by M C Beaton
She was wearing a gray cambric gown over which she wore a gray levantine pelisse. On her white hair, she sported a Park carriage bonnet of white crêpe over white satin lined with a fluting of broad blond. The crown was finished with light gauze puffing; on the left side was a bunch of Provence roses, surmounted by a marabout plume of feathers.
Her pale eyes held the twinkling humorous look often adopted by people who have very little sense of humor.
“I am at last come to see you,” she said with great condescension and not troubling to rise. Then she sat back a little in her chair and smiled benignly on both Delphine and the comte.
“Why?” The comte watched her with the bright, inquisitive look of a robin surveying a juicy worm.
“Why not?” parried Lady Gladstone gaily. “It is time I called to pay my respects.”
“Oh, yes,” said the comte. “I quite agree. But why now when you have not troubled before?”
“Well, really,” bridled Lady Gladstone. “I would have thought my very presence was enough in itself.”
“I do not agree,” said the comte patiently.
“Jules!” muttered Delphine in an anguished voice, but he affected not to hear.
A series of conflicting expressions battled their way across Lady Gladstone’s face. She had expected the newly married couple to be overwhelmed by the honor of her visit. Everyone was talking about the comte’s exploits and bravery in the market square. She had always prided herself on being a leader of fashion, and if the comte were to be fashionable, she did not want to be left out.
And so she rushed on. “I am come to invite you both to my little musicale. To be held on Friday.”
“This is Wednesday,” the comte pointed out. “Do you normally hold such impromptu affairs?”
“Oh, yes,” lied Lady Gladstone, who had planned this evening for some months and had had, until today, no intention of inviting the Comte Saint-Pierre or his wife.
Delphine eyed her husband nervously. She opened her mouth to accept, but the comte forestalled her and said quickly, “Unfortunately, we have a previous engagement for Friday. We are invited to Woburn.”
“The duke!” exclaimed Lady Gladstone. “But I was not invited.”
“It is only a small party for a very few friends,” said the comte smoothly.
Delphine knew her husband was lying, but good manners stopped her from pointing out this fact in front of Lady Gladstone.
Lady Gladstone had not felt so flustered or put out for quite some time.
Instead of having all the joys of patronizing the Saint-Pierres, it seemed as if they were patronizing her. The comte was looking at her with a polite sort of social pity.
“No doubt the dear duke was aware of my little evening and knew I should not be free to attend,” said Lady Gladstone, trying to keep the note of agony out of her voice.
“No doubt,” said the comte with patently false politeness.
“Mr. and Miss Bryce-Connell,” announced Bradley smugly. Minute by minute, the comte was becoming more of a hero in the Marsham Manor household. All the servants knew that it was thanks to his exploits in the marketplace that the county had started to call.
Harriet fluttered forward. “My dear Comtesse Saint-Pierre,” she cooed. “And my dear comte. Such fun watching you yesterday. So brave!”
“‘Pon rep, yes!” Geoffrey Bryce-Connell giggled, mincing across the room. “Wonderfulest thing I ever did see.”
The couple then affected to notice Lady Gladstone for the first time.
Harriet shrewdly guessed Lady Gladstone had come to invite the Saint-Pierres to her musicale. She also guessed that Lady Gladstone had not told them the affair had been planned some time ago.
“We are looking forward to visiting you on Friday, Lady Gladstone,” said Harriet. “Geoffrey thought I might have forgotten because you sent us your invitation such ages ago, but I said, ‘My dear brother, how could I possibly forget an invitation from Lady Gladstone?’“
“How very odd,” commented the comte lazily. “Lady Gladstone was just telling us it was an impromptu affair.”
There was an awkward silence. “In any case, you cannot come because you are going to Woburn,” said Lady Gladstone. “Tell me, Miss Bryce-Connell, what think you of …”
“Woburn!” Harriet interrupted, glancing sideways at her brother. “We cannot possibly compete with that. Geoffrey was just saying to Sir Giles Mancroft today that things at Marsham Manor have obviously changed—poor Sir George never went anywhere, you know—and that the Comte and Comtesse Saint-Pierre should be invited to the hunt ball next Wednesday.
“Sir Giles, of course, pointed out that invitations at the last minute are so rude, but I said, ‘Never fear, Sir Giles, I am sure the Saint-Pierres will understand, and Geoffrey and I will issue the invitation on your behalf.’ Now, do say you will come.”
“We should be delighted,” said the comte blandly, ignoring a fulminating look from his wife.
Lady Gladstone was pink with embarrassment.
At that moment, the door opened, and Maria Bencastle lumbered in. She had had a dreadful time. She had gone to Littlejohn to shop at the haberdashery, and Mr. Partington had affected not to see her, so she had been unable to get any service. People had pointedly turned their backs on her in the street, and several children had cat-called after her, shouting, “Meddlesome, gossipy crow.”
And now this! The comte sitting at his ease, entertaining the Bryce-Connells and Lady Gladstone.
Harriet’s beautiful eyes filled with malice as they rested on Mrs. Bencastle. “I have just been inviting the Comte and Comtesse Saint-Pierre to the hunt ball on behalf of Sir Giles,” she said. “They have graciously accepted.”
“Oh, very well,” said Maria ungraciously. “I am still in mourning. But I suppose it will be all right if I do not dance.”
“Oh, but you are not invited, Maria,” cooed Harriet. “After all those awful things you said about the comte being a spy, well, everyone always knew you had a wretched tongue, but they do feel you went a tiny bit too far this time.”
“I do not gossip,” poor Maria blustered. “It’s all lies.”
“Oh, but you do,” said Lady Gladstone, delighted to turn attention away from herself. “You told us all that Sir George had made a dreadful mistake marrying a French nobody.”
“And you did not encourage her one bit, either,” put in the comte maliciously.
Lady Gladstone began to look flustered again. “My heavens! How time passes!” she exclaimed, getting abruptly to her feet. “Pray escort me to my carriage, my lord.”
The comte walked out with her. “If having calls made on one,” said Delphine to Harriet, “means having to endure a display of spite in one’s own home, then I would rather be a recluse.”
“But you should be used to that,” exclaimed Harriet, raising her eyebrows. “I thought living with Maria would have inured you to it. Of course, we are all at fault and we did encourage Maria. She is so divinely malicious.”
“I will not stay here another moment listening to this,” said Maria Bencastle. “I thought you were my friend, Miss Bryce-Connell. Yes, I know you told me to call you ‘Harriet’ but that was when you were pretending to be my friend.”
“For someone who says she is not going to stay another moment,” said Harriet sweetly, “you are taking an unconscionable time in leaving.”
“Wait!” said Delphine. “There is no need for you to leave, Maria. Mr. and Miss Bryce-Connell are going.”
“Are we?” said Geoffrey Bryce-Connell, looking surprised.
Harriet opened her mouth to say something, caught the sparkling and militant look in Delphine’s eyes, and stood up hurriedly.
“Come along, Geoffrey,” she said, sailing towards the door. “We can say good-bye to the comte outside. Good-bye, Comtesse. Tell your fascinating husband that he must save at least one waltz for me.”
When the door closed behind the Bryce-Connells, Delphine turned to Maria Bencast
le, who was beginning to sob miserably.
“I think, Maria,” she said gently, “that we will forget all the yesterdays and start from now. As far as I am concerned, you never said anything. That way we can be comfortable again.”
But Maria Bencastle looked at her dumbly and then abruptly left the room.
“I hope that is the last call,” thought Delphine. “I really do not think I can bear any more.”
But during the day, carriages kept arriving in front of Marsham Manor, and the excited servants ran to and fro, carrying trays of tea and wine and cakes.
Maria Bencastle did not appear again. While carriages came and went, she sat in her room and nursed her injured pride. She was not a bad woman, only a very lonely, rather stupid woman with too much time on her hands who had always tried to rise in importance by criticizing other people.
She did not want Delphine’s tolerance or forgiveness. Maria Bencastle wanted to be proved right. She desperately wanted the Comte Saint-Pierre to turn out to be a Bonapartist spy after all and so restore her standing in the community and in her own eyes.
She had meant to apologize to the comte. Now she found she could not. She blamed him for her day of humiliation, for it was inconceivable that she should blame herself.
Delphine did not have an opportunity to talk to her husband until dinner was served. She waited impatiently until the servants had withdrawn, took a deep breath, and started to berate her husband.
How dare he accept invitations without consulting her first? How dare he lie about them going to Woburn when she doubted that the Duke of Bedford even knew of their existence!
The comte surveyed her lazily, occasionally stifling a yawn, until at long last she had finished.
Then he picked up a bell beside his plate and rang it. Bradley entered so promptly it was almost as if he had been listening at the door, which in fact he had.
“Good evening, Bradley,” said the comte to the old butler. “That was a singularly disgusting dinner.”
“I am desolated it did not meet with your lordship’s approval,” said Bradley.
“Yes, but what are you going to do about it? Only see how spleenish these dreadful viands have made her ladyship.”
“Jules. I must protest …”
“You see? Her ladyship protests also.”
“And it please, my lord, Mrs. Hamilton, the cook, is very old and is due to retire from your lordship’s employ.”
“Good. Then you will spare Mrs. Hamilton’s feelings by not repeating my criticisms. See Mr. Garnett and arrange that she be handsomely pensioned off. And find me a French chef.”
“My lord, the only French chef I know of hereabouts belongs to Mr. and Miss Bryce-Connell.”
“Is he accounted good?”
“Oh, excellent, my lord. Folks do say were it not for his artistry, then no one would call at the Bryce-Connells.”
“I will lure him away. Thank you, Bradley.”
When the butler left, Delphine said in a thin voice, “We did very well at Marsham Manor before you came. I was able to live a peaceful and well-ordered life. I have never had such an upsetting day. You chattered and chattered like a … a chatterbox. Sir George commanded respect from our neighbors. Oh, they have come to call, but simply because you are a freakish novelty.”
“No one called on Sir George the Good.”
“That was because he did not wish it so. Occasionally some of the French gentlemen he had rescued would visit us.”
The comte looked surprised. “Although your French has much improved, my heart, you still speak our language with a correct English accent. I was under the impression that until the arrival of the Marquis de Graux and Monsieur Renaud you had not spoken to anyone French.”
“That is correct.”
“But if these people called, did you all speak in English?”
“I was not allowed to see them.”
“Odso? Why?”
“Sir George felt the sight and sound of my countrymen might reanimate my memory and bring back to me the horrors I had endured.”
“Rather short-sighted of him,” murmured the comte. “Memory is a strange thing; the longer it is denied, the more violently it returns one day.”
“Every word you say,” said Delphine passionately, “is a criticism, direct or oblique, of Sir George Charteris. Well, I will never forget him, I will never stop admiring him.”
“And neither you should,” said the comte equably. “But do not expect to turn me into a copy of your late husband, Delphine.”
“And why not? What better model could you have?”
“You know,” he said plaintively, “some people might think I am rather a good sort of person myself.”
“And no one more so than you yourself.”
“Unfair, Delphine. All this bantering fatigues me immensely. You need not leave me to the seclusion of my port. I am going to retire.”
“Then retire,” shouted Delphine. “And good riddance!”
He looked at her for a long time, with a bland, pleasant expression in his blue eyes, until her own fell before his. Then he quietly left the room.
Delphine found her hands were trembling. She knew she had behaved abominably. But he disturbed her, threatened her peace by his very presence. He exuded a strong air of masculinity, a hint of possession. Today he had shown that he meant to be the master of Marsham Manor. That was not what troubled her.
There was something about him that suggested he was only biding his time, playing with her, until he should decide to master her.
And yet, on the other hand, she knew she had only to tell him she did not wish this marriage and he would leave.
After a long time, she became weary with her jumbled thoughts and decided to go to bed.
She went upstairs and slowly prepared for bed. She donned a very pretty nightgown of green silk with a deep décolletage and a froth of lace falling from the shoulders to the elbows. Delphine studied her reflection as she brushed out her hair. She had made the nightgown some years ago—why not admit it?—in the hope of making the staid and gentle Sir George more passionate.
The silk was very thin and showed every curve of her body.
She remembered the first time she had worn it, waiting for her husband, trembling in anticipation.
Sir George had entered the bedroom and had puttered about, getting ready for bed. Then he had seemed to see what she was wearing for the first time and had said, “Delphine, my angel, you must not wear such a thin and skimpy garment these winter nights.” He had gone over to the chest of drawers and rummaged through them, finally drawing out a thick flannel nightdress.
“Now, put this on immediately,” he had said in his fatherly way. “I do not wish you to catch the ague.”
That had been the night that was to be one of many such nights, when Sir George had kissed her gently on the forehead before turning over and going to sleep.
During his last illness, he had insisted she take a suite of rooms for her own use.
Delphine looked at herself again and put down the brush with a sigh.
What would Jules think could he see her in it? she wondered suddenly.
She went and opened the window and rested her elbows on the sill.
It had been showery that day, and the air was fresh and cold, carrying the scent of cut grass and flowers. A light wind whispered restlessly in the trees, blowing a strand of Delphine’s hair across her mouth.
And then she saw a dark figure lurking in the darkness of the trees at the edge of the lawns. Suddenly, the moon came out from behind its covering of cloud, and, at the same time, the figure stepped out from the shelter of the trees. It was a man with a thin, foxy face, white in the moonlight. He wore a drab sort of cloak and was hatless. He was watching the house intently.
Delphine drew back hurriedly and crossed the room and rang the bell. After some moments, a maid arrived, and Delphine told her there was an intruder in the grounds and to send out as many men as possible. Then she retu
rned to the window. But of the mysterious intruder, there was no sign.
She stayed, watching, at the window as servants began to appear in the grounds carrying sticks and guns, torches and lanterns.
The matter was being taken care of, but Delphine had an urge to tell her husband about it. Of course, she was not going to his rooms so that he could see her in her green nightgown. Of course not! She was merely going to inform him of the reason for the commotion outside.
The comte had Sir George’s old rooms, those that he had retired to in the last days of his illness. They were on the opposite side of the main staircase from those used by Delphine.
She knocked at his door and then went in, feeling silly and expecting him to be asleep.
But he was sitting by the fire, wrapped in a faded blue dressing gown which had seen better days.
“You really must order new clothes,” said Delphine. “You must realize, Jules, that you may draw on the bank anytime you wish.”
He rose to his feet and stood looking at her.
“Ma foi,” he said wonderingly. “And you, my heart, should never wear anything else.”
Delphine blushed. “I—I just came to tell you there was an intruder in the grounds. But I sent the servants to either find him or chase him away.”
He was still staring at her, a warmth and a glow in his blue eyes she had not seen before.
“Jules!” said Delphine sharply. “You are not attending. There is an intruder in the grounds …”
He took two steps across the room and gathered her in his arms.
“Don’t,” begged Delphine. “Please don’t.”
He slid one hand up under her hair and put the other firmly in the small of her back and pressed her tightly against the length of his body.
She could feel a slow, rhythmic pulsation from his body, beating through her own. She told herself she should break away before he kissed her. But it was already too late.
His lips, hard and firm, were already covering her own, slowly softening as they caressed her mouth, parting her lips while one hand seductively stroked the nape of her neck and the other slid up between their bodies to close over her breast.