“Do you have this Frenchman’s name?” St. Lyon asked, interested.
Rawsett, having spied an errant thread hanging from his coat sleeve and having abandoned gossip for sartorial adjustment, looked up with a characteristically blank stare. “Name?”
“Yes,” St. Lyon said patiently. “Of Miss Nash’s lover.”
“Oh. Oh, yes. I do. Rousse. Andre Rousse.”
“It can’t be,” the comte murmured.
Rawsett screwed up his face in earnest concentration before answering. “No. I am certain I have it right because I recall the name rhymed with chartreuse and that had been the color of the waistcoat I was ordering from my tailor when Skelton came in—to order the most heinously ill-considered jacket. I swear, the man has no sense of style whatsoever—and revealed”—he paused—“all.”
Then, with a meow of distaste, he set his index finger alongside his nose. “Man’s a terrible gossip.”
“And Lord Skelton expressly told you that Andre Rousse was Miss Nash’s lover?”
“Not only lover,” Rawsett said with ill-concealed eagerness, “but her protector. He has taken over the payments on her house and makes free use of the front door!”
Could it be? St. Lyon wondered. The name Rousse had many associations for him. The older ones were clearly discountable, but more recent ones might prove interesting.
Those men St. Lyon remained in contact with in France had, in their missives, infrequently mentioned an agent of nebulous affiliations who on occasion had interfered with, and on others had aided, those dedicated to the restoration of the monarchy. His name had been Rousse. It could not be that this was the same man who had plucked the fruit that St. Lyon himself had so often been tempted to steal.
“And you say this is a new…friendship?”
“Far as I can tell, the man just arrived in town a fortnight ago and straight off is seen kissing Miss Nash in public and entering and leaving her house at very interesting hours of the day.”
“Servants’ gossip,” St. Lyon suggested.
“No, this comes from several reliable witnesses. Members of the ton.”
Perhaps Charlotte Nash had taken a lover, whoever he was, damn him for his insolence, St. Lyon thought. St. Lyon could have seduced the little cat, but he was far more circumspect. He’d had to be. But once this Monsieur Rousse left…Well, now that the fruit had been plucked, there was nothing to prevent it from passing to other hands. And that, he thought with an inner sigh, might be a while yet.
He still awaited the arrival of three more well-financed “guests,” and given the difficulties of traveling from afar across a continent now divided by war on almost every front, it would be another few weeks before they appeared and the bidding could finally commence. In the meantime, he had to keep a diverse and not always amenable group busy enough so that they did not kill one another. He might have employed Rawsett in that capacity for a while. The fool was amusing, Alas, he had another, much more important, mission for his cohort.
Poor Rawsett, he would be unhappy to be told he must leave again, St. Lyon thought, tucking his hand companionably through Rawsett’s arm and drawing him toward the great hall. Perhaps he wouldn’t tell him until tomorrow.
“Tell me, Rawsett, are there any wenches down at the crossroads tavern worthy of—how does one put this delicately?—serving their betters?”
Rawsett, beaming at having his sophisticated partner ask his opinion on the merits of rustic lady birds, rubbed his hands together and prepared to expound.
St. Bride’s Abbey
Autumn 1794
Dand Ross squatted down, hands on his knees as he peered up into Douglas’s bruised face. He let out a low, appreciative whistle. “Now what, I’m asking myself, could a noble lad like Dougie Stewart have done to raise the ire of the eternally persecuted John Glass?”
Douglas moved his jaw experimentally before spitting out a gob of blood onto the stable floor. “You’re an idiot, Dand.”
“Will you wipe the blood off your face, Doug? The sight of it is makin’ my stomach do all sorts of unpleasant things,” Dand said, reaching into his pocket and extracting a raggedy kerchief. He tossed it to his friend, who mopped at his lip. The damage wasn’t as bad as initial evidence would have it. He would sport a bruised eye and a fat lip, but the cut was shallow and his teeth were all intact. “Why were they on you like that, Douglas?”
“John heard Ram and me talking about the brotherhood of the rose. He wanted to take the vow.”
Dand’s expression twisted in comical confusion. “That bit of theater in the garden last month, you mean? When you had us stab our thumbs with the rose thorns, clamp hands, and bleed all over one another as we pledged eternal allegiance one to another? You took a beating over that bit of nonsense?”
“It isn’t nonsense to me, Dand,” Douglas said quietly. His gaze was intent, piercing. “Or Ram. Or Kit.”
“All right, Doug,” Dand finally said. “Why didn’t you let him say the words? They were just words, after all. You would have saved yourself a good thrashing.”
At this, Douglas blinked. “They weren’t just words, Dand. Don’t you understand that? It was a promise. It was a vow. It was…sacred in a way. I wasn’t going to cheapen it by letting John Glass make a mockery of it. He wouldn’t die for you. He wouldn’t die for anyone. If I let him make the vow, it would cheapen it for all of us. Don’t you see that? It would mean nothing. Don’t you take anything seriously?”
Dand leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees, his hands dangling between. “They’re just words, Doug. Not worth taking a beating over.”
“Are you saying you wouldn’t have done the same as I?”
Dand laughed, just as genuine in his disbelief as Douglas. “No, Doug. I wouldn’t.”
“Then I pity you, Dand Ross, I truly do,” Douglas said. His face was tight and unhappy. He headed for the stable door, fully intending to leave Dand behind. But then he stopped as if he could not, despite his better instincts. “I love you, Dand. But I despair of you, I truly do,” he said.
“No more than I do you,” Dand whispered, jumping to the ground and following him.
12
Culholland Square, Mayfair
July 28, 1806
“MA’AM?” Lizette’s head popped around the bedroom door. Caught in yet another reverie where Dand kissed her in between bouts of declaring himself her devoted slave, Charlotte guiltily dropped the yellow rosebud she’d idly been twirling between her fingers and swung around.
“Yes, Lizette?” Charlotte said.
“Lady Welton is downstairs and would like a few moments of your time.”
“Lady Welton?” Charlotte repeated with pleasure. It had been days since she had heard from her onetime benefactress. She had begun to worry that something was amiss in the Welton household and decided that one of the boys must be cutting up rough or perhaps Maggie had decided to return early from her trip abroad with her new husband. “By all means, show her into the front parlor and offer her some refreshment. Tell her I shall be down directly.”
With delighted anticipation, Charlotte brushed her short curls and threaded a ribbon around her throat before hurrying downstairs. She entered the room with her hands held out in welcome. “Lady Welton! How wonderful to see you!”
The older woman, dressed in a notably subdued fashion, rose and awkwardly took Charlotte’s outstretched hands in hers, squeezing tightly as her gaze swept Charlotte from the top of her well-coiffed head to the dainty kidskin slippers peeping from beneath the hem of her white Swiss-dotted gown.
“You don’t look like a soiled dove,” Lady Welton blurted out.
“A what?” Charlotte’s pleasure vanished. She shouldn’t be surprised. Indeed, she should have realized that no outrage committed by a Welton offspring could have accounted for Lady Welton’s long absence. Perhaps, somewhere deep within, she had.
Now, Lady Welton’s gaze darted anxiously about the room as if looking for some sign of an ong
oing bacchanal. Then, with a fastidiousness Charlotte had never before witnessed, she perched her rounded little rump gingerly on the edge of the divan and surveyed Charlotte with a mixture of mystification and sorrow.
“You know, Lottie. A…Woman of Easy Virtue.”
If this hadn’t been so obviously distressful for her former benefactress, Charlotte might have laughed. Thank God, Lizette arrived at that moment with a tray. She arranged the decanter of iced lemonade and glasses on the table before Charlotte, bobbed a curtsy, and left. Gratefully, Charlotte took the moments provided to prepare for this interview. If Lady Welton’s opening salvo was any indication, this meeting could only prove a most painful one.
Baroness Welton had come for a purpose. Just what that purpose was remained to be seen, but already Charlotte suspected it boded little good for the girl who’d once been sheltered in the Welton home. But for the creature she and Dand Ross had created, a budding Cyprian who would enter St. Lyon’s castle and steal a volatile missive, it would doubtless amount to a victory. She must cling to that.
It really was too bad her heart would not allow her to enjoy her triumph.
“What does a Woman of Easy Virtue look like?” she asked, pouring out the bittersweet liquid.
Lady Welton, forgetting for a moment her discomfort, squinted thoughtfully. “Abandoned. Blowsy. Feverish and…unpleasantly hungry.”
“Good Lord!” Charlotte murmured, a little repelled. “Well, perhaps I am made of a different metal?”
“I hope not,” Lady Welton answered.
Charlotte regarded her in surprise. “Why is that?”
“Because the alternative is that you have not entered into this improper liaison because of passion but because of…money.” Lady Welton said the last word as if it fouled her mouth.
“Those are my only choices?” She tried to sound offhand, but Lady Welton, the misery clear in her blue eyes, was far too dear for Charlotte to fully disguise her own distress.
“No.” Lady Welton held out her hand and at once, without considering that a hard-hearted trollop would ignore such a gesture, Charlotte reached out and took it. Lady Welton’s hand trembled.
“I understand you, Lottie,” she said. “I know you. You are so like me, unwilling to let the ponderous pronouncements of Society tell you what to do or who to know or how to act. I know you are high-spirited and flirtatious and perhaps a little too often at the mercy of your impulses.”
Impulsive. How little this dear woman understood her. Everything she did sprang from a focused and predetermined plan. Everything except her reaction to Dand Ross. She was the least impulsive woman she knew.
“I know how a young man can turn one’s head and make any sacrifice seem worth a few minutes in”—she swallowed—“his embrace. Especially if he is handsome. Especially if he exerts…untoward pressure in gaining a hold over you.”
Dear God, Charlotte realized, Lady Welton was asking if Dand had seduced her against her will!
“Lady Welton, I am not—”
Lady Welton’s hand darted up and covered Charlotte’s lips, silencing her. “Please, Charlotte. Think.
“You have only to tell me you are not willingly adopting this…life, that you regret your situation, and I shall find a way to make this right. Welton, for all his havey-cavey ways, is not without influence and I shall do everything in my power to see that you…do not suffer overmuch from this…misstep.”
Slowly, she lowered her hand, covering Charlotte’s and squeezing tightly. “Please.” She was desperate for reassurance, so wounded. So betrayed. “I do not know how to explain to Maggie. I do not know what to say to Welton. Please. We love you, Lottie.”
Pain swept through Charlotte, shaking her to the core. She could not speak. She had accepted that there would be distress and anguish she must bear, had never fooled herself that her life after this venture was ended would ever be anything but difficult. And she had, of course, considered her sisters’ unhappiness, telling herself that whatever hurt they endured would be assuaged with time and their husbands’ love and support.
But she had never appreciated that what she was doing would so profoundly affect those others who loved her, admirers and schoolmates and friends. Certainly she must count Lady Welton amongst them.
How could she hurt so many? How could she hurt Lady Welton, who had never shown her anything but kindness, who had sheltered her and cosseted her, treating her like a daughter of the house rather than the penniless hanger-on that she knew herself to have been?
What choice did she have?
“I am sorry, Lady Welton,” she managed, her lips rigid with her determination to keep her smile in place. “But I am quite satisfied with my present situation.”
Lady Welton’s hand fell away. “I do not believe it. You…you cannot understand what this means, child. You will be an outcast. You are an outcast.”
Charlotte forced a lilt to her voice. “There are societies besides the ton.”
Lady Welton shook her head. “No, my dear. Not for you there aren’t.
“Do not fool yourself by telling yourself such lies. You were raised amongst a certain set. You were raised to a certain manner, to have certain expectations of your life and your future.
“You are used to being lauded and courted and celebrated. To going wherever you wish with the certainty that you will be welcomed when you arrive. To meeting people who do not turn from you on the streets, but greet you with admiration and affection. To dining with friends who want nothing of you save your company.
“Charlotte, we have always been blunt, you and I. I will be blunt now. Is this woman, this Mrs. Mulgrew, the sort of person with whom you wish to spend the remainder of your years? Are you content with the company she represents, the women she knows who must, because of their circumstances, always stand aside for their betters? Do you want to spend every moment henceforth knowing that you are being assessed like a piece of cattle by disreputable and dissolute men?”
Charlotte turned her head, afraid that she would break down in tears and Lady Welton would misread her distress and send for the militia to wrest her from Dand’s evil clutches.
“Lud, Lady Welton,” she managed in a rush, “you seem to know an inordinate amount about the life of a lady bird.”
The earnest light abruptly died in Lady Welton’s expression, leaving her looking suddenly fragile and injured. “You are being deliberately hurtful,” she said softly. “I would not have thought you capable of such. Indeed, I do not know you.”
Charlotte looked up, chin high. She had not played the role of self-involved bon vivant for so many years only to have her skills fail her at the first inconvenient stab of conscience.
“I daresay,” she said carelessly. “And I suspect that is really the reason for this visit, is it not?”
“What?” Lady Welton asked, confused.
“So that you might tell me directly that you can no longer know me,” Charlotte said. “Most decent of you. Most honorable. Pray, consider yourself to have fulfilled whatever obligation you feel you have toward me.”
“That is unfair.” Lady Welton’s hands twisted in her lap, her expression as wounded as that of a lapdog that had been kicked.
“It is,” Charlotte agreed before she could stop herself. “But you know you really have no choice but to agree with my assessment, don’t you? You can no longer know me,” Charlotte said in a far softer, gentler voice than she’d intended. “I understand.”
Tears welled up in Lady Welton’s eyes. Tears of sorrow. But also relief. “I wish there was some other way. I wish—”
The door to the morning room swung open and Dand, immaculate in Ram Munro’s purloined garments, stood in the doorway, his gaze possessive and protective. A lie. Everything about this whole sordid or-deal was a lie. His ardency, her lost virtue, their relationship, his past—even down to his damn clothing. She returned his gaze knowing she was not doing a good job of masking her misery. She bit her trembling lip.
His gaze narrowed, tautness hardening his features and then he was coming into the room, straight toward where Lady Welton sat dabbing at her eyes with the handkerchief she always kept tucked in her bodice.
“Lottie, me love,” he said with a devilish grin. “You didn’t tell me we had company!”
He couldn’t expect her to introduce him to Lady Welton. It would be the highest insult to the poor woman. Charlotte would not do it. She wouldn’t!
As though scalded by his words and afraid that Charlotte, or at least this alien creature she’d once known as Charlotte, would do just that, Lady Welton stumbled to her feet. Then, head held high, tears streaming unchecked down her powdered cheeks, she chugged wordlessly past Dand and disappeared into the hall. A moment later they heard the front door shut.
Charlotte tried. She tried as hard as she could to find her easy cavalier manner, the trick of insincerity and casualness. She looked up, lifting one brow as she gazed into Dand’s tanned, angular face.
“Well, that went rather well, I thought,” she said.
And then he was pulling her up and into his arms, holding her close, his hand cradling her head against his broad shoulder.
And she broke down and wept.
13
Jermyn Street, Piccadilly
July 30, 1806
TWO DAYS LATER, Ginny looked up from leafing through the fashion magazines piled around her divan and upon seeing her young friend, at once put aside her contraband editions of La Belle Assemblée. Charlotte looked unwell.
Though she lacked the classic beauty of her sisters, Charlotte had always possessed something more, a vivacity and élan that invested her countenance with an irresistible appeal. But that animation was missing now. Violet shadows encircled her gold-flecked eyes and strain made her mouth pale and vulnerable.
With a sense of foreboding, Ginny closed the magazine on her lap, dispensing with the customary greeting and saying instead, “What is wrong, Charlotte? Where is Mr. Ross?”
My Surrender Page 15
