A Proposition for the Comte

by Sophia James

  ‘Others?’

  ‘Cummings, for all his double-dealing, isn’t the killer. Antoinette Herbert is paying somebody else to do that. I had thought at one point it might be you.’

  ‘It wasn’t.’

  ‘I realised that when you came to warn me that Violet was in danger.’

  ‘So they were trying to set me up, too?’

  ‘It seems so.’

  ‘Your ministère sent me a letter explaining the problem of the missing gold. If Cummings is involved, he would have seen that missive.’

  ‘Which may be the reason this has suddenly all escalated.’

  ‘You think he warned Antoinette Herbert?’

  ‘I saw her at his town house last week. She left in the early morning.’

  ‘She is his lover?’

  ‘She was Harland Addington’s lover, too.’

  ‘Good God. I will have her house searched.’

  ‘I don’t think she would keep the gold there.’

  ‘Where else, then?’

  ‘She’d need someone who was used to handling such things.’

  This thought rebounded into others and Lian remembered the jeweller Whitely’s fear and wariness when he had registered Violet’s presence in his shop. Whitely was a big man and, when Lian had shaken his hand on entering his premises, his palms had been calloused and hardened. Like a soldier. Miller had been a soldier, too. Could there be some connection there?

  Whitely knew the work of George Taylor and he had been an associate of Harland Addington. It suddenly all made sense.

  ‘Douglas Cummings has summoned me to appear tomorrow morning before him to answer to six cases of murder. I did kill four of them but that is because they had kidnapped Violet and were trying to kill me. Eli Tucker saw to the rest.’

  ‘Is she all right? Violet?’ Mountford’s question was tightly asked.

  ‘She is now but the past days have been difficult for her, to say the least, and so she is resting upstairs.’

  ‘Where are you meeting Cummings tomorrow?’

  ‘At his house, which I thought unusual.’

  The Minister shook his head. ‘Sometimes we speak to those from a higher echelon of society in an informal environment. Given your title, there is a precedent for it.’

  ‘If you were to be present it would be more formal.’

  Mountford began to laugh. ‘I can see why your ministère sent you here, de Beaumont, but why should I want to walk into the tiger’s den for you?’

  ‘Not for me so much as for Violet. You promised her mother that you would always watch out for her.’

  ‘How would you know I did that?’

  ‘Violet told me.’

  Mountford sat down heavily.

  ‘Your wife is rich and came with an unblemished pedigree. Violet’s mother was the daughter of a self-made businessman and although the money was there it was not excessive. It was the hope of more that persuaded you to seek greener pastures, a decision you regretted within a month of marrying the woman who became your wife. But by then it was too late for the both of you as she had married Wilfred Bartholomew.’

  ‘You have done your homework.’

  ‘Now is your chance to wipe the slate clean and make amends. Violet needs to be protected and this is one way you can be certain to do it.’

  ‘Very well.’

  ‘Don’t tell Cummings you are coming. Let us just see how it all plays out.’

  After giving Mountford the details of the timing of the appointment and seeing him off, Aurelian went upstairs to find Violet. He wanted to know that she was safe with such a suddenness it took his breath away.

  She was sleeping, with her hair hung in a winding braided plait against the sheet, redness magnified against the pale.

  As if she knew he was there her eyes opened, awareness flooding into the green-grey depths.

  ‘I was dreaming of you.’

  He smiled at the words and crossed to the bed, sitting on the coverlet. ‘Charles Mountford has just left.’

  She frowned. ‘What did he want?’

  ‘I asked him to come with us tomorrow when we see Douglas Cummings. He said he would, which is a help.’

  ‘Come to bed, Aurelian. Come and warm me up.’

  Lian stripped off his clothes quickly and slid in beside her and she tipped up her head and kissed him. All the worry was pushed away and he felt himself relax. She was here and she was his. The walls he had always held around himself tumbled down until there was nothing left to hold him back.

  ‘When I first saw you, all I could see was the light.’

  He said the words softly but they were important because she had to know what he was to her before tomorrow. Taking a breath, he continued.

  ‘I was always in darkness, you see, and it was a relief to feel the bright break through. Before you,’ his voice shook but he made himself carry on, ‘before you I was lost.’

  * * *

  Violet was astonished at his words, the quiet of night around them and one small candle burning on the table beside the bed.

  She sat up.

  ‘What is it you are saying, Aurelian?’

  He came up beside her. ‘I am saying that I love you and have done since the first moment I set eyes upon you when I awoke after the doctor had visited. I love your bravery and your honesty and the way you are kind. I love that you are like a warrior in your protection of family. I love you with every part of my heart, Violet, and with each breath I take.’

  Tears pooled and she could feel them rolling down her cheeks. To listen to such a promise was beyond anything she had hoped for. This was not the immature love she’d felt for Harland but a real and solid and for ever love with a man who was moral and honest and good. Aurelian believed in things that were not greedy or shallow or pointless. He had fought for his truths and his life and here he was finally laying down his heart for her, giving her words that could leave no room for misconception.

  ‘Will you marry me, Violet, and become my wife?’

  ‘What if we don’t have children?’

  ‘Then we don’t.’

  It was simple and easy, the hope of it left in the hands of fate. It was as if a huge burden had been removed and she felt the weight of it slide away.

  ‘Then, yes. I will marry you.’ There was no hesitation now or uncertainty. ‘I love you, too, Aurelian, and I have done since that night you made love to me when I asked for your protection. Before that I had never known what it could be like between a man and a woman.’

  ‘Well, I have not felt it like this before, either, so perhaps it is just us.’

  She laughed and leaned into him, feeling his arms coming about her and his heart beating as fast as her own.

  He kissed her then, slow and deep, taking the time to let her understand what he felt wordlessly and she answered him back.

  How easily he could do this, she thought smiling, this rousing her into heat. The space between her legs throbbed with desire and she closed her eyes with the ecstasy.

  He would be her husband and she would be his wife. Together. For ever. Two halves of a whole. She reached down to find his centre and rolled over on top of him.

  ‘My turn now, Aurelian,’ she said, and his teeth flashed in the half-shadow.

  ‘Mon plaisir, Lady Addington. Fais comme tu veux.’

  My pleasure. Do as you like.

  ‘You promise?’

  ‘I do.’

  The words were said as a vow and she smiled.

  ‘In the church when we are married remember this moment.’

  He laughed, the room fused with humour and hope.

  ‘Love me, Aurelian.’

  ‘I will.’

  * * *

  The day began badly, with the snow that had threatened falling steadily and the roads, as
a result, clogged with traffic. Aurelian looked tense, and even more tense as the moments ticked on by, holding them up.

  ‘You wish us to be early?’ Violet asked this as she rearranged the shawl she wore around her neck to keep out some of the cold.

  ‘I want to see Cummings’s face when Mountford arrives, for surprise is a great revealer.’

  ‘Of guilt?’

  ‘And of knowledge. The Minister’s presence will worry him.’

  He gazed out the window and Violet saw that they were moving again and that the obstruction ahead had been cleared away. Eli Tucker and the others would be just outside Cummings’s house watching and that was a relief for with Violet beside him he wanted nothing at all to go wrong.

  ‘If there is trouble stay low and leave the room as quickly as you can. Stand next to Mountford. He is the safest of all the options apart from me, though I wish to hell that I had not let you come...’

  ‘You couldn’t keep me away and I would have followed you had you left me, for this is my battle, too.’

  ‘Douglas Cummings will either take flight or fight when he sees Mountford. I am picking the second but I have no true knowledge of Antoinette Herbert’s movements for she was not at her house at all last night.’

  ‘You had her followed?’

  ‘I did. Tucker is both circumspect and largely invisible even given his size.’

  ‘But you think there are others, too, in this.’

  ‘I am certain of it and I pray to God they are not all out in force this today.’

  They had reached the house of Douglas Cummings now and alighted from the carriage, Aurelian’s arm beneath her elbow as he helped her up the steps.

  When they were shown into a salon to one side of the entrance he saw Mountford and Cummings standing together and his blood froze momentarily. Had he underestimated Charles Mountford’s lack of morals?

  Pushing Violet behind, Lian drew his pistol, levelling it at both of them, but Mountford spoke without turning a hair.

  ‘I have explained our concerns to Douglas, Comte de Beaumont, and he is as eager to bring this farce to an end as you and I are.’

  ‘Farce?’ Aurelian could barely get the word out, his eyes skimming the further parts of the salon to qualify danger. Finding no one about to pounce upon them he lowered the gun, but still kept a tight grip upon it.

  ‘The French gold has made fools of us all.’ Cummings said this. ‘Harland Addington was adamant that the bounty would be a lot more lucrative than it was but with so many involved in its disappearance there was not much room for sharing.’

  ‘Who was involved?’ While Cummings was talking it seemed a good idea to encourage him at it.

  ‘Harland and Violet Addington for starters.’ His eyes raked across Violet, hatred in the stare. ‘The jewellers Miller, Taylor and Whitely and Antoinette Herbert with all her lies and deceitful plotting. Perhaps in truth she was the worst of them all.’

  ‘She was your lover?’

  Cummings laughed but the sound was rough. ‘She used her body to get what she wanted and led men like bulls with hoops of gold through their noses to make certain that she held the upper hand.’

  ‘You murdered Miller, then, while he was a prisoner?’ Mountford asked, disgust in his words.

  ‘No. I let her in to talk with him, that was all. I think it was a poison she used. There was yellow froth coming out of his mouth as he died a few hours later.’

  ‘And George Taylor. You were seen at Chichester about the same time he was murdered?’ Aurelian asked this.

  Cummings blanched. ‘I’d had a note to meet Whitely the jeweller there. He didn’t turn up and so I left for London only to find Taylor had been murdered half a mile away from the tavern I was directed to wait at.’

  ‘Whitely is definitely involved, then?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘But why are you? You had a job with a sense of importance in it. A family.’

  ‘I did not imagine it would come to this. I wanted some money to pay off my bills. I’ve worked for fifteen years solid in this department, for God’s sake, and I’ve never as much as had a holiday.’

  ‘Well, you will have a long one now. I am letting you go from this day on and there will be charges laid.’ Mountford sounded furious.

  The door closed suddenly, with a bang that had Violet jumping as the lock turned. Aurelian crossed to wrench at the handle but no amount of movement could release the catch. Then two canisters were thrown through the window, the glass exploding into flame and smoke and sending fragments of metal through the air.

  Aurelian launched himself at her and she found that she was on the floor, his body plastered across her own. With the smoke in the room Violet could not make out any other form, though she had seen Douglas Cummings fall in the first few seconds after the blast.

  ‘Mountford?’ Aurelian’s voice.

  ‘I’m here...in the...corner.’

  His words sounded strange and uneven and after checking she was all right, Aurelian moved across to the Minister. With the clearing of smoke, the damage became so much more apparent, blood splattered across the room. Cummings was dead, lying face down at a strange angle to one side of the window.

  Finding her wits, Violet stood, testing her legs which felt like jelly beneath her.

  ‘Be careful of the glass shards,’ Aurelian warned her and when she looked across at him his face and arms were dotted in small points of blood.

  Outside she could hear people calling from the street and there was a rush of feet on the pavement. It was the fire brigade by the sounds of it and the long arm of the law would be with them.

  Then the door opened and Eli Tucker held the jeweller Whitely by the scruff of his neck. ‘This man threw the canisters, my lord. He was hiding in the garden.’

  Alexander Whitely looked nothing like the prosperous and arrogant jeweller of a few weeks before. He was dressed in black and his face was screwed up in anger.

  ‘She made me do it. Antoinette Herbert and her fancy promises which have all come to nothing. She even took the gold back from my shop and she promised she would not.’

  ‘Take him outside and hold him.’ This came from Aurelian as he stood sheltering Violet across the room from where Douglas Cummings lay. His arms came around her strong and solid, the smoke wafting about them making her cough.

  Was there fire, too? She suddenly saw flame take on the fabric of the sofa, threatening to light the curtains.

  Aurelian moved to lift the rug across the fire, jerking away the long curtains from their pelmets and stomping on them with fervour, his hands and face blackened by the task.

  Finally there was a silence.

  * * *

  Much, much later they lay in the main chamber of the town house in Portman Square, the curtains pulled back from the window frame so that they could look outside at the night.

  The glass fragments from the explosion had been removed from Aurelian’s face, the process leaving him with a swollen eye and a split lip.

  ‘So where do you think the gold will be?’

  ‘Antoinette Herbert herself has probably stashed it away. Mountford will find it, believe me, just as he will easily track her down and he will be the one to return it to Paris.’

  ‘What of your father?’

  ‘That’s part of the bargain I made. He will be released into Mountford’s custody and he will bring him back to England.’

  ‘To live at Compton Park?’

  ‘No. He will want to be with my sister at the house of my aunts’ outside of London.’

  ‘My goodness. I shall inherit a family that grows by the moment, then.’

  ‘You will like them, too, for they are good people.’

  ‘And Amaryllis?’

  ‘They can come home when they wish to.’

  ‘Will the gold go to N
apoleon?’

  ‘I doubt it. Our countries might have been at war but those with true power always keep doors open for other opportunities.’

  ‘Like you do, Aurelian?’

  ‘Less so now than ever before. Now I know what I want and it is only you. We can be married as soon as everyone is home again.’

  She laughed at that and took his hand. ‘Thank you for all you did for me today. I hope these don’t hurt too much.’ She touched with one finger his face in all the places the glass had punctured.

  ‘Kiss me and they will feel better.’

  When she turned to him in the semi-darkness she did a lot more than that.

  Epilogue

  Ten weeks later

  They were married at Compton Park, under a bower of roses, in the small chapel attached to the house. Violet could not even imagine where her husband had found flowers in such abundance.

  She wore pale ivory silk overlaid with the most beautiful lace she had ever seen. Aurelian told her that it made her look like an angel and that she should always be dressed in such finery.

  His father had come from France, and although he was thin and pale at first, he began to look healthier with each passing day. Amaryllis and the children had also returned from being abroad, looking much better than they had in years.

  Summerley Shayborne was the best man and Violet had asked Aurelian’s sister to stand up with her as a bridesmaid. Berenger was sweet and young, and her laughter and enthusiasm brought joy to all the proceedings.

  Celeste Shayborne arrived with vases of jasmine and camellia and fuchsia from her hothouse at Luxford, her grandmother having bound them with colourful ribbons so that the chapel looked like a fair with all the marks of celebration upon it.

  Aurelian’s aunts were also present, and although they seemed stern to begin with they soon lost their inhibitions and danced away with the rest of the party.

  Lytton Staines, the Earl of Thornton, came to support Aurelian as did his other great friend Mr Edward Tully.

  Towards midnight Aurelian led Violet out on to the glassed-in balcony overlooking a courtyard.