Maggie MacKeever by The Baroness of Bow Street Read Free Book Online

know.”
    “Dear Mignon!” Lord Barrymore caught her hand in his. “If I may call you so? Would that your safekeeping was in my hands! But I speak too precipitately, I know. Forgive me. I will mention that matter no more until our acquaintance has had an opportunity to blossom, until you have seen for yourself the depth and durability of my devotion to you.”
    Mignon wished ardently that Dulcie had not seen fit to leave her alone with her admirer. “I think you forget, Lord Barrymore, that I am two-and-twenty years of age, and hardly in need of either a keeper or a chaperone.”
    “Lord Barrymore?” He arched a brow. “Tolly, surely. And you are the merest child.”
    Mignon cast about in her mind for a means of distraction. She hit upon a ploy that, if it did not give Lord Barrymore a positive disgust for her duplicity, would put his tedious devotion to good use. “There is something you can do for me, if you will, but it requires the utmost secrecy. You must speak of it to no one, not even my aunt. Nor must you question me.”
    “Anything!” Lord Barrymore was fervent. “Ask for the moon, the stars, and I will fetch them for you!”
    “It’s nothing so difficult as that.” Mignon drew forth a letter from her sleeve. The posting of this item had proven no small challenge. She dared entrust it to none of Lady Bligh’s servants, not wishing to tax her aunt’s tolerance by means of a forbidden correspondence with an ineligible parti. “Merely see this safely posted for me.”
    “As you wish.” Without even glancing at the address, Lord Barrymore tucked the letter away. “Tell me more of your aunt’s strange caller. Just who is Leda Langtry?”
    “A childhood friend,” Mignon replied, relieved that he had temporarily abandoned his courtship. “And the publisher of a weekly news sheet. Dulcie, as you may have gathered, was instrumental in securing Leda’s release from Newgate.” She shrugged, and then caught the slumbering cat as it slid from her lap. “I know little more.”
    “A degrading situation,” observed Tolly, “for a female of apparently gentle birth. I’ll wager she has an interesting tale to tell. What is her connection with Warwick?”
    Lady Bligh appeared as if by magic in the doorway. In her wake trailed a maidservant burdened with a teapot and two cups. “If Warwick had his way all journalists would be either transported or hanged. Charity! Have you not yet learned to count? I said three teacups!”
    The maid, an extremely timid creature with homely nondescript features and straggling mouse-colored hair, looked ready to cry. “Beg pardon, milady,” she stammered. “I thought you said two.”
    “No matter!” said Lord Barrymore. “I was just preparing to take my leave.” The little maid fled.
    Mignon stared after the girl. “I can’t rid myself of the feeling that Charity dislikes me.”
    “Nonsense, my dear Miss Montague!” Again she had earned Lord Barrymore’s approval, it seemed. “You are a great deal too imaginative, though that is no great fault in a young girl. The wench is doubtless just envious of one who is her superior in so many ways.”
    “Is it nonsense? I’m not so sure.” Lady Bligh’s remark went almost unnoticed in the flowery effusions with which Tolly presented them as he took his leave. 
    At last he was gone. Dulcie’s dark eyes moved to her niece, who with a sigh of relief sank back into her chair. “My dear, such a worthy young man!”
    Mignon met her aunt’s twinkling gaze. “Dull as ditchwater, you mean.”
    Lady Bligh poured the tea, presented her niece with a cup; seated herself once more on the sofa, and propped up her feet on a circular table inlaid with double rows of brass. “I’ve a notion,” she said thoughtfully, “that there’s more to your young Romeo than meets the eye.”
     

Chapter 5
     
    Simpkin was a most superior valet, a seeker after perfection who could truthfully claim that he had never forgotten a single bag