Anne Barbour Read online

  Point Non Plus

  Maggie MacKeever

  Vintage Ink Press

  Los Angeles

  This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictionally.

  Copyright © 2011 by Gail Clark Burch

  Cover illustration taken from La Belle Assemblee evening dress, July 1818

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form by any means without the prior written consent of the Publisher, excepting brief quotes used in reviews.

  ISBN: 978-0-9826239-9-2

  Library of Congress Control Number: 201194394

  First Printing: January 2012

  This book is an original publication of Vintage Ink Press.

  For further information

  contact www.vintageinkpress.com

  Printed in the United States of America

  Books by Maggie MacKeever

  Point Non Plus

  The Tyburn Waltz

  Vampire, Bespelled

  Waltz With A Vampire

  An Extraordinary Flirtation

  Lover’s Knot

  Love Match

  Cupid’s Dart

  Lady Sherry and the Highwayman

  French Leave

  Our Tabby

  Sweet Vixen

  An Eligible Connection

  Strange Bedfellows

  Lady Sweetbriar

  A Notorious Lady

  Fair Fatality

  The Misses Millikin

  Jessabelle

  Lady Bliss

  A Banbury Tale

  Lady in the Straw

  Lord Fairchild’s Daughter

  El Dorado

  Outlaw Love

  Caprice

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  EPILOGUE

  Point Non Plus:

  A situation with no options.

  A state of utter perplexity.

  CHAPTER ONE

  Claret and champagne, thought Mina. And oh! The price of peas. The expense of maintaining a gambling house was enormous, even though that house was not in Piccadilly but rather the raffish Haymarket, alongside hotels and cafes and taverns, the King’s Theater for Italian Opera and the Theater Royal, vying for attention with popular entertainments from human curiosities to animal prodigies, her own favorite to date being a half-dozen turkeys executing a country dance.

  She was the proprietress of a Pandemonium. Mina marveled at herself. Since said Pandemonium was in the Haymarket, did that make her Haymarket ware?

  The hour was late, the gaming rooms in full swing. Those rooms were as fine as their more fashionable rivals, furnished with thick carpets and marble fireplaces, rich woods and comfortable sofas and chairs. Moxley, admitted Mina, had known what he was about. Moxley had known what he was about in regard to many matters; had possessed a certain exuberance, a joie de vivre. But Moxley was water well run under the bridge and there was no use sniffling over milk that had been spilt.

  Moxley House stood on the west side of the street, at the northern end; two residences combined, with basement, three stories and a garret, four chambers to each floor.

  The first floor was given over to gaming. Mina entered the front room. On each side of the rouge et noir table — marked with two red and black diamond-shaped spots on which the players placed their stakes — a croupier waited with rake in hand, her task to watch the cards and gather in the money for the bank. Moxley’s employed more females than any other London hell, all of them dressed in gowns as expensive as any worn in fashionable drawing-rooms, if with even more bosom put on display.

  The dealer laid out two rows of cards, one designated as rouge and the other as noir; the players bet on which row would have a count nearer thirty-one, on whether the first card of the winning row would be of the color for that row, or whether it would not. Mina noted the pile of markers, none less than a half-crown. A buffet laden with various alcoholic beverages stood against the far wall.

  The next room was dominated by a long table covered with green cloth and divided by tightly stretched pieces of string. These croupiers were equipped with hooked sticks instead of the usual rakes.

  The game here was hazard. Intent players crowded around, most of the masculine persuasion, clean-shaven or whiskered or mustachioed, hair pomaded or dressed with fragrant oil; clad in evening coats of blue and brown, pantaloons or trousers, square toed shoes or Hessian boots, bulky neck cloths and waistcoats of every imaginable hue. Mina recognized several familiar figures, among them a slender, fair-haired young man leaning on the back of a chair. Abercorn was a reckless plunger, who would lay odds on anything from the turn of a card to a race between flies crawling up a windowpane.

  A smile here, a quick word there, a raised eyebrow answered with a nod or a slight frown— Mina glanced into one of the private alcoves where whist was being played for stakes that would have satisfied the legendary Charles James Fox. The atmosphere was hushed, the shutters closed, the thick curtains drawn.

  In the third large chamber, a statuesque brunette presided over the faro table. Faro was a complicated game, involving a banker and an unlimited number of players who staked their bets against the dealer over certain combinations of cards. The odds in favor of the banker were second only to those in roulette. The majority of the players were paying as much attention to the dealer’s neckline as to the cards she dealt.

  Moxley had definitely known what he was about.

  The E.O. table was being set in motion by a russet-haired young woman. Mina appreciated humankind’s fascination with gambling on the revolution of a circular device. Romans had upended chariots and spun the wheels. The ancients twirled shields balanced on the points of swords. Mina suspected that was how cavemen came to invent the wheel.

  The quiet was broken by the rattle of the dice, the clatter of the ball, the low murmurs of the players, the soft voices of the dealers as they announced the result of the last gamble, or requested the players to make their game anew.

  Wagers, gentlemen. There was the cost of wax candles and champagne to offset.

  Intent as they were upon their various games, on the dice, or cards, or ball, not one of the gamblers failed to notice their hostess pass by. Wilhelmina Moxley belonged to a family famous (or infamous) for their amorous adventures, the gentlemen renowned for the number and quality of their mistresses, the women for their inclination to give their hearts unwisely and too well. Had the Loversalls a motto, it would be: Love fully, with complete abandon, and always with great style.

  This Loversall remained a Nonpareil at forty, a deep-chested woman with red-gold hair drawn up in an Apollo knot, stunningly sensual features and dark-fringed sapphire eyes. She wore a scarlet gown with frills around the hem, the fitted bodice cut low to display her enviable décolletage, the puffed sleeves threatening to slip off her shapely shoulders with the slightest shrug. The widow’s refusal to wear mourning shocked some and titillated all. Odds were being laid as to whom she’d bed and bury next.

  Mina pretended to be amused.

  The last of the public chambers had been made into a
supper room. Crystal chandeliers illuminated small tables laid with silver and fine china upon pristine linen cloths.

  Several patrons were enjoying a substantial supper. A number of spirited conversations were underway. Mina paused to speak with a wealthy silk merchant, ordered a glass of wine, selected an apple tart.

  Her gaze fell upon a gentleman seated alone at one of the small tables. He was perhaps thirty years of age, with grey eyes and close-cropped brown hair; a successful solicitor with offices located near the Royal Courts of Justice, in the vicinity of the Temple Church.

  Mr. Eames seemed somber. Mina hoped he hadn’t wagered more than he could afford to lose.

  She moved toward his table. “Why so morose, my friend? Has Dame Fortune not smiled on you this eve?”

  He got to his feet. “I’ve gone down more heavily than I like, but I’m not yet lurched. May I have the pleasure of your company?”

  Mina seated herself. Mr. Eames sank back into his chair. She picked up her fork and took a bite of apple tart. He raised his wineglass, swallowed, tried not to grimace, didn’t succeed.

  Mina raised her brows. “Is the quality of my claret so inferior?”

  “It is I who am inferior, or so Sir Ian informs me,” he replied gloomily. “And Lady Anne will do nothing of which her father disapproves.”

  Mina marveled, not for the first time, at the astonishing perversity of the human heart. “Have you considered Gretna Green?”

  “I would not dishonor the lady with an elopement.” Mr. Eames set down his glass. “Or if I would, she wouldn’t, so there’s an end to it.”

  “You will think of something.”

  “I have thought of numerous things, each one frowned on by the law.”

  Mina wondered how many things she had done — was doing at that moment — that were frowned on by the law. She took another bite of apple tart.

  A man entered the room. His head was shaved, his eyes cold, his nose as flattened as his ears. He looked every inch the bruiser he had been before Moxley hired him to oversee the hell. Samson knew all the ways of cheating, with cards and dice, by means of handkerchief or snuffbox or rubbing the eye; recognized at first glimpse a Greek or Captain Sharp or law officer’s spy. Conversation faltered, then more quietly resumed.

  What now? Mina pushed back her chair. Samson threaded his way among the tables, bent and murmured in her ear. A woman claiming to be ‘Cousin Ianthe’ had invaded the premises at pistol-point, he said, and was demanding to speak with the proprietor. “That one’s no more Miss Ianthe than I’m David’s sow, and so I told her, upon which she threatened to shoot off my cullions if I didn’t fetch you to her straightaway.”

  Ianthe, here? Impossible. Ianthe was traipsing around Russia with a pair of German princelings. Furthermore, Ianthe disliked bloodletting and was unlikely to be brandishing a firearm, unless she had gone out of her head.

  Loversalls not infrequently went out of their heads.

  Mina glanced at Mr. Eames, who had withdrawn into his own unhappy musings. “You put her in the morning room?”

  “Aye, and locked the door.”

  Leaving Samson to keep an eye on the gaming suite, Mina made her way to the private portion of the house. With a feeling of foreboding, she unlocked the morning room door.

  In front of the fireplace stood a small figure wrapped in a voluminous dark cloak. On her nose perched a pair of dark spectacles, on her head a mass of mud-brown hair so ugly it could only be a wig. In her right hand she held a double barreled, double triggered handgun with brass fittings, an engraved ivory grip, and a relief carved wooden stock. The pistol was pointed not at Mina’s cullions, since Mina had none, but instead at her heart.

  “You asked to speak with me?” Mina inquired, more politely than she felt. “I might be more amenable if you aimed that gun elsewhere.”

  The pistol lowered, fractionally. “Buonsera, Cousin Wilhelmina. I might be more agreeable if I had not been made to wait! I do not wish to shoot you, no or anybody else, except maybe Paolo, but I am tired and hungry and have travelled a great distance, and your man tried to turn me away.”

  Cousin? Mina had numerous cousins, Loversalls being prone to rather indiscriminately procreate. Ianthe was otherwise occupied in Russia. Cara was busy procreating with her spouse. Whereas Beau—

  Mina experienced a sinking sensation, as if the apple tart she’d recently consumed had bypassed her stomach altogether to take up residence in her toes. Bloody hell, she thought but said, “Oh, mercy! Zoe.”

  CHAPTER TWO

  “Well you may say ‘Oh, mercy!” cried Zoe. “I mean, look at me. Have you ever seen such a fright?”

  Mina sank down on a sofa. At seventeen, Zoe had been a beautiful spoiled minx with a host of admirers and a willful nature that earned her such sobriquets as ‘limb of Satan’, and an excited expectation that she would be swept off her feet at any moment by her own true love. Now, ten years later, she was unrecognizable in an unflattering gown of a singularly ugly grey. The wig — those spectacles — her mottled complexion must be due to a copious application of theatrical paint.

  Did Mina want to discover why Zoe wore a disguise? Most definitely she did not. “You are not at your best, I think,” she murmured, diplomatically. “I am of course delighted to see you, but what brings you here?”

  Zoe clasped her hands to her bosom. “Oh, Cousin Wilhelmina! I am quite undone.” She still clutched the pistol. Mina experienced a brief fear — or hope — that the firearm might discharge.

  The firearm did not. “Are you mad?” Mina inquired. “Give me that at once! Waving guns around – you could have killed someone!”

  “Did you think I meant to shoot you?” Barrel first, Zoe handed her the weapon. “How absurd! If I was going to shoot anyone it would be Paolo, and I’m not certain I won’t yet.”

  Mina grasped the pistol gingerly. Where to put the blasted thing? She tucked it behind a sofa cushion. Time enough later to decide where the handgun was best hid.

  “I have been betrayed!” Zoe dropped gracelessly into a chair. “You look shocked, and so you should be. I shall tell you all — but first, may I have something to eat? I have not eaten for a prodigious long time.”

  Mina rang a bell. The summons was answered by a footman. Mina issued orders. The footman bowed himself out of the room.

  Zoe took off her dark spectacles, revealing bright blue eyes. “So you inherited a gaming hell. How bold you are to manage it yourself.”

  “Hardly,” said Mina drily. “I require some means of support, jointures and widow’s portions not being something with which, in the excitement of the moment, I concerned myself.”

  “We have all done absurd things,” sighed Zoe. “It comes from being a Loversall.”

  The footman returned, placed his tray on a table, then silently departed. Zoe fell upon the food as if she hadn’t eaten in days.

  “It is astonishing,” said she, whilst nibbling on a chicken leg, “how quickly one can come down in the world. A mere fortnight ago I had never ridden — under a load of cabbages, mind you – in a farmer’s cart; nor crossed the Channel in a sea so rough that I cast up my accounts over the side of the packet boat; nor travelled on a common stage. It was a horridly dirty stage, and as a result I am none too clean myself, which is something else I am not accustomed to, and everything is Paolo’s fault.” She discarded the remnants of the chicken leg, licked her fingers, and picked up a wing. “I didn’t believe Beau when he said I was too young to wed. I realize now he may have been correct. Paolo was so bold and brave and dashing. I was overset with passion. My heart overcame my head.”

  She had not been alone in that reaction. The extravagantly handsome young Conte de Borghini had sent all the damsels into a romantic twitter and their mamas to devising diabolical matrimonial snares. “You fled your husband?” inquired Mina. “All the way from Milan?”

  “It was not Milan but Paris,” said Zoe. Cousin Wilhelmina gave much less the appearance of a lady smote by sympa
thy than one wishing her unexpected guest to Hades, but surely that could not be. “And I did not ‘flee’, I left.”

  From beneath the sofa crept a plump grey feline with white chest and paws and whiskers. Mina lifted the cat into her lap. It curled up with its nose beneath its tail and promptly went to sleep. “Grace is growing old,” Zoe ungenerously observed.

  Grace wasn’t the only one. Mina felt herself growing more decrepit with each moment passed in Zoe’s company.

  Zoe pushed away her plate and chair, rose and began to pace. “If I learned anything from my father, it is that before one purchases a new pair of shoes, one should first try them on to make sure they fit. But I paid no heed. And I am well served for it, because my true love has turned out to be a toad.”

  Mina was taken aback by this comparison of paramours with footwear. “The path of true love is often set with difficulties,” she soothed.

  Platitudes, from a woman who had put five husbands in the ground thus far? “You should know!” snapped Zoe.

  “What I know,” retorted Mina stiffly, “is that hearts do not truly break, and one does not die of the dumps. You have fled to London. Now what do you mean to do?”

  Zoe paused to grimace at her image in the gilt-framed looking-glass. “I shall go to the Opera, and have an ice at Gunther’s, and ride in the Park.”

  “Oh?” Mina felt her right eyelid twitch. “I assumed from your disguise that you didn’t want your husband to know you are in Town.”

  Zoe swung away from her reflection. “I don’t! By the time Paolo realizes I have left him I shall be safely hid away. Like Grandmother Sophie after she got caught with that foreign dignitary lacing up her stays.”

  “In a nunnery? You can’t be serious.” Mina’s own stays, alas, were being unlaced by no one but her maid.

  “Why not? Paolo will never think to search for me there.”