Devil’s Cub at-2 Read online

  She shrugged carelessly. “Oh, I tell no secrets, sir!”

  The door opened and the landlord came in, followed by a serving-man with a tray. Miss Challoner walked over to the window while the cloth was laid. When they were alone again my lord said: “Your coffee—have I ever heard your name? Mary, isn’t it?”

  She forgot her role, and said coldly: “I have not given you the right to use it, sir.”

  Again he laughed. “My good girl, youVe given me whatever rights I choose to claim. Sit down.”

  She remained where she was, eyeing him.

  “Obstinate, eh? Ill tame you,” Vidal said, and got up.

  She had an impulse to run from him, and curbed it. She was swept off her feet and dumped down, none too gently, on a chair by the table. A heavy hand on her shoulder kept her there. “You elected to come with me,” the Marquis said, “and by God you’ll obey me, if I have to lay my whip about your sides!”

  He looked so grim that she could not but believe he would do as he threatened. She sat still and he removed his hand from her shoulder. “Drink your coffee,” he said. “You’ve not much time.”

  Her hands were no longer quite steady, but she contrived to pour some coffee into the cup.

  “Shaking, eh?” said that hateful voice. “I shan’t beat you if you behave yourself. Let me have a look at you.” He turned up her face with a careless hand under her chin. “You’re not so bad-looking after all,” he remarked. “I dare say we shall deal extremely together.”

  She drank a little of the hot coffee; it put heart into her; she replied calmly: “Unfortunately we shall have no opportunity of judging. I go back to London by the first coach.”

  “Oh no, my dear,” said his lordship. “You’ll go to Paris with me, in Sophia’s stead.”

  She pushed her cup and saucer away from her. “You’re talking wildly, my lord. You won’t expect me to believe that it is me you want to run away with.”

  “Why not?” said his lordship, coolly. “One wench is much like another after all.”

  She sat very upright, her hands lightly folded in her lap. “You’ve been worsted, sir, but need you insult me?”

  He laughed. “We’ll see who’s worsted when we reach the end of the jest, my girl. As to insults, egad! I wish you would tell me how I may insult so bold a piece as yourself. Don’t put on that missish face, my dear. It won’t serve after this night’s escapade.”

  “You can’t take me to France,” she persisted. “You think because Sophia was indiscreet—that I—that we are loose women, but—”

  “If you’re trying to make me believe in your virtue, you’re wasting your breath,” interrupted his lordship. “I knew what your sister was from the start, and as for you, whatever doubts I may have had you’ve set at rest. Virtuous young ladies, my dear, don’t lend themselves to these jests. I may not be very much to your taste, but if you contrive to please me, you won’t find me less generous than any other man.”

  “You are unpardonable!” she said in a suffocated voice. She got up, and this time he made no effort to prevent her. “Have the goodness to tell me how far I am from London. What is this place?”

  “Newhaven,” he replied, draining his tankard.

  “Can I travel by stage-coach from here?”

  “I’ve no idea,” said his lordship with a yawn. “It need not concern you. I meant what I said.”

  “To take me to Paris? You’re absurd, my lord. Do you suppose I should make no outcry? In these days even a noble marquis could scarcely force a young female aboard his yacht.”

  “Scarcely,” agreed his lordship. “But I can make you so damned drunk that you’ll be in no fit case to struggle, my girl.” He drew a flask from the pocket of his greatcoat and held it up. “Hollands,” he said briefly.

  She was scandalized. “I think you are mad,” she said with conviction.

  He got up and came towards her. “You can think what you like, Mary, but you’ll drink my Hollands.”

  She moved back till the wall stayed her. “If you touch me, I’ll scream,” she warned him. “I don’t desire to make a scene, but I will.”

  “Scream away,” he said. “You’ll find old Simon is very deaf—when he doesn’t want to hear.”

  She was shrewd enough to know that the landlord would hesitate to interfere with his noble patron if he could avoid it, and felt suddenly very helpless. The Marquis towered over her, and it seemed likely that he really would force the contents of his flask down her throat. She said quietly: “Please do not make me drink that. I am not a shameless woman, my lord, though I must seem to be one. I can—I think I can make you understand, if you will listen to me.”

  “I’ll listen to you later,” he replied. “There’s no time now.”

  As though to corroborate him, someone knocked loudly at the door, and called: “My lord, we’ll miss the tide!”

  “I’m coming,” he answered, and turned back to Mary. “Quickly, you!”

  She held him off, both her hands clasping his wrist. “You need not make me drunk,” she said. “Since there’s no help for it I’ll come.”

  “I thought you would,” said the Marquis with a grim little smile.

  He turned away from her to the table, and picked up his tankard, and drained it. He never took his eyes off her, and she found herself unable to look boldly back at him as she would have liked to do. He set down the tankard as she came to pick up her cloak from the chair where she had laid it, and said with a drawling note in his voice: “You’ll see no one but my own fellows on the quay, but if you should be tempted to make a scene, remember I shall be beside you, and can throttle you before you’ve time to make more than one screech.”

  He strolled over to her as she drew her cloak round her, and before she realized what he was about, he had grasped her arm, and taken her throat in one of his shapely hands. He let her feel what strength lay in his fingers, and though for dignity’s sake she forced herself to be passive the blood drummed unpleasantly in her head, and she felt herself to be in danger of losing her senses. “Like that,” the Marquis said, smiling mockingly down at her. He let her go, and she put up her hands to her bruised throat. “Unpleasant, eh?” he said. “If you force me to do it again you’ll find yourself unable to speak for quite a little while. Having throttled you—and I can do it in a flash, my dear—I shall carry you aboard, informing anyone who might chance to be about that you have swooned. Do you quite understand, wench?” The muscles of her throat felt stiff. She managed to say: “Perfectly, sir.”

  “I thought you would,” he said softly. “Now come!” He dragged her arm through his, and led her to the door. The pistol in the pocket of her cloak knocked against her knee, and she remembered its existence with a start.

  She did not think that she could pull it out with one hand, with the Marquis holding her other in his. She was very much afraid that it might go off if carelessly handled, nor had she any intention of firing it, and creating thereby the very scandal she wished to avoid. When she took it from its holster she had been prompted by no more than a vague notion that it might be well to possess a pistol. No plan of using it had entered her head; she had not even foreseen the need of it. It was too late now, but at the first opportunity she would manage to extricate it from the coat pocket into which it fitted so tightly.

  The Marquis led her out. He stopped in the coffee-room to pay his bill. The landlord was all obsequious attention. Miss Challoner made a mental resolve never again to set foot in Newhaven.

  She accompanied the Marquis, willy-nilly, out on to the quay. White horses raised their crests in the troubled sea; Miss Challoner eyed them with inward trepidation. Then she saw the graceful yacht she had observed from the coach; it was heaving on the water even in the shelter of the quay. Miss Challoner began to feel squeamish, and glanced imploringly up at the dark face above her.

  My lord paid not the slightest attention, but compelled her to walk down the gangway on to the deck of the Albatross. She was aware of a f