The Virgin Whore (Hennessey Series Book 4) Read online

  The Virgin Whore

  Hennessey Series- Book 4

  Meg Buchanan

  Range Road Press

  New Zealand

  Published in NZ by Range Road Press, 2019

  Copyright © Meg Buchanan 2019

  The author inserts the moral right to be identified as the author of the work.

  All characters in this book are fictitious,

  and any resemblance to actual persons,

  living or dead,

  is purely coincidental.

  Cover designed by Netta Newbound

  Chapter 1

  Saturday 13th December 1890

  THE MIRRORS IN THE FOYER caught and diffused the light. The subdued glow surrounded him like water as a man appeared from behind the desk.

  “Can I help you, sir?” the man asked.

  Courtney nodded. “I’m booked for dinner, Courtney Samuels.”

  “Yes, Mr Samuels, I’ll check if your table is ready.” He watched the man go through the double doors into the dining room. This used to be a gentleman’s club, all dark stained timber and faded rugs, but he’d heard the business had a new owner and now everything was still understated and tasteful, but new.

  Sprigs of holly adorned the front of the desk. It was the only concession to Christmas he could see in the place. In Auckland, there had been garish decoration in every shop window, and Christmas wreaths at every turn.

  Through another set of doors, a movement caught his eye. A young girl was hustled along the passageway by two men. Her long brown hair tied back in a ponytail, a coat and boots on, but no gloves or hat. The girl looked back at him, eyes blank, frightened, her face pale. Then she was pushed through a door into a room, and the door was shut and locked behind her.

  He’d never seen a female here before. Another change, not just the decor. Perhaps he should intervene. The men waited, watching him. He decided to mind his own business and looked back at the dining room.

  The man he’d spoken to was talking to a woman at the far end. He knew her, he hadn’t seen her for years, but it was Charlotte Pryor. She must be in her late thirties by now but was still slim and beautifully and extravagantly dressed in red silk, her shoulders bare, her hair a soft chestnut.

  So, she was the new owner. No wonder the place had changed.

  Charlotte came through doors. “Courtney! How lovely to see you.” The warmth of the welcome was disconcerting after having very little to do with each other for fifteen years. Up close, it was possible to see the fine lines around Charlotte’s eyes. “I hear you still see my aunt. How is she?”

  “Fine,” said Courtney. In the dining room men and girls sat at tables, others stood at the bar. At first glance, the gowns the girls were wearing were beautiful, but on closer inspection, he could see each gown, made from very fine silk or satin or voile was almost transparent and cut so it draped close to the girls’ naked bodies. The effect was startling, subtle and seductive.

  Charlotte opened the door further with a grand sweeping gesture. “I must get to Auckland soon and visit Millicent. Eugene is waiting for you by the bar. Your table is ready.”

  Eugene, as tall, dark and as gangly as he’d always been with his fringe still falling over his eyes and dressed to the nines, came into the foyer. “Courts. I saw you from the bar.”

  “I was just coming to find you,” said Courtney.

  Charlotte nodded at a girl standing near the doorway. “This is Sophie; she’ll serve your meal.”

  Sophie held out her hand to shake the hands of the two men then fluttered it down again to her skirts as if she wasn’t sure of the etiquette. The girl was perhaps sixteen, very slender, a little over medium height with long dark hair caught up and held off her face. Pretty. She pushed a curl behind her ear to cover the gesture, gave a reserved smile and stood against the door holding it back. “This way,” she said.

  Then one of the men in dark suits who stood discreetly around came over and spoke quietly to Charlotte. “She’s here.”

  Charlotte nodded. “I’ll come.” She turned back to Courtney and Eugene.

  “Business?” Eugene asked.

  “Yes, and it is something I must deal with now, we’ll have to catch up later.” Then she left in a rustle of silk skirts and a drift of perfume.

  As they entered the dining room, Eugene nodded at the profusion of barely disguised flesh on display. “The law says young girls can’t be employed where alcohol is served.”

  “Charlotte appears to have found a way around that law.”

  “She does. And the powerful and wealthy of Auckland come to Thames for the evening to enjoy her hospitality.” Eugene pointed at a cluster of elderly men dressed expensively, each with a girl hanging off his arm. “See that group over there? Watch the papers, and you’ll see one of those men reported as taking some stance on morality.”

  Courtney looked where Eugene was pointing. “It’s difficult to judge them, we’re here too,” he said.

  Eugene grinned. “That is a little pompous, Courts.” He started to wander back towards the bar, but Sophie hurried, caught up, and then led them through the room of diners to an empty table near a window. Set for two with crystal, silver, flowers and linen.

  She pulled a chair out a little and then pushed it back in as if again unsure of what she should do. “This is where Miss Pryor would like you to sit,” she said. She spoke beautifully; the accent polished.

  Courtney studied her, intrigued, she was clearly the product of a careful upbringing, and reminded him of his sister Alice, the slender body, the delicate beauty, the refinement.

  Sophie moved to the other side of the table and waited for Eugene to be seated. “I’ll find the menus for you,” she said and went over to the sideboard.

  Why would she be working here? With Charlotte in charge and the way the other girls were dressed this club had to be a brothel now.

  A voice cut through his thoughts. “Are you lonely, Courts?” Courtney dragged his eyes away from the girl to Eugene across from him, laughing.

  “A little short of female company.” And that was mainly Eugene’s fault. He could be with Millicent tonight, instead he’d cut short their time together for what sounded like a business meeting.

  “You could have Sophie for the night,” said Eugene.

  “Couldn’t afford it.”

  Eugene laughed. “That’s unlikely, didn’t you just inherit the family fortune?”

  Courtney shrugged. Yes, he was reasonably wealthy now, but it didn’t mean he planned on wasting money.

  Sophie gave them the menus. “Miss Pryor said you’ve been to the club before,” she said to Eugene.

  He nodded and smiled at her. “I’m here often.”

  She acknowledged the comment as if she already knew that, then picked up the wine bottle and filled a glass, her hands slender and the wrists finely boned. “You’ll need time to study the menu.”

  Courtney leaned across the table for the bottle as she moved away. It looked like he’d be pouring his own wine. She was obviously new to this work. “What do you recommend?” he asked Eugene.

  “The fish soup.”

  “Fish soup it is then.” He put his menu beside his cutlery and watched Sophie, her curls escaping from their clips and falling onto her cheeks as she took their order. When she walked away, Eugene was smirking again.

  “What?”

  “Nothing.” Eugene picked up his glass. “Do you still visit the lovely Millicent?”

  Courtney played with his fork. “Just come from there.”

  Eugene sipped at his wine then put the glass down again. “Now, onto why I asked you to dine with me. I hear you and William ha
ve the contract to resurvey the Hauraki.”

  Of course, Eugene would know that. He tended to make it his business to know what was going on. He came to the country twelve years ago to be a schoolmaster and ended up mining. By keeping his ear to the ground, he managed to turn the small fortune he made from mining into a large one by becoming a mine owner.

  Courtney nodded. “Now mining is starting up seriously in Waihi, the government is planning new railway lines and roads to link Thames, Paeroa and Waihi townships. They want the area resurveyed, and we’ve been employed to do it. We’re still surveying any new claims too.”

  “That’s good work.”

  Courtney nodded. “Not interesting though, we went over the same ground ten years ago. Why are you asking?”

  “Have you heard of the cyanide extraction process?”

  “I’ve heard it’s possible to use cyanide to extract gold from quartz, but nobody has been able to make it work on a large scale.”

  “Until now. A John MacArthur working with a couple of brothers, Dr Robert and William Forrest, have developed the MacArthur-Forrest Process for the Tennant Company. By suspending the crushed ore in a cyanide solution, they’ve achieved a separation of up to ninety-six percent pure gold.”

  “What’s normally extracted?”

  “Around fifty-four percent.”

  “That’s impressive.”

  “It is.”

  Courtney leaned back in his chair and idly waited for the return of Sophie. “And now that more gold can be extracted from the quartz, if you rework your mines in Thames you become rich?”

  “Richer,” said Eugene. “But that isn’t what I asked you here to talk about. Thomas Russell is back in Auckland.”

  “So, I heard.” Courtney watched Sophie come to the table carrying a tureen of soup. The white dress she was wearing looked expensive and the style young. With the high neckline edged in lace and pearl buttons on the bodice it was totally wrong for this place. She looked like she should be at a picnic by the river or reclining in a punt on a lake not working in a whore house.

  Now Eugene was watching Sophie too. It was unlikely Sophie appealed to Eugene, the way she did to him, in all the time he’d known him, Eugene had never shown any interest in a woman. Sophie started to serve the soup and some slopped onto the cloth

  “Apparently,” said Courtney. “He’s persuaded the Bank of New Zealand to pay his debts and lend him forty thousand pounds.” He saw Sophie pick up a napkin and pat at the mark ineffectually.

  He put his hand on top of her’s to stop the dabbing and said, “It’s of no importance.”

  Sophie snatched her hand away and stepped back. Surprised by her extreme reaction to being touched, Courtney lifted his palms in a hands-off gesture. The girl worked in a brothel and reacted to being touched like she’d been burned. Strange. He picked up a napkin and covered the spill. “Problem solved,” he said to her.

  Sophie gave an apologetic half-smile and carried on ladling soup into his plate. Courtney turned back to Eugene who was grinning again but didn’t comment, just carried on talking about Thomas Russell.

  “Yes, he’s a miracle worker. For someone rumoured to be insolvent, it was impressive. But regardless of rumours, before Russell left England, he floated the Waihi Mining Company on the London stock exchange and is selling shares in the company. He intends buying the Martha mine and all the other small mines around Waihi then building a battery and cyanide plant at Queens Head near Waikino. It’s been dubbed the Victoria Battery. I’m thinking of buying a large block of shares in his company.”

  “It sounds like good business.” Courtney watched Sophie lift the tureen carefully, tongue caught between her teeth, and move around to Eugene. “You win both ways. You get more gold from your quartz when it is processed, and you get paid to process gold from other the mines. So, what do you need from me?”

  “Information about the extent of the railways and roads the government are planning. If the Victoria battery is built at Waikino it means it won’t be far to take the rock to get it processed, but the transport system will still need to be there.”

  “I think the new roads will happen quite quickly, but a railway line from Thames to Waihi, especially as it is to pass through the gorge is less certain. The local iwi is against having a line near Mount Karangahake.”

  Eugene picked up his spoon ready to start on the soup. “That’s what I heard. Will the iwi win?”

  “They may not win, but they’ll slow things down.”

  Sophie finally finished serving and went back to the kitchen. Courtney tried the soup. Delicious. Charlotte employed a good cook.

  After a while, Eugene put his spoon down and dabbed his lips again. “And I hear McKenzie is still buying up claims on the mountain.”

  Courtney nodded. “He is, and now he thinks the Wentworth and his latest claim overlap. He wants me and William to resurvey the boundaries.”

  “He probably just wants to get extra land without having to pay for it.”

  Courtney laughed. “William thinks the problem is McKenzie can’t read a map.”

  “For your sake, I hope he’s right. You did the original surveys didn’t you?”

  Courtney nodded again. “It was William’s first job. We’ll do his work next week, get it done before Christmas then we’ll be free to do the government work after New Year.”

  Eugene pushed his plate away a little. “Will William sell to McKenzie? He owns several claims on the Karangahake and isn’t working them. Now he’s bought the farm on Rotokohu Road he isn’t living on them either, McKenzie has mentioned he’s interested in those claims.” So, this was what Eugene really brought him here to discuss.

  “He hasn’t mentioned it, there are several good reasons not to let anyone near those mines,” he said carefully. Eugene must know that if William did sell his claims, it could mean disaster for all of them.

  Eugene nodded. “I had thought we were safe.”

  “So, did I. Why would McKenzie want them? Most of the claims never showed more than a little colour, and the one that did is worked out.” Worked illegally, and if that news ever got out, it would get them all hung.

  “McKenzie will have heard of MacArthur and Forrest’s work and Russell’s plans and will think as I do, even if just the tailings from the mines are reworked it would be worthwhile. Added to that, digging and pumping equipment is getting better so it’s possible go deeper than in the past and still make money.”

  “So, mining is likely to start up again on the mountain now?”

  “With a vengeance, I’d say. And William’s claims don’t tell the story they should, so I was wondering what he planned to do.”

  Courtney scratched his chin. “Good question. I’ll ask him.”

  When they were finished eating, Eugene went to join a friend by the bar. Courtney stayed seated. The man Eugene was talking to, wasn’t an acquaintance and he couldn’t be bothered being sociable. He lazily watched for Sophie’s return. There was something about her that held his attention. Her incongruity with the surroundings, the hesitancy, the shyness suggested a lack of familiarity with the work.

  She came back and started to clear the table. When she’d made a stack of the plates, she looked over at him, all dark eyes and long lashes.

  “Are you acquainted with Miss Pryor?” she asked. Distinctive eyes, somewhere between green and brown.

  “Charlotte?”

  “Yes, the owner of the club. Are you a friend of hers?” And the perfect diction suggested money and education.

  “No, I met her a few years ago, but we aren’t friends. Why?”

  Sophie moved carefully around the table collecting the spoons and put them on the empty soup plates. “The way she spoke to you, it was like she was a close friend of your family.”

  He couldn’t imagine Charlotte and his reserved mother being friends. “I don’t think my mother would approve of her.”

  Sophie giggled. She pulled the side plates towards her. “I heard y
ou mention mining. My parents are friends with Mr Russell, do you know him?”

  “I know of him.” Her parents must move in the best of society if they knew Russell. He was even more curious about her now. “Why are you here?”

  Sophie hesitated before she answered. “I’m Miss Pryor’s assistant,” she said finally.

  “This is unusual work for an assistant.”

  She picked up the soup bowls and cutlery and put them on the other plates. “Miss Pryor said I need to learn about all the business, not just the work in the office. When did you know Miss Pryor?” she asked.

  “Fourteen years ago?”

  “I wasn’t here then.”

  Her voice was so soft he needed to lean in closer to hear. “I’m not surprised. You would’ve been all of one.”

  She giggled. “No, I’m not that young, I’m seventeen.” She picked up the pile of plates.

  “Ancient.” She giggled again and then looked around anxiously. Charlotte had returned to the dining room and was standing by the door watching them. Sophie stared back at Charlotte, the expression in her eyes, openly defiant, almost challenging. Unexpected and without explanation.

  Then as quickly, the expression was gone and she pushed a curl off her face again. She looked down at the dishes she was holding. She’d smudged her dress with the soup. She moved one of the spoons so it was sitting better, and the other fell onto the carpet.

  Courtney retrieved it and gave it to her. Sophie smiled an apology at him and balanced the cutlery on the plate again, then took the plates to the kitchen. She was lovely, refined, nervous and totally inept.

  Now the entertainment had disappeared, he went to find Eugene. It was time to leave because even if there was a moon, it was going to take him a couple of hours to get home.

  Eugene walked out to the foyer with him. “Sound William out,” he said. “See what he’s planning.”

  “I will,” said Courtney. “I’ll see you in a few days and let you know.”