"The Slightest Provocation" - читать интересную книгу автора (Rosenthal Pam)

Chapter One

The road was smoother here, winding closer to the city gates. The borrowed traveling carriage wasn’t jolting so fiercely on its springs; Lady Rowen’s coachman had managed to coax the exhausted horses into a gentle trot. Peggy, the maid, had fallen asleep on the backward-facing seat, head lolling against blue velvet, mouth slightly agape, apple cheeks glowing from the day’s rain and wind.

A Dutch painting.

Mary Stansell, née Penley, congratulated herself on the justness of her observation. Oh yes, very much a Dutch painting, all earthly flesh, rich textile, and pure, transcendent light.

She smiled at her own cleverness. And then she frowned uncertainly.

Did the Dutch do moonlight? In truth she had no idea; she’d seen so many paintings this year that they blurred in her memory.

The clouds had lifted. Mary wiped her breath from the glass to stare up at the moon shedding its beams through the coach’s window. After a beastly hard day of travel, the pale illumination made a pleasing composition from a muddle of objects on the floor-baskets, books, and parcels; maid’s and mistress’s muddy boots; and (hell and botheration!) a ragged strip of muslin trailing from beneath Mary’s skirts.

She’d stepped through the hem of her petticoat; poor Peggy would have to stitch it up when they arrived at the inn.

Her mouth twisted. Poor Peggy indeed.

No, that was unfair. It was hardly the maid’s fault that they were short of fresh linen; it hadn’t been Peggy’s idea to wait so long, and then to quit Paris so suddenly, with no time to send the last bundle to the laundress. The girl had done what she could to keep things nice along the journey’s way. And she was certainly entitled to an innocent flirtation.

If innocent was what one might properly call the curve that had suddenly and completely reshaped Peggy’s soft baby lips. Mary watched in fascination as a flush started somewhere at the base of the plump neck, rosy bright pink spreading upward now, beneath the freckled cheeks’ surface. Blissfully unaware of moonlight and mistress both, her young chambermaid was in the thrall of a delightfully wicked dream.

Or was Mary simply imagining it, projecting, as though by magic lantern, her own unruly desires onto the screen of Peggy’s wide, guileless countenance?

It was a diverting notion. Because she’d had it on no less authority than Mr. Shelley that she was sadly deficient in imagination. He’d told her as much last summer, when she’d declined to continue traveling with him and the rest of his household.

Ah, but you see, he’d protested, we are not merely a household. Warming to his subject, eyes sparkling beneath his wide brow, pale schoolboy curls stirred by the wind off the Swiss mountain lake, he spoke of idealism, a leap into mankind’s future, the imagination’s mortal reach beyond the bounds of petty conventional morality-with himself, his beautiful beloved Miss Godwin, and Miss Godwin’s rather earthier stepsister, at the center of their new bold Eden.

Tactfully, she’d swallowed back the response that had at first sprung to her lips: that it hardly took imagination to see who had the most to gain from all this rampant idealism. Checking her words was a hard-won skill; a decade ago she might have delivered a rebuke stinging enough to redden the young genius’s pretty ears. Since then, however, she’d learned the art of gentle refusal, the helpless shrug and self-deprecating smile. I’m sadly bound to my obligations, sir; just think of all the precious letters of introduction I’ve got, expeditions arranged, sights and monuments to visit.

As you like, madam, he’d replied. A brief pause to recover his equilibrium, and he’d launched into an elaborate disquisition on poetic spirit and inner vision-capabilities, he feared, that were rather beyond her petty limitations.

It had been a stimulating lecture, though she might have gotten equally good conversation if she’d stopped back with Miss Godwin. Still, she listened obligingly, while the wind off the lake turned chilly and the light of the poet’s intellect bade fair to burn deep into the night. He might have chosen a gentler way to frame his argument. He probably would have, if she’d been better able to hide her amusement.

Give me another decade, she thought now, and I’ll master the extra measure of control. No need to ask for the decade, of course; it would come whether she liked it or not. And by the time it did come, by the time she was forty…

But she’d just had a birthday; she was thirty-one now, and (as though to illustrate the passing of time) had recently acquired a pair of small, gold-rimmed, oval reading spectacles. There had been letters of birthday congratulation from England, and one from Matthew Bakewell in France; he was studying the wonders of Jacquard weaving in Lyon. Too delicate to ask whether she’d finally seen her estranged husband, he’d simply written how much he missed her company, was counting the days to Midsummer Eve when they’d be together, and looked forward, finally, to a resolution of their complicated situation.

After nine years of separation from Kit Stansell, she wanted some resolution as well. Something simple and settled, with a man as fine as Matthew.

Just be happy with Miss Godwin, she’d exhorted young Shelley. Leave aside the fantasies of communal love, and for God’s sake get rid of the stepsister.

Leave aside all the fantasies. And the memories as well.

A gentle snore bubbled from Peggy’s open lips. The coach swayed, righted itself on its springs, and turned onto a smaller road. The inn was close by the city gates; they couldn’t have too much farther to travel.

On the whole, Mary thought, Percy Shelley had been quite correct in his assessment of her. She loved poetry, liked poets, and was clever enough with words herself, but the poetic temperament was as little her forte as the ironic was his.

Irony, a penchant for exaggerated self-scrutiny, perhaps, and a small skill at observation-as if it would take any skill to discern what was going on between Peggy and Lady Rowen’s handsome footman, Thomas.

What had taken skill was ignoring it. Easier before today: the good weather and smooth roads had helped. The coach Lady Rowen had lent her was so well sprung and comfortable that Mary had been able to occupy herself with books or her journal, when she wasn’t staring out the window, reliving her peregrinations: Rome, Florence, Venice; Greece and Turkey; the Alps; and castles along the Rhine.

Since Waterloo, every Englishman and -woman who could afford it was touring the continent, trudging up mountainsides, gaping at monumental ruins, buying up nearly everything else, and-according to Lord Byron anyway-rendering the place utterly uninhabitable.

Mary had found it quite delightfully habitable; she’d spent a wonderfully entertaining year, moving at a brisk pace with a series of charming companions. The only annoyance was the occasional stupidity of being cut, by widgeon-brained people one could avoid in London but might unexpectedly bump up against at Ephesus or Pompeii. Small matter. Her separation from her husband was stale news; her association with the Shelley party, respectable if a bit outré; her latest less-than-respectable liaison managed discreetly and recently brought to an amicable close.

Anyone she might actually want to be acquainted with was happy to know her, for she made a charming tourist-earnest and inquisitive, amused rather than annoyed by the inevitable mishap; frightfully well-informed and endlessly appreciative of whatever there was to be seen.

Today’s plaguing mood was an aberration, no doubt brought on by all the rain. Peggy and Thomas had been most circumspect, but there could be no ignoring them with everyone so jumbled together by the weather. A formidable storm had blown in; a lesser coachman than Mr. Frayne might have refused to start out this morning.

Perhaps he’d been overzealous. A pity to work the horses so harshly. But he was proud of his skill, and (like all of the dowager marchioness’s servants) devoted to doing his best. He was also-when given the rare chance to converse with two-legged creatures-more than a little bit pompous and long-winded.

Big arms folded beneath his voluminous cape, he’d whistled through the gap in his teeth, decrying the bloody hellishness (begging the lady’s pardon, perhaps he should say the capriciousness) of the elements. But seeing as it was such a first-rate vehicle the marchioness kept, and what with Lady Christopher wanting to get home to England as soon as possible, he thought he could see them through.

Clutching his top hat in front of him in an exaggerated show of decorum, he’d promptly ruined the effect by his insinuating pronunciation of Lady Christopher, all but winking to show that he knew a thing or two, being so long in the family’s service. Though of course he’d never breathe a word of it.

Ah, well. Better-bred people had said and done much worse. The brewer’s daughter had learned to respond affably to a title that felt (more than ever in her current circumstances) like fancy dress. The woman estranged from her husband was quite accustomed to being quizzed.

The storm, Mr. Frayne. Do go on, sir.

Well, then. He drew a breath.

The local people were of the opinion that the storm was like to pass by nightfall. Not that you could entirely trust them Frenchies and their stories. Still, it looked that way to him as well.

It’ll be a hard day for sure (he seemed to be concluding his remarks now), but if my lady and the little maid is willing to trudge through the wet an’ the muck alongside the coach when we comes to some o’ the biggest hills-well, then, ma’am, you can lay your trust on Thomas and me to do for you.

Thomas had nodded with great seriousness, and Peggy had beamed up at him proudly.

Good. Then we’re off. (Mary had begun to turn away.) Thank you, Mr. Frayne.

With lu-u-u-ck, Mr. Frayne had added (the latter syllable stretched almost to the breaking point of ponderous slowness, to signal that Mary must turn back and hear him out), you’ll be sleeping in an honest English bed tomorrow night, Lady Christopher. One more night on French soil, and by tomorrow I’ll be putting you on the Dover-Calais packet, safe and snug and more or less in one piece.

Yes. Thank you very much indeed.

In one piece. More or less. Well, with a lot more mud on her skirts and a lot less food in her stomach, since the vehicle’s jouncing and lurching had caused her to lose her luncheon several hours ago. And with bruises on her feet, from wet shoes rubbing through bunched stockings.

At least her insides had ceased their churning. She’d even felt some pleasant twinges of hunger. Tonight’s inn was reputed to have an unusually good kitchen; Lady Rowen had made particular mention of it. They should be arriving quite soon and in very reasonable time under the circumstances.

Mr. Frayne had badgered and cajoled the horses through rain and wind and muck up to their fetlocks, while Thomas handed Mary in and out of the carriage with great ceremony, holding the green umbrella over her as though she were a precious, delicate parcel, even as he sent the occasional fleeting smile back over his shoulder at Peggy splashing along behind.

Absurd to have felt those twinges of envy, of a couple of servants’ evident happiness. Absurd, self-indulgent… ignore it, Mary. Orangey light was flickering through the coach windows-from hearth fires, in houses along the road. They must be approaching the inn.

Peggy yawned and rubbed her eyes with round little fists reddened from the rain. She looked very young, as indeed she was: eighteen, hardly older than Betts, Mary’s niece at home.

While Thomas must be nearly a decade older, well over six feet tall, and quite excessively handsome; he’d doubtless cut quite a swath during his own employer’s tour across Europe. He did seem to care for Peggy, though. Would he continue to do so if she became pregnant? In the event, of course, Mary would do what she could to help. But it was a pity to leave it all to fate-and even worse to trust to nature.

“You can’t do a thing about it.” Her sister Jessica had said this years ago, when Mary and Kit had first been married and Mary had consulted her two older sisters about a wayward scullery maid.

“Jessie’s right.” Julia was two years younger than Jessica, equally opinionated, and particularly voluble in the Scots intonations she’d adapted since her marriage. “We’ve both tried to teach them, and so did Mama. Of course, nothing’s entirely trustworthy, but they and their young men think it’s indecent even to try to improve their chances against nature. ‘Them things is just for hoors, Mrs. MacNeill,’ was what my chambermaid told me when I broached the subject with her. And then, remembering the contents of my nightstand, she added, ‘Well, hoors and eddicated ladies, I guess, beggin’ yer pardon, Mum.’ Which showed me my place quickly enough.”

“Only be sure that Kit’s keeping his… eyes to himself,” Jessica had added. She’d blushed-they all knew about Arthur’s misadventure with a maid, during Jessie’s difficult recovery from a miscarriage some years past. The affair was completely smoothed over, but Mary had rushed to hug her eldest sister nonetheless-the exuberant gesture, she thought now, rather sullied by a youthful, callow presumption that such a thing could never happen to her.

Jessie had laughed and generously returned the hug. “Not that Kit could have eyes-or anything else-for any woman in the world besides you.”

The light through the coach windows had turned a bright, smoky yellow-gas lamps, she supposed, to mark the inn. They’d arrived without her noticing it.

Calls of greeting mingled with the admiring whistles and halloos such a fine traveling coach inevitably called forth. Torches and lanterns guided their way through the porte cochere and through the yard to the inn’s front door. Glare and rattle and cry made a pleasant diversion from her echoing thoughts and memories.

Mr. Frayne brought the horses up smartly, Thomas leaped down from beside the coachman to hand Mary out, and Peggy gathered up the jumbled objects strewn around the seats and floor during their filthy, exhausting, but-thank heaven-now completed day on the highway.

Her last night on French soil.

Of course, he hadn’t made much effort to see her either-they’d missed each other in more than one capital city. Missed or avoided-she’d heard talk of an Austrian baroness. Perhaps she should have lingered a bit longer with the Shelley party. Or better still, with her companion in Milan. Not that he’d necessarily be paying attention. But (in the event that he were) just to show him that she could…

Defiantly, she lifted her chin against that last notion. Shaking Thomas’s hand from her arm and hurrying with light steps toward the inn’s front door, she held her head so high and her back so straight that no one watching would have thought her anything but entirely confident and rather haughty, if a bit disheveled.

And almost beautiful, the dark-haired gentleman observed silently, from among the inn yard’s shadows.

Almost, but not quite. Too energetic, perhaps. The brown eyes too bright, set too wide above her cheeks.

Alighting onto the cobbles-the swirl of snuff-colored skirt, white petticoat, and dark red cloak affording him a precious moment’s glimpse of muddy boot and slender ankle-her movements were too quick for any classical notion of beauty.

Too quick, too willful, too complicated, and yet too lacking in mystery. Just see her marching across the yard with that ridiculously endearing little triangle of torn white cloth fluttering behind her.

It reminded him of a bit of stage business-comic soubrette brought low by her unmentionables. Or a white flag of surrender fluttering over a battlefield. Surrender easier to go after than forgiveness.

He lit a cheroot, from a torch stuck in the inn yard wall. Foolishly, he’d thought she’d be arriving much earlier. The weather… he should have known better; a soldier should always take account of changes in the weather.

The coachman had gone inside now, to get some supper for himself. It would be a while until she came down to eat; she’d be needing a good wash, perhaps a rest, and doubtless some repair work in the petticoat area. He’d grown finicky about matters of dress during his service in Paris and at the Viennese court. And so he was surprised to discover that-at least in the little matter of the petticoat-he rather hoped she’d leave things as they were.