Ariadne was no more decided concerning her own conduct. There would be no call upon her by her mother. She had dreaded that interview, so should be relieved she need not face it. It was odd to recognize that she was not. Something inside her regretted the lost opportunity to learn more of the woman who had given her birth. Something within longed to know why she had been handed over to someone else like the unwanted kitten in a litter.
Should she pay a condolence call now, leaving her card if not admitted, or just let it go? The blood relationship was undoubtedly there and some things were a matter of common decency. Regardless, she had never met her stepfather or any of his daughters by her mother, did not know them at all. Her mother might have sought contact before, but would she wish it in her sorrow? What possible use could she be to her blood relations at this time? What comfort could she offer? It seemed purest hypocrisy to visit now when she had been so very determined to avoid them. Yes, and did she really wish to become enmeshed in their lives when she had other concerns, other aims of her own?
What did the social conventions require of her in this peculiar situation? Did filial duty enter into it at all?
Going back and forth in her mind with the choice was driving her mad. She could not think what she wanted to do, much less what was required of her. Still, it seemed she should do something.
She could not get the scene she had witnessed out of her mind. Her mother's grief remained with her, weighed on her. Her obvious love for the girl who had died, her horror-stricken despair over the manner of it, had been so very piteous. Ariadne could not help wondering if she had felt even a portion of that desolation over her own removal to the Dorelle household. She had not died, it was true, but she had been just as lost to her mother. Somehow, she had never considered how the woman who gave birth to her might have felt about giving her away. She had always assumed she had been glad to be free of the burden.
That need not be true. She might have grieved.
Had she misjudged her mother all these years?
What else might she have misjudged?
Ariadne's head ached with the confusion inside her. She wasn't sure she was capable of leaving the town house for fear of being sick. She hovered constantly on the verge of tears when she had thought never to cry again after weeping so much for Francis and then Jean Marc.
Rising from her bed, she went to the armoire. She pushed aside her gowns to expose a long case that lay at the back. Lifting it from its hiding place, she carried it to the bed. It was of highly polished ebony wood inlaid with silver, a sword case of fine craftsmanship. She unfastened the catch, opened the lid and laid it back onto the mattress.
Nestled in the case, in a bed of black crushed velvet, was a pair of matched rapiers, traditional dueling swords, with their black leather sheaths beside them. Beautifully made, they had leather-wrapped handles and swept-back hilts of ornately wrought metal plated with silver and black enamel. The maker's mark, a fleur de lis, was stamped into the upper blade which was also chased for a few inches with a design of leaves and vines. She had purchased the set in Paris after walking past the window of a weapons store where they had been displayed. They appealed to her on a visceral level she could not have explained if her life depended on it. Owning them had given solid form to her vague idea of retribution for Francis's death.
She touched the chasing on one blade, thinking of Gavin's disparaging suggestion that she was attracted to fencing for the sake of such beautiful metalwork. He might be more correct than he knew, though the deadly power of the sword also satisfied something inside her. Unladylike as it might be to dwell on such things, owning the means to protect herself, as well as exact recompense for injury, made her feel stronger inside.
Could she really use one of the blades? The anger that had driven her seemed to burn less bright. Everything was more complicated than it had appeared from a continent away. The depression of spirit occasioned by the tragedy she had witnessed that morning made it all seem too great an effort.
This uncertainty would pass, she was almost certain of it. The question was how she might feel when it was done. Closing the sword case lid again, she put it back in the armoire.
Gray skies gathered, lowering, becoming steadily darker as the day advanced. Candles and lamps had to be set alight by mid-afternoon. Ariadne, in the attempt to break free of the impasse that gripped her, dressed and took her needlework, a petit-point fire screen, into the salon.
Maurelle was not there. She had grown sleepy after a strenuous morning followed by a dreary afternoon, or so Adele said when Ariadne discovered the maid loitering on the gallery. She was resting in bed.
Ariadne set a few stitches in her canvas while sitting before the salon fireplace, but could find no real interest in the pattern. When the rain began to fall, she laid her handiwork to one side and went to the window where she stood leaning on the frame, watching the wind-whipped sheets of water that blew down the street and the silver streams that poured from the eaves onto the balcony outside.
She was still there when a visitor was announced. At the sound of a masculine tread, she turned quickly, her eyes wide.
It was only Sasha. He shook the raindrops from his hat and thrust it under his arm with his cane as he came forward. Unlike the sword masters who were more familiar in Maurelle's house, he kept to the European visiting style which limited calls to a scant fifteen minutes. In token of this short stay, a gentleman did not give up his belongings but kept them in his grasp.
It was bizarre to be disappointed that the caller was not Gavin Blackford. She was surely not in such an odd humor that the prospect of sparring with the Englishman could be preferable to her own company or that of any other. Was she?
"How kind of you to call when it is so wet out. I had not thought to see anyone for what is left of the day." Ariadne's greeting as she gave him her hand was, perhaps a shade warmer than it might have been to make up for her lack of real welcome.
"Should I stay away when you require a friend, ma chère? I came the moment I heard how overset you were after witnessing this morning's sad events."
"You heard? How was that?"
The tops of his ears turned red as he waved a careless hand. "These things are bruited about, you know. The important thing is that I am here."
"As I said, it was good of you to trouble."
"What disturbs you must rouse the same emotions in my breast, fair one. Tell me what you require for solace and I will bring it to you. Only command me, for I am at your service."
À votre service.
The English sword master had said the same not so long ago. The words Sasha had spoken seemed but an echo of another voice, another promise.
"I hardly know which way to turn," she said with a small shake of her head. "In truth, I'm almost persuaded there is nothing to be done."
"You know best, but I fear you are more disturbed than you will admit. Why else would you allow the escort of Blackford on the street, or suffer that he should touch you in so public a manner?"
She moved away from him, returning to the settee
before the fire, staring at the coal lumps like small glowing pillows behind the ornate grate. "Is that what this is really about? That I was seen with the maître d'armes?"
"You must admit it was indiscreet," he said, standing at rigid attention.
"I will do nothing of the sort. How dare you suggest— " She stopped, took a calming breath. "Please sit down, Sasha. We must talk."
"I am not sure I care for the sound of that." His gaze was wary as he lowered himself to the fauteuil that sat at a right angle to the settee.
"Possibly not, but it must be done. We have known each other for a number of years, have shared good times and bad. I am grateful for your constancy and the way you stood by me while Jean Marc was ill. I care for you..."
"And I adore you, mon ange."
"Allow me to finish, if you please." She waited until he subsided. "As I was about to say, I care for you as a friend, which
makes this difficult for me. It is immensely flattering that you followed me here from Paris. I am fully aware of the honor you have paid me. It may be that I even encouraged you in some fashion, though unwittingly, I swear. I have told you time and again that I have no interest in being married again, also no inclination to indulge in.. .in an affair."
"But why, adored one?" He moved with a flexing of heavy muscles to join her on the settee, sweeping aside the needlework she had left there and dropping his hat and cane on top of it. Picking up her hand that lay in her lap, he cradled it in his own. "What have I done to offend you?"
"Nothing, you've done nothing," she declared while resisting the urge to remove her cool fingers from his damp and too warm grasp. "The fault is in me. My nature is not.. .not passionate." The memory of her enthrallment at being snatched against the Englishman's hard body intruded, but she pushed it from her thoughts.
"I could undertake to convince you otherwise if you will only give me leave."
"Unlikely, I assure you. More than that, I'm certain my attraction for you is simply that I am not disposed to fall into your arms as do other females."
"You wound me, madame. I am not so shallow."
"I don't say it's the challenge to your manhood alone. The novelty intrigues, perhaps."
"I love you, this I swear." He carried her hand to his lips, his pale blue gaze intense above it.
Ariadne took a breath and let it out again as she thought how much easier it would be if she could accept his devotion. She could not. She was not even sure if he believed in it himself or if the pretense was only a habit. "You think so because you have had no chance to grow bored with my close company. It will pass."
"Never."
His mustache tickled her palm before he flicked it with his warm tongue. It was all she could do not to jerk away and wipe her skin dry. "Sasha, please."
"I cannot live without you. Your skin is so pale and fine, the curve of your elbow so delicious." He kissed his way from her wrist to the turn of her arm. "I am enraptured by the grace of your neck, so like a dancer's or, better, a proud swan."
She drew back, placing her free hand on his chest to hold him off as he tried to draw her close enough to nuzzle the skin at the turn of her neck. "Swans are dangerous birds, you know. They attack when capture is attempted."
"Attack?"
"I assure you. A slap, so I am told, is permissible under such circumstances."
He frowned while the scar on his cheek darkened. "Who said this?"
"The maître d'armes, if you must know."
Abruptly, he released her. "Is that why you prefer the swordsman, because he teaches you these defenses?"
"I prefer him, as you would have it, because he doesn't make them necessary. He would never attempt to instruct me in anything other than the use of a sword."
"Then he cannot be much of a man."
"If this is how you view my misjudgment in seeing you alone, as an opportunity to prove your masculinity, then I must ask you to leave," she said, rising to her feet so he was forced to stand. It was not so much that she thought he might seek to overpower her, but rather that she was reluctant to prolong what had become a disturbing interview.
"You will regret this, Ariadne. So will your paramour."
She stepped away from him. "Threats and insults, Sasha? They are unbecoming after all this time. And if you would speak ill of Monsieur Blackford, you might remember his sword is always close at hand."
"I could cut that yellow-haired popinjay in half with a single blow."
"So you might, if you could touch him."
The instant the words left her mouth, she regretted them. It might sound as if she dared him, and she did not mean it that way. It was only that she had seen Monsieur Blackford's skill first hand and could not allow it to be disparaged. She was also fond of Sasha, or had been, and did not like to think of him facing off against the sword master.
The Russian drew himself up to his full height. "I may be no maître, but I am not without skill."
"I am aware, and did not mean to suggest otherwise." She clasped her hands tightly at her waist, torn between the need to soothe his bruised ego and her longing to speed his leaving. "There is simply no need to go to such lengths. Nothing in my association with Monsieur Blackford requires it."
"Nor will you allow me the right to resent it if it should, in spite of what has been between us."
"The only thing between us was friendship which conveys no rights."
"We shall see, my Ariadne. We shall see." Snatching up his hat and cane, he stalked from the room.
Ariadne stared after him with a frown between her brows. She had thought only to make her position clear. Instead, she seemed to have made the situation worse.
Should she send to warn the sword master? How vain it would sound, that Sasha was so jealous of her company that he might issue a challenge over losing any portion of it. Added to that, it was not certain he would actually seek a meeting. What would be the pretext, after all? His temper would likely cool in the winter rain and that would be the end of it.
She hovered, staring at nothing, while her heart thudded against her ribs with slow, sickening beats. She felt both cold and hot at the same time, and it was difficult to breathe. Of what was she afraid? That the sword master would be hurt when she had longed for months for nothing so much as that he should know pain? Or only that Sasha might steal the revenge she plotted?
It was ridiculous to be so affected. She would make no move to intervene then.
But what if she was wrong?
What if she was wrong?
Twelve
Gavin stared at himself in the mirror attached to the wall above his washstand with something less than his usual detachment. He had cut himself shaving, something so rare as to be unheard of. It wasn't that his hand was unsteady, he knew, but rather that he had been trying to scrape his beard too close.
"I coulda done better."
That pithy observation came from Nathaniel, his young apprentice who stood holding Gavin's redingote of gray merino with silver buttons and black velvet collar. It was a new acquisition. That he had chosen this evening for its inaugural wearing was part and parcel with the blood congealing on his chin. He really should have more sense. Madame Faucher was unlikely to see him in the new coat for more than the few seconds it would take him to strip to his shirt sleeves.
"I don't doubt your prowess with a blade," he answered while dabbing at the blood with a length of damp toweling, "but you are not my valet, mon vieux, nor are you likely to be."
"I do for you. We agreed."
"You keep the salon clean, make the morning coffee and run the errands that annoy me, such as summoning the washerwoman." Gavin gave the gangling sandy-haired young man, once a street boy called Squirrel, a severe glance in the mirror. "You do not act as my personal servant since I am no babe needing its chin wiped or bottom washed. In return, I have undertaken to teach you the finer points of swordsmanship and, not incidentally, French and English. That," he finished with emphasis, "was our agreement."
"You had somebody to do for you back in England."
The boy, always touchy, had turned obstinate of late. He was growing up, must be—what? Around seventeen now, though he looked older. Life on the street was not kind to beasts or children, Gavin thought. Nathaniel had filled out considerably in the year or more spent in his employ but could still use a few pounds.
He looked back at him in the mirror. "I had a gentleman's gentleman in England, true, a man well-trained for the job. But I am not, you will note, in England."
Alarm crossed Nathaniel's expressive face. "You ain't about to go home!"
"Aren't," he corrected. "Banish the thought. The dubious pleasure of cleaning the cuspidors and ridding the salon floors of tobacco juice shall be yours for longer than you'll want it."
"That's all right, then, though I'd like it better if you had fewer Americans as clients."
"Agreed. A great reason to love
the French in this fair city, that they scorn chewing tobacco as a heathen habit."
Nathaniel grunted, his idea of adequate conversation among gentlemen. As Gavin reached for the redingote, Nathaniel held it up for him. "You going to teach the Widow Faucher again?"
"To brave the harridan, rather, and see how much can be accomplished without a bloodletting."
"Yours or hers?"
"Brat," Gavin castigated without heat while sliding into the long, full-skirted coat and fastening the double-breasted front. It had been a mistake to confide in the boy, he suspected. He had made a habit of it in the last few months since it was not unlike talking to himself.
It was Nicholas who had asked as a personal favor that he take Nathaniel in and instruct him. It was not something he could have refused his half brother even if he had wished, which he did not. The lad had native wit, initiative and a prickly sense of honor all his own which made him a pleasure to know. In doing his possible to help him grow into a man of worth instead of a street tramp, Gavin had come to look on him almost as a younger brother. In his more introspective moments, he thought the relationship a deliberate cultivation, to compensate for his past loss.
"Want I should wait up for you?" Nathaniel asked, putting his shoulder against the door frame and crossing his arms over his chest.
"Ready to greet me, all bleary-eyed condemnation, on my return? I think not. Beside, I have no idea how late I shall be."
"You plan more than a lesson then."
"Remove your mind from its former home, guttersnipe. I plan nothing."
"You sure of that?" Nathaniel squinted at him, as unfazed by the insult as he was by the occasional compliment.
Gavin wasn't sure at all, which had formed another part of his momentary distraction with his ivory-handled razor in hand. He had a matter or two to discuss with Ariadne Faucher this evening, including her interest in the lady whose daughter had been killed, also the identity of the man who had raised her deadly ire. What happened afterward could depend on the answers.
Guarded Heart Page 10
