Melisande rolled her eyes at his foolery, but she smiled as well. She was looking forward to her first Christmas with Jasper.
They made good time that day and were at Aunt Esther’s house well before supper time.
In fact, as their carriage rolled to a stop in front of the Edinburgh town house, Aunt Esther was seeing off another couple she’d no doubt had for tea. It took a moment to recognize Timothy and his wife. Melisande watched him, her first love. There had been a time when the mere sight of his handsome face had made her catch her breath. It had taken her years to recover from losing Timothy. Now the pain of his loss was muted and somehow apart from her, as if the broken engagement had happened to some other young, naive girl. She looked at him, and all she could think was, Thank goodness. Thank goodness she’d escaped marrying him.
Beside her, Vale muttered something under his breath, and then he was bounding from the carriage.
“Aunt Esther!” he cried, seemingly oblivious to the other couple. He strode toward her, and somehow, someway, bumped against Timothy Holden. The shorter man staggered, and Vale went to help him. But Vale must’ve knocked against Timothy again, because he landed on his rear in the muddy street.
“Oh, dear,” Melisande muttered to no one in particular, and scrambled from the carriage before her husband killed her former lover with his “kindness.” Mouse jumped down as well and ran to bark at the fallen man.
Before she could get there, Vale had offered his hand to help Timothy up. Timothy, the blind idiot, took it, and Melisande nearly covered her eyes. Vale pulled a trifle too hard, and Timothy popped off the ground like a cork and staggered against Vale. Vale leaned his head close to the other man, and Timothy’s face suddenly went an ashy gray. He leapt back from Vale and, declining any further help, hurried his wife into their carriage.
Mouse gave one last self-satisfied bark, happy to have chased him off.
Vale bent and petted the dog, muttering something to Mouse that made his tail wag.
Melisande breathed a sigh of relief and strolled to the two males. “What did you say to Timothy?”
Vale straightened and turned entirely too-innocent eyes on her. “What?”
“Jasper!”
“Oh, all right, but it wasn’t much. I requested that he not visit my aunt.”
“Requested?”
A satisfied smile was playing about his mouth. “I don’t think we’ll be seeing Mr. Timothy Holden or his wife here again.”
She sighed, secretly pleased at his concern for her feelings. “Was that entirely necessary?”
He took her arm and replied softly, “Oh, yes, my heart, oh, yes.”
Then he was leading her toward Aunt Esther and calling, “We have returned, Aunt, and we bring news of the reclusive Sir Alistair!”
Chapter Seventeen
The next day, the king announced a final trial. A golden ring was hidden in a cavern deep underground and guarded by a fire-breathing dragon. Well, Jack put on his suit of night and wind and took up the sharpest sword in the world, and soon enough he stood at the entrance to the cavern. The dragon came roaring out, and Jack had quite a battle, I can tell you, for the dragon was very big. Back and forth they fought, all through the day. It was almost nightfall when the dragon finally lay dead and Jack held the golden ring in his hand. . . .
—from LAUGHING JACK
A week later, Melisande walked in Hyde Park with Mouse. They’d arrived back in London only the night before. The journey from Scotland had been uneventful—saving for a horrible meal of cabbage and beef on the third day. Last night, Melisande had made a pallet in a corner of her room, and Vale had slept with her there all night. It was an odd arrangement, she knew, but she was so glad to have him with her, sleeping next to her, that she didn’t care. If she had to make her bed on the floor for the rest of her life, it would be fine with her. Suchlike had given the pallet a curious glance but hadn’t said anything. Perhaps Mr. Pynch had informed her of Lord Vale’s strange sleeping habits.
The wind fluttered her skirts as she walked. Vale had gone to speak with Mr. Horn this morning, probably about Spinner’s Falls. Melisande frowned a little at the thought. She’d hoped that after talking to Sir Alistair, he’d give up the chase, perhaps find some peace. But he was just as intent as ever. Most of the ride back to London he’d theorized and plotted and told and retold her his ideas of who the traitor might be. Melisande had sat and worked her embroidery, but inside, her heart was sinking. What was the likelihood that Vale could discover the man after all these years? And if he couldn’t find the traitor, what then? Would he spend the rest of his life in a fruitless search?
A shout interrupted her gloomy thoughts. She looked up in time to see Mrs. Fitzwilliam’s little boy, Jamie, embracing Mouse. The dog licked the child’s face enthusiastically. Evidently he remembered Jamie. His sister carefully bent to pat Mouse’s head as well.
“Good day,” Mrs. Fitzwilliam called. She had been standing a little apart from her children. Now she strolled over. “It’s a lovely day, isn’t it?”
Melisande smiled. “Yes, it is.”
They stood side by side, watching the children and the dog for a bit.
Mrs. Fitzwilliam heaved a sigh. “I ought to get Jamie a dog. He begs for one most piteously. But His Grace can’t abide animals. They make him sneeze, and he says they’re dirty.”
Melisande was a little surprised at the casual mention of the other woman’s protector, but she tried to hide it. “Dogs are rather dirty sometimes.”
“Mmm. I expect so, but then so are boys.” Mrs. Fitzwilliam wrinkled her nose, which only made her lovely face more adorable. “And, really, it’s not as if he visits us very much anymore. Hardly once a month in the last year. I expect he has gotten himself another woman, like an Ottoman sultan. They keep ladies like sheep in a herd—the Ottomans, I mean. I believe they call it a harem.”
Melisande could feel herself blushing, and she looked down at her toes.
“Oh, I’m so sorry,” Mrs. Fitzwilliam said. “I’ve embarrassed you, haven’t I? I’m always saying the wrong thing, especially when I’m nervous. His Grace used to say that I should always keep my lips firmly together, because it spoiled the illusion when I opened them.”
“What illusion?”
“Of perfection.”
Melisande blinked. “What an awful thing to say.”
Mrs. Fitzwilliam cocked her head to the side, as if considering. “It is, isn’t it? I didn’t realize it at the time, I think. I was very much in awe of him when we first met. But then I was very young too. Only seventeen.”
Melisande truly wished she could ask the other woman how she had become the Duke of Lister’s mistress, but she was afraid of the answer.
Instead, she said, “Did you love him?”
Mrs. Fitzwilliam laughed. She had a lovely, light laugh, but it was tinged with sadness. “Does one love the sun? It’s there, and it provides us with heat and light, but can one truly love it?”
Melisande was silent because any answer she gave would only add to the other woman’s sadness.
“I think one must be equals to love,” Mrs. Fitzwilliam mused. “Equal on some fundamental level. I don’t mean in wealth or even status. I know of women who truly love their protectors and men who love the women they keep. But they are equal on a . . . a spiritual level, if you see what I mean.”
“I think I do,” Melisande said slowly. “If the man or the woman holds all the emotional power, then they cannot truly love. I suppose one must lay oneself open to love. Let oneself be vulnerable.”
“I hadn’t thought of that, but I think you must be right. Love is essentially a surrender.” She shook her head. “It would take courage to surrender like that.”
Melisande nodded, looking at the ground.
“I’m not a very courageous woman,” Mrs. Fitzwilliam said softly. “In a way, every choice I’ve made in life has been out of fear.”
Melisande looked at her curiously. “Some would
say that the life you’ve chosen takes a great deal of courage.”
“They don’t know me.” Mrs. Fitzwilliam shook her head. “To be guided by fear isn’t the life that I wished.”
“I’m sorry.”
Mrs. Fitzwilliam nodded. “I wish I was able to change.”
As do I, Melisande thought. For a moment, they shared an odd rapport, just the two of them, respectable lady and kept mistress.
Then Jamie gave a shout, and they both looked over. He appeared to have fallen in some mud.
“Oh, dear,” Mrs. Fitzwilliam murmured. “I had better take him home. I don’t know what my maid will say when she sees his clothes.”
She clapped her hands and called briskly to the children. They looked disappointed but began slowly walking over.
“Thank you,” Mrs. Fitzwilliam said.
Melisande raised her eyebrows. “For what?”
“For talking with me. I enjoyed our conversation.”
Melisande suddenly wondered how often Mrs. Fitzwilliam got to talk with other ladies. She was a kept woman and therefore beyond the pale with respectable ladies, but she was also the mistress of a duke, which would place her far above most anyone else. She stood in a rarefied and lonely sphere.
“I enjoyed it too,” Melisande said impulsively. “I wish we might talk more.”
Mrs. Fitzwilliam smiled tremulously. “Perhaps we shall.”
Then she was gathering her children and bidding farewell, and Melisande was left with Mouse. She turned back the way she’d come. A carriage waited for her, and a footman trailed her discreetly behind. She thought about what she’d said to Mrs. Fitzwilliam, that true love demanded vulnerability. And she wondered if she had the courage to make herself that vulnerable once again.
“WAS MUNROE ABLE to provide you with any new ideas of who the traitor could be?” Matthew Horn asked Jasper later that afternoon.
Jasper shrugged. They were riding through Hyde Park again, and he was restless. He wanted to nudge Belle into a gallop, ride until both he and the mare were sweating. He felt near the breaking point. As if he couldn’t push forward with his life until he found the traitor and moved on. God, how he wanted to move on.
Perhaps that was why his voice was sharp when he said, “Munroe said I should look at the money.”
“What?”
“The man who betrayed us was probably working for the French. Either he did so for political reasons or he was paid. Munroe pointed out I should look into the finances of the men who were captured.”
“Who would take money and then go through the hell of being captured?”
Jasper shrugged. “Maybe he didn’t intend to get caught. Maybe something went wrong with his plan.”
“No.” Horn shook his head. “No. This is ridiculous. If there was a French traitor, he’d make sure he wasn’t near Spinner’s Falls when the Indians ambushed us. He’d pretend illness or fall behind or simply desert.”
“What if he couldn’t? What if he was an officer? See here, only the officers knew where we marched—”
Horn snorted. “There were rumors among the men. You know how well secrets are kept in the army.”
“Granted,” Jasper said. “But if he was an officer, he would’ve had a hard time getting away. We’d already been decimated at Quebec, remember. Officers were in short supply.”
Horn pulled his horse to a halt. “So you will investigate the finances of every man who was there?”
“No, I—”
“Or will you just investigate the finances of the captives?”
Jasper looked at Horn. “Munroe told me something else as well.”
Horn blinked. “What?”
“He also said you were in Paris.”
“What?”
“He said he has a French friend who wrote that he met a man named Horn at a dinner party in Paris.”
“That’s preposterous,” Matthew exclaimed. His face had reddened, and his mouth was a grim horizontal line. “Horn is not such an uncommon name. It was another man.”
“Then you weren’t in Paris this last fall?”
“No.” Horn’s nostrils flared. “No, I was not in Paris. I toured Italy and Greece, as I’ve already told you.”
Jasper was silent.
Horn gripped his reins and leaned forward in the saddle, his body stiff with anger. “Are you questioning my honor, my very loyalty to my country? How dare you, sir? How dare you? Were you any other man, I would call you out this very minute.”
“Matthew . . . ,” Jasper began, but Horn wheeled his horse and cantered off.
Jasper watched him go. He’d insulted a man he’d considered a friend. Jasper rode back to his town house, grimly pondering what made him insult a man who’d never done him any harm. Horn was right: Munroe’s friend could very well be mistaken as to who he’d seen in Paris.
He reached home, his thoughts conflicted, and found that Melisande was still out, a fact that turned his mood even more black. He’d been looking forward to seeing her, he realized, and discussing the disastrous ride with Matthew Horn. He bit back a curse and stalked to his study.
He’d only time to pour himself a splash of brandy before Pynch knocked on the door and entered.
Jasper turned and scowled at his valet. “Did you find your man?”
“Aye, my lord,” Pynch said as he advanced into the room. “Mr. Horn’s butler was indeed the brother of a fellow soldier I served with.”
“Did he talk?”
“He did, my lord. Today is his half day off, and I met him in a tavern. I stood him several drinks as we reminisced about his brother. The man died at Quebec.”
Jasper nodded. Many had died at Quebec.
“After the fourth drink, Mr. Horn’s butler became loquacious, my lord, and I was able to turn the conversation to his master.”
Jasper gulped the brandy, no longer sure he wanted to hear what Pynch had to say. But he’d started these events in motion, had sent Pynch on the hunt as soon as they’d returned to London. It seemed cowardly to balk now.
He looked at Pynch, his loyal servant who’d nursed him through the worst of the drunken stupors and nightmares. Pynch had always served him well. He was a good man.
“What did he say?”
His valet looked at him, his green eyes steady and a little sad. “The butler said the Horn finances were quite distressed on Mr. Matthew Horn’s father’s death. His mother was forced to relieve most of the servants. There were whispers that she’d have to sell the town house. And then Mr. Horn returned from the war in the Colonies. The servants were rehired, a new carriage was bought, and Mrs. Horn wore new gowns—the first in six years.”
Jasper stared blindly into his empty glass. This wasn’t what he wanted. This wasn’t the relief he’d sought. “When did Mr. Horn’s father die?”
“The summer of 1758,” Pynch said.
The summer before Quebec fell. The summer before Spinner’s Falls.
“Thank you,” Jasper said.
Pynch hesitated. “There is always the possibility of an inheritance or some other perfectly innocent source of money.”
Jasper arched a skeptical eyebrow. “An inheritance the servants never heard about?” That was very unlikely. “Thank you.”
Pynch bowed and left the room.
Jasper topped off his glass of brandy and went to stare into the fire. Was this what he wanted? If Horn was the traitor, could he really turn him in to the authorities? He closed his eyes and sipped the brandy. He’d put these events in motion, and he was no longer sure he had any control over them.
When he looked up again, Melisande was standing in the doorway.
Jasper drained his glass. “My lovely wife. Where have you been?”
“I took a walk in Hyde Park.”
“Did you?” He crossed to the decanter and poured himself more brandy. “Out meeting demimondaines again?”
Melisande’s face grew cool. “Perhaps I should leave you by yourself.”
“No. No.
” He smiled at her and raised his glass. “You know how I hate being alone. Besides, we must celebrate. I am close to accusing an old friend of treason.”
“You don’t sound pleased.”
“Au contraire. I am ecstatic.”
“Jasper . . .” She looked at her hands, clasped at her waist, as she gathered her words. “You seem obsessed with this hunt. With what happened at Spinner’s Falls. I worry that the hunt is harming you. Would it not be better to . . . to leave it be?”
He sipped the brandy, watching her. “Why would I do that? You know what happened at Spinner’s Falls. You know what this means to me.”
“I know that you seem caught by what happened, unable to move beyond it.”
“I watched my best friend die.”
She nodded. “I know. And perhaps now you should let your best friend go.”
“If it were me, if I’d been the one to die there, Reynaud would never rest until he found the traitor.”
She watched him silently, her tilted cat eyes mysterious, unfathomable.
His lip curled as he drank the rest of the brandy. “Reynaud wouldn’t give up.”
“Reynaud is dead.”
His entire body stilled, and he slowly raised his eyes.
Her chin was tilted up, her mouth firm and almost stern. She looked as if she could face down an entire hoard of screaming Indians.
“Reynaud is dead,” she repeated. “And besides, you are not him.”
MELISANDE BRUSHED OUT her hair that night and thought about her husband. Vale had left his study without another word this afternoon after they’d argued. She stood up from her dressing table and roamed the room. The pallet was ready for their bed, and the decanter of wine on the side table had been newly filled. All was in readiness for her husband. Yet he wasn’t here.
It was past ten o’clock, and he wasn’t here.
He’d shared supper with her. Surely he hadn’t gone out again afterward without telling her? That had been his habit in the first days of their marriage, but things had changed since then. Hadn’t they?