“A good question, Alasdair. I guess you want your courtship to reach the Scalbys’ ears. You despise them, I don’t doubt you have good reason. You’ve never told me all of it and I never pressed you for it. A man’s secrets are his own, even a boy’s are—and that’s what you were when you met them. I know that, but little else. Except it has to do with your father. I suppose you’re seeing Kate because she’s their cousin and you think that will dismay them. It’s a rococo scheme, even for you. What’s the point?”
Alasdair leaned back in his chair and stretched out his legs, affecting calm. But his eyes denied it. “The point? Revenge. Revenge is a strange thing. If a man’s angry at someone, he wants satisfaction, of course. In the first pure flare of rage, killing the object of his fury is the only thing that will do it for him. Fortunately, with most men, Reason takes over. He remembers that murder’s a mortal sin. Moreover, if he succeeds, there’s the nasty fact that Society will then usually do the same to him. A duel? But they are illegal and unsatisfactory. Apart from the fact that if you win you might have to go into exile, it might satisfy your anger against one person, but what if you’re offended by two?
“Mayhem is good, too,” Alasdair said. “But it’s so temporary. A burned-out house can be rebuilt, can’t it?” He spoke as though he were amused. But he wasn’t and neither was his friend. He held up a finger, “But say anger has been thwarted for decades. Suppose the sin is too great to be settled by a lawsuit or even the spread of scurrilous gossip. What then? I’ll tell you what. As years go by, a man discovers he needs more than simple reprisal. Years have gone by,” he said harshly, “and I’m not just any man. I need their complete destruction. Now even a rope around their necks wouldn’t do. Death’s too sudden, too complete. I want them to live with defeat, I need to see their eyes when they know I’ve beaten them.”
He looked down at his hand as though suddenly noticing the tight fist it had closed to, and opened it. He dropped bits of pulverized walnut into his plate.
“They’ve hidden themselves,” he said softly, brushing his hands together. “They’re more cloistered than nuns, nested like eggs, secret as a nut in the shell. No one’s seen them since they returned to England. I will. I must. Yes, I could end it without doing that, but I will see them as I ruin them. They’ve hidden themselves well and can continue to, because they can turn away friends—if they had any. But they can scarcely turn away family. Kate’s my key.”
He looked at his friend soberly. “They caused my father’s death, Leigh. They ruined him by enticing him into a fatal financial scheme. He might have recovered from that. He was a gentle man, never a coward. But they made it worse, visiting him and mocking him, dancing on the grave he hadn’t yet dug, promising him shame for years to come, ruining every last thing he held dear. He felt he had no choice. As I have none now.
“I’m no prince of Denmark,” he added, a slow, sad smile spreading across his mouth, easing the tight lines of it. “I didn’t choose to procrastinate. I tried to make them pay right away. But I couldn’t. They were powerful, and I wasn’t. How could I be? They were grown, I was still a lad. And I was unmanned by grief, deep in shock and sudden crushing debt, only sixteen, suddenly poor, with a name to try to salvage and an estate to save from total ruin. I’ve worked and grown and hardened since then. Now I’m no longer poor, or young, or powerless. Now, too, I will take my time.
“It’s a little thing I’m after,” he added in cajoling tones as he stared at the fire seething in the hearth. “Just a few minutes in their company, to face them and tell them what I know, what the world will know, and how little credit or reputation they’ll have in the world once I’ve done it. That’s all. Not much, is it? No harm will come to anyone else. Least of all to Kate.”
“It’s a madness with you, Alasdair.”
“Yes. True,” Alasdair said with a quirked smile. “But I’m a lucky lunatic, because when it’s done I’ll be sane.”
“And Kate?” Leigh persisted. “Is there a possibility of a future for her in your plans?”
Alasdair’s smile grew cold. “So, after all the denial, the truth. You’ve a care for her, after all?”
Leigh shook his head. “I do, but I don’t know her well enough to have more than that. I doubt it would matter if I did. I told you before, have you looked at her when she looks at you? Or are you too full of your own plans even to see her?”
“I see her,” Alasdair said. “I like her. But I’ve no intention of allowing myself to have serious intentions toward any woman until I’m free. Don’t you understand? I’m married to this scheme of mine, Leigh. I’m faithful to it. I have been for almost two decades, and I can’t commit myself to anything or anyone else until I’ve fulfilled my oath. I restored my fortune, I will restore my father’s good name, to let his soul finally rest in peace. And,” he added more quietly, “I will regain my own peace of mind.”
When Leigh spoke his voice was sorrowful. “My God, Alasdair. What did they do to you? It goes beyond revenge for your father, doesn’t it?”
The dancing flames in the hearth reflected on the surface of Alasdair’s dark eyes, and his expression held darker fires. “Yes,” he murmured. “It goes beyond that. I can only hope when I’m done, it will be done too.”
“Memory can’t be killed by killing of any sort.”
“No. But it can be appeased. Have done,” Alasdair said in lighter tones. “It will be over soon, and then we’ll see. You may yet drink a toast to my bride. But I’m damned if I know who that unlucky lady will be. Yes, I know, I’m damned anyway,” he added with a true smile. “I do intend to marry, to continue my line, that’s always been part of my plan. But as I said, I like Kate, and want the best for her, and I don’t know if that would be me. For that matter, I don’t know if there’ll be enough left of my heart to share with anyone. And she deserves no less. So if you’ve a fondness for her, don’t let me stand in your way.”
“You stand in my way by simply standing there.”
Alasdair shrugged. “I won’t repeat my father’s actions, even for you, dear friend.”
Leigh winced. “I never meant that.”
“I know you didn’t, I just wanted to see you squirm. And since you’re pleased to dissect my life and intentions, what about you and the little Swanson chit? Have you seen her when you enter the room? Speak of incandescence, she lights from within at the sight of you. She’s charming, you know.”
“Yes, I know. But she’s a child. As for her lighting up when I enter a room, well, why not? Of course the poor girl rejoices when she sees me. I’m kind to her. I make her laugh. I take her out of that house and treat her like a lady. And she has no one to compare me with, no man has ever paid attention to her. She has that clutch of hideous sisters to contend with, and they’ve helped keep her a secret, like a mad relative in the tower.”
Alasdair grinned. “So she’s your charity work, is she?”
Leigh paused. “I suppose she is.”
“And Kate? If I cry off, I should think you’d at least try your hand at entertaining her. Even though you’ll have to travel to the countryside to do it.”
“I’ve a carriage and horses, so, as you said, we’ll see,” Leigh said with a challenging look in his eye.
“Very good,” was all Alasdair said, as he selected another walnut. But this time he quickly and neatly cracked it in his hands.
The two men parted in front of the restaurant.
“I’m to my club,” Lord Leigh said. “Care to come along?”
“No, thank you, I’m going home. I’m not quite respectable enough for your club yet. No, don’t offer to accompany me to another. I don’t feel like gambling and can’t go wenching. It’s a book by the fireside for me. This respectable life will be my ruin. I’ll see you tomorrow at two. We have an appointment with the ladies, remember? The art exhibition? Then tea?”
Leigh nodded. “I remember. But your debt to me is rising. Any more enlightening exhibitions, and I think I’ll ask you
for some disreputable addresses.”
“Oh, I don’t doubt you can hunt up some of your own,” Alasdair said, “I go to the baths merely to be clean, I remind you.” He chuckled at his friend’s rising color, clear even in the lamplight. Waving a negligent hand, he ambled off down the street.
It was a busy section of town. Streetlamps glowed, private coaches and hackneys clattered down the street, lanterns fore and aft adding their own wavering lights. Passersby chatted as they strolled, boys carrying torches lit their way along the cobbles. Many sections of London were dangerous by night, but all the light in this district kept crime down, and the safety that provided lured ever more people out for a night on the town.
Deep in thought, Alasdair stepped around slower pedestrians as he made his way toward his town house. Leigh’s comments had started him remembering, and he hated that. He wasn’t thinking of Kate, or revenge. He was too busy trying not to think about why he needed both.
He’d long since ringed the thing round with so many plots and plans, snares and schemes, that it was hard to see clearly. He seldom had to think about the actual reason he needed revenge. But time had passed, and he’d enacted most of his schemes, so now the ugly thing could sometimes be glimpsed, pulsating like a worm surprised in the center of a rotting peach.
The worst nightmares had stopped long before, the moment he paid his first informer for information about the Scalbys. That was literally blood money. He’d earned it by working with his hands and back beside his tenants in the fields, trying to raise enough crops to keep the estate in good heart. His tenants had worked harder for him because of it. He was lucky in that, at least. The war effort required food for the troops, and his farms produced. He was lucky in his friends, too. He learned how to invest his money, growing it as carefully as he’d worked his fields.
By the time the Scalbys left England, Alasdair was a man, and a fairly rich one. His finances were in order, his life free to follow his dream. That dream was of revenge. When the Scalbys left, so did he. They established a home away from home on the Continent entertaining as lavishly as they ever did. Never political, they changed allegiances with the times and so were useful to every side. Alasdair crossed the Channel too.
As the war with France dragged on, Alasdair joined a select group of gentlemen abroad. He spied for His Majesty, and himself. As his pile of incriminating documents about the Scalbys grew, the incidence of his night panics—those dreams that dragged him screaming from his sleep—shrank in proportion to information received. It was like raking a midden, but the higher the mountain of filth he amassed, the more peace he found.
Sometimes, though, even now, he’d wake in a sweat, mocking voices still echoing in his ears, the stink of opium and patchouli in his nose, the imprint of those cold hands still on his hot, shrinking flesh. But now, at least, he didn’t remember the exact words or feelings magnified so intensely in his dreams. He didn’t allow it.
He’d learned to rise from bed, throw open a window, and breathe in clean air. Then he’d turn on all the lamps to banish the night. Then he’d pace and plot and plan to keep his mind from its sleeping horrors. The echoes of his shame would fade into dawn.
He accumulated information. The Scalbys had played at every evil game. They’d debauched the innocent. They’d gorged on forbidden pleasures. That wouldn’t matter, Society forgave that if it was done discreetly. But by following their adventures, by interviewing the fallen and promising vengeance to the grieving, Alasdair finally had enough proof to hang them—if he cared to. More than enough to ruin them, and that was his aim.
A man could take another man’s innocence and get away with it. He might trick another man out of his life, sully his infants and shame his name, and yet still be permitted in polite society. But one rule couldn’t be broken. Society did not forgive noblemen who swindled other noblemen out of their fortunes. They’d done that to many more men than Alasdair’s father.
That was good, and it was enough. But by digging in lives the Scalbys had touched, Alasdair discovered that they’d also committed treason. It was his crowning achievement, capping all his years of work. Because that was absolutely unforgivable. That, all their money and influence couldn’t wash away.
It was a bit of carelessness in a lifetime of callous betrayals. The Scalbys had always deftly danced around politics, but once, they’d stumbled. They’d found out some things from a drunken officer who had stayed at their home for their pleasure, and his. They’d told those things to another friend of theirs—in a letter. Not for money, but for favors. It didn’t matter. The secrets were military ones. Luckily for Alasdair, the old friend was, like so many of their friends, also an enemy of theirs.
Alasdair had the papers. He had them at last. Utterly.
He had them, but never forgot they were still dangerous. Serpents could slither out of the tightest corners. But if they were helpless it wouldn’t be half as satisying a game. So he kept watch on them as surely as they did on him. They obviously were waiting for his next move. When should he make it? He turned it over and over in his mind as he walked, as he’d been doing for weeks, because it was such a delicious problem, too rare a treat to gobble down. He’d waited too long to waste such a wonderful opportunity for ultimate revenge; he had to have the precise moment for it. He deserved it as much as they did. He might have been working for his country as he tracked them, but that wasn’t known outside of the War Office. What everyone did see was how he filthied his name by following their star. He’d had to go down into the gutters with them, and had come up with his own reputation ruined. They’d pay for that as well.
The streets grew darker as Alasdair neared his house. He lived in the best part of town, where bright lights weren’t tolerated any more than loud noises. A single lantern glowed above each door. It was quieter here, too. The Watch, an old pensioner hired to carry a rattle to sound the alarm if he saw trouble, dozed safe in his little booth at the corner, as comfortably nestled in his high chair as the wealthy he was supposed to be guarding were in their beds.
Alasdair strolled home, deep in thought, trying to guess how long it would be before the Scalbys asked Kate to visit them. Or would they? They knew he was courting her, did they guess why? Did they know just how much he knew? He slowed as a disagreeable thought occurred to him. If so, would they resist the impulse to interfere? Would he have to do something bolder?
He picked up his pace again, his bootsteps ringing on the pavement. Even if the Scalbys didn’t guess the ultimate weapon he’d gotten hold of, they wouldn’t be happy at the idea of him marrying into their family. Maybe they’d have her visit so they could find out?…but then when they saw her, would they try to see if they could make some profit from her?
His mouth tightened at the thought. He wouldn’t permit it.
He just wanted her to be invited. He’d invite himself along with her, send her from the room, and have his triumph. But they were lying low. He’d have to force their hand. Maybe cause more gossip they couldn’t ignore. Not enough to ruin Kate, just enough to fuel rumor. Keep her out too long one night? Kiss her in public? He smiled. It would be a pleasure to mix work with pleasure.
How would it feel to be able to run his hands through that crop of buoyant curls at last? To pull her close against his body, feel those high shapely breasts burning against his chest, to nuzzle her neck and breathe in the wild spring scent of her, feel that smooth downy cheek against his lips, taste, at last, that smiling mouth…
He turned at a noise. But not fast enough…. Just enough to get the bludgeon blow on the side of his head, not the back of his neck. So he didn’t go down, but only staggered. He managed to dodge the next blow, but he couldn’t get his bearings because his head was ringing too loudly. He swung out wildly and hit his attacker flush in the mouth, he felt teeth against his knuckles. But there were two attackers. He was dazed, and it was dark. He shook his head to try to see straight. He couldn’t gauge how far his attackers were from him because the blood f
rom the cut on his temple was flowing down over his eye.
The pain in his head was so bad he hardly felt more than a punch in his chest as the knife went in. But he could hear it scrape against a rib as the man pulled it out, and he became infuriated. He lunged and grabbed, wrestling for the knife he saw glinting in the lamplight. He wrung the wrist that held it, and when it fell free, he grabbed the knife in his fist. When the other man came clawing for it, Alasdair swung it hard. It sank into the fellow’s chest. Alasdair didn’t let go of the hilt, so he and the other man fell like lovers, tangled together, striving together.
He rolled on the ground struggling, until total darkness fell.
12
They were coming for him. It was time, but he wasn’t ready yet. Alasdair wished he’d drunk more and had more of what they’d given him to breathe in, because muzzy as he was he could still feel and hear. He was much too aware. He kept his eyes closed. Not tightly, because if they saw his eyes squeezed shut they’d know he was feigning sleep, and he wouldn’t have them think he was a coward. But he was, and he hated himself for it There was shame enough to deal with without that. He had to keep remembering that he was mature now, old enough to handle anything, and this was just another thing he had to contend with.
He forced himself to breathe slowly and evenly, letting his lids lie smooth, praying they’d leave him. No, he was beyond prayer, obscene even to think of it now. But he hoped they’d leave him if they thought he was oblivious. He felt a hand on his chest and knew that it wouldn’t matter, because even if he wasn’t insensible, they were.
He heard voices murmuring, he thought he heard laughter, too, they were having a good time. They always did.
“Is he awake?” someone asked.
“I don’t know,” another answered. “It doesn’t matter at this juncture.”
Indeed, it didn’t. He’d done this in a thousand dreams, and it never mattered. But this time was different because this time he felt pain, and it wasn’t just in his heart and cringing soul. His head was ringing, there was a sharp pain in it as well as a stab of pain in his chest every time he took a breath. The sickly stench of opiates was in his nose once more. He tasted spirits on his lips. He knew he lay vulnerable, naked before strangers again. He despaired. There might be variations, but this was the dreaded dream returned.
Edith Layton Page 14