Chapter 5 JULIANA WAS HEADED

Juliana was headed for a red morocco binding behind the doors of a glass-fronted bookcase when a soberly dressed gentleman impeded her approach.

"Mrs. Merton?"

"Mr. Gilbert," Juliana replied with a nod. She'd never exchanged more than a few words with him, an occasional browser in her shop. But she had the deepest respect for his reputation. Only in his thirties, Matthew Gilbert was perhaps the premier rare bookseller in London. Although bookseller was too humdrum a word to define Gilbert's position as adviser and confidant to the book-collecting nobility.

"I'm glad to meet you," he said. "You had some interesting volumes of ecclesiastical history on your shelves. Nothing I wanted, but I wondered if you had any others."

"I have a few other volumes from the same source in my back room. If you'd care to visit the shop I'd be glad to bring them out."

"I have a customer who might be interested."

Juliana was somewhat surprised. The books he'd mentioned were among the last Joseph had acquired, on the fatal trip when he'd met his death. She'd almost given up hope of finding a suitable clergyman on whom to unload them.

Maybe one of Gilbert's clients was a bishop.

"I shall call on you soon," he said with a polite nod.

"It might be best to send word when you wish to see me. I shall spend much of the next few weeks in these rooms."

"Of course. Where else would any successful bookseller be?"

Being so described by Matthew Gilbert put a smile on her face. But her good mood at rubbing shoulders with a major figure in her trade shattered when she asked the porter for the Aretino.

"I'm sorry, madam," he said stiffly. "Ladies are not permitted to view the contents of this cabinet."

"Why not?"

"It contains volumes of an unsuitable nature."

She drew herself up to her full height of five feet, one inch and glared at him.

"I am not a lady. I am a bookseller. And I wish to see Aretino's Dialogues."

She spoke louder than intended. Every eye in the room rose from its bibliographic perusal and fixed on her.

Wonderful. Most of the London book world, the men she was so anxious to impress, including Mr. Gilbert, had heard her demand a notorious work of erotic literature. She blushed to the roots of her hair.

Uncertain whether to retreat or stand her ground, she rested for a moment, trying to summon the courage to argue her case, when she felt a light touch on her arm and a smoky voice in her ear.

"Why don't you let me see to this, Mrs. Merton."

The marquis had come to her rescue. She returned to her seat in mingled gratitude and resentment, with a touch of wry amusement at her own expense. For all her lectures she could hardly now accuse him of indiscretion.

Poor girl, Cain thought as he waited for the now amenable porter to unlock the cabinet. He'd been watching, curious about what Mrs. Merton was up to, and felt a shadow of annoyance at seeing her smiling and curtsying to a man who looked as though he had a stick up his respectable arse. Irrationally, perhaps, he felt possessive of the little bookseller. She was supposed to be working for him. Then he heard her scandalous request echo around the almost silent room. He'd never been able to resist the urge to assist a woman in distress.

Tarquin Compton stood beside the same bookcase. Cain often encountered him in the haunts of the demimonde: green rooms, masquerades, entertainments hosted by fashionable courtesans. Unlike Chase, Compton was also welcome in every haunt of the beau monde, a darling of the ladies who craved his opinion in matters of taste and lauded his wit.

Cain had no reason to dislike Compton more than any other member of the ton that rejected him. Why should he care that the dandy exercised his wit at Cain's expense, coining a series of stupid names for him? The Sinful Marquis (too obvious), the Unchaste Marquis (a bad pun), the Meretricious Marquis (lamentable alliteration). Most recently Compton had reportedly called Cain the Feral Marquis, suggesting he'd been raised by wolves.

All these soubriquets referred, in apposition, to that of his saintly father. As usual Cain's stomach roiled with acid at the mere thought of his sire.

"Interesting choice of book," Compton said.

Seeking the hidden barb in Compton's mild tone, Cain raised his head to meet the taller man squarely in the eye. "Then I'll step aside and leave it to you, Compton. Let me recommend the thirty-five postures. You could use some lessons in performance, I suspect. I seem to recall Maria Johnson was under your protection until she found she preferred me."

"I doubt it was my skills she found inferior. Rather the size of my purse."

"And Belinda Beauchamp-not her real name, I fancy-left you after a week. Mm." Cain put forefinger to his mouth in a mockery of concentrated thought. "Oh, yes, I believe she came to me. Without anything very flattering to say about her most recent lover. And I don't believe she was referring to the size of his purse."

"I defer to your knowledge of the ladies of the night, Chase, since you were all but born in a brothel." Compton's tone matched the disdain on his perfectly shaven hawkish face.

Cain adjusted his balance into a fighter's stance. He could see the other man's muscles tighten in preparation.

Compton looked down his nose in silence.

"You're nothing but a hypocrite, Compton," Cain said with a provocative grin. "But forgive me if I'm wrong and you sought these virtuous ladies only for the pleasure of their conversation."

Peace hung in the balance as Compton hesitated, clearly less willing than Cain to cause a scandal. Cain tossed another stick on the fire. "And speaking of hypocrisy, what are you doing next to a cabinet full of 'unsuitable books'?"

Cain prepared to dodge a punch but instead, to his great surprise, he was the recipient of a sheepish grin.

"You have a point," Compton said. "It so happens that I collect, among other things, the kind of books found in this bookcase. But only those," he added with a hint of mock piety on otherwise expressionless features, "of outstanding artistic merit. I can highly recommend the one you're about to look at."

The moment when every man in the room had raised his eyes at the sound of her voice had to number among the worst of Juliana's life. Almost as infuriating was the fact that, as a woman, she was not permitted to show a valuable book to a client.

The marquis experienced no difficulty having it brought out for examination. He returned to their table with the red volume tucked under his arm and took his seat at her side.

She found his proximity disconcerting. Accustomed as she was to crowded viewing rooms and cramped seating, the presence of her fellow bookmen never bothered her. Her attention, like theirs, was engaged by the assessment of fine bindings, the condition of engravings and fore edges, the steady rhythm of collating pages.

Even the odor of the occasional unwashed dealer dissipated in the familiar scent of book dust and old leather. But not Chase's. An indefinable bouquet-cleanliness, a hint of tobacco mixed with some kind of pricey masculine unguent-assailed her nostrils. When his thigh, accidentally or not, rubbed against her own, she found it hard to concentrate.

It had been bad enough when the object of their examination was something as untitillating as a Caxton. But the Aretino. Good Lord, what a book!

She'd never actually seen an edition, merely knew of its repute-or ill repute. He placed the volume between them and opened the volume to the title page.

The Dialogues and Thirty-Five Postures, after Aretino, she translated silently. Innocent enough, it appeared, until she discovered exactly what was meant by "postures." She had no idea men and women could do such things.

She felt her cheeks grow hot. Was that rather plump and almost naked woman actually about to...?

She looked at the caption. La femme embrasse le Dieu Priape ailé. That meant embrace or kiss. She glanced back at the picture. Kiss in this case, definitely kiss. And the meaning of "the winged God Priapus" was all too obvious.

"It's a nice large copy," she remarked, trying to project dispassionate judgment.

"So I see." Lord Chase's voice was completely bland.

Hurriedly she turned a page. This time the man was doing the "kissing" and in an equally shocking place.

"Notice the freshness of the engraving," she said. "A fine impression."

"Yes indeed," he murmured. "I can see he's making a very fine impression."

She shot him a look. His face showed nothing but perfect gravity, and she didn't believe it for a minute.

She babbled on about the quality of the drawing, the rarity of the edition, the splendor of the binding, with little idea if she made sense. Every minute the book lay open before them she was aware of Chase, not as a book buyer but as a man. Every nerve prickled and the room seemed stifling.

Visions of herself doing some of those...things...with Lord Chase flashed through her mind. Heat bloomed in areas she never thought about and her breasts felt tight. She glanced down to make sure the hardening of her nipples wasn't apparent through the fabric of her gown. The heavy mourning concealed her excitement but it also exacerbated her fever. She'd never been more relieved than when she reached the last page and closed the book.

"Thank you, Mrs. Merton. That was very educational."

She muttered something, fairly sure that in this case the education had been all hers.

"If there's nothing else you'd like to show me today," he continued, "let me take you home."

"Thank you, but I have a couple of errands to perform on the way. I shall walk."

"It's a cold day," he coaxed.

Dear Lord, she hoped it was snowing. Then she would have a chance of cooling off.