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CHAPTER THREE

I stood in the shadows, adjusting the bottom of the gold lace mask I wore round my eyes, and watched as groups of rowdy customers made their way inside the Lucky Penny. Every time the door opened, there was a blast of noise, a flash of red velvet and flickering light, the smell of perfume and cigar smoke. It was a tempting glimpse of another world, and I edged closer, drawn to it all.

This was the third time I’d stood outside the gaming hall. It had proved embarrassingly easy to slip out of the house and hail a cab to Whitechapel. For one thing, Max and Izzy often spent evenings sneaking out themselves to perform covert missions for the separate agencies they worked for – the ones they thought I knew nothing about.

Of course, I’d been aware of Max’s government work for years. It hadn’t been a difficult deduction to make – one had only to pay attention to his comings and goings and the way they lined up neatly with certain news items, to take note of the company he kept, to listen occasionally at a closed door.

Izzy’s secrets were, I will admit, much better kept, but we did live together. I saw plenty to arouse my suspicions. At first I thought she worked for the same agency as my brother but I quickly discounted that theory. There was no way that Max was recruiting female agents from the aristocracy; that was decidedly not his style. Still, he seemed to know what she was doing, and occasionally they went out on their nighttime excursions together, stealing into the darkness practically hand in hand. After several months it became thrillingly apparent that the people Izzy worked with were all women, and it didn’t matter if she slipped them in through the service entrance or communicated with them in code: I was skilled at spotting patterns.

Sometimes I felt I should tell the pair of them that they didn’t need to go to the trouble of sneaking around, that they could simply come and go as they pleased, but I took a certain amount of pleasure in allowing them to continue creeping in and out of their own home, because they had, once again, dramatically underestimated me.

The first two times I’d been to the Lucky Penny, it was to gather information. Having never been to a gambling den, I was interested in the etiquette. It had been a wise decision, because I’d learned that, while women did frequent the club, they were always masked. I also noticed that no women seemed to enter alone. This had given me a moment of disquiet, but I realized I would simply have to time my arrival to coincide with one of the large, rambunctious groups that often weaved their way through the wide mahogany doors.

Despite my best efforts, my casual enquiries into the place and its owner within my own social circles had turned up very little. Any young woman my own age knew nothing about it, sheltered as we were from such scandalous adventures. (Unfortunately.) And I could hardly risk alerting Izzy and Max to my plan by betraying my interest. All I’d learned was from my own late-night observations, and I would have to hope that would be enough.

While the club was on Goulston Street, in a rather dingy part of Whitechapel, the building looked better cared for than most. The sign hanging discreetly over the door had no words on it: only the image of a gold coin, glinting in the dim light of a single, flickering streetlamp. The clientele was surprisingly upmarket for such a location. It must be part of the thrill that drew members of the upper classes – a trip to this part of town. If it felt as though they were flirting with danger, they were reassured, I supposed, by the presence of two burly men who flanked the door, their meaty fists hanging listlessly at their sides until the first sign of trouble.

Keeping out of view of them had been the greatest challenge presented to me thus far, but that was about to change. I had no time to waste. It was a mere handful of weeks until the social season kicked off in earnest, and then Mother would be here, down from the estate in the country where she usually lived, and my life would be an unending cycle of teas and dinner parties and balls. In other words: a living, breathing nightmare.

I’d studied card play with a single-minded enthusiasm for just over three months, and the mathematics were fascinating. As far back as the 1650s, Pascal and Huygens had produced exciting theories on the structure of games of chance. It was an area ripe for investigation, and this side project of mine had proven to be a rich intellectual pursuit. Which was going to make tonight all the more satisfying. I was confident that I could turn the slim purse of coins in my reticule into, if not quite a fortune, then certainly a sizeable sum.

As a large party caterwauled its way down the street, I took a deep breath and slipped through the dingy light, to follow behind them. It was now or never.

Three women accompanied six or seven gentlemen, and they were clearly slumming it in Whitechapel, and giddy on the adventure of it.

“I do hope Joe has ordered in more of that brandy,” one of the gentlemen chortled from over my left shoulder, his words slightly slurred. “He’s got a fine nose for drink.”

“Ash has got a fine skill for smuggling, you mean,” one of the women giggled, and several of the men guffawed at that. I tried to join in, though to my ears my laughter sounded wooden. Now that the moment was here I found I was much more aware of all the different ways things could go wrong.

No one had seemed to notice me joining the party, and I sent up a silent prayer that it would stay that way. We reached the two giants at the door, and I dared to peep up at one of them. He was a huge, hulking man with a head that looked like it had been carved – barely – from a lump of rock. A rock with the general impression of a face.

I sent him a thin smile, and he surprised me by returning it, a flash of yellowing teeth that made him look quite sweet. It was a bolstering moment, and I sailed through the door and inside the Lucky Penny for the first time on a wave of confidence.

I hit an intense wall of sound so abruptly that it felt as if something had detonated before me.

The place was heaving with people, as excited groups gathered round the different games taking place. A long table with a roulette wheel had drawn a particularly large crowd. I took a moment to get my bearings. The room was big, and people slipped out from behind the heavy forest-green curtains that surrounded us – implying that there were smaller rooms off to the sides as well. This concurred with my own observations from pacing the perimeter of the building and counting the windows. There were no windows here, only this decadent cocoon of deep-green velvet, and so there must be other chambers beyond. The tables were polished mahogany, the seats upholstered in a deep plum-jam red, the occasional leafy palm stood next to heavy gold (though to my eye, not real gold) candelabras.

There was a great air of excitement, and the scene was lit by a blaze of candlelight. A number of deep-red light shades cast a rosy glow that made the room feel even warmer than it already was. Waiting staff in grey uniforms whirled deftly between the oblivious crowds, delivering drinks and small plates of food, silent as shadows.

I waited to feel my usual discomfort, but at the moment the scene was too captivating, the thrill rushing through me too deep for me to be anxious. Also, standing masked in this crowd, where not a single soul expected to find Lady Felicity Vane, made me feel deliciously anonymous. No eyes crawled over me; there were no naked looks of interest or calculation. As far as I knew, not one person in this room was worried about how I behaved or who I may or may not marry. No one was measuring me against some impossible standard. No one was paying attention to me at all. The thrill deepened.

I passed my cloak to the attendant and shook out my skirts, then I took a few minutes to wander around the room, watching the various games currently unfolding with interest. I accepted a glass of brandy from one of the uniformed servants, slipping a coin on to their tray. I sipped, feeling the golden burn of it run down my throat. It was surprisingly good – presumably part of the smuggled bounty mentioned by the group – though not a patch on the stuff I occasionally pilfered from Max’s study.

Eventually, I settled at one of the tables, where a man in a dark uniform was dealing vingt-et-un. This was what I had been preparing for; it was time to put my theories into practice. I watched for a while, knowing that the further into the deck the dealer got without shuffling, the greater my chance of success.

It was simply a matter of calculating the ratios and likelihood of high or low cards being drawn. I had only to keep the numbers clear in my head for as long as possible – and thanks to the way my mind worked, and the amount I’d been practising, I could keep them clear for a good, long time.

At last, I slid a single coin across the table, placing my first bet. It felt momentous. My heart thumped, and my hands had gone clammy, but after several cards were turned my prediction held.

“Vingt-et-un,” the dealer said with a smooth smile. “The lady wins.”

The feeling that ran through me then was more intoxicating than the velvet-gloved punch of brandy. My single coin grew to five, and I felt a smile curving at my own lips.

An hour later, the smile that the dealer gave me in return had grown wooden. “The lady wins again,” he said as the audience that had begun to cluster around me erupted into cheers.

I had been winning steadily for some time now. It seemed that my various hypotheses had been correct, and that was the greatest thrill of all. After that first win, the excitement in the act of gambling itself had faded almost straight away – what had remained instead was a giddy enjoyment in predicting the patterns of the cards. The numbers rang, crystal-clear bells in my mind, drowning out the crowd. All that existed was the problem in front of me as I calculated the probability that the card about to be drawn would be a six or lower.

“You play well,” a voice came from beside me, taking me by surprise.

I turned to find a man smiling at me. It was a broad smile that showed off straight white teeth. He was probably about Max’s age, with sandy hair and an open, friendly countenance.

“Thank you,” I said, my eyes turning back to the cards.

“It’s a thrill to watch a beautiful young woman experiencing a streak of good luck,” the man continued.

“It’s not luck,” I said absently.

“No?” The man’s voice lilted up in interest. “Witchcraft, then?”

This surprised a laugh out of me, and I turned to find him grinning. The mischievous expression on his face was winning, and he waggled his eyebrows, drawing another laugh from me.

“Perhaps it is witchcraft,” I said lightly, placing my bet.

When the four of clubs was revealed, I couldn’t contain a crow of triumph.

Suddenly, in place of the dealer’s elegant fingers, a coarse hand, the size of a dinner plate, came down on the table in front of me, jarring my concentration. I froze, held the numbers still in my mind as they threatened to leap about.

“Excuse me,” I huffed, irritated, eyes pinned to the cards. “You’re interrupting.”

“Boss wants to see you,” a growly voice boomed from somewhere above me, and when I reluctantly turned to look up over my shoulder, I found the burly doorman standing at my side. Only there was no longer a hint of sweetness in his face. Now the look in his eyes made my blood chill.

For a moment, my mind flashed to the voice in the library. There was a decided possibility that this boss might be the man at the wedding, and if that was the case, and he moved in such circles, I did not want to risk being recognized as Lady Felicity Vane even behind the protection of my mask.

“I have no desire to see your boss ,” I said with all the calm I could manage. “Please thank him for the invitation, but tell him I decline to accept.”

“It weren’t an invitation,” the man grunted, and he tugged the back of my chair so that I came away from the table with a muffled sound of surprise. The crowd around us, including the smiling gentleman, melted away, plenty of wide-eyed, interested stares and gossipy clucking sounds in their wake.

I eyed the giant with dislike. He eyed me back. I made some swift calculations and it seemed the best plan at the moment was to defuse the situation, meet this manager of his and then be on my way. I would have to hope that my mask did its job and preserved my anonymity. The whole matter was made more frustrating, because – having made the effort to infiltrate the place – my winnings remained a long way from my goal for the evening.

I straightened my shoulders, treated the brute to another freezing look, then got to my feet.

“My money,” I said, turning to the dealer with my hand held out.

The dealer opened his mouth, but the giant spoke first. “Oh, don’t you worry, Spence here will take care of that, won’t you, Spence?”

“Of course,” the dealer said, his eyes darting from the giant to me.

“See that it’s waiting for me when I get back,” I said icily, and he nodded. “Fine.” I turned to the enormous man beside me. “Lead the way.”