Regency Pleasures and Sins Part 1 - Louise Allen Mills & Boon e-Book Collections

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turn into a sanctimonious straight-laced Puritan if he carried on like this. You need some fun, Nick Stangate, he told himself. Whether having Miss Talitha Grey in the Parry household would prove to be fun, exactly, remained to be seen. It was certainly not going to be dull. And if that young lady thought she was going to keep any secrets from him for very long, she was seriously mistaken.

      That small stiletto thrust about the opera dancer had been neatly delivered, he thought appreciatively. Presumably it was intended to repay him for the remark about buying hats, which she had risen to all too easily.

      Amelie LeNoir. Could she really mean that she was friendly with an opera dancer? Presumably, if she was the niece of the lodging-house keeper, she shared the same house—unless she was in some man’s keeping. No, even Miss Grey would not openly profess friendship with a kept woman. A virtuous actress would be a novelty—and possibly a means by which to tease Talitha Grey.

      In a very short time he was becoming addicted to the stimulus of provoking the flash of green fire in those wide eyes. He would seek out Miss LeNoir and in the meantime he must have a word with his enquiry agent. Neither Miss LeNoir nor Talitha’s secret had featured in the expensive reports that had arrived at regular intervals, systematically setting out Miss Grey’s career from respectable gentry childhood through reclusive poverty with her dying mother to hard-working self-reliance. Lord Arndale disliked incompetence almost as much as he disliked not being in command of all the facts: Mr Gregory Tolliver was going to have some explaining to do as to why a Society matron knew his target’s secrets and he did not.

       Chapter Seven

      The next day Zenna accompanied Tallie to see first Mr Dover the solicitor and then to Martin and Wig-more, the bankers Nick Stangate had recommended. Tallie found herself expected at both sets of offices and at both of them found herself making decisions and issuing orders, which, if she gave herself time to think about it, seemed the stuff of fairy tales. Eventually they emerged blinking into the watery sunlight on the corner of Poultry and Queen Street, an obsequious clerk at their elbow to hail them a carriage.

      ‘We were received with the most gratifying degree of attention,’ she observed to her friend once they were alone and the cab was crawling down Cheapside towards St Paul’s. ‘But I still cannot believe that I was sitting there, making decisions about bank deposits and gilts, and being lectured on the absolute necessity to make my will.’

      ‘You and your money were what was receiving the attention,’ Zenna retorted. ‘What a lowering thought that men who would have scarcely noticed us yesterday hung upon your every word and wish today, simply because of your acquisition of wealth.’

      ‘That is the way of the world, I suppose.’ Tallie looked sombre for a moment, then smiled wickedly. ‘But reprehensible though it may be, I fully intend to enjoy it—we have been prudent and sensible too long, Zenna. We deserve a holiday!’

      ‘We? But I have my plans for the school to draw up and house-agents to see, as well as my pupils to attend to,’ Zenna protested.

      ‘You cannot do both, not efficiently at any rate. Zenna, why do you not give notice to the parents of your pupils and concentrate on the school. No, hear me out.’ She raised a hand as Zenna opened her mouth. ‘This school is an investment—a joint investment—is it not? Then I should be investing in your time to set it up, and you should be concentrating on house-agents, and interviewing teachers and drawing up a curriculum and so on.

      ‘Stop frowning, Zenna!’ She laughed at her friend’s dubious expression. ‘I understand all your scruples. We will talk to Mr Dover and ask him to draw up a partnership agreement, then all will be set out and fair. Now agree, do, because I have lots of other plans I want to discuss with you.’

      ‘Very well,’ Zenna agreed with the air of someone being persuaded to do something they wanted to do, but felt they should not. ‘I will be guided by Mr Dover, he does seem a very rigorous lawyer and will make sure I am not taking more than my fair share in this agreement.’

      Tallie nodded decisively. ‘And I have had another brilliant idea for investing my money. It concerns Mrs Blackstock. What if I should buy a town house or two? She could run them as select boarding-houses. I am sure she would soon be making a handsome profit for me and thereby a good income for herself.’

      ‘An excellent idea,’ Zenobia approved, grabbing the hanging strap as the cab once again jolted to a halt. ‘What a crush! I had not realised the City would be so busy. What about Millie? I confess, I have not observed Mr Hemsley in her company again, but I know she is receiving notes from someone, for she blushes and hides them under her table napkin when the morning post arrives.’

      ‘That is difficult,’ Tallie agreed, peering out of the window. ‘Why, no wonder the street is in such chaos, some yokel is driving a herd of sheep through! But I do not think it will be any faster to get out and walk, so we had better stay where we are. I had thought that if Mrs Blackstock was busy with the new boarding-houses, Millie might stay at home to help her. But she loves the stage—it is not as if she is doing it because she needs the money. Then I thought of giving her a dowry in the hope of attracting some respectable person to marry her, but I cannot think of a tactful way of doing that, so I confess I am somewhat at a stand.’

      ‘Hmm. No doubt something will occur to us. What are you doing this afternoon? Shopping?’

      A roll of banknotes had been burning a hole in Tallie’s reticule for the past hour, but she wanted to take Zenna shopping with her when she went. Tallie had a plan to buy her friend some clothes so she could be invited to parties too. That was going to take some tact and cunning and Zenna was engaged that afternoon with pupils.

      ‘I must go shopping tomorrow, for I cannot arrive at Lady Parry’s with my wardrobe in the state it is. I am sure she will recommend me to all the right modistes once I am with her, but until then I need your advice, Zenna. Are you free tomorrow? Because if you are, we can look at house-agents as well.’

      Zenna agreed, attempting to look as though she would enjoy the experience. She produced her tablets and began to add to her endless lists, while Tallie brooded on the interview with Madame d’Aunay she had resolved on having that afternoon.

      She had already written to her employer, apologising again for her absence, giving a carefully edited account of her change in circumstances and informing her that she would be stopping work as soon as she had finished the hats on which she was working. She expected Madame to be unhappy about this, but she was unprepared for the atmosphere that greeted her when she arrived at the shop that afternoon.

      The first shock was the fact that Madame curtsied as she entered the salon and ushered her through to her inner sanctum, the elegantly appointed private room reserved for the best clients.

      ‘I must apologise, Madame …’ Tallie began, only to be silenced by the expression of forced affability on Madame’s face.

      ‘Do not mention it, Miss Grey. Naturally you will wish to dissociate yourself from this establishment immediately. I have your outstanding wages here.’ She reached for an envelope, a slight flush staining her neck.

      ‘Goodness, no,’ Tallie protested. ‘I have given you no notice, I cannot take that.’

      ‘Very well, ma’am.’

      Tallie blinked. Had her former employer called her ‘ma’am'? ‘The hats on which I am working—’

      ‘Sarah will take them over, Miss Grey.’ There was an awkward pause. ‘I will naturally be sorry to lose Lady Parry’s business, but—’

      ‘But why should you?’ Tallie felt distinctly disorientated.

      ‘I understood that you would be living with Lady Parry, Miss Grey, and naturally assumed—’

      ‘Oh, good heavens, no!’ Tallie realised her former employer thought she would be making the hats directly for her patroness from now on.

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