by Sophia James
‘Will David come, too?’
‘If you are going he is bound to want to for I have seen the way my father’s godson looks at you. But be warned, although he is eighteen he is also far too boring.’
Cassie blushed, hating the red that often rose in her cheeks at the mention of anything personal. She had arrived in France four months earlier, travelling from London by boat into Marseilles in the company of her mother’s brother and her cousin, and the warmth of the south had seeped into her bones like a tonic.
‘I want to meet someone who will take my breath away. A rich man, a good-looking man, a dangerous man.’ Celeste’s voice held that thread of wishfulness that Cassandra had often heard her use. ‘I am so very tired of the milksop sons of my father’s friends.’
‘But what of Jules Durand?’ Her cousin’s latest swain had been at the door most days, professing his love and his intentions, a strange mix of shyness and gall.
‘He is not...manly enough. He tells me too much before I want him to. He kissed my hand yesterday and all I could think of was to pull away from the wet limpness of his lips.’
All of a sudden the conversation had gone to places Cassandra did not understand, the edge of virtue tarnished by a feeling that seemed...bruised. Celeste had grown up in the year since she had seen her, the lines of her body curvy and fuller. Tonight under the bedcovers some other feeling lingered, something wrong and false.
Her cousin’s blue eyes flashed. ‘Do you never wish for a man’s hands upon your body, finding the places that feel only magic? Do you not want to know the wonderment that all the great books talk of?’
‘No.’ Cassie pulled the collar of her nightgown full around her throat. Her own bedroom was down the corridor amongst the shadows and she had been scared to stay there, but this room suddenly held a fear that she could not comprehend.
‘You are no longer in boring stuffy old England. Here women know the dance of love and they flaunt it.’ Rising from her bed, Celeste simply pulled off her gown, standing against the flame of her lamp like a goddess.
‘I want to know what it is to be passionate and wanton and brave. Only dull wits shall be for ever stuck with one boring husband for the rest of their lives and I certainly shall not be that. When we are young we should be able to know...everything.’
Cassie’s eyes ran across the fat abundance of her cousin’s breasts, breasts that were so different from her own. Celeste’s waist had slimmed and her hips had spread and the hair between her legs had been trimmed back into the shape of a heart.
‘You look beautiful.’ The words came from the very depth of admiration.
‘Too beautiful to be wasted on the boys that I am forever annoyed by here.’ One hand cupped her breast and the other fell to the soft place between her legs. ‘There is no power more durable than that of womanhood. No influence over men as strong as the desire for sex. Remember that, Cassandra, when you do finally grow up, and use it wisely.’
Draping a blanket around herself then, she smiled, turning again into the more-known cousin, the girl who would push the boundaries, but was kinder with it.
‘You look shocked, Sandrine.’ She began to laugh in earnest now. ‘Shocked and stiff. I do not think you are made for such confessions.’
All the words fell across Cassandra. Words she had not heard before or thought of. Ideas that had been a part of a world far from her own, lost in the corruption of love. She wished she were home in England, Maureen in the chamber next door and her father not far away either. Rodney was too young to think much of right now, but even his presence would have been a relief.
‘Come, let us sleep, cousin, and I promise I shall behave myself entirely. You have been ill, after all, and I should not tease you.’
* * *
In her bedroom in London all those years later Cassandra dashed away the tears that came so readily whenever she thought of Celeste. Her cousin’s promise had been fulfilled in blood and in pain, the danger of Baudoin’s brother Louis and the wildness within him no match for a slightly wayward French virgin steeped in the potential of adventure and romance.
‘Romance.’ She whispered the word into the room, and it curled into sin. Some losses were beyond comprehension and this was one of those. Some truths, too, were made mute by their sheer and utter horror.
Her truths.
No, she could never let Lord Nathaniel Lindsay know the exact depth of any of them and after discovering today that he worked for the British Service she knew she would have to be more than careful. Just another gulf of difference between them that could never be bridged.
* * *
Lady Acacia Bellowes-Browne hung on to his arm at the Smithson ball and laughed, a soft musical sound that ran through tenseness and made Nathaniel relax.
‘You said that you would come down to Bellamy for the hunting, Nat. I have held that promise for some weeks now’
‘And indeed I shall,’ he answered, liking the feel of her fingers on his skin, the many rings she wore decorative and colourful. He was about to speak again when Lydia Forsythe came across to the group.
‘I am sorry to disturb you, Lord Lindsay, but I want to thank you for your help the other week. Mama said you were most kind in ensuring that I did not bleed to death.’
‘I rather think that you would not have.’
‘Well, Miss Cassandra Northrup said that I might and she is thought to be most proficient of all in the arts of medicine. When I visited her to give her my thanks she barely allowed my gratitude. Instead, she has asked for my help with her charity. Mama, of course, does not approve, but I think it is important...to remember about the plight of others, I mean...’ She petered off as Acacia began to speak.
‘Cassandra Northrup has lobbied us all in her pursuit of supporting those less fortunate.’
Interest sparked his question. ‘You think she is too assertive in her search for patrons?’
‘No, not that. She is known to delve into the shady corners of London when locating all the broken women and I think she understands neither the dangers nor the gossip associated with such an occupation. She looks as if butter would not melt in her mouth, but I have it on all accounts that she is well versed in the art of self-defence.’
‘Isn’t she just wonderful?’ Lydia Forsythe’s eyes were alight with hero worship, and the woman standing with Hawk, who Nat had not met before, also nodded her head.
A paragon and model of charitable benevolence. What would these people say if they were cognizant of the truth as he knew it? He had not told a soul about the names she had given to Lebansart. A questionable protection? A foolish guardianship? Even for England he had not betrayed her.
‘She will never marry again, of course. She has made that quite plain.’ Acacia’s voice drifted into his thoughts.
‘She won’t?’
‘No, my lord. The love of her life was lost in a terrible accident in Paris and she has no want to ever offer her heart to another.’
Nat’s mind scrambled. Paris?
‘Well, I think that it is romantic to tender thoughts for a husband long dead.’ Lydia Forsythe for all her youth was most outspoken in her opinions. ‘I have asked the Northrup sisters to my ball and they have promised to attend.’
‘An inducement of money for the cause would no doubt bring them running,’ Acacia was quick to add. ‘The Daughters of the Poor is a worthwhile charity, however. I have a maid acquired from that very organisation and she has been a godsend. Cassandra Northrup’s benevolent society is both efficient and organised.’
‘She has a school somewhere?’ Nathaniel could not believe what he was hearing.
‘In Holborn. When the girl was sent to me she was well equipped with clothes and books. Miss Maureen Northrup is apparently the one who sees to that side of the business.’
Hawk began to laugh
. ‘They sound formidable.’
‘They are. Kenyon Riley is involved in the endeavour as well.’
‘I thought he had lost a leg somewhere in America?’
‘Lost a leg and gained a fortune.’ Hawk took up the conversation. ‘And his great-uncle, the old Duke, is about to die without issue.’
‘A timely inheritance, then, for the Northrups.’
‘Oh, indeed,’ Acacia trilled. ‘And Kenyon is most besotted by them.’
Nat looked away. Cassandra Northrup had a knack of landing on her feet after adversity and using others to the very best of her own advantage.
Of all the men in the world he was the one to know that.
‘Maureen Northrup has her own worries.’ A wide frown marred Acacia’s brow.
Now this was new.
‘She does?’
‘She is virtually deaf. She lip-reads, of course, and speaks in her inimitable fashion, but it is the younger sister who runs the show.’
‘And the father?’
‘Lord Cowper is a man who has tried to carry on the life’s work of his beloved wife. Something of tiny animals we cannot see that live on our skin and make us sick.’
Nathaniel’s mind went back. Sandrine had insisted upon dousing his gunshot wound in the clearing all those years ago with water and she had cleaned her hands before she had touched him. She believed in these things, too, then. Every single fact he heard about her was more astonishing than the last.
‘I have read of this. Such a hypothesis is gaining in traction in scientific circles as a credible theory.’
Acacia spread out her fingers and peered at them against the light. ‘Well, I can see no sign of these things of which they speak and because of the wild claims of their science there are many here in society who do not view the Northrups with much kindness. Bluestockings frighten men of little brain.’
Hawk began to laugh loudly. ‘Not quite the ideal of Victorian expectation.’
‘By virtue of ornamental innocence, you mean?’ Acacia shook her head as she said it.
Innocence.
The word stretched across the years, and Nathaniel was back beside the river in the small cottage of the Dortignacs, his new wife’s hair spilled across the pillow like living streams of fire and gold.
Madam and Monsieur Dortignac had insisted they both be up the next morning, bathed and dressed in clothes that were remarkably formal. It was therefore no surprise when a man of the cloth had appeared an hour later, although the blood had ebbed from Sandrine’s cheeks as she had grasped the intention of his visit.
‘Marriage? They want us to be married now?’
‘They feel as though they have fallen from grace, so to speak, by allowing us the freedoms of sharing a bed. This is their way of making amends with God.’
‘But you cannot possibly want this?’
He smiled. The light caught at her hair this morning and tumbled across the soft green-blue of her eyes. ‘Sometimes when people need things with as much passion as they need us to marry it does not hurt to humour them. Particularly given that they saved our lives by their actions and probably put their own at risk.’
‘You think it wise, then?’
‘I do.’
‘Well, I should never hold you to such a farce, Monsieur Colbert,’ Sandrine said. ‘If we are wed by simple expedience and obligation then who should need to know of it when we leave here?’
God. You. Me. The priest. Two names in a book that make this union traceable? Nat said none of what he thought, however, as he looped the chain over his head and unhooked the clasp.
‘I received this after my mother died. It belonged to her mother and her grandmother before that.’
‘Then you shouldn’t risk it with me.’
Ignoring her protest, he lifted her left hand, the cold smallness of it within his warmth. ‘Let’s try it for size.’
It did not fit her ring finger, but it nearly held on her middle one. When they reached Perpignan he would have it resized.
‘It almost looks as though it could be a real emerald,’ she said quietly, and he smiled as the Dortignacs and the priest came into their room. Madam Dortignac had found some winter wild flowers and she handed the straggly bouquet to Sandrine with a smile.
‘For you, my dear, she said softly. ‘The very last of the autumn purple crocuses.’
* * *
Much later, as Sandrine held her arm out so that the light glinted upon his mother’s ring, it was impossible to clarify what he felt, the witchery of the sickness from the wound at his side still holding him prisoner, yet something else free and different.
But while his mind was ambiguous, Nat’s body was not and the need in him surfaced beneath thin sheets. She had felt it, too, he thought, because she rolled over to watch him, a silent, wary question in her eyes and a hint of compliance. Her lips turned up at each end like the beginnings of a smile, a girl changing into woman right before his very eyes.
He could not help his want, nor could he rein in all that was left better unseen, the words of troth between them allowing whatever it was they might desire: warmth, relief, resolution.
Or nothing, with their sickness.
He wished he might touch her in quiet acquiescence, but instead he turned onto his back, sense winning out.
‘They were more than happy to leave us alone this time.’
At that she laughed, joy enveloped in the dark closeness.
He remembered the feel of her in the bed when he had awoken that first time, the contours of her body, the thinness, the elegance. Like catching energy and holding it.
‘You were a beautiful bride, Sandrine Mercier, with your hair let down.’
‘And my bare feet. Don’t forget those. But I think green suited me.’
‘Indeed. The ancient gown was particularly flattering.’
‘It was our hostess’s grandmother’s and it was twenty sizes too large. At least you had clothes that fitted.’
He held his tongue and wished that they were home at St Auburn, the English winter about them and everything familiar. When she had taken off the wedding gown after the ceremony the lines of her ribs had been drawn starkly on her skin.
‘You are too thin.’ He should not have said the words, he knew, a piece of paper gave him no mandate for such a criticism, but it was concern that made him speak, not disparagement.
‘I was sick. For a long time.’
‘At Nay?’
‘Before that even.’
‘And now?’
She shrugged and looked directly at him. ‘Have you ever lost someone close to you?’
He looked away.
‘My whole family, apart from my grandfather.’ He wondered at what had made him say it, made him confess to a hurt he had always held so very far from others.
Her fingers crawled into his, warm and true, the honesty of the connection endearing. He coughed to clear the thickness in his throat and thought with all this emotion he must be more ill than he knew.
‘My own mama died fifteen months ago. It was an accident.’
She stressed the last word in an odd manner, making Nat wonder if perhaps it wasn’t.
‘I was there when it happened and the doctor thinks my mind became damaged. Afterwards I could not be...happy. Papa grew impatient and I was sent on the journey south with my mother’s brother and his daughter to recuperate and forget.’
Cassie swallowed and held on to him even more tightly. The fever made her head swim and her vision blurry, but she knew exactly what she was saying. She needed to tell him—there was no going back because in the past few days even under the duress of hiding from those who would want to find them she had suddenly felt free. At liberty to be honest and say all that had been held bound in her mind.
He did not even flinch. ‘The accident?’
‘I added some liquid to her experiment before she had asked for it to be done and the vapour from it made her sick right then and there. She died three hours later.’
‘How old were you?’
‘Sixteen. Old enough to wait and listen.’
‘The exactness of science is sometimes over-exaggerated and the emotion of blame is the same.’
His voice was quiet, unfazed. For the first time in a long while Cassie did not feel breathless.
‘Did you intend to kill her?’ he asked finally.
‘Of course not.’ Shock jagged through her.
‘But you knew that those particular elements combined might cause a problem?’
‘No. I have no true understanding of all the properties of things.’
Dropping her fingers, he stretched his arms above his head, linking them under his neck so that he could watch her with more ease.
‘Once, when I was small, I took a horse and rode it for hours until the steed sat down and died. My father said the horse could have stopped running with my light and small touch upon it, or thrown me off into the brush. He said the stallion did neither because he wanted to keep running. His choice. Would your mother have added the next ingredient of her experiment if you had not been there?’
‘I think so.’
‘Then it was her choice.’
‘But I ruined our family. Papa told me so.’
‘No. I think if your father blamed you, it was he who did that completely by himself.’
Perception. Skewered into truth. It was all she could do to stop the tears of a relief that felt indescribable. Someone else believed that she was not responsible even with all the facts at hand. More of the inheld tension that she always felt melted away.
Colbert had saved her in the river, she knew, the water in her throat and in her eyes, the heavy panic of exhaustion pulling her down. He had saved her, too, when he had insisted on the hole covered in leaves and branches being made on the leeward side of the bush, tucked into calm. How would she have found shelter otherwise without his knowledge of survival?