Wanton Angel (Blackthorne Trilogy) Read Online Free Page B
Author: Shirl Henke
“You know how I detest dressing up in court regalia. High-heeled slippers pinch my feet.”
“Duke Umberto d'Aquino will be in attendance, and I hear he's looking for an artist to paint his family.”
“I shall be most winsome and charming to him, then,” Beth said with a grin. “But the slippers will still pinch my toes.”
* * * *
“Not a bloody trace of her.” Derrick stared out the window of the handsome quarters Drum had let for them. “I made inquiries all about the waterfront. Even ventured into the fondachi. ” He shuddered, remembering the Neapolitan version of English slums, with their tiny airless rooms, noisome and dark as caves.
“Ah, my boy, your lust will one day see you dead in an alley. Of course the beggarly classes around the waterfront wouldn't talk with you—even if, mind, you could converse in passable Italian, which you cannot.”
“Neither can you.”
“Ah, but being a rational man, I have no desire to communicate with lazzaroni ,” Drum retorted as he continued unpacking their trunks. “His Britannic Majesty's English is all I aspire to speak.”
“Scarcely a practical attitude for a man sent to the Continent to spy for that very same Britannic Majesty,” Derrick replied dryly.
Drum shook out a pair of doeskins and inspected them critically, saying, “I am not the spy. You are. If it weren't for some slight misunderstanding with my creditors in London, I would never have departed fair Albion's shores.”
Jamison gave a snort of laughter. “A slight misunderstanding in the neighborhood of twenty thousand pounds. Actually, I thought it rather generous of the Foreign Office to buy your way out of Newgate.”
“Generous indeed. In return I must risk my life on this absurd venture, acting as bodyguard to a reckless madman,” Drum said with a sniff.
“Not just bodyguard, body servant, my dear Drum, body servant .” Derrick chuckled.
The little dandy stiffened and dropped a pile of starched neckcloths into the drawer of a huge armadio . “I shall remember this humiliation whilst I'm guarding your backside against Calabrian thugs. My aim might be a bit off.”
“Your aim is never off,” Jamison reminded him, returning to brood as he stared out the window at the narrow cobblestone streets six stories below their quarters. What had become of the stunning woman with the russet hair and Boadicean stride?
His reverie was interrupted by a knock at the door. The landlord's pudgy young son stood panting after his sprint up the steep stairs. “For the signore,” he said in broken English, handing a sealed note to Drum, then waiting for a reward for his swift delivery.
Derrick crossed the room and flipped a coin into his grimy fingers. Swift as a thief, he took off. Drum closed the door, then handed Jamison the missive. Breaking the seal, he read, scowling. “You'd best hurry with the unpacking. I've just been summoned to an audience with the queen.”
* * * *
Caroline Bonaparte Murat had never been a beauty like her sister Pauline, but rather favored their brother, with plump pouty features and a heavy mien. Like Napoleon, she also took her role as head of state very seriously. Her husband, the dashing and handsome Joaquim, tried to be a good ruler but was far better at leading cavalry charges. With the exile of Napoleon to the not-too-distant isle of Elba, both Queen Caroline and King Joaquim of Naples walked a tightrope between British naval power and Austrian land forces.
Thus the gaiety of their court appeared a bit strained during the autumn days of 1814. But the decadent Spanish Bourbons, who had held the kingdom before the French interlopers arrived, had known how to live like royalty, and the soaring towers and vast stone walls of
“Duke Umberto d'Aquino will be in attendance, and I hear he's looking for an artist to paint his family.”
“I shall be most winsome and charming to him, then,” Beth said with a grin. “But the slippers will still pinch my toes.”
* * * *
“Not a bloody trace of her.” Derrick stared out the window of the handsome quarters Drum had let for them. “I made inquiries all about the waterfront. Even ventured into the fondachi. ” He shuddered, remembering the Neapolitan version of English slums, with their tiny airless rooms, noisome and dark as caves.
“Ah, my boy, your lust will one day see you dead in an alley. Of course the beggarly classes around the waterfront wouldn't talk with you—even if, mind, you could converse in passable Italian, which you cannot.”
“Neither can you.”
“Ah, but being a rational man, I have no desire to communicate with lazzaroni ,” Drum retorted as he continued unpacking their trunks. “His Britannic Majesty's English is all I aspire to speak.”
“Scarcely a practical attitude for a man sent to the Continent to spy for that very same Britannic Majesty,” Derrick replied dryly.
Drum shook out a pair of doeskins and inspected them critically, saying, “I am not the spy. You are. If it weren't for some slight misunderstanding with my creditors in London, I would never have departed fair Albion's shores.”
Jamison gave a snort of laughter. “A slight misunderstanding in the neighborhood of twenty thousand pounds. Actually, I thought it rather generous of the Foreign Office to buy your way out of Newgate.”
“Generous indeed. In return I must risk my life on this absurd venture, acting as bodyguard to a reckless madman,” Drum said with a sniff.
“Not just bodyguard, body servant, my dear Drum, body servant .” Derrick chuckled.
The little dandy stiffened and dropped a pile of starched neckcloths into the drawer of a huge armadio . “I shall remember this humiliation whilst I'm guarding your backside against Calabrian thugs. My aim might be a bit off.”
“Your aim is never off,” Jamison reminded him, returning to brood as he stared out the window at the narrow cobblestone streets six stories below their quarters. What had become of the stunning woman with the russet hair and Boadicean stride?
His reverie was interrupted by a knock at the door. The landlord's pudgy young son stood panting after his sprint up the steep stairs. “For the signore,” he said in broken English, handing a sealed note to Drum, then waiting for a reward for his swift delivery.
Derrick crossed the room and flipped a coin into his grimy fingers. Swift as a thief, he took off. Drum closed the door, then handed Jamison the missive. Breaking the seal, he read, scowling. “You'd best hurry with the unpacking. I've just been summoned to an audience with the queen.”
* * * *
Caroline Bonaparte Murat had never been a beauty like her sister Pauline, but rather favored their brother, with plump pouty features and a heavy mien. Like Napoleon, she also took her role as head of state very seriously. Her husband, the dashing and handsome Joaquim, tried to be a good ruler but was far better at leading cavalry charges. With the exile of Napoleon to the not-too-distant isle of Elba, both Queen Caroline and King Joaquim of Naples walked a tightrope between British naval power and Austrian land forces.
Thus the gaiety of their court appeared a bit strained during the autumn days of 1814. But the decadent Spanish Bourbons, who had held the kingdom before the French interlopers arrived, had known how to live like royalty, and the soaring towers and vast stone walls of
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