The Captain of Betrayal by Claudia Stone

Author:Claudia Stone
Language: eng
Format: mobi, azw3
Publisher: 0
Published: 2018-07-08T18:30:00+00:00

CHAPTER TEN

James had never experienced a meal quite like it. At Emily's insistence, he had taken a seat at the head of the table for dinner and found himself the object of intense scrutiny. Half a dozen ladies stared at him with unconcealed curiosity, their attention only broken when Polly had finished serving and had sat down herself.

"Is anyone going to explain what's going on?" an elderly lady asked, peering openly at James, her eyes sparkling with mischief behind a pair of spectacles. "For I'm far too old to wait for things to reveal themselves over the course of time —I could be dead by the second course."

"No you won't, Mrs Actrol," Polly replied with a warm smile, as she passed a plate of mashed potatoes around the table "For there is no second course."

"Oh, you wicked child," Mrs Actrol gave a hoot of laughter, that rocked her rather ample frame. "Fine--if I cannot threaten you with my tenuous grip on the threads of life, then I don't know what I can do to make you reveal your secrets."

James resisted snorting at Mrs Actrol's words; never had a woman looked less like she was clinging on to life. In fact, the elderly lady seemed tickled pink at the turn of events; her eyes were gleaming and there were two pink spots of excitement on her powdered cheeks.

"Allow me to explain," James said, his deep voice causing every lady's head to turn in his direction. "I am Captain James Black, late of His Majesty's Navy and currently in the employ of the Duke of Everleigh. Polly and I were acquainted as children, and we have recently renewed that acquaintance."

He used his most authoritative voice, and if he had been speaking to anyone else bar Polly's irascible authoress guest, he knew that his statement would have settled matters but, alas, Mrs Actrol was not to be deterred.

"Ah, you are the same Captain Black who called a few nights ago?" she questioned innocently as she cut into her fish, "That same Captain who was told there were no rooms available, when at my count, there were four."

"The very one," James inclined his head, the corners of his lips twitching with a suppressed smile of amusement. He had never faced an interrogation quite like this; all soft smiles and impeccable manners. Give me a drunken brawl in a tavern any day, he thought to himself, as he speared a piece of asparagus with his fork.

"Curious..." was all that Mrs Actrol could say in reply, sensing that in James she had met an opponent who could resist her probing questions.

"James' mother was my teacher," Polly volunteered, obviously wishing to divert the conversation to safer ground. "Mrs Flora Black, she ran a penny school in Newcastle, that was how we met."

"Flora Black?"

Mrs Actrol's veneer of benign curiosity slipped away at the mention of James' mother, her mouth was open with shock and she peered at James, raking him from top to toe with her blue eyes.

"As I live and breathe," the authoress said, placing her fork down upon the table.

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