by Лорен Уиллиг
"A carafe of your house red, please?" I asked, before the maitre d' could escape. Just because I was pissed with Colin was no need to be rude to the staff. Just because some people couldn't control their tempers didn't mean I couldn't. Just because…
I realized a waiter was standing over me, waiting for me to take the offered menu. Belatedly, I took it from him, glad for the dim lighting that hid my flush, part irritation and part windburn.
Taking the chair across from me, which looked ridiculously little and spindly with him looming over it, Colin sat himself gingerly down. Whether that was because he feared the staying power of the chair or because he had picked up on the ominous tilt of my menu was unclear. I suspected the former.
I had meant to continue in cold silence, blasting him with the frost of my displeasure, but irritation and curiosity got the better of me. Abandoning any attempt to read the menu, I tossed it aside and leaned forwards with both elbows on the table.
"What was all that with you and Nigel Dempster out there?"
Instead of answering the question, Colin planted both his elbows on the table. "How long have you known Dempster?"
"Since about six o'clock this evening," I answered automatically, and then kicked myself for it. What was I doing answering his questions? I had asked first. Just because his elbows were bigger than mine didn't give him any right to bag first answer.
"Really," said Colin, managing to inject a world of mistrust into that one simple word.
"Give or take half an hour," I added. "I wouldn't want to be anything less than perfectly accurate. How long have you known Dempster?"
"Awhile."
That was certainly informative. He was just lucky I had left my thumbscrews in my other bag.
"Right," I said. "Okay. I don't know what's going on between you and Dempster, but if you want to be mad at him, be mad at him. Don't get all pissy with me."
It wasn't the most elegantly phrased argument I've ever made, but it got the point across. Colin removed his elbows from the table and looked at me curiously. "You really don't know?"
"I don't even know enough to know what I'm not supposed to know," I said irritably. "I met Dempster for all of five minutes this afternoon while I was doing research at the Vaughn Collection. He's the archivist there, you know."
"I knew that," mumbled Colin.
"So if you'd like to sit here and fume about Dempster or whatever else it is that's eating at you," I said, warming to my theme, "feel free to go right ahead. I'll just head off home and spend the evening watching the snooker championships."
"It's not snooker season, actually," offered Colin, in a conciliatory way.
"Fine. Darts, then."
"Envisioning them thrown at my head?" he asked ruefully.
Despite myself, I smiled back. "We were getting there."
We both leaned back as the waiter appeared and placed the carafe of wine in the center of the table between us, expertly flipping glasses right way up. He took our order, too, but don't ask me what I ordered, or how I ordered. When he had sidled away again, we both leaned forward, as at an unspoken cue.
After a long moment, Colin said, "Would an apology do, or does it have to be the darts?"
I melted in an instant. But I wasn't going to let him off the hook quite that easily. "I'll accept an apology if it comes with an explanation."
Colin rubbed his neck with his hand, regarding me like a hopeful puppy dog. "Are you sure you wouldn't prefer just to fling something at me and get it over with?"
I leaned back against the cushioned back of the banquette, folded my arms across my chest, and waited.
"Dempster?" I prompted.
Colin considered for a moment, contemplated the olive plate, considered some more, and came out with, "We don't get on."
"That much I figured out on my own."
Colin shifted restlessly in his seat. "It's a long story."
I patted the side of the glass carafe. "We have a large carafe of wine."
Colin let himself relax into a rueful grin. "I really am sorry. I didn't mean to drag you into it."
"Since I've already been dragged," I suggested, grasping the carafe with two hands and tipping it forwards over his glass, "it would be nice to know what's going on."
"Thanks." Colin took the glass I held out to him. He raised it an ironic salute. "Cheers."
"So?" I urged. "Story?"
After a moment's consideration, Colin gave me the short version. "Dempster dated my sister."
That was not quite what I had been expecting.
But it did certainly make a lot more sense. For a man to leap to the defense of his archive was just kind of odd; for him to leap to the defense of a sister was really rather sweet. Especially when that sister had just gone through a particularly nasty, self-esteem-destroying…
From the dark reaches of memory, in a completely different part of my brain, a snatch of gossip came floating up to the fore.
"He's that one!" I yelped.
Colin gave me a look.
I shrugged. "Pammy told me."
"Pammy talks a lot."
"She means well. She just wanted to make sure I didn't say something that might upset Serena. Wait — let's not stray from the point. Dempster is Serena's evil ex?"
I was still grappling with this key concept. It wasn't totally inconceivable. He was a reasonably good-looking man, if one went for the tall, dark type, and the little bit of gray at his temples only gave him a distinguished look, reminiscent of up-and-coming politicians and the better-looking sort of college professor. I put Dempster's age at late thirties, early forties, but that wasn't too ridiculous a leap for a girl in her mid-twenties, especially one looking for a replacement father figure. Grant, of unlamented memory, had been thirty to my twenty-two when we started dating. He liked them young, young and adoring. Hence my eventual replacement. But that's another story. Grant had no business butting in on my date.
Colin was watching me over the small bulb of the candle, the uncertain light playing off the planes of his face, making his eyes seem even more shadowed and wary than they were. "How much did Pammy tell you?"
"Only that Serena had just gone through a particularly nasty breakup." I think Pammy's phrasing had been more along the lines of "royally dumped," but that wasn't something that needed to be repeated to Serena's brother. I can be tactful. When I remember to be.
"Right," said Colin. "Serena's always been a little bit…"
"Vulnerable?" I suggested.
"Quiet. Shy. Defenseless. Our family — " Colin broke off with a brisk shake of his head. "That's too much to go into. At any rate, Serena wasn't in a good way. She met Dempster at an arts course. Something to do with authentication. Ironic, really."
"I gather Dempster turned out to be in-authentic?"
"At the time, Dempster seemed like a good thing. Steady, devoted, solicitous."
"What happened?" I had an uncomfortable feeling I knew where this was going. Especially when I remembered the Dempster's plummy voice rolling over the words, I think the answer lies in the Selwick collection.…The memory gave me chills, and not of a good variety.
Watching me, Colin nodded once, as though something had already been asked and answered. "You can guess, can't you?"
I met his gaze straight on. "He was after her for the papers, wasn't he?"
"Got it in one." Colin poked at a small green olive with his fork as though the olive had personally offended him. "He was very clever about it, too. For the first few months it was all art and music and mutual acquaintances. He didn't mention the Pink Carnation at all, except offhandedly, as part of a paper he was writing on iconic representations of great English heroes, or something of that ilk."
"Hmm," I said. That sounded awfully like a line in my dissertation prospectus. That did not please me. "And then?"
"He asked Serena to 'help' with his research by looking for old family papers. She gave him one or two things — not much, but enough to whet his appetite."
I wondered what I would have done if Colin's aunt hadn't miraculously offered me carte blanche among her papers.
It wasn't at all comparable, I assured myself. I wanted Colin entirely for his extremely attractive self, not for his access to archives. Even though that had been a very intriguing pile of papers I had left unexplored up at Selwick Hall….
Perhaps Dempster had been initially attracted to Serena in the beginning, too, before archival fever took hold.
"And then what?" I asked, preferring not to follow that line of thought to its conclusion. It was different. It just was.
With the air of a man getting through a necessary but unpleasant task, Colin said briefly, "Dempster applied to Aunt Arabella for permission to see the rest. She refused."
"She didn't refuse me," I said smugly.
Colin raised both eyebrows at me. "Aunt Arabella has excellent taste." As I preened, he added, "Most of the time."
I made a face at him.
"If you're not going to compliment me, you might as well go on with the story," I said resignedly. "I imagine Dempster didn't take the refusal well?"
"To put it mildly. He became more and more insistent. He even asked her if she couldn't just remove a few documents, and return them before Aunt Arabella noticed."
I made appropriate noises indicating extreme horror and shock. The waiter hastened anxiously our way, but having ascertained that the choking sounds weren't caused by an olive lodged in someone's larynx, he obligingly sidled away again.
"Naturally, Serena refused," announced Colin, sounding rather proud of his little sister.
"Naturally!" I echoed.
"When Serena refused, Dempster became abusive."
"Physically?" I asked.
Colin made a wry face. "He didn't need to be. Working on her mind was easy enough. She was ugly, she was dull, she was fat, no one would ever date her if she didn't have him — it was all an attempt to terrify her into doing what he wanted."
"But it stuck," I said softly.
"It stuck," Colin agreed. "It was nothing she didn't already think of herself."
"But she's…" I brought my hands together in gesture indicative of extreme skinniness. "Tiny. Teeny-tiny. Super skinny. And she's absolutely charming," I added, as an afterthought.
"Try telling her that," said Colin grimly.
"I will," I said, resolving to shower Serena with compliments the very next time the occasion arose. It wouldn't be that hard. She really was that charming, in that shy, slightly retiring way that tends to get plowed under when stronger personalities are present (i.e., just about everyone else).
"So that's why," I said. "That's why you reacted so badly when you saw me at your aunt's that first time."
"That was part of it," Colin agreed. "I wasn't feeling too kindly towards academics at the time."
"And now?"
Colin leaned back in his chair, looking at me from under half-lowered lids. "Let's just say I'm willing to admit there might be exceptions."
"How very generous of you," I drawled.
Colin's eyes glinted in the candlelight. "I try to be fair."
The sparks were coming along so nicely that I almost hated to spoil it by bringing it back to Dempster. "So when Dempster greeted me by name tonight, you must have assumed…"
"That you two were in cahoots," Colin finished.
"Wow." I shook my head to clear it. "That would be quite a plot. Dempster, having failed with your sister, goes and dredges up a female to try her wiles on the male half of the family. Since we all know men are notoriously susceptible to that sort of thing."
Colin's eyes crinkled in a way that suggested the joke was on him. "We are here, after all," he said, indicating the half-empty restaurant, with its dim lighting and cozy little tables.
"Right," I said sarcastically, trying to cover the little thrill that went through me at the implication that he might be susceptible to my wiles. "Me as Mata Hari."
For some reason, Colin didn't seem to find this idea nearly as absurd as I did. "Why not?" he asked.
"Did you really think I was interested in you only for your papers?" I demanded incredulously.
It wasn't until Colin raised one eyebrow, looking as smug as Lord Vaughn at his very smuggest, that I realized just what I had let slip.
I cast about for a last-ditch way to talk myself out of it.
"Um, what I meant was…would you like an olive?"
I thrust the little olive plate at him.
Colin took the plate and set it down, possessing himself of my hand instead of an olive. "It's nice to know that it's not just my papers you're interested in."
"Well, yes," I said, as red as the tablecloth. I dropped my eyes in front of his amused gaze. "I'm glad we've got that cleared up."
"Eloise?"
"Yes?"
"You're all red."
"That happens when I drink," I said hastily. "It's the Irish flush. We call it the Curse of the Kellys. Happens to all of us."
"Does it?"
"No," I admitted. "I just made it up to have something to say. Don't ask. I'll just go and get my foot out of my throat now, shall I?"
"Don't let that stop you. I think you're doing quite well," said Colin, not bothering to hide his grin.
"Do you know," I said inconsequentially, "that Pammy wanted me to spend the week practicing seductively spitting out olive pits?"
Colin looked deeply interested. "Is there a seductive way of spitting out olive pits?"
"That's exactly what I said! Pammy said I was hopeless," I added.
"Pammy doesn't know what she's talking about."
We broke off, grinning foolishly at each other, as the waiter arrived with the food that I couldn't remember ordering. It seemed almost a shame to clutter the space on the table between us with the half-dozen little plates that seemed to go with our starters, baby eggplant stuffed and stewed, gooey concoctions of rice and raisins wrapped in grape leaves, something pureed that looked like baby food for grown-ups, with bits of flat, heavenly smelling bread stuck artistically round it for dipping. With all the fuss and clatter, Colin discreetly released my hand, and we settled back demurely on our own sides of the table as the feast was arrayed before us, as if we hadn't just been holding hands like Lady and the Tramp with a strand of spaghetti between them.
Not being of a romantic disposition, the waiter professionally doled out plates and departed, leaving us again to our own devices, without so much as a serenade.
It's very hard to remain sentimental in the face of hot food. Giving in to the inevitable, I took a large spoon and began ladling pureed eggplant onto my plate.
"Why did Dempster want so badly to see the papers?" I asked, handing the spoon over, handle first, to Colin.
Accepting the proffered spoon, Colin raised his eyebrows at me over the eggplant. "Why did you?"
"That's different," I protested, poking a triangle of bread emphatically into the pureed eggplant. "I have a dissertation to write. What does he need it for?"
"Can't you think of more compelling reasons than a dissertation?"
I considered. "At the moment? No."
Colin leaned back in his chair, somehow managing to fill all available space. "Not even money?"
Chapter Seventeen
Sigh no more, ladies, sigh no more,
Men were deceivers ever…
— William Shakespeare, Much Ado About Nothing, II, iii
It was nearly a week before Mary saw Lord Vaughn again, but that didn't matter. As Mrs. Fustian had so helpfully pointed out, hating was common, but had Mary
been willing to take the time to do so, she might have been disposed to despise, loathe, and revile Lord Vaughn, all of which fell well within the permissible parameters of Mrs. Fustian's lexicon.
But she didn't. Because he wasn't worth the bother.
It wasn't as though she spent her spare hours reclining on her virginal bed, dreaming impossible dreams of what have been. Instead, she had spent them draped in white cheesecloth, reciting impossible rhymes, in Lady Euphemia McPhee's private theatre in Richmond. The theatricals had provided a welcome distraction, even if the sight of St. George's spear made her think longingly of running certain people through.
Unfortunately, Lady Euphemia wasn't the only one with a taste for the stage. On a miserable, rainy Tuesday, Mary found herself slogging reluctantly up the steps of the Uppington town residence, prepared to endure that ritualized horror commonly known as a musical entertainment.
Mary's slippers squelched against the black-and-white marble tiles of the entrance hall. She had landed with both feet squarely in a puddle when her brother-in-law handed her out of the carriage. She couldn't even blame him for neglect. There had been no patch of ground that hadn't contained a puddle. The Uppingtons' footmen were having a busy time of it, scuttling about after the guests with cloths to sop up the rainwater that created gleaming slicks on the shining marble floor. One unfortunate young lady had already gone into a skid that landed her flat on an unmentionable part of her anatomy.
A perfect day for a musicale.
They were among the earliest arrivals. Although Lady Uppington had engaged a celebrated soprano for the entertainment, her daughter, Lady Henrietta, was to sing first. Loyal friend that she was, Letty had refused to risk missing so much as one syllable of her friend's song.
Mary trailed along behind her sister and brother-in-law into the music room, where Lady Uppington was bustling about, overseeing the disposal of a regiment of gilt-backed chairs, designed to cause anyone over five feet tall severe cramps in various parts of their anatomy. The prime seats, the ones towards the back that allowed for easy escape, had already been taken, one by the Dowager Duchess of Dovedale's revolting pug dog, who yipped at the newcomers as though daring them to try to move him.