Unmasking Sin, page 21
He rose to his feet. “And now, having interfered and betrayed my friend to his fate, I shall take my leave.” He bowed elaborately. “Until tonight, my lady.”
*
Simmie’s jaw dropped when she saw the ensemble into which she was to dress her mistress. “What in the name of all that’s holy, do you want with a nasty wig?”
“I want you to dress it into a fashionable style that is quite different to anything I usually wear.”
The gown she had chosen was more elaborate than anything she had worn to Maida before—a ball gown that had been part of her first set of bride’s clothes and reviled thereafter. Burgundy silk and cream lace, it had been too mature for her at seventeen. At three-and-twenty, it was both eye-catching and almost regal. To a ton party, she would probably have worn it with pearls. To Maida, as the exiled Bonapartist widow, she chose the paste diamonds and garnets, which made her look just a little vulgar.
The blond wig styled very well and added to the style. She contemplated more paste diamonds by way of a headdress, and on impulse, rummaged in her own jewel box for anything she might string with good effect through her wig.
In the end, she upended the jewel box and gave it a shake. And to her surprise, on top of the meager jewels, the velvet bottom of the box landed with a soft thud. And on top of that, a dazzling, ruby necklace, with earrings tumbling over it.
She stared at the pile, her lips parting in shock.
Simmie said, “Where in the world did those come from?”
From a man called Renwick. Via Theo. “God knows,” she said aloud. “I must have borrowed them ages ago and forgotten about them. I’ll have a think.”
While Simmie began collecting her day clothes, Rebecca threaded the rubies through her fingers, wondering what on earth she should do about them. Give them to Renwick tonight? Or should she get some kind of document from him to prove their return and the writing off of Theo’s debts? She needed to speak to Ludovic.
Accordingly, she put them in the string bag that had once held the paste jewels and stuffed them into her reticule.
Ludovic. Her mind dwelled again on Mr. Francis’s words, and wonder thrilled through her heart. Ludovic loved her. And it was up to her to act. And she would. She really would, just as soon as the matter of his brother’s innocence was proved. And that could be tonight.
Her breath caught. With sudden decision, she rose from the stool and walked to the wardrobe, where she took down the lilac gown she had worn to Maida the night she had first met Ludovic. She folded it, together with its underdress and a shawl, and dropped them into the small carpetbag on the wardrobe floor.
“Simmie,” she called the maid as she was about to leave. “Have you ever been to Maida Gardens?”
Chapter Twenty
Captain Peveril Dauncy put the finishing touches to his evening toilette and considered a convivial evening at White’s. Of course, he was promised to that French fellow, d’Espan, or something like that, at Maida Gardens, which might have novelty value, though it was pretty far off the beaten track. And he had decided to get up early in the morning to see if he couldn’t earn the rest of that fee the Rawlstons had offered him.
Of course, he owed d’Espan, or whatever his name was, for stealing Ludovic Dunne’s woman. He grinned at himself in the glass at the memory. The arrogant, pompous ass had been made to look delightfully foolish, and Dauncy had been more than happy to share a bottle of champagne with the victor. They had been entertaining company, and the prospect of winning more money off d’Espan at cards was certainly appealing, if such a thing could be managed at a public masked ball.
But all in all, the place was vulgar, and d’Espan’s widowed sister-in-law, who had been promised as a treat, was probably forty if she was a day, pinch-faced with anxiety and frigid to boot. No, on the whole, a few hands of cards at White’s was probably preferable, followed by an early night.
The Rawlstons’ business could, indeed, be the beginning of a new career for him. If he made enough money at it, he need never follow his father’s demands and get leg shackled. After all, if he combined the new business fees with his half pay from the army, he could live very comfortably, pretty much as he liked, with no need of the old devil’s misery allowance.
So, White’s it was.
His valet presented him with a sealed note on a silver tray. He almost didn’t open it, but since the direction was not written in his father’s hand, he broke the seal and saw it was from Constantine Rawlston.
It may be of interest to you that the lady we discussed may attend the masked ball at Maida this evening. However, she is undecided…
“God’s boots,” Dauncy muttered angrily. “Have they nothing better to do than pester me with rumors of what she might do? They’d have me waste my evening by going all the way out there for nothing!”
He almost threw the note down without reading the rest, except a familiar name leapt out at him.
…she is undecided, due to the fact that our one-time solicitor, Dunne by name, is going to be there. Presumably, even she does not like to run into the help while at one’s leisure.
“Well,” Dauncy said, smiling. “That is a different case altogether. Maida it is.” Who knew? He might even get to kill two birds with one stone, as it were, come off scot-free and in good funds, and still take the widow to bed if she was pretty enough. And enjoy a lie-in the following morning.
Accordingly, he rifled his drawers for an old mask and domino cloak, then dropped a neat little dagger into one coat pocket and a small pistol into the other.
*
“Well,” Mr. Francis said, clearly impressed as he climbed into Rebecca’s hackney and squashed in beside the young woman who could only be the actress, Melissa. “You seem to have hit just the right note. What do you think, Mel?”
The carriage jerked forward once more, casting light and shadow over all of them.
“From what I can see,” Melissa replied, “he will be eating out of her hand within five minutes.”
“Do we need introductions? Discreet introductions, obviously. Madame, this is Melissa, who will cling to me like a limpet to give you the opportunity to engage Dauncy. Melissa, Madame Reine d’Espan, my sister-in-law, who may look down her nose a little at you.”
“Apologies in advance,” Rebecca said ruefully.
“No need. It’s not half what I usually suffer on stage,” Melissa said with a grin.
“What if he doesn’t come?” Rebecca asked them after a few minutes gazing out the window as they trundled past Hyde Park.
“I believe Ludovic has taken steps to encourage his attendance,” Mr. Francis said, though she must remember to call him Francois. He smiled slightly. “Don’t look so worried. You do not need to gush over him. A little aloofness will challenge him and draw him in so that he is desperate to impress you. Just follow my lead and elaborate as you need.”
“And we won’t let him touch you,” Melissa said bluntly.
Rebecca blinked. “Thank you.”
“Well, I wouldn’t like to be in Ludovic’s way if anything happened to you.”
Which left Rebecca speechless.
The familiarity of Maida helped to settle her. They tied each other’s masks in the carriage and descended entirely incognito. Melissa slipped immediately into character, chattering and giggling, while “Francois” bought their tickets, and they walked up the drive toward the pavilion.
The familiar strains of waltz music drifted down to them through the trees and gardens. After yesterday’s rain, everything smelled fresh and sweet, and it was once again a pleasantly warm evening, so the dancers had spilled outside and, as before, several tables bounded the dance floor.
Francis led them in the opposite direction to Rebecca’s usual table and politely seated his ladies opposite each other at a rectangular table before taking the chair beside Melissa. Hailing a waiter who tried and failed to avoid his eye, he ordered a bottle of champagne with four glasses and some lemonade for the ladies. Then he sat back, looking jovial, and he and Melissa looked around for a tall, fair man in uniform.
In the end, it was Rebecca who saw him first. While trying to appear aloof, she had been gazing around her in search of Ludovic’s familiar shape and failing to find it. Dauncy was rather more obvious.
He was not in uniform tonight. Perhaps he expected his companions to be too vulgar. A black domino hung from one shoulder, and he actually twirled his mask on one finger as he eyed the dancers as though considering cuts of meat.
“To the left of you,” she murmured across the table. “Just by the dance floor.”
Francis nodded curtly. Melissa chattered, and Rebecca looked deliberately bored. Presumably, when he considered he had impressed the dancing women enough, Dauncy turned away from them and slipped on his mask.
Francis bounced to his feet, waving, and Dauncy strolled unhurriedly toward them. He bowed to Melissa and murmured a greeting before he looked inquiringly from Francis to Rebecca.
“Reine, allow me to present my friend Captain Peveril Dauncy,” Francis said proudly. He appeared to be equally proud of them both. “Dauncy, my dear brother’s window, Madame Reine d’Espan.”
Rebecca offered him a languid hand while her eyes appraised him and apparently found him wanting. “Monsieur,” she said.
“Madame,” he replied reverently, holding onto her hand when he should, by the rules of English politeness, have let it go. He even kissed it according to continental customs. Suppressing her shudder of revulsion, she allowed herself to regard him with marginally more interest. “D’Espan told me of your beauty, but before God, he did not do you justice.”
“Once, perhaps, when I was young, I was beautiful,” Rebecca mourned. “Francois knew me then.”
“Sit down, Dauncy,” Francis invited, pouring champagne into the one waiting glass. He made small talk for a little and then turned to murmur something in Melissa’s willing ear.
Dauncy smiled at Rebecca and sipped his champagne. There was interest, but no recognition in his eyes. “So, what in the world makes you imagine you are no longer beautiful?”
“You mistake me, monsieur. I no longer care if I am beautiful.”
“Why not? Because you lost your husband?” he asked boldly.
She shrugged. “Beauty is a child’s obsession. In this life, what matters is not how you look but what you do. You are a soldier. You know this.”
He straightened very slightly at the subtle compliment. “Your husband was a soldier?”
“My husband was many things, but yes. Perhaps you met in the battlefields of France. You might even have killed him.”
Dauncy’s jaw dropped. “Here now, that’s a large jump! You mean you’re not emigrees? He did not fight against Bonaparte?”
“Of course not,” she said scornfully. She sat back, toying with her glass, challenging him with her eyes and her smile. “Does that make a difference to your perception of beauty, Captain?”
“Absolutely not,” he said promptly. “Would you care to dance, madame?”
She inclined her head, trying to give the impression that he had passed a first test. “Very well.”
Of course, the weakness in their plot was the dancing. He could confess all his crimes in her ear, and there would be no one but Rebecca to hear it. But she needn’t have worried. He did not pursue the previous discussion but talked of other things—the gardens, the weather, the quality of champagne. After a few moments, she let him hold her a shade too close, tried not to flinch as he brushed his leg against hers, and caressed her hand with his thumb. She let herself smile more frequently, tried to adopt an expression of reluctant admiration for the way he looked, the way he danced. Even while a voice in her head whispered, I hate this. I hate this. For this was the traitor who had let another man die, disgraced for Dauncy’s treachery.
Only by reminding herself of this could she keep smiling, keep dancing while her flesh crawled. For she had insisted on doing this, and it was for Ludovic.
As they returned to their seats afterward, she was aware for the first time of the shadowy figures at the table next to theirs. It thrilled her to know that one of them was Ludovic, with his friendly magistrate, and yet his presence made this whole, bizarre evening more real. She kept her eyes on Dauncy, holding his gaze to keep it from straying, though all he would see would be two—or was it three?—masked men of indeterminate features.
Francis, who had arrived back from dancing with Melissa only a second ahead of them, poured the rest of the champagne and called for another bottle.
“So,” Dauncy said, leaning back to distance himself from the other two as he drank from his glass. “Are you just visiting this country, or you exiled?”
“Visiting. You may not know it, but there are admirers of the emperor in your country, too.”
“I do know it,” Dauncy said. “In many unexpected places.”
Her eyes widened at the significance in his eyes and voice. Then she laughed. “You tell me you are one? I cannot believe you, Captain Dauncy.”
“You would give me the lie?” he said with a trace of hauteur.
“Oh, no, not exactly,” she replied, covering her mistake with a toss of her head that made his eyes darken.
His hand reached blindly for his glass, sipping while she talked.
“There are people who admired his upholding of the revolutionary principles that brought him to power and guided his laws that he spread throughout Europe. There are those again who admire only his military skill that defeated all the armies of Europe for so long. I think you might be the latter, with a sneaking sympathy, perhaps for the former. It is rare to meet an aristocrat who thinks so.”
Dauncy smiled. “What makes you think I am an aristocrat?”
“The way you carry yourself, like a king. And you are a British officer.”
“We are not all noblemen, you know.”
“But I think you are one. And yet, you admire Napoleon. That is something.”
“Oh, if you only knew. I more than admired him, madame. As I think, did you.”
She dropped her gaze to her glass and sipped, hoping to hide the sudden flush of triumph. “What did you do, sir? Discuss his tactics with your fellow officers around a campfire? In an admiring sort of way, of course.”
Dauncy smiled, clearly challenging her. “You are very disparaging…for a woman. It’s possible you have no idea of the things I have done, the risks I have taken in the cause you merely bleat about.”
“Merely bleat?” she repeated. Her voice shook, for quite suddenly, she wanted to laugh, and at completely the wrong moment.
“You are a woman,” he said dismissively.
“And must therefore stay at home with my needlework and my children?” she mocked. “Perhaps involve myself in a little charity work for the soldiers? Allow me to say, you have no idea what women are capable of, what I did, often in alliance with my husband, to bring about Napoleon’s victories!”
And she launched into one of the prearranged stories of daring and adventure that led to the fall of a vital fortress in Spain.
A smile began to spread across Dauncy’s face, not one of derision, nor even of shocked admiration, but of desire.
She began to feel nauseous.
“You are passionate,” he said low, his eyes darkening with arousal.
She forced herself to hold his gaze. “I am. Are you?”
And just like that, he began to tell a story of his own. Her eyes widened with perfectly genuine shock. For he was telling the story of the treachery laid now at the door of Ludovic’s brother.
Her awe was genuine. “You did this for France? For Napoleon against your own people?”
He shrugged. “Of course. Though it helped buy a few little luxuries, too.”
“You were brave, as brave as my husband when he and I sought to bring the emperor home from Elba…”
He swallowed that story, too, and, no doubt inspired by her blatant admiration, immediately capped it was another tale of his own, one she had heard nothing about before. This time, she refilled his glass, leaning closer to him.
“Tell me more, Captain,” she murmured adoringly.
And he did. At last, though without names, came the story of the missing foreign office document and how, when vising his uncle, he had planted it in the desk of a clerk, thus causing him to take the blame and the punishment.
“Leaving me free to continue,” he finished smugly.
“Truly, Captain, you are one of a kind,” she said fervently. “Indeed, you have quite upset me. I am overcome.”
Her hand did indeed shake as she took a reviving sip of champagne.
Her other hand was covered by his as he came closer yet, almost touching her face with his lips. “Shall we leave this place? Together?”
Forcing herself, she curled her fingers around his. “I am too overcome. You have brought back so much… But tomorrow. Yes, tomorrow, you must come. Francois will tell you where to find me.”
He smiled, a mixture of triumph and excitement. His hand reached up to her mask. “I have not even seen your face.”
She caught his wrist, smiling back. “Tomorrow, Captain. Tomorrow, you will see everything.”
His eyes almost goggled, and again she was flooded by quite inappropriate laughter, making her shudder as she tried to squash it. Fortunately, he took it for passion and kissed her hand.
“Then, madame, I will get on with the things I have to do before tomorrow.”
“You will not forget?” she said.
“How could I?” He sprang to his feet and bowed to her and to the table in general.
“What?” Francis said. “Off so soon?”
“Afraid so. But I have had a splendid evening. And tomorrow will be even better.” He kissed his fingers to Rebecca and walked jauntily away.
