The Heroic Baron

by Nikki Poppen

  She knew it was a foolish hope. How would Alain know she was coming to London unless he saw one of the ads? Even if he knew, there was no guarantee he’d want to see the concert. Many things could change in three years. She certainly had changed. She was no longer the fresh-faced country girl struggling to survive in a city. Perhaps Alain had married. He was a baron after all. He’d need an heir, and she’d done nothing to assure him that she was well. He had no reason to expect that she was even alive and perhaps every reason to expect that she was dead. What other reason would seem plausible to him?

  Her futile perusal of the crowd revealed nothing. Cecile swept another elegant curtsy and exited the stage. She had only enough time to touch up her coiffure and make up before her dressing room door was besieged with well-wishers, all of them male and all of them hoping to entertain the lovely French violinist with a late supper. The guards placed at her door brought in countless bouquets. Cecile consoled herself with the knowledge that at least the poor flower girls standing outside the Royal Opera House were doing a swift business tonight from the looks of the bouquets populating her small chamber. She would go through the cards tomorrow.

  The women would send their messages tomorrow, invitations asking her to perform at a private musicale or give a private concert at someone’s mansion in town. Her experiences elsewhere in Europe had revealed that she could make more money giving private concerts than she could at large public performances. But the public performance was necessary to draw the needed attention and lay the bait. Everyone would want to hear more, want to claim they had been the first to “discover” the talented woman from Paris. She had money now for dresses, nice hotel rooms and dinners, for traveling expenses, and a highly competent secretary who handled all her business. She had the money now that she and Etienne had craved in Paris.

  She told herself she wanted to see Alain if for no other reason than to make contact with Etienne, whom she’d missed desperately since that first evening apart. Certainly, she didn’t want to see Alain because she still expected him to marry her. But part of her heart wasn’t so easily convinced.

  The secretary, an efficient thin woman of unusual height, Mrs. Brown, slipped through the door and slammed it shut with her hip, her arms full of addi tional flowers. “There is a mob of young bucks outside tonight. You outdid yourself, Madame” Mrs. Brown was English, which made her indispensable to Cecile. Cecile had learned quickly that the English prided themselves on titles. Mrs. Brown insisted on calling her madame although Cecile had insisted it was not necessary or appropriate.

  “One gentleman has been quite insistent,” Mrs. Brown continued in a tone suggesting the gentleman had quite tried her patience. “He sent you this.” She nodded to the small letter resting on top of the bouquets. “I noticed the note bears his seal. This is a titled gentleman.” One of the first lessons Mrs. Brown had taught Cecile was the importance of rank, not only of oneself, but of others as well. Many of the men who flocked to her door were young gentlemen hoping to impress her with their father’s titles. Few of them had anything more to offer. Those men did not appeal to Cecile in the least. They were simply carousers, interested in sowing wild oats and living on their fathers largesse until they came into their inheritances.

  “What is his title?” Cecile asked, her curiosity only moderately pricked. She was interested in one man alone.

  Mrs. Brown sighed, somewhat deflated. “He’s a baron” Her sigh indicated she thought barons were noble by the skin of their teeth since they were on the bottom of the noble pecking order. But the word baron put Cecile on full alert.

  “The baron of what? Does it say his name?” She asked, careful not to let her thoughts run too far afield.

  “It looks like Wickham. Yes, it’s Baron Wickham.”

  “Alain,” Cecile breathed his name in a heady whis per. She sat down hard on the little stool before her vanity. Alain was here. He had come, and he’d come looking for her. “Mrs. Brown, give me his letter and wait for a reply.” Cecile extended her hand and took the heavy paper. She broke the red wax wafer and read, her heart pounding.

  “Mrs. Brown, tell him I will have dinner with him. Ask him to wait at the theater entrance and then send the dresser to come help me change,” Cecile instructed. She had become very good in the past years at issuing orders and taking charge.

  With the dresser’s help, Cecile readied herself in record time. She changed out of the stunning red performing gown into something more suitable for dinner with a baron. She selected a gown of midnight blue with a satin bodice banded in a wide satin ribbon under her breasts of the same color, falling into a slightly fuller muslin skirt and delicate chiffon overslip. Thanks to her time with General Motrineau, she’d discovered that dressing in gowns made of a single color enhanced her stature. Dressing simply and not giving into furbelows and excessive trimmings gave her an aura of maturity, which her image definitely needed.

  Cecile fastened a small strand of Scottish pearls around her neck. They weren’t as dazzling as the excellent paste jewels she wore for performances, but they looked elegant and tastefully subdued with the dark dress. She combed out her hair and refashioned it into a smooth chignon at the nape of her neck and snatched up a lightweight spring pelisse of silver-gray cashmere. A quick dab of rosewater behind her ears and at her throat completed her toilette.

  A look in the mirror before exiting told her she’d accomplished her goal. She wanted Alain to see the woman she’d become, a self-sufficient woman who could take care of herself. He need not be bound to her out of past obligations. He need only to come to her honestly out of the dictates of his heart.

  Cecile found Alain waiting outside, leaning his long form against one of the opera house’s colonnades. She took a moment to study him from her vantage point. She could not see his face, but his shoulders were as broad as she remembered them, beneath the black opera cloak he wore. He carried a silk top hat and walking stick in one hand, his honey-gold hair glowing like a halo in contrast to the darkness of his attire in the spring evening. Her heart began to race at the prospect of her dream so close to fulfillment.

  In her daydreams she had long played out the scene in which she and Alain found each other again. She would be the grand lady, finely dressed, self assured, poised with the manners of the highborn-a woman Alain would be pleased to call his wife, a woman worthy of the title “Lady.” All those fantasies spun in the dark loneliness of the years without him were worthless now. She stood rooted on the theater steps, unable to progress or even to find her voice, so moving was the sight of him. Like water to the thirsting, rope to the drowning, fire to the freezing, the sight of him was all that and more.

  Cecile found her voice and claimed her dream in a single, soft spoken word. “Alain”

  He turned at the summons and Cecile drank in the sight of his face, so familiar and yet slightly altered from the face that populated her dreams on a regular basis. This face was tanned from hours spent working beneath the sun, but the mossy eyes were still as she recalled. He was dressed impeccably, overwhelmingly breathtaking, as golden, as godlike as she’d ever thought him. Her imagination had not failed her these long years and at the sight of him, she regretted not a single moment of her sacrifice.

  “Cecile!”

  Her heart skipped at the sound of her name on his lips and all thought of playing the grand lady fled. She cared nothing for decorum, but only to be in his arms again. He was pushing his way up the steps towards her, heedless of the stares his charge drew from the last of the post-theater crowd still mingling on the steps. She could not wait for him to reach her. Cecile lifted the hem of her satin gown and rushed to meet him.

  His arms were about her enfolding her in their strength. Cecile breathed the scent of him and turned her face to his. In that moment his lips found hers in a soulbinding kiss, and she knew she was home. His body was all heat and hardness as he pressed her to him, his joy, his happiness complete. Unbidden, the words he’d spoken to her beneath the tre
e during General Motrineau’s al fresco party came to mind. `When I woo you, you shall know it.’ And she did. The man for whom she’d defied an army had waited for her. She had lived for this moment and it had come. As long as she lived, there would not be a moment to rival this one. Her face was wet with her joy when they drew apart, Alain keeping her hands in his as if he could not bear to be separated from her again even if only by inches.

  “Cecile, you’re a vision. Let me look at you!” Alain spread her arms wide and stepped back, taking in the whole of her. His eyes reflected the truth she’d seen in the mirror.

  “Thank you. You look well yourself,” she said rather stiffly, still at a loss for words.

  “You’re speaking English!” Alain exclaimed in wonder. “When did you learn?”

  “I took lessons in Paris. It seemed imperative to learn English after..” Her voice broke off. She had not meant to discuss the past standing in Covent Garden. Yet, there was so much between them that needed saying, why she hadn’t come to him until now. The questions he must have!

  Alain understood, a smile of joy wreathing his face. “Say no more. We have so much to discuss. I doubt one night will be enough, but we have time now. Come and dine with me. I’ve taken a private room at Rules for us”

  “Yes” Cecile breathed, her eyes unable to leave his. This was a fairy tale and daydream combined. She was with Alain again, and he was escorting her to dinner in London. It was so far removed from anything she’d dared to dream.

  Alain tucked her hand in the crook of his arm. “I have taken a table at Rules for us. It’s not far, just across the piazza at Southampton and Maiden Lane. We can walk, if you like.”

  Cecile found her voice enough to muster a little of the old teasing. “Were you that sure I’d accept your invitation when you sent your card?”

  “If you did accept, I could hardly be caught without having made any preparations. I thought it better to think ahead and risk looking the fool to the proprietor instead of looking the fool with you” Alain admitted honestly.

  “You could never look the fool to me, Alain.” Cecile said softly, squeezing his arm. “I’d be just as happy with a bottle of wine, cheese in the park, and a loaf of crusty bread.”

  Alain smiled down at her, “I know. We’ll have time for that too. We’ll have all the time you will allow me, Cecile.”

  Rules was indeed close by and their walk was only a matter of a few minutes. Inside, the maitre d’ led them straight away to a private room which could have seated six, expressing the whole while how honored they were that a baron and such a renowned violinist would patronize the establishment.

  “I hope you don’t mind the privacy,” Alain said after the gushing maitre d’ had left. “I selfishly want you to myself” He broke off suddenly. “My God, Cecile. I can’t believe you’re here. That we’re here, having dinner together. You’re alive!” He reached for her hands across the table and stroked their backs with the pads of his thumbs.

  “Alain, you’ll make me cry.” Cecile scolded while the proof of her scold welled in her eyes.

  “I know. I feel it too. Tonight is a miracle. Somehow it is hard to concentrate on the ordinary.” He smiled and winked. “Nonetheless, I do hear their roebuck venison is excellent.”

  Cecile laughed, appreciating his efforts at small talk. Such banter would give them time to settle their ram pant emotions. She matched his attempt at normal conversation. “Tell me about Rules, Alain. Do you come here often?”

  “I haven’t been to London much in recent years,” Alain shrugged, “Its amusements haven’t been all that diverting for me, at least not until tonight.” He caressed her hands, lost for a moment. Then he brightened. “But Rules has been in business for eighteen years. It’s become a regular spot for theatergoers. I imagine most of the guests tonight were also at your concert, another reason I didn’t want to take a public table. I thought you might not like the attention.”

  Cecile found the small talk flowing between them consoling. It was a wondrous thing to talk with Alain as if it were an everyday occurrence. It was no small triumph to her that she could do so in English. But conversing about roebuck and oysters was far from what she really wanted to ask and no doubt far from the things weighing on Alain’s mind.

  At last, the entrees arrived and the servers left them alone to dine. For the first time that evening, they had both the privacy and the time they needed for their long awaited discussion.

  “How did you learn English?” Alain broached the subject, picking up the reference she’d made in the piazza.

  Cecile took a sip of the rich red wine, buying time to organize her thoughts. Where to start? How to start? “I studied violin-making and playing under Nicholas Lupot. Do you remember him? I mentioned him to you before. He has a small but lucrative business in Paris. When I showed talent for the craft and for performing, Monsieur Lupot kindly hired a tutor for me. When I proved proficient in that as well, we hit on the idea of me touring. He has no interest himself in travel, but he is interested in profit and it is good for the rest of the world to see the greatness of France” Cecile paused and took another bite of the venison.

  “He found my secretary, Mrs. Brown as well. She used to be a lady’s companion. She taught me all types of things about going on in society: how to dress, how to comport myself as a lady,” she waved a fork with a teasing smile, “how to eat in high society. I think she has been a success”

  Alain nodded, his eyes glowing like emerald coals. “There is a mantle of sophistication about you now.”

  Cecile challenged his frankness. “Do you find it to your liking?” She reached for her wineglass, her gaze holding his over the rim of the crystal goblet.

  “I would have liked you as much without it,” Alain responded.

  Cecile lowered her eyes at the compliment. “I’ll always be that girl, Alain.” She said quietly. “Etiquette and satins are nothing more than window dressing.”

  “Yes, and thank goodness for that. I will always love the girl I met in Paris who was poor but wouldn’t take money to inform on her neighbors.”

  Alain reached for the decanter of wine to refill her goblet.

  Cecile waved him off. “No, one glass is all I want”

  “Very well,” Alain replaced the decanter on the table. Silence stretched between them. Alain cleared his throat, his voice low and quiet when he spoke again. “Cecile, may I ask what happened that night in Le Havre?”

  It was a difficult question, but Cecile knew there would be one more question tonight that would be even more difficult to answer. “I was arrested in Le Havre” It would be easier to tell the tale without looking at Alain, but she knew she had to see every reaction on his face.

  “To my credit, I led them a merry chase, as the English would say. I kept them hunting me long enough for you to get underway and to safety, which was my goal, my only goal. I couldn’t bear the thought of everyone suffering when I could prevent it. Of all of us, I had the best chance of surviving such an arrest. I had men who admired me, for whatever reason, in high places. Even in the group of soldiers on the wharf, there was one who had courted me in hopes of favors”

  Alain’s emerald eyes flared. His hand played idly with the stem of his goblet. “I wouldn’t have had you buy my freedom with your body” A grim edge tinted his voice.

  “Then you’d have been a fool. A dead fool, and the rest of us dead with you” Cecile said bluntly. “Before I tell you what happened, let me tell you what I have learned since we parted. My family’s motto was la verite ou rien do you know it?

  “The truth or nothing,” Alain translated.

  “I learned the night I lied for you at the general’s that truth has its place but its place is not absolute, not when it means death for good people. My father never learned that and it got him an early grave. I learned I had power of my own if I would just seize it. Until Le Havre, I had lived my life as a victim. I didn’t realize it at the time, but I’d spent the years since my paren
ts’ deaths believing I could not change the world. It didn’t matter if Napoleon was in power or if a king sat on a throne. I realize now that I just had to change myself. I can’t change the world, but I can mold myself to better face its challenges and in some small way, I might change the world a little. You helped me see that, and Le Havre proved it.

  “Yes, I spent unpleasant months under house arrest at General Motrineau’s, not knowing my sentence. I thought I was awaiting a trial, but in the end, word got to General Motrineau and I was freed without a trial or a sentence or any stigma on my name. I was free to go”

  “Why did you not come to me?” Alain cried.

  “Shh, Alain, mon cheri.” Cecile shook her head, sensing the hurt he must feel. She had been alive and he’d been mourning her all the while. “Let me explain. I knew I had been pardoned without blemish in part because of the general’s influence but also in part because there were people who still hoped to catch L’Un. They still believed I knew who he was and where he was. If I were free, I could lead them to him.” She seized Alain’s hands. “Mon cheri, if I had come to you, they would have hunted you down and I would have forfeited your life all for the vanity of my love. I had no money so I went to Nicholas Lupot and he took me on as an apprentice of sorts. It occupied my time and threw the circle of private citizens who wanted to see you dead off your trail.” Cecile paused to let the import of her words settle as waiters entered with raspberry trifle syllabub with raspberry coulis and black currant almond tarte topped with almond liqueur.

  When they left, Cecile took a bite of the fluffy dessert. “Now, tell me all about Etienne. Is my brother well?”

  Talk of Etienne took the remainder of dessert and after dinner drinks. Cecile’s heart soared with Alain’s news of Etienne’s success and education. Her brother was thriving and happy. It was all she could wish for him.

  When the last of the dishes had been removed, they rose and gathered their things. Alain swung his opera cloak proficiently around his shoulders, and then proceeded to drape Cecile’s pelisse about her. His hands brushed the bare skin of her shoulder and she trembled at the intimate contact. A moment later, his lips pressed against the sensitive pulse at her neck, his hands still firm on her shoulders where the pelisse rested. She arched against him until her head rested on his shoulder. What heaven it was to give into such temptation.