LITMIR.BIZ

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Mrs Penny?’ The woman nodded, but he saw the anxiety in her eyes and how her hands were twisting in the apron again. ‘Now, you are not to worry. No one will think you have had anything to do with this. What are you paid?’

      ‘Sixpence a week, sir.’

      ‘And when were you last paid?’

      Her brow wrinkled with the effort to remember. ‘Three weeks ago, sir.’

      Giles fished in his pocket. ‘Here,’ he handed over a coin which made her gasp. ‘That will pay your back wages and is some extra for your trouble today. Now, the tea?’

      ‘That was kind,’ Joanna observed faintly as he pushed her gently onto the sofa.

      Giles sat down beside her, but did not try to touch her. He was puzzled that she showed no surprise at seeing him: perhaps the shock was just so all-encompassing that she would not have questioned any familiar face.

      ‘Joanna, did he touch you?’ he asked, and this time he saw she understood him.

      ‘Oh, no. There was no danger of that.’ Her voice was calm and, although faint, quite clear. ‘He wanted a virgin, you understand. He made it very plain what for, and that was where my value lay.’

      Giles had suspected that as soon as he realised that there was a woman in the scheme. Thoroughgood was not a solitary pervert, kidnapping girls for his own gratification. No, he was a trader in a very specialised commodity. But he had hoped that Joanna had not realised and that nothing had been said to shatter that innocence. He wanted to take her in his arms; even without touching her he could see the fine tremor running through her entire body. Her skin was so pale it seemed translucent and her eyes appeared unfocussed. But how would she react to being touched by a man now?

      She did not respond when Mrs Penny came in with the tea. Giles nodded thanks to the woman and told her to get on with the tasks she normally carried out but not to venture upstairs, whatever she heard.

      He pressed a cup into Joanna’s hand, but she could not hold it steady so he put it down again to let it cool. After a moment she turned and looked at him, although he could not tell whether she really understood who she was talking to.

      ‘He said that they would get a very good price from the man who…from the man—’ She broke off, biting her lip. ‘And money from those who would pay to watch. They said a man called Milo Thomas would come and collect me in a coach. I think there will be other girls in it.’

      ‘How can that be?’ Joanna asked him, her face reflecting her desperate need to understand. ‘I know men go to brothels, have mistresses. Of course I do. And I am not so foolish as to believe that women would not turn to such a way of life if they had better alternatives. But surely men want someone who knows how to make love? Is that not more pleasant? Yet there must be many men like those he was talking about, otherwise how could the brothel keepers and people like the Thoroughgoods make money from them? How could it be worth the risks?’

      Giles wished vehemently that he was not the one having to answer her questions. In fact, he would rather have found himself surrounded by French cavalry at that moment. If he got this wrong…

      ‘The vast majority of men are perfectly decent and normal,’ he said, keeping his voice as steady and quiet as he could. ‘Just as you imagine, they want to enjoy themselves, and they want the woman they are with to enjoy herself as well, whether it is within marriage, or outside it. Normal men,’ he added, with a hint of a smile, ‘would feel it a slur on their manhood if the lady did not find pleasure in their attentions.

      ‘But there are some who like cruelty, like to inflict pain. I think it must be about feeling powerful, that men who do not feel assured of themselves like to dominate someone weaker. Some stick at bullying their families and servants, others maltreat their horses. Some, just a few, go further. It is not many, Joanna, you must not assume that half the men you meet and know socially are like this, hiding a wolf’s teeth under a human smile. But the ones who enjoy such things can usually pay for it, and pay very well to get exactly what they want.’

      She looked at him, and he could see her eyes were beginning to focus a little and knew she had listened and understood. As he watched, her rigid calm began to falter and the tears started to well up in her eyes, which had turned a dark, dull brown.

      ‘Joanna, come here.’ Without stopping to think whether she might fight him, he leant forward, took her in his arms and lifted her on to his knee, holding her tight against his chest. ‘Most men are decent men who respect women. Men like your father, like Alex, like William will be when he grows up.’

      He could feel the front of his shirt becoming wet. She was crying almost silently. Then she nodded and he heard her voice, muffled. ‘Like you.’

      ‘Yes. Like me. I would never hurt you, Joanna.’ For some reason that seemed to make things worse: in the tightness of his embrace he could feel her sobbing fiercely. Not knowing what to say, or whether it was better just to let her weep, he simply held her, his face buried in the silk of her hair, his body shaken with the force of her sobs. Never, in his entire thirty years, had he felt so violently protective towards a living creature, nor had he ever known himself to be in such a killing rage. He could not trust himself to open that door upstairs without a restraining presence or there would be murder done.

      Finally the sobs died down and he tentatively let his arms fall away from her. Joanna sat up a little, but otherwise made no attempt to move from his knee.

      ‘Would you like some tea?’ She nodded and reached out for the cup, sitting there sipping it like a trusting child in his lap.

      She put it down at last and turned to face him, her eyes still drowned in tears. ‘He did not touch me, but it still feels like…’ she struggled with the word ‘…like rape.’

      ‘Because he forced those words into your mind, he forced that image into your imagination?’

      ‘Yes, exactly that. You understand so well. Now I cannot make them go away.’

      Giles thought carefully before he spoke, then simply trusted to his instincts. ‘They were only words. They were only images, they were not reality, because you would not let them be. You were fighting back, you were not a victim. Those things would not have happened because you were never going to give up.’

      ‘You saved me,’ she pointed out.

      ‘Only because you helped me. If I had not come today, you would have been scheming, plotting, resisting.’ He smiled at her. ‘Where did you find the courage, Joanna?’

      ‘Thinking of the other girls,’ she said simply. ‘And thinking of what…of what someone who is very important to me would have expected of me.’

      For some reason Giles felt that he had been punched in the solar plexus. Of course—this mysterious man who had so upset her at the Duchess’s ball that this entire train of events had been set in motion. He could hardly cavil at anything that had given Joanna the strength to resist, but why was she wasting her emotions on this damned man? She was worth more, this pattern-book débutante who had kicked over the traces.

      ‘Remember that you had the courage to fight,’ he said, when he had trampled on his anger. ‘And talk about it, don’t bottle it up.’

      ‘Who can I talk about it with?’ she asked.

      ‘Me. Hebe. Alex.’

      ‘Alex? Goodness, no!’ Joanna sounded almost normal again. ‘I am scared of Alex.’

      ‘Why on earth? He usually has to fight the ladies off—or at least he had to until he had Hebe to do it for him.’

      ‘He looks so…sardonic,’ Joanna said. ‘Hebe told me that her maid on Malta said he looked like “a beautiful fierce saint”. He was furious, apparently.’

      Giles grinned, saving that one up to torment Alex with on some future occasion. It was enough that talking of their friends had restored Joanna a little. ‘Will you be all right if I go and talk to Mrs Penny? I want to find out where

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