Last Night's Scandal (The Dressmakers 5)

As it turned out, the way in was clear. But they didn’t get far. They were crossing the south transept when a fellow carrying a lantern hurried toward them.

“Sorry, gentlemen,” he said. “No visitors after dark. I know some like a broody atmosphere or want to be frighted out of their wits—”

“We’re not visiting,” Lisle said. “We’ve only come—”

“You must come back in the daytime. Very busy, I admit, with the workmen, but they must clear out, mustn’t they, before we can make a start of things. And now this matter of the crypt, and everyone pestering for a look at it.”

“That isn’t—”

“I can’t tell you how many scholars we’ve had, measuring and arguing. Last I heard, it’ll cost a hundred thousand pounds to repair the damage, but that doesn’t include the crypt, as they haven’t decided what to do. Half at least saying it must be dug out and the other half saying leave it as it is.”

“It’s not about—”

“You come back tomorrow, sirs, and someone will be happy to take you about and answer your questions and tell you why they’re disputing about what’s Norman and what’s Perpendicular.” He shooed them toward the door.

Theorizing that the watchman was slightly deaf as well as garrulous, Lisle said, more loudly, “We’re looking for two ladies.”

The man stopped waving his lantern at the door. “Ladies?”

“My aunties,” said Olivia, sounding uncannily like an adolescent male. Mimicry came easy to her.

Lisle glared at her. She always had to embellish.

“One about so tall,” said Lisle, holding his hand level with Olivia’s ear. “The other a trifle shorter. They wanted to see the church, and particularly the crypt.”

“Oh, yes, indeed,” said the man. “I told them to come back tomorrow. It isn’t at all safe, I warned them, but they wouldn’t have any of that. Before I knew what I was about, there I was, leading them about and answering questions. But I’m not employed, sir, to give tours at night, and I won’t be making any more exceptions.”

“Certainly not,” said Lisle. “But perhaps you could tell us when they left?”

“Why, not ten minutes ago, I’m sure. Maybe it was a quarter hour. I don’t recollect exactly. But they left in a hurry. Lost track of time, they said.”

“Did they happen to say where they were going?” Lisle said.

“The George in Coney Street, they told me. They asked for the quickest way back. Said they were late for dinner.”

“If they left ten minutes ago, we should have met up with them,” Lisle said.

“They might have gone another way,” said the watchman. “Did you come by way of Stonegate?”

“We did,” said Lisle. “Did they—”

“As I explained to them, the name refers to the stone brought to build the Minster,” their informant said. “It traveled from the quarries by water, and landed at Stayne Gate, below the Guildhall.”

“Do you think—”

“They were interested to learn that the author Mr. Lawrence Sterne lived in Stonegate in his bachelor days.”

“Do you think they went another way?” Lisle said in a rush.

“Mayhap they took the wrong turning, into Little Stonegate,” the watchman said. “I hope they didn’t go astray. I saw them safely out of the church, I promise you. The way is poorly lit, indeed, and with all this debris about, it’s all too easy to—”

A shriek cut him off.

Lisle turned in the direction of the sound. He saw nothing. Then he realized he saw nothing in the place where Olivia ought to be.

“Olivia!” he shouted.

“Ow, ow, ow,” Olivia said. Then, remembering that she was supposed to be a male, she added, “Deuce take it.”

Her voice wobbled. Indeed, the pain made her eyes water, and she wanted to cry, although that was mainly frustration. She saw no way to get out of this gracefully. “I’m over here.”

“Over where?”

The light of candle and lantern wavered over the various heaps of debris.

“Here,” she said.

At last the light swung toward her ignominious pose.

She lay, arse upward, half on and half off the pile of lumber and stone and whatever else she’d tripped over. A precious small pile, she saw as the men came nearer. But like the small hole that had finished Mercutio, it had been enough to do for her. She’d struck her knee—and that hurt—and landed on an elbow, which sent pain twanging up her arm. But that was nothing to what she felt when she tried to stand up.

Lisle passed his candle to the watchman and crouched beside her.

“This is why I tell them not to come at night,” the watchman said. “A man could trip and crack his head open. Even in the daytime you’ve got to watch where you’re going.”

“Stand back a bit,” Lisle said. “Hold the lantern higher.”

The watchman retreated and did as he was told.

Suppressing a groan, she managed to turn slightly. She didn’t care what Lisle saw, but she’d rather not have her arse center stage for the watchman to gape at.

“Where’s your hat?” Lisle said in a low voice.

“I don’t know.”

He ran his fingers lightly over her tightly pinned hair. “You don’t seem to be bleeding.”

“I fell on my arm.”

“If you hadn’t, you could have cracked your skull.”

“There’s nothing wrong with my head,” she said.

“That’s a matter of opinion.”

“It’s my foot. I can’t get up.”

“I’m going to throttle you,” he said. “I told you—”

“To stay close, I know. But I only moved a very little away. I was trying to get a quick look about before he ejected us. And then—”

“You tripped.”

“It wasn’t a bad fall, but my right foot won’t hold me. I think I twisted my ankle. Help me up, will you?”

“Is anything broken, curse you?”

“I don’t think so. It’s only the foot. It won’t cooperate—and it hurts like blazes if I try to make it cooperate.”

He said something under his breath in Arabic. She supposed there wasn’t an English curse strong enough to express his feelings. Then his hand grasped her right foot, and she nearly shot straight into the air. He inspected it, inch by inch, turning it gently this way and that. She had all she could do not to moan—and she wasn’t at all sure whether this was on account of the pain or the feel of his hands on her.

From her foot he made his way swiftly but gently up to her knee.

“I don’t think you’ve broken anything,” he said.

“That’s what I—”

She broke off because he was dragging her up into a sitting position. Before she could catch her breath, he caught her under the arms and pulled her upright. When her right foot touched the floor, she winced.

“Don’t put any weight on it,” he said. “You’ll have to lean on me. Luckily, we haven’t far to go.” While he spoke, he slid his arm under her coat and around her back. His arm, bracing her so firmly, was warm and hard. She was aware of his hand, under her breast. Her breast was aware of it, too, the skin tightening while morals-sapping sensations cascaded downward.

While propping her up, he fished some coins out of his pocket and gave them to the watchman. “Sorry about the trouble,” he said.

“I hope the young gentleman recovers soon,” the man said.

“Thank you,” Olivia said in her young male voice.

Lisle said nothing. He maneuvered her through the door, and slowly down the steps into the yard.

They proceeded in silence through the narrow passage into High Petergate.

Lisle didn’t trust himself t

o speak.

She’d frightened him out of his wits. She could have broken her neck or cracked her skull.

Even when he knew she was more or less in one piece, he worried—about broken bones, splintered bones, concussion.

It looked as though she’d done nothing worse than turn her ankle. The trouble was, it had taken him too long to reach that conclusion.

He’d put his hands on her head, her foot, and her leg. He’d examined her far too scrupulously and spent too much time doing it.

That was not intelligent. He’d been even less intelligent when he hauled her upright: He’d put his arm under her coat instead of over it.

Instead of encountering a protective layer of waistcoat, he felt the thin fabric of her shirt and the waist of her trousers. When she leaned against him, the bottom of her inadequately protected breast rested on the side of his hand. Under the shirt, the soft flesh was so warm.

It would have tried the self-control of a saint to walk in this intimate way: her breast bobbing against Lisle’s hand and her hip pressed against his as they made their way so slowly out of the church, down the steps, and out of the church yard and on. Holding her so close, he could smell her hair and her skin. . .