"Patricia C. Wrede - Magician 2 - Magician's Ward" - читать интересную книгу автора (Wrede Patricia C)

“More magic, I suppose.” Mrs. Lowe shook her head. “I’ll speak to Richard about that in the
morning.”
 “Speak to him?” Kim said, beginning to be alarmed. For the past week, Mrs. Lowe had made Kim’s
life a respectable misery. She had insisted that Kim accompany her to pay interminable morning calls on
dull but acceptable acquaintances, forbidden all walks alone, and made it quite clear that, in the unlikely
event of Kim’s encountering any of her former friends, Kim was to cut them dead. Thus far, however,
she had not attempted to interfere with Kim’s magic lessons.
“I am sure you will have plenty of opportunity to study when you are back in Kent,” Mrs. Lowe said.
“Magic is all very well, but it is hardly a necessary branch of knowledge for a young woman in your
situation. While you are in London, we must make the most of your chances. I cannot say I have any
great hope of success, given your ... circumstances, but there are one or two possibilities—That is why I
wished to talk to you tonight.”
“I don’t understand,” Kim said warily.
“Mrs. Hardcastle knows a gentleman who sounds as if he will do very nicely. Well, perhaps not a
gentleman, but respectable enough. She has arranged for us to meet him tomorrow afternoon, and I
wished to warn you to be on your best behavior.”
“Best behavior—You can’t be thinking of getting me leg-shackled to some gentry cull!”
“If what you just said was some sort of reference to arranging a suitable marriage for you, yes, that is
precisely what I was referring to,” Mrs. Lowe replied stiffly.
Kim didn’t know whether to be amused or appalled. Her, married to a toff? In her wildest notions,
she had never thought of such a thing. She looked at Mrs. Lowe, and her amusement died. The woman
was serious. “It’d never work.”
“It certainly won’t if you burst out with a remark like that over Mrs. Hardcastle’s tea table. Consider
carefully what I have said, and be prepared tomorrow, if you please. I am afraid that your ... interesting
background means that you are unlikely to have many opportunities of this nature—you would be ill
advised to waste this one. Good night.”
Kim stared at the closing door, then flung herself back into the window seat. Marriage! She’s the
one who’s dicked in the nob. There isn’t a toff in London who would marry a penniless, nameless
sharper, even if I have gone all respectable. She shifted restlessly in the window seat. Respectability
did not sit comfortably with her, but what other choices did she have?
She couldn’t go back to the streets, even if she were mad enough to want to. What with all the
regular eating, she’d filled out more than she’d have thought possible; posing as a boy now. would be out
of the question. She hadn’t the training to be a housemaid or take up a trade, even if she could find
someone to hire her. Mrs. Lowe’s “respectable gentleman” wasn’t a serious possibility, but sooner or
later Kim would have to think of something. She couldn’t stay Mairelon’s ward forever.
Though that doesn’t seem to have occurred to him.
But Richard Merrill—whom she still could not think of as anything but Mairelon the
Magician—didn’t look at things the way other people did. Well, if he did, he’d never have got himself
made my guardian. For all the awareness he showed, you’d think he was perfectly willing to go on
feeding, clothing, and housing Kim until they both died of old age.
Maybe she should ask him about it. Maybe she would, if she could figure out what “it” was,
exactly—or at least well enough to explain. “I’m bored” would only get her a larger stack of books to
study; “I’m not happy” sounded ungrateful; and “Your aunt is a Friday-faced noodle” was insulting. But
there had to be some way to put it.
Meanwhile, she had three more pages of Shepherd’s Elementary Invocations to decipher before
morning. She didn’t want Mairelon to think that she wasn’t working at her lessons, not if that Mrs. Lowe
was going to ask him to stop them. Sighing, Kim climbed out of the window seat.
The text on magic occupied Kim for several hours, but when she finally laid it aside and went to bed,
she found it impossible to sleep. She lay in darkness, staring up at the plaster ceiling and listening for the
clatter of Mairelon’s carriage on the cobblestones outside. Around her, the household quieted as the