no way out: Another England, #3

By Eric Alan Westfall

It's April of 1816 in Another England.

And Jeremy—a whore from the Dock—is living in a guest bedroom in the London home of the (in)famous Iron Marquess, with over fifteen days missing from his life.

For someone who remembers everything from his third birthday on, it's unnerving not to know. Fine, fourteen days for the coma and the infection delirium, with a couple of brief remembered moments. But those first thirty-six hours. Do they explain how he got hurt, how he got to Ireton House, and why his lordship's mountain-sized valet is taking care of him? Or why his ironness looks at him with nothing iron at all in his eyes?

Jeremy and the Iron Marquess both have dark secrets. Toss in a forced engagement, an inheritance, a scheme to clap Jeremy in Bedlam, a wall in a hall with paintings to the left and waiting emptiness to the right, the revelation of the missing hours, a problem with plumage, some numbered accounts, and a long sea voyage, and even with incredible sex, humor, Shakespeare, Lewis Carroll, and a fabulous toy collection, it all seems to mean there's no way out of the snares surrounding them.

Or is the old saying true: where there's a waltz, there's a way?

152,612 words of story (roughly 508 pages in a mass market paperback)

• Language: English
• Publisher: Eric Alan Westfall
• Release date: Sep 13, 2018
• ISBN: 9781386941125

Book preview

A Hearty Round of Cyber-Applause To:

Beta Readers

The generous women who have, over the years, provided invaluable

comments and advice through beta reading. In alphabetical order:

Alexis, Beck, Britta, Katy, Lila, Natalia, Natalie, and Parker

Plus a special thanks to Alexis, who stepped in during the final push

to get the book done, with more beta help.

Note: If I’ve omitted your name, let me know

and I’ll correct my error

(Remember, dear readers, as with all authors,

the fault lies not in our betas, but in ourselves)

Cover Artists

El excelente Roberto Quintero que una vez más ha capturado

un momento en el libro para completar la perfección

con su pintura de portada,

y para

Karrie Jax, quien diseñó el diseño para el título y el autor

con un ojo infalible de Ricitos de Oro para lo correcto.

***

The superb Roberto Quintero who has once again captured

a moment in the book to complete perfection

with his cover painting,

and to

Karrie Jax, who designed the layout for title and author

with an unerring Goldilocks eye for just right.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

A Hearty Round of Cyber-Applause

Another England

1. It All Begins

2. Aftermath Of The Beginning

3. More Aftermath

4. Still More Aftermath

5. In the Marchioness’s Bedroom

6. One Impossible Thing Before Breakfast

7. The Start of A (Beautiful) Friendship?

8. The First Visit

9. The Second Visit

10. Investigations Abound

11. The Third Time Is Not A Charm

12. Banging the Bankers Back

13. Adonis On The Half Shell

14. In Which Several Secrets Are Surrendered

15. The Problem With Dull Plumage

16. Planning For Plumage

17. Birds of a Feather Try Plumage Together

18. Putting Plumage To Good Use

19. The Matter Of Numbered Accounts

20. The Incident At Rundell, Bridge & Rundell

21. Starting The Tangled Web

22. The Ton Tales Tale

23. Preparing To Paint

24. Slowly Painting The Dock

25. Is That All There Is?

26. Uncovering The Canvas

27. When A Lying Shite Gets Caught

28. The Incident At Stoneleigh Castle

29. You Bastard!

30. The Wanderer Sets Sail

31. In Which A Hawk Is Met, And Laughter Ensues

32. Return To The Dock

33. The Wanderer Returns

34. The Duchess Does It Again

35. Money Matters

36. Money Matters Again

37. Privy Privacy

38. Harry Speaks Out, But Not At Harfleur

39. Breakage Happens

40. Another Ton Tales Tale for the Ton?

41. To Almack’s Or Not To Almack’s

42. Where There’s A Waltz, Is There a Way?

Author Bio

More Books by Eric Alan Westfall

ANOTHER ENGLAND

For want of a nail…

But… what if the nail had not been lost?

What if…

On a fog-fading beach on the English side of the Channel, three men stood apart from the baker’s dozen who waited with little patience for the three to be done. Four kept the oars of the not-quite-beached jolly boat ready for a rapid departure, a fifth stood knee-deep in the surf, a thick, muscular arm keeping the bow steady. The sixth, the fugitive’s loyal companion, was already in the boat. Numbers seven through thirteen formed a ragged arc around the landing site, two watching the boat and the trio, the rest with their backs to the water, weapons raised, watching and listening for any who might have followed.

Two of the three spoke in almost whispers a few feet away from the third. The third was a fox harrowed by the hounds after the disaster at Worcester, hunted across England, but now escape was imminent. At least once he took the requisite steps into the water, then clambered into the stern with as much elegance as an exhausted, wounded man might command, so he could be rowed at speed to the ship waiting to spirit him away to France and safety. The other two would stay behind, waiting to serve again at need. Of all there, only these three were certain there would be a need, though not soon.

But before the wait could begin with a departure, a question had been asked, but not answered. The fugitive became impatient, demanding a response with an insistence borne of entitlement. The taller of the pair turned to face the third, bent slightly forward, spread his hands in a smaller, tighter version of a formal bow to higher rank. Straightened.

Major Charles Alexander Beaumont, eldest son of Baron Weston, looked once more to his left at Captain Edward Matthews, second son of a London innkeeper, paused, and found something in the other’s expression which brought a glimmer of a smile to the edge of his lips. The captain’s nod was so brief it might have been missed, but the third man, the fugitive who watched and waited, missed neither the smile nor the nod.

The major, who faced each moment of the battle, and every moment of the escape, without hesitation, hesitated then. A slow inhale, and then he let the breath flow out. He looked once more to the man beside him and answered the question. "I am a friend of Edward’s… a special friend of Edward’s, and I should prefer not to die because of whom I love."

The answer was not what the fugitive expected…not when the usual response to the offer was a request for honors, title, wealth, land, a boon for some future need. Unusual, indeed, but in his eyes, not unreasonable. He nodded.

The pair swept him another bow, formal, deep, with all the requisite flourishes protocol required, expressing appreciation of a promise made, but without the slightest hint of obsequiousness. In the watchers’ eyes, the bows were nothing more than the major and the captain bending their upper bodies forward a degree or two, perhaps a little farther than before, their eyes perhaps contemplating sand, salt water, perhaps a trio of ruined boots, before becoming upright again.

As the oars pulled deep and swift to get the jolly boat to the ship, the shore component of the baker’s dozen scattered to the winds. The major and the captain mounted, rode, but stopped their horses at the top of the slope leading down to the beach, waiting to be certain the sails bellied out and the wind carried him away. When the ship moved, so did they.

And then there were none.

But what if… in the glorious days not long after 29 May 1660, Charles II kept his promise?

What if…in the heady days of the Restoration, when the King could do no wrong, he persuaded Parliament to end the death penalty for sodomy, and repeal the laws themselves?

What if…a century and a half later, in 1816, the Prince Regent ruled, if not reigned, in: another England?

1. IT ALL BEGINS

JEREMY

6 April 1816

1:38 p.m.

Ireton House, London

no way out

The voice was back.

Inside my head.

Still I swiveled, twisting to look behind, knowing I would see what I always see when the words are said—nothing. The unpainted, scuffed wooden floor was empty. The door to second story elegance had not creaked since we passed through, shutting it behind us, moments ago. The stairs to lesser third-story elegance and fourth story no elegance at all were both bare of bodies who might whisper words only I could hear.

I turned forward again, teetered, and reaching out, slapped my palms flat against the walls of the narrow servants’ stairs. Pressing hard, I tilted back, but my socked foot slipped on the slick wooden edge. When I landed, the floor made known its displeasure with a sharp splinter through the rope-belted loose trousers, ill-fitting smalls, and into my bum. I yelped.

The cold voice of Thomas, the senior footman, came up the stairwell from the landing below. His lordship is waiting.

I shifted my weight to my left hip, and rolled to my knees, giving him a fine view of my bottom if he was watching, a movement by now instinctive. I made a point of lifting my left leg with great care, and with equal care placing my foot on the floor, again in case he was watching. A right foot repeat and then clearly awkward struggling to get myself as upright on the landing as I could—although a boy with a twisted spine and a twisted leg can never be truly upright—followed by a shuffle-step away from the edge. I suppressed the temptation to rub my right arse cheek. Without turning around I called down, Well, bugger ‘is bleedin’ lordship! Me feet ‘urt ‘n me arse ‘as been ‘urt, too.

My feet didn’t hurt much any more. Though bandaged still, and covered with the thick wool stockings sagging around my ankles, they were almost healed. But the pretense might keep me here, with a comfortable bed, and good food, for a while longer. I grinned a small, wicked grin to myself, and wiped it away as I turned to face the stairs. Right, then. Shall I drop me britches, turn ‘n bend and you can see what’s stickin’ in me bum, ‘n maybe come up ‘n pull it out?

It was amazing how much disdain could be contained in stare and stance. Thomas managed to look down his nose while looking up the stairs.

Orright, orright. Jus’ wait a bleedin’ minute. ‘n you might want to close yer eyes so’s y’don’t see somethin’ what might ‘orrify you, in case me grip slips, ‘cause I ain’t goin’ nowhere with somethin’ stickin’ in me arse.

My hands were on the knot in the rope, and I grinned broadly when the footman closed his eyes, with a stern Be quick about it then, boy.

I untied the knot, loosening the waistband since whoever supplied the trousers was much thicker around the middle than me, using my left hand to hold the pants up. I reached behind, working my right hand into my smalls and found the painful little bugger. With thumb and forefinger I wiggled it free, brought my hand round to the front, and looked at the bloody, bloody thing. I shouldn’t have, but I did. I lifted the three-quarter-inch sliver before my face. Oi! Is this a dagger wot I see before me?

Bloody hell. Bloody, bloody, bloody hell. Maybe Thomas wouldn’t....Well, bloody hell all over again, he did. The footman was looking at me now, his eyes wide, his mouth open to say something, and then he slowly shut it.

It would only make it worse if I tried to cobble together an explanation of why, or how a sixteen-year-old street boy (the age I gave) could paraphrase The Scottish Play. I shut my own mouth, dropped the splinter, retied the knot, and began descending the stairs with care, one thumping step at a time. I braced one hand against the wall—his lordship did not believe in hand rails for his servants—in case of another slip. The footman waited until I was almost at the landing before turning away. Watching my downward struggle, he was unconcerned about the possibility of another fall, his expression informing me if I fell I was on my own. I followed in silence as we went through the halls of the first floor to the front of the house.

Ah, his lordship’s library. I stared at the door.

I’d been in there, just the once, when I shouldn’t have been. But then, I shouldn’t have been in the house in the first place, but I was, though I didn’t know why. Or how I came to be here. Both were part of what was missing. I could remember every...bloody...thing up to the night before...whatever...happened. Remember the Dock on the 12th, the clock in my head saying it was ten thirty at night when I swallowed the last man’s seed. I remember the taste. Remember, too, the glint of the shilling as it spun through the air, making me get off my knees, bend and stretch to reach it in the muck. The feel of the metal between my fingertips as I picked it up. Then the twist and roll away, my back taking the brunt of the kick meant for my belly. The man was one of those who, once his cock was drained, and eager to be tucked and buttoned away, feels guilty and lashes out at the one responsible for his sin. I remember his silhouette as I got to my feet, and he realized how much taller I was, and how the silhouette turned and hurried away.

Then nothing more until I woke up here in sobbing agony, weak, my feet, head and thigh throbbing with pain.

I shook my head, shoving the Dock thoughts away, replaced them with the memory of my visit to the library, brief though it had been. It was large, and looked as if created by merging two rooms. A loved room, for all his lordship’s reputation of being cold iron, loving nothing except, perhaps, what he saw in a mirror. The books had been read, not purchased by the yard and shelved for display. They were everywhere. The desk with intricate carvings which dominated the room had several, one in front of the great chair behind it, a brilliant blue silk marker showing his lordship’s place. More on the window seat to the left of the desk. Neat stacks on the floor, placed with care out of the way of anyone who might consider tripping over them. The tables had a liberal allowance of them, as did several chairs.

No books, however, garnished the large wing-backed chair before the desk. It was a supplicant’s chair, and by the emptiness of the seat, his lordship graciously spared the supplicant the additional humiliation of having to move a stack of books, with no idea where to place them, before sitting to plead. The sofa and two chairs before the fireplace were empty as well.

My visit might have been longer after the butler walked in had I been looking at books, though from the expression on Carleton’s face he believed his master’s odd start—me—was an illiterate lout. I was, however, discovered examining the contents of the glass case on a gleaming dark wood stand next to the desk. Obviously, I must have been trying to figure out how to unlock it, lift the lid, and make off with the brace of very expensive pistols displayed on the dark blue velvet which showed off the gleaming brass. Actually, I’d been thinking the pistols were in a very suggestive position, one above the other, but then, I found many things suggestive. Almost everything, in fact. A passing breeze blew in my ear and stiff I was.

I’d tolerated Carleton grabbing me by the ear and hauling me limping and gimping away. Tolerated, too, the biting lecture about not biting the hand which both fed and took care of me, though only the good Lord above and his lordship here below had any idea why, and it might have been a good idea for him to let me grab the always-loaded pistols, and perhaps I’d have been kind enough to put myself and the staff out of our collective misery by blowing my head off. Thomas was my minder on library-visit day, and he was not happy to be told off in front of me, for having abandoned his post in the face of the raging heathen horde (the boy with the hurting ear, head, thigh and feet) and allowing the enemy (the same boy) to gain access to his lordship’s sanctum sanctorum. A bit of Latin I wasn’t about to mention I understood.

Now I was at the library again, but this time with an invitation. Command, rather. I paused, waiting for Thomas to open the door, and then realized even if I was a species of guest, it was not one for whom his lordship’s servants opened doors. I would somehow have to rise above my roots and figure out how to turn the handle and open it myself.

I did so, though the door was too heavy to swing inward with as much drama as I hoped, but well-enough hinged it still swung. I almost smirked at Thomas, but didn’t when I saw the odd expression of smug, cold satisfaction. I shrugged, plastered my face with a bright smile, remembered to pitch my voice properly higher, and then limped with vast good cheer into the room.

Oi, gov! Wotcher wa....

The last word faded into silence.

I understood the reason for the footman’s expression.

Everyone in the room was looking at me, the slight sound of the door opening having warned them and enabled them to turn in its and my direction. No door in this house would dare open noisily; doing so risked instant dismissal and consignment to the woodpile, once broken into suitable lengths.

The supplicant’s chair was not beside the desk, suggesting intimacy, nor in front to confirm supplication, but at the left front corner, hinting at the possibility of a place of modest honor. Right and left and other directions originated from the desk’s owner.

In the supplicant’s chair was a man of middle years, forty-three of them now, to be precise. Conservative dress; red of hair, though it was of the dark variety and not the brilliant flame so often thought to be odd. He was red of face, too. Most often it was from drink, almost as much from anger, with a high probability the current dangerous flush was anger, given the whiteness of the knuckles on the hand clenching the arm of the chair. John Davies, Baron Enderby. The man who sired me.

A woman sat in the next chair, a lesser wing-back drawn up beside the baron. Of more than middle years, thirty-eight by admission, forty-eight in truth, and no one ever had the nerve to ask her how her son from a prior marriage could be twenty-five. Conservative clothes as well—the baron would never allow anything else—and hair in a ringlet style more suitable to a woman half her age. Quiet diamonds shone in her ears, around her neck, and on her hand.

The baron was quite capable of pinching a ha-penny until it screamed in agony, yet he would not allow the world to believe he could not afford proper dress for his wife. She had no expression on her plump face, at least, none discernible to those who did not know her well, but to those who did, as I did, the glitter of triumph in her eyes was unmistakable. The widow Margaret Merriweather, now Davies. My stepmother.

I turned my head towards the sofa which had been moved to form part of the grouping, angling right from the desk. My face had already closed the shutters on the frivolous bonhomie of my entrance, but despite my instant vow I would not allow the baron and his wife to gain information from my face, I could not prevent my eyes widening at the pair on the sofa.

At the end nearest the desk was a young woman whose clothes not only did her no justice but an actual disservice. Whoever chose her clothing for this day ignored her usual fondness for low-cut, chest-tight gowns emphasizing her best feature—if one enjoyed features such as bosoms. I was not an admirer of hers, nor any, regardless of size or shape.

I doubted she had changed much in the years since I last saw her. I wondered, but only a little, what sort of force had been required to get her into a high-necked and tasteful gown, one most definitely not her style. She had never been a diamond of the first, or indeed, any, water. She was more plump than fat, with brown hair in ringlets styled in a fashion at least somewhat becoming.

The expression in her dog-brown eyes was odd. A combination of nerves, uncertainty perhaps, fear, and clear contempt. The latter was unsurprising. It had always been there. Letitia Fairchild was soon to be twenty-three. She was the oldest daughter of Viscount Raymond Fairchild, standing a little beside, a little behind her. Their estate was an hour’s drive from Enderby.

Seated next to her was a man dressed in the height of fashion, if fashion could be said to have ascended to such astronomical heights of absurdity. Dark of hair, cut and curled in a style doing equal disservice to his round face and stocky body. Richard Merriweather, my step-brother.

Last, and most assuredly least, was the vicar of Wakefield. He quivered—one could hardly call it sitting, given the restless motions he could not contain—on a plain, straight-backed chair which was out of place for the library, and had not been there on my last visit. My vicar, or so he said. I considered him my father’s creature, a black-clad, pious familiar given to spouting of abominations.

For a moment I hoped there were no more, but then felt more than heard movement behind me, heard the carpet sigh again as the door moved across it, the faint thunk! when it closed, the quiet snick! of the lock. No way out, the voice said, pitched so only I could hear, but a true voice this time. In my ears and not my mind. Andrew Hunter, my tutor-cum-torturer.

A complete set. Well, complete plus the odd addition of the Fairchilds.

And as I looked at each face I could feel what I had built up inside me since I ran, collapsing card by card by card, though my body didn’t move. My face had not either, not since my tiny display of surprise over the presence of the Fairchilds. I learned the lesson of facial immobility, long before I’d escaped.

My father’s voice destroyed the silence. You’ve caught the thief.

"Not a thief." If there was a God, I would hate Him for the fact the baron can still turn my voice to the sullen voice of a boy of fifteen, fourteen, thirteen, well-caught and unwilling to admit the truth. Oh, yes, my house of cards was well gone.

no way out

I nodded agreement inside myself to the voice.

I am not a thief-catcher, my lord, nor am I in the employ of the Bow Street Runners. The Marquess’s voice reached out from its lair behind the desk, grabbed all their heads and turned them towards him, as inevitable as metal scraps and a magnet. I resisted, and I did not know whether he noticed. Is he, or is he not, your son?

My father tried for the sorrowful voice of a much-put-upon father. I had no doubt the Marquess would be fooled by the baron’s manipulations, verbal and otherwise, like all the rest had always been. As much as I might wish otherwise from time to time, as any father of an unruly boy often does, he is.

From time to time? The baron lies. Try forever and always.

The voice directed its Marquess magnetism at me. Do you remember him?

My father’s snort, and bitter tone, interrupted before I could speak. "Remember? Him? He remembers everything. Ask him what he was doing at half-four of the clock on the afternoon before his fifth birthday, and he will tell you. And if you have a way to check his accuracy, you will inevitably find he is correct. But he did not get this...this...."

Abomination, the vicar’s voice intruded, and the baron only shrugged and went on.

His mother’s people. Irish, you know. Although my head was down in the way of an abashed boy, I could still tell when the baron turned to examine my twisted spine, my turned leg. His voice became more disdainful and cold. I had not thought it possible, but it was. When it came to cruelty, the baron was always capable of more. "He also wasn’t a...cripple...when he stole my money and left."

You! Boy! Look at me!

I raised my head in a slow bit of defiance, as if the movement was by choice and not command, and looked at him for the first time since entering. Royce Alexander David Jonathan Henley, Marquess of Ireton, heir of the Duke of Stoneleigh. The Iron Marquess, as the Ton called him. At eighteen he’d acquired vast wealth, entailed to his own son when he reached eighteen, or whenever this Marquess succeeded his father. He was somewhere in his thirties, unmarried still, a rake among rakes, a Corinthian among Corinthians, and so on and on. An iron voice, indeed, with barely banked fury behind it. "You lied to me?"

It was something less than a question, something more than a statement. An accusation? An expression of utter shock someone would dare to lie to the Iron Marquess?

I had lied, from necessity. Direct lies, indirect, though as little as possible for practical reasons. Surviving alone in London, often as a whore, required exquisite skill at dissembling.

I let go of the biggest lie. I unwound from the twisted slump which tricked usually observant eyes into believing I was not quite so tall. It was most effective in dim lighting or darkness. Unwound, as well, the twisted leg which had never been twisted. Another successful device to convince any who looked at me I was at least defective in body. When you look at a cripple, you don’t look at him, you glance, and look away, and avoid noticing anything lest your eyes be contaminated.

Maintaining the pose of a twisted cripple requires work, constant concentration, and results in strained muscles, even after all this time. I ignored the gasps from most of the Marquess’ visitors. The baron’s response was a grunt of outrage. I rolled my shoulders, shook my left leg, and ignored, too, the expression I saw from the corner of my eye, of almost tangible fury rising behind the desk, though the owner of the fury remained seated. There was, though, something...odd about his expression. Visible fury would be expected of him, but fury with a tinge of...satisfaction? Then it was gone, and I had to consider other things.

When I finished my untwisting, I stood an exceedingly thin, four inches over six feet. Even with a slight shoulder slump, my normal posture when I was not twisted, I towered over everyone else in the room, whether they sat or stood. The same would not be true if the mountain, also known as Harris, the Marquess’s manservant, was in the room. Had he been, several of us would have had to stand in the corridor to allow adequate breathing space for the rest.

I shrugged, and then, knowing the situation, my situation, did not remotely call for it, I looked at the Marquess and grinned. I hoped to infuriate him more. I did. The thin lips with surprising sensuality, the lower the slightest bit plumper than the upper—I had not looked at him when I came in, but I would have to be dead not to have noticed him—had thinned to near invisibility. I lowered my voice to my normal range, set free the Seven Dials dialect I had been using. He blinked at a voice as aristocratic as his own. A somewhat deep baritone to his tenor, which was, I thought, the cause of the second blink.

People lie, your ironness. I would have thought you’d have learned that at your great age.

You insolent puppy! my father snarled to accent the image of his own red-faced fury. Apologize at—

A sharp gesture of his lordship’s hand sliced my father’s voice off. Ah, what I would have given, had the motion been a trick I could have learned...and dared to use.

You said— he began, before I cut him off.

Nothing to you. Not directly. It was impolitic to interrupt one of the greatest of the land, but then I had no reason to care. If there was no way out, as appeared to be true at the moment, then when I went out, I would go out with style. My style.

If Ireton ground his teeth any harder, he would have to have a wooden set made. Or perhaps ivory. He could afford it. You told Harris—

"I remember what I said to Harris, your ironness. As Lord Enderby said, I remember everything. My bitterness matched my father’s tone, doubled, tripled, quadrupled it. Or rather, everything except for a time frame between just before midnight, on 12th March 1816, to moments before three a.m. on 25th March 1816. I know the time because of my internal timepiece, and the clock in the room which chimed right after I awakened. When I found the mountain looming over me, I said to him, ‘I can’t remember.’ Three times, in an increasingly agitated tone. I was speaking of the period I could not remember, not the entirety of my life. You never questioned me. Neither did Harris. Nor anyone else. I am not responsible for your assumptions."

A little more of me came back. I stood straighter, as if I was proud of the height I had spent the last several years minimizing.

You pretended....

Interrupting him had become more fun than I had had, had been allowed to have, in a long, long time. Oi, gov, yer mean loik this? Me voice ‘n all? Well, if yer’d ever ‘ad to make yer way on the streets, you’d know... I shifted back ...you would get knifed, or worse, if this is how you speak to those you, ah, interact with, all day, every day, in the places I’ve had to live. A tiny pause. Your ironness.

Don’t call me ‘your ironness!’ he snapped. I thought he would have lasted longer.

My voice was all young innocence. "But, you are the Iron Marquess, are you not? I thought I was being correct about the appropriate honorific. Should I have said, ‘your irony?’"

He wouldn’t give me the satisfaction of a glimmer of a smile, the barest twitch of a corner of his mouth. But I saw it in his eyes, and gave him a smile of my own. A real smile, though my situation was far from one where smiles were appropriate. It was odd, but for a moment I thought his eyes widened when I smiled, but decided it was nothing more than a trick of the light.

Remarkably necessary things, lies. Don’t you find it so, your ironliness? Dealing with the Ton; dealing with family? Especially with family. I did not look at the baron, and the Marquess saw the not looking. So, yes. When the mountain asked me my name and my age, I told him Jeremy and sixteen.

There was no triumphant, Ha! at my admissions. Instead he asked, with a gesture encompassing everything—from my twisted body, to my age, to my being the heir to a barony—why I lied.

I folded myself down into my younger-boy persona, the cripple with the twist to his back, the lurch to his leg, the boy who whored himself to survive, sometimes to men who enjoyed the thought of what they were doing to a boy so young. Sometimes, when the place in which we met, the place in which we had sex, which was often the same, was dark enough, the man might have me pretend to be younger. Oi, gov, watcher think? A boy what’s sixteen, all alone, no money, no fambly, well, ‘is ‘igh ‘n mighty lordship ain’t gonter toss me out on me arse, not after takin’ me in in the first place, now is ‘e?

And then I straightened. All the way this time, shoulders back and into the me I would never give up again. For the first time since 13th June 1813 I stood tall. "But a well-bred young man of nineteen, quite possibly of the nobility given the correctness with which I speak, clearly not having a single feather with which to fly, would not be precisely tossed out, but certainly investigated. Perhaps compelled to go where he does not wish to go."

The baron—I long and long ago abandoned the use of father in reference to him—inhaled in preparation for a verbal flaying, but the Marquess’ hand stopped him again. Either his reflexes were remarkably fast, or else he had anticipated the baron’s likely reaction to the latter part of my speech and lifted his hand to interrupt the baron before he built up a full head of steam.

The Marquess said nothing, staring at me with the iron stare which must have been the origin of his nickname. Had he learned it at his father’s knee, or developed it on his own? I wondered whether the Iron Marquess was really him, or his version of the sixteen-year-old me—a mask to survive. He let the silence go on. We were waiting with varying degrees of eagerness for the Ireton version of the Sermon on the Mount, and he was choosing his words with care. After his treatment of the baron, no one else in the room dared the silence. So I did.

What did I say?

He did me the courtesy of not pretending to misunderstand me. I knew I had said nothing to give myself away once I awakened, well, other than the stupidity of paraphrasing The Scottish Play to the footman, but Thomas had no time to tell him. At 2:43 in the morning on 13th June, I took fifty pounds out of the baron’s desk, laid a false trail towards Edinburgh, about which I had talked so much, so carefully much, for the preceding six months. Besides whatever other abominations I may have inherited from my mother and her family, I have to conclude my acting skill was one of them.

Since then, I have been sixteen whenever I needed to be, which was most of the time. Granted, I was a freakishly tall sixteen after a growth spurt the year following my escape, but I was convincing. As a cripple I limped my way to a place near the spot I had chosen for the night, and segued into another version of myself, the young, talented, cocksucking whore, my noticeable brilliant hair darkened with dirt, or covered with a cap.

And when I was done, a confident stride took me into the shadows, where I segued into the cripple. There had been one or two who thought to rob me, but I proved their syllogism—all cripples are easy prey; he is a cripple, therefore he is easy prey—to be false, using the logic of fists, and feet and elbows and arms.

The only way he could have gathered this group to confront me, to send me back, force me back, was if I said something while I was delirious. I have avoided looking in my darkened hall for those days. The mountain—Harris was not at first pleased with the name, but eventually gave up trying to correct me—told me my fever lasted for more than a week, and when it broke, I was in a coma for days. I had no idea why they did not just let me die.

You said to Harris, not to me, ‘Don’t send me—’

I raised my hand, palm towards him, forefinger up, the others slightly curled. He did me the surprising courtesy of acknowledging the wait-a-moment gesture and stopped speaking.

Imagine a hall. Yourself standing in it, facing one wall. Whether there is a wall behind you or not is of no matter, since you never look. Directly in front of you is an oil painting, brilliantly candle-lit. To your left there is another painting, the lighting discernibly less brilliant. If you were to turn your head left you would see—as I see, when I choose to look, am forced to look—another painting, then another...and another...and another until there are no more candles, and it is only the accumulated brilliance of the nearer candles creating a dim light for the paintings going on, and on, to the final painting. Or in reality, the first. Your beginning.

My beginning was the day I heard my father say of me, his voice dismissive, "It is doubly unfortunate he is both my heir and looks so much like her. But I needed her dowry. The her" to whom he referred was my mother, who had died shortly before my first birthday. I regret having no memories of her.

I was three years old, plus one day, the day I knew the baron did not care about me and never had. Nor ever would.

I was three years old, plus one day, when my mind painted, in excruciating detail, the sights and sounds of the baron’s voice speaking to someone whose identity I never learned. I did not move from the shadows outside his library, where I stood behind the round pedestal with the tall Grecian urn on top. I didn’t peek around the partly open door to see who he was talking to. Nor did I peek around the fat, curved wooden column, smelling of beeswax, when I heard the footsteps of the unknown leaving. If I’d done either, they would have been a part of my painting.

Instead, the painting shows me sliding down the wall, knowing I would get dirty, knowing I would be punished for my dirt, dropping my little bum on the carpet, pulling my knees to my face, wrapping my arms around my knees, and then doing my best to cry so I would not be heard.

I became very good at crying so as not to be heard.

Standing there, if you look to your right, the hallway stretches away in utter darkness, though you know very well somewhere farther along it will come to an end. But since you can have no memory of what is yet to happen, the absolute darkness only disappears—section by section—when a new painting appears on the wall.

The paintings from those early years are not as well-done as the ones around you now, but then you’ve been painting them for sixteen years and more. Practice begets perfection, it’s said. And every one of the recent ones is of such extraordinary realism it is almost as if you are there. Inside the painting.

As I am there. I do not always look at these paintings as a member of the Ton might raise a quizzing glass to examine a Turner masterpiece on display at the Royal Academy. Instead, I am, more often than not, inside. Experiencing it. All of it. Whether if I choose to revisit a particular painting, or whether my attention is drawn to it by accident. The catalog in my mind of everything which has ever happened to me is far more accurate than the lists at the British Museum telling you where to find the statue of this or the sarcophagus of someone. I refused to look at the day before my fifth birthday, looked instead at a part of the hallway further to my left, the part belonging to 12th March to 27th March—a space empty and unlit, except for two small paintings, lit by a few candles.

I forced myself to move, to walk past the first, stop in front of the second. Forced myself to look at the painting. I remembered.

14th March 1816. It was early in the morning though not yet dawn. The clock in my head was muted. Perhaps because of the excruciating pain...the right side of my head, my left thigh, pure agony in the soles of my feet. A voice. Harris’ voice as I later learned, saying, I’ll send....

My voice, ragged, raw, shrill, the high voice of the terrified sixteen-year-old I had been when I ran, Don’t send me back!

My hand, thin, frail, quivering, flailed about until it was swallowed in the enormous rough palm of the mountain’s hand. The other enormous hand held a cloth, wiping away, with surprising gentleness, some of the sweat pouring off my face, dripping onto bed clothes already soaked. I grabbed his forearm, felt the thick hair, felt how weak my fingers were, tightened them as much as I could, while I begged, as I had so often, with such desperation, begged for other things never granted, but with a faint hope of success this time. "Please, please, don’t send me back!"

His voice was deep and rumbling as he promised me he would not. My right hand, arm, lost all strength, dropped to the bed. He set my left down on the soft, thick counterpane. I started drifting away.

Where are you from, boy?

The words caught me before I was gone. Yes, yes, it made sense. He had to know where not to send me. Enderby, I said.

Fool. Thrice-damned fool. All I had to do was say nothing and he could have kept his promise, simply because he did not know where to send me. But I trusted, I spoke. And so the mountain knew. And lied. Otherwise they would not be here to force me back to the place the world would consider the heir’s rightful home. And it will be by force, though not in the presence of the Marquess.

I was three years older, many inches taller, but still, force was the reason for Hunter being here. He enjoyed hunting me down when I ran before, far too young to do it well. He enjoyed what he got to do to me when he brought me back. Enjoyed reminding me yet again, as he had minutes ago, there was no way out. A forever truth, now, for once back under the baron’s control I will never again be allowed the shreds and shards of freedom I once had.

Or perhaps they are here because the Iron Marquess did not accept a servant’s word as binding on his greatness.

I pulled my attention away from the painting, stepped out of the hall, came back to the library.

I looked down at the Marquess, in every way. I no longer cared. Perhaps if I irritated him enough he’d....No, he’d never challenge a baron’s heir...half his age? A little more? A little less? And not for any reason I could give him here and now. I let my bitterness show. And more than a bit of my contempt. On the streets, I heard the Iron Marquess was a man of honor. It appears the word on the street is wrong.

His lips vanished and had I a fanciful mind—something bruised and battered out of me so very, very long ago—I would have said flames lit in his eyes. He opened his mouth, and I mocked his gesture to the baron, cut him off with movement and more words.

"The mountain promised me I would not be sent back, my lord. My tone made clear he was no lord of mine, nor indeed, any kind of lord at all. And after he gave me his promise, he asked me where I did not want to go. And like a bloody idiot I told him."

I turned to look at my watchers, the hunt pack with its prey cornered, and at Hunter who stood deferentially back, away from his betters, blocking the door. In case I rushed him, his fingers fiddled with a key he tucked back into his waistcoat pocket once he was sure I had seen it. His bland look told me what the key had been used for, as if I hadn’t already heard the door being locked. I turned to the man behind the desk.

"And so, here we are. Because your servant’s word is not your word and therefore can be broken with such ease?"

The watchers stared at the insane young fool who was baiting a man with the power to destroy him, the power to destroy them all if he chose to exercise it. They did not see the expression in his eyes. It was stunned surprise, and gone so fast I almost believed I’d imagined it. But I have not survived so well, though well has not been well at all, by not observing and understanding what I observe.

"H...I thought, when he told me, as it was his duty to do, you meant you did not wish to be sent back to where you were when...you were found." His tone was the tone of a man who never explained, never excused, and detested the thought those words were both.

No one had told me how I got here. I couldn’t ask the few servants I had contact with. I had asked Harris once, and he evaded a response. I had seen the Marquess to speak to only once, when I was still weak in bed, but conscious enough to shape myself as well as I could to the cripple I played, and remember who and what I was supposed to be.

He said, You survived, boy.

‘at’s right, me lord. Oi did.

He replied with a tone I couldn’t interpret, then or now, though I have looked at that painting several times: Good.

But my surprise at his words, at the misunderstanding I now realized was not a dark and devious plot by the iron heir to the stone duchy, held me too long silent. And so I lost the chance to find out more.

The baron spoke in what was as close to a deferential tone as he could pretend. My lord, if I may, I believe we have all troubled you enough. I thank you for your care of my son.

Was I the only one who heard the this freak of nature which followed? No. Astute as he might be, I do not believe the Marquess heard the phrase, but everyone else did, as it was a favorite baronial phrase, said often.