Wicked and Wonderful by Valerie King Page A

the skirt about her bed, her cape, the padded inside lid of her sewing box and in every other place imaginable, the removal of which would require a very long time, indeed. In the bank she had four hundred pounds. She hoped to make another deposit very soon of no less than seventy-five pounds.
    Such was her life. And tonight, when she had been able to add a full five pounds to her savings, she was exultant. She hummed a little more as she took the perfume bottle and dabbed a little of the lavender scent on her neck and her wrists. She liked sleeping with the delicate fragrance wafting to her nostrils now and again.
    She was just turning back her bedcovers when she heard the flap of her tent move. There was only one person she expected to see at this hour of the night and that was Margaret. She turned around hoping to have a comfortable cose with her, then nearly swooned.
    There in the doorway was Kelthorne.
    “I did not mean to startle you,” he murmured, keeping his voice low.
    His eyes appeared oddly wild. She wondered if he had been drinking and if so was she in danger from his advances?
    She pulled the shawl close about her neck. “You must go,” she whispered. “I can see that you are in your altitudes, but this will not do. Were I to scream, you would have to answer to John and Henry and the others. Indeed, my lord, I beg you will leave. ”
    He smiled. “Your friend, Mrs. Ash, knows that I am here so you are safe if that is what concerns you. And I am not in the least foxed. She permitted me to come to you although she said I must be gone in five minutes. So, you see I am both here by permission and have promised to leave promptly.”
    “Margaret allowed you?” she queried, continuing to whisper. Well, she would certainly be quarreling with at least one person on the morrow.
    She stared at him incomprehensibly. “But why are you here?” she asked, wondering what he could possibly mean by coming to her in this odd fashion and so late at night with or without Margaret’s permission.
    “I do not know,” he responded. His expression was so strange. His gaze never left her eyes.
    She hardly knew what to do. She gestured to her poor stool, which would hardly be comfortable for him since he was such a tall, muscular man. “Will you sit down then?”
    He did not even glance at the stool but rather shook his head. “I thank you, no.”
    “Kelthorne, I do not pretend to know you very well, but you seem overset. Perhaps you should leave now and call on me tomorrow when your mind is more settled.”
    He shook his head. “That will never do. I do not understand this hold you have over me. When I watch you perform, it is as though you reach inside me, take hold of my heart, and refuse to let go. I have been trying to mend my ways. I have intended to make a fresh start of things. But this, this power you exert is in no manner fair to me. I wish you would desist.”
    Judith hardly knew what to make of this speech except that she thought it the most ridiculous thing in the world that he would blame her for his present feelings, which to her seemed odd in the extreme. In fact, so strange was his conduct that she sat down on her bed, carefully of course lest the corner give way again, and she slowly slipped her hand beneath her pillow. Her dagger waited there. She had used it more than once to chase away the unwanted attentions of a man. John had taught her well how to wield a blade, never to lift her arm high and always to keep the sharp edge at an upward slant.
    He dropped to his knees before her and placed his hands on her legs. “Let me go, Judith, I beg of you.”
    “You should leave now, my lord. Again, you are hardly making the smallest sense.” Her hand trembled on the dagger. She knew the moment was ripe, that she ought to make her sentiments more clearly known by exposing her weapon, still she restrained herself, especially since for some reason she found it quite difficult to breathe. His hands were