The Countess Conspiracy (35 page)

“Well, then.” Sebastian sighed.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Robert enter the room. He was alone; Minnie didn’t like crowds, and if he remembered correctly, she’d had a bad experience at one of his lectures. Oliver and Jane followed; they’d brought Free with them. They flanked Violet and her mother, sitting in an easy group, smiling with one another.

“Maybe,” Sebastian said, “you might consider a very minimal introduction. Everyone here already knows me. One or two sentences, if you will.”

“Very well, sir.”

After that, there was nothing to do but wait. Wait while the seats filled in. Wait while the clock ticked closer and closer to eight in the evening. Wait a few seconds after that, until the doors closed and the ushers nodded to Jameson that the last stragglers had found their seats.

Jameson shuffled up to the front.

“Tonight’s lecture will be given by Mr. Sebastian Malheur. He needs no introduction, as his discoveries regarding the science of inheritance are known by all. I give you Mr. Malheur.”

Sebastian stood and looked out over the sea of faces. Some were familiar; others he’d never seen before. His lectures had always felt like a secret joke, one that only he and Violet understood. Tonight he felt a sense of gravity, as if his entire life had contracted to a pinpoint. Every one of his jokes had brought him here: onto a stage in front of the entire world, about to announce the truth.

He took a deep breath. His task was easy. All he had to do was point to Violet, and then watch her shine.

He felt as if all his life had brought him to this moment. One sentence from him, and everything would change. He took a deep breath and began.

“This isn’t Mr. Jameson’s fault,” he said in carrying tones, “but every word of that introduction was false. I will not be giving tonight’s lecture.”

A surprised murmur rippled through the crowd.

“I have never made any discoveries about the inheritance of traits, except a trifling piece I presented a short while ago regarding violas. And I am here today for one reason only: to introduce you to the person whom you should have known before now.”

He couldn’t look at Violet, not as he said those words. But he sensed her in the front row. He felt her unease and her hope as keenly as if those emotions were his own. The crowd had gone utterly silent in disbelief.

“I have been given the credit for the work I’ve presented thus far,” he said, “but in fact, my role has been more of a helper, if you will. So let me introduce the individual giving tonight’s lecture. This person did all the research for the work I presented, had the brilliant insights underlying every word I have ever spoken. Excepting, of course, the improper ones.” He grinned. “Those were mine.”

He did look at Violet then. Her eyes were wide, her mouth open. He smiled at her—he couldn’t help himself—and looked up at the rest of the crowd.

“I give you Violet Waterfield, the Countess of Cambury. Her ladyship will be—”

A rumble swept over the crowd, a thousand murmurs of surprise and disbelief.

“Is this a joke?” someone called from the side.

They’d know it was serious soon enough. The moment she started speaking, they’d recognize her mastery.

“Her ladyship,” Sebastian shouted into the din, “will be lecturing on her latest discovery, which, you will soon see, is her most exciting to date.”

For a second, he thought Violet was going to be ill. She sat in her seat breathing hard, looking down. But then Jane, seated beside her, squeezed her hand. Violet’s mother patted her knee. Violet took a deep breath. The greenish cast left her face and she rose to her feet.

She glided to the front, turned, and…

And she smiled. She smiled as only Sebastian had ever seen her smile before, a smile that filled the room, fierce and powerful.

This is not a joke,
that smile said.
You will have to deal with me on my own terms, from here on out.

Sebastian had never felt so proud. He stole to the seat she had vacated, sliding between Jane and Violet’s mother.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” Violet said. “Today, I give you the chromosome.”

Until this moment, only Sebastian had seen this side of her—the side without sharp prickles, the side that was nothing but sheer exuberance. Damn anyone who said that she wasn’t beautiful. She was now.

“You don’t know what a chromosome is—yet.” She beamed at the crowd. “But you will. Let me start with the work of my colleagues. Mr. Malheur is one, and he has sold his contributions rather short. I could not have managed this work without his lengthy and comprehensive work on violas, as you shall see. I must also give equal credit to Bollingall here at Cambridge, whose work was vital.”

She left off any other designation, which Sebastian suspected was a deliberate choice. She had spent hours talking the matter over with Mrs. Bollingall.

And then she was off. She didn’t hesitate. She didn’t flinch. And even though Sebastian was aware of a couple whispering behind him—whining, in truth, because apparently Violet giving the lecture rather than Sebastian had upset some ridiculous plan of theirs—he had eyes only for Violet. She was utterly incandescent.

He noticed the gentleman behind him only when the man stood and left twenty minutes in—a deeply boorish choice.

Violet did not falter despite that rudeness. He was fairly certain she didn’t even notice it.

By the time she started showing the enlarged sketches they’d made of Alice Bollingall’s photographs, the murmurs had nothing to do with her gender and everything to do with her work. When she brought the talk to its triumphant conclusion, Sebastian was not the only one on his feet, shouting and stamping.

He barely registered that the gentleman who had left earlier had come to stand near him.

Jameson eventually waved the crowd to silence. They subsided reluctantly into their chairs—all but that one gentleman, who remained standing. Sebastian cast him a glance. He held a paper in his hand, and sported a ridiculous set of mustachios.

“This has been most illuminating, I’m sure,” he said. “And I’m sure we all have years’ worth of questions. But the schedule allots only twenty minutes. And so, gentlemen…”

He frowned and glanced at Violet, and then shook his head in confusion.

“…And, uh, ladies. If you might…”

The mustachioed gentleman stepped forward. “There will be no questions,” he said in a booming voice.

Jameson frowned. “Who are you?”

“I am John Williams, third constable for Cambridge.” He held out a paper with a flourish. “And based on the activities seen tonight, I have obtained a warrant from the magistrate.”

“A warrant?” Jameson stepped forward; Violet stepped back.

“A warrant,” the man said. “For the arrest of one Violet Waterfield, on charges of inciting a riot, uttering lewd and lascivious statements in a public place, and disturbing the peace.”

Chapter Twenty-three

T
HE CROWD SWALLOWED
V
IOLET
and the constable like an amoeba extending its pseudopods around a morsel of food.

An amoeba, Violet thought feverishly. A thingy-blobby. Thingy-blobbies had brought her here, and now thingy-blobbies were bearing her away. She was aware that she was not quite in her right mind.

They moved
en masse
to the magistrate’s court a few streets down.

In the press of those who surrounded her, she couldn’t see any of the people who mattered—not Sebastian, not her mother, not any of her friends. She still hadn’t quite wrapped her mind around what had happened.

She recognized the constable. It was William—he with the high-pitched, whining spouse—and he’d no doubt been looking for an opportunity to do this for ages.

“I’m a countess,” she whispered to him as they brought her before the bench. “I’ll have your badge for this.”

He regarded her with lazy intent. “I had to nip out to adjust the warrant,” he finally said. “I had planned to bring Malheur in, but you’ll do instead. I’ve had enough of these disturbances. If this ungodly work is yours, I hope you enjoy being branded a criminal.”

He’d even managed to muster three magistrates; they faced her, solemn in dark robes and white wigs.

Before the proceedings could start, Violet’s mother came to the front.

“Your Worships,” she said, “you have no power to hold my daughter. The warrant is sworn for Violet Waterfield, but your constable neglected to inform you that she is the Countess of Cambury. As a peeress, she can be charged with a felony only in the House of Lords.”

The magistrates looked at one another in sudden doubt.

“God,” one muttered, audible to Violet’s ears. “What a mess.”

“Is her husband present?” asked another.

“He is deceased.”

“So she’s a dowager countess, then?” He frowned.

“No,” Violet’s mother said. “The new Earl of Cambury is eleven years old.”

There was another frown. One of the magistrates rubbed his forehead. “Do the privileges of peerage accrue to peeresses whose husbands predecease them?”

“How should I know?” the other magistrate replied. “We’ve never charged a peeress before.”

White wigs bowed together in a hushed conference.

When they broke apart, the one in the middle banged his gavel sharply. “This court will adjourn until the morning,” he said, “in order to determine which body this matter must be brought before.” He looked over at Violet. “Your ladyship, I trust that we can be assured of your presence on the morrow?”

“Of course.” Violet held her head high. “I shall be here.”

“Then so shall we. Court is adjourned until tomorrow at nine in the morning.”

“I
CAN’T LET THIS HAPPEN.
” Sebastian slid his hands into his pockets, feeling the comforting weight of the round glass ball there. It had been only a few hours since Violet’s lecture had ended in disaster, and that thought had echoed in his head ever since. “I can’t let this happen to you.”

Violet stood in her greenhouse, the moonlight spilling over her plants, kissing her face with a pale, shimmering light.

“I don’t see how we have any choice.” She folded her arms and looked away. “Robert and Oliver are arguing law. Mama has arranged for legal counsel. We don’t know what will happen tomorrow. How can we prevent an unknown?”

She was so utterly calm, like an oak standing in stillness. Not a leaf rustled. He didn’t know how she could be so quiet, rooted as she was at the center of a maelstrom. He had no idea what to say to her, how to comfort her. He only knew that he had to make things right.

Her arms slid around herself.

God. He should have been the one to keep her safe. He should have told her what it would mean to take his place. If he’d been more circumspect in his lectures, less antagonizing, they might not be here. If he’d given that talk himself. The world was on fire with
ifs,
and they all pointed to the same thing. It was his fault, and he couldn’t let this happen.

She turned to him, but instead of accusation, her face was ablaze with light. “I know I should be worried,” she said, “but oh my God, Sebastian, did you see me? Did you
see
me?” She let out a delighted laugh.

He couldn’t help but smile. “Yes.” He slid his hands around her shoulders, drawing her close to him. “Yes. You were amazing.”

It was so easy to bend his head to hers, to feel the softness of lips he didn’t deserve to kiss, to hold on as tightly as he dared lest she slip from his grasp.

“But we have to think about tomorrow,” he told her.

“Mmm.” She shrugged. “I have to admit, I can’t quite believe that tomorrow can possibly come. This entire evening feels like a strange dream happening to someone else.”

“How odd.” Sebastian leaned down and brushed his lips against her forehead. “It feels like a strange dream to me.” He reached out and took her face in his hands. “One that is happening to someone else, when it should be happening to me.”

“It
is
rather ridiculous.”

“No.” He took a deep breath. “Violet, listen to me. It’s my fault this has happened. I antagonized those who’ve opposed what I was saying. Is it any wonder that they’ve finally responded? They don’t want to hurt you. Only me.”