The Last Hellion Read Free Page B

failure, and its editor, Macgowan, desperate enough to do anything—even hire a female—
    that offered a chance of survival.
    "Nearly half past two," Lydia said, returning the watch to her skirt pocket and her mind to the present. "I had better go. I'm to meet Joe Purvis at Pearkes's oyster house at three to look over the illustrations for the next chapter of the dratted story."
    She moved away from the desk and started for the door.
    "It isn't the blasted literary critics, but your 'dratted story' that's made our fortune," Angus said.
    The story in question was The Rose of Thebes , whose heroine's adventures had been recounted in two-chapter installments in the biweekly Argus since May.
    Only she and Angus were aware that its author's name, Mr. S. E. St. Bellair, was also a piece of fiction.
    Even Joe Purvis didn't know that Lydia wrote the chapters he illustrated. Like everyone else, he believed the author was a reclusive bachelor. Never in his wildest dreams would he have imagined that Miss Grenville, the Argus's most cynically hardheaded reporter, had created a single word of the wildly fanciful and convoluted tale.
    Lydia herself did not like being reminded. She paused and turned back toward Angus. "Romantic claptrap," she said.
    "So it may be, but your fascinating claptrap is what hooked the readers—
    especially the ladies—in the first place, and it's what brings them back begging for more. Damnation, you've even got me wriggling on your hook." He rose and rounded the desk. "That clever girl, your Miranda—Mrs. Macgowan and I were talking about it, and my wife thinks the wicked, dashing fellow ought to come to Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion
    his senses and—"
    "Angus, I proposed writing that idiotish story on two conditions," Lydia said in a low, hard voice. "No med-dling from you or anyone else was one condition. The other was absolute anonymity." She bent a glacial blue stare upon him. "If the faintest hint gets about that I am the author of that sentimental swill, I shall hold you personally responsible. In which case, all contracts between us shall be null and void." Her blue glare bore an alarming resemblance to one employed by certain members of the nobility, under which generations of their inferiors had quailed.
    Lionhearted Scotsman though he was, Macgowan cowered under the frigid look as any other inferior would, his countenance reddening. "Quite right, Grenville,"
    he said meekly. "Most indiscreet of me to speak of it here. The door is thick, but best to take no chances. You know I'm fully aware of my obligations to you and
    —"
    "Oh, for God's sake, don't toady," she snapped. "You pay me well enough." She marched to the door. "Come, Susan." The mastiff rose. Lydia took up the leash and opened the door. "Good day, Macgowan," she said, then strode out the door without waiting for an answer.
    "Good day," he said to her back and, "Your Majesty," he added under his breath.
    "Bloody damned queen, she thinks she is—but the bitch can write, confound her."

    There were a great many people in England at this moment who would agree that Miss Grenville could write. Many of them, however, would have maintained that Mr. S. E. St. Bellair could write even better.
    This was what Mr. Archibald Jaynes, valet to the Duke of Ainswood, was Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion
    attempting to explain to his master.
    Jaynes didn't look like a valet. Narrowly built and wiry, with beady black eyes sitting very close to his long, crooked—on account of being broken several times
    —nose, he looked more like the weasely sort of ruffian frequently encountered at horse races or boxing matches, taking bets.
    Jaynes himself would have hesitated to use the term "gentleman's gentleman" on his own account. While, despite his unprepossessing features, he was exceedingly neat and elegant, his tall, handsome master was not what Jaynes would call a gentleman.
    The two men sat in the best—which was not saying much, in Mr. Jaynes's