The Orphan's Tale (58 page)

Paul V. Malet

Provisional Prefect

It made no sense, not after all that had passed between them over the past month. Surely, surely he could have worded such a message differently! But this short missive seemed so distant, so cold - were it not for his even, elegant handwriting, she might have thought that another had written it.

She set the embroidery frame aside and frowned at the note again, then crumpled it and tossed it into the grate.

Distance! Coolness! And this from the man who had held her at Montmartre and all but asked for her hand! She rose, shook out her shirts, and took the candlestick. She was tired and her bed was waiting. She would sort this matter out during the night, since she was certain she would be unable to sleep.

She mounted the stairs and went into her bedroom. The room was spare but comfortable, with light yellow wallpaper decorated with a medallion design.
Lace curtains covered the window beneath a puffed white muslin valance. A Persian carpet woven in a geometric pattern of warm reds and blues covered the floor, and a smaller rug of gray and red sat before the hearth. Her bed was narrow and deep, curtained with white and covered by a whitework spread that had been part of her trousseau at the time of her disastrous first marriage. Yellow Chinese vases covered with pink peonies, imported by her father from Shanghai, sat on the mantelpiece.

She unpinned her hair and brushed it about her shoulders, then raised her hands to the pearl buttons that fronted her bodice.
Her nightgown and lace nightcap lay across the bed. Someone - probably Marie - had turned down the covers.

She considered.
A posset would help her sleep. Best go downstairs and mix one for herself, and hope that it would help her forget her worry about Paul.

She refastened her bodice, tied her hair back with a rose
-colored ribbon, and started to the door.

A
knock upon the door made her jump.

"
Yes?" she called.

"
It's Alcide, Madame. Chief Inspector Malet is here - "

"
Paul?"

"
Yes, Madame. He asks to speak with you if you haven't retired yet."

Elise opened the door and stared at Alcide.
"It's late," she said. "Where is he?"

"
In the large salon," Alcide replied. "He looks exhausted." He hesitated and then said, "Do - do you want me to tell him you have gone to bed?"

"
No," she said. "I will be right down."

He was waiting before the fireplace.
Except that it was dark outside, things were just as they had been when she had first met him. This time, though, he seemed exhausted and drained, and he was gnawing his lower lip. Marie-Francoise had done that, too. On her it had been charming. On Inspector Malet it was touching, and she found herself thinking of the lonely little boy that he had been, growing up in that terrible prison, starved for love and struggling to rise above the filth around him.

And
then she remembered the note.

He had heard her.
He looked up as she came toward him. His eyes seemed almost black in the candlelight, and his mouth was tight, as though he were in pain.

"
I received that very abrupt message you sent me from the Prefecture," she said. "You told me you wouldn't be back tonight."

"
I apologize for the abruptness," he said. "I have been pushing myself too hard and it has affected my manners. I did have an emergency to tend to, and I was on my way to it, but I decided that it must wait until I settle matters here with you."

"
'Settle matters'?" she repeated, hurt by his tone. "I am not in any hurry, Paul. It can wait until you're rested."

"
No," he said. "It must be tended to at once. That is why I am here: I won't require those rooms any more since I will be returning to my own home tonight. There is a matter of outstanding rent owed: I believe I still owe you three weeks' rent: are we agreed on that?"

She looked straight at him.
"We are agreed," she said. "I can verify it in my books, if you wish, but I believe you are quite correct."

He nodded and sat down at her escritoire.
He took a sheet of her stationery and wrote briefly, then took another sheet and filled that. He blotted both sheets and handed them to her.

"T
his is a draft on my bank," he said, tapping the shorter note with the end of the pen. "M. de L'Aulnes of the Banque de France will honor it at once. The other is a receipt. If you will sign it, I can submit it with my Procès-Verbal and be reimbursed for my costs here."

Elise looked down at the papers.
"I see," she said. She raised troubled eyes to his face. "Paul - " she said.

He spoke over her.
"My belongings are packed," he said. "I will send my servant for them tomorrow. Our association in this venture will be concluded once you sign the receipt for me."

She scanned the receipt, then looked up at him.
"Do you want me to do this?" she asked.

"
Yes," he said.

There was nothing more to say.
She took the pen and dipped it in the ink, then paused. "I will miss you, Paul, when all this is - is concluded," she said.

His tired, somber expression warmed slightly.
"Yes," he sighed, leaning back in his chair and closing his eyes. "You made it very clear. Sign it, please."

She gazed down at him for a long moment, puzzled.

"Sign it quickly," he said. His eyes were still closed.

Her pen scratched across the paper.
She set it aside. "Here," she said, and offered the receipt.

He opened his eyes with an effort.
"Done?" he asked.

"
All done," she replied.

"
Then I am no longer in the terrible situation of being a guest under your roof," he said, rising. "Now - "

She lifted her chin.
"'Now - '?" she said challengingly.

He took both her hands in his and drew her to him.
"Now," he said. "There is nothing in the world to prevent me from telling you that I love you as I have wanted to all these past weeks."

Elise slipped her hands from his clasp only to move into his arms and raise her face silently to his.

"Now do you understand?" he asked when they moved apart.

"
I understand that you are my own darling guardian angel who worries too much about unimportant things," she returned a little tartly, for he had frightened her for a moment. But she raised her hand to touch his cheek.

He caught her hand and pressed it to his lips.
"But I was bred and born in scandal and I didn't want it to touch you. I have loved you almost from the first moment we met, and I couldn't speak until now, not while I was a paying guest sleeping under your roof. My God, it was hard! But I know how terribly gossip can hurt a lady like you, and I wanted to spare you that pain."

She chuckled and stretched up to kiss his cheek before subsiding against him once more.
"Then why, dearest, why did you act so oddly tonight?" she demanded, running experimental fingertips along his lapel, smoothing the faint line of the scar on his chin, delicately testing her new rights and privileges.

He drew a shaken breath and said,
"I wanted you to have a choice, so I summoned Saint-Légère home."

Her fingertips stilled against his lips.
She pulled away a little and frowned up at him.

He didn
't meet her eyes. "You see, I saw the letter you had written to him that night we went to the Butte. I was afraid you might feel something for him, still, but I wanted you to be happy, so I - I sent it in the official dispatch case for you. And you were smiling when you got his letter tonight... I love you so much, Elise - I have never felt this way for anyone before. And I thought if you did care for him - I thought you should have a choice, even if it meant you might not choose me, so I called him home just now, before I came here - "

"
That was when you sent that abrupt message!" Elise exclaimed. "But you didn't mean to come back when you sent it!"

"
No," he admitted. "But then I realized what I had just done. I thought I might have lost you - I couldn't bear it. Elise, I can't live without you. Will you marry me?"

Delighted warmth filled her like wine, and she clasped her hands behind his head and drew him to her again.

"My noble idiot!" she said through her laughter. "I gave you my answer at Montmartre almost a week ago. You only needed to ask the question. That letter you sent to Charles for me told him I couldn't marry him because I loved another. Tonight's letter was his response accepting that and assuring me of his continuing friendship."

She looked up into his eyes and her laughter gentled at his expression.
"Oh my love!" she said. "How could I look at another once I had seen you? My life was nothing but empty bustle before you came, meaningless pursuit of busyness less as a means to accomplish anything than as a way to keep myself from thinking. And then you came to the Rose d'Or, and it was as though I were seeing things through new eyes and learning of a new sort of life, one with purpose and nobility. I couldn't help loving you. Now that I have found you, I will never let you go. Now stop all this nonsense and kiss me again!"