The Baron's Charade (Regency Stories Book 3) Read online

  ***

  Not only had Elizabeth brought back another mug of ale, but over the next few hours, they had another three. No one gave them any bother, which continued to surprise Isabel, and for the first time in a very long time she felt a sense of relaxation. Relaxation and a bit of dizziness. And then there were the fits of giggles. Every action and word in the pub she found to be marked with hilarity, so she was laughing at things she somehow understood—if she had been in her right mind—were not funny, yet she could not help herself.

  Their talks had gone from the present to the future and to and fro several times in those three hours, until the conversation turned to Lord Charmain.

  “Oh, I cannot lie any longer,” Isabel said, though even saying as such made her giggle uncontrollably. “I do find him handsome.”

  “Of course he is handsome,” Elizabeth said with a wave of her hand. “I have never argued that point.”

  “He is. However, he’s also more than a bit vain and quite a bit arrogant.” She slapped the table. “No gentleman should be arrogant!”

  “Here, here!” Elizabeth laughed and almost fell from her chair, but she managed to right herself without much issue.

  More people had filled the pub, and Isabel took note of a man smiling at her from a few tables over. He was somewhere in his middling thirties of age, and Isabel returned his smile with a polite one of her own. Then he raised his mug to her and so she did the same.

  “Isabel!” Elizabeth said when she saw at whom Isabel was smiling. “You must take care. He might be starting some sort of game with you!” Though her tone was admonishing, she snickered as she said the words.

  “And I shall play it back,” Isabel said haughtily. “No man can defeat me in a game.” She took a drink of her ale and then almost spit it out when the man came walking up to the table.

  “Ladies,” he said with a bow for each. “Samuel Fairbanks at your service.”

  “Oh,” Elizabeth said. “I did not realize you were employed at this fine establishment.”

  This brought on a bout of laughter from all three, and then Mr. Fairbanks said, “In all honesty, I am not employed here; however, I am in service for the Crown. Do you mind if I sit?”

  Isabel sat up straighter. A man working for the Crown was of some importance and one not to be trifled with. “But of course,” she said. “Please, sir, join us.”

  The man took a chair beside Isabel. “Thank you. I came to take my ease, but I must admit, I was somewhat worried about the type of patrons I might find. Then I saw the two of you and felt that perhaps I had made the right choice.”

  Isabel grinned, happy to meet a man who appreciated a woman of her standing. Granted, her father was only a member of the gentry, but he had worked hard to earn his place in society. However, the more she studied the man, the more she began to question his honesty. His clothing, though clean and pressed, did not appear to be something a person working for the Crown would wear.

  As if he could read her thoughts, he leaned in and said, “I’m dressed as a commoner. You see…” He glanced around and lowered his voice even further. “I am in search of an assassin.”

  Isabel gasped. “An assassin? Here in London?”

  “I’m afraid so, Miss…?”

  His smile was kind, and he had such gentlemanly ways, she could not help but reply, “Miss St. Clair. Miss Isabel St. Clair of Eaton, Bedford. And this is my very good friend, Miss Elizabeth Haddington, also of Eaton.”

  “Miss St. Clair,” he said as he took her hand and kissed it. “It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

  “Likewise,” Isabel said. Her face had to be as red as a beet, it burned so.

  “I’m afraid an assassin has taken the life of a duke near Cornwall. A young child overheard the man say he was going to London, and I have been in search of him ever since.”

  Isabel’s heart raced. “What does he look like?”

  “A rugged man. I beard that is as dark as his soul and as thick as a forest. He has a scar in place of his right eye. It is quite hideous really.” He sighed. “I fear he may have made his way to France, though there are rumors he has been seen in this area. You have not seen him, have you?”

  “No,” Elizabeth whispered, her eyes as wide as saucers. “We have not.”

  “A man who kills dukes,” Isabel said. She imagined her eyes were as wide as Elizabeth’s. “I am horrified to hear such a thing.”

  “He has killed women, as well,” Mr. Fairbanks said. “Ladies of the ton.”

  Both Isabel and Elizabeth gasped at this. And here they had been out—and unaccompanied!—drinking at a public house! What had they been thinking putting themselves in such danger?

  “What a horrible man,” Isabel managed to say. “Elizabeth and I are of the ton. Do you believe he might try to hurt us?”

  He took a drink and then set the mug on the table. “Where are you staying?” he asked.

  “I am at Lyme Street number eighteen, and Elizabeth is on Rose Lane number four.”

  The man tapped a finger to his lips. “I know these areas quite well. Are you at home every night?”

  Isabel found it easy to talk to this man, and soon she and Elizabeth were telling him all about the parties and dinners they would be attending. He listened with apt attention, clearly intrigued by how busy their schedules were.

  “I must be honest with you, Miss St. Clair, Miss Haddington,” he said when they finished. “Your life could very well be in danger.”

  Fear coursed through Isabel, and she turned to see Elizabeth appear just as terrified. “So, we are not safe?”

  “No,” he said. “From what I have gathered, women of immense beauty are his targets. You are far too beautiful to not attract his attention. However, fear not, for I will catch him before he is able to harm a hair on your pretty heads.”

  His words brought her a sense of security. A gentleman working for the Crown had offered his protection, and she felt nothing but relief.

  “Perhaps I can tell you more of my assignment later?”

  Isabel smiled and nodded her head. Then her eyes went wide when Miss Miriam walked up to the table.

  “Samuel Fairbanks,” she said with narrowed eyes. “And what are you up to?”

  The man jumped from his chair and stammered, “Miriam! I-I was just telling my new friends…”

  “What? You need money to find your lost daughter? Or is it the tale of working for the Crown again?” When he flinched, she added, “The Crown. Oh, Samuel.” She shook her head.

  “You do not work for the Crown?” Isabel asked, shocked.

  Miss Miriam laughed. “He does not.” Then she turned to Samuel. “If a single item goes missing from either of these women’s homes, so help me, I will come after you. Now, leave.” Not once did she raise her voice, but the man gave a trembling bow and then rushed out the door.

  Miss Miriam looked first at Isabel and then at Elizabeth. “This is no place for ladies such as yourselves,” she said, her tone still even. “It is full of thieves and vagabonds.”

  “But…you are here,” Isabel said, attempting to calm her raveled nerves. “You are a lady, are you not?”

  Miss Miriam smiled. “Concern yourself with your own business, Miss St. Clair,” she said, not unkindly, but not comforting either, “not mine.” She did not wait for a response but instead turned and walked away.

  Isabel stared at Elizabeth. “I thought he was a gentleman,” she said, her mouth dry. She drank the remainder of her ale in one gulp.

  “Who was that woman?” Elizabeth asked. “How do you know her?”

  “That is Miss Miriam, a cousin to Lord Charmain. She does not like me, though I have no idea why.”

  “Well, I am glad she was here. Come. Let us have one more and then we will go to the theater.”

  Isabel wanted to argue but found herself nodding her head in agreement instead. As she waited at the table, she could not help but feel foolish for being duped by Mr. Fairbanks. Perhaps her parent
s were right when they said she was naive. However, this outing had proven an important lesson: men were liars and not to be trusted, and she vowed that if she found a man lying to her again, she would never speak to him again.

  Chapter Ten

  Before leaving the pub, Isabel and Elizabeth ate a hot bowl of stew with large hunks of crusty bread, which helped stabilize the spinning room significantly, for Isabel most certainly had more ale than her poor mind could handle. How could anyone consume even much more—one group of men, Isabel observed, drank thrice the amount that she and Elizabeth had!—how could they and still be left standing? That question was answered just before they left when one of the men in question toppled over in a heap, much to the guffaws of his companions!

  “I believe that is our sign to be on our way,” Elizabeth said with a silly grin.

  Isabel barely heard what her friend said and did not respond.

  “Isabel? Are you all right?” Elizabeth asked as she came to a stop and grabbed Isabel’s arm.

  “What? Oh, yes. I was just thinking of that wretched Mr. Fairbanks. How was it that I could fall for such a tale?” She shook her head in wonderment. “Perhaps I’m too eager to find a gentleman and it causes me to think like a fool?”

  Elizabeth clicked her tongue. “Nonsense,” she replied. “His story was woven with care. You should not worry; I believed his story as much as you.”

  Isabel gave her friend a smile. Elizabeth had always been able to smooth Isabel’s worries, and she was grateful to have such a friend.

  “Come, or we will be late for the theater,” Elizabeth urged.

  By the time they came around the corner in Covent Garden, Isabel’s head was right again, for which she was happy. She decided her previous reluctance to consume alcohol in great quantities was well-founded, and she hoped it would not happen again anytime soon. Though, she did have to admit that being in a pub was certainly entertaining.

  The wait was not long, and soon Isabel was following Elizabeth down a long aisle that separated rows upon rows of seats, all facing a large stage currently obscured by a massive red curtain of velvet. She guessed there were well over two hundred people in attendance. Though it was louder than the pub had been, the significantly tall ceiling helped alleviate some the sounds of laughter and discussion.

  The people here were dressed in their finest clothes, and a sudden thought came to Isabel. “I worry someone will recognize me,” she whispered. Where had her earlier courage gone? More than likely with the fading of the effects of the ale. “Perhaps we should leave.”

  “Oh, fiddle-faddle,” Elizabeth said. “There is nothing about which to worry. Plus, being seen here is not as horrible as being seen at the pub, and you survived that without anyone recognizing you.”

  Isabel snorted. “Except Miss Miriam,” she said with annoyance under her breath.

  “What was that?”

  “Nothing.” Isabel sighed. What was it about that woman that rubbed her the wrong way? Or rather, why did Isabel seem to annoy her? This was something to which Isabel was not accustomed; most everyone she had met in her life thus far seemed to enjoy her company.

  “Do you know…?”

  A hush fell over the crowd as a man walked across the stage in front of the curtain, and when he spoke, his voice echoed across the room, louder than Isabel would have expected.

  “Good evening, Ladies and Gentlemen,” the man said once the audience quieted. “Tonight you will be delighted to witness the greatest theater group in London. Our production of The Princess and the Thief is now in its third week, and I see the familiar faces of many of you who have been with us before.” A piano played, and for the first time, Isabel noticed a man sitting to the left of the stage. “And now, without further ado, The Princess and the Thief.” The man bowed and remained so as he backed off the stage and the curtains opened to a scene of a city street.

  A young boy of perhaps twelve years of age walked out into the middle of the stage, a cap grasped in his hands. “I never wanted to be a thief,” the boy said, addressing the audience directly. “Though that is what happened. And it is a story that you should hear.”

  Isabel found herself immediately immersed in the production as the young boy and the other actors, both young and old, took to the stage. She found the story delightful and laughed with the other attendees, of whom she became unaware for a majority of the play. Even during the intermission, she found herself barely able to contain her excitement for the second act.

  “And?” Elizabeth asked. “What do you think?”

  “It is great fun!” Isabel said with a smile she could not have tempered if she tried. “I find myself so immersed in the story, even much more so than when I’m reading.”

  Elizabeth laughed. “Then that says quite a bit since you read incessantly.”

  “Oh, you!” Isabel said with a matching laugh.

  “Come, everyone is returning to their seats.”

  Isabel followed the crowd back to where they had been sitting, and she was barely able to contain her excitement to learn what happened to the young boy who had spent a goodly amount of his young life as a pauper.

  As the play continued, Isabel was just as immersed as she had been in the first act. The young love of a pauper and a young princess brought tears to her eyes—even more so when the two were forced to never see one another again by decree of the King, and the audience irrupted into applause as the curtain closed once again. Isabel could hear movement behind the curtain, but it did not take long before the man at the piano began to play, and the man who had introduced the play walked out to the middle of the stage once again.

  “Twelve years have passed, and the young Princess is now of an age to seek out a husband.” He bowed himself off the stage as the curtains opened to a new scene, this one of a royal courtyard.

  It was not the beautiful setting that made Isabel gasp, though it caught the embodiment of what she thought a castle courtyard would have appeared—not that she had been invited to a castle at any point in her life. No, it was not the setting but rather the woman who came walking out onto the stage, a stately golden gown worthy of any Princess and a crown upon her head that twinkled in the bright lights of the stage.

  “Miss Miriam?” Isabel whispered. She had to force her mouth closed.

  Elizabeth nodded. “That certainly looks like her.”

  “A lady of the ton in the theater?” Isabel said, her voice barely above a whisper. “Surely she must not be concerned with what others think.” The woman acted in plays, drove carriages, and conversed with ruffians in pubs as if she knew them personally, and Isabel could not help but admire her while at the same time hold a suspicion for her. She could not take her eyes off the scene before her, and not for the same reasons as she had been transfixed before.

  A man walked out onto the stage, the same pauper’s hat as the young boy had carried throughout the play now on the man’s head, pulled down so it obscured his face. Isabel felt a strange stirring in the pit of her stomach as he knelt down before the Princess.

  “Michael?” Miss Miriam cried out in that same booming voice all of the actors used. “Is that you?”

  The man rose, took off his hat, and clutched it in his hands. His head remained lowered, his long hair hiding his face. “It is I,” he said.

  “Why are you living in the streets as a beggar?” the Princess asked.

  “I am a thief, and there is no other place for someone such as I. That is why.”

  The look on the Princess’s face softened. “You are no thief,” she said. “You stole bread to survive lest you die from hunger.”

  The dialog continued, and when the man finally looked up, Isabel sat back against her seat. If she had been standing, she would have taken a step back, for Baron Charmain most certainly had not left to feed tigers in India as he had said he would be doing. No, he could not be doing such acts, for at this moment, he stood at center stage playing a pauper in a play. The strange thing was that if she had not
recognized Miss Miriam, it would have been more than likely she would not have recognized Lord Charmain, for he did not look anything like himself.

  Elizabeth went to speak, but Isabel stopped her. “Yes. I know. His lies know no bounds.” Inside, her chest tightened, for though she had refused his offers to call on her, she had still had an interest in the man. Now, however, her suspicions of him were well-founded. Chances were he was not a baron at all! He was indeed a great actor, for though she understood he enjoyed creating tales, she never imagined he would construct a lie to the extent that he would say he was a member of the ton!

  However, it was not this horrid realization that sent a tear cascading down her cheek. The man could have his lies, for she had already chosen to have nothing to do with him anyway. No, he was not the direct cause of her weeping. What brought forth that drop was the realization that no gentlemen existed, not in London, or more than likely, anywhere else in the world.

  As the play continued, Isabel watched with little interest, but when the two characters professed their love for one another and kissed, anger unlike any Isabel had ever felt coursed through her, for no cousins could kiss—even if it were for the stage—in such a manner. Even the audience seemed taken aback at such a public show of affection.

  Granted, his secrets were his own, and Isabel had no right to question his reasons for speaking the falsehoods he had. However, she found she could not allow anyone, even him, to pretend the way he did offstage. Yes, the man had lied to her one too many times, and she was determined to find out why.

  ***

  Isabel waited until the crowd had dispersed, anger boiling inside her. The man had ridiculed her numerous times! How dare he act in such a manner when all the while he was pretending to be much more than he was? It was one thing to lie about his time abroad and quite another to pretend to be a baron.

  Poor Elizabeth had stood several times, and when Isabel did not move from her seat, the woman sat down once again. Finally, Elizabeth said, “Come. The other attendees have already left.”