Jane Feather - Charade

by Unknown

Molly bobbed to My Lord's back and fled in relief, while Danielle pouted crossly. By dinnertime she would have been without food since the noon of the previous day—a fact that her heartless husband seemed not to consider.

  "Do you not care to bathe, also, milord?"

  "I have done so already, on deck," he replied.

  "In the open air?" Danny forgot her hunger for the moment at this diverting prospect. "I wish I could do so."

  "I do not think, brat, that you would enjoy having buckets of cold water thrown over you by a group of seamen."

  "No, I daresay you are right," she agreed, stepping from the tub. "Have you sent someone to find horses?"

  "I have." He turned to look at her and Danielle deliberately let the towel fall.

  "Do I please you, sir?" Her eyes twinkled.

  "On the contrary," he said in a blighting tone. "At the moment, you displease me enormously."

  "Oh." Crestfallen, Danny made haste with her dressing, thankful that the riding habit was a relatively simple garment and she had no need to ask for help. She was beginning to develop the unpleasant suspicion that this eagerly awaited journey was not going to be as amusing as she had anticipated—not with an empty belly and in the company of Linton in his present mood.

  "You will wait here," Justin told her, once he had pulled on his top boots and shrugged into his coat.

  "Will it be necessary for me to turn the key on you?"

  Danny shook her head and returned to her perch on the window seat where she picked up her book again, biting her lip hard. Justin almost relented but her earlier look of triumph still rankled and he

  decided he was not yet ready to give up his little game.

  He left the cabin and went in search of Forster and information about the horses. When he returned it

  was in the company of the cabin boy staggering under the weight of a laden tray that Danielle regarded with naked relief. But she kept her seat until the boy had left and pretended to read with feigned indifference to the unmistakable French smells of fresh-baked bread, garlicky sausage, and ripe cheese.

  "You may cease your pretense, infant. I know full well that you are ravenous. Come to the table; we

  have little time to waste." He filled a glass with milk from a copper pitcher and handed it to her.

  Danielle drank deeply and then caught Linton's pained frown. "Oh, do I have .. . ?"

  "Yes, you do," he interrupted. She wiped the milky mustache from her lips with a checkered napkin

  and decided to take the bull by the horn.

  "My lord, may I please ask a question?"

  Linton propped his elbows on the table and rested his chin in a cupped palm as he looked at her quizzically. "Now, I wonder why you are asking my permission," he mused. "What possible difference would it make if I said no? Since that little word appears not to exist in your otherwise extensive vocabulary."

  "Oh, pray do not be odious," she begged. "I may deserve it, but it is most unpleasant. Could you not instead just be furious as I thought you would be and then it would be all over?"

  "Make no mistake, Danielle, I an furious," the earl said grimly, "and I expect to remain so indefinitely. If you do not care for the consequences of your actions, you should have thought a little more clearly before."

  It was pointless, then. If he would not respond to her in any way except for this frigid near-indifference, she would have done better to have stayed at home. If he saw her only as a troublesome responsibility, then there was no hope for the partnership that would have made all right.

  "I will not accompany you to Paris," she said, fighting back the tears.

  "You most certainly will! You do not suppose that I would trust you out of my sight after this?"

  "You need have no fear." Cold anger came to her aid. "I understand full well what you want of your marriage. I'll not interfere with your pleasures again, my lord."

  "And what is that supposed to mean?" Justin pushed back his chair, completely nonplussed by this attack that seemed to come from nowhere.

  Danielle shrugged. There was nothing left to lose. "I had thought, since I do not appear to be sufficient satisfaction in the bedchamber, that maybe we could at least share danger together. I am perhaps too young and unsophisticated for you in some areas, sir, but I have much experience of this present business. Since you do not acknowledge that, we will settle for the sham marriage of convenience. I will be perfectly discreet, I assure you."

  Justin had allowed this dignified speech to run its course only because he was quite dumbfounded. He

  had intended to punish her with his simulated annoyance for just a few more minutes before bringing the charade to an end, and now she was talking apparent nonsense. Except that she wasn't, because Danielle never talked nonsense.

  "You have been keeping something from me, have you not?" He rose from his chair and came to stand, towering over her. "I warned you the last time that I would not be so tolerant again."

  "I have kept nothing from you that you do not yourself know . . ." The fire died from her voice. "Perhaps you were not aware that I knew, but . . ."

  "Knew what?" Justin pulled her to her feet and Danny's knees began to quake.

  "Let me go!" She yanked herself from his grip and fled across the state room. "If you did not wish me to know of your . . . your . . . renewed . . . relationship with Lady Mainwairing, you should have told your mother and sister to keep still tongues in their heads."

  Justin's jaw dropped. "My what?"

  "Well, it is common knowledge that you have taken up with your previous mistress." Danielle sought cover behind the bed, even as she fired her arrows.

  Justin found a thread he could grasp. "My mother told you this?"

  "Your sister," Danny returned. "At your mama's instigation. She was afraid that if I heard from someone outside the family, I would react in an indecorous manner."

  Sarcasm dripped as she mimicked Beatrice, and Justin, who knew his mother and sister only too well, finally understood. This had been behind the estrangement between Danielle and his family, and Danielle had been harboring this viperous secret all these months, before, through, and after their own reconciliation that had followed the revelation of her activities with D'Evron.

  "Come here," he instructed, his calm voice belying the hurt that fuelled his fury.

  Danielle decided that that was the least safe option she had. She moistened her dry lips with the tip of

  her tongue and stood her ground.

  "It will be the worse for you if you do not," he said quietly, reversing her decision.

  Danny stomped across the cabin toward him. Justin did not touch her. "Why did you not tell me of this before? You knew the true nature of my relations with Margaret."

  "I thought I did, but since everyone else put a different construction on them, I realized I was wrong." Somehow, the hoped-for note of dignified outrage wasn't ringing true.

  "You thought I would deceive you? You still think I have deceived you?"

  Danielle looked at him, her eyes wide. Could she have been wrong? "If... if it is not true, then I beg your pardon," she stammered inadequately.

  "I do not understand," Justin said deliberately, twisting the knife, "exactly what I could have done to deserve your mistrust."

  "You might have trusted me enough to tell me that you had been Maman's lover," she flashed, unable

  to bear alone the guilt of this tangle.

  "Sweet heaven!" Justin felt the ground of his righteous wrath slip from beneath his feet. "Who told you that?"

  "No one told me." Danielle stiffened her knees and her resolve. "I happened to be behind the screen in

  the retiring room at Almack's when the Dowager Duchess of Avonley and Lady Almera Drelincourt happened to be discussing, with considerable amusement, the idea that you had taken the mother to mistress and the daughter to wife. They appeared to find it monstrous funny, my lord. I did not."

  Justin winced, imagining the horror of that revelation on this d
irect creature. "I should have told you,

  my love, but I did not think to do so. It happened long before you were born and I was little more than

  a child myself. Had I thought anyone would still remember I would, of course, have spared you that.

  To tell the truth, I did not realize anyone knew of it."

  "That is no excuse," Danielle said fiercely. "It was a fundamental fact that you should have told me long ago. I do not find the concept hard to accept, but... but you might have told me a little of her when she was happy. It was an unpardonable deceit to have kept that from me. I do not care how many mistresses you may have had, but I should have liked to have heard from you that one of them was my mother. After everything that has happened between us... my circumstances .. . the way we met, that you should keep that from me! How could I help but lose trust?"

  "I do not know how to ask your forgiveness," the earl said, feeling desperately for the right words in

  what was probably the most major crisis he had yet faced. "The only occasion on which I thought of

  that interlude was in the Inn of the Rooster when you were telling me of your escape from Languedoc.

  It seemed inappropriate at that time to mention it, and afterwards ..." He paused. "You have kept me so busy, my love, that I have not thought of it. It was an unpardonable thoughtlessness, and I know not

  how to make amends."

  Danielle felt as if Atlas's burden had been lifted from her shoulders. He should have thought to tell her, but he had not deliberately deceived her. If she had confronted him, instead of losing all faith in a man whom she should have known would never knowingly have given her cause to do so, the issue would have been dealt with long ago. It was all the fault of this damnable society where living a lie was quite natural. Until she had become a part of that society it would not have occurred to her not to face her husband with the rumors.

  "It is over," she said quietly. "I have been foolish and you have been thoughtless. We are even,

  n'est-ce pas?"

  Justin felt a surge of relief as he reached for her and she came willingly into his arms, her body soft and trusting. "We will begin anew, my love. Only truth between us from now on—however unpalatable."

  "Only truth," she concurred, meeting his gaze.

  "Your word, Danny."

  "Word of a Varennes."

  "Then I am satisfied. Let us take horse, Madam wife, and begin our enterprise."

  Chapter 16

  "What think you of the little de St. Varennes, Madame Verigny?" Marie Antoinette passed a desultory needle through the tapestry of her embroidery frame as she posed the question to one of her ladies.

  Madame Verigny looked across the queen's crowded salon in the Tuileries Palace to where Danielle sat on a low chair apparently engaged in animated conversation with a clearly admiring group of courtiers. "Elle est tresjeune et tres belle." Madame's laugh was brittle. "And not unaware of her charms, I think. Her husband should have a care—when midsummer weds with spring there is always danger."

  "Tu as raison" Marie Antoinette agreed. "But I think that is a marriage made in heaven. They have eyes only for each other. La petite is a coquette, bien sur, but do you notice the way her eyes light up when

  the earl is near? It is almost indecorous." She laughed, a rare sound these days. "I find her a refreshing addition to our exile and we are in sore need of some warmth and sunlight in this gloomy place."

  Madame Verigny agreed. The Tuileries was a damp dank contrast to the glittering airiness of the many-windowed Versailles. The perimeter walls were high, the gardens overgrown with trees, and the steep scarp of the Seine prevented any approach from the south. The Swiss Guard were in constant attendance, an ever-present reminder of the royal family's need for protection, although since the mob attack on Versailles last October there had been little overt hostility. But the court remained immured inside the walls of the Louvre and the Tuileries and avoided exposure to the world of the city. As a result, their only amusements were gossip and backbiting, and an addition to the coterie was indeed welcome.

  Danielle, after four days, was heartily sick of the place. It stank of unwashed bodies and chamber pots hidden behind tapestry screens. Both men and women spent an inordinate amount of time scratching as the lice dropped from their elaborate coiffures to feast greedily on the tender flesh of backs and bosoms. Danielle, perforce, wore her hair lightly powdered because to appear otherwise would be seen as a gross insult to the queen, but she scrubbed herself in cold water both night and morning and spent the larger part of every night in pursuit of bed bugs who had a more than comfortable home in the feather mattress and appeared to find Danielle's blood considerably sweeter than they found Justin's. Justin, in desperation after the first night, had scoured the apothecaries for a lotion that faithfully promised to repel all boarders and had bought coarse linen sheets to lay on the mattress as an added barrier. But his wife still leaped from the bed with a stream of profanities at least half a dozen times a night to hold a candle above the mattress in fruitless search of the beasties who vanished into the feathers the minute there was light.

  She was waiting now for Justin's return from the Assembly which, since the removal from Versailles, had its home on the north side of the Tuileries Gardens in what had once been a riding school built for the young Louis XV. The building was close to both the Tuileries and the Palais Royal where, in the former, the royalists debated with a passion equal to that of their rival faction in the latter. Covered passages now ran between the clubs and hotels of the Place Vendome, where administrative offices were set up, and members of the Assembly could travel easily between the new parliament house and their offices, regardless of the weather.

  Justin had promised to escort Danielle to the Assembly in the late afternoon, once she had performed her duty asguest of the queen's court and could slip away without undue remark. Faithful to his promise he strode into the salon at around four o'clock, making his obeisance to Marie Antoinette before

  acknowledging his wife.

  "I was just saying to Madame Verigny how pleasant it is to have company from the outside, my lord." The queen smiled at the tall, sober-suited figure. "But you are no courtier, sir. You are rarely with us." She tapped his wrist with her ivory fan.

  "I beg pardon, Madame, if I appear neglectful," Linton murmured. "Danielle and I are most grateful for your hospitality, but there are matters of her estate that I must settle."

  "It was most fortuitous that she was in England at the time of the jacquerie." Toinette said with a shudder. "Such a terrible story. The poor child must have been devastated."

  "She was," Linton concurred truthfully. "But I feel sure that your kindness in receiving her has done much to restore her spirits."

  "She does not appear to lack for spirit," Madame Verigny said tartly, and found herself on the receiving end of a frigid stare. Color crept into her cheeks and she returned to her embroidery as my lord made a deep leg to Her Majesty and went to his wife.

  "That was unwise of you," the queen said to her companion. "I do not think My Lord Linton takes kindly to criticism of his wife, implied or otherwise, and indeed I do not myself think she has deserved it." Crushed, Madame Verigny made no response.

  Danielle greeted her husband with impeccable lack of enthusiasm before excusing herself from the attentive group. "Dear God, but I am like to die of boredom, Justin," she declared as soon as they reached the corridor. "Maman always said Louis's court was a dead bore but I did not realize how much truth she spoke. You must allow me some freedom soon or I shall do something dreadful, I feel certain."

  "Tomorrow," he soothed, "you shall don the gown of the burgher's wife and visit the shops, with Molly

  in attendance."

  "But poor Molly has the most dreadful mal d'estomac. She insists it is the food and I daresay, if you are unused, it might have an adverse effect, but I think it was perhaps unkind in me to have brought her. Do you think so?" She looked up at him anxio
usly.

  "I think, my love, that Molly will regale her children and her grandchildren with this tale of adventure

  and there will be no mention of her discomforts," Justin reassured with confidence.

  "Well, I hope that you are right. Perhaps she is feeling more the thing already. I will visit her before we leave."

  Danielle found Molly in the slip of a room adjoining the chamber occupied by the earl and his countess. She was still wan-faced and laid upon her bed, but the worst purging was now over. She managed a

  small smile as Danielle bathed her forehead with lavender water and matter-of-factly emptied the

  chamber pot out of the window. "I will procure you some bouillon when I return," Danielle promised, quite unsure how she was to manage such a thing in this rabbit warren of corridors peopled by faceless individuals, but she was determined nevertheless and Justin would help her.

  "Tomorrow, we shall take the air if you feel able to leave your bed. I feel sure it will do you the world