A Season to Be Sinful Read Online Free PDF Page A

surviving it?
    Im afraid I can answer neither of your questions. While I was being attended to, and Miss Dumont was being quieted, he was carried off.
    Carried off? Whatever do you mean?
    Just that. Taken away.
    By the parish watchmen?
    No, not the Charlies. By his accomplices, I should think. Except to remove his person from mine, no one evinced concern for him. That he was wounded was apparent. There was the knife hilt under his ribs and blood seeping on the stones. Hoist with his own petard, as you said. Onlookers moved in closer, and when the area was cleared again, he was gone.
    Then mayhap he was not hurt at all.
    I cannot conceive of a reason for such an elaborate ruse, but it doesnt matter. His wound was real enough. The blood on my waistcoat and shirt was quite real.
    You did not mention blood before.
    We were speaking of my injuries then, he said with perfect calm. And I will remind you that there were none. In any event, the waistcoat and shirt went the way of my trousers. Kearns insisted.
    As well he should have. She gave him a considering look. I did wonder why you so easily accepted a whisky this morning. It is not generally your way to drink this early.
    Sherry had only accepted the tumbler because he knew most of it would be used to lace his godmothers tea, but if she thought he required Dutch courage or the hair of the dog to set last nights adventure before her and behind him, he would not correct the assumption.
    It was good of you to come and tell me the whole of it, Sherry, she said. I shudder to think how the story will be perverted by the time I hear it again from Lady Calumet.
    Yes, there is that.
    Hmmm. Georgias gaze became a little unfocused as she regarded a point in the distance beyond her godsons shoulder and set herself to the task of perverting the facts to fit her own sense of how the tale should be told. I shall have to put it about that you gamely acquitted yourself. One does not like to think that you simply lay there under that unfortunate person. Do you ever carry a blade, Sherry?
    I do not.
    She sighed, expecting just that answer. No matter. It is perhaps better that you had no weapon. Placing yourself between the cutpurse and your lady friend is romantic nonsense, of course, but just the sort of thing a doting mama with a daughter on the marriage mart will want to hear. Are you certain you were with Miss Dumont, dear? Mighten it have been Miss Harriet Franklin who accompanied you? I think you will agree she is likely to inspire more gallantry than Miss Dumont.
    What she inspires is indigestion.
    Lady Rivendale frowned. Truly? That is too bad. I admit to having some hopes in that direction.
    Sherry merely shook his head and set himself comfortably back in the wing chair, though if she had offered him another pour of whisky he would have seized it with the alacrity of a man going under for the third time.
    Mrs. Nicholas Caldwell, nee Cybelline Louisa Grantham, brushed past the butler in the foyer of her brothers town-house and summarily announced herself in Sheridans li-brary. He was caught between pleasure and dismay in the same manner he was caught between standing and sitting behind his polished cherry wood desk.
    Cybelline did not expect ceremony from her brother, though she knew he was hard pressed not to offer it. Oh, do sit, Sherry, if that is what you intended. I am quite content to come to you. She briskly unwrapped the paisley shawl from around her shoulders and unfastened the ribbons of her straw bonnet, then tossed bonnet and shawl in the direction of the damask chaise, all the while advancing on the desk as if she were a regimental standard bearer. She stopped only when she was inches from the chair into which he had slowly lowered himself. Perhaps youd better stand, she said. I will have to see for myself that you are unhurt.
    Would you be offended, he asked mildly, if I snapped to attention?
    Beast.
    Sherry pushed back his chair and stood, allowing himself once again to be