In Debt To The Earl. Elizabeth Rolls

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СКАЧАТЬ fun, say, steeplechasing,’ Nick said. ‘Even if I don’t win, the ride is fun.’

      ‘And gaming isn’t?’

      Nick shook his head. And winced. ‘No. I felt sick most of the time.’

      Relief flooded James. ‘Come down this summer and we’ll race. There’s a colt you can try out for me. He’s not up to my weight.’

      ‘If the pater ever lets me off the leash again,’ Nick said. ‘I’ll have to write to him. Tell him what I’ve done and—’

      ‘I’ll sort it out,’ James said. ‘No need to upset your parents.’ William and Susan were good people, but the boy would never hear the last of it and he suspected Nick had learned his lesson. Learned it the hard way, but at least he had learned it. Many never did. Also, William couldn’t afford to settle a debt like this. James could.

      ‘What? No!’ This time Nick did sit up, swearing at the pain. ‘Curse it, James!’ he went on, when James had helped him back against the pillows. ‘I wanted advice, not your money!’

      ‘If I didn’t believe that, you wouldn’t be getting either,’ James said. ‘Listen, you aren’t the first youngster to make a fool of himself in London, and—’ he grimaced slightly at the memory ‘—I don’t suppose I was either.’

      ‘You?’ Nick sounded as though he could as easily have believed St Paul’s had heaved itself up off its foundations and walked away on chicken legs.

      James reminded himself that his cousin was nineteen. ‘I wasn’t born staid and respectable,’ he said. Far from it.

      Nick flushed to the roots of his hair. ‘I didn’t mean that! It just seems unlikely that you could have done something this stupid.’

      He’d been a great deal more stupid. ‘Believe it or not, you don’t have a monopoly on idiocy,’ he said. ‘But that’s beside the point. The point is that someone bailed me out and never let me repay her.’

      Nick stared. ‘Her? Who?’

      James cleared his throat. ‘What I’m saying is that I’ll sort this out and consider that I’ve done something towards clearing an old obligation.’ He was fairly sure Elizabeth would see it that way.

      ‘Now I feel like a worm as well as an idiot,’ Nick muttered. ‘I will pay you back, whether you like it or not.’

      ‘Fine,’ said James, knowing better than to tell the idiot boy that the money didn’t matter. If it mattered to Nick, so much the better. ‘Now, you’d better tell me who and where I have to pay. And while we’re at it you can furnish me with Captain Hensleigh’s direction.’

      Nick blew out a breath. ‘I don’t know it, but you’ll find the Cockpit easily enough.’

      ‘The Cockpit? Is that the hell?’ James asked.

      Nick nodded. ‘Yes. It’s in an old cellar. Used to have cocking there, apparently. He’s there most nights.’ He frowned. ‘You don’t need him, though. Fellow called Kilby bought the vowels. One of his bullies let the name slip, but they said to ask at the Maid and Magpie tavern with the money.’

      Paget’s return with coffee gave James a moment to think. He sat down on a chair by the bed and sipped. The first thing was to pay off the debt. Before Nick got another beating from this Kilby’s enforcers. After that...

      James’s jaw hardened. Then he’d go after Captain Hensleigh.

      ‘James?’

      He looked at Nick. ‘Hmm?’

      ‘You aren’t planning something stupid, are you?’

      ‘No.’ The lie came easily. ‘I was thinking that your parents are due in town soon.’ He ignored Nick’s groan. ‘You can go out to my place at Chiswick for a couple of weeks until you look less like something the cat coughed up and that rib has a chance to heal.’

      Nick smiled weakly. ‘Nice try. And you don’t think Mama will just pop down for a visit? Chiswick isn’t that far out of town.’

      James shrugged. ‘Not if I hint to your father that you took a woman with you.’

      Nick sank even further into the pillows and James noted with some amusement that under his bruises the boy was blushing. ‘Damn it, James! They’ll think I’m in the petticoat line!’

      James suppressed a grin. ‘Aren’t you? Well, it’s your choice. Do you prefer your mama clucking over you like a hen with one chick?’

      Nick groaned. ‘All right, all right. I take your point. Thank you.’

      ‘You can go in my carriage when the doctor says you can travel,’ James said, sipping his coffee. ‘This is excellent, by the way. Do you think Paget might confide his secret to my cook?’

       Chapter One

      Three weeks later

      James blinked across the table at his opponent. ‘I make that a thousand pounds, Hensleigh. Time to settle up, don’t you think?’ He spoke with extra precision, as if without care his speech might have slurred. With seeming clumsiness, he knocked his glass of burgundy. ‘Oops,’ he said absently.

      Hensleigh smiled broadly as he righted the glass. ‘Oh, come now, Cambourne! I’m no faint heart. The merest reverse! You must give me at least a chance to recoup my losses. Double or nothing on the next hand? Winner take all?’

      James would have preferred to end this farce right there and then, walking out with his winnings, or at least Hensleigh’s vowels. Frankly he thought he’d spent enough time in the Cockpit.

      Finding the hell had been easy. Getting in had been trickier, even with the password Nick had given him, but a crown to the doorman had worked a minor miracle. He’d noted Hensleigh on his first visit, a tall, bluff, open-faced sort, with thinning ginger hair, but hadn’t approached him. Instead he’d played dice at another table, careful not to win or lose too heavily, once he’d worked out how the dice were weighted. He’d dressed carefully, making sure he looked and behaved like a well-heeled squire fresh from the country—a pigeon ready for plucking. He’d also introduced himself as plain Mr Cambourne. In this situation his title would be a hindrance. He’d watched the card play, come to the conclusion that Hensleigh was far from the only Captain Sharp in the room, and planned accordingly.

      Sure enough, the first time he’d played whist, he’d been allowed to win. Easily. Afterwards, when Hensleigh had come up to congratulate him, he’d grumbled that his opponent wasn’t skilled enough to make it entertaining. The second time he’d lost a little, but won more, swaggering away two hundred pounds to the good. Tonight Hensleigh had approached him, all “hail, fellow, well met” and “care for a hand or two?” Apparently tonight was plucking time.

      James considered. Double or nothing would end the affair and he wanted it over. The dingy, smoky hell, with its complement of the desperate and the dangerous, bored him. Several women, their profession—and assets—very obvious, prowled the room, only too ready to relieve СКАЧАТЬ