Dangerous Obsession

by Natasha Peters

  When we reached the house late that night I went straight to my room without speaking to anyone. I unpacked my valise, put my money and jewels back in their box, and threw myself face down on my bed. Jules came after a while and offered food or tea, but I didn’t want anything. Hours passed and I lay motionless, like one dead. I thought of my life with Seth Garrett, who didn’t love me, and of the future I would never have with Martin, who did. Why had Seth stopped us? Why didn't he just wash his hands of me, let me go?

  He didn’t come to my room that night. I had breakfast in my room the next morning, and when I went downstairs for lunch he was already seated at his place in the dining room. I didn’t speak. I couldn’t eat. And neither could he.

  At two o’clock that afternoon a man called to see Seth. Jules showed him into the study and when he came back I grabbed his arm.

  “Who is that man, Jules? I have never seen him before.”

  “The Duke de Terné,” Jules said. “I believe he is a cousin of the de Vernay family.”

  My mouth felt dry. “Why do you think he’s here?” I didn’t really have to ask, but I needed to hear the words spoken.

  “I would assume that he has come to offer a challenge to Monsieur Seth, Mademoiselle,” Jules said with imperturbable calm. “But don’t worry, there have been duels before. Monsieur Seth always wins.”

  When the visitor had left I went to Seth. I stood in the doorway of the study. He looked up and I saw pain in his face.

  “He is going to fight you?” I whispered.

  “Damned young fool,” Seth growled.

  “Don’t hurt him,” I begged. “Please, Seth. I’ll stay with you for as long as you’ll have me. I’ll gamble for you and—and do anything for you. Only don’t hurt him! Please!”

  “I’m not a complete villain,” he said. “I don’t slaughter children.”

  François Neval came that evening. He and Seth closeted themselves in the study and I listened, my ear pressed against the door.

  “It’s to be tomorrow morning,” François said. “You’ll meet on the southwest field in the Bois before dawn. I am to supply the weapons. The usual—twenty paces, turn and— dear God, Seth, isn’t there something we can do?” François cried suddenly. “Martin de Vernay is the King’s favorite nephew! If anything should happen to him—! You’ve got to get out of this. Send an apology or something. For the love of God!”

  “Don’t you think I tried?” Seth rumbled. “That damned snot de Terné tried to insinuate that I was a coward. Pistols at dawn. Of all the damned nuisances.” I heard the clink of glass as he poured himself a drink. “Damned Gypsy bitch. She isn’t worth it.”

  “Then send her away!” François said. “Let her go to him if that’s what he wants, if it will put an end to this madness! It’s what she wants, isn’t it?”

  “But it’s not what I want,” Seth snapped. “She belongs to me.”

  “No woman is worth this!” François yelped. “Even if you don’t get killed, you could be exiled from Paris, from France! You know how strict they are about duelling. The King’s nephew!” he said again. “I think you’ve gone mad, Seth. And you know what else I think? I think you’ve fallen in love with the girl! You have, haven’t you? Why didn’t I see it before? You’ve lost your head over that yellow-haired Gypsy!”

  "You’ll lose your head if you don’t shut up and get out of here!” Seth barked. This is none of your damned business, François.”

  “None of my business? I’m your second in this mess! I’m your friend! Well, I’ll see you tomorrow in the Bois. For God’s sake don’t drink so much! You know what drink does to a man’s aim. Someone could get hurt.”

  I slipped away, back to my room. Was it true, what François had said? Was Seth in love with me? He hadn’t admitted it, but he hadn’t denied the charge. Seth, in love with me. It wasn’t possible. I tried to remember the conversation we had had—was it just the night before?— when I suggested to him that his behavior was that of a jealous man afraid of losing the woman he loved. He hadn’t denied that, either. He had grown thoughtful and he had gotten drunk.

  Yes, he loved me. I was sure of it. But why did the knowledge disturb me? Why did it make me want to cry? I had wanted something like this to happen. I had always known that the only way I could hurt him was if he loved me. But now hurting him didn’t seem so important.

  If he were killed, it would end my torment and my imprisonment. It was so crazy! I hated him, didn’t I? And yet nothing in the world could compare with the feel of his arms around me in the darkness. I loved to lie against his deep chest and listen to the soft thunder of his heart. Even with my limited experience of men, I knew that what we shared was unusual, unique. I understood his needs so well, as he understood mine. Our bodies fit so perfectly together. If he died—that pleasure would die with him.

  And what about Martin? Poor, dear Martin, who cared about me. This duel would cause a scandal, whatever the outcome. Martin was strong and determined, but could he withstand the pressures that would mount from all sides when the story came out? Opposition to our marriage would be stronger then ever. Even the King might intervene.

  I couldn’t sleep that night. I stood at the window and looked at the moon. And then all of a sudden I had a vision of death. I saw blood pouring out of the moon, dripping on the earth, falling on the trees and the houses like rain. A man dressed in black would die tomorrow.

  I ran to Seth’s room and burst in without knocking. He was still fully dressed, standing in front of the fireplace with a half-empty glass in his hand.

  “What do you want? Go back to bed.” He drank deeply. I was amazed that a man could drink so much and still be able to stand.

  “I had a dream,” I said breathlessly. “I saw a man die! Please, Seth, you mustn’t fight tomorrow! I felt it, Death, very close! You remember, I had the same feeling, the same premonition when my uncle—and when the Gypsies were dying. Please, Seth—”

  “I’ve already told you that I wouldn’t hurt your precious Martin,” he said. “Go away, Rhawnie. I’m not interested in your dreams. Cheer up, maybe I’ll be the one to die. You’d like that, wouldn’t you.”

  “No.” I whispered. “No, I don’t want you— promise me, Seth.” I grabbed his arm. He was as solid and unyielding as stone. “Promise me, you won’t wear black tomorrow. Please!”

  He gave an incredulous sneer and shook me off roughly. "Still up to your dirty little Gypsy tricks, aren't you?” he said. Then he turned his back on me.

  A frost fell that night, covering the city and the parks with a white haze, turning the leaves of the chestnut and maple trees of gold. I didn’t sleep, and I don’t think Seth did, either. Just before dawn I stood at my window and watched him ride out of the stable yard on Hugo, his roan. I couldn’t bear the waiting. I dressed quickly and went out to the stables. Boucher tried to prevent me from going, but I took Blaze out without a saddle and rode off towards the Bois. I knew the way, I knew exactly where Martin and Seth were meeting. On that same field where Seth and I used to race, and where I had met Martin for the first time after the ball.

  The mist of morning hung low over the frosty plain. I could see a small knot of men standing under the trees near the duelling site. I tethered Blaze to a tree and moved closer, keeping well back and out of sight. I didn’t want to distract them but I had to see, I had to know. Seth was wearing a flowing black cloak over black trousers and a white shirt. The fool, I thought. Why couldn’t he listen?

  And Martin, too, was dressed in black—black coat, black trousers, black waistcoat, and a black stock at his throat. I recognized François and the Duke de Terné. There was another man present, smaller than the rest with a telltale black bag at his feet. The doctor.

  François and the Duke de Terné came together, the two seconds. François spoke earnestly, the Duke nodded, then walked back to Martin. He and Martin spoke briefly and Martin shook his head. He didn’t want to settle the dispute except by killing. Nothing less than Seth’
s death would satisfy him.

  Seth shed his cloak and Martin his coat. Seth hefted the pistol in his hand and pointed it at the trees, right at me. I ducked down, but I was sure he hadn’t seen me. The two men took their places, back to back in the center of the field. I moved closer, so that I was directly in line with them.

  The Duke de Terné began to count loudly. Martin walked towards me and Seth away from me. The pounding of my heart kept pace with their steps. The birds in the trees around me awoke to the dawn and twittered as they foraged for breakfast. On the other side of the forest the city came slowly to life. A train whistle shrieked, wagons rumbled over cobblestones. Shopkeepers came out of their homes, breathed the crisp morning air deeply, and headed for their businesses. Mothers dragged their sleepy children out of their beds and made them ready for school.

  “—Eighteen. Nineteen. Twenty. You may turn and fire at will.”

  Martin spun around and fired immediately. I couldn’t see past him, I couldn’t see if Seth was hit. There was no answering shot.

  “Fire, damn you!” Martin shouted.

  I broke out of the trees and raced towards them. I had to know if Seth was hurt. He was still standing, but even from far away I could see the red stain on his white shirt front. His pistol was raised and pointed at me. He intended to fire at Martin and to miss. But at the last second he saw me. He twitched the pistol aside just as he fired. I was only about three feet behind Martin when the shot came. I heard him give a surprised gasp. Then he staggered and fell.

  I fell on my knees beside him and supported his shoulders. Tears poured down my cheeks. “Martin,” I said. “It’s me, Rhawnie. Oh, Martin!”

  He seemed to recognize me. He smiled and his lips shaped my name. Blood poured from a wound just under his collarbone.

  Rough hands seized me and pulled me away from him. “Stay away from him, you Gypsy whore!” the Duke de Terné hissed. “Stay away or I’ll have you arrested and sent to the guillotine!”

  “Martin!” I whispered in farewell. “Martin.”

  I looked around for Seth. He was limping slowly away from the field, away from me. His pistol lay smoking in the grass, its deadly purpose fulfilled.

  9

  Gypsies in Exile

  MARTIN DIED and we fled to London to escape arrest. Damp weather and chilling cold drove us back to the continent, to Italy. Seth rented a villa in Fiesole, high in the hills near Florence. We stayed only a couple of months before going to Venice for the carnival season and gambling, then we travelled to Rome. That was the spring of 1844. We spent the summer in Switzerland, the autumn in Dalmatia, in a villa on the Adriatic, the winter in Spain and Portugal, and in the spring of 1845 we were back in London again. We had been together nearly two years.

  Very soon the places we visited lost their differentiating characteristics in my mind. Life was one long faro game in a steamy salon, surrounded by shrilly voiced people with painted faces and empty hearts who were looking for love and fortune and would find neither. We stayed in a succession of hotels that blurred into one hotel, one suite of rooms where Seth and I quarelled and made love, where I endured his moods and his coldness. Things had gotten very bad between us since the duel. If he loved me at all, as I once suspected, he never showed it. He resented me and blamed me for our exile from Paris—not that he would have stayed there for long anyway, but he hated being moved by forces not of his own making. As he said, he wanted to deal with life on his own terms, in his own way, in his own time.

  I resented his controls of my life, but not as much as before, when Martin was alive, and not as much as I resented his brooding. I knew that he was exploiting me for gain, but I sensed that he had come to depend on me as much as I had come to depend on him, for human closeness, if not for love. Of course he wouldn’t have admitted that he needed me, not in a hundred years. He liked the money and he liked the sex, certainly. But I am sure that he would have told anyone that he valued me for no other reason.

  London that spring was less dreary than usual, and the gambling was profitable and fun. One night in May I played faro with an American shipbuilder in a gambling hall in Soho. The man wouldn’t quit until he had lost all the money he had with him, which was almost two thousand pounds. It was the largest win of my life. I was delighted, and even Seth managed to drop the sour expression that had become part of his mask since the duel. But no sooner had we cashed in our chips than we heard a woman shriek and a man shout.

  “Police! This is a raid!"

  “The cue for our exit," said Seth, holding my elbow and steering me away from the doors through which the law had entered.

  “I don’t understand," I said. “We have done nothing wrong."

  “We’ve gambled in an unlicensed establishment, darling. Highly illegal."

  I clutched at his arm. “They will put us in prison?" I feared nothing else in the world. The thought of being shut away in a grey cell, behind bars—

  “They might," he said with a careless shrug. “But not if we get out of here before they catch up with us. Ah, I see they’ve got the stairs covered." Indeed, a herd of uniformed men in hard, flat hats had surged into the salon, blocking all exits, shouting that everyone was under arrest. The place was a madhouse. “I saw a door, flush with the wall—” Seth said thoughtfully. Then he led me right to a small door, covered with the same brocade as the walls and almost invisible unless you knew where to look. We ducked through and found ourselves on a flight of narrow wooden stairs that led down. They took us to the small coal cellar under the house.

  “You are a wonderful fox,” I complimented him. “I didn’t see that door.”

  “I’m as slick as any Gypsy,“ he said modestly. “I wonder if there’s a way out of here.”

  The place was pitch dark. The only light we had was Seth’s matches, and they were running low.

  “Last one,“ he said, striking a match. “I can’t see—” I blew it out. Poof.

  “Now why in hell did you—“ he started to protest.

  I slipped my arms around his neck and kissed him tenderly. “Perhaps we will see a glimmer of light from the street,“ I suggested. “There is surely a window.” A long kiss followed. Then a very long kiss.

  “You’re corrupt,” he murmured, kissing me back. “A corrosive influence. I wouldn’t let you teach in my Seminary for Young Ladies.”

  “Then I’ll be your pupil,” I said. “Your only pupil.”

  “Tuition is very steep,” he warned, holding me close and nuzzling my neck.

  “I’ll work it off,” I promised. We spent the next ten minutes at that foolishness.

  Then Seth said, “Let’s get back to the hotel.” We opened our eyes and sure enough, there was a faint glimmer from high up on the wall. We could still hear muffled screams and shouts from the salon. I was glad, because when we scrambled up the coal heap under the window we made a lot of noise. I even had a fit of giggles, and no matter how sternly Seth spoke to me, I couldn’t stop.

  We emerged from the bowels of the building onto a darkened side street. A carriage was passing and the driver saw us and stopped.

  “For hire?”

  “For hire,” Seth affirmed, helping me in. He gave the man the address of our fashionable hotel in Belgravia and we rode off. We said not one word on that ride. We were too busy kissing.

  Only when we stepped into the light of the small lobby did we see that we were both black from coal dust. We looked at each other and laughed until we were weak. Seth ordered baths. We were still laughing as we washed each other and splashed around like a couple of children in a wading pool.

  Seth dried my hair vigorously and I shouted that he was too rough. “Not rough enough,” he growled, wrestling me to the floor. He covered me with his body, but I tickled and fought until he rolled off. I fell on top of him and pinned him down with my weight. My wet hair slapped his cheeks. Then like a wet mermaid, I slithered down between his legs and loved him with my lips and my mouth and throat. He groaned, but not from pa
in, and he writhed with pleasure. All the anger and tension between us was gone. Later we lay together, exhausted but not yet ready to sleep.

  “I think you must be Gypsy,” I decided. “If your mother was a pirate she must have been Gypsy, too.” I rubbed my cheek on his chest. “Everything about you is Gypsy: the dangerous way you like to live, your love of freedom and money. Everything except—” I stopped myself.

  “Except what?” he wondered drowsily.

  “If you were really Gypsy you would be married now,” I said. “And you would have lots of children. Why else does a man live, if not for that?”

  “He lives for pleasure,” Seth told me. “And to provide for his mistress, who is very demanding and expensive. I can’t afford to marry.”

  “There is an obvious solution,” I told him. “Marry your mistress.”

  He gave a derisive snort. “I haven’t been keeping you busy enough, Rhawnie,” he remarked. “You have too much time to think.”

  I awoke before dawn. Seth’s place beside me was empty. When I went into the sitting room that adjoined the bedroom I found him slumped in a chair near a window. There was a half-empty glass of scotch in his hand. He looked like he hadn’t slept.

  He didn’t look up when I approached him. I shivered a little in the cold room and pulled my peignoir tighter around me. It was blue, the same color as the Grecian-style nightgown I wore underneath.

  “I want to talk to you, Seth.” He didn’t move, so I pulled up a short stool and sat at his right hand. “I was sick this morning. Yesterday, too. You remember, I almost fainted the other night at the theater. I think I’m going to have a baby.”

  He raised his head. His eyes were dull, almost grey, like the early morning sky. They bored through my garments, scanning my still-slim figure.

  “You’re sure?” he asked.