squirmed in his grip. Lashed out with a foot. Lord Havelock twisted his fingers into the material of the boy’s collar and held him at arm’s length, with apparent ease, so that the boy’s feet, and swinging fists, couldn’t land any blows on anyone.
The boy promptly let loose with a volley of words that had Lord Havelock giving him a shake.
‘That’s enough of that,’ he said severely. ‘Those aren’t the kind of words you should ever utter when ladies are present, leave alone when you’re in church. I beg his pardon, Miss Carpenter,’ he said, darting her an apologetic look.
She was on the verge of admitting she’d heard far worse coming from her own father’s lips, but Morgan was almost upon them, his beetling brows drawn down in anger. And her brief urge to confide in anyone turned tail and fled.
‘What’s to do, Morgan?’
‘The little b—boy has lifted my purse,’ Mr Morgan snarled. Reaching down, he ran his hands over the squirming boy’s jacket, evading all the lad’s swings from his grubby little fists.
A verger came bustling over just as Mr Morgan recovered his property. ‘My apologies, my lords, ladies,’ he said, dipping into something between a bow and a curtsy. ‘I cannot think how a person like this managed to get in here.’
Dotty and Lotty came upon the scene, arm in arm as though needing each other for support.
‘If you will permit me,’ said the verger, reaching out a hand towards the boy, who had ceased struggling as though realising it was pointless when he was so vastly outnumbered. ‘I will see that he is handed over to the proper authorities.’
‘Yes, see that you do,’ snarled Morgan as the verger clamped his pudgy hand round the boy’s wrist. ‘It comes to something when a man cannot even safely walk through a church without getting his pockets picked.’
‘He will be suitably punished for his audacity, attacking and robbing innocent persons upon hallowed ground, never you fear, sir,’ declared the verger.
Mary’s heart was pounding. Could Mr Morgan really be so cruel as to have him dragged off to prison?
Lord Havelock, she suddenly noticed, hadn’t relinquished his hold on the boy’s collar.
‘Hold on,’ he said. ‘Morgan, this isn’t... I mean, I think this has gone far enough.’
The two men glared at each other, locked in a silent battle of wills.
The boy, sensing his fate hung in the balance, knuckled at his eyes, and wailed, ‘Oh, please don’t send me to gaol, sirs. For lifting a purse as fat as yours, I’d like as not get me neck stretched. And I wouldn’t have lifted it if I weren’t so hungry.’
‘A likely tale,’ said the verger, giving the boy’s arm a little tug. But Lord Havelock kept his fingers stubbornly twisted into the boy’s clothing.
Mary saw that Dotty and Lotty were clinging to each other, clearly appalled by the situation, but too scared of offending Mr Morgan to say what they really thought.
Well, she didn’t care what he thought of her. She couldn’t stand by and let a child suffer such a horrid fate.
‘For shame,’ she cried, rounding on Mr Morgan. ‘How can you want to send a child to prison, when his only crime is to be hungry?’
‘He lifted my purse....’
‘Which he can see you can spare! You are so rich, I don’t suppose you have ever known what it is to be hungry, to be desperate, to have nowhere to go.’
‘Now, now, miss,’ said the verger. ‘We don’t want raised voices in here. Please moderate your tone....’
‘Moderate my tone!’ She whirled on the plump, cassocked man. ‘Your creed demands you feed the hungry, not toss them in prison. You should be offering him food and shelter, and help, not punishing him for being in want!’
Lotty and Dotty stared at her as though she had gone quite mad. Actually, everyone was staring at her. She pressed her hands to her cheeks, shocked at herself for speaking with such fervour, and disrespect, to a man of the cloth. For raising her voice at all. Whatever had come over her?
But then, the shocked silence that echoed round them was broken by Lord Havelock’s crisp, biting voice.
‘Quite,’ he said with a decisive nod. And then turned to the verger. ‘And I really don’t care for the way you just spoke to Miss Carpenter. Look, Morgan, you have your property back, can you not...let him go?’
Mary took a step that placed her next to him. Side by side they faced the rest of the group.
He really was rather a...rather a wonderful person. She’d been able to tell he hadn’t liked the notion of throwing the pickpocket in gaol, from the way he’d refused to relinquish him into the verger’s custody. But she’d never expected him to spring to her defence, as well. It was just about the most...amazing, surprising thing that had ever happened to her.
‘Thank you, my lord,’ she breathed, darting him a shy glance. And noting that the way the sunlight glanced off his bright bronze curls made him look like... Well, with his strong hand clamped firmly behind the little boy’s scrawny neck, he could have been a model for a guardian angel. The rather fearsome kind who protected the weak and downtrodden against oppression.
‘Not at all, Miss Carpenter,’ he replied grimly. ‘I believe you have the right of it. This boy’s nothing but a bag of bones. When,’ he said, turning his attention to the dirty scrap of humanity he held in one fist, ‘did you last have anything to eat?’
The boy squinted up at him. ‘Can’t remember. Not yesterday, that’s for sure. Day before, mebbe...’
At that, even Morgan looked taken aback. ‘Look,’ he began, ‘I had no idea...’
The boy’s face twisted into an expression of contempt. ‘Your sort never do. She’s right...’ he jerked his head in Mary’s direction ‘...got no idea what it feels like to have nuffink. Or what you’ll do just to earn a penny or two....’
‘If you had the means to earn an honest living, would you, though?’ Havelock shook him by the coat collar. ‘Or would you just keep right on thieving?’
The boy snorted in derision. ‘Who’d give me a job? I ain’t got no trade. No learnin’ neither.’
‘If you can learn to pick pockets, you can learn an honest trade,’ said Lord Havelock witheringly. Then he frowned. ‘Don’t suppose anyone would want to take the risk, though.’ He closed his eyes, drew a deep breath and sighed it out.
‘My town house could probably use a boot boy,’ he said. ‘You’d get a bed to sleep in, meals provided and a wage, if you kept your nose clean.’
The boy promptly straightened up and wiped his nose with the back of his hand.
‘I got no wiper, but I’d try and keep it clean if I got all what you said.’
‘Morgan? Will you let the matter drop if I take charge of the boy?’
‘I... Well, if you are prepared to attempt to rehabilitate him, I suppose I can do no less.’
Dotty and Lotty heaved a sigh, showing they were as relieved as Mary to see the boy escape the full force of the law.
‘Then if you will excuse me, ladies,’ he said, bowing first to her cousins, and then to her, ‘I had better take him there myself. Straight away. And hope that his arrival won’t induce my butler to leave,’ he grumbled.
He was scowling as he led the boy down the aisle. He didn’t slacken his hold on his collar, either. Which was probably wise. Who knew but if he let the lad go, he wouldn’t run straight back to whatever gutter he’d sprung from, and the associates who’d probably led him into his life of crime in the first place?
Damn Morgan for foisting this guttersnipe on