Masquerade

by Janet Dailey

  Again his remark was met with silence. She removed the straw hat and replaced it with a bonnet that had plumes of white ostrich feathers sweeping down its sides. Brodie frowned in exaggerated disapproval.

  "That would be guaranteed to tickle a man's nose and turn any whispered word into a sneeze."

  The corners of her mouth deepened with the faintest suggestion of a smile, the only outward indication that his observation had amused her. Brodie didn't need any other.

  When she removed the bonnet, she automatically lifted a hand and smoothed any disturbed strands of hair into place, the action drawing his gaze to the black sleekness of her hair, parted in the center and drawn back into a small knot near the back of her neck.

  "In all honesty, mam'selle, your hair should never be hidden beneath a hat or bonnet. It is its own adornment, a midnight curtain gleaming with starshine," he declared softly when she reached for another bonnet. "Covering such beauty should be a sin."

  Calmly she slipped her own velvet bonnet onto her head, its rich garnet color matching her walking dress. Without once looking at him, she began to secure the trailing ribbons beneath her chin with a small posy of artificial flowers.

  Madame Simone emerged from the rear of the shop, took one look at Brodie, and rushed over, her expression running the gamut from horror and fury to panic and outrage. "I regret the delay, Mademoiselle," she blurted. "If this gentleman has been bothering you in my absence—"

  "On the contrary, Madame Simone," she spoke at last—in flawless English, her voice round and soft and reserved. She could, Brodie thought, handle men as she pleased. "I believe it is I who have been bothering him." Brodie smiled and resisted the urge to throw back his head and laugh at this very astute and provocative observation. She had indeed been bothering him ... in the most stimulating way. "If you will excuse me, Madame, I believe my aunt has completed her purchase."

  With a graceful turn, she glided away from them. Madame Simone started after her, but Brodie caught her arm. "Introduce me."

  "Nom de Dieu, you do not realize—" she whispered in frantic protest.

  "Introduce me," he repeated in the same low undertone, then held up the bundle he was carrying. "Introduce me, or these drawings will end up in the muddy bottom of the Mississippi instead of in your back room. And for your information, the Sea Star was damaged in a storm during her crossing and limped into Havana. She'll be a week being repaired. Which means it will be more than a week before your competitor, the modiste Madame Trussard, receives her copies of the latest fashions."

  "A week," she breathed in excitement.

  "Introduce me."

  She straightened, the chance of stealing a week on her competition overcoming any reservations she had about the wisdom of granting his request. Turning, she fixed a smile on her face and walked with him over to the young woman and her chaperone, a woman of indeterminate age whose face bore no family resemblance at all to her charge's.

  "Monsieur Donovan, allow me to present Madame Jardin and her niece, Mademoiselle Adrienne Jardin," the proprietress declared, then completed the reverse introductions. "Mesdames, this is M'sieu Brodie Donovan. He is the owner of the shipping company the Crescent Line."

  Madame Jardin gave him a baleful look. "You are a Yanqui"

  "Regrettably, yes. It was a tragic circumstance of birth over which I had no control. I hope you will not hold it against me, Madame, Mademoiselle." He inclined his head to each of them in turn and caught the amused, and approving, smile that curved the lips of Adrienne Jardin—and the dark glow in her eyes that revealed definite interest.

  "A pleasure, Monsieur Donovan." She nodded her head, acknowledging the formal introduction.

  "Yes, a pleasure, m'sieu," her aunt repeated with little conviction. "Now we must say adieu."

  "Not adieu . . . au revoir. We will see each other again," Brodie stated, looking straight at Adrienne Jardin when he said it and realizing that his patience would be sorely tested by the careful manners and correct ways of doing things dictated by Creole society. He watched her leave the shop with her aunt, then turned to the proprietress. "Jardin. Where have I heard that name?"

  "It is Emil Gaspard Jardin's name, you know. It is whispered that he owns half of the Vieux Carre and a half dozen plantations on the river. Adrienne is his granddaughter," she replied, and held out her hand. "You obtained your introduction—for all the good it will do you. I will take my package now."

  Brodie gave it to her. "What makes you think it will do me no good?"

  "You heard the old crow of an aunt," she said, tearing at the brown paper around the fashion plates. "You are a Yanqui. And Emil Jardin clings to the old attitude toward Americains."

  "We'll see." He knew there was a way around him. There were always ways.

  Leaving Madame Simone to her intense perusal of the drawings, Brodie exited the shop and paused on the banquette to gaze after the departing figure in garnet. The strains of Cado's violin came to him. He turned and crossed the street to the blind fiddler's corner.

  "Emil Jardin, Cado—where does he live?"

  "You want to know about him?" Startled, the old man missed a note.

  "I want to know about his granddaughter Adrienne, everything you can find out. Does she assist in the marketing? If so, when? Is there a regular hour? The theater, the opera, where does she usually sit? What invitations has she accepted? What balls and masquerades will she be attending? I want specific dates and times."

  "But such details—"

  "The house servants will know them, and house servants can be encouraged to talk." This time he didn't drop coins into Cado's hat. Instead he slipped some folded bills into the pocket of the old man's coat.

  14

  Nattie moved away from the bed and picked up the satin robe Remy had tossed over the arm of the loveseat earlier that morning. "I'm sure it won't be any surprise to hear that Brodie Donovan got detailed information about Adrienne's daily activities and plans." She carried the robe to the closet and hung it on a padded hanger on the back of the door. "And during those next two weeks, he arranged for their paths to cross several times. Twice he was at the pillared arcade of the old French Market when she went there with her aunt to do the day's shopping. He attended Sunday mass at the St. Louis Cathedral, where her family worshiped. When he found out she had a fitting at Madame Trussard's, he waited at a nearby cafe until she came out, then chanced to meet her on the street. And there was the opera too.

  "In those days," Nattie explained, "four operas were performed every week at the Théâtre d'Orléans, two grand and two comique. When he found out which operas she was going to, he got tickets to two of them, seats in the dress circle. My grandma said that between acts he visited her box. 'Course, he didn't get to talk to her every time he accidentally saw her."

  "But Adrienne must have encouraged his pursuit of her and guessed these weren't chance meetings." Remy curled an arm around the bedpost and sat down at the foot of the mattress, wrinkling the coverlet Nattie had so carefully smoothed.

  "Sure she did," Nattie agreed quickly. "There's no doubt she was just as attracted to him. Part of it was probably that he was different from the young Creole men she knew. He dressed well, but he wasn't a dandy, like some of them were; he wasn't a quarrelsome braggart, all obsessed with honor and dueling; and he observed all the proprieties back then without acting like he was bound by them. And his being a Yankee probably added a touch of the forbidden, too. Besides"— Nattie shrugged—"doesn't every young girl at some time in her life dream of meeting a man who can thrill her—a man who's bold and handsome, who will defy anything to have her for his own? Times may change, and people with them, but not in the ways of love or our dreams of it—man or woman."

  Remy couldn't argue with that.

  "Anyway," Nattie continued, "after those chance encounters, Brodie then found out Adrienne was going to a ball at the St. Louis Hotel. That's where nearly all the fashionable balls were held—at least the ones attended by the Creol
es. The Americans had their parties at the St. Charles Hotel ... in the American section of town. This particular bal de société, as they called it, was a private-subscription affair. Brodie Donovan probably had to use all his contacts in the Quarter and twist every arm he could just to get his name on the invitation list. And then he had to pay dearly for the privilege of attending the ball. In a way, he was as single-minded in his pursuit of Adrienne Jardin as he'd been in building his shipping company—not minding the time, the effort, the cost, or the risk. ..."

  Tall pillars circled the famed rotunda of the St. Louis Hotel, its beige-tinged-with-pink marble floor gleaming beneath the high dome of its elaborate and ornamental ceiling. Paintings covered the walls, and a long bar of solid marble curved halfway around the room. And the patrons were as finely appointed as the decor—including Brodie Donovan. Wearing the requisite white gloves with his black tailcoat over a white waistcoat, Brodie picked up a brandy from the polished top of the marble bar and idly swirled it in its glass. With a turn of his head, he glanced again in the direction of the room's entrance and ignored the poke of his starched-stiff collar.

  The cadence of the music rose as the band played a quadrille. Brodie scanned the file of dancers on the floor, doubting that he had failed to see her arrive, but verifying it all the same. Satisfied that she wasn't among the dancers, he swung his gaze to the ball guests milling about along the outside circle by the towering pillars. White satins, cream taffetas, pastel silks, gowns adorned with flowers, glittering beads, and sequined lace, but none worn by the dark-haired, dark-eyed Adrienne Jardin.

  He took a sip of brandy and glanced at a group of guests entering the rotunda. He recognized a planter and his family from upriver and started to turn away, then spotted an elderly woman in a drab stone-colored gown, her headdress of lace and pink ribbons barely able to conceal the spreading thinness of her gray hair. It was Adrienne's sour and rather sad aunt.

  A second later the planter and his family veered to the right, and there she stood, her black hair swept high on her head, a blood-red rose at the side, the low-cut corsage of her silk gown baring the rounded points of her pale shoulders. Suddenly every edge of the night was sharp and biting, and every scent was sweet and keen. His restlessness and impatience vanished at the sight of her.

  He pushed his brandy glass back onto the bar counter, then stiffened as he saw the man at her side, lean and elegant in his black evening clothes. He had Adrienne's ebony hair and equally dark eyes, and there was a faint similarity in their features, though his were more sharply cut. Dominique Jardin, Adrienne's brother and the only grandson of Emil Jardin. Through him the Jardin legacy would live on.

  Brodie breathed a little easier, but not much. According to Cado, Dominique Jardin was not a Creole dandy to be taken lightly. At twenty-five, he was a veteran of more than a dozen duels, his skill with a rapier reportedly rivaled only by that of his fencing master. More than that, he and Adrienne were exceptionally close for a brother and sister. It was said he was proud of her beauty and extremely protective of her reputation.

  Thoughtfully Brodie reached for his glass of brandy and took a minute to study this new obstacle. In the past he'd had only Adrienne's chaperoning aunt to be concerned about, and she'd been relatively easy to circumvent. Her reputation for Gallic thrift was renowned in the Quarter; Brodie'd merely had to wait until she was haggling with some merchant, then he could be assured of having Adrienne all to himself. Cado claimed the old spinster used the money she saved to buy absinthe on the sly. The house servants said she was a secret tippler.

  Unfortunately Dominique Jardin shared no similar failing. On the contrary, he was said to be as sharp and as quick as the rapier he wielded, a fitting heir to assume the family mantle, a man to be approached directly. Brodie took a last sip of his brandy and pushed away from the marble bar to wander slowly, casually in their direction.

  As Adrienne advanced into the domed rotunda on her brother's arm, she acknowledged the waving of hands, the nodding of ornamented heads, her gaze always moving, being careful not to miss a sign of recognition from any dowager, and to maintain a composed smile of interest. The lively strains of a quadrille filled the room, rising above the bright hum of gaily chattering voices and the sweeping rustle of stiff taffetas, satins, and silks, the soft whisper of her ruched gown lost in it, the caged crinoline of her petticoat holding the circular fullness of the skirt away from her and giving her the appearance of gliding over the gleaming marble floor.

  Here and there she and Dominique were detained by gloved hands reaching out to stop them. "Adrienne, if only your mère were here to see how beautiful you have grown."

  And another declared, "Ah, chère, but it was only yesterday you went to sleep in our box at the opera."

  "Dominique, you remember our daughter Gisette."

  "Where is your grand-père? I had hoped to see him this evening."

  Dominique explained that a small emergency at one of their plantations upriver had required their grandfather's presence, but that he was not expected to be away long—a day or two, perhaps. Then they moved on, strolling beneath the galleries that circled the domed ceiling.

  As the last notes of the quadrille faded, Adrienne watched the dancers leaving the floor, conscious of the fine tension that had her tightly gripping the handle of her closed fan. Again she skimmed the faces of the men garbed in the mandatory black evening dress, ignoring the women with their satiny shoulders and shimmering gowns, not admitting to herself that she was looking for anyone in particular.

  Before the dance floor had completely cleared, the band struck up another tune, a waltz this time. Dominique turned to the older woman on his other arm. "Come, Tante ZeeZee. Permit me to have this first dance with you."

  She harrumphed in response, her expression scornful of the invitation, but her eyes warmed with affection when she looked at him. "I am too old to be whirled about the floor like a dervish. You have done your duty by asking me; now let us speak of such foolishness no more."

  "Now I am hurt that you refuse to dance with me, your favorite nephew," Dominique teased, something only he could get away with.

  "Hmmph, you are my only nephew," she retorted. "And your feelings will recover quickly from the slight. It is better that I take my seat along the wall with the rest of the ancient tapestry. If you wish to be kind, later you may bring me a glass of absinthe."

  Leaving them, she went to join the other matrons along the wall, ensconced on seats provided for those who sat out the dancing. There she would spend her evening, listening to gossip and occasionally inserting an ascerbic comment of her own. Adrienne considered again the loneliness of her aunt's life, relegated to the role of glorified servant, the chatelain of her father's house, dependent on him for her existence—a loneliness assuaged by two things: the jade-green liquor and Dominique.

  "You almost coaxed a smile from her," Adrienne observed as she cast one of her own at her handsome brother. "She adores you so."

  "Is that bad?" He drew his head back, feigning an affronted look.

  "Very. You are adored by so many women now, one more may fill your head with conceit," she replied in jest.

  Instead of maintaining the light banter, Dominique turned serious. "But it is not I who am adored by so many women so much as it is the Jardin name and the wealth it portends."

  She looked at her brother, his remark reminding her of the many duties and responsibilities that would one day be solely his to bear, burdens he'd been groomed to assume almost from the day of his birth. How old had she been when she'd first recognized that no matter how much her grandfather loved her—and he'd never given her cause to doubt his love for her—she would never occupy the place of importance in his life that her brother, Dominique, held. While she was the delight of her grandfather's life, Dominique was his heir. Through him Emil Jardin would know his immortality. Through him the Jardin name would be carried on. It was the way of things, and she loved her brother too much ever to resent his p
osition.

  Studying the clean lines of his profile, she announced, "Any woman who looks at you and sees only that is unworthy of the man you are."

  "Praise from my sister?" Dominique raised an eyebrow in mock amazement. "What other surprises will this evening hold, I wonder?"

  "Let us hope many." Adrienne turned again to the couples taking the floor and skimmed the host of guests crowding at the edges. Out of the corner of her eye she caught a hint of burnished red, deep and dark like mahogany. He was here. Not thirty feet away. Exchanging pleasantries with the Monsieur Rousseau. She let her glance linger on him for an instant, more than a little pleased to discover how magnificent he looked in formal dress, the white silk cravat tied in a small, precise bow at his throat, the black tailcoat splendidly emphasizing the width of his shoulders. Then she looked away, her smile deepening with the sudden rush of exhilaration. "Perhaps there will even be wonderful surprises."

  Although she kept her eyes steadfastly averted from him, she knew the instant he moved on— toward her—and yet she maintained the pretense of being unaware of his approach, instead watching in satisfaction as other feminine heads turned to cast curious and admiring glances his way.

  She waited until his tall shape had entered her side vision, then allowed her wandering glance to encounter his. But the knowing glint in his brown eyes made her wonder if she'd fooled him at all.

  "M'sieu Donovan," she said, acknowledging him first.

  "Mademoiselle Jardin." He inclined his head in a show of respect, his gaze holding hers a fraction longer than propriety allowed, reaffirming his interest, and then he moved on to her brother— again showing a surface observance of convention.

  "Dominique, allow me to present Monsieur Brodie Donovan." Adrienne quickly and smoothly made the necessary introductions. "My brother, Dominique Jardin."

  She heard the coolness of her brother's response and witnessed the testing handshake the two men exchanged. The subtle inquiries Dominique made were what she'd expected, and the proper replies Brodie Donovan gave, she'd anticipated.