver, lifted his head from poring over a book and stood blinking at us.

“Right, then. Best cover your faces as best ye can, ’specially in those fancy garments.” She held the door for us, gesturing us out as she raised her voice. “Have a lovely day. Please come again. I promise it’s no’ usually this crowded.” This last comment rang with vexation, and was obviously added for the benefit of the mob. She punctuated it with firm closing of the shop’s door.

Chapter 13

Gage helped me open the umbrella, and then I gripped his arm tightly and lowered my head, trusting him to guide us through the swarm of people. Mrs. Tolliver might have thought our garments ill-advised, but they did the trick as we knew they would. Because they screamed quality, and because Gage oozed quiet authority, the people gathered on North Bridge Street moved out of our way without thought. Even my lowered head was to be expected, given the fact that gentlewomen were supposed to be reserved and demure.

For the most part, the mob was a silent, sullen mass, huddling beneath their drab clothes as they grew damper in the rain. For some, this was the only manner in which they washed themselves, and the smell attested to it. Only the men gathered at the front, near the windows, seemed to be making a disturbance—banging on the glass and shouting from time to time as they tried to intimidate Mr. Heron. In truth, I suspected the two watchmen positioned under an adjoining shop’s eaves were all that kept them from hurling a rock through the window.

I felt more at ease once we’d maneuvered through the thickest part of the crowd, but unfortunately