Penelope by Marilyn Kaye

Author:Marilyn Kaye
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-312-37559-1
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
Published: 2007-09-24T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter Nineteen

At nine in the morning, the Cloverdilly pub was pretty empty—just a couple of hard-core drinkers at the bar. Lemon assumed the back gambling room was busier.

But he didn’t have to go there to find Max. He spotted the shaggy-haired guy at the other end of the room. He wore an apron, and he was sweeping the floor. Lemon was glad he’d been able to shake off Edward that morning. He could just imagine the sad SOB teasing Max about his new working uniform.

Actually, Lemon wasn’t sure what he was doing here himself. There’d been a message on his desk that morning from Max, asking that Lemon meet him at the Cloverdilly. All he could think of was that maybe the guy had won some money in a game and wanted to pay back the five grand.

He studied the boy, who hadn’t noticed him yet. He really seemed like a regular sort of guy. Something about the whole experience still didn’t make sense. As he watched, the bartender approached Max.

“Hit the toilets next. They’re a mess.”

Max nodded, lifted the bucket of water, and trudged off into the restroom. Lemon felt a twinge of pity, which he forcibly brushed away. Why should he care if an impoverished aristocrat was reduced to scrubbing toilets? Max had been born with a silver spoon in his mouth, he’d blown the Campion fortune, he’d made his own bed. He wasn’t worth feeling sorry for.

And yet, Lemon couldn’t help feeling there was something, something decent about Max. Then he shook his head wryly at his own assessment. What did he, Lemon, know about decency? He’d spent his entire adult working life in this job, exploiting the unfortunate, exaggerating rumors, manipulating scandals. Integrity was not exactly his middle name.

He went over to the bar, ordered a coffee, and opened a newspaper that was lying there. While Lemon’s paper had broken the story in the early morning edition, the other city newspapers had all picked it up by now. Headlines had varied: SHE’S REAL, THE WALKING, TALKING PIG, THE PIG-GIRL EXISTS! But all the articles carried the photos Lemon had picked up the evening before.

He still couldn’t believe how it had happened. When he got the call at his paper, he thought it was a prank, and he’d been about to hang up on the muffled voice—and then he thought he heard something plaintive in the tone, and he continued to listen.

“This is Penelope Wilhern. I have some photos for you. Photos of me.”

He was stunned. “Why do you want to give me photos of yourself?”

“I’m not giving them to you, I’m selling them. I want the five thousand dollars.”

He was surprised when she explained why she needed the money, but the more he thought about it, the more sense it made. It was as if for the first time ever, he was realizing that she wasn’t just some bizarre object of interest hidden away from view. And when he arrived at the designated meeting place, at midnight in the park, Penelope became even more real.

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