A Convenient Gentleman. Victoria Aldridge

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СКАЧАТЬ be directed to the Castledene. The afternoon she spent thoroughly cleaning out the remaining spare bedrooms in the hotel, rewarded for her efforts when a party of four—a group of mining engineers arrived just that day from Wellington—rang the bell at the desk to ask about accommodation. While she could not yet offer them a meal in the dining room, they seemed very satisfied with the luxurious private rooms she showed them to. She was kept very busy for the next couple of hours, flying up and down stairs with her arms full of towels, jugs of hot water and boots to be polished. When her guests had left for dinner, directed to the same hotel Caro had dined at the previous night, she sat down at the bottom of the stairs, her head spinning. She was enjoying herself enormously, but she hadn’t looked in on Aunt Charlotte for hours, and she hadn’t eaten anything since the early morning.

      In the kitchen she found the pot of soup Mr Matthews had made earlier that day, together with a couple of loaves of bread, so she prepared a tray and took it up to her aunt. Charlotte appeared a little better, but flatly refused to eat anything.

      ‘But I am thirsty, darling,’ she said croakily, and then pulled a face when Caro produced a fresh jug of water. The cold water made her cough, a deep, unsettling sound, and Caro resolved to call the doctor in if her aunt’s health was not improved in the morning.

      Mr Matthews was waiting for her in the kitchen.

      ‘Well?’ she demanded as she put the untouched tray on the table and pulled up a chair. ‘Did you find him?’

      ‘I did,’ he said ominously, but she chose to make nothing of his sour expression.

      ‘Good. I asked the minister if he could marry us tomorrow—that’s Friday, at one o’clock. That gives me time to see Mr Froggatt before the bank closes late afternoon.’ She swallowed a spoonful of the soup Charlotte had rejected and licked her lips appreciatively. Mr Matthews surely had to be the best cook in the world. ‘Oh, and did you find out what his name is?’

      ‘Gray,’ he said. ‘Wiv an “a”.’ Mr Matthews sat down heavily across the table. ‘First name’s Leander.’

      ‘Caroline Gray.’ She tried the name, rolling it over her tongue, deciding that it was a name of distinction. ‘Caroline Gray. Yes, I like that.’

      ‘Cost you a hundred quid,’ he snarled and she dropped her spoon in shock.

      ‘A hundred pounds! My word, he must fancy himself dreadfully! Tell me you’re joking!’ At the shake of his head she picked up her spoon again. ‘Well, tell him I’ll go to ten pounds and no more. There must be hundreds of men who’d get married for less!’

      ‘Not this one.’ Mr Matthews propped his chin on his hands and met her eyes squarely. ‘Said if you won’t pay he ain’t interested. He’s a toff, girl. Might only be worth ten quid. Might only be worth half a crown. But he’s been raised as quality and that lot’ve got queer ideas ’bout money. They always act like they don’t know nothing ’bout money, even when they ain’t got none. You follow me?’

      ‘No. I haven’t got a clue what you’re talking about.’ Caro placed her spoon and emptied dish in the washing basin and smoothed her skirt down. ‘But if this Gray fellow thinks he’s too good to marry me, I’d like to know why. Where is he?’

      Mr Matthews’s eyes widened in alarm. ‘I’m not saying!’

      ‘By which I take it he’s in the Castledene bar.’ She glanced at the mantleclock. It was only just after five o’clock. The bar would scarcely be busy at this hour, and her guests would only now be sitting down to eat at the hotel in Princes Street. ‘I’m going to talk to him, Mr Matthews. Are you coming or not?’

      As if the poor man had any choice. He followed miserably in Caro’s wake as she stormed through the doors of the bar. The barman of the previous night looked up in surprise but, when he saw who was following Caro, he rapidly decided against challenging her. The ugly little man had spent almost half an hour in quiet, intense conversation with the young drunk in the corner, and when the barman had gone up to them to demand that they order another drink to justify staying on the premises, the little man had given him a look that had him shaking in his shoes. The barman bent his head and concentrated on wiping out the beer mugs.

      Leander Gray was sitting at a table, slumped against the wall, his attention absorbed by the card he was holding in his hand. From right to left and back again he flicked it between his fingers, over and over, at blurring speed. Then he looked up and saw her. As he got to his feet the card disappeared so swiftly that she wondered if she had been seeing things.

      ‘Miss Morgan, I presume?’ he said in that irritating manner, so correct and studiously polite that she could not be sure that he was not privately making fun of her.

      She inclined her head a fraction. ‘Mr Gray. I believe we should talk.’

      ‘About what, Miss Morgan?’

      ‘About the completely unrealistic cost of your services, sir.’

      His dark gaze flicked behind her to Mr Matthews. ‘In that case, I don’t believe we have anything to discuss, Miss Morgan.’

      ‘On the contrary, Mr Gray.’ She folded her hands before her waist and raised her chin. He was just a penniless drunk, after all, with nothing to lose by marrying her except the sharing of a perfectly innocuous name. And yet…

      His oddly blank eyes challenged her, making her mouth suddenly dry. Damn him, she thought furiously. How dare he act as if she were nothing and he the master of all? He would marry her, and then she would have the greatest of pleasure in tossing him out and throwing his ten pounds—or twenty, or whatever it took!—out into the snow behind him.

      Deciding to change tack, she switched on her warmest smile. That usually served to disarm most men. ‘Mr Gray, we have a matter to discuss that could be of benefit to us both. But I don’t think that here’—she inclined her head towards the barman who had drifted over to ostentatiously remove a speck of dirt on a nearby table—‘is the most suitable place to hold such a conversation. Could I suggest that we move to the hotel?’ She let her eyes flick over his decidedly lean frame. ‘I could offer you a light meal, perhaps a warm room for the night?’

      He kept her waiting just a second too long to be polite.

      ‘No, thank you, Miss Morgan.’

      She stiffened in rage. ‘Mr Gray, I don’t believe that you’re in a position to have a choice!’

      His shoulders lifted in the slightest of shrugs. ‘One always has a choice, Miss Morgan.’

      Damn it, he was laughing at her! Not for the world was she going to let him get away now! She leaned forward, her fingers resting on the edge of the table, her face set in contemptuous lines. ‘Does one choose to turn one’s back on fifty pounds, Mr Gray?’

      ‘My price, Miss Morgan, is one hundred pounds.’

      ‘Sixty!’

      ‘Ninety.’

      ‘Seventy-five or you can forget it, Mr Gray!’

      She heard Mr Matthews choke at the vast sum, but it was too late—she’d made the offer, and with money she didn’t have. But at least the obnoxious Mr Gray bent his head in acceptance of her bid. She’d won after all, just as she had known she would. Ignoring Mr Matthews’s outraged glare boring holes between СКАЧАТЬ