To Wed a Wicked Prince

by Jane Feather

  “There are those in high places who have a different view.” One of the guests who had been listening in attentive silence spoke up. He was the only man apart from his host who was not the worse for wear. “They say Alexander is only pretending to friendship with Boney…lulling him into a sense of security. I understand you know the czar well, Prokov, how does that sit with you?”

  “It may be,” Alex said lightly. “But I couldn’t say. I knew the czar well at one point, but we’ve had our differences recently…my emperor doesn’t take kindly to criticism.” He sipped his wine, his expression bland, but everyone around the table understood the implicit message. Prince Prokov was in exile, voluntary or otherwise, because he had fallen foul of his sovereign.

  Livia, who thought she knew better, was puzzled. It was clear to her now that Alex had had an ulterior motive for this dinner party with these particular guests. But she couldn’t work out exactly what he was up to.

  Boris and two of his minions set out the second course. Livia had had no part in the ordering of this meal, as she would have done if it had been prepared by her own staff, but she could find nothing to object to in the menu. The Rhenish cream, the savoy cake, and the anchovy toast all found favor with her guests, as did the champagne that replaced the burgundy, which had accompanied the first course.

  “Of course, with Napoleon putting his relatives on all the thrones of Europe, it’s perhaps understandable that the czar would like to add King of Poland to his own crown,” Alex said, deftly steering the conversation back to the original subject. After a while he caught Livia’s eye and gave her an infinitesimal nod.

  Livia accepted the signal that it was time for the ladies to withdraw and rose to her feet. The gentlemen stood up politely as the ladies left the dining room; then the serious drinking of the evening could take place. The decanter of port circulated and the men relaxed in their chairs, loosening neckties, leaning elbows on the table, following their host’s conversational lead.

  Livia endured the tedium of the teacups in the drawing room, listening to the chatter about children, the complaints about servants, the discussions of the latest fashions. Several times she tried to introduce a livelier topic but her guests didn’t seem to know what to do with it, and she came to the conclusion that they were so unaccustomed to taking part in any subject outside the domestic realm that they believed anything else belonged to the realm of husbands and was thus beyond them.

  Fortunately for her sanity the gentlemen joined them after a relatively short period. Alex came over to her where she sat in front of the tea tray. He bent to take a cup from her and murmured, “I tried not to leave you too long.”

  Livia passed a cup to the servant who stood at her elbow. “Take that to Lord Eversham, please.” She glanced up at Alex from beneath her lowered eyelids and whispered, “I’d have been heading for Bedlam had you waited much longer. This is torment.”

  He nodded gravely as if she had said something of great import and strolled over to a sofa where three ladies sat side by side like sparrows on a clothesline. Livia had no idea what he said, but suddenly they were on their feet.

  “My lord, I think we must be on our way,” Lady Carmarthon said, with a flutter of her fan. She glanced sympathetically towards Livia.

  “Yes, indeed, Eversham,” that gentleman’s lady agreed, with her own sympathetic look at Livia. “Such a pleasant evening, Princess Prokov…Prince Prokov. So kind of you to invite us.” She came over to Livia and whispered, “My dear, how wretched for you.”

  Livia rose to her feet and responded with the wan smile that seemed appropriate in the circumstances. What on earth had Alex said? She shot him an inquiring look that drew only a solicitous smile in return.

  “Yes, you poor dear, I know how dreadful these things can be,” Lady Eversham murmured, taking her hostess’s hand and patting it. “I trust it will pass soon.”

  “You are too kind,” Livia murmured. What was supposed to be the matter with her? Should she press her fingers to her temples, double over with a stomachache, dab at her eyes with her handkerchief? She settled for fanning herself languidly and keeping the wan smile in place.

  Alex escorted their guests to the door as soon as Boris reported that their carriages awaited, and Livia, acceding to the universal wish that she not disturb herself unnecessarily, remained in the drawing room with the teacups.

  Alex returned after a very few minutes, looking remarkably pleased with himself, Livia thought.

  “You look very smug,” she declared. “What’s the matter with me? I didn’t know what symptoms to play up.”

  “You did very well,” he said with a grin. “I thought I should do something to give you a reprieve, since you endured the tedium with such a brave face.”

  “Yes, but what did you say?” She looked at him a little suspiciously. There was something about that grin.

  “I merely hinted that you were a little under the weather, a touch of migraine, only to be expected in the circumstances…”

  “You implied that I was pregnant?” She stared at him.

  “Either that or very much not so,” he said airily. “They could draw their own conclusions. But I have noticed that ladies, particularly those with the sensibilities of our guests, tend to respond to female complaints with instant sympathy.”

  He laughed at her speechless indignation. “My dear girl, only an earthquake otherwise would have dragged their husbands away before they’d had recourse to my cognac. Their ladies needed to be sufficiently engaged with your complaint to overcome for once their overbearing husbands.”

  Livia could see his point and her mouth curved in a reluctant smile. “Well, it was outrageously indecorous of you, but I’m grateful for the reprieve, however you managed it. But what was the evening about, Alex?” She was serious now, watching him closely. “You had something in mind, but I don’t understand what. I understood you to be a friend of the czar’s and yet you implied that you were his enemy.”

  He didn’t answer immediately, instead pouring himself a glass of cognac. “May I pour one for you?”

  “No, thank you,” she said with a touch of impatience. “I just want an explanation for why I’ve spent the last four hours in that company. What were you doing?”

  “I was interested in their views,” he said. “I heard them talking in the club a few weeks ago and it interested me.” He turned back from the sideboard, his goblet in his hand. “I do on occasion feel rather far away from my home, my dear, and sometimes it’s a pleasure to talk about it.”

  Livia frowned. “That’s all. You’re homesick and so you invited them so that you could talk about Russia and the czar?”

  “In a nutshell.” He sipped his cognac.

  “But why those men in particular?”

  “It so happens that they all have a finger in the pie of foreign affairs,” he told her. “They’re not particularly important members of your prime minister’s team, but I was interested in their views and thought they would be more forthcoming in a social setting.”

  It was a perfectly reasonable explanation, and yet something niggled at the back of Livia’s mind. “Why did you let them believe that you and the czar are at outs?”

  “To a certain extent we are,” he said simply. And it was only the truth.

  “Did he send you into exile?”

  He shook his head. “No, no, we’re not that badly at outs. But I felt it might be wise to absent myself from St. Petersburg for the duration of this war.” He smiled rather ruefully. “Slavs tend to be hotheaded, Livia, and our royal courts can be dangerous places when a particular faction gets the wind beneath its wings.”

  “You thought you were in danger?”

  Again he shook his head. “Not really, but I felt a change of scene would be beneficial.” He came over to the sofa and sat beside her. “Are you satisfied, sweeting?”

  “Of course,” Livia said. How could she not be? But she wasn’t. There was a ring of truth but the tune was off-key. “I th
ink I’ll go to bed. Are you coming?”

  “In a short while. I have some correspondence to catch up with.” He leaned sideways and kissed the corner of her mouth. “Thank you, my sweet, for putting up with my whim.”

  “What’s one tedious evening in the scheme of things?” she said lightly, rising to her feet. “Wake me.” She blew him a kiss as she left the drawing room.

  Alex stayed where he was for a while, sipping his cognac. The explanation he’d given her had been close enough to the truth that it should have satisfied her. But he had the unmistakable impression that she was not convinced.

  He got up with a sigh. It would have been easier all around if Sophia Lacey had named as her heir some nice mousy lady with an amenable disposition and a somewhat blunted intelligence. He glanced up at the portrait over the mantelpiece and raised his glass in a toast. Absurd to imagine that that vibrant, strong-featured woman could have chosen as her heir any woman who fitted his description. But why exactly had she chosen Livia Lacey?

  He made his way to the library, thinking about this. Livia had said once that she’d been told Sophia wanted to leave the house to a woman who bore her name. Even if she didn’t know her, even if the kinship was as vague as Livia implied that it was. But why?

  He sat down at his desk and dipped the quill in the inkpot, but for a moment he didn’t attempt to put pen to paper as he gazed into the middle distance. Sophia’s own child could not be named in her will. She shared no name with her own child. Could she have wanted to choose an heir who had a named connection with her, however tenuous? A female heir, someone who could not possibly remind her of the son she had given up?

  His gaze went to the top shelves of the bookcase and he shook his head in defeat. Whatever mental gymnastics he put himself through, he could not reconcile the idea of a woman who possessed such texts with the father whom he had known.

  He put pen to paper and realized that the ink had dried on the nib during his cogitations. He had little interest in writing his dispatch to St. Petersburg tonight, but it needed to be done while the ideas were still fresh. Diversionary tactics were complicated enough without a faulty memory.

  Livia awoke the next morning with the now familiar sense of unease. She lay gazing up at the embroidered tester that portrayed a rather wonderfully erotic copy of a Fragonard painting. It had been part of the original furnishings of the house and she had come to like it so much that she had had it cleaned and repaired in the renovations. Another little piece of the puzzle that was Aunt Sophia. How many lovers had she enjoyed in this bed, gazing up at that richly sensuous scene?

  Alex stirred beside her and as always came awake in an instant, clear-eyed and coherent, with none of the cobwebby tendrils of dreams and sleep that always plagued Livia for a few moments on waking. “Good morning, my love.”

  “Good morning.” She stretched indolently and turned her head on the pillow for his kiss. “It’s raining.” The relentless drumming on the windowpanes was loud in the room.

  Alex sat up. His gaze flicked upwards, as it always did in this bed, to the tester. And his thoughts were very similar to his wife’s. “That’s a nuisance, I was engaged to ride with some friends.” He pushed aside the covers and stood up, rubbing the back of his neck. “What are your plans for the day?”

  “A lunch party, but I think I’ll make my excuses.” Livia hitched herself up against the pillows, enjoying the sight of her naked husband. “Will you ring for Ethel?”

  He did so, came back to the bed to kiss her again, then went into the adjoining chamber to ring for Boris, who, despite his elevation to majordomo, continued to serve as the prince’s valet. He sharpened the razor on the strop and handed it reverently to his master, draping a warm towel around his neck.

  Alex dipped the razor in the water. The dispatch he had written the previous night needed to be sent by the clandestine courier service, but he intended that it should also come to the notice of Prince Michael Michaelovitch before it went on its way. A nice piece of deflection that would cover tracks most effectively. How best to do that?

  He was still considering his options when he went down to breakfast and found a message from Tatarinov beside his plate. It was oblique but clear enough to Alex. Contact has been made.

  Alex helped himself to a dish of creamed herring and poured a tankard of ale. Livia never joined him for breakfast; she maintained that his choice of diet in the morning turned her stomach. He considered her preferred menu of coddled eggs, bread and butter, and strong tea to be equally repulsive, but fortunately it was not a bone of contention. There were enough of those already, incipient for the moment certainly, but lurking, a layer of complexity beneath the apparently smooth surface of their marriage.

  His wife was puzzled, confused. She was uneasy. Alex knew that. But he also knew he couldn’t give her the answers that would solve her problem. He needed her, needed the framework of this marriage within which to work, and he could not risk jeopardizing that framework.

  Contact had been made with their agent in the army. The man had the funds to act. Now he needed the opportunity. And the courage. He would be unlikely to survive.

  Alex buttered a piece of black bread, wondering what kind of man it was who sent another man to his death while staying warm and safe at home.

  Should he call this off…go and take care of it himself? The opportunity would present itself to him quite easily. But of course he couldn’t. He was the man who organized, arranged, and paid.

  And he had a wife. Which brought him full circle. He would have to leave her in England and he couldn’t do that. It would leave her unprotected, and his personal protection was all he had to give her. A more personal involvement would endanger her even more than she was already endangered.

  Most of the time he succeeded in ignoring the danger she was in by concentrating on the conviction that such a consideration was secondary to the vital business that had brought them together. His father had instilled in him the belief that there was no higher motive, no greater goal for a man, than patriotism. No sacrifice was too much for one’s country. But did he have the right to involve in his own patriotic struggle someone for whom the issue had no relevance?

  Alex got up from the table with Tatarinov’s message and went into the library. He sat down and wrote a warm invitation to Prince Michael Michaelovitch.

  Chapter Twenty

  THE RAIN SHOWED NO SIGNS of lessening throughout the morning. Livia debated excusing herself from her luncheon party and then decided against it. For some reason she was restless and the weather didn’t help. Alex, undeterred by the wet, had gone to his club, and the prospect of staying alone with only a book for company, listening to the rain beating against the windows, seemed a poor prospect.

  “Morecombe, I’ll take the berlin to Berkeley Square this morning,” Livia instructed as she crossed the hall on her way upstairs to change. “It’ll keep the rain off.”

  “Oh, aye,” he said, and wandered away towards the kitchen regions.

  Livia, unperturbed by this monosyllabic response, continued upstairs, knowing that Morecombe would send Jemmy to fetch the coachman, and indeed when she came down to the hall a little later Morecombe was standing sentinel at the front door.

  “Coach is ’ere.” He struggled with the bolts and eventually pulled open the door.

  Livia put up her umbrella and ran down to the street, where Jemmy held the carriage door open for her. “Nasty day, m’lady.”

  “That it is,” she agreed, handing him the umbrella as she climbed into the gloomy and somewhat dank interior of the ancient coach. Slow and lumbering it might be when compared with the barouche, but at least it had a roof.

  The rain had not diminished when she left Betsy Ormond’s house in Berkeley Square a couple of hours later.

  “That’s such a wonderfully eccentric coach, Livia,” Betsy observed, accompanying her guests to the front door.

  “Maybe, but it’s also very practical in this weather,” Livia said c
heerfully. “May I take anyone else up?”

  “If you don’t mind dropping me in Albermarle Street, my dear, I’d be grateful,” an elderly lady said, winding an extremely long fur boa around her neck and then tucking her hands into her muff. “Hargreaves has the carriage this morning, and I was going to send a man for a hackney, but I’d much prefer to travel in such delightful style.”

  “I’ll be glad of your company, Lady Hargreaves,” Livia said. “Ah, here’s Jemmy with the umbrella.”

  Jemmy ran up the steps with the umbrella raised to shelter the women the short distance from the door to the carriage. “Tell the coachman we’ll be going to Albermarle Street first,” Livia instructed as she stood back to give her passenger precedence into the carriage. She climbed in after her, careful not to step upon the trailing boa, and Jemmy closed the door.

  “So, my dear, how’s married life?” her companion inquired, leaning forward eagerly, eyes bright at the prospect of a confidential chat.

  “Well enough, I thank you,” Livia said, unsure as always quite how to respond to such inquiries, unless they came from Nell or Ellie.

  “No happy event on the horizon as yet?” the lady asked. “Oh, impertinent of me, I know, my dear, but forgive an old woman’s curiosity.”

  “Not as yet,” Livia said, hoping that would put an end to the topic.

  “Ah, well, it can take a while,” Lady Hargreaves said comfortably. “So long as that husband of yours is patient.”

  Livia simply smiled a response. Her companion leaned forward again. “It’s amazing what you’ve done with Sophia Lacey’s house…I was only saying to Hargreaves just the other day how she’d barely recognize it now. It was such a pity that in the last years she became so reclusive. Quite the gadabout she was in her youth, and even later when with all the goodwill in the world one had to admit she’d passed her prime.”

  “How well did you know her?” Livia tried to conceal the extent of her interest.