The Earl's Untouched Bride (4 page)

The Earl stared at him. Captivating? Until this morning he had barely looked at her. Like a little wren, she hid in the background as much as she could. And when he had looked he had seen nothing to recommend her. She had a beak of a nose, set above lips that were too thin for their width, and a sharp little chin. Her hair was a mid-brown, without a hint of a curl to render it interesting. Her eyes, though...

Before this morning she had kept them demurely lowered whenever he glanced in her direction. But today he had seen a vibrancy burning in their dark depths that had tugged a grudging response from him.

'What she may or may not be is largely irrelevant,' he said coldly. 'What just might prompt me to take her to wife is that in so doing I shall put Du Mauriac's nose out of joint.'

Conningsby laughed nervously. 'Surely you can't wish to marry a woman just so that some other fellow cannot have her?'

The Earl returned his look with a coldness of purpose that chilled him. 'She does not expect me to like her very much. You heard what she said. She will not even be surprised if I come to detest her so heartily that I beat her. All she wants is the opportunity to escape from an intolerable position. Don't you think I should oblige her?'

'Well, I...' Conningsby ran his finger round his collar, his face growing red.

'Come, now, you cannot expect me to stand by and permit her father to marry her off to that butcher, can you? She does not deserve such a fate.'

No, Conningsby thought, she does not. But then, would marriage to a man who only wanted revenge on her former suitor, a man without an ounce of fondness for her, be any less painful to her in the long run?

Heloise gripped her charcoal and bent her head over her sketchpad, blotting out the noise of her mother's sobs as she focussed on her drawing. She had achieved nothing. Nothing. She had braved the streets, and the insults of those soldiers, then endured the Earl's mockery, for nothing. Oh, why, she thought resentfully, had she ever thought she might be able to influence the intractable Earl one way or another? And how could she ever have felt sorry for him? Her fingers worked furiously, making angry slashes across the page. He had coaxed her most secret thoughts from her, let her hope he was feeling some shred of sympathy, and then spurned her. The only good thing about this morning's excursion was that nobody had noticed she had taken it, she reflected, finding some satisfaction in creating a most unflattering caricature of the Earl of Walton in the guise of a sleekly cruel tabby cat. She could not have borne it if anyone had found out where she had been. It had been bad enough when her
maman
had laid the blame for Felice's elopement at her door
—
as though she had ever had the least influence with her headstrong and pampered little sister!

With a few deft strokes Heloise added a timorous little mouse below the grinning mouth of the tabby cat, then set to work fashioning a pair of large paws. Folly
—
sheer folly! To walk into that man's lair and prostrate herself as she had!

There was a knock on the front door.

Madame Bergeron blew her nose before wailing, 'We are not receiving visitors today. I cannot endure any more. They will all come, you mark my words, to mock at us...'

Heloise rose to her feet to relay the information to their manservant before he had a chance to open the door. Since her seat was by the window, where she could get the most light for her sketching, she had a clear view of their front step.

'It is the Earl!' she gasped, her charcoal slipping from her suddenly nerveless fingers.

'It cannot be!' Her papa sprang from the chair in which he had been slumped, his head in his hands. 'What can he want with us, now?' he muttered darkly, peering through the window. 'I might have known a man of his station would not sit back and take an insult such as Felice has dealt him. He will sue us for breach of promise at the very least,' he prophesied, as Heloise sank to the floor to retrieve her pencil. 'Well, I will shoot myself first, and that will show him!' he cried wildly, while she regained her seat, bending her head over her sketchbook as much to counteract a sudden wave of faintness as to hide the hopeful expression she was sure must be showing on her face.

'
Noo!
' From the sofa, her
maman
began to weep again. 'You cannot abandon me now! How can you threaten to leave me after all we have been through?'

Instantly contrite, Monsieur Bergeron flung himself to his knees beside the sofa, seizing his wife's hand and pressing it to his lips. 'Forgive me, my precious.'

Heloise admired her parents for being so devoted to each other, but sometimes she wished they were not quite so demonstrative. Or that they didn't assume, because she had her sketchpad open, that they could behave as though she was not there.

'You know I will always worship you, my angel.' He slobbered over her hand, before clasping her briefly to his bosom. 'You are much too good for me.'

Now, that was something Heloise had long disputed. It was true that her mother should have been far beyond her father's matrimonial aspirations, since she was a younger daughter of the
seigneur
in whose district he had been a lowly but ambitious clerk. And that it might have been reprehensible of him to induce an aristocrat to elope with him. But it turned out to have been the most sensible thing her mother had ever done. Marriage to him had saved her from the fate many others of her class had suffered.

The affecting scene was cut short when the manservant announced the Earl of Walton. Raising himself tragically to his full height, Monsieur Bergeron declared, 'To spare you pain, my angel, I will receive him in my study alone.'

But before he had even reached the door Charles himself strolled in, his gloves clasped negligently in one hand. Bowing punctiliously to Madame Bergeron, who was struggling to rise from a mound of crushed cushions, he drawled, 'Good morning,
madame
,
monsieur
.'

Blocking his pathway further into the room, Monsieur Bergeron replied, with a somewhat martyred air, 'I suppose you wish to speak with me, my lord? Shall we retire to my study and leave the ladies in peace?'

Charles raised one eyebrow, as though astonished by this suggestion. 'Why, if you wish, of course I will wait with you while
mademoiselle
makes herself ready. Or had you forgot that I had arranged to take your daughter out driving this morning?
Mademoiselle
—
' he addressed Heloise directly, his expression bland '
—
I hope it will not take you long to dress appropriately? I do not like to keep my horses standing.'

Until their eyes met she had hardly dared to let herself hope. But now she was sure. He was going to go through with it!

'B...but it was Felice,' Monsieur Bergeron blustered. 'You had arranged to take Felice out driving. M...my lord, she is not here! I was sure you were aware that last night she...'

'I am engaged to take your daughter out driving this morning,' he continued implacably, 'and take your daughter I shall. I see no reason to alter my schedule for the day. In the absence of Felice, Heloise must bear me company.'

For a moment the room pulsed with silence, while everyone seemed to be holding their breath.

Then Madame Bergeron sprang from the sofa, darted across the room, and seized Heloise by the wrist. 'She will not keep you waiting above ten minutes, my lord.' Then, to her husband, 'What are you thinking of, not offering his lordship a seat? And wine
—
he must have a glass of wine while he is waiting!' She pushed Heloise through the door, then paused to specify, 'The Chambertin!'

While Monsieur Bergeron stood gaping at him, Charles strolled over to the table at which Heloise had been sitting and began to idly flick through her sketchbook. It seemed to contain nothing but pictures of animals. Quite strange-looking animals, some of them, in most unrealistic poses. Though one, of a bird in a cage, caught his attention. The bedraggled specimen was chained to its perch. He could feel its misery flowing off the page. He was just wondering what species of bird it was supposed to represent, when something about the tilt of its head, the anguish burning in its black eyes, put him forcibly in mind of Heloise, as she had appeared earlier that day. His eyes followed the chain that bound the miserable-looking creature to its perch, and saw that it culminated in what looked like a golden wedding ring.

His blood running cold, he flicked back a page, to a scene he had first supposed represented a fanciful scene from a circus. He could now perceive that the creature that was just recognisable as a lion, lying on its back with a besotted grin on its face, was meant to represent himself. The woman who was standing with her foot upon his chest, smiling with smug cruelty, was definitely Felice. He snapped the book shut and turned on Monsieur Bergeron.

'I trust you have not made the nature of my interest in your elder daughter public?'

'Alas, my lord,' he shrugged, spreading his hands wide, 'but I did give assurances in certain quarters that a match was imminent.'

'To your creditors, no doubt?'

'Debt? Pah
—
it is nothing!' Monsieur Bergeron spat. 'A man may recover from debt!'

When Charles raised one disbelieving eyebrow, he explained, 'You English, you do not understand how one must live in France. When power changes hands, those who support the fallen regime must always suffer from the next. To survive, a man must court friends in all camps. He must be sensitive to what is in the wind, and know the precise moment to jump...'

In short the man was, like Talleyrand, '
un homme girouette
' who was prepared, like a weather vane, to swing in whichever direction the wind blew.

Somewhat red in the face, Monsieur Bergeron sank onto the sofa which his wife had recently vacated.

'So,' Charles said slowly, 'promoting an alliance with an English noble, at a time when many Parisians are openly declaring hostility to the English, was an attempt to...?' He quirked an inquisitive eyebrow at the man, encouraging him to explain.

'To get one of my daughters safely out of the country! The days are coming,' he said, pulling a handkerchief from his pocket and mopping at his brow, 'when any man or woman might go to the guillotine for the most paltry excuse. I can feel it in the air. Say what you like about Bonaparte, but during the last few years I managed to hold down a responsible government post and make steady advancements, entirely through hard work and capability. But now the Bourbons are back in power, clearly bent on taking revenge on all who have opposed them, that will count for nothing!' he finished resentfully.

Charles eyed him thoughtfully. Monsieur Bergeron feared he was teetering on the verge of ruin. So he had spread his safety net wide. He had encouraged his pretty daughter to entrap an English earl, who would provide a safe bolthole in a foreign land should things become too hot for his family in France. And he had encouraged the attentions of his plain daughter's only suitor though he was an ardent Bonapartist. Every day Du Mauriac openly drank the health of his exiled emperor in cafes such as the Tabagie de la Comete, with other ex-officers of the Grand Armee. Much as he disliked the man, there was no denying he would make both a powerful ally and a dangerous enemy.

Finding himself somewhat less out of charity with his prospective father-in-law, Charles settled himself in a chair and stretched his legs out, crossing them at the ankles.

'Let me put a proposition to you.'

Monsieur Bergeron eyed him warily.

'I have my own reasons for not wanting my...er...disappointment to be made public. I wish, in fact, to carry on as though nothing untoward has occurred.'

'

But...Felice has run off. That is not news we can keep quiet indefinitely. It may take some time to find her, if you insist you still wish to marry her...'

He made an impatient gesture with his hand. 'I am finished with Felice. But nobody knows for certain that it was her I intended to marry. Do they?'

'Well, no...'.

'Then the sooner I am seen about in public with your other daughter, the sooner we can begin to persuade people that they were entirely mistaken to suppose it was Felice to whom I became engaged.'

'What are you suggesting?'

'Isn't it obvious? Since Felice is out of the picture, I will marry your other daughter instead.'

'But
—
but...'

'You can have no objections, surely? She is not contracted to anyone else, is she?' He held his breath while he watched the cogs whirring in Monsieur Bergeron's head. Heloise had spoken of proposals to which she had not agreed, but if her father and Du Mauriac had drawn up any form of legal agreement things might be about to get complicated.

'No, my lord,' Monsieur Bergeron said, having clearly made up his mind to ditch the potential alliance with the man whose star was in the descendant. 'She is free to marry you. Only...' He slumped back against the cushions, closing his eyes and shaking his head. 'It will not be a simple matter of substituting one girl for the other. Heloise has so little sense. What if she won't agree? Ah!' he moaned, crumpling the handkerchief in his fist. 'That our fortunes should all rest in the hands of such a little fool!'