"Dammit, Charles, will you roll those dice?"
"Nay." Turning suddenly, she began raking up her coins, shoving them into her hat for want of a better place. Good God, she had won a small fortune! "What?" Radcliffe seemed horrified. "You cannot quit now."
"Of course I can."
"But you are on a winning streak. You have made more money at the table than you got for cashing in your jewels. You cannot quit now!" he wailed.
Charlie rounded on him with disgust. "Have you not had enough? Really, Radcliffe, your behavior is shocking. I would think that you, of all people, would know better than to waste time and money on gambling. Just look at these people. 'Tis a sickness. Come, let us go home."
When he merely stared at her rather blankly, she took his arm with her free hand and turned him firmly toward the door. "I would suggest that you not risk entering such an establishment again," she said. " 'Tis obvious you get too caught up in the game. I would not wish to see you mill yourself in one of these places."
Radcliffe allowed her to drag him away, and Charlie heard groans from the people behind them who had been winning by betting on her and had hoped to win more.
Radcliffe had the decencyto look somewhat contrite. Charlie shook her head as they exited the establishment.
"Oh, my lord!" a voice pleaded, "Please. If you could? They won't let me in to find my husband. If you could just nip back in and fetch him out for me? I'd be ever so grateful."
Charlie glanced around at that soft, imploring voice as they stepped out of the gaming hall. It was the woman who hadbeen begging entrance on their arrival.
"Your husband?" Charlie glanced from the boy who clung to the woman's skirt, to the girl who held her hand firmly and looked so solemn.
"Aye. He" She hesitated, lip trembling, then shook her head in despair.
"He's in there gambling our lives away. He don't mean to do it. Don't even want to, I don't think, but he just can't help hisself. We lost our inn to his debts six months ago, and we moved to the city. He took a job as a driver, and I found one as a half-time cook in an inn here, and we've been hobbling along, I thought.
I'd buy groceries and he'd pay the rent. Or at least he was supposed to, only I found out today he hasn't been paying the rent. I came home to find the landlord bailing the way. My husband hasn't paid rent for three months and 'til he pays up we are out. We cannot even collect our things. And today is payday. I know he has the rent money with him and is even now losing it. Please. Please,"
she begged. "If ye'd jest fetch him out so I can tell him about the landlord. He'd stop then, I know he would."
Charlie gazed at the woman, taking in her clean, plain gown and the children in clean but poor quality clothes and scrubbed faces with a sinking heart and asked, "Is he very tall and thin?""
"Aye. You saw him in there?" she asked hopefully, and Charlie felt her heart constrict. She suspected the woman's husband was Mr.
Tall-and-Desperate, the man who had gambled every last coin away; the weary woman's troubles were about to increase. The woman's gaze dropped to the hatful of coins Charlie clutched and she frowned slightly. Charlie could easily give the woman her rent money, but if her husband was Mr. Tall-and-Desperate he would be out any moment, and should he get his hands on it, it would go the way of the money she had watched him lose tonight. Mayhap she should just follow them home and pay their rent or "There he is! Papa. Papa!"
Charlie gave a start at the boy's sudden happy cries and turned to see the man now exiting the gaming hall. As she had suspected, it was Mr.
Tall-and-Desperate. He looked even worse now than he had inside. His eyes were empty, his skin sickly white as he gazed at his farmly. Nodding slowly, he walked toward them.
Charlie stepped back as the woman anxiously blurted out the news about the landlord. "Do ye have the rent money?" she asked.
Seeming not to hear her, he hugged and murmured something to each of his children. When she repeated the question, he straightened, and Charlie felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end at the man's expression as he faced his wife.
Taking the anxious woman's face between his hands, he kissed her almost reverently.
"I'm sorry. I love you," he murmured, then released her and stepped back.
He gave her a queer smile, then turned and walked into the street, directly into the path of a passing carriage and four.
Chapter Twelve
"Papa!"
Charlie caught that heart-wrenching cry and glanced down at the children with dismay as she realized that this was the last image they would have of their father. A curse choking her, she shoved her hat into her pocket and turned the children away, hiding their faces against her waistcoat and shielding them from the sight. She couldn't prevent their hearing, however, and felt them shudder in horror, then begin to sob as the air filled with the panicked screams of horses and men.
Radcliffe had hurried after the man in an attempt to draw him back, but had not been able to reach him before the horses did. Now he knelt, examining the broken body before straightening. His ashen face was enough to tell Charlie what she needed to know, and she glanced worriedly at the silent woman beside her.
Obviously in shock, the wife waited tensely as Radcliffe approached, probably knowing what he would tell her, but hoping against hope that she was wrong.
"I am sorry. There is nothing to be done for him. He is dead."
The woman slumped at those words, her head drooping like a limp daisy, silent tears coursing down her cheeks. Radcliffe watched her with concern for a moment, then turned and let loose a piercing whistle that brought his carriage forward at once.
"Help them into the carriage, Charles," he instructed. "I shall only be a moment."
Nodding, Charlie ushered the children forward as the driver leapt down to open the carriage door. She lifted first one child, then the other into the carriage before glancing around to see that the mother still stood where she'd been. Even as Charlie started back for her, Radcliffe shoved some money into the hand of a man he had taken aside, then moved to assist the woman. Taking her arm, he gently urged her toward the carriage, speaking to her softly as he did.
Swallowing asudden lump in her throat at the gentle concern he was showing, Charlie turned and got into the carriage, smiling at the weeping children reassuringly. The widow followed at once, with Radcliffe right behind her.
He murmured something to the driver, the door closed, the carriage rocked as the driver regained his seat, and they moved off at a funereal pace. The silence inside the carriage was thick and stifling, but there was little Charlie could think to say as she eyed the trio on the opposite bench. They were like clothes in a wardrobe. Slack and empty. Turning away from their hollow eyes and expressionless faces, she stared blindly out the window at the passing buildings.
It was not until the carriage came to a halt outside a dilapidated boarding house that the woman suddenly regained some expression, and that was panic. Her gaze shot to her children helplessly, tears welling in her eyes.
" 'Tis all right," Charlie reassured her quietly. She knew the woman was terrified of being turned away, but she had every intention of putting her winnings to good use by helping this family.
"I shall see them to the door," she murmured to Radcliffe as the driver opened the door. Stepping down, she waited as the driver assisted the widow out, then lifted down first the daughter, then the son to the street. Casting another reassuring smile at the mother, Charlie started toward the front door of the establishment pausing when it suddenly flew open and an odious little fellow in a filthy and tattered shirt and pants stepped out to bar the way.
"Back are ye, Mrs. Hartshair? Well, yer still not comin' in. I told ye. I'm wantin' my money. Ye owe me fer three months and ye'll pay it or kiss yer belongin's goodbye."
"Please, Mr. Wickman," the woman murmured painfully, clasping her children close. "My husband he's dead" She shuddered over the word, but forced herself to continue. "We've nowhere else to go. I'll pay the rent the best I can, but my children"
"Dead?" the man interrupted, a startled look on his bulldog face that became calculating as the woman nodded. "Well, that there puts a whole different picture on things, don't it?" His gaze slid up and down her consideringly.
"A woman shouldn't be on her own. Not safe. Mayhap we can be coming to an agreement."
His expression left no doubt as to what kind of agreement he was considering, and Charlie felt herself bristle like a hedgehog. "The only agreement will be her paying the rent she owes you and collecting their things. She will not be staying here."
His beady eyes swiveled to Charlie, taking in her gentleman's outfit with an arched eyebrow. "So that's the way of it? Already found herself a protector?"
Charlie stiffened at his words, then turned to the woman he had addressed as Mrs. Hartshair. "You said it was three months' rent you owed?"
She nodded uncertainly.
"How much a month?"
When the woman hesitated, the landlord spat out an amount that made her eyes widen incredulously. " 'Tis barely half that!"
"Aye, but it's late, so I'm charging you interest," he announced smugly.
"I am afraid interest is out of the question."
Charlie glanced around with surprise at Radcliffe's steely words. She had not heard him approach.
"You shall take the correct amount and allow them to collect their things.
Or you shall be paid nothing and we shall use the money to replace whatever they are forced to leave behind. Which shall it be?"
Charlie turned back to see the landlord scowl briefly. His gaze moved from Radcliffe's tall, erect form to the crumpled hatful of coins that she had pulled from her pocket; then he gave a surly nod. "Deal."
Charlie counted out the necessary coins and held them out. The man snatched them so swiftly she almost missed the action.
"Take them inside, Charles, and assist them in gathering their things. Mr.
Wickman and I shall wait out here for you."
Mr. Wickman obviously did not care for the arrangement but could do little about it. He stepped reluctantly aside, glaringas the Hartshairs hurried past.
Charlie followed them into the dim, smelly interior of the building and up two flights of rickety stairs to a small room that had made up the entire living space of the Hartshairs. One end of the room was taken up with a bed; a length of string strung alongside it told her that a sheet or some such thing had probably been slung over it at night for privacy. Two pallets in the opposite corner were where The children had obviously slept, leaving a small spot around a fireplace that held a chair with a broken and mended leg, and rough tools for cooking.
Charlie felt a lump develop in her throat at such penury and was grateful that it didn't take long for them to gather what little they had. She had never been inside such a dismal dwelling, nor had she ever known anyone who'd had so few possessions. A couple of ragged items of clothing. A tattered little doll of the girl's. A clumsily carved wooden figure that was the boy's. One pot and one pan for cooking. They all fit into a small bundle, then Mrs. Haitshair turned to face Charlie with determination.
"I'm wishing to thank you for what yer doin', payin' our rent and all, but"
She swallowed and chew herself up proudly. "I'll pay ye back somehow, but"
"I am not truly doing you a favor so much as you are doing me one. Or at least I hope you will," Charlie interrupted her.
When the woman peered at her a bit suspiciously, Charlie explained, "Radcliffethe gentleman downstairs?" At her nod, Charlie continued, "Well, I fear his cook quit just this morning. He has not had an opportunity to look for a replacement just yet and Well, it does seem as ifyou need a home and a more substantial job just now."
"A job?" she echoed with an expression of combined hope and fear.
"Aye." Charlie offered her a bolstering smile. " 'Tis a live-in position, so the problem of your being without a home just now would be solved."
"But what of the children?" she asked anxiously. "They would not be underfoot?"
"Nay. I am sure all will be fine. Why, your daughter could help out Bessie, my sister's maid. 'Twould be good training for her. And I am sure they could always use a hand in the stables when your son is old enough."
"Oh, my." She dropped onto the edge of the bed, looking suddenly overcome.
Charlie eyed her uncertainly.
"Are you all right?"
"I it is just" She shook her head weakly and tears began to course down her face. Her children were at her side at once, confusion and fear on their faces even as they sought to comfort her. She drew them into her embrace, kissing the top of first one head, then the other before raising her face to peer at Charlie with blind gratitude and adoration. "Things have been so bad for so long.
My husband, God love him, he did not mean to gamble, to make things so hard. He tried to stop, constantly promised to. But" She shook her head wearily.
"He was a good man when I married him, then he took to gaming, then the drink.
He neglected business and began to sleep the day away. When we lost the inn, I thought that he must see how much damage all of this was causing. I thought sure he would change. But when Mr. Wickman told me about the unpaid rent, then"
She paused and her eyes became glassy with honor. Charlie was sure she was recalling her husband's death. The woman's expression cleared and she whispered, "God forgive me. I never wished him dead, but right now I see more hope for the future than I have in years."
She raised slightly shocked eyes to Charlie. 'I'm an awful woman to feel that way, aren't I?"
Charlie shook her head solemnly. "Nay. You are a woman with two children to raise, clothe, and feed. And you have been trying to do so alone for quite some time while your husband stole the roof from over your head and gambled it away.
Now you are free of the sickness he had and the hold it had over your life.