Eloisa James - Duchess by Night (19 page)

Harriet sat down as wel .

Of course Jem appeared a moment later.

Ah, it is Mr. Cope, he said genial y. I wondered, when the footman reported that a young lady was the worse for drink.

I dont know why youd think so, Harriet said, looking up at him, final y, because there was nowhere else to look.

Our Kitty does not usual y drink to excess, he said, bending over to peer at his guest. It must have been a great disappointment that sent her into such a pit of despair.

I real y couldnt say, Harriet said. I believe that she expects you to ask her to marry her, perhaps even tonight.

Yet another disappointment in play, Jem murmured. Dear me, the poor girl seems to have gone to sleep.

I should go upstairs, Harriet said, not moving. There was a strange excitement racing through her veins.

Jem looked at her. And waste buttered eggs? I love buttered eggs. When they are cooked correctly, they are silky, and my cook makes them excel ently.

He could make a salad of straw sound delicious, Harriet thought. Two minutes later, a footman had picked up Kitty and carried her off.

Tsk, tsk, Jem said, sitting himself in Kittys chair. Young women cant drink like men, you know. Theyre apt to topple off to sleep before they even think of taking their wings off. I suppose thats what happened to the two of you?

Exactly, Harriet said. That describes it perfectly.

Never disappoint a woman, Harry, Jem said. There was a glint of amusement in his eyes that saidsaid what?

Ive been thinking about the lines of verse you keep handing me, he continued. I suppose youl have another two lines for me tomorrow?

I expect so, Harriet said, a bit cautiously. It depends on whether I am given another missive for you, of course.

The dark is my delight , he said. And then that business about the nightingale singing at night. You know, it almost sounds like a theatrical song, that kind that appeared in old plays.

Mr. Povy opened the door and placed a silver tray in front of them. Buttered eggs, he announced. Extra butter, as your lordship prefers. Hot tea with lemon.

The rest we can see to for ourselves, Jem said amiably, but with an unmistakable tone of dismissal.

He wants to be alone with me, Harriet thought with a thril . He wants to bealone. With me or with Harry?

Obviously with Harry, since he didnt know Harriet existed.

What were you working on today? she asked, biting into a piece of toast.

Letters, he said. My lord chancel or tel s me that the King is quite distraught over a debt to the King of Denmark. But since I advised two years ago that it was best to avoid giving any funds to the Guinny Company backed by Denmark, which they choose to ignore, I feel the privy-counselors wil have to solve this debacle on their own.

I didnt know that you exchanged correspondence with the lord chancel or, Harriet said.

Money, Jem said. If you have a great deal of it, it precipitates you into conversations in which you would prefer not to participate.

With the lord chancel or?

And the King. My guess is that the King wil remove the first lord of the treasury by the end of the week. The only thing of interest I did today was unpack a box of curiosities sent to me by a man in London.

What was among them? Harriet said.

A salamander, Jem said. And a squirrel shaped like a fish. Theres a piece of wood from the cross of Christ, which I utterly discount because its the fortieth such piece Ive been offered, and that number alone is enough wood to put a good wal on a privy.

Why did you buy it then?

It was part of the lot, Jem said. Monsieur Bonnier de la Moson died last year, and his col ection is being sold off.

I dont understand, Harriet said. How exactly can you make use of a squirrel shaped like a fish?

I dont make use of it. Knowledge is my ultimate end.

That sounds very grand, Harriet said. And yet knowledge general y has some use.

Not this kind, Jem said cheerful y. Im a feckless sort. I like to examine anything strange or unlikely very, very closely. There was a light in his eye that suddenly made Harriet wonder exactly how he found her strange .

Everything out of the common run of things is valuable in its own right, Jem said. People, after al , are so similar. The majority of them bore me to tears.

Harriet finished a bite of buttered egg. It sang to her mouth, if silky eggs had a voice. In that case, she said, why on earth do you always have a houseful of guests? Either you find them boring, in which case you should send them al home, or you actual y enjoy them.

Ah, but the people you find here are not in the common run.

Harriet thought about that a while. I dont agree, she said final y. I have been enjoying myself enormously. But while it is true that Kitty is rather more forthcoming about her particular ambitions, she strikes me as similar to many young ladies.

Kitty is no lady, Jem pointed out.

And yet she is akin to most of them. Theres a wistful look in her eyes, you know. I think she wil marry the next man who asks her I must remind myself to hold my tongue, Jem murmured.

She wil marry, Harriet said firmly, and then she wil have a great many children. And while she wil likely have fond memories of being one of the Graces, and perhaps even keep a feather or two as a memento, she wil have any number of delightful, noisy children and be very happy. In fact, I would guess that shel never think about her past as a wild young angel.

Youre remarkably cynical for such a young sprig, Jem observed.

Harriet snorted. Cynicism is not the provenance of the elderly.

And what is it brewed from, then?

Oh, boredom, she said lightly. When one is bored, one tends to spend an inordinate amount of time analyzing ones neighbors.

Thats why I would suggest that there is no great difference between your salacious guests and the run of the ton .

They burn more brightly. Gentlewomen are tediously attached to concepts of marriage and fidelity, even as they carry on affaires .

Are they? There seems to be just as much anxiety here as I find in the ton , Harriet said. Take Nel , for instance.

Nel appears to have something of a fascination for me, Jem said. She caught me in the corridor the other day and I thought she was going to leap on me like a ravening lion.

There is no accounting for tastes, Harriet said. My point is that Nel appears deliciously free of societys pressures. But secretly I believe shes rather desperate to marry you, rather than merely bed you.

I am afraid to ask about my true desires.

She opened her mouth but he raised his hand. I truly mean it. I dont wish to know. Vil iers?

Hes different, she said. He has a passion.

Chess.

Yes. When a person has a passion, his life is different.

And have you a passion? He asked it quietly enough, but the question rang in Harriets ears.

Had she a passion? Had she some reason for living that would make a mockery of Benjamins wish to kil himself? He kil ed himself because he wasnt the very best at chess. That was a passion, if you wish.

Not a true passion. And you?

Im lucky, Jem said, finishing the last of the toast. I have several. In fact, I am somewhat burdened with passions. I love creating things, like my rash tower. I love learning about odd things in nature, like squirrel fish. And I am very fond of watching how money moves through markets, which has been useful for my pocketbook.

You are lucky, she said. If one of those things fails to please, you can turn to another.

You need to find something, obviously. Harry, you need a passion.

W hen Harriet final y made it upstairs, she found Nel sitting on her bed. She suppressed a groan at the sight of her.

Nel leapt to her feet. Its working! she cried.

What is working? Harriet said, dropping into a chair. The warm glow of cognac had faded away, leaving her bone-tired.

Strange is beginning to notice me. I dont know how youre doing it, Harry, but its working!

How can you tel ?

We met in the corridor, and he grabbed me by the shoulders, looked into my face very seriously, and said, Isnt your family name Gale?

She stopped.

And then? Harriet prompted.

That was it. I leaned toward him a bit, in case he wanted to give me a kiss, but he set off down the corridor again. Stil , his interest is definitely piqued. And now I have an idea.

What is it? Harriet asked, smothering a yawn.

I think I might marry him.

Harriet couldnt stop a little laugh. Real y?

Nel was not the sort to be easily put off. Strange needs a wife. Obviously he is deeply attracted to me, and only waiting for the right moment to approach. If I play this correctly, hel marry me.

How wil you play it? Harriet asked.

Il refuse to bed him, Nel said. Only the first request, of course. And I need you to change the poem.

In what manner?

To signify matrimony, of course.

I cant see how to do that, Harriet said dubiously. Ive been talking about nights and delight. How can I turn that to marriage?

You can do it, Nel said encouragingly. Unless you think I should just let him come up with the proposal himself.

I think thats a better plan, Harriet said with some relief. The poem is already written. The last couplet wil rhyme Nightingale and Nel Gale, obviously.

I cant say I think much of that rhyme.

I never said I was a poet, Harriet retorted.

Nel bounded from her chair and bent to give Harriet a kiss. You are my knight in shining armor. Im so grateful to you! And she was gone.

Harriet stayed where she was, staring at her booted toes.

Benjamin was such a passionate man that she had faded into his shadow during their years of marriage. It was only when she wore mens breeches that she was able to parry and fence with a person like Strange. Normal y someone so beautiful would make her tongue-tied. He would look at her with indifference, and she would mumble and walk away.

It was only in breeches and stockings, with her legs exposed for the whole world to see, that she had courage.

A passion

Beyond a passion for wearing breeches.

The word slid into her mind with the cool sound of steel. If I were al owed to have any passion I wished, Harriet thought, I would have one for the art of the rapier. Jem had started her lessons in order, he said, to give her a weapon, to make her a man.

It worked. She felt powerful with that thin, dangerous blade in hand. She felt like the kind of person who should be listened to.

Her blood sang with the beauty of matching her opponents swirling movements with her own. It was a complex sort of mathematical thinking that she understood.

She got up and grabbed her rapier again, exhaustion forgotten. Pushing aside the chair so she had a good space, she began to practice the moves he taught her. Attack, parry, feint, thrust. Jems voice sounded in her head. The straightest path between two points is with your tip, not the side of your blade . She pretended she had an opponent opposite her, coming in with a swirling keen blade. She practiced her move against him over and over and over again. Watching the silver gleam of his blade, seeing it cut the air, bringing her own up to meet it.

Blocking is a move of last resort. Evade the blade.

She practiced that, over and over, imagining the angle of the blade, the position of the body, jumping to the side so that his invisible rapier slashed through space rather than her body.

By the time she bent over, clutching a stitch in her side, panting, sweat dripping from her brow, the house was deadly quiet. It had to be the middle of the night.

Yet somewhere she could hear

Could it be a cat cal ing? It sounded like a cry. Harriet wiped her face and put down her rapier. Her shirt was a bit damp around the col ar.

It was extraordinary how different it was to be a man rather than a woman. She never sweated in her womans clothes. Now her heart was thumping, and her blood was racing. It made her want to laugh.

Without bothering to pul her boots back on, she opened the door so she could hear the noise more clearly. That was no cat.

She started running.

Eugenia, the third floor, the locked door.

Harriet flew up the stairs, came to the huge oak door that barred Eugenias wing from the rest of the house.

She could hear her clearly now, little thumps from her fists beating on the door, and cal s drowned by sobs.

Eugenia! she cal ed. Its Harry. Whats the matter?

There was a rush of words, but she couldnt understand. So she raised her voice to a shriek. Is there a fire?

A little voice said, close to the keyhole. Theres a fire in my bedchamber.

Oh my God, Harriet said, her head starting to swim. Wheres the footman? Where is he?

She heard sobs. I dont know where he is. Ive been hammering for ages and no one came, and its cold and dark, and my governess She couldnt hear the rest.

Is there a lot of smoke? Harriet asked in her sternest voice.

She only heard sobs and something she couldnt understand.

Eugenia, I need you to listen to me. Put your ear to the keyhole. Is there smoke in the corridor?

Silence. Then: No.

Excel ent, Harriet said, her mind racing. Now, did you pul the bel cord in your chamber?

I forgot, Eugenia said, her voice catching in a sob. I was frightened and I ran out of there and I dont want to go back!

I dont want you to, Harriet said. Can you see the fire?

Eugenia sounded a little puzzled. Of course not.

Then stay right where you are, Harriet said. Dont move. If the fire comes, stay low. Il be back in one minute, Eugenia. Wil you be al right until then? She felt the door anxiously. It was chil , without the glow of a fires warmth. Surely the blaze wouldnt swel into the hal immediately. Eugenia! Can you hear me?

Yes, she said. But, Harry

Just wait, Harriet said sharply.

She turned around. She was on the third-floor corridor, and bedchamber doors stretched on either side of her. Without hesitating she pushed open the door closest to her, and felt for the bel cord. She couldnt find it so she ran to the windows and threw open the drapes.