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Authors: Provocateur
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a floor. Does that mean anything to you? Do not trouble me with lies, sir. I am no longer the gullible girl you once deceived.”
The crowd, massing from the stairwell, shoved her into him.
“I never found you gullible,” he muttered, off balance in this odd conversation, his hands on her shoulders. How did one steady disbelief? “Only mysterious.”
“And you, sir,” she tipped her head. “Are sad.”
“Sad?” He protested with a laugh.
“And lonely,” she went on, as if truth were painted in broad strokes upon his forehead.
Mirror-like, her eyes reflected the truth of him. Storm cloud blue, as if heaven itself sought the hidden depths of who and what he was, she stripped him naked, left him vulnerable and exposed.
“Your secrets are safe with me,” she said quietly.
“Secrets?” Lydia Oswald glared at him as if he were dung flung by passing coachwheels. “And what business have you sharing them with an innocent young lady?”
He answered readily, with a polite bow. A man in his line of work always stood ready with answers, with a facade of social charm. “Have you not heard? I am a sad and lonely man, Mrs. Oswald? A creature to be pitied.”
“I will not pity a man who, by his own actions, places himself in a position for which he then begs sympathy.”
Roger chuckled. He knew just how to set the tone in such a situation. “No more should you.”
Nose in the air, the loud-mouthed Lydia dragged the mysterious Miss Selwyn away. He could not blame her. Too well had he built himself a reputation deserving of distance.
He hoped Dulcie Selwyn spoke the truth in promising him her silence. A catastrophe awaited, if she ever voiced her suspicions to the gossip-prone Lydia Oswald.
The Royal Naval Hospital
He waited for Dulcie at the Royal Naval Hospital the following day. He knew she would come. She and her father took a river barge every week from a dock near the Tower around the jutting Isle of Dogs to Greenwich. Mr. Selwyn served escort in his daughter’s weekly visits to the sick and wounded.
Selwyn spent most of his afternoon at the College or strolling the docks examining ships. Dulcie whiled away the hours reading to, and chatting with, injured and retired sailors.
Roger told himself he waited for her because Miss Selwyn might do him mischief. He could not admit, even to himself, that the knowing look in her eyes drew him, that the tone of her voice, and her recognition of his loneliness, drove him to it.
A miserable place, the infirmary, and yet Dulcie stepped fearlessly into that sulfurous den of mangled and missing limbs, a seeping, stench of ill-healed wounds and moaning men.
Those with strength enough, cried out to her when she entered the wards. Enthusiastic greetings.
“’Ow are you today, Miss?”
“Good of you to come.”
“Best look in on Stapleton and Dawley. Bedeviled by pain, they are, poor lads.”
“Suffering turrible from ‘is burns, Dawley is.”
“Cap’n Stapleton has not slept so soundly since your last visit, miss. He brightens when he hears you’ve come.”
“Always dreaming, poor man, and tossin’ about. Shouting for mercy from them heartless pirates, Persian priggers!”
“Watch yer language, Collins, or I shall have your tongue out, quicker ‘n any Joassamee!”
“Beggin’ your pardon, miss.”
Her voice soothed as she moved among them with quiet purpose. “Sorry to hear he does no better. How heals the leg, Mr. Walden? Does the phosphate of manganese and iron improve your energy, Mr. Hall? You have better color today. Is the wound knitting, Captain Kelly?”
She knew the patients intimately, the doctors and caretakers almost as well. He might have spoken to her there, in the wards, one more bandaged man among many, and yet he could not bring himself to interrupt her work. He content himself in watching. She lingered at Stapleton’s cot, spent some time chatting with the poor man, and with soothing words and swaying bauble, put him to
The crowd, massing from the stairwell, shoved her into him.
“I never found you gullible,” he muttered, off balance in this odd conversation, his hands on her shoulders. How did one steady disbelief? “Only mysterious.”
“And you, sir,” she tipped her head. “Are sad.”
“Sad?” He protested with a laugh.
“And lonely,” she went on, as if truth were painted in broad strokes upon his forehead.
Mirror-like, her eyes reflected the truth of him. Storm cloud blue, as if heaven itself sought the hidden depths of who and what he was, she stripped him naked, left him vulnerable and exposed.
“Your secrets are safe with me,” she said quietly.
“Secrets?” Lydia Oswald glared at him as if he were dung flung by passing coachwheels. “And what business have you sharing them with an innocent young lady?”
He answered readily, with a polite bow. A man in his line of work always stood ready with answers, with a facade of social charm. “Have you not heard? I am a sad and lonely man, Mrs. Oswald? A creature to be pitied.”
“I will not pity a man who, by his own actions, places himself in a position for which he then begs sympathy.”
Roger chuckled. He knew just how to set the tone in such a situation. “No more should you.”
Nose in the air, the loud-mouthed Lydia dragged the mysterious Miss Selwyn away. He could not blame her. Too well had he built himself a reputation deserving of distance.
He hoped Dulcie Selwyn spoke the truth in promising him her silence. A catastrophe awaited, if she ever voiced her suspicions to the gossip-prone Lydia Oswald.
The Royal Naval Hospital
He waited for Dulcie at the Royal Naval Hospital the following day. He knew she would come. She and her father took a river barge every week from a dock near the Tower around the jutting Isle of Dogs to Greenwich. Mr. Selwyn served escort in his daughter’s weekly visits to the sick and wounded.
Selwyn spent most of his afternoon at the College or strolling the docks examining ships. Dulcie whiled away the hours reading to, and chatting with, injured and retired sailors.
Roger told himself he waited for her because Miss Selwyn might do him mischief. He could not admit, even to himself, that the knowing look in her eyes drew him, that the tone of her voice, and her recognition of his loneliness, drove him to it.
A miserable place, the infirmary, and yet Dulcie stepped fearlessly into that sulfurous den of mangled and missing limbs, a seeping, stench of ill-healed wounds and moaning men.
Those with strength enough, cried out to her when she entered the wards. Enthusiastic greetings.
“’Ow are you today, Miss?”
“Good of you to come.”
“Best look in on Stapleton and Dawley. Bedeviled by pain, they are, poor lads.”
“Suffering turrible from ‘is burns, Dawley is.”
“Cap’n Stapleton has not slept so soundly since your last visit, miss. He brightens when he hears you’ve come.”
“Always dreaming, poor man, and tossin’ about. Shouting for mercy from them heartless pirates, Persian priggers!”
“Watch yer language, Collins, or I shall have your tongue out, quicker ‘n any Joassamee!”
“Beggin’ your pardon, miss.”
Her voice soothed as she moved among them with quiet purpose. “Sorry to hear he does no better. How heals the leg, Mr. Walden? Does the phosphate of manganese and iron improve your energy, Mr. Hall? You have better color today. Is the wound knitting, Captain Kelly?”
She knew the patients intimately, the doctors and caretakers almost as well. He might have spoken to her there, in the wards, one more bandaged man among many, and yet he could not bring himself to interrupt her work. He content himself in watching. She lingered at Stapleton’s cot, spent some time chatting with the poor man, and with soothing words and swaying bauble, put him to
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