by Eloisa James
Not everyone in Carthage was sane, as evidenced by the rapid pattering of feet around the pile of shards waiting in the sun to be catalogued.
“Oh Christ,” Gabriel moaned. “He’s at it again. Nanny must have let him loose.”
“Do something,” Kate murmured. “I can’t move.”
“Don’t move,” he said, pressing a kiss onto the nape of her neck. “You lie there and let that baby girl grow fat and happy.”
“Little Merry is baking,” she said, rubbing her rounded tummy. It wasn’t a complaining groan, since Kate had discovered that she much preferred the sunny warmth of Tunis to the chill of an English winter.
“We’ll be back in England in a couple of months and you’ll be telling me how cold the castle is.” He gave her another kiss. “I’m sure you could use a massage . . .” He gave her a little nip, right at the smooth part at the back of her neck, then soothed it with a kiss.
Whatever Kate might have replied was lost when a small form burst into the tent, waving a shard. “I found something wonderful, Papa! Look what I found!”
A very small princeling named Jonas ran over, followed by a small yapping dog, and put the broken pottery piece in Gabriel’s hand. He was named for his favorite uncle, Mr. Jonas Berwick. “See, Papa,” he cried. “It’s a bird. I found a bird!” His stubby finger traced an arch that might well have been a wing, a dent that might have been an eye, a crack that looked something like a beak.
“That’s amazing,” Gabriel said slowly.
Something in his voice made Kate raise her head.
Without speaking, but with a very solemn face, he handed her the bird. But, like Gabriel, her eyes didn’t fasten on the beak, but on the ancient Greek letters.
She puzzled over it for a moment. She had spent the last few years devouring the languages and books that she never had access to when younger, but her knowledge of the Greek alphabet was still shaky. “Oh my God,” Kate whispered. “It says DIDO!”
Gabriel burst out laughing.
“What is it, Papa?” Jonas called, jumping about on one leg. “Why are you laughing? Have you seen how good I am on one leg?”
“You’re just like Biggitstiff!” Gabriel chortled.
“It says Dido,” Kate protested, lying back down and holding the shard up in the light so she could see it better. “It does have a wing, darling.”
“That’s not the wing,” Jonas said disapprovingly. “That’s the bird’s bottom. See, it’s been dropping poop right there.” He pointed to a tiny mark at the bottom of the o for Dido.
“And that,” Gabriel said, “is an alpha, rather than an omega, as you assumed, m’dear. Jonas’s poop is the wiggle that turns an alpha to an omega.”
“So what does the word mean, then?” Kate asked sleepily.
“My guess is the shard spells half of didascalos,” Gabriel said, “meaning pupil or disciple. Which is interesting in itself, given that we were speculating over whether there might have been an organized school on the grounds.”
“It’s a bird,” Jonas said disapprovingly, taking it back.
“Fly the bird outside and find Nanny,” Gabriel said, giving him a little push. “Mama needs a nap. Take Freddie with you.”
Barring the fact that he couldn’t seem to stay out of a shard pile when he saw it, Jonas was a fairly well-behaved boy, so he trotted away, leaving a dusky tent, an amorous prince, and a drowsy princess.
Who found herself tempted . . . and woke up.
Epilogue
In the wondrously various world of Cinderellas, the prince always manages to find his cinders girl, and carries her off to his castle. Sometimes the evil stepsisters are banished, sometimes they become housemaids in the castle, and once in a blue moon, they transform into house fairies. The wicked stepmother is never seen again, the pumpkin rots in the garden, and the rats are set free to wander whither they wish.
This particular Cinderella ends a bit differently. Of course, the prince did manage to find his cinders girl and carry her off to his castle, except for those months when they happily migrated to warmer, less rainy climes. The evil stepsister, who wasn’t really evil at all, moved to a country estate with her inestimable husband, where they raised eight children. None of Lord Dimsdale’s offspring was very bright, but they were cheerful and extraordinarily beautiful. Even more important, they were very kind, taking after their papa and, indeed, their mama as well.
They did not take after their maternal grandmother, the wicked stepmother, perhaps because they rarely saw her. Mariana sold her estate to Gabriel, who bequeathed it to his brother Wick. She promptly moved to the city and married a prosperous banker. In a short time she acquired three times as many gowns as she had owned before. She died abruptly, of a lung ailment, leaving her banker impoverished and rather less bereft than he would have thought.
Kate and Gabriel settled down together in the messy, charming castle full of relatives, assorted children (they had three), and animals. Freddie lived to a ripe old age, traveling back and forth from archaeological sites with aplomb. The elephant lived even longer, though the lion unfortunately ate two shoes one day and expired the next.
And now I shall borrow from an author of some of the world’s best tales, Rudyard Kipling, to say, O Best Beloved, that every story must come to an end. I leave you with the final, crucial point of fact: They all lived happily ever after.
Even the pickle-eating dog.
Historical Note
A fairy tale exists in a kind of timeless hour, caught between today and yesterday. For that reason, I allowed myself more freedom with language than I have in previous historical novels. A Kiss at Midnight, I cannot emphasize too firmly, is a fairy tale, not an historical novel. There are many ways that princes found wives, but it is doubtful than any of them ended up with a castle and an English bride in just this way. If I had to suggest a date, it would probably be somewhere around 1813, during the Regency.
My biggest literary debt lies, obviously, in Perrault’s version of Cinderella. Scholars generally think that Perrault mistook the word vair (fur) for verre (glass); I reimagined his slippers as translucent, due to being created from stiffened taffeta. A similar literary mistake is that The School of Venus was wrongly attributed to Aretino for years, and published in England under his name; it was actually written by a student of his, Lorenzo Veniero. Besides those gentlemen, I owe a debt to E. Nesbit’s The Enchanted Castle. While I had no magic ring to transform my characters into living marble, I tried to give Pomeroy Castle some of the delicious joy of Nesbit’s castle.
Acknowledgments
My books are like small children; they take a whole village to get them to a literate state. I want to offer my heartfelt thanks to my personal village: my editor, Carrie Feron; my agent, Kim Witherspoon; my website designers, Wax Creative; and last, but not least, my personal team: Kim Castillo, Franzeca Drouin, and Anne Connell. I am so grateful to each of you!
About the Author
ELOISA JAMES is the author of eighteen award-winning romances. She’s also a professor of English literature, teaching in New York City, where she lives with her family. With two jobs, two cats, two children, and only one husband, she spends most of her time making lists of things to do—letters from readers are a great escape! Connect with Eloisa on her Facebook page (www.facebook.com/EloisaJamesFans), through her website (www.eloisajames.com), or through e-mail at
[email protected]
.
Praise
“Eloisa James’s writing
is absolutely exquisite.
She is one of the brightest lights. . . .
Her writing is truly scrumptious.”
Teresa Medeiros
By Eloisa James
A Kiss at Midnight
A Duke of Her Own
This Duchess of Mine
When the Duke Returns
Duchess By Night
An Affair Before Christmas
Desperate Duchesses
Pleasure for Pleasure
The Taming
of the Duke
Kiss Me, Annabel
Much Ado About You
Your Wicked Ways
A Wild Pursuit
Fool for Love
Duchess in Love
Copyright
This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
A KISS AT MIDNIGHT. Copyright © 2010 by Eloisa James. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
EPub Edition August 2010 ISBN: 9780062005366
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Table of Contents
Cover
Title Page
Dedication
Contents
Prologue
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
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Epilogue
Historical Note
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Praise
By Eloisa James
Copyright
About the Publisher