Lady Alis shifted, her eyes revealing a momentary loss of poise. “It’s . . . not really a house. More like . . . a gypsy wagon? We don’t have a coat of arms.”
More confused than ever, Auguste waited.
Lady Alis patted the shoulder of the lanky boy beside her and deposited her packages in his arms. “You’d better run along, Stockton. Ellen will be missing my help with the tea trays. Put these in the kitchen. I’ll be along soon.” She spoke in a low voice, but Auguste heard.
Stockton pushed back a shock of pumpkin-colored hair and looked at him. “Good luck t’you.” He ran down the alley and climbed into the pony cart on the other side of the dust-dim street, rattling off a moment later.
Auguste now took a sweeping view of his companion, wondering. Tea trays and gypsy wagons? The girl was a riddle from one end to the other. It was evident she had not spent much time in Weircannon, else they would have met at the parties his mother held every Season.
Auguste rumpled his hair and followed Lady Alis, who had taken a stalking course farther down the alleyway. He wanted to say the clever things princes usually said when meeting fair cousins, but his mind was a cat’s cradle of impertinent questions he didn’t think she’d answer. Maybe if he began on the topic of mutual friends.
Dash it all! He’d never been fond of any of the people introduced to him at court and could think of no one about whom he could inquire. The only person he really liked was bombastic Lord Humphries and him only because years ago he used to take Auguste aside and make comical criticisms of the cabinet members while feeding him lozenges.
Auguste had always liked those lozenges.
“Do you know Lord Humphries?” he asked as they neared the termination of the alley.
Alis turned with a relieved smile and bounced on the ends of her toes. “Yes.” An emphatic statement. This was progress.
“Oh, jolly. Do you like him?” Idiot. People aren’t compelled to like their acquaintances.
That worried pucker came back to her brows, but she laughed and flicked her hands. “He’s my uncle. Good, dear Uncle Humphries.”
Good, dear Uncle Humphries? She didn’t sound like she knew him at all. Of course she could be one of those nieces who stayed conveniently out of the way most of her life, but a suspicion took up residence in Auguste’s mind that perhaps this Lady Alis with her tea carts and gypsy wagons wasn’t quite what she made herself out to be.
“Did he give you lozenges too?” Auguste masked a shrewd smile by feeling his jaw.
“Oh yes.”
Liar. “What flavor?” He presented his most roguish smile and rolled his fingers. “I always forget.”
Lady Alis bent her head. “Lemon, I think.”
Auguste clapped his hands. “Peppermint. Why do you lie?”
“I’m not lying,” she countered. “My lozenges were peppermint—I mean . . . lemon?” She ended in a pleading question.
“You are dealing with the royal prince, you realize.”
“Don’t I know it.” The crackle mounted in her eyes, and she started off down another alley angling toward town.
Auguste kept just a step behind the girl like a herding dog. “Why are we doing this? Either you are a singular flirt wanting to get me down a back alley for some childish romantic reason or you know something I don’t and refuse to tell me.”
“You’re clever,” Lady Alis said, turning her head just far enough that Auguste could see her distinct profile. “Not as . . .”
He kept one step behind her, enjoying the sensation of protecting something, though in all honesty there was nothing from which to protect her. “Not as . . . ?” he prompted.
“Bad as I expected. Or as ugly.”
“What sort of venom did they breed into you? Oh, I forgot. You’re a Blenheim. Deny it if you will, but I know.”
She gave him a curious, intelligent look. “As much as it pains me to notice, you’re actually—”
“Decent?” he supplied.
Lady Alis nodded. They emerged back into the shopping district, and Auguste saw her stiffen. Her eyes focused someplace distant.
“What is it?”
Alis had gone pale and she drifted away. “I must go. Laureldina and the girls. I—it’s just—Oh, goodbye, Your Highness. I’m sorry again for crashing into you!”
“And laying me out like a corpse.”
“That too.”
She had taken his hand in hers, and Auguste realized that it felt perfectly natural and pleasant to let her hold it. He twined his fingers through hers and squeezed. “Must you go just now?” He didn’t want this strange and fascinating girl to leave. Not when they’d just started to get along.
She squeezed his hand. “I really must. Goodbye.”
She dropped a curtsy, gave a salute, dashed down the alley, and was gone, leaving Auguste to wonder at all he'd been missing by staying in the castle all these years.
8
Laureldina only bludgeoned my head slightly when she came home from their shopping expedition and complained of my absence. Evidently she had not seen me with Prince Auguste when I glimpsed her from the end of the alley. I answered her questions with honesty: I was shopping for a new gown because she couldn’t expect me to live in squalor my entire life if she ever hoped to be rid of me. I deserved my chance to find a husband as much as her daughters. Furthermore, I wanted to be present tonight when Lord Humphries came to have dinner with the family.
Laureldina laughed in her scornful way but otherwise made no protest.
I went upstairs a half hour before Lord Humphries’s scheduled arrival and pulled my battered travel case from the foot of the bed. Inside was a cast-off dress from Clarisse, altered and mended ages ago to make an almost-presentable gown. It glowed insipid mauve in the light of the tallow candle. The color was atrocious, but I took the gown from the trunk and laid it out, straightening the old lace here and there where it had been crumpled.
Beneath the dress was a framed ink drawing of Prince Auguste’s face, clipped from a newspaper ages ago. This I kept on my basin-stand at Cock-on-Stylingham, accustomed to lecturing it ad infinitum on my worst days. Now, as I turned it to the candlelight, I was able to see the points in which the face was far nobler than I’d ever before been willing to admit. The brow was heavy but loyal, and I had seen the stony mouth form a wry grin several times. And yes, though I had tried to erase it from my memory, I still felt his strong hand shaking mine, like a pleasant, troubling ghost.
I tossed the frame back inside and slammed the lid. I could not like the man when I’d sworn to depose him.
“You are going to take his throne, you recall,” I muttered. But though Auguste’s portrait was now face-downward in a dank chest, the essence of him danced in my head with maddening clarity; a rogue wearing my crown with a grin that made it impossible to hate him. A grin that attracted me.
And what did he mean by saying he was not enjoying the throne? Could it be that he would volunteer his crown without a brawl? Only a madman would do it.
“I don’t care,” I reminded myself and wriggled into the unappealing remodeled gown. “I shall take the throne whether or not I am in love with Auguste.”
In love with him? I astonished myself. My reflection in the speckled mirror by the door showed my eyes round and concerned. I couldn’t love him. I didn’t believe in love at first sight. And even though knocking a man prostrate, arguing, and laughing was not an ordinary how-d'you-do, I refused to acknowledge the idea. I was Alisandra Carlisle, a girl with her wits about her. I couldn’t fall in love with just anyone, and certainly not at first sight. I was not living in a fairytale.
I reached over my shoulders to button the dress, tied the sash in an anemic bow and stepped into my new slippers. I looked nearly presentable, and Lord Humphries would just have to grin and bear it if he was displeased with the “heir” on whom he’d pegged his money. I might explain that the dresses I ordered were not ready-made, and I had not worn this atrocity through fondness for it.<
br />
Nothing further to do. I left my room and joined Ellen downstairs.
“Are you wearing that thing to dinner?” She wrinkled her nose. Drips from the soup spoon ran onto the cobbled floor.
“Nothing better till the dresses come. And I do hope that snobby tailoress stabs herself with a needle for each of her insinuations. I hate people who insinuate.”
Ellen only laughed and began ladling the soup into a tureen. “I heard Lord Humphries come in the door. He’ll be upstairs now, and I only hope he’s colorblind; looks like you've got ague.”
“Thank you, Ellen-Best, for that confidence, but as there really is no remedy for fashion tragedies, I shall hope along with you. I wouldn’t want Lord Humphries to think he’d financed a chronically ill upstart.”
“You've only got to start talking. You're a nice-looking lass in general but not in that color. Let's hope your wit makes up for your complexion.”
“If there is one comfort, it might be the fact that Clarisse looked even worse in it than I.” I hefted the heavy tureen, careful not to slop, and hoped Stockton had remembered to set the table for the first course. “Off I go. Pray.”
“I will.” Ellen gave me a whiskery kiss and patted the place on my cheek with her old fingers. “You're a princess sure and certain. Go show the old bats.”
With this benediction, I hurried up the stairs and squeezed past Stockton in the hall without speaking. My nerves played hopscotch with my stomach. At the top of the stairs, I set the tureen down on a serving cart, checked to make certain I’d remembered a fresh ladle, then pushed the whole to the doorway of the dining room. I paused there a moment, grimacing as one of Laureldina’s vapid remarks reached my ears.
Oh Lord, if it is pleasing in your sight, let nothing go wrong. I smoothed the front of my dress, gripped the handle of the serving cart with both hands, and pushed it into the dining room.
The clink of crystal and silver suspended as I read displeasure and annoyance on the girls’ faces. William sat back and grinned, and Laureldina made the weakest show of a smile as if she severely regretted having given permission for me to be there.
The man at her right was Lord Humphries, presumably. I had expected someone a bit older. Someone who looked less like a sea captain and more like the grandfatherly sort who’d pat my head and ask me to play a round of whist. His hair was unpowdered, and he wore no wig. By the strong set of his jaw I knew I had chosen a good ally. He was the sort of man who courted revolution and juggled firebrands for the fun of watching the world gape.
His eyes, so pale as to almost look silver, met mine. “Is this the Lady Alisandra Carlisle?” With one hand he swirled his wineglass while the other drummed aimlessly on the cloth.
Laureldina put her hand to her stomach and gave a matchstick smile. “This is my stepdaughter.” Her voice was breathless, brittle.
I stepped forward, pushing the serving cart and its bountiful soup tureen over beside the table. “And you are Lord Humphries?” I asked, even as I took up the ladle.
He stood and bowed. “At your disposal.”
Laureldina toyed with her ebony necklace. “Oh, no one is ever at her disposal, uncle. La, you make it sound as if she were important. And in the presence of His Royal Highness . . .”
I froze and swiveled on one heel to face the all too familiar apparition: Auguste stood at the side table, wineglass in hand. Blood rushed into my face, and if I had lacked color before, I made up for it now.
“Your Highness!” I made the lowest curtsy I knew, ladle still in hand. “I am honored to make your acquaintance.” If I hadn’t been so weakened by shock I might have remembered to be proud of the way I played the astonished kitchen maid meeting a future king. But if my words were feigned, my shock was not, and I was grateful for the table hard by and the generosity of Auguste in raising me and kissing my hand as any benevolent ruler would.
Laureldina laughed. By the tremor in her tone I suspected the prince had not deigned to kiss her daughters’ hands. “Alis, this isn’t an acquaintance. The prince, I am sure, has much better things to do than know you.” She said the words for my hearing alone, but Auguste was close enough to hear them all, I knew.
His eyes poured out a torrent of questions. I silenced him with a panicked shrug and prayed he would not mention our meeting.
“I had not met this daughter when you came uptown last year, Lady Ecksmore,” Auguste said. “I am pleased to know her now.” It might have been my imagination, but I fancied a trace of pointed amusement as he spoke, as if he wanted to irk her.
Laureldina closed her eyes, and her collar bone shifted under the heavy gems. “Alis has not been well the past few years,” my stepmother lied with a compassionate smile at me, frightening in its frailty. “Arthritis in all her joints. The doctors did not think the activity of the Season would be good for her health.”
Auguste shot me a look and clicked his tongue. “And yet she serves the soup? Oh no, Lady Alis, let me. It would be my delight to serve.” He took the ladle from my hand and, before I could even think to make a protest, began to fill the bowls himself, pushing the cart as he went. Scoop, pour, step to the next place, repeat.
I bit my lip and made a helpless face at my stepmother who sat, red faced and ashamed, at the head of the table. Strange as it was to sympathize with this woman, I shared in her mortification that the Prince of Ashby was scooping our broth. Gladly would I have taken the spoon from him, but that would have deepened my disgrace. What kind of prince served soup to his subjects?
And then the irony struck me: What kind of prince? A good prince.
Oh, heavens.
“Please sit down and let me,” I begged, bending close to his ear.
One corner of his mouth tipped, but he shook his head, shy and determined. “It is my pleasure to serve you.”
Clarisse turned as pale as her mother was red, and Vivienne picked at the cloth with her fingernails. William looked merely interested, like a St. Bernard who finds the comely spaniel has been given the job of raking the kennel’s sawdust. Lord Humphries sat back in perfect composure, spreading his big brown hands on the table and fingering the lip of his wineglass now and then in a thoughtful manner.
The whole company was silent except for Auguste, who tried to make small talk as he filled the bowls. I dropped in a spineless heap in my chair and winced as His Majesty filled my bowl last and moved the serving cart to the other side of the room. Then he returned and sat at the other end of the table. My nerves were reduced to their lowest state. I wished nothing more than to retreat to the kitchen and resume my former life as a nobody.
Lord Humphries said grace in a rumbling Northern accent that ill suited the petite phrases from the Book of Common Prayer, but somehow the bluff thunder of the words stroked my fur down.
When the soup course was finished, Stockton’s polite cough at the doorway reminded me that Ellen would have finished roasting the quail. I excused myself with a curtsy to Lord Humphries and the prince and exited the room in a whish of mauve skirts.
“The prince came up for dinner.” Stockton gripped my elbows, his face tragic, and steered me toward the stairwell. “I was going to tell you, but you were so quick down the hall I hadn’t time.”
I waved Stockton off and re-tied the feeble sash of my gown. I needed fresh air and a moment to think, and the wide hall provided both. I had not prepared myself for the day’s second interview with my rival. Heavy footsteps thudded on the wooden floor behind me, and I stiffened, willing it not to be the man who had stolen my throne and composure.
“M’lady Alis, a moment please?”
Chills sprang up my backbone at the introduction of the voice, and for one hair’s breadth of a moment I thought it was Auguste’s. But a heavy hand descending on my collar announced the new companion as Lord Humphries. Stockton scuttled downstairs per the direction of my eyebrows.
“Alis, you devil.” Lord Humphries kissed my hand and winked. “What a blunder, introducing yourself to the pr
ince this morning before we’d even met. How much does the man know?”
I shook my head. “I couldn’t say. We met in town, and I babbled on for a bit—can’t even remember what about. We argued, I think.”
“He mentioned as much when I invited him for dinner.”
“He knew he was coming here? To my house?”
Lord Humphries took the decanter of cheap brandy from a silver tray on the hall table and poured a glass. He lifted it to his eye and stared at me through the amber liquid, then handed it to me. “Auguste did not know that I was coming here. I only mentioned having dinner with my niece, Laureldina Carlisle, and her children. You are a recent production, my dear. I made no mention of an Alisandra Carlisle. What a nice surprise it was for him, I’m sure, seeing the breathing copy of his own father in female form. What did you say to him? He’s smitten.”
I spluttered through the foul brandy, but the little that made its way down my throat fortified me. “Smitten?” I spat.
“Mmm, yes. You’ve cut the cloth a bit close if he’s in love with you. Will you lose resolve for our campaign and let your beloved take his ignoble throne without ever trying your hand? And after all the work we’ve done. You know, Alis, I had confidence in you from the moment I saw you come in tonight, saluting his royal highness with a soup spoon. Plucky.”
“He’s not my beloved,” I snapped.
Lord Humphries’s eyebrow twitched, and he grinned as if he had a cramp. “But he will be. Auguste is a fine man, and I congratulate you.”
The man enraged me. I crossed my arms and leveled at him. I was just as tall as he and quite as dignified. “I will beg you to hold your tongue.”
“You aren’t my queen yet. And since I am financing this precarious theatrical production, madam, you may think of me as your godfather. In which case,” he added, taking the rest of my brandy for himself, “I can say anything I like.”
The point was too correct to dispute. I considered him a moment then went down the stairs. “Follow me, aged godfather. You might catch cold from the draught.”
Five Glass Slippers: A Collection of Cinderella Stories Page 19
