by Anne Gracie
As they walked away, Gil commented dryly, “Quite an education, watching you handle a harmless little old lady.”
“Smugness does not become you, Gilbert. Besides—harmless? She’s a bloody witch! You should recruit her.”
“How do you know I haven’t already?”
Zach laughed.
Chapter Twenty-two
You want to tell me, and I have no objection to hearing it.
—JANE AUSTEN, PRIDE AND PREJUDICE
“M’mother dragged me to Lady Beatrice’s literary society once before,” Gil told Zach as they approached the big white house in Berkeley Square. “Not the usual kind of literary society. It’s packed full of old ladies who can’t read small print anymore. The girls read the books aloud, then everyone has tea, then they read a bit more, then they all go home. Sometimes they even read the same book twice!” He shook his head in mild disgust.
“Sounds painless enough.”
“The trouble is, every old lady has at least one eligible young female relation that she’s trying to palm off on some hapless fellow,” Gil said gloomily. “Why else d’you think m’mother dragged me there in the first place? Not for my entertainment, you can be sure of that.”
They rang the bell and Lady Beatrice’s butler opened the door. His eyes narrowed in recognition.
Before he could say anything, Zach handed him Lady Beatrice’s card. “Messrs. Black and Radcliffe for the literary society.” The butler glanced at the card, and stood back to let them enter, managing to convey in some mysterious butlerish fashion that while he disapproved of her ladyship’s imprudence in inviting such a dubious fellow as Zach, he would naturally honor the card. But he would be watching and Zach had better behave himself.
All conveyed without a word. Marvelous, Zach thought as he stepped inside and found a large liveried footman waiting to collect coats, hats, gloves and umbrellas. “Afternoon, William.”
“You!” Having no mysterious butlerish powers, William started forward, clearly ready to throw Zach into the street, but the butler cleared his throat in a discreet and meaningful manner, and with visible difficulty, William restrained himself.
Again, Zach admired the butler’s powers. He handed William his hat. “Apologies for my earlier deception, William. Not really a gypsy. Was on government business.” He tapped the side of his nose.
Gil shrugged off his coat and handed it to the butler. “Numbers dropped since the start of the season, have they, Featherby?” he said. “Can usually hear the din from here.”
“On the contrary, sir,” Featherby murmured. “The quiet is because you have arrived a little late. The reading has already begun.”
As he passed the still glowering William, Zach slipped a gold guinea into the big man’s hand. From the look on the footman’s face, it reconciled him slightly to having Zach in the house. Just barely.
Zach followed Gil, who seemed to know his way. They entered a large drawing room, where at least fifty people were seated in semicircular rows, all facing the front.
It wasn’t quite full of old ladies, Zach saw. There were at least a dozen younger men, all exquisitely dressed and seated in the front semicircle of chairs.
On a small podium sat three young women. Jane, in the center, was reading aloud. The young men leaned forward, gazing at her raptly.
Puppies, Zach thought. He wanted to bang their heads together and boot them out the door.
Lady Beatrice caught his eye and nodded a regal greeting. Zach nodded back. Most of the chairs were taken, and he and Gil waited just inside the door, so as not to disturb the reading.
Zach stood in the doorway listening, drinking in the sight of Jane, sitting with her back straight, reading aloud, as earnest as a schoolgirl.
“He came to ask me whether I thought it would be imprudent in him to settle so early; whether I thought her too young—in short, whether I approved his choice altogether; having some apprehension, perhaps of her being considered (especially since your making so much of her) as in a line of society above him. I was very much pleased with all that he said . . .”
She looked enchanting. Her voice was clear, her reading ever so slightly . . . wooden.
He found it utterly endearing.
At the turning of a page, she glanced up and saw him. Her jaw dropped, she lost her place, then fumbled and dropped the book. She shot a glance at a man seated to her left and flushed. Zach could only see the back of his head. Sandy hair and a balding pate.
There was an immediate scrimmage as the young dandies at the front leapt into action, competing gallantly to retrieve the dropped book and return it to her.
Zach was more interested in the fellow who’d caused that anxious look. Taking advantage of the disturbance, he moved fully inside, choosing a position at the back of the room where, standing, he had a clear view of Jane. Gil followed.
Since that first fraught look, Jane hadn’t even glanced at Zach, but the way she avoided looking in his direction told him she knew exactly where he was. Beside her, the sister with whom she’d been walking in the park watched him with an expression that indicated if she found him hanging from a cliff by his fingers, she’d gladly stamp on them.
She was loyal to her sister. Zach liked that. He smiled and gave her a friendly nod.
Order restored, Jane resumed her reading, her color considerably heightened.
The sandy-haired fellow turned his head and gave Zach a long, hard look.
“That’s Cambury,” Gil murmured.
Zach had thought as much. Across the crowded room the two men eyed each other. What can you offer her that she hasn’t already got? The old lady’s question echoed in his head and he thought of that moment, that split-second instant, when she’d gone from resisting him to kissing him back.
Did she kiss Cambury like that? His fists clenched at the thought of her golden slenderness in Cambury’s pudgy hands. He shoved them in his pocket.
Jane paused a moment, then her voice rose as she read with slight emphasis:
“It is always incomprehensible to a man that a woman should ever refuse an offer of marriage. A man always imagines a woman to be ready for any body who asks her.”
Feminine titters rippled through the audience.
Zach’s lips twitched as he wondered which one of them she was aiming that at. Him, no doubt. Or perhaps all the men in the audience.
She continued: “Nonsense! A man does not imagine any such thing. But what is the meaning of this? Harriet Smith refuse Robert Martin! Madness if it is so; but I hope you are mistaken . . .” and Zach’s attention wandered.
He had no interest in this story. He was examining his surrounds, wondering how, in this crowd, he would be able to speak to her in private. The old lady had tricked him. It looked well-nigh impossible.
Jane finished the page and passed the book to the dark-haired young woman sitting on her right, who continued reading. Unlike Jane, she had a real flair for the dramatic.
“Freddy Monkton-Coombes’s wife—her sister Damaris,” Gil murmured in Zach’s ear.
“I thought there were four sisters. The other one not here?”
“Daisy.” Gil jerked his chin to indicate her. “The little one sitting in the far corner, sewing. She never reads.”
“Why not?”
Gil shrugged.
“For sisters, they don’t look much alike, do they?” Zach commented.
“Shush!” A lady turned around with an indignant look. “Damaris is reading!” They subsided into abashed silence. Jane still hadn’t looked at him, not since that first shocked glance as she’d realized he was here.
It was, he hoped, a good sign. If she was indifferent to him, she’d look. Surely.
In the break between chapters, while everyone was eating cake and drinking tea, Lady Beatrice caught his eye and waved him imperiously closer. The wrinkled ol
d face was bland, but the eyes brimmed with mischief.
She beckoned her nieces over and, when they’d gathered around her, said, “Gels, I would like you to meet Mr. Black, a gentleman newly arrived from Italy.”
Zach bowed gracefully as she made the introductions. She ended, “Zachary is the grandson of an old friend of mine. And do you know what else? He knew your father, gels, the dear departed Marchese di Chancelotto.” She beamed gently at Zach with a cat-who-ate-the-cream expression, and he recalled that she’d predicted his arrival would liven things up. “And he speaks fluent Italian—what do you think of that, eh, gels?”
Not a lot, judging by the way her nieces stiffened and stepped closer to Jane. Four pairs of eyes fixed him with a hard expression, daring him to do his worst.
He smiled at the mischievous old bat through gritted teeth. So much for her assurance of discretion. “You misunderstood me, my lady,” he said smoothly. “What I said was that since I had recently arrived from Italy, your nieces and I might perhaps have acquaintances in common.” He glanced at their unresponsive faces and shrugged. “But perhaps not.”
He turned to Jane. “Delighted to meet you again, signorina,” he said in excellent Italian, and went on to apologize—still in Italian—for the misunderstanding, assuring her and her sisters that he’d never met the marchese.
Hoping he had reassured them, he was surprised to see four blank—and slightly panicked—expressions on the faces of three of the four nieces. The small one just glared at him with uncomplicated fury.
Jane looked quite frozen. Her sister Abby said hurriedly, “We do not speak Italian, Signor Black.”
“Only Venetian,” Jane added.
Zach inclined his head gracefully. Of course, Venetians were very proud of their distinct culture and history. He said in the Venetian dialect, “My Venetian is a little rusty, but if you would prefer me to use that . . .” And when he received another equally blank and slightly panicked look, he realized the old lady had tricked him. The girls had no idea what he’d said.
“Ah, you don’t wish to speak Venetian?” he said quickly in English.
“Not in public,” Jane told him. “We were brought up to believe it’s impolite to speak a language others in the room do not speak.”
“Oh, but Miss Chance,” a lady gushed, “I would love to hear a Venetian conversation.”
“Me too,” said another. “I learned Italian in the schoolroom, of course, but I have never had the pleasure of conversing with a native speaker.” She batted her lashes at Zach. “Especially such a dashing one.”
Jane’s sister Abby stepped forward. “Sorry, but Lady Beatrice has forbidden us to speak Venetian”—she turned to the old lady and said with an edge of steel—“haven’t you, Aunt Beatrice, dear?”
The old lady gave Zach the sweetest smile and said, “Indeed I have. I should have warned you, Mr. Black, Italian is bad enough, but the mere sound of the Venetian dialect gives me the most frightful palpitations. It was all the fault of the doge. Or was he a marchese? I forget—the most divine-looking man, with such eyes—like drowning in chocolate, my dears—and the longest, thickest lashes. And his figure—I vow, his valet must have had to pour him into his breeches. As for peeling him out of them—well . . .” And she sighed with gusty reminiscence.
At that point the butler rang a little bell and there was a general shuffle to resume seats. Jane gave Zach a look that gave him to understand that if she never saw him again, that would be perfect.
Damn and blast. He’d come here to mend the situation between him and Jane, and now—with his Italian/Venetian debacle—it was worse than ever. He glanced at the old lady, cursed her under his breath. It amazed him that she’d lived so long, that nobody had yet strangled her.
She grinned back at him like the veriest urchin brat, filled with such unrepentant glee, he was forced almost to laugh.
Zach inclined his head to her, acknowledging her victory. The devious old hellcat. She’d led him right down the garden path, paying him back, no doubt, for his initial deception of Jane. It had been an impressive performance.
He glanced at Gil to see if he’d witnessed the debacle, and saw his friend once again battling with silent convulsions. Zach made his way to the back of the room. All was not lost, he told himself. He was still here in the house where Jane lived. There must be a way he could see her, explain. Apologize.
He stepped back to let a lady pass when a sharp little elbow jammed into his ribs, hard. “Oof!”
He turned, rubbing his ribs. The culprit was a small, elegantly dressed young woman, the fourth sister, Daisy. “Sorry,” she said. She didn’t look the least bit sorry. That elbow had been deliberately aimed. Another one who wanted to punish him for speaking Italian, no doubt. She jerked her head toward the door. “Follow me, gypsy.”
Gypsy? Intrigued, he followed. She led him along the hallway and Zach was surprised to see she had a distinct limp. He was also surprised by her accent: pure broad Cockney, nothing like Jane’s.
“The old lady told me to say you’re to wait in the parlor along ’ere.” She opened a door and showed him into a small, elegant parlor. “When the reading’s done, she’ll send Jane in to talk to you.”
“Thank you—” he began.
She cut him off. “Don’t thank me, it’s the old lady’s house so she can ’ave whoever she wants in it. I don’t agree, but it ain’t up to me. But”—she eyed him grimly—“you hurt or embarrass my sister Jane and I’ll gut you like an ’erring, understand, gypsy? Wiv a rusty blade.”
Little firebrand. Zach nodded. “Fair enough. For what it’s worth, I don’t have any such intention. Quite the opposite, in fact.”
She sniffed, unimpressed. “Fine words from a fancy gent, but you’ve already made her cry once.” She added fiercely, “Just don’t do it again, orright?” and stumped away.
Zach grinned. He liked her, liked the way she was prepared to stand up for her sister and threaten to gut a man twice her size if he hurt her. Jane had good family.
As for the old lady—God only knew what she was playing at. She must have led his grandfather a right merry dance. Or maybe he’d led her the dance and she was paying his grandson back. Whatever her motives, he hoped she really did mean to send Jane to talk to him. Only time would tell.
Zach stretched himself out on a chaise longue, and waited. He wouldn’t put it past the old girl to “forget” to inform Jane he was here, leaving him cooling his heels indefinitely.
* * *
To his surprise, after the hubbub of the departing guests died down, the parlor door opened and Jane stood there, eyeing him with cool disfavor. “I have been asked to listen to what you have to say,” she said coldly. “I don’t know what lies you told Lady Beatrice to get her to—”
He rose. “I didn’t lie to her.”
“Why not? You lied to me.”
“No. I misled you, I admit, but I never lied to you.”
She gave him a skeptical look. “You can’t have it both ways. You’re just playing games with me, with Lady Beatrice, with all of us.”
“I can understand why you might think that,” Zach conceded. “I have a frivolous streak that’s gotten me into trouble before, I admit. And in a way, that’s how this started off—but it wasn’t a game.”
She gave an unimpressed sniff and moved toward the door. He caught her by the wrist. “Please, just sit down and hear me out.”
She looked pointedly at the hand holding her, and with some reluctance he released her.
“Why should I believe a thing you say? You’re a chameleon, a will-o’-the-wisp. A liar.”
“Lady Beatrice knows who I am—my true identity. She knew my grandfather, who I’m told I strongly resemble. And she saw me christened as a child.”
She arched her brows at that. “Babies change; you could be anyone.”
“Gil Radcl
iffe and I have been friends since our school days. I’ve been working for him, gathering intelligence for the British government for the last eight years. I’m staying with him at the moment. He will also vouch for me.”
She stood with arms folded, tapping her foot, considering his claims, and he added, “It was Gil’s invitation I used to get into the masquerade the other night. It was I who wrote his name on your card. Don’t blame him, though—he knew nothing about it until afterward.”
She thought for a moment, then turned toward the door. “I’m going to check all this with Lady Beatrice.”
“Why? You saw how she treated me. She told everyone there she knew me.”
“She also said you were a friend of my father, the Venetian marchese, and there’s no such person. She made him up.”
“She did?” Zach had assumed the story had come from the girls. And that, he realized suddenly, was why they’d reacted with such hostility to his speaking Italian. Jane, of course, had assumed he was trying to embarrass her.
“I didn’t know you didn’t speak Italian—or Venetian,” he said quickly. “I apologize. Lady Beatrice led me to understand that you did.” She still looked mistrustful, and he added, “Truly. I had no idea I would cause you or your sisters any discomfort. I came here today to clear away any misunderstandings between us—do you honestly think I would deliberately sabotage myself, particularly in such a public manner? Truly, I meant no harm.”
She considered that, and gave a reluctant nod. “We love Lady Beatrice dearly, but she does have a . . . a mischievous attitude to the truth at times.” She opened the door. “But when it’s important, she won’t lie to me, and I still intend to check.” She exited the room, leaving Zach pacing. Would she even come back?
He had to convince her to believe him. And to wait.
After a very long ten minutes, Jane reentered the room and sat down. “Lady Beatrice vouches for you; I am yet to be convinced.” She folded her hands in her lap, looking like a demure schoolgirl. “She tells me your name isn’t even Zachary Black.” Her brows rose sardonically, her voice anything but demure. “And you claim you never lied to me?”