The Disdainful Marquis (17 page)

“Belladonna,” Rose explained as they prepared to go. “Gives your eyes a sparkle like nothing else. I didn't offer any to you, dear, for it's a thing you have to get accustomed to. It blurs things up, you know. So when you look your best, you can't see a blessed thing. The lights all dance, and sometimes you can't be sure of recognizing who you're talking to, for you can't make out their face properly.”

“Sometimes,” said Violet cryptically, “that's a blessing, too.” Rose and Violet proceeded to the duchess's chamber with the slow, stately tread that Catherine now saw was necessary for them when their eyes were so unreliable.

The dowager was swathed in silvery gray, with so many diamonds shining at her throat and hair that Catherine felt sure her companions could only see a sparkling blur of her rich attire.

The duchess stared at Catherine. “Now, that's the way I like my companions to look,” she crowed. “You'll have every eye upon you. You're finally getting the hang of it. And Rose and Violet, you two are bang up to the mark. Let's away. Don't wait up, Gracie, for this is to be a late evening.”

Gracie nodded as they left, knowing hill well she dared not slumber till her mistress was safely tucked in bed again.

Catherine tried to sink back into the shadows as she sat in the coach. And she tried to be less aware of the startled looks that James, the duchess's coachman, gave her when she stepped out into the blaze of light and torches outside Count D'Arcy's residence. She felt, as she trailed along behind Rose and Violet, deeply ashamed of her new appearance, and of the spectacular effect it was having upon those who turned to stare at her.

As their little party was announced, all heads turned to the top of the stairs to see the quartet make their way down the grand staircase to join the company. Her eyes almost as blurred and dazzled as Rose's and Violet's, Catherine saw that these were men and women in the most elegant clothes and jewels that she had ever seen. The company was composed of the titled and the infamous—poets, mistresses, wanderers and actresses, the rag and tag of émigré Europe, and the foremost pleasure seekers from her own land. All collected together and flashing their eyes and gems and costumes beneath the light of a thousand candles while musicians tried to drown their converse with light music.

Many stared at the haughty Violet and buxom Rose. Many gaped at the regal duchess and her train of demireps, whose reputations had preceded her here. And many gazed with delight upon the delicious child with the figure of a grown woman and the face, even beneath the paint, of a lovely gamine.

Catherine tried to ignore the sensation they had caused and that her employer was obviously reveling in. She stared about her in shame and despair…until her eyes caught and held one familiar face high above the crowd. A face that she had been unwittingly looking for. He had been watching her, she thought in deeper despair, and there was no doubt in her mind as to his thoughts. The marquis looked at her, at her face, at her neckline. His handsome face was immobile, but the contemptuous disdain in his gray eyes was readable even from across the room.

Chapter IX

“Sinjun,” complained the petite dark-eyed woman, “you have been neglecting me. You've been here all night and you haven't danced with me once. You were not used to be so reluctant to enter my arms,” she said coyly, tracing patterns with her fingertip upon his sleeve.

“Cecily,” the marquis drawled, “you were not used to be Lady Smythe. Now that you are a respectable married woman, you cannot want to pick up our old ties. What would Alistar say?”

“Oh, pooh,” she fretted, stamping one foot—an effect, he noted with amusement, quite lost in the throng of people. “I haven't seen him all night either. He's probably off somewhere with that Italian trollop of his. We have a very modern arrangement, Sinjun,” she wheedled. “We each go about our own business, and no one's the worse for it.”

“Cecily, my dear,” the marquis said, beginning to edge away, “why should you try to reignite an old burned-out flame, when I have seen that devastating M. Dumont there has not taken his eyes off you for a moment?”

The woman wheeled and turned to look for her admirer and, not finding the rapt young face of M. Dumont anywhere nearby, she turned again to rate the marquis for his little jest and found herself standing quite alone.

With an exclamation of dismay, she flounced off to see her husband, to rail at him for his pursuit of foreign females.

“Oh, Lord, Jenkins,” the marquis said in a low voice, when they met at one side of the card room, “for every true rumor, there are a hundred false ones. I have a list of many names now, it's true, but coming here this night has added nothing. For no sooner do I get on the trail of something, when there is an interruption.”

“Your past catching up with you, lad?” Jenkins grinned.

“There's that, but I am quite expert at sidestepping. But more importantly, there's Beaumont. He's here, and he's everywhere tonight. He seems to be dogging my footsteps. And whenever I look into his eyes, I see tumbrels rolling. He suspects everything, but can prove nothing. “

“He can do nothing,” Jenkins said, lifting his glass of wine and holding it to the candle's light. “We're at peace now.”

“Now. At this moment,” the marquis sighed, “but if the scales tip, I would be first on his list.”

“Whose field does he play in now?” Jenkins asked before draining the glass.

“Ah, now that,” the marquis said, shrugging and then pausing as a waiter came close, “is a neat question.” He took another glass of wine for Jenkins and one for himself, and they toasted each other until the waiter drifted off into the crowd and they were alone again.

The marquis began drinking his wine and then stopped suddenly to stare at his glass. “Now that,” he said, “is criminal, such stuff to be even decanted in the land of the grape itself.” He looked around casually, then continued, now sure of their privacy. “If we discover which pockets he has his hand in, we'll know for a certainty which way the wind is blowing. Our estimable commissioner…of what is it now? Taxes, water? No matter, our friend Beaumont is an excellent weather vane. He catches every nuance of the winds of fortune. That is how he has gotten and held his own fortune. Be sure that he will never put a foot wrong. In fact, I think that if we were but privy to the workings of his mind, there would be no need to compile all these names. For whatever the fate of France is to be, be sure that Beaumont will know it a half hour before the king himself.”

“Aye,” Jenkins rumbled, “but as he's not one to give an Englishman the time of day, best keep your ear to the ground.”

“But not too obviously, of course,” the marquis sighed. “Instead I shall ogle the ladies, drink more than is good for me, game for all I'm worth, and submerge myself in every bit of frivolous gossip. There are times, Jenkins, when I long for no more than a cozy fireside. I grow old, I think.”

Jenkins gave a rude chuckle. “Oh yes. I can just see you there, dandling your grandchildren on your knee, graybeard. But in the meanwhile, until you can delight in such homey pastimes, I notice you're spry enough at your job. You haven't taken your eyes off the duchess's newest doxy all night. Is it that you think she holds the secrets of the succession behind those lovely blue eyes?”

The marquis seemed taken aback for a moment and then drawled in the offhand languid manner Jenkins knew so well, “No, that's an altogether different game. Miss Prunes and Prisms has arrived in Paris and finally shows her true colors. Or true paints, if you want to be more exact. She's obviously been after big game all the while. And I'm just curious to see to whom she attaches herself. For there's a lot to be learned from seeing to whom such a pricey little package delivers. Rose and Violet will ply their trade with whoever has the price of a night's entertainment. But these more expensive frigates will only sail off with someone who is prepared to come down handsomely for them. I think our little miss will show us the way the winds of fortune are blowing almost as well as our old friend Beaumont.”

Jenkins glanced around the room before saying dryly, “But she hasn't sailed off with anyone as yet. The last I saw of her, she was trying to blend in with the furniture.”

“She's only waiting for her opportunity, Jenkins. She's after more than her weak sisters-in-trade.”

“You are too harsh on her.” Jenkins sighed, shaking his head.

“Still thinking she is but a sweet little miss caught in the coils of misfortune? That's not like you, old friend. She comes to her first Paris fete, rigged out to the nines, painted and gowned like an actress. Did you see her entrance? She attracted more notice than a queen. The old girl's beside herself with happiness. ‘The Duchess of Crewe is a succés fou,' they are all saying. That little rhyme will be the catchword of the season.”

“Look sharp, lad,” Jenkins said, turning away. “Beaumont's eyes are upon us. He's talking to that waiter. His men must be everywhere here.”

As the marquis drained his glass and prepared to leave, Jenkins smiled and whispered one farewell. “You have to get your mind back on business. Why don't you just meet her price and then you will be able to forget about her and get on with it.”

The marquis walked over to the entrance to the great room where the dancers were whirling about together to the strains of a waltz. He watched them as he spoke with a young sprig just out of Cambridge on his first tour, who was chattering away excitedly. It was possible, he thought with a wry grin, to stand and chat with almost anyone at such an affair without even listening to half that was said. A sage nod, a small smile, or an occasional laugh when the speaker seemed to have delivered himself of a witticism was enough. He was the lofty, cynical Marquis of Bessacarr after all, wasn't he?

As the young man happily prated away, passing on all the secondhand tidbits he had amassed, Sinjun listened with half of his attention. The other half was focused on the amusing little playlets that passed before his eyes.

Lady Devon was playing her husband false with a handsome Austrian. Mademoiselle DuPres was batting her lashes at an old gentleman who had escaped the guillotine and come back to tend his lately restored estates. Mademoiselle DuPres knew, Sinjun thought, that the old chap would now need a wife to help him people his lands again. And Hervé Richard, who had been a man of substance and power when Bonaparte had led this land, was jealously watching his brother Pierre, who had been a beggar then and who was now a rich man deep in the Bourbons' confidences. The wheel of fortune had not yet done turning, the marquis thought, and that was why he was here tonight.

The marquis' eyes narrowed as he followed Hervé Richard's angry gaze. For his brother Pierre, as stout and overfed as his beloved friend Louis Bourbon, was dancing with Catherine Robins. Pierre smiled and bobbed, his red face beaming, while the girl seemed to be in an agony of discomfort. Was she never done with playacting? the marquis thought violently. She had captured the plum tonight. Pierre was a rich man now, and his presence at court gave him power and influence. And still she acted the shy virgin. But it seemed to be a useful ploy, for Pierre looked delighted with his little prize.

As the marquis watched, Beaumont, as neatly clad and unexceptional a little man as ever, came up to Hervé's side and began whispering to him. So Beaumont had some interest in watching the little playlet as well? Beaumont seemed to be consoling Hervé, who everyone knew burned with jealousy of his estranged brother. Now why should Beaumont be interested in Hervé? Sinjun's thoughts raced. Hervé was déclassé now, abandoned and impoverished. He had not followed his leader into exile, but he was financially and socially as much of an exile as Bonaparte. If Beaumont sought his company, then indeed something was in the wind.

“But, Sinjun, you say nothing. Don't you agree?” the little lord at his side asked.

The marquis recalled himself with difficulty. “Why, I'm sorry, Peter, I was distracted. What did you say?”

“I don't blame you. Not a bit. She's a smasher all right, isn't she? I wish I had the blunt to interest her,” the young man said sadly, looking over to where Catherine danced.

“Now, now, Peter, she's too rich for your blood,” the older man laughed. “And mine too, I think.”

“Never say so,” Peter replied, laughing. “Why, good English gold outweighs French any day.”

The two men laughed, and then the younger, seeing the marquis' distraction, bowed and went off in search of more congenial company. It was good to have spoken with the marquis, for he was a man of the world and one whose name would excite much interest and envy among his friends when he returned home. But he was a strange fellow, after all, so bored that he seemed half asleep, those gray eyes half masted and quiet throughout their whole discourse. Peter essayed the same look as he made his way to the punch and found he almost stumbled against a footman as a result. Practice, he told himself sharply, that would be the answer.

But there was no boredom in the marquis' eyes as he watched the interminable dance go on in front of him. He watched Catherine dip and sway in Pierre Richard's arms. Her figure was exquisite and her face entrancing, even under all the paint. The swept-up dark curls revealed her white vulnerable neck. The marquis found that his hands were clenched. There was no use for it. He was interested in her. He had been from the moment he had seen her. Jenkins was right. Though she might be nothing more than a cyprian, certainly less discriminating than any of the wenches he usually consorted with, he did desire her. And his fascination with her was only getting in the way of his mission here. He must have her and be done with it.