by Arnette Lamb
Threading his fingers through hers, he tucked her arm against his waist. “Tell me about Vicktor Lucerne.”
“What brings the great composer to your mind? Are you a patron of music?”
“ ’Twas something the Throckmorton girl said after you left. According to her, you’re the reason Lucerne will not perform in England.”
At the thought of her former charge, Agnes laughed. “Vicktor performs where he will and when he will. Even at the age of two and ten, he is a true genius of music.”
“You’ll get no argument from me on that count. How did you meet him?”
“You have something on your nose.” She touched him there and frowned. “Must be a bruise from putting it where it doesn’t belong.”
“Clever. Now tell me how you came to travel as Vicktor Lucerne’s bodyguard.”
Some people referred to Agnes in that fashion; others styled her a companion. “After a near-successful kidnapping of their son, the Lucernes contacted me. For almost a year I traveled with Vicktor.”
Edward stopped before a thriving rosebush and picked a bloom. Taking a whiff, he closed his eyes. “Were you ever injured in defense of him?”
“Aye. I tore a nail off my thumb. It bled profusely.”
With a flourish, he presented the flower to her. “The truth, please.”
She’d been bedridden and in agony for two days, but an understatement seemed best. “I suffered a bruise.”
His gaze slid over her in a proprietary way. “Where were you bruised?”
“My ribs.”
“Were they cracked or broken?”
To conceal her discomfiture, Agnes laughed. “A stranger would think we were discussing china plates.”
He did not laugh. “ ’Twas no accident, was it?”
The mating calls of insects buzzed in her ears. “Nay.”
“Were you attacked?”
“Yes. By two ruffians and a club.”
“Your foreign fighting skills prevailed?”
The event was in the past; she could jest about it now. “After a taste of that club, aye.”
“Where was Lucerne?”
“Where any lad in the circumstances should have been—crouching in fear behind a rain barrel outside the Burgtheatre in Vienna.”
“The ruffians left you alone after that?”
“Not exactly. Their employer was persistent.”
“Oh? Who was he?”
“A wealthy Turkish prince. He invited Lucerne to Constantinople. Vicktor declined. The Turk took offense and used force.”
“Only once?”
“Yes. I advised His Highness to be more creative in his inducements to a lad of two and ten.”
“Was he?”
“Very much so. He lured young Vicktor with the promise of his very own caravan.”
“A much more enticing bribe to a lad. What happened then?”
“I learned to ride a camel and wear a veil.”
He slid an arm around her. “What a wonderful adventure.”
She had the advantage of limited time, for they’d be going in to dinner soon, but in her heart, she didn’t want to move away from him. “ ’Twas actually, and I’m pleased that you asked.”
“There is much more that I would know about you.”
But rather than ask another question, he turned her to face him. Moonlight bathed his features in a soft glow. Just as he bent to kiss her, the door opened and the butler announced dinner.
Agnes almost wilted in relief.
Edward cursed but said, “The night is young, Agnes MacKenzie, and good food makes me more determined to get what I want.”
As it happened, the meal was an inventive collection of veal florry, ham with chestnut sauce, and an assortment of soused fish roes. Seated between Edward and the mayor, Agnes declined a glass of red wine, fearing that she might stain her dress.
Silver clanged against crystal, and the parson, who was seated on the other side of Edward, rose. When last Agnes had seen the man, she’d been scandalously cradled in the earl’s arms. The mayor’s wife and Commodore Hume had been there, too.
In his overlong blessing, the cleric made reference to friends and loyalty and staying true both to one’s faith and to the messenger who delivered it. Agnes thought the topics unusual until the cleric sat down and brought up the subject of Edward’s visit to Saint Vincent’s Church.
Edward put down his fork and addressed the cleric. “With all due respect, John, this is hardly the place for such a discussion.”
The ensuing conversation so angered Agnes that she excused herself before the dessert was served. Edward caught up with her in the music room, where she’d taken a chair in the back row.
11
AGNES STARED AT THE SILVER buckles on his shoes. “You did nothing to change the cleric’s mind, you wretched Lowlander.”
Edward sat in the chair beside her. “Change it from what?”
“Wipe that innocent grin off your face,” she spat. “You could have contrived a reason for our presence at another church. But did you? Nay. You allowed that cleric to think that we are contemplating marriage.”
“How can that be?” He could have been discussing the arrangement of the chairs, so casual was his tone and manner. “I do not recall ever hearing you say that you like me.”
Now he was being obtuse. “I do like you, but do not ask me why, for at the moment a reason escapes me.”
“Very well. I’ll rely on those occasions when you are the most friendly to me. Truly, though, the cleric’s mistaken assumption does have a beneficial aspect.” Crossing one knee over the other, he picked at the velvet of his breeches. “If he tells Mary Throckmorton, she may become discouraged and treat some other fellow to that game of peekaboo with her breasts.”
The image tickled Agnes. “You did not look away.”
“ ’Twas an interesting observation in some respects. You see, one of her breasts is quite larger than the other.”
“What!”
“A commonplace occurrence, and one that is well documented in anatomy texts.”
To keep from slapping his face, Agnes folded her arms.
“Yours are perfect.”
He thought she was covering herself. She dropped her hands to her lap. “You are outrageous.”
“But to return to your original complaint,” he went on. “Had you not hurried from the table, you would have heard me ask the good cleric to keep his assumptions to himself or risk losing my patronage.”
She’d spoken too quickly. “No one will think we are getting married?”
“Short of your leaping into my arms forthwith? Nay.”
The door opened, and the other guests streamed in. Agnes had taken a seat at the back of the room near the exit on purpose; if the music was boring, as was often the case at these affairs, she could slip out unnoticed. Others among the guests had planned to do the same, for they glared at her as they were forced to take chairs in front of her.
For entertainment, four of the Throckmorton sisters performed using spinet, fife, and mandolin. Poor Penelope must have been sent back to the inn, for she was not among the performers. The quartet began with several selections from Mozart. Next came an unusual rendition of a Vicktor Lucerne sonata. Unfortunately for the music, the women had switched to three-string lutes and a drum. The Butterfly Sonata sounded more like a cricket fest.
Agnes winced at the travesty.
Beside her, Edward nodded to sleep. In repose he looked like the scholar and loving father and younger than his age. She understood completely why Mary Throckmorton had flirted shamelessly with him tonight. Thinking of the many evenings he must have spent at similar affairs, Agnes wondered why he had not married a second time. Finding no plausible answer, she decided he was happy in the bachelor’s life.
She didn’t for a moment believe his doctorly story about unusual female anatomy; he’d said it to provoke her. But if she chose to verify his appalling claim, she could easily find the answers in
the medical texts in his study or in the library. Every day women died in childbirth, and doctors spent time worrying over differences in breast sizes? No. He was having her on.
With that particular embarrassment in mind, she couldn’t resist retaliating. Leaning close, she opened her fan and spoke behind it. “Wrecked ships and forever cabbages.”
He started, then tried to collect himself.
Moving back, she stared at the musicians but watched him out of the corner of her eye. “Were you napping, my lord?”
“Nay.” He yawned but didn’t have the decency to look guilty for it.
“Then what did I say?”
He blinked and looked around the room, as if seeking his bearings.
“You were napping,” she said.
He moved so close, she could feel his breath on her face. “Sleep with me tonight, and you’ll find out for yourself what I truly look like upon awakening.”
He uttered scandal with reckless abandon. She should rap him atop his head with her fan and storm from the room. But her heart was racing with that peculiar excitement only he could inspire. “What were you dreaming about?”
“If I were, which is not to say that I was, but merely for the sake of this discussion. If I were dreaming, ’twould take more than gibberish from you to wake me up. Several enchanting ways come to mind. Shall I tell you—”
“Go back to sleep. At least then you cannot embarrass me without shaming yourself in the doing.”
“Consider this, my philosopher.” His shoulder bumped hers. “I could have pretended to sleep to get you to talk to me, which you’ve not done enough of tonight.”
“Incorrect. After the misconception you perpetrated on the cleric, I spoke to you. I distinctly remember saying that I hoped you grew an ear in the middle of your forehead.”
“Ghastly image that.” He cringed. “I’d as soon sleep through my next wedding night as hear with the flat of my face.”
She tried not to laugh but failed.
“See?” he crowed. “You do like me.”
His immodest reaction reeked of swelled male pride. Eager to put him in his place, she said, “May I offer my felicitations now on your anticipated wedding night?”
“Anticipated being the important word.” His eyes gleamed with wicked light. “Aye, you may, and be sure to mention the part about being fruitful.”
Desire, base and raw. That’s what he wanted from her. “The conjugal aspects of marriage interest you the most.”
“Nay.” Turning, he mapped her face with an intense gaze. “A bright mind behind enchanting brown eyes will catch my interest first.”
Smooth didn’t begin to describe his methods. “I’m sorry I awakened you.”
“Did I mention a mouth and a tongue that fit perfectly with mine?”
Mortified, she glanced at the people around them. To her relief, half of them were either snoozing or fighting off sleep, and the other half were bemoaning the poor entertainment. Agnes thought it best to whisper. “You’re a rogue and much too familiar.”
“Because I find pleasure in telling you that your hands have magic in them?”
“Aye.”
He patted his knee. “We are agreed then. I am familiar with the way your hands feel, and they inspire magic.”
“Your roundabout logic will fail with me. Go back to sleep.”
“You will awaken me if I snore.”
It wasn’t a question. She sighed loudly. “Of course.”
His smile was sinful, wicked. “I knew you would.”
Agnes thought he smelled like linen dried in the summer sun. Why hadn’t she noticed that before? “How can you be sure that I will awaken you again?”
“Your stepmother told me that you are loyal to a fault and considerate of others. I’ve been in your company long enough to agree.” He closed his eyes and squirmed until he found a comfortable position. “Unless you’d like to return to the subject of what I look like upon awakening . . .”
“I’m certain you resemble a troll.”
He grinned but didn’t open his eyes. “You could put it to the test tomorrow morning.”
But the next morning Agnes learned that Edward had left orders that he was not to be disturbed. Upon their arrival home the evening before, he’d gone into his laboratory.
“He’ll come out for meals and to tuck the children in, but little else,” said Mrs. Johnson. “ ’Tis his way when an idea is upon him.”
That was Agnes’s first disappointment of the day.
She filled her pomander and went to the music room. After a fitful night filled with disturbing dreams of Edward, she desperately needed inner harmony. An hour later, she conceded defeat. Soon she must face her growing feelings for him. The coward in her hoped they found the assassin first.
Riddled with worry for both her family and his, Agnes went in search of Hannah. She found her sitting on the carpet in the Elizabethan wing. Chattering a steady stream of gibberish, the girl spoke to her menagerie of carved animals, which she’d herded into groups on the floor. As usual, she avoided books, drawing paper, and writing utensils.
Edward had not exaggerated the girl’s aversion to letters. Agnes thought Hannah believed there was a finite number of letters, and that Christopher possessed them all.
Agnes spent a fruitless morning trying to teach the girl the alphabet. Sarah had the skill of teaching. At the thought of her sister, Agnes felt loneliness settle over her. She glanced at the tapestry covering the alcove. Behind it lay the locked door that led down to Edward’s dungeon laboratory.
Fighting melancholy, she got to her feet and extended a hand to Hannah. “Would you like a slice of c-a-k-e?”
Trancelike at the notion of letters, the girl stared at nothing. “Want Papa.”
Tears choked Agnes, and she pulled Hannah against her, swaying from side to side. “I know, and he misses you, too. But he’s making important things.”
Her sweet face puckered with sweet concern. “ ’S’progress.”
“Yes, it’s very great progress.” Agnes’s father had seldom locked himself away. At five years old, she and her sisters had mounted their ponies and ridden with him into the fields at harvest time. They’d slept in haystacks and sung songs around the fire.
But the MacKenzies of Ross had never been plagued by an assassin.
Agnes’s second disappointment of the day came when she Learned that no messenger had arrived for her from London. What had arrived at Napier House was another bouquet of Lindsay roses.
She plucked at the petals. After that dreadful gossip from Mary Throckmorton, Agnes longed to know what was occurring in her sister Mary’s life. Passion ran high between Mary and Robert Spencer, the earl of Wiltshire. But was passion enough? Mary didn’t think so. Edward believed that physical intimacy constituted a promise, and Mary and Robert had undeniably become intimate. Would Papa see it the same way?
Agnes didn’t know, but instinctively she thought the choice should be Mary’s. Had Papa been forced to wed any of the women who’d conceived Agnes, Mary, and Lottie, he would not have married Juliet White. That would have been a tragedy, for Juliet was the mortar that held the MacKenzies together.
Agnes felt apart from them now. Even in Canton, she had not felt so isolated. The reason for her loneliness frightened her. She was falling in love with Edward Napier, and she couldn’t find the will to prevent it. Her life’s course had been charted years ago on a dockside quay. Family came before romantic entanglements, and Agnes needed her family now.
Word would come soon. Papa wrote to his children on Saturday. Sixty hours later, she’d have the news.
With Auntie Loo and the others to watch Hannah and Christopher, and Edward barricaded in his dungeon, Agnes put the Moroccan dice in her bag and left for her appointments. Her first stop was Saint Nicholas Hospital, where she left half of Lindsay’s flowers and twenty pounds. To deliver the other half of the roses, she traveled by barge for the second time across the river to the orphanage. She
’d visited the home before and hired some of the girls to clean the tower. Today she left a purse of twenty-five pounds and references for the maids.
After an informative meeting with Penelope Throckmorton, Agnes staved off a wave of guilt. She had used the girl, coaxed her into disloyalty, drained her of information, and received a gift in return. Through teary eyes Agnes stared at the small book in her hands. A book of sonnets. A memory of the night before.
Penelope had been sent back to the inn early for the crime of putting a lizard in Mary’s lute. “Made her screech like the monkey she accused me of being,” Penelope had bragged.
In parting, Agnes committed a further act of betrayal against her new young friend; she’d convinced an unsuspecting Penelope to leave the mercantile first. Only the shopkeeper knew of the meeting, and her silence was easily bought for the purchase of a butter-colored apron for Mrs. Johnson and nightcaps for the children.
The carriage rumbled down the unpaved streets. Surrounded by fields and hills, Glasgow was a city of merchants and tradesmen. Only London boasted more wealth and commerce than Glasgow. Every year tons of American tobacco found its way here. Shipbuilding thrived. The textile industry flourished.
The driver shouted. The carriage lurched. Agnes braced herself, but not before she was thrown against the side. Pain shot through her shoulder, and she gritted her teeth to keep from crying out. She should have worn the sling last night, but vanity had defeated good sense. Edward hadn’t protested.
What fiend of man made that dress?
A cocky compliment, and the most original she’d ever received. What was he thinking now? She pictured him poring over drawings, blunting quills, crumbling paper and tossing it into the hearth.
Rancid smells assaulted her nose, and she covered her face with her gloved hands. Shouting people and braying animals announced that the market lay ahead. A tripe shop and a peruke maker shared a storefront. In the next block a plumber and a sign painter stood cheek by jowl.
Trimble kept his office in the top floor of the Anchor and Wheel Tavern, a respectable establishment near the brewer’s guild.
He opened the door, yanked a napkin from around his neck, and waved her in.
