by Leda Swann
His quiet whisper broke in on her thoughts. “Look at me, Mademoiselle Ruthgard.”
Unwillingly, she slowly raised her head and looked directly at him. He wore his uniform with style and ease – indeed, it looked as though it had been designed to show off every best feature he possessed. His shoulders were broad in his jacket, with the lace of his sleeves falling elegantly over his wrists.
His hair was as black as the ace of spades, curling in long ringlets to his shoulders. His complexion was as dark as hers was fair – a bronzed color that looked as though he spent more hours outside on his horse than inside a lady’s perfumed boudoir – but his skin looked as smooth and soft as her own for all that.
His eyes were a deep, dark brown, flecked with green and fringed with long dark eyelashes. She looked into them – and she was lost. His gaze held hers with such force and power that she could not look away. “You will dance with me tonight.”
It was a command, not a question. She could not refuse him anything he demanded of her. She nodded, her throat too dry for words.
“I will allow Monsieur Charent one of your dances if you insist upon it – but only because he is my friend. The rest are mine.”
He was intoxicating, enchanting, as if had had put her under a spell that left her utterly susceptible to his power. The newness of him entranced her. He was so unlike every other man she had ever known. She trembled under the force of his magic, but it was not yet strong enough to make her abandon her dear papa when she had promised to dance with him first. She didn’t know where she found the courage to say him nay even in a small way. “You cannot have them all. I have promised to open the ball with my father.”
His teeth gleamed white in a broad smile. “One dance for your father, then, and one for my friend. That gives me the rest of the night to start to get to know you as well as I want to.”
There were goose bumps scattered here and there on her arms as he let finally let go her hand to stride off and mingle with the crowd – part of it and yet standing above it. She gave an involuntary shudder as she watched him go.
She did not understand what was happening to her. She was no green girl to be bowled over by the first man to pay her a few cheap compliments. She was eighteen already. Many girls her age were already wed and had a babe or two at the breast by now.
She had been pursued by many a man before, all of them liberally bestowing fine words upon her to disguise the fact that they had nothing of real value to offer her. She had no lack of suitors for her hand. Her father had already refused a dozen offers at the very least – her generous dowry meant that she attracted fortune hunters like flies. “Fine words buttered no parsnips,” her father would say as he sent them packing. He wanted more of his future son-in-law than the ability to make pretty speeches and steal the odd kiss in a dark corner.
She had been glad to see them go. She cared not a fig for any of them – but Monsieur de Tournay was not like the others, who had all smelled more or less of a combination of cheap cognac and desperation. His eyes had pierced through to her very soul. The touch of his hand had made her shiver up and down her spine. Up until the moment she caught a glimpse of the strangers from Paris, she had been enjoying playing the hostess and welcoming her guests to her father’s house, but now she wanted only to escape from the demands upon her. Her evening suddenly sparkled as vividly as the diamond she wore on her breast. She wanted to be free to dance. She wanted to be free to dance with Monsieur de Tournay.
She shuffled her feet as she greeted the next guests, scarcely even registering who they were. She went through the motions politely, but her mind was a thousand miles away, on the other side of the room where Monsieur de Tournay was doffing his hat and bowing to a pretty, dark-haired girl in a green dress. How she envied the girl his smiles and words. She wanted them all to herself.
Her father gave an indulgent smile at her restless abstraction. “Off you go and tell the musicians to strike up for the first dance. It’s high time I got to dance with the most beautiful girl in the room.”
Her heart racing with anticipation, she glided through the room to carry the message to the musicians.
Monsieur de Tournay could never spout mere empty flattery. He looked and felt too sincere to waste time in idle chatter that meant nothing to him. She knew to the depths of her soul that he would claim her as his partner for the evening.
The musicians struck the first few notes of a stately gavotte, and the couples lined up ready to begin. Courtney glanced all about her at the other dancers, but Monsieur de Tournay was not amongst them. She was glad of it. Though she danced this dance with her father, she was waiting for him – and only him. She did not want him to dance with anyone other than her, but she could not possibly be so rude as to ignore her other guests.
She made her curtsey to her father and began the slow steps of the gavotte. The thought of dancing next with her handsome Parisian made her steps light and lively and her spirit sing with excitement. She flew through the intricate steps of the dance as if she had wings on her heels.
The dancers had barely come to a breathless halt when Justin Legros ambled over to her side to claim her hand for the next dance. On any other night, she would have been glad to see him. He was quite the handsomest man of her acquaintance and she liked him as well as if he had been her brother. She had even thought half-heartedly of marrying him – if he would ever make up his mind to propose to her. Their marriage would please her father and the elder Monsieur Legros very well.
Tonight, however, she could scarcely restrain her irritation at his casual attentions. She did not want to dance with him. Let him pluck up his courage to ask another woman tonight. Where was Monsieur de Tournay when she wanted him?
Her eyes searched everywhere for the dark-eyed Frenchman, but with no success. She stifled her exasperation as well as she could. Justin was not to blame that her pleasure would have to be postponed for another set. She was about to put her hand on Justin’s arm to accept his offer when a voice came over her shoulder. “The lady is promised to me for this dance.”
She felt her heart give a skip of excitement at the sound of the longed-for voice. She should not have lost her faith so easily. He had rescued her just in time.
Justin dropped the arm he was offering her to turn around and glare at the newcomer. “Mademoiselle Ruthgard cannot dance with you. She has a prior engagement.”
Courtney gave an exasperated sigh. “Oh, Justin,” she hissed in a low whisper. “I know very well that you only asked me to dance because your father and mine expects it of you. Go on, be off with you.”
Justin looked at her, his forehead creased in surprise as if seeing her for the first time. “What nonsense is this? I don’t give a damn what my father expects. I asked you to dance because I like you.”
“You can dance with me another time.” She turned around and put her hand on Monsieur de Tournay’s arm. “Go and clean up at the card tables instead.”
“If you insist.” Justin shrugged without malice and ambled away in the direction of the card tables.
Monsieur de Tournay’s dark eyes were dancing with amusement at their furtive exchange. “That poor young man you dismissed so cruelly is your betrothed?” he asked, as they made their way over the floor to join the other dancers.
Courtney shook her head emphatically. She would not have Monsieur de Tournay think she treated her accepted lover in such an offhand fashion. “Not at all. I am not engaged to anyone.”
“He is in love with you, then, and would like to be your betrothed?”
She giggled. She could not imagine Justin in the throes of a deep passion for any woman at all – least of all her. He was too indolent by nature to fall in love. “His father is my father’s best friend. We have known each other for ever. He is more like my brother than anything else.”
“He seemed to have quite a proprietary air about him.”
Proprietary? Maybe just at little, she supposed, though she had never thought abou
t it quite that way before. Justin was simply Justin – no more and no less than that. “No doubt he thought I was in need of his protection. His father would like him to marry me. My father would like him to marry me. He does not want to marry me, but he does look after me as if I were his younger sister.”
“And you? Would you like him to marry you?”
She put her head to one side and thought about it for a moment. “He would make a comfortable enough husband, I suppose, if I had to marry someone. He would not beat me or drink away all our savings. I would marry him if my father insisted upon it, I suppose, but I would not choose him of my own free will.”
“Why not? He is a handsome young man, is he not?”
She looked at him from under her lashes. She could not think why Monsieur de Tournay was interested in Justin. “I have always thought so.”
“And wealthy?”
“His father is the richest merchant in all of Lyons – richer even than my papa. He has the largest emerald trade in all France.”
“And kind?”
“He has always been so to me.”
“Yet you do not want to marry him?”
She shook her head. How little Monsieur de Tournay knew of women if he thought they would be satisfied with nothing more than youth, wealth and kindness in a husband. “He likes me well enough, but he is not in love with me. He has made no effort to woo me or to win my heart. I cannot be content with such a lukewarm affection as he would have for me.”
“You believe in love, then?”
How could she not? She was reminded every day in so many ways how dearly her father had loved her mother. When she was to wed, she would not like to settle for a lesser love than her parents had shared. “Absolutely. Do you not?”
He stopped dead for a moment, breaking the flow of the dance. “I did not use to think so,” he said, looking deeply into her eyes. “Now I am not so sure.”
Courtney hugged his words to her heart as they continued across the floor. She found it almost unbelievable, almost too good to be true, but it seemed she had made an impression on the heart and mind of this sophisticated Frenchman. She could feel the eyes of the other women in the room on her, watching her as she danced with the handsome stranger, envying her that she was his first choice, and hoping that he would ask them to dance, too, before the evening was over. She reveled in being the center of attention. Her birthday party so far was an utter triumph.
The dance was over too soon for her liking. She could have gone on talking to Monsieur de Tournay for hours yet. With some reluctance, she gave him her hand, curtsied to him in farewell and half turned her head to look for her father. She would rejoin her papa until she was asked to dance again. She trusted she would not remain unclaimed for long.
Monsieur de Tournay did not let go off her hand. “Where do you think you are you going in such a hurry, Mademoiselle Ruthgard?”
She liked to hear the sound of her name on his lips. It sounded so intimate. “I was looking to see where papa has gone.”
“Surely you are not tired of dancing already and wish to sit down?”
Tired of dancing after only two dances? She would dance all night into the small hours of the morning if she could. “Not at all.”
“Then do not desert me yet. Do not forget, you have promised all your dances to me tonight.”
She tossed her head with growing self-confidence. He may have ordered her to do so, but she had not agreed. “I have not promised them all to you.”
He bent his head towards her so that his breath tickled the hair on the nape of her neck. “Maybe not. I have claimed them all, which amounts to the same in the end.”
Surely he was only teasing her. “I cannot dance only with you. That would be scandalous.”
His voice was as soft and seductive as that of the devil’s when he tempted Eve with the apple. “Then it is as well you have danced once with your papa. There will be no scandal in being monopolized by me for the rest of the evening.”
Only a stranger to Lyons could possibly think so. There would be scandal enough made that she had danced with him at all – a stranger to most of them there, and a Frenchman to boot. She had already provided enough fodder to keep the entire Belgian community of Lyons buzzing with gossip for days. “It would be very rude of me to ignore all my guests so shamefully when they have come here to celebrate my birthday with me.”
He waved his hand as if that was of no consequence. “I am a soldier and so must be forgiven for any breach of etiquette. Soldiers are well known to have no manners. They have no time for social niceties – they simply take what they want and may the devil take the hindmost.”
She grinned at his blatant attempt to grab what he wanted. Merchants like her father were a bit like that sometimes, too. A soldier could take what he wanted at the point of a sword, but a clever merchant could take what he wanted from you with a smile and a bow, and leave you feeling pleased with your bargain. “I am not a soldier. I must be bound by politeness and custom.”
He cocked his head on one side and looked at her with a twinkle of mischief in his dark eyes. “Have you never wanted to rebel against custom?” he asked. “Have you never wanted to do something so utterly unexpected that people would never look at you the same way again? Have you never wanted to be free to live your life the way you want to live it, without thinking about what other people feel or say about you?”
She wanted to be a successful merchant like her papa and make clever bargains so that he was proud of her – but she did not want to defy custom in any other way. “Not particularly. I suppose I am not the rebellious sort.”
“Every person is the rebellious sort if they care enough about something. Have you never wanted to kick off your shoes and squelch through the mud in your bare toes? Have you never wanted to dance naked in the rain? Have you never wanted to spend the whole evening with a fascinating stranger you have just met instead of being polite to all your friends as you know you ought to be but don’t feel in the mood for?”
She grinned at him. He was trying to bait her into spending the evening with him. “Mud is full of worms and I don’t like having worms between my toes. Besides, good manners and duty to King and country make for a civilized society.”
He was not smiling now - as if she had said something that displeased him. “Passion makes for an honest one.”
She did not see why she should be forced to choose. “You can be honest and polite at the same time.”
“Can you?”
“Of course.”
“But if you had to choose between them, which one would you choose?”
There was only one answer to that question. “I would have to choose honesty.”
A smile spread over his face, making the curled ends of his moustache point towards the ceiling. “Good choice. You have chosen to spend the evening with me, and let your guests go hang.”
She shook her head. He was trying to twist her words around again to make them mean something she never would have said. “I said no such thing.”
“You chose honesty over courtesy. You want to spend the evening with me, do you not, and only courtesy is stopping you?”
She could feel the tips of her ears grow pink and hot. Were her feelings that easy to read, or was he just making a shrewd guess? “You are very sure of yourself.”
“I am a soldier. I take what I want – if I can get it. Tonight I want your company.”
Just then the musicians struck up again. He held out his hand and she accepted it with a tremor in her stomach. He was so forthright in his demands she could not say him nay. “You may have my company for a while longer then, if it pleases you.”
His teeth were a brilliant flash of white under his curled moustache as he led her on to the floor again. “It pleases me greatly.”
Courtney could feel the disapproving eyes of the matrons on her as she stepped out again with the same partner. Madame Legros, she knew well, would be particularly displeased. Even more than her fa
ther and Monsieur Legros, she wanted to see a match made between Courtney and her son.
Poor Justin, she thought to herself with a small sigh. Once she might have considered him, lukewarm as his affection for her was, but now she had hardly a thought to spare for the boy. What was Justin when compared with the dashing Monsieur le Tournay?
She put the thought of Madame Legros’s sour face out of her mind. She would not worry about her now, not when she was being spun about by her soldier.
The second dance seemed even shorter than the first had done. She was surprised to find herself out of breath at the end of it. She must have been dancing with more spirit than usual. Either that, or her dashing partner had taken her breath away.
“You look flushed,” he said in a low voice as he led her away again, her hand on his arm. “May I get you a glass of wine?”
A glass of wine was just what she needed to cool down the heat of her face and moisten her parched throat. “Yes, please.”
He escorted her to a secluded spot by the large doors that lead out to the garden. “Wait for me here. I will be with you again shortly.”
The cool air from the open doors, perfumed with the sweet scent of a warm summer evening, bathed her in its freshness. She breathed deeply, reveling in her momentary distance from the crowd in the great chamber. She needed a few moments to collect herself, to gather herself together again. She could not do it in Monsieur de Tournay’s company. On the contrary - his presence was the disturbing element that she needed to come to terms with. She was intoxicated by him – yet she felt a sense of danger when he was around. She did not know what to do with him. All she knew was that she did not want to lose a moment of his company.
