Page 11 of The Marriage Method

“Oh no,” Nell said. “Please don’t refrain. If you have a criticism to bestow upon me—”

He turned back to her. “Not on you. On that wire cage contraption of yours. It’s the true culprit in this.”

Heat threatened to flood Nell’s cheeks once again. This time she failed to suppress it.

It was bad enough that he’d lifted her skirts. That he’d seen her stocking-clad limbs, with the darning on her right knee. Now he was criticizing her undergarments? The unmitigated nerve!

“Don’t you dare speak another word,” she said in the same perilous tones she sometimes employed with the more insolent of her students.

Miles was undeterred. “No one requires skirts of such astounding circumference. They’re impractical, as well as being dangerous.”

Nell’s eyes narrowed. The man clearly had a death wish. “Let me guess, in addition to being a brilliant editor, a fearless reporter, and a champion of truth and justice and cats, you’re also a member of the anti-crinoline league?”

He snorted. “Don’t be absurd. I’ve rarely given the things a second thought.”

She stabbed her hatpin back into place, securing her hat in its correct position. “Until this moment, it seems.”

“Yes, well…the device is hard to ignore on direct acquaintance.”

Her blood simmered with mingled embarrassment and indignation. “You have no acquaintance with my undergarments, sir, direct or otherwise. I’ll thank you to keep your opinions about them to yourself.”

A shadow of a smile edged his lips. It vanished as swiftly as it appeared. “I beg your pardon. I have been unforgivably rude.”

“Yes. You have.” She paused, adding dourly, “A gentleman wouldn’t have looked at it at all.”

“If that’s so,” Miles said, “a gentleman would have been precisely zero use in removing that cat.”

Nell privately conceded the point. She only hoped that Reverend Pettiman would prove to be as rational-minded about the matter when Miles found him.

If Miles found him.

Whether he did or he didn’t, Nell’s own course was plain. She had no choice but to return to the Academy on the next train.

Miss Corvus would require fair warning, and Nell would be remiss if she didn’t give it to her as expeditiously as possible. It would have to be in person. There wasn’t time to stitch one of the coded sewing samplers Nell and her Academy sisters used for confidential communications. And Nell could scarcely commit this morning’s events to a telegram that any nosy clerk at the telegraph office might read.

She turned to stare out the carriage window, her stomach twisting into an inextricable knot. Good lord, but this was a mess.

No, not a mess, she amended bitterly. A failure. And on her first mission, too. For that’s what this was, and no mistake.

She hadn’t come all this way simply to answer Miles Quincey’s questions. Important as it was to the Academy that she put his inquiries to rest, there was another matter that was more important still. It had arisen in the days directly preceding Nell’s imminent departure for London. A pressing enough issue that Miss Corvus had summoned Nell to her private chambers and given her the assignment herself.

“I wouldn’t normally send you on such an errand,” Miss Corvus had said. “But as you’ll already be in town, you’ll be well placed to investigate the matter.”

Nell had shaken her head. Much as she’d have liked to take charge of the situation, she knew she wasn’t best suited for it. She wasn’t Effie. She hadn’t spent years abroad, mastering the art of gliding, sharklike, through the treacherous waters of fashionable society. From childhood, Nell’s feet had been planted firmly on the shore.

“I wouldn’t know where to begin,” she’d said.

As ever, Miss Corvus had anticipated her. “There’s a seamstress in Whitechapel with whom I once had an acquaintance. She can’t read. It makes writing to her an impossibility. You must visit her in person. Speak with her. Persuade her to introduce you to the madams at the brothels thereabouts. She does a steady trade for them, and will know where to direct you.”

“But I have no experience outside of the school,” Nell had objected. “I can deal with Mr. Quincey well enough. That calls for strategy and diplomacy. But for something of this nature, surely you would do better to send Miss Sparrow.”

Along with Effie and Nell, ginger-haired Gemma Sparrow was one of the earliest of the Academy’s graduates. Now a teacher at the charity school, she instructed the girls in self-defense with her trademark brand of ruthless gusto.

“Miss Sparrow is a blunt instrument,” Miss Corvus had replied. “It’s your soft touch that’s required here. You have a gift for inspiring women and girls to trust you. It’s time you put it to use.”

The compliment had been double-edged. Nell had once been destined to use her beauty as a weapon in the Academy’s service. But after the girlhood accident that had injured her leg and damaged her smile, she had instead poured all of her energies into being a faithful friend, a devoted teacher, and an enthusiastic mentor. Admirable qualities, to be sure, but they weren’t the roles Miss Corvus had originally envisioned for her.

Indeed, it seemed to Nell that she’d begun this mission with her credit already in the red. Success would have balanced the books for her. While failure would only prove to Miss Corvus, once and for all, that Nell had no value outside the walls of the school.