The Scoundrel and I: A Novella Read Free

there’s a comb about the house somewhere.”
    “But combing will tear it all out,” Letty said.
    “Then she shall wear a wig like Lady Rowden,” Margaret stated.
    Letty’s little brow got dark.
    “Here’s what,” Tony said. “I happen to be acquainted with a pair of dolls searching for two little girls of their own. What say you ladies if I bring them over and introduce all of you?”
    “Hurrah!” Margaret exclaimed, tightening her arms about his neck.
    “Thank you, Captain,” Letty said fervently. “We shall be most, most happy to meet them.”
    Tony’s throat was too tight, and not only from Margaret’s snug little arms. He could not be fonder of these mites. But he wasn’t ready for three of his own. Not all at once. Not
all of the sudden
.
    Even more importantly, he didn’t want a wife. He’d always been as happy as a drunken sailor on his own, even when he wasn’t actually drunk. Now that his friends were all knotted up in wedded bliss, he was delighted to enjoy the fruits of their domestic tranquility while avoiding it entirely himself.
    But he could not avoid
this
.
    This was not for pleasure. This was for honor.
    From across the parlor he felt his friend’s studying gaze. Blast it, but he shouldn’t have come here. Not today. Not in this muddle.
    The earl rose to his feet. “Come, poppets. Let us find your sister and invite her for a stroll in the park.”
    They clambered down from Tony’s knees.
    “Care to join us, Anthony?” the earl said as the little girls took their father’s hands.
    Tony shook his head. “I’ll beg off this time.”
    The trio went from the parlor.
    “Will you dine with us
en famille
tonight?” The countess’s soft foreign vowels rolled over the words.
    “Afraid I can’t.” Tony set down the glass of brandy untasted. The stuff would never taste the same again. How many times rolling on the deep, without another sail in sight, had he urged his first officer to relax and enjoy a peaceful moment of well-deserved leisure? But John Park had been dedicated to his work and devoted to his captain. It hadn’t been until Tony insisted that his lieutenant finally gave a try to enjoying himself like a regular fellow.
    Once introduced to the card table, though, John had not enjoyed himself. He had lost himself.
    Two years later, it killed him.
    “Previous engagement.”
A funeral
. He climbed to his feet. “Much obliged, though.”
    “Anthony,” she said. “What troubles you?”
    His own idiocy.
    “Naught that I can’t fix, my lady.” He bowed. His stomach ached. His head ached. His chest ached. By God, this was almost worse than war.
    He took his leave of the countess, barely seeing the familiar street as he mounted his horse, or the people he passed who greeted him. Across his vision instead were Mrs. Park’s horrified eyes the night before as he’d told her to hurry, her threadbare gown, the shabby flat, and the three urchins crying for her attention, all of them bone-thin because their father had spent his every penny—
and more
—on the tables.
    If John had come to him earlier, he could have helped. He could have done something. If he’d only known before yesterday…
    But he had not. He hadn’t even seen John Park since January, when they brought the
Victory
into port.
    Now he would do the honorable thing. Now he would make it right.
    After the funeral.
    Tomorrow.
    Tomorrow he would ask his former first officer’s widow to marry him.
    ~o0o~
    The orbs of Elle’s eyes would not function properly. Her gaze stuck as though by glue to the drainage grate cemented into the cobbles of the alley before her toes.
    Fifty-three.
    The number of pieces of type irretrievably lost.
    Fifty-three.
    Not five. Or three. Either of which might be overlooked. Perhaps. But
fifty-three
.
    At both dawn and dusk the day before when the traffic was light, then again this morning, she had searched in every crack between cobbles. In vain. So she had returned to the shop and