Ross huddled in the darkness, gathering the remains of his tatty coat about him. The little square of golden light at the window taunted him almost as much as the scent of dinner coiling on the frigid night air. The cottage was hardly an impressive sight with its sagging thatch and a door that didn’t […]

Stacking a deck of cards was a skill that Dinah had learnt many years ago while still a small child. She had practised until it was second nature. Tonight, however, under the watchful eyes of the man in front of her, she felt all fingers and thumbs. The room was dark and dingy, the smell […]

Beau watched as his boyhood friend, Sebastian Grenville, the Duke of Sindalton, ran down the stairs from his grand home on Grosvenor Square. The tall, imposing figure leapt into the waiting carriage and the glossy black conveyance, drawn by four equally glossy bay horses, drew him away. The gold leaf of the duke’s coat of […]

October 16 th , 1819. Newmarket. England. Oscar Paget looked over to see his best friend Bertram Aldous, the Viscount Withington, fighting to calm his excitable filly, Aphrodite. He’d just mounted by Thomond’s post and the pretty creature was doing her best to unseat him, thoroughly overwrought by the crowds. The anticipation in the air […]

The Workhouse in the Parish of St. John at Hackney, in the County of Middlesex. September, 1802. The building was ancient, a Tudor cottage which at one time might have been a handsome building, with its gable ends and quaint corners. Now it mouldered, narrow roofs sagging around a multitude of tall chimneys that struck […]

Lord Marchmain, otherwise known as August Bright, stared at the man who had been his idol for so many years and shook his head with remorse. That the fellow had been reduced to this; it was shocking, and rather terrifying, too. The object of the young man’s pity was none other than the Duke of […]

“What do you mean you’ve never heard of it?” Violette demanded of her husband. She looked away from the view for a moment as the carriage finally turned onto the long, winding path that led to Longwold, the vast and imposing home of her brother, the Marquess of Winterbourne. “Surely you stirred the Christmas pudding […]

“That blasted dog!” Aubrey Russell was not by nature a violent man. In fact, quite the reverse was true. Blessed with glorious good looks, thick auburn hair and a naturally sunny disposition, it was rare that anyone heard him so much as raise his voice. A fact that had always made his father out-of-reason cross, […]

Marie de Wynn was a spectacular whore. There was no getting away from it, though Gwenn knew the words were her mother’s own, and said with pride. Even on the wrong side of forty, Marie de Wynn was still a breathtakingly beautiful woman, the kind for whom men fought duels. Helen of Troy must have […]

“Not that one, you stupid girl.” Isabella snatched the brooch from her abigail and threw it across the room. It landed will a dull thud on the luxurious, thick pile of the carpet in her bedroom. “I said the diamond and pearl brooch. Can’t you tell a sapphire from a pearl?” “Yes, my lady,” the […]

The day dawned bright and fair. A cerulean sky spread wide overhead, without so much as the suggestion of a cloud in sight. After the last few days of heavy rain the sudden touch of warmth and sunshine had wrought a vast change upon the countryside. Vistas that had been dull, miserable, and lost in […]

Mr Phillip Ogden had served the Devlin family all his adult life. He had worked his way up to his position as steward, the pinnacle of his career. The previous viscount had been an admirable man, the kind it made you proud to work for. He’d been politically active and well respected throughout England. A […]

“Wherein we meet the players, each of whom dream of entirely dif erent characters.” Cheyne Walk. Chelsea. 1819. It was March, and a cold damp night pressed against the windows of the handsome house on Cheyne Walk. At four a.m. it might have been supposed every soul in Chelsea was asleep, quiet as it was. […]