Читаем A Dangerous Fortune (1994) полностью

She shook her head. "It's not the riot," she said. "I've seen fights before. But this is the first time anyone ever took care of me. All my life I've had to look after myself. It's a new experience."

He did not know what to say. All the girls he had ever met assumed that men would take care of them automatically. Being with Maisie was a constant revelation.

Hugh looked about for a cab. There were none to be seen. "I'm afraid we may have to walk."

"When I was eleven years old I walked for four days to get to Newcastle," she said. "I think I can make it from Chelsea to Soho."

Section 3

MICKY MIRANDA HAD BEGUN to cheat at cards while he was at Windfield School, to supplement the inadequate allowance he received from home. The methods he invented for himself had been crude, but good enough to fool schoolboys. Then, on the long transatlantic voyage home which he had taken between school and university, he had tried to fleece a fellow passenger who turned out to be a professional cardsharp. The older man had been amused, and had taken Micky under his wing, teaching him all the basic principles of the craft.

Cheating was most dangerous when the stakes were high. If people were playing for pennies it never occurred to them that someone would cheat. Suspicion mounted with the size of the bets.

If he were caught tonight it would not just mean the failure of his scheme to ruin Tonio. Cheating at cards was the worst crime a gentleman could commit in England. He would be asked to resign from his clubs, his friends would be "not at home" any time he called at their houses, and no one would speak to him in the street. The rare stories he had heard about Englishmen cheating always ended with the culprit's leaving the country to make a fresh start in some untamed territory such as Malaya or Hudson Bay. Micky's fate would be to go back to Cordova, endure the taunts of his older brother, and spend the rest of his life raising cattle. The thought made him feel ill.

But the rewards tonight were as dramatic as the risks.

He was not doing this just to please Augusta. That was important enough: she was his passport into the society of London's wealthy and powerful people. But he also wanted Tonio's job.