The Perfect Royal Mistress Read Online Free PDF Page B

Russell.”
    “Bah! That is only because you are a lecherous young jackdaw!”
    “Lady Russell,” he smiled, showing mock indignation, and with it, surprisingly boyish charm. “I really would have expected better from you.”
    “And I would have expected precisely the same as what I saw from you, Lord Buckhurst!” she declared, turning on her heel as others clambered forward.
    As Lord Buckhurst handed her the money for the sweetmeats, along with an astoundingly generous tip, Nell felt herself being pushed and prodded, but she managed to keep her smile, and her attention, on him. “I thank you indeed, sir.”
    “Ah, if only they were pearls instead of coins, I would cast them willingly before you,” he sighed with enough overaffected drama that Nell could not quell a loud burst of laughter that erupted in a very unladylike fashion. “And when you say that sort of thing to proper ladies, does it actually work?”
    “Nearly always,” he laughed charmingly.
    “’Ow fortunate for me that I’m not the least bit proper!”
    A more sincere smile crossed his face. She saw that he was surprised by her clever tongue. “If you are here tomorrow, I shall be delighted to buy your sweetmeats once again.”
    “’Twill be my pleasure to serve your pleasure, sir,” she flirted openly.
    Her attention was quickly drawn to another customer, but her thoughts eddied a moment longer on Lord Buckhurst. The power she had felt in that brief interlude was a heady sensation.
    Nell began to work the pit with ease after that, smiling and laughing as openly as she did at the Cock & Pye. Drawn by her infectious laugh and her raw beauty, men flocked to her, and Nell reveled in the attention. “Give us an orange, love!” called a stout man with black button eyes. “And there shall be ten pence more in it if you will add a kiss!”
    “For six pence more I’d kiss the orange but not you!” she chuckled. To her surprise, with a wide happy smile, he added the ten pence, pinched her cheek, and was gone.
    It would be easier than she thought to charm her way to a good meal for Rose and herself, she realized even before the next man pushed his way forward. Proper food, at last!
    “Two oranges! I shall take two!”
    “’Old your ’orses!” she called back through the din, reaching into her basket as she leveled her eyes, and her smile, directly upon him.
    “I would hold anything belonging to you!”
    “You’d best settle for the oranges, sir!”
    “Today, perhaps! But I will be back for whatever you have on offer tomorrow!”
    Even at sixpence an orange, half the cost of a seat in the pit, it was not long before Nell sold almost every one. As the performance drew nearer, she held an orange back, hiding it within the folds of her skirt, so that she might have reason to stay inside and glimpse a bit of the play. She wanted to ensure an explanation should she be asked why she had not left along with the other orange girls.
    Selling outside the theater, she had only been able to hear the laughter of the audience and the faint strains of the musicians. Now she greedily drank in all of the atmosphere, the sense of anticipation that was growing in the crowd, until candles were snuffed by young men who worked for the theater company and a young actress came from the wings and onto the stage. In the role of a maidservant dressed as a man, she stood in the center of the boards that jutted out into the musicians, and began the opening monologue.
    “Now good people, listen well, I know in your hearts you hate serious plays, as I hate serious parts, but if you sit now calmly you shall see before you not drama but a world of fops and tarts!”
    The audience responded by erupting in laughter. Standing back near the entrance doors, Nell listened intensely to the dialogue. The audience responded with great fits of laughter as the girl was joined by two men in guard’s costumes. Nell studied each of the actors and made note of the voices they used, how