Page 5 of Jackie’s Climb (A Twist Upon a Regency Tale #9)

I n Pol’s dream, he was chasing the gambler from the night before—Le Gume. Jack Le Gume, to be precise. Pol had asked a few questions and discovered that the man was well known in the area. And liked, too. He was remembered as a graceful winner and a cheerful loser. He won more than he lost, apparently. But not huge amounts, and those who had met the man swore to Pol that he was honest.

She was honest. Pol was certain of his impression from the night before, but now, in the dream, he tackled her to stop her from running away, and as she fell, the beard tore from half her face. Pol looked down into a face he knew. Jackie Bean, the stable boy from Squire Pershing’s.

Was he wrong, then? And yet his body insisted that the lithe shape underneath him was female and desirable.

At that point, Pol woke up. He was in the study, lying on the sofa under a rug, half aroused. Suddenly, he realized what his dream had been trying to tell him. He should have guessed sooner, for she had done little to disguise her name. Jack Le Gume . Legume. A bean was a sort of legume. Jackie Bean. Yes, and Jacqueline Haricot, too. Haricot was French for bean, and the French born Miss Haricot, the dressmaker’s apprentice and daughter, was very definitely a woman.

A lovely woman. Slender, but beautifully curved, with light brown hair that she usually wore tightly confined. But he had seen it loose, once, falling in soft waves to her shoulders. He had been riding past the field where she and her mother kept their cow, and she had not seen him, but the horse had stopped at a signal he did not know he had sent, and he had sat for a minute, staring at her with a dry mouth and an odd ache in his chest.

No wonder he had not guessed. The seamstress might be small, but she was all woman. However, now that he’d noticed it was obvious. She was also the stable boy, and the gambler.

A soft click came from the door, which he had locked before he went to sleep. A similar sound had reached through the mists of sleep to wake him, he realized. Someone was tapping metal upon metal outside the study door.

No. Inside the door lock, for the light from the embers in the fireplace was enough to see the door open, and he had locked it himself, before he had settled on the sofa.

He watched as a slender figure slipped through the opening and closed the door. Not Oscar, then. His cousin was the only person with a right to pick the lock, though it was not likely he’d try. In the unlikely event he even wanted to enter the study and found the door locked, his style would be to hammer on it and demand to be let in.

This person was twelve inches too short and more than a hundred pounds lighter. For the same reasons, it couldn’t be the viscountess. Amanda, perhaps? But Pol already knew who it was. Perhaps it was the faint scent of violets, so vague he might have been imagining it. Perhaps it was the tightening of his body, already primed by the dream. She is safe , said a part of his mind, rejoicing far more than made sense, given they had not had even a single conversation.

Why was Jackie Haricot or Bean, or whatever her surname might be, breaking into Oscar’s study?

She had made her way to the desk and was crouching down by the drawers on one side. He shifted the rug from his legs and swung his legs to the floor to sit up, watching her the whole time. Her focus was on the drawers, and she didn’t notice him. The scratching sound suggested she was once again picking a lock.

He did not speak until he was ready, his weight balanced forward so he could make a spring for the door if she attempted to escape.

“Are you looking for anything specific?” he asked. “If it is the money Oscar cheated you out of, I’m afraid it isn’t here. Probably Oscar took it with him. He has ridden over to Civerton, I daresay for gaming and… um… other things.”

The girl froze when she heard his voice. As he kept speaking, she slowly moved, her head coming up, so she was looking at him over the desk. “Is it you, Mr. Allegro?” she asked, only a small tremble in her voice indicating what was probably a turmoil of emotions.

“Yes. And you are Jacqueline Haricot. Or Jackie Bean. Or Jack Le Gume. Or perhaps—since you are the dressmaker’s daughter, are you not—Mademoiselle La Blanc? Are there any other identities I should know about?”

She had risen to stand, little more than a shadow in the dimly lit room. One shoulder lifted in a shrug. “You should not know about any of those identities, Mr. Allegro.”

He smiled at the wry humor in the remark. No denial, he noted.

“Jackie Haricot will do,” she said, and added, “If you know who I am, you know that Lord Riese doubled my mothe… my employer’s rent. Did you know he was demanding me as payment? Madame La Blanc would not hand me over, of course, and so he doubled the rent. Cochon .”

Pig . Pol could not disagree with her assessment. The woman’s rent was already high at ten pounds a year, though the cottage was large by the standards of the village. But the point was, twenty was extortionate.

“You are taking a risk, being so honest with me,” he pointed out, as he poked a spill into the embers until he had a flame and then used it to light the candles in the holders on the mantelpiece. He could explain that he had tried to argue Oscar out of both the planned seduction and the rent change, but Miss Haricot had no reason to believe him.

“I have heard you are the best of the family, Mr. Allegro,” the girl said.

The lady. From her bearing, her accent, and her choice of vocabulary, she had been educated as a lady. Pol’s desire to learn more about the forces that shaped her was almost equal to his most improper urge to embrace and kiss her. To keep his urges in check, he lit the candles on the desk.

Even the more innocent desire was not to be satisfied at this moment, for the door handle rattled as someone opened the door, and Miss Haricot dropped into hiding behind the desk.

*

Jackie concealed herself just in time, for Lady Riese’s voice boomed through the room.

“Allegro! What are you still doing here at this time of night?” She sounded accusing, as if she had caught him at some malfeasance.

In some ways—in many ways, in fact—Lady Riese was more dangerous than her son, for she was clever, and so concealed her true nature behind a facade of austere courtesy. Her voice told the true tale, however, as did her eyes. Both were harsh, especially when dealing with those she thought beneath her.

Mr. Allegro’s reply in his warm baritone was courteous but firm. “I worked late, my lady, as quarter day is approaching. I will be here early for a meeting the steward organized before he was called away, so I decided to sleep on the sofa to make certain I am here in time.”

“Quarter day, is it?” the viscountess grumbled. “Where is my son, Allegro? Why are you not watching over him?”

“He went into Civerton to meet some of his friends, my lady. I expect him to be gone all night.”

Lady Riese snarled. “He needs looking after, Allegro. You know this.”

She had directed that tone at Jackie when Jackie had come with Maman to take the lady’s measurements or to do a fitting. It had the brutal weight of a large hammer and had left Jackie feeling bruised and shriveled.

Mr. Allegro sounded as if he was entirely unaffected. “I have instructed his groom to bring him straight home once he leaves the brothel, my lady,” he answered. “I daresay he will be near insensible and will make no objection.”

After a moment’s silence, Lady Riese hissed, “You are insolent, Allegro. Remember, nobody is irreplaceable.”

“Very true, my lady,” the man replied.

“Hmmph,” said Lady Riese.

“Is there something I might help you with, my lady?” Mr. Allegro asked.

“The accounts for the cottages in the village. Lord Riese has made some changes for the new quarter. I wish to review them.”

“Of course, my lady. I shall fetch the book.” He moved to the desk, stepping into Jackie’s view. From her position on the floor, she could see him select a file book from the top of a neat stack of documents.

“Lord Riese has increased some of the rents and decreased others,” he told Lady Riese, moving out of sight again. “Repaying gambling debts or favors in the latter case. At least one of the rents has been doubled because he wishes to force the tenant into allowing him sexual access to her employee.”

A slap sounded, followed by Lady Riese’s harsh voice. “It is not your place to ascribe motives to your master, nor to criticize his decisions. What happens to the Riese tenants is not your concern,” she said.

Mr. Allegro’s calm and courteous tones did not change. “I merely advise, my lady. The Riese estates depend on the wellbeing of the Riese tenants. As might Lord Riese’s safety as he rides around the neighborhood.”

“Are you threatening your master?” Lady Riese demanded.

“Not I, my lady. I merely advise. Desperate people do desperate things. Lord Riese would do well not to drive people to desperation.”

Lady Riese’s laughter was a grim sound, with nothing of humor about it. “Those mice? Those frightened cowering fools? They will mutter into their beer, but none of them will do anything. Besides, my Oscar could fight off a dozen of them and not disturb the set of his coat. And then Lord Barton would send them all to the assizes, to hang or to be transported.” He probably would, too, for the magistrate was Lady Riese’s lover. “No,” she insisted. “Oscar is in no danger. Give me the rent book.”

He must have complied without speaking, for her voice next came from farther away. “Do you have an eye for the dressmaker’s girl, Allegro? That social-climbing little tart with her airs and graces? She thinks to tease Oscar until he provides a way for her to climb up out the muck that is her natural home. He will take her, of course, but she need not think above her station. Perhaps Oscar will allow you his leavings.” This time, her chuckle did sound amused.

The bitch! Social-climbing tart, indeed! Even if Jackie were stupid enough to think Oscar could be trapped into marriage, she would not touch him with a very long and very pointy stick.

She heard footsteps and the click of the door latch falling.

“She has gone,” Mr. Allegro said. “You can come out now, Miss Haricot.”

Jackie discovered that her hands were locked into fists, so tightly that her nails had cut her palms. She relaxed them and used the desk to haul herself to her feet.

“Thank you for not telling Lady Riese I was here,” she said.

Mr. Allegro shrugged. “I tell the Rieses as little as possible, although just now…” He rubbed his hand over his cheek. “You no doubt heard that Lady Riese has no sympathy for your plight, and no intention of standing between her son and the victims of his vices. I imagine you climbed up here with a plan. What is it, and how can I help?”

Could he be trusted? Would he really help? She looked into his steady brown eyes. Kind eyes, she thought again. But then she realized another fact about him.

He is not going to leave me to wander about the house on my own, and if he does not help me, I shall have to go home empty-handed. And I am running out of time.

“You were there last night when Lord Riese cheated me out of my winnings,” she commented. He had helped her then, too, come to think of it, by stopping Lord Riese from seizing her. She shuddered at the thought of what might have happened had that ogre discovered she was a woman.

“Yes?” Mr. Allegro said.

“I need that money to pay the rent,” she found herself saying. “I came to steal it back, and also to look for evidence of Rotten Riese’s crimes so he can be stopped before he hurts more people.”

Mr. Allegro’s jaw dropped, and he stared at her. Jackie glanced toward the window. If he called for help, would she be able to get out that way? What possessed her to blurt out her plan like that? Why didn’t he say anything?

As the silence endured, her discomfort grew. “Right,” she said, taking a step to the side so that she could sidle around the desk and make for the door. “It was too much to ask. I’ll just be off then.”