Page 16 of The Spy Who Loved Her
“Can’t read,” Dannyboy said succinctly.
Rafe had suspected as much, but it served his purposes better that the boy couldn’t—at least at present. “Good,” he said. “Come back every morning, then. If I’ve a job for you, I’ll give it to you then.”
“And if not?”
“Then I’ll instruct Mrs. Morris to give you a shilling and send you on your way. And you’ll have a half-crown for each day’s errands on those days when I’ve got work for you.” It was more than the lad would earn working in a factory, and for easier work. But children—especially those that looked like street children—often went unnoticed on the streets of London, and Rafe would gladly pay a premium to ensure his messages were afforded a certain degree of privacy. “And you’ll tell me at once,” Rafe added, “if anyone intercepts you or questions you about my business.”
“For a half-crown a day,” Dannyboy said, “I’ll kick ‘em straight in the bollocks for ye.” With an impish grin, the boy slipped out the door and thundered down the stairs, and Rafe snatched the note off the desk, pressing thecrumples out as he opened it, the prickly, sharp letters blooming across the scrap of paper. The message that Chris had deemed important enough to send to him through a courier, however young and ill-equipped for such a thing.
Midnight. Monday.
So. It seemed they both knew their duty, then. But it was his own soul that would be theworse for it.
Chapter Six
Breakfast was often a disastrous affair—at least, when taken at a long table filled with twenty children, each of them far too chipper and excitable than one might reasonably expect anyone to be at such an hour.
Table manners were, at best, an afterthought, and Emma had to dodge more than a few flying bits of cutlery. And food. But she hadn’t been quite quick enough to dodge little Cynthia’s flailing hand, and so she’d ended up with a great glob of raspberry jam upon the front of her dress.
“Cynthia, your toast belongs in your mouth or upon your plate,” Emma chided gently as she swiped at the sticky substance with her napkin.
“Sorry,” Cynthia mumbled around a mouthful of toast.
“It’s quite all right, darling,” Emma said. The girl was just eight years old and had been with her only a few months now, but she was a sweet, exuberant child with cheerful disposition and a bit of a penchant for mischief. “How are your studies coming along?”
Cynthia beamed, her crumb-encrusted grin blinding in its brilliance. “Miss Finch says I’m too clever by half!”
Emma hid her smile behind her teacup. The child was unaware, of course, that it wasn’t precisely a compliment—but then Cynthiawasclever. If she had been a boy, Emma was certain she would have been bound for university. She had a head for mathematics that far outstripped most children of her age, and often those considerably older. In the few months she’d been within Emma’s home, the child had learned to read, to write legibly, to work complicated sums, and had even acquired an elementary understanding of French. If she was perhaps a little more excitable now than was deemed appropriate even in children, still she was on her way toward a respectable vocation in the future. That bright mind would serve her well. Or possibly get her into a great deal of trouble.
At the opposite end of the table, Josiah had his head bent over a book, his brow creased in studious reflection as he scanned the lines containedtherein while absently chomping on a piece of toast. He’d gone through so many books in his tenure with her, poring over them in her library for hours and hours.
Probably, she thought, he would appreciate the dusty old tomes which Ambrose had kept in his office. Not exactly light reading, but if anyone could get use out of them, it would be Josiah.
The din of so many chattering children, which had begun at a dull roar and had risen since to an ear-splitting crescendo, was brought to silence when Miss Finch gave two sharp claps of her hands. “Finish quickly, children,” she said. “Lessons will begin in five minutes, and I’ll expect you to have found your seats by then.”
Miss Finch was only one of the several matronly women that Emma had hired to educate and mind the children, but she was an efficient, no-nonsense sort of woman whom the children revered like a deity. Truth to tell, Emma rather did as well, since she had an effortless command about her that seemed to make a body instinctively obey. With only two claps of her hands, she had effectively quelled the usual mayhem of breakfast, and the only sounds remaining were of the children scraping the last bits of egg from their plates or else gulping down what was left of their tea as they hurried to do as Miss Finch had bid.
As the last of the children scattered for the school room, Neil arrived at Emma’s side. “Beg pardon, ma’am,” he said. “You have a caller.”
“Oh? Who?” Emma swiped once again, in vain, at the jam staining the bodice of her gown. Ruined, in all likelihood. It wasn’t so much that her laundry maids were not wonders with stains, but that the toast had been buttered as well, and grease was far more difficult to manage.
“A young boy,” Neil said. “He had a note for you, but he wouldn’t give it to me. Said he’d kick me in the”—an uncomfortable clearing of his throat—“in an unmentionable place if I tried to take it from him. I put him in the green salon.”
“I see.” Emma set down her napkin, rising to her feet. “I’ll see him, then.”
“I thought you might. Shall I send for tea?”
On her way toward the door, Emma stopped to consider. “How young, exactly, is this boy?”
“Ten on the upper end, I’d say. Certainly no older.”
“Better to make it drinking chocolate, then,” Emma said. “And some biscuits, if Cook has got any ready-made.”
Neil sketched a bow and left to make the necessary arrangements, and Emma made her way across the vast expanse of the house toward the green salon, where Neil had placed the child to await her. The presence of a footman just outside the room suggested that Neil had not been precisely certain whether the child could be trusted not to stuff something valuable into his pockets were he to be left unattended.
The boy sat upon a couch that was much too big for him, kicking his feet in his impatience as he waited. Absently, he scratched at his long, shaggy hair—fleas, she supposed, if he was lucky. Lice if he was not.
His head jerked toward her as she entered the room, and he hopped off the couch in all the vivacity of youth. “You Emma?” he asked, squinting at her, once hand cocked upon his hip, his chin jutting out at an impudent angle.
