Jane Feather - Charade

by Unknown

  black script, lay on the desk. Justin examined it idly. The writing was most definitely masculine but notes written, according to the rules of dalliance should appear with Danielle's hot chocolate of a morning, not arrive late at night. Justin found that his reaction to the message was somewhat similar to his wife's when faced with Margaret's urgent summons. He was more than ordinarily curious. But Danielle would doubtless apprise him of the contents with her usual directness.

  He heard her voice some fifteen minutes later bidding a cheerful good night to the porter and Justin went into the hall to greet her.

  "Milord, you are before me." She moved toward him, all smiles. "I have had a famous evening. You would not believe the latest on dit about Lady Massey. She is apparently enceinte and she must be all

  of thirty-three, but her husband is a very old man—sixty if he is a day. However, her lover is unjeune homme and it is said . . ."

  "I can well imagine what is said." Justin, mindful of the night porter, eased her ungently into the bookroom. She wore a gown of dull gold over an oyster satin underdress. The de St. Varennes diamonds caught the light from the branched candelabra. But in spite of their many-faceted brilliance, they paled beside the vibrant sparkle of her eyes, the soft radiance of her skin.

  "You have an admirer, my love." Justin indicated the note, watching through narrowed eyes as she examined it. Did he imagine the slight stiffening of those slender shoulders as she read the contents?

  "It is only the Chevalier D'Evron. He wishes me to drive with him tomorrow." Danielle ripped the note into small pieces and tossed them onto the tray.

  "And will you do so?"

  "Mais, d'accord." Her lower lip disappeared between small pearly teeth. "We speak French together, Justin, and talk of France and the past. It is good to be with a compatriot, tu comprends?"

  "Oui, Danielle, je comprends." It seemed a reasonable statement and he was quite prepared to let it go

  at that until she spoke again, hesitantly.

  "There is something I think I should tell you, Justin."

  The hairs on the nape of his neck prickled, but he merely inclined his head in invitation.

  "I have been drawing some considerable sums to assist the emigres from Paris who find themselves in difficulties." Danielle perched on the arm of a chair and began to twist the diamond ring on her finger.

  "I should perhaps have mentioned this earlier, milord, but for some unaccountable reason it did not

  occur to me to do so." She looked up with a rueful smile.

  "And why does it occur to you to tell me now, my love?" Justin was conscious only of the strangest

  sense of relief.

  "I think it is probably because I shall be needing to spend rather more," she said candidly.

  "I see." The earl took snuff. "Tell me, Danny, are you asking my permission or merely apprising me of the facts?"

  "The latter, I think, sir." Her face was grave. "I could not refuse to help. Their situations in many cases are quite dreadful. Most of what they had, they have been forced to leave behind and it is hard for them to find work and . . . the children, Justin. They are hungry."

  There was nothing of the mischievous sprite about her now. Not for the first time Justin reflected that

  his wife's personality was as many-faceted as the brilliant prisms encircling her throat.

  "D'Evron is also involved?"

  She nodded. "The chevalier discovers the need and does what he can to alleviate matters. There are others beside myself who provide money and also work. D'Evron is attempting to set up a network of assistance. One person alone can do little and your entire fortune, Justin, would be a mere drop in the ocean."

  "I do trust, Danny, that you will refrain from dropping my entire fortune into that ocean." Justin regarded her quizzically and she gave a low laugh.

  "I will sell my diamonds first, milord."

  "And I will oblige us both by assuming that remark was made in jest. But I should warn you that I did

  not find it in the least amusing."

  "No, my lord," Danielle murmured meekly, dropping her eyes.

  "Impossible brat," Justin said without rancor. "You will,of course, do as you think fit whilst maintaining some control over your philanthropy. Is it agreed?"

  "Agreed." Danielle gave him a radiant smile. "I keep very careful records, Justin. Do you care to see them?" She moved to the rolltop desk and opened a small drawer, reaching into the back for a sheet of paper covered in immaculate calculations. Justin examined the figures, fascinated. She was incredibly meticulous and while the final sum was certainly sizable it was no more than many a giddy wife lost in

  an evening over the pharaoh tables.

  "You trust D'Evron to act for you in these matters?" he asked bluntly, handing back the document.

  Danielle flushed with annoyance. "I am not quite such a numbskull as you appear to think, sir. If I did

  not trust him, I would hardly give him carte blanche with your money."

  "No, no of course not. Forgive me, Danielle. I meant no aspersions on the chevalier's character or on your perspicacity." Linton made haste to retrieve himself. "Come, let us consider the matter closed for

  the moment. I should be glad if you will keep me informed as you think necessary."

  "Well, there is just one other matter," Danielle said, seizing the opportunity. "There is a family by name

  of Duclos that the chevalier has mentioned to me. I should perhaps explain how I would like to help

  them . . ."

  * * *

  Danielle lay awake through most of the night, miserable in her guilt. She had lied to Justin for the first time and she could not quieten her conscience by saying that it was a lie of omission rather than commission. She had deliberately given him a half truth that would provide her with an excuse to be in D'Evron's company and would ease any suspicions as to her other activities.

  Justin slept in tranquil peace beside his wife, his hand on her hip moving unconsciously to keep pace with her tossings and turnings. When he awoke at dawn she was deeply asleep, in her first deep sleep of the night. He slid from the bed, drawing the covers over the creamy shoulders, examining the small face with a frown. Even in sleep there was a tension, a small crease between the straight eyebrows. She looked much as she had done in those fugitive days in Paris. Justin wondered if the plight of her countrymen was causing her to relive her own privations—if so, his efforts to distance those memories for her were as naught. But there was only so much one could do to heal another, and Danielle was most definitely in control of her own destiny, for all that she was a brat and a vagabond with a mercurial temper and a wicked tongue.

  * * *

  It was some two weeks later when Danielle stepped out of the hired sedan chair onto yet another filthy lane just off Fleet Market. "You will wait for me," she said tersely to the bearers who, since they were clearly not to be paid at this point, had little option.

  Danielle had now made several of these excursions without the protection of the chevalier and there was no hesitation in her step as she walked into the narrow hallway where layers of grease formed a shiny patina on the walls. Muted voices came from a room on her left and she turned the doorknob with the

  tips of her gloved fingers. The small room was bitterly cold; little daylight came through the exiguous grimed window and what light there was flickered uncertainly from tallow candles. The girls working at the long table were little more than children, their arms mere sticks poking through ragged sleeves. Not one of them raised their eyes from their stitching at Danielle's entrance. The reason for their lack of interest rose heavily from a chair in the far corner. The woman's arms were like tree trunks splotched with large brown freckles; her gown—if it deserved such a name—was a dirty gray, hair, of similar color, wisped beneath a filthy ragged cap.

  "You be needin' somethin'?" she wheezed. Danielle took a step back from the gin-sodden breath.

  "How can you expect these chil
dren to work without light?" Danny demanded. "They'll ruin their sight."

  Mrs. Bumbry was taken aback. Her mouth hung slack and the yellow-stained eyeballs stared. She was not accustomed to being taken to task for her working conditions and certainly not by young ladies of Quality, and, unless she was headed for Bedlam, she was being confronted by Quality. Her girls provided the undergarments that went on the backs of stolid bourgeois matrons and Mrs. Bumbry had contact only with the agent who commissioned her, provided the materials, and haggled over the price.

  A choked giggle came from the table. Mrs. Bumbry's arm swung and the giggler fell off her stool to collapse in tears amidst a heap of discarded material, scraps of thread, and much dust.

  Danielle restrained herself. To jump to the child's defense would only bring down further retribution on her head once her defender had left. "You have an Estelle Lanton indentured to you, I think."

  "What's that to you?" Mrs. Bumbry grunted.

  "I wish to break her indenture. I think, if you want your-girls to continue with their work, we should talk elsewhere." Danielle walked to the door, the skirt of her riding habit caught over one arm. She had decided some time ago that riding habits were the easiest form of dress for these forays into London's underbelly. Mrs. Bumbry followed the slim figure, not because she wished to but because quite unaccountably she seemed to have no choice. "Do you perhaps have a parlor?" Danielle inquired sweetly. "Or somewhere where we may be private? Please do not concern yourself about the dirt. It does not worry me in the least."

  Mrs. Bumbry, who had never concerned herself about dirt except on her girls' fingers when it might be transferred to the materials, looked around the small hallway with new eyes. She had conceived considerable dislike for this young woman who stood tapping an elegant booted foot on the grimy floor, her cold brown eyes quite at variance with the polite smile.

  Mrs. Bumbry opened a door onto a small parlor of overstuffed chairs and dust-laden tables.

  "Thank you." Danielle walked past her, whacked an armchair with her riding crop, stepped back as the dust rose, and decided to remain on her feet. "You have the indenture papers, madame?"

  "Estelle's indentured to me for three years." Estelle also happened to have the neatest fingers when it came to placing delicate stitches.

  "Nevertheless, Mrs. Bumbry, I am come to break the indenture. We will agree on a price."

  The other woman's eyes shifted. Maybe she could afford to lose Estelle for the right price. There were hundreds of others dying for want of work, maybe not so neat, but they could be trained. "'Ow much?"

  "One hundred guineas." Danielle knew that it was much more than Mrs. Bumbry had paid for her slave girl and she knew also that it was only the beginning of the bargaining.

  "I couldn't let 'er go fer that," Mrs. Bumbry whined. "One of my best workers, Estelle is. An' I spent months trainin' 'er."

  On a starvation diet supplemented by a heavy hand, Danielle reflected. "I would like to see her papers," she said. "You will understand that I cannot negotiate without seeing what I am negotiating for?" Her

  tone was benign, her manner reasonable, and Mrs. Bumbry decided that the game was worth playing.

  "Hundred and sixty," she said, laying Estelle's papers on the desk. "Not a penny less. I worked with that girl for months and she don't even speak the lingo."

  "May I see?" Danielle moved round the desk and the next minute the papers were in her hand. "One hundred guineas, Mrs. Bumbry. It is a great deal more than you deserve."

  "You give those back, you hear?" the woman shrieked. The door burst open and a man twice the size of Mrs. Bumbry appeared.

  "What's goin' on 'ere?"

  "Nothing at all," Danielle said calmly. "Is this ... uh ... lady, your wife? Because if so, I think you might be well advised to fetch the smelling salts. She is a little distrait, you understand."

  While they gobbled, one in fury, the other in total incomprehension, she tore the indenture papers into shreds and laid one hundred guineas on the desk. "You may count them if you wish. But I think you will find that the sum is correct." With that she swept from the room, crossed the hall, and opened the door onto the sweatshop. "Estelle?" Her voice was soft. "Viens avec moi, petite."

  The girl was perhaps ten, her eyes sunken in the pale face, and she held her body as if prepared for a blow. "What do you want of me, milady?" she whispered.

  "Rien du tout, ma petite. I am come to take you home. Your maman has need of you." Estelle hesitated, her gaze darting fearfully toward the door. A yellowing bruise stood out on her cheek.

  "Allons-y, Estelle." Danielle took the girl's hand, conscious that every moment of hesitation lessened her advantage of surprise. When the two in the parlor recovered there was no knowing who they would summon to their assistance, and not even D'Evron knew that the Countess of Linton was in Sheep's Alley this afternoon. She had her pistol, of course, but it wasa threat best kept for emergencies. She hustled the girl out of the house where the sedan-bearers still stood, picking their teeth and kicking the cobblestones.

  When he saw the two of them, the leader spat into the kennel. "Cost yer double."

  The scrawny Estelle and the far from ample Danielle weighed considerably less than a tall, well-muscled man. But Danielle was in no mood for argument. "Qa va," she said shortly and pushed Estelle ahead of her. It didn't seem to matter that she had spoken French, her meaning was quite clear to the chair-bearers who trotted off rapidly, away from this unsalubrious neighborhood.

  Danielle had accepted that respect for her rank deteriorated in direct ratio to the distance she went from Grosvenor Square. An unaccompanied woman, however well dressed and haughty her bearing, was accorded scant respect. Her money was all that mattered and the indefinable aura of authority that was created simply by the presence of the pistol in the deep pocket of her habit.

  She pushed aside the greasy leather curtain to give directions to the bearers and then scrunched up on the narrow seat beside Estelle, taking the child half onto her lap. She explained that Estelle's father had found work in the kitchens of a hostelry on the outskirts of town. Her mother and the children would be lodged above the stables and Estelle was needed either to help in the hostelry or to watch the little ones while her mother worked. It was hardly an ideal situation for a family who had once commanded three domestic servants and a successful, if modest, epicerie in Corbeille Esson. But it was the best that D'Evron could do for them and unimaginably better than the hovel in Eastgate and Estelle's servitude in Mr. Bumbry's sweatshop.

  Danielle remained in the chair while Estelle ran into her mother's arms, then gave the bearers instructions to return her to Grosvenor Square. They were lean, fit young men, but their journey this afternoon had been long and arduous. Danielle would have paid them off except that she had no certainty of finding others to take their place in the squalid slums where chair-bearers never penetrated. Besides, they would be paid handsomely for their exertions and probably would not take kindly to losing their customer to rivals, anyway.

  Just before they reached Grosvenor Square, Danielle rapped sharply on the wooden frame and the chair halted. "I will alight here. I thank you for your trouble." The sovereign she handed the leader drew a small gasp and four tugged forelocks. Danny responded with a nod and set off on foot to traverse the few hundred yards to Linton House. She was in no physical danger at this point but much in danger of social censure should her unaccompanied walk fall under an unfriendly eye.

  "Danny, what in Hades are you doing?"

  "Jules!" She greeted him with a smile of relief. "You will give me your arm, will you not?"

  "I should rather think so! What are you about, coz? Going about town in a common sedan? Justin will

  be ..."

  "In quite a taking," Danny finished for him serenely. "But since he will not know of it, we need have no fear."

  Lord Julian, knowing his cousin, was not at all sure of that fact. "Danny, you have been up to something, and I insist on kno
wing what."

  "Insist, Jules?" Her eyebrows arched as they reached Linton House, Danielle in the perfectly respectable company of her husband's cousin.

  "Yes, damn it, insist." Julian stopped at the bottom step. "If you do not tell me what you have been doing, I shall tell Justin exactly what I saw."

  "Jules, you would not! You could not be such a tattletale."

  "You would be surprised, ma'am," he returned, grimly he hoped.

  Danielle had a great need to unburden herself and Julian, while he might hem and haw in an elder brotherly way, would as like as not enter into her story with considerable enthusiasm. She did not believe for one minute that he would be capable of bearing tales to her husband and told him so roundly, before saying that she had need of a confidant but he might regret finding himself in that position.

  Julian was quite certain of that fact but felt curiously responsible. His memories of the defiant urchin on the Dover road had not been completely extinguished and he had a lively sense of what his cousin's wife was capable in the right circumstances. If she was unable to tell Linton, then it was best that she tell him—at least that way one member of the family would know what she was up to.