Ridgley broke into a deep, glad laugh. "I shall, by gad!" He clapped his free hand on Vaille's shoulder. "Like old times, eh, Phil?"
"Yes," said Vaille gruffly, "like old times!"
The Earl beamed on him. Vaille blinked mistily. "I'll go and call up our vehicles," said Ridgley.
"We'll return together," said Vaille. "If you please, Ted."
"Aye, aye, sir," grinned Ridgley, and took himself off.
For a moment, the Duke stared after his cousin. When he turned, his pleasant smile was gone. "Well," he said bleakly, "what do you expect of me, Damon?"
Damon's nerves tightened. "Nothing, sir. You do not have to—"
"To acknowledge publicly my… crippled son?"
A knife turned in Damon's heart, but his chin lifted. "I know it must cause you humiliation. And I am, indeed, sorry. But—I will not hide it any—"
"Sorry—are you!" The blue eyes fairly sparked. "By God, how noble! I was angered with Ridgley for near twenty years and find my anger was unwarranted! In your case, I am fully justified! And fiend take you, Damon! I may never forgive you!" He took a step towards his son, and the Marquis blinked and retreated. "How dared you?" Vaille went on in a quiet voice more deadly than the loudest shouting. "How dared you imagine that I would be offended by such a trite affliction? Or by any affliction in my own son! How dared you think I would view you with any less fondness—or give a hoot in hell what others thought!"
Damon's heart began to quicken. His eyes searched that handsome face eagerly.
"When I think," Vaille snarled, "of all the years I have longed to have you beside me! Of all the misery to which I have been subjected purely because of what others laid to my pride—never admitting their own! Well, sir? Never stand there like a deaf mute! What have you to say for yourself?"
"But… but…" stammered Damon, "I always thought… I believed…But, father, I—"
"What did you call me?" thundered Vaille.
"Father—sir."
"You was used to coin another name."
"Yes." said Damon apologetically. "And I know you—"
"Say it!" Vaille scowled.
Wonderingly, Damon said, "Mon…Père?"
Vaille, his smile suddenly tender, said, "By Jove, Camille, I do rather like the sound of that—after all!"
He held out his arms and, in a most undignified manner, clasped his son to his heart.
Chapter 27
"Took us half an hour to catch some of those blasted hacks!" grumbled Clay.
Whitthurst, drinking hot coffee with much pleasure, his scorched self deposited in a fireside chair in the pleasant parlour of "The Oaken Bucket," nodded. "Whole damn barn full of horses one minute. Not a nag for miles the next…" His words trailed off, and he paused, his thoughts turning back to the thundering charge of those maddened animals and Damon lying helpless in their path.
The three young men exchanged grim glances, noting which the Duke frowned, and the hand he leaned on the mantle tightened into a fist.
"Well, I'm glad you came up with us," Damon smiled.
"And I'm relieved your—er—problems are so happily resolved," said Clay, with a sidelong glance at Vaille.
"So I'm become a problem, am I?" the Duke retorted. "Well, problem or no, I am forever in your—"
The door burst open, and Charlotte Hilby rushed into the room, her face pale and hunted looking, her cloak swirling out behind her. Oblivious of all but the Duke, she cried tragically, "Philip! Oh, my darling—I bring the most ghastly news! Poor Camille has been—" She broke off, her eyes widening as the Marquis' stood and faced her. Vaille jumped forward, caught her as she swayed, and half carried her to the sofa.
Clay raced to the door and shouted, "Brandy! Quick!"
Seating himself beside the beauty, Vaille gathered her into his arms and said, "My dearest girl, whatever has happened now?"
And when Miss Hilby had sipped a little of the potent brandy, coughed, and a trace of colour had crept back into her cheeks, she gasped, "I had gone…to Cancrizans to beg Camille's aid in the matter of this senseless… duel." Again, she stopped, her frantic eyes searching Vaille's calm face.
"There will be no duel, my love," he reassured her. Surprised by such a public term of endearment, she glanced swiftly at the others present. "I have been a very great fool," the Duke went on. "Indeed, why you have borne with me is more than I can understand. But—unless the prospect of becoming a Duchess displeases you—you and I have much to plan…"
Her eyes widened joyously. A flush brightened her lovely face. Disregarding the others, Vaille raised her hand and kissed it with betraying tenderness. Charlotte swayed closer, touching his cheek, her eyes adoring. Ridgley's embarrassed cough recalled her to the present, and she cried, "Oh! What a henwit I am! Camille—you must go at once! Phineas Bodwin sent one of his grooms to warn us you had stopped at the spa and been caught in a flash fire in the barn! We mourned you as dead!"
"My God!" gasped Damon. "Sophia never believed that?"
"But—my dear, the groom told us Phinny had been on the way to find you and tell you of the duel when he saw your carriage race by, empty, but the horses mad with fear. He followed the tracks and then saw the fire but could not get inside to help you. What else were we to think?"
"But… didn't Ariel tell you—?"
"Ariel came with us," Clay interposed. "The good fellow's so devoted to you, Cam. He was half crazed to know if you'd broken your neck falling off my Rajah or got yourself shot. He's in the kitchen now, for his back was quite burned, and his grace's coachman insisted the doctor must look at him."
Stunned, Damon asked, "Does Sophia know Whitthurst was with me?"
"No! Thank heaven! We went at once to the barn…" Charlotte clasped her hands. "I shall never forget her face when she saw that… that ghastly… glowing mass. We were both weeping… praying there was some mistake. But then—one of the men began to… rake the embers. And he found—" She shuddered, and Vaille patted her hand comfortingly. "Found the charred remnants of… your special… boot," she went on. "It was almost gone, Camille, but there was no… mistaking it. Thompson had gone with us, of course, and he broke down completely and said you'd insisted on…wearing it. Even now, they are attempting to search the wreckage. But—the heat was so fierce, they told Sophia it might be hours before… they could—Oh! How could Phinny have made such a dreadful mistake? Is he here? He was coming to try and stop the duel and tell Philip of your… your—Camille! You must go at once! Dear Sophia is breaking her heart!"
Damon was already limping to the door. "Ariel! Ah—there you are, my good friend! Lord Ridgley's chaise and my father's greys! All four of 'em! And fast!"
Damon refused the services of a groom, knowing that no man would drive as he intended to drive. He took no shortcuts this time, yet reached the Priory in an incredible forty minutes to find two carriages drawn up behind the house, one of which was his own, the other bearing the insignia of the Bow Street Runners. Guiding the team expertly round them, he swung around to the front of the house and was out of the chaise almost before the lathered horses had stopped. The front door was flung open as he limped up the steps, and Thompson and Mrs. Hatters rushed out. For an instant, he thought the man was going to embrace him, but he stood aside, blinking through swimming eyes as the little woman rushed into Damon's arms, sobbing, "Oh, thank the good Lord! We thought… we thought—"
"I know." He kissed her gently. "But as you can see, I am unhurt." Thompson, who was clinging wordlessly to his shoulder, as if needing the reassurance he was indeed flesh and blood, viewed his damaged countenance with a shocked expression, and Damon grinned. "Well—almost!"
The valet drew an arm across his eyes and gulped, "Her ladyship…"
"Where is she?"
"The music room," said Mrs. Hatters. "Hurry, sir!"
Damon cuffed Thompson lightly on the chin and hurried away. In the Great Hall, a crash and a muffled scream greeted him, and he leapt to catch Feather, who swayed beside th
e stairs, a tray and a broken glass of milk at her feet. She hugged his bruised ribs so hard he was forced to beg for mercy, and when he had kissed and reassured her and told her there had not been, nor was like to be, any duel, she sobbed gratefully, "I was just taking some warm milk to poor Sophia. Oh, Camille—never stand here comforting a silly old woman! Go to her!"
A dark-visaged man, wearing black clothing, said, "Your lordship, there is some questions wot I must put to—"
"Bow Street?"
For answer, the man held out his small baton of office. "Hif I may 'ave—"
"You may, indeed. In half an hour, exactly."
"Yus, sir. But first—"
"And not before," said Damon curtly, and strode past him.
The music room door was open. It was very quiet inside, , with no sign of that beloved, golden head. He pushed the door wider and entered cautiously. Sophia lay huddled on the sofa, one tear-stained cheek pillowed on her hand. Her eyes were closed, and a glittering drop coursed slowly down her face. Horatio, fascinated by this strange behaviour, was creeping toward the girl, and as Damon watched, the goose nibbled, but very gently, at the fingers of one drooping hand, for all the world as though he sought to comfort that terrible grief.
Sophia, opening swimming eyes, said brokenly, "Oh, Horatio… he is gone from us. My precious love… And soon— poor bird—you will be alone, for my heart is dying, also…" Her voice broke on a sob. "Oh, Camille… Camille!"
Overwhelmed by the depth of this sorrow, Damon moved closer but found her lying as if in agony, both hands clasped over her face. And he hesitated, fearing to frighten her into a collapse by suddenly appearing.
Horatio looked up at him, trundled back to the rug, and settled himself. Damon's glance fell upon the wounded harpsichord.
To Sophia, the music sounded faint and far away, so sunk was she in grief. Perhaps it was the echo of her happiness that rang in her ears. The memory of her beloved, playing with such tenderness the song he had written for her and claimed was for his fictional Great Aunt. She opened tear-dimmed, aching eyes and thought to see him once again, sitting there, his hair as tumbled as ever, his back so ramrod straight, his handsome face so terribly battered, and… She sat up and wiped at her eyes with a desperate eagerness. The music stopped. Peering, afraid to believe, not daring to accept what she saw, she crept toward him.
Damon swung around on the bench, his own eyes blurring at the full sight of her woebegone little face.
"Do… do not disappear… my own, my love," she pleaded, chokingly.
"Never!" He stood, and held out his arms.
Sophia gave a strangled cry and flew to him like a bird to its nest.
And in a little while the sun, being past the zenith, sent a pale but glowing finger down the diminishing clouds and through the side window, a finger that touched upon two heads very close together, one black and one golden. The man seated upon the bench before the old harpsichord, the girl clasped tightly in his arms.
Horatio, aware somehow that all was right with his world once more, went trundling down the hall in search of food. And never knew that behind him, he left—paradise.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Patricia Veryan - [Sanguinet Saga 04] - Love's Duet Page 35