The Royal Scamp Read Free

including Lady Gloria Devere.”He went to the wine table and poured himself a glass.
    To assuage Joshua’s temper, Esther offered him wine.
    “Is it from your inn?”he inquired.
    “Yes.”
    “Then I’ll pass.”
    “A pity I hadn’t known you were coming, and I might have got in some hemlock,”Esther snipped. “How is old Lady Gloria, Buck?”Not that she cared, but it was a thorn in Joshua’s side that such a noble old relict as Lord Grodon’s spinster daughter had taken up permanent residence at the Lowden Arms, bringing a whiff of nobility with her.
    “Poorly. She never owns up to good health, though she’ll outlive the lot of us. We served sixty dinners, all told,”he added. “We’ll have to think of buying new china. I’ve been looking through some catalogs. I think pink would add eye appeal to Peters’s dinners.”
    Joshua stared to hear a man discuss such feminine details.
    “It is our excellent location that accounts for the extra meals,”Esther explained to him. “Close to Windsor and, of course, Strawberry Hill, where the tourists are always eager to see Mr. Walpole’s Gothic monstrosity.”
    “The location is far from ideal,”Joshua said. “Too close to London for folks traveling west from it to be ready for a stop, and too close for those traveling east to draw a halt. With London only a few miles away, they will go ahead rather than put up at an inn.”
    “Twenty-eight travelers seem to be unaware of it today. Of course London is more than a few miles away. And there is Hounslow Heath to be traversed, where the highwaymen do me a very good turn. Travelers are so frightened of them, they rarely venture past my place unless they can reach London before dark. As our reputation spreads and they know they will find a good meal and a well-aired bed awaiting them, they stop over for dinner and remain the night.”
    “That’s true,’Buck agreed. “I personally see that every bed is aired after use. From five o’clock on we have carriages pulling in every ten minutes. All the travelers say the same thing; they might as well call it a day, for they won’t tackle Hounslow Heath with dark coming on. The highwaymen are getting bolder by the day. Captain Johnnie is the main culprit.”
    “I don’t know why Bow Street doesn’t set up a stronger patrol on the heath,”Joshua grumbled.
    “He would like to see my business ruined,”Esther joked to Buck.
    “It would take a downturn if they ever captured Captain Johnnie,”Buck said, and refilled his glass. He was not much atuned to a joke.
    “Then I hope he runs free for a good many years yet.”
    Joshua bristled, but whether it was her support of the Royal Scamp or Buck’s making free with the wine that caused it, she couldn’t say. “Just the foolish attitude I would expect you to take!”
    “You know where to place the blame,”she told him airily.
    “I suppose you’re half in love with the rogue, like all the ladies. They were singing a ballad in his honor last week in London. 'The Royal Scamp’it is called. Making a hero of a villain—a common thief.”
    “You have all the romance of a turnip, Joshua,”Esther told him. “How could any lady in her right mind fail to be in love with a dashing highwayman who dares to attack whole caravans single-handed? They say he is very gentlemanly, too. Why, Mrs. Heskett, who had the pleasure of being robbed by him, said he left her very fine diamond wedding ring on her finger rather than hurt her by pulling it off, for it was a trifle tight, you know. I daresay all wedding rings bind after a while,”she added mischievously.
    “If he works alone, he hadn’t much choice, had he?”Joshua asked. “If he put down his pistol to yank a tight ring off, it wouldn’t be long before the men in the carriage would overcome him.”
    “That is one explanation for his gallantry. He seems to be safe from attack while he kisses all the ladies, at least. Odd none of the gentlemen bother to overpower him