Both Armand and Gaston were incensed at what they insisted on calling the insult offered to her, though they could not agree on what should be done about it. Armand thought that Touchet should be called out, while Gaston seemed to feel that the problem would be best handled between René and the governor. They demolished the plate of cakes and drank most of a bottle of wine while they argued about it, but accomplished little more. By the time they finally left, with many assurances of their support, Cyrene’s headache was full blown.
She had walked to the door with Armand and Gaston. Beyond the gallery, the rain slanted down, dimpling the gray lakes that had formed in the streets, falling from the eaves in steady silver streams. Cyrene stepped back inside to take her shawl from where it lay on the end of the settee and wrap it around her, then moved back out onto the gallery once more.
There was something soothing in the steady fall of the rain. She felt her headache recede and the tension begin to drain from the back of her neck as she strolled along the gallery. The wet dampness sweeping under the eaves in a mist now and then was cool on her face. The street lay empty before her. The houses sat huddled and wet on either side with their shutters and doors tightly closed and small eddies of smoke rising from their chimneys. She could smell the faint aromas of baking bread and cooking onion and seafood mixed with the tang of the smoke. She moved to lean her back against the house wall, breathing deep, watching the endless rain.
It was odd that both René and Madame Vaudreuil had chosen today to suggest that she go to Paris. Their propositions were very different, of course, but she could not help wondering if it were something less than accidental. She could not picture René discussing his affair with her with the governor’s wife, telling her of when and how he had made his suggestion. Still, it appeared that with him anything was possible.
She would not leave. She had not realized how attached she had become to this new land until two people had tried to persuade her to desert it. She loved its lush fecundity, the grand scale of its rivers and its wilderness, its dramatic changes of weather, even its rain. She had thought that she had been restricted in her movements by the Bretons, but that was as nothing to the restrictions she would face in France where her every movement and every word she spoke would be carefully watched; where women were expected to keep to their places, which were the kitchen and the bedroom and, one afternoon a week, perhaps, the salon.
Intolerable. Even if there were not the Bretons. How she missed them, gentle Pierre and irrepressible Jean. She prayed they were safe and well and had been as prosperous in their trading as they desired to be. She hoped they were not worrying too much about her, so much that they forgot to have a care for themselves.
What would they think of René if they knew of the counterfeit bills? They had gone from suspicion of him to qualified approval. Perhaps their first impression had been the right one. She should have paid more attention to them. But no, she had been too enthralled with the man she had saved.
She still did not believe what she had discovered, did not want to believe it. In spite of everything, she had thought there must be some explanation for what René had done in betraying the Bretons, some reason of loyalty to king and country or of respect for the integrity of the laws restricting trade that had overridden his obligation to them and to her. That there was not was a fact she could not bring herself to face.
Even now, she wondered if she could be wrong about the money, if it was real tender. Or if it was counterfeit, perhaps there was some reason for it being in his possession? Maybe he was holding it for someone or else did not realize that it was not genuine?
She was not so great a fool as to believe either could be possible, no matter how comforting it might be.
What, then, could she believe?
The notes were well made compared to most, very close to the real thing. It was likely, then, that they had come from France since the local facilities for such things were few. There was a printer but only for official announcements. All newsletters were imported from France; there was not enough considered to be of interest in the colony to warrant a local publication.
The only purpose in bringing the notes from France that made sense was to pass them off as real, exchanging them for necessary goods and services. There was no way of knowing how much René had already disposed of in that manner, how much damage he had done the economy of the colony. It was possible that he had intended to use some of the bills to engage in trade, passing them to the Rhode Islander, Captain Dodsworth, until he had met Touchet on the beach that day when she had seen them in close conversation. No doubt he had received a different proposition then.
The question that posed the most difficulty was the connection René had with the rash of counterfeit script that had been appearing in the town for the past year. It did not appear that he could have had any hand in that whatsoever. And yet, wasn’t it too much of a coincidence that he should be involved in the same dirty game? Wasn’t it possible that his involvement had been responsible for the attempt on his life the night she had saved him — and even the evening before?
The questions required answers. Too much that affected her personally depended on what those answers might be for her to ignore them. But how was she to find out what she needed to know?
She could ask René.
A shiver ran through her at the prospect. In order to carry it out, she would have to admit that she had pried into his belongings. She did not care to think what he would say or do if he learned of it.
The only other solution that presented itself was to find a way to look at the contents of the lacquer box that held the correspondence he worked on so assiduously, correspondence that might be connected with his activities in the colony. She would be willing to wager everything she owned or hoped to own that the answer was there. The only trouble was that it was locked and René kept the key with him at all times.
She had to have the key.
Naturally she could not leave the house or René until she had that key and the answers she sought.
18
RENÉ RETURNED AT DUSK. By then Cyrene had not only had time to walk to the flatboat and bring back needle and thread to mend the opened seam of his coat but also to consider the problem that lay before her. The key she needed, René kept in his pocket. Since she had none of a pickpocket’s training in removing a man’s valuables, he must be induced to remove his clothes. There were, as far as she could see, three possible occasions when he might do so. The first was at bedtime, the second when he bathed, and the third was for the purpose of making love. When he took a bath or made himself ready for bed, he always put away his own clothing, leaving her no excuse for touching them, much less rummaging through them. That left only one possibility.
It did not necessarily follow that she would be given an opportunity to search, even if she did get him out of his coat and breeches; she was, in most cases of that nature, rather distracted herself. She would think of something. She must think of something.
Dinner was a quiet meal. René seemed preoccupied, his mind on other things though his gaze rested on Cyrene now and then, touching the bruise on her cheek until she was as conscious of it as of a brand. Her stomach was so tight with apprehension of what lay ahead that she could not eat, but sat dipping her spoon into her soup, tasting it now and then, or pushing her food from one side of her plate to the other.
They carried their claret, along with a tray of savories and nuts, into the salon before the fire. Cyrene was reminded of the fiasco of the afternoon, something that had almost slipped her mind in her concentration on the matter at hand. She told René of Touchet’s visit and his offer, as much to fill the silence as anything else, though she was aware of a certain curiosity to hear what he would say about it.
“Why are you still here?” he asked, and sipped his wine.
Irritation stirred below her detachment. “I hardly know, to be sure. Having a price tag placed on myself is such an honor; it delights me beyon
d measure to have the marquise think that I can be bought!”
“I see. It’s perversity that made you stay.”
There was, perhaps, a certain amount of truth in that, though he could not know the other reasons that had urged her to go. She said in flat tones, “What else? Except, of course, the small matter of a threat.”
He leaned his head back against his chair, watching her, swirling his wine. “And is that the only reason?”
To antagonize him was not going to help her cause. Besides, there was something vibrant in his low tone that caught at her heart, making it feel as if the space for it was too small. She forced a smile. “Certainly not. I also enjoy Martha’s cooking and your ability to select wine, along with a few other attributes.”
“Such as?”
“Let me see,” she said with a frown. “Your choice in coats, not to mention jewels. The turn of your leg in your breeches. The benefits of your expertise in the pastime for which I am kept.”
He set his wineglass down on the table beside him, saying abruptly, “Do you really think that’s all I wanted of you?”
“Isn’t it implied in the arrangement?”
“To hell with the arrangement.”
“By all means. Do you wish to change it?”
She did not know where the challenge came from or why she made it. There was no future for her with René; she knew that even if he did not.
“I wish…”he began, then stopped. After a moment, he sighed. “I suppose not.”
She could not just sit there like a log and wait for his amorous impulse to create the situation she needed. Cyrene drained her wine and put her glass aside, then rose and went to René in his chair, kneeling at his feet with a billow of skirts. She put her hands on his thighs, feeling the muscles tense under her fingers as she spread her palms over the worsted of his breeches.
She looked up at him, her golden-brown eyes dark. “Tell me what you wish.”
René reached out to trace the blue-shadowed injury to her face with his fingertips. Deep inside him, some sixth sense that he had developed over the past few years stirred. She was up to something, wanted something of him. He wondered what it was. It didn’t matter; he would as soon she had it as to destroy this moment with questions.
“I wish,” he said with measured slowness, “that we could start all over. I wish I had met you in France four years ago when we were both innocent — or, in my case, reasonably so. Failing that, I wish I could take you far away from here, to a place where there was no one except the two of us and no past.”
There was such pain in his voice. It sent a tremor of foreboding through her. Then, as she heard the echo of his words, felt their meaning seep into her mind, it was as if she assimilated with them a sense of the same longing to start afresh, to meet on some neutral ground, to meet as a man and a woman without ties or mixed loyalties, without doubts.
“Very well,” she said. “I will be anything and anyone you choose. A milkmaid? A merchant’s daughter? A seller of sweets and candied violets? What would you have me?”
A smile curved the smooth contours of his mouth. “If you were the merchant’s daughter, you would not be where you are now or doing what you are doing.”
She was not sure he was taking notice of the delicate slide of her hands toward the apex of his legs. “You are still left with a choice.”
“The seller of sweets would, I fear, have long ago lost her innocence in some back tenement.”
She gave him a limpid look. “Then it’s to be the milkmaid?”
He reached for her just as she reached her goal, drawing her up to sit on his lap and the hard length she had created there. “The idea of innocence has begun to pall after all. I think I will have you as you are, Cyrene, my siren, and where we are.”
The play on her name pleased her fancy, even as she saw that her second attempt at seduction, like her first, was going to succeed, and she threw back her head to laugh with a curious triumphant joy tinged with the taste of tears. He bent his head to press his face into the soft curves of her bosom exposed by her gown, holding her tightly as if he meant never to let her go.
They undressed each other with deliberate care and soft wordless sounds of pleasure. Naked and languid with the engulfing arousal, they eased down from the discomfort of the chair to the hearth rug. At first Cyrene was aware, thinking of the weight of the key in René’s coat pocket as the garment fell to the floor, hearing its dull clink. Then she ceased to reason or to plan. She joined René as together they cavorted in the fire’s glow, letting it heat their blood to boiling as, mindless and uncaring, they found in each other the antidote to pain that rose always from its own source.
It was long moments before Cyrene, lying in the curve of René’s body, with his arm over her waist, could bring herself to realize that what had just transpired was not her sole object. She swallowed, breathing deep, then jerked erect suddenly, holding her head as if listening.
“Martha,” she whispered, “coming for the tray!”
She scrambled to her feet and dived for the heaped clothing around the chair. Scooping it up — petticoats, coat, bodice, breeches, shirt, and chemise — all in a wad, she made a dash for the bedchamber.
René was more alert and faster than she had expected. He was right behind her with their shoes and stockings in his arms. There would be no time to take the key from his pocket, though she could feel the shape of it under her hand. With a despairing mental curse, she flung the garments down on a chair, then arranged her face in an expression of impish glee, spun around, and caught René around the waist before going still. She pretended to listen. There was nothing, of course; there never had been.
She shrugged with a light laugh. “I must have been mistaken. But so long as we are here, and the bed is there…”
There was a glint of humor in his eyes. It disturbed her for an instant, making her feel transparent. He could not know, however. She held his gaze with her face lifted to his until he bent slowly to take her lips and turned with her toward the high mattress that awaited.
It was easier this time than the last to become lost in the vortex of desire, easier for her bodily responses to be tapped. And yet she could not quite reach the same degree of nothingness, the same careless splendor. The image of the coat and the key remained at the back of her mind, a taunt and a threat. It was a passionate relief when at last René subsided against her, when his soothing caresses of repletion and gratitude ceased and she heard his deep and even breathing.
There was a brief, uncomfortable feeling inside her as she considered her actions of the past few hours. She dismissed it. Some things were necessary; to be too nice in one’s habits could be a weakness.
Still, she waited, staring up into the darkness and counting the slowly passing seconds off one by one. When a good half hour had passed, she eased away from René a few inches. He did not move. She waited again. She could hear her pulse like a soft, feathery drumbeat in her ears. The hard jar of her heart shook her left breast. She forced herself to breathe with a regular, even motion, in and out, again and again.
She shifted, easing over the mattress a few more inches. The filling of moss made a quiet snapping sound like a buried twig. A section of the bed ropes gave with a soft creak. She stopped once again.
She hated this creeping about, this need for subterfuge. It was foreign to her nature, abhorrent to everything she had ever been taught. She despised the circumstances that had brought her to it, the man who had caused them, and herself for instigating the entire chain of events in the first place. The only good thing she could see about what she was about to do was that it would end the entire degrading episode. It must, or she could not bear it.
What seemed like eons later, she pushed herself up on the mattress and swung her legs off, sliding slowly to the floor. The wood planking was cold to her bare feet, but she expected it and made no sound. Standing erect, she began to drift with infinite caution around the side of the bed that lay between her and
the chair where the clothes were piled. She touched it lightly with her fingertips, barely grazing it, so that she would not bump into it in the dark.
“Where are you going?”
She gasped, her nerves leaping under the skin, as he spoke. Damn a man who slept so lightly! It was a moment before she could find her voice. “Nowhere. Go back to sleep.”
“Were you looking for something?”
“No…” she began, then realized before the syllable was out that some explanation was required. Her mind raced, searching for the most plausible excuse, the one furthest from the truth. “No, not really, only Martha must have moved the chamber pot.”
“Here on my side.”
There was nothing else to be done. She found the pot. After a moment, she moved away again.
“Now what?”
“Nightshirt,” she murmured.
“Never mind, I’ll warm you.”
She was only two steps from the chair. “Really, I—”
She was caught from behind and lifted in strong arms. René swung around with her. The bed ropes jounced as she landed on the mattress, then he was beside her, drawing her into the prison of his arms. The warmth of his body, the male smell of him, washed over her. She felt ill with the defeat and the thwarted rage it engendered. She wanted to lash out, to kick and scream.
None of that would help. She lay unmoving, but the effort to remain so sent a shudder through her.
“You really are cold,” René said, and held her closer, drawing the bedclothes higher and tucking them around her shoulders.
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