The Seduction of the Crimson Rose pc-4

by Лорен Уиллиг

  "We do find ourselves among the distinguished members of the Common Sense Society, do we not?" Vaughn drawled, deploying his quizzing glass in a way that suggested he hoped the answer would be not.

  The thin man regarded him warily. "You do. And since you appear to have the advantage of us…"

  Vaughn made an elegant leg, lace fluttering and jewels glinting. He was as out of place in the rough-hewn room as a tiger in Hyde Park.

  "I am Vaughn," he announced, with the unconscious arrogance of three hundred years of being able to introduce oneself by one name alone. "I had the pleasure of meeting your estimable Mr. Paine many years ago through the good auspices of my cousin, Lord Edward Fitzgerald. It was…an unforgettable experience."

  The hawk-nosed man inclined his head, his dark eyes never leaving Vaughn. "I am Mr. Rathbone. This" — he indicated the shorter man — "is Mr. Farnham, who acts as chairman for our Society."

  The round-faced man bobbed and mumbled his pleasure at the introduction. It seemed, thought Mary, a rather curious disposition of roles. Mr. Rathbone, with his automatic habit of command, appeared unlikely to take second chair to anyone, much less so insignificant a figure as the pink-cheeked Mr. Farnham, who was beaming welcome and goodwill through his chipped teeth. Either there was some title higher than chairman in their little Society, or Mr. Farnham possessed unexpected talents beneath his humdrum faзade.

  Vaughn must have entertained similar questions, because he trained his quizzing glass lazily on the taller man, in a way that made the hollows beneath Rathbone's cheekbones go even hollower. "And you, Mr. Rathbone? What role do you play?"

  "I have the honor to serve as vice-chairman," said Rathbone shortly.

  "Vice…chairman," mused Lord Vaughn, separating the one word into two. "What a very pleasant position that must be. Such…scope."

  "Are you, too, a reformer, Lord Vaughn?" inquired Rathbone. He seemed to have difficulty wrapping his tongue around the title. Ah, one of those, thought Mary. The problem with revolutions was that they scraped up all sorts of ideologues with ridiculous ideas about doing away with hereditary honors and giving land in common to the masses and all that sort of rubbish.

  Polishing a corner of his quizzing glass, Vaughn neatly avoided the question. "I do what little I can. I have," he added modestly, "been fortunate enough to be admitted into the august company of the Societé des Droits des Hommes."

  Mary had never heard of it, but it worked an immediate magic upon the shorter man, who in his excitement rose to the balls of his feet and flapped his hands like a chicken.

  "The SDH! Our sister Society in Paris," he explained to Mary, for want of anyone else to explain to. His voice emerged in a nasal squeak, too high-pitched for his amply padded frame. "Our model, our guide…I'd always hoped to visit the SDH someday," he finished wistfully.

  Rathbone was less impressed. "Then you know Monsieur Delaroche, of course."

  "Of course," Vaughn assured him blandly. "Excellent fellow. A bit quick with the guillotine finger, but always good for a spot of revolutionary rhetoric. His extemporaneous harangues were quite the rage when I was last in Paris."

  Rathbone looked at Vaughn sharply, but Farnham cut in, bobbing in front of the other man. "How lucky you were to be in Paris during such stirring times! How did it feel," he demanded eagerly, "to breathe the clean, pure air of liberty?"

  "Rather fetid, actually. The French, you know," Vaughn replied, touching his handkerchief delicately to his nose.

  Farnham's face fell, but after a moment's deep reflection, he nodded in understanding. "Of course," he said. "We are so frightfully cut off here. Did the resolution pass?"

  "Which one? Sausages for all, or death to the aristos?"

  Farnham frowned uneasily, as though not quite sure whether Vaughn were bamming him. "The latter, of course."

  "Oh, indubitably. Four frogs to one. We adjourned just before midnight, and had a bang-up sausage fest at Mme. Lefarge's pie shop."

  Farnham looked wistful. Unmoved by culinary considerations, Rathbone's eyes narrowed. "You seem to treat our goals with a certain levity, Lord Vaughn."

  "Far be it from me to impart undue humor to so serious a cause. I am simply giddy with the delight of being here among you tonight. Do tell me, Mr. Farnham, have you read Mr. Paine's latest pamphlet?"

  "You mean…" Farnham's head sunk until it seemed to have nearly disappeared into his cravat, leaving nothing but a pair of eyes peering out.

  "Precisely," said Lord Vaughn.

  "I'm afraid I don't understand," interjected Mary.

  "His new pamphlet," whispered Farnham, his piggy eyes swiveling madly from side to side. "It is about…It suggests…"

  "Invasion," declared Lord Vaughn.

  Chapter Seven

  Welcome, destruction, blood, and massacre.

  — William Shakespeare, Richard III, II, iv

  The word shivered in the air among them.

  Lord Vaughn hefted his cane as though testing its weight. "Invasion," he repeated, rolling the word on his tongue as Mr. Farnham wrung his hands and Rathbone's eyes continued to narrow until they were all but swallowed up. "A French invasion to bring about the glorious benefits of the revolution to those of us here at home. Mr. Paine has generously offered himself and his expertise to Bonaparte as guide in helping us create a new form of representative government in our degenerate state. A bold prospect for a new age."

  "Indeed," squeaked Mr. Farnham, clasping his hands together and peering over his shoulder. "But to speak of it…easy enough for Mr. Paine to write from the safety of America, but to talk of such a thing, here…"

  "Come, man," said Vaughn jovially, his diamonds winking incongruously as he dealt the other man a hearty clap on the back. "We are all friends here, are we not, Rathbone?"

  "So we have been given to believe," replied Rathbone tightly. "And you, Miss…"

  "Alsworthy," supplied Mary, with a modest droop of her bonneted head.

  "And you, Miss Alsworthy? What do you think of our prospects for a French style of government?"

  "I think," said Mary demurely, "that if it comes with a French form of fashion, I shall like it very well indeed."

  Lord Vaughn took refuge behind his handkerchief.

  "The dust, you understand," he explained innocently, flapping the lace-edged linen in illustration. "Damnable to the delicate nose."

  Mr. Rathbone was unconcerned by the state of Vaughn's sinuses. "A very light response, Miss Alsworthy, to such weighty events. Am I to understand that you view the fate of nations as nothing more than a diversion? A parlor game, perhaps?"

  "It was certainly not my intention to give you that impression," hedged Mary, even if it did fall close to the truth. Did this scarecrow of a man truly believe he could command the destiny of empires? It would have been laughable if he hadn't been quite so serious about it. He would, reflected Mary, have made a brilliant Grand Inquisitor, if only he had had a Spanish accent and a small goatee.

  Even without those props, he managed to radiate disapproval, all of it in Mary's direction. "We prefer our members to demonstrate a certain seriousness of purpose."

  Mary struck her Joan of Arc pose, one hand clasped to the bosom and the head tilted slightly back towards the heavens. Or where the heavens ought to be if there weren't a ceiling in the way.

  "I pray you, sir, do not judge me by my mere faзade. Beneath these meaningless rags beats a heart that burns with the injustices perpetrated by an unequal society" — it was, in fact, entirely unfair that some girls should get husbands while other, prettier girls did not — "and I have pledged myself in whatever humble way I may to doing my own small part to remedy those iniquitous inequities."

  Mary was quite proud of the alliteration at the end. All those tedious years of playing poetic muse did have their benefits. She could also do an excellent epic simile if the occasion called for it, but she thought that might be a bit much, even for a revolutionary society.

  Rathbone shifted so tha
t they stood a little apart from the others. "Perhaps your part, Miss Alsworthy, may be larger than you think."

  "I would be honored to think that might be the case," replied Mary carefully, trying not to notice the way his dark frame walled her away from the rest of the room. The expanse of black broadcloth barring her path emitted an unpleasant smell, musty wool with an acrid overtone of wood ash, like a damp fire. Mary darted a glance past him at Lord Vaughn, but Vaughn was arm in arm with Farnham, bending over the man with exaggerated solicitude. She hadn't really expected him to ride to the rescue, had she? That hadn't been in their arrangement — and saving embattled maidens wasn't much in Vaughn's line.

  She was, after all, here for a specific purpose: to roust out French spies. It wasn't as though Vaughn were squiring her about for the pleasure of her company. She would do well to remember that.

  With that in mind, she asked, "What do you think, Mr. Rathbone, of this talk of invasion?"

  "I?" There was something cruel about the curve of Rathbone's lips, a secret knowledge that made Mary, for the first time, wonder at the wisdom of toying with world affairs. But it was too late now. She was committed. And she was damned if she would cry coward before Lord Vaughn. "I think that more subtle methods might be employed to achieve the same ends."

  "I, too, am a great believer in subtlety, Mr. Rathbone." Steeling herself to rest a hand lightly on his arm, she added pensively, "It has long been a sorrow to me that the disposition of society prevents my playing a larger role in events of so much moment to us all."

  "If the spirit is willing, the opportunity will present itself."

  "I do so hope so." Mary looked up at him through her lashes. "But how will one know opportunity when it comes to call?"

  His too-bright eyes raked her face, probing at the levels of pretense. Mary returned his scrutiny without faltering. Some people thought they could read another's thoughts from their eyes. Mary knew that to be sheer bunk. She could lie with her eyes just as effectively as her lips.

  Whatever Rathbone saw, it seemed to satisfy him. Enough so that his thin lips relaxed, opening to say…

  "Hallo!"

  Mary started as a cheerful voice shattered the silence, interrupting whatever it was that Mr. Rathbone had been about to confide. The breath Mary hadn't realized she was holding went out in a rush, leaving her vaguely light-headed as her gloved hand dropped from Rathbone's arm.

  Straightening, Rathbone nodded coldly to the newcomer. It wasn't Lord Vaughn, come to intervene, but the gentleman she had noticed from across the room, the one in the red patterned waistcoat with the exuberant golden brown hair. Up close, he was older than he had appeared, with white lines scarring the tanned skin around his eyes. Unlike Lord Vaughn, this man's wrinkles were the sort that came of squinting at the sun, rather than too many late nights in too many ladies' bedchambers.

  Strolling up beside Rathbone, he clapped the other man on the back, beaming genially from Rathbone to Mary and back again. "Rathbone, won't you do me the great honor of an introduction?"

  "Miss Alsworthy, Mr. St. George." The vice-chairman looked more than ever like a Grand Inquisitor as he looked down his nose at St. George. "I would remind you both that the meeting will be called to order in precisely two minutes."

  "No need for reminders, Rathbone, old chap. We shall attend faithfully, I promise you."

  For a moment, the vice-chairman looked as though he might like to object, but the other man's smiling regard was too much for him. With a stiff "See that you do," he stalked off in the direction of Paine's painting, collaring Farnham as he went. Mary watched him go, not sure whether to be relieved or annoyed by the interruption.

  Either way, there was nothing to be done now but accept the setback gracefully.

  "How do you do," said Mary, putting out a hand.

  "Incredibly relieved," said Mr. St. George, bowing over it with evident relish. "I don't know if I could bear another evening with only the faithful for company. You're not, are you? If so, I'm most terribly sorry — for multiple reasons."

  "Not so bad as that, at any rate," said Mary laughingly, nodding towards Mr. Rathbone's stiff back. "This is only my first meeting."

  "I've been to at least twenty," confessed Mr. St. George glumly. "It's m'sister. Never been quite the same since her husband stuck his spoon in the wall. She's taken to causes."

  So that explained the woman in the black bonnet. Tilting her head in sympathetic understanding, Mary's tone warmed considerably. "And you are forced to escort her?"

  St. George squared his shoulders. "Someone has to."

  They both jumped as the gavel resounded against the wooden table, calling the meeting to order.

  "Gentlemen!" called Farnham breathlessly from his perch next to the framed engraving of Paine. "Ladies! I hereby call this meeting of the Common Sense Society to order. If the secretary would rise and read the minutes from last week's meeting?"

  A shabbily dressed man shuffled to his feet next to the table, pieces of paper drifting to the floor as he rose. "Th-thank you, Mr. Chairman…," he began.

  St. George lowered his voice to a whisper as he and Mary, in silent accord, melted back towards the far wall, as far away from the gavel as they could get. "At least this lot is better than my sister's last go. All August it was homes for aged governesses."

  Mary cast a doubtful glance at the stuttering secretary, who was being harangued by hecklers who disagreed with his rendition of their speeches from the previous week. "Somewhat more decorous than this lot, surely?"

  Propping a shoulder against the wall, Sr. George said darkly, "You don't know what true horror is until an aging harridan tells you you're not to have any sticky toffee pudding until you recite all your multiplication tables. Brought me out in hives. I couldn't remember a thing after the sevens. And before that it was the Society for the Protection of Turtles."

  "Turtles?"

  "Saving them being put into soup, that sort of thing." Mr. St. George looked like a man who knew all too much about that sort of thing for his own liking. "I'll tell you one thing I've learned: French chefs have a deuced annoying habit of carrying very large knives. It's not sporting."

  "I'm sure you've earned your place in heaven — with the path all paved with turtle shells."

  "It's felt more like that other location, especially when one chap dumped boiling broth on me. I tell you, in that moment, I felt myself in genuine sympathy with the turtle."

  "Enough to give up turtle soup?" inquired Mary archly.

  "There's no need to be extreme," St. George hastily assured her. "I just close my eyes and think of the governesses."

  "Have you any notion what your sister will choose next?"

  "She seems to be pretty well stuck into this at the moment. Can't move half a foot without tripping over a pile of prosy treatises."

  "Don't you mean informative pamphlets?"

  St. George grinned at her. "Just so."

  Behind them, the gavel clattered down. "If those in the back would care to pay attention…," squawked Mr. Farnham. Mary and St. George exchanged guilty smirks, united in delinquency.

  Even as she smiled, Mary was figuring sums of her own. His clothes weren't at the height of fashion, but they were of good fabric and decently made. The cameo stickpin in his cravat was Italian, unless she missed her guess, and worth a pretty penny. That sort of complexion generally betokened time spent outdoors, and time spent outdoors generally happened on an estate. From the outward indicia, she would reckon his income at about five thousand pounds a year, perhaps slightly more. A widowed sister might be a liability, but not if, as it seemed, she had her own income. He was not unattractive, appeared good-natured, and was most definitely flirting. Given her current lack of prospects, she could do much worse.

  A life spent watching Letty and Geoffrey holding hands beneath the breakfast table, for example.

  After all, Lord Vaughn had advised her to set her cap at a gentleman of a reforming nature. From far away she could he
ar Vaughn's voice echoing in mocking memory. You and I? No, no, and no again.

  He needn't have bothered with three nos. One would have been enough to get the point across.

  In that case, he could have no objections to her cultivating the interest of Mr. St. George. As long as it didn't interfere with their business arrangement.

  Mary's lips curved in the beatific smile that made her admirers weak at the knees and her family distinctly nervous.

  "…a special treat," Farnham was saying in his high-pitched voice. "A letter all the way from Pennsylvania from our revered brother in exile, Dr. Priestley." The announcement was greeted with applause from some and loud hisses from others.

  "Who?" whispered Mary to St. George.

  "One of the founders of the old Constitution Society," St. George whispered back. His breath smelled of cloves, like a country kitchen at Christmastime. Pleasant enough, if one liked that sort of thing. Which, Mary assured herself, she most definitely could. It was simply a matter of acquiring a taste. Like brandy or olives. "That was before my time. At least, before my sister's time, which amounts to the same thing."

  As Mary watched, Mr. Rathbone stalked up to the podium, a rolled piece of paper tucked beneath one arm.

  St. George groaned. "That's torn it. If Rathbone's going to read one of old Gunpowder Priestley's letters, we could be here till next week."

  "Gunpowder?" Mary asked, diverted. "I assume his parents didn't christen him that."

  "No. It's something dull and biblical. Joseph or Joshua…The gunpowder bit was entirely his own doing, from what I understand. You know about the Gunpowder Plot, don't you? Guy Fawkes crouching under the House of Lords and all that?"

  Tilting her head, Mary quoted the old nursery rhyme, "'Remember remember the fifth of November; Gunpowder, treason and plot…'"

  Adding his voice to hers, St. George finished with relish, "'I see no reason why gunpowder, treason should ever be forgot'! Brilliant rhyme, that. Sticks in one's head, you know."

  Mary wasn't particularly interested in treason two centuries old. That had been a different world, a world of religious wars and dynastic squabbles. It was hard to believe that only half a century before, men had fought and died to try to restore a Stuart king to the throne in place of a Hanoverian one. Compared with the tumult of revolution across the Channel, the quibbles over which royal brow should bear the Crown seemed rather quaint and entirely irrelevant.