For a mad moment she imagined he was talking about having him so close, and bit back a groan.Not quite everything. I want you closer still…
Then reality reasserted itself. She located ParadiseCourt, then checked the engraver’s name at the bottom of the sheet: J. Heron, Covent Garden. Her blood started to heat. “Indeed it is.”
She felt Morgan nod, then straighten.
“I’m afraid, Mister Heron, that your version won’t do.”
The mapmaker’s face fell. “Why not?”
“Because this map is a piratical imitation!”
Chapter Thirteen
Harriet almost laughed at the overly dramatic way Morgan saidpiratical imitation. He would have been right at home in some terrible Drury Lane melodrama.
He swept his arm grandly at the map in front of her, like a prosecution lawyer confronting the accused with a bloodstained knife inscribed with their own initials.
“Harriet, would you care to explain to Mister Heronwhythis map is not to our taste?”
Harriet lifted her veil. She drew herself up to her maximum height of five feet, three inches and fixed Heron with a basilisk stare.
“Because you, sir, are not the original engraver. This is a copy from the version made by my father and myself last year.”
Heron’s eyebrows shot up as he finally recognized her, and his face grew red. “How dare you! What slander. You have no proof.”
Morgan smiled in the same way Harriet imagined a crocodile would smile just before it ate you.
“Would you care to show him the proof, my darling?”
“I would.” She pointed to Grosvenor Square and batted her eyelashes. “I assume you’re aware of the concept of trap streets, Mister Heron? This courtyard, ParadiseCourt, does not exist except on my version of the map. You’d know that, if you’d produced the map yourself. Instead, you’ve copied my deliberate amendment. How do you explain that?”
Heron slipped a finger into the collar of his shirt and tugged, as if it was suddenly too tight. Harriet fervently hoped he was imagining the squeeze of the hangman’s noose.
“My son!” Heron blustered. “He’s only fifteen, and a lazy lad. I’ve been trying to train him up as my apprentice. I taskedhimwith mapping that particular part of London. Told ’im to walk the streets himself, every inch, to make sure the map was accurate.”
Morgan let out a disbelieving snort. “I bet he spent more time inside a nice warm coffeehouse than tramping around the streets. I bet he thought he could save himself a great deal of work by simply copying someone else’s work and passing it off as his own. Where is the boy?”
Heron looked cornered. “Out. I don’t know where.”
His eyes darted left and right as if searching for an escape route and Harriet wondered if there really was a lazy son or whether the boy’s existence was as fictitious as Paradise Court.
Morgan sent Heron a glower Harriet was certain he’d perfected to scare the living daylights out of subordinates on board ship.
“Plagiarism is a very serious offense. Miss Montgomery here can sue you, and win, according to the law brought about by—”
He glanced at Harriet in silent question.
“—William Hogarth,” she supplied quickly, amused that Morgan knew she’d have the details on the tip of her tongue. “The Engraving Copyright Act of 1735, whichconfers exclusive rights, for a period of twenty years, to persons designing engravings and similar works. It says an engraver shall be entitled to profit from his—or her—designs, and gives them the sole right to print and reprint their original works without hindrance.”
Morgan nodded. “If it goes to court you will lose, Mister Heron, no doubt about it.” He gave another dramatic pause. “Lucky for you, Miss Montgomery is as kind as she is beautiful. She will not drag your name and professional reputation through the mud, if you promise to cease and desist. You will hand her the printing plate you have created, and swear never again to copy one of her maps.”
“But!—” Heron sputtered.
“Have you met my brother, the Earl of Powys?” Morgan asked sweetly. “Gryff, do come over here a moment.”
Gryff obligingly sauntered over and nodded to Heron.
“I hear your children’s jigsaw maps are rather popular in theton, Mister Heron,” Gryff said easily. “My friend the Prince Regent wouldhateto learn you’ve been copying other people’s work. He might withdraw his royal patronage if word gets about that you’re a thief. Think what that would do for your sales.”
