Amanda Scott (7 page)

Brandon looked at him. “Gypsy camp, and don’t go giving me any lip, my man. ’Tain’t your place to be saying where we should or shouldn’t go.”

Cleves looked shocked. “No, sir, and like as not them gypsies know a sight more than both of us together about strained fetlocks. Some of ’em ’ave got magic in their fingers.”

Satisfied, Brandon lifted Carolyn to his saddle and swung up behind her. A quarter hour later they entered the camp.

Seven caravans nestled beneath the trees surrounding a clearing, and steam curled from pots bubbling over campfires near all but one, where a girl with long black hair tied back from her face with a red scarf, and golden hoops dangling from her ears, turned a small roasting animal on a spit. Other plump, dark-haired children played all-hide among the trees, shrieking and laughing, ignored by the several adults who could be seen nearby.

The whole scene fascinated Carolyn, but she was particularly captivated by the women, whose tight bodices and full skirts looked as though they had been made up of odd bits of bright fabric and contrasting braid. Despite the unmistakable curiosity flashing in their black eyes as they watched the visitors, not one moved to greet them.

“You seek help for your
gree
?” a gruff voice demanded.

Carolyn’s view of the man’s approach had been blocked by Brandon’s left shoulder, so it seemed almost as though he had appeared out of thin air. He was of middle age, large and brawny, and he carried himself like a lord.

Brandon said casually, “I am looking for the Rom called Salas. I owe him money.”

“You owe my son
roop
or
suhakie
?” the man demanded. “Silver or gold?” Then he shook his head, realizing that Brandon still did not understand him. “Little or much, and for what?”

“For a horse, a
gree
,” Brandon said. He grinned. “Much to him, I think. He has my watch. I want it back.”

The big man smiled back, showing yellowing, crooked teeth, one blackened in front, before his gaze flicked briefly over Carolyn and back to Brandon. “You wish to sell your
raiena
, your lady? My son needs wife, and she is much pretty.”

“Well, as to that,” Brandon murmured, as though he were giving thought to the matter, “I should have to—”

“Brandon!” Carolyn dug him in the ribs with her elbow.

He grinned again. “Fact is, sir, she ain’t mine to sell. You’d have to talk to her—Ouch, Carolyn, quit that!”

But she didn’t answer him for the simple reason that her attention had been diverted by the sight of one of the most handsome young men she had ever laid eyes on. He walked up behind the older Romany, his dark eyes gleaming with interest as he looked her over, his teeth flashing white in a huge smile when he caught her gaze. Flushing, she looked away.

Brandon, too, had seen the younger man. “Ah, there you are Salas, old man. I’ve come to redeem my watch and to pay what I owe you for this nag.”

“A fine
gree
,” the young man said. “He goes well for you?”

“Very well,” Brandon said, shifting Carolyn a bit in order to extract his purse from his waistcoat. “Here’s your money. Where’s my watch?”

The young man’s eyes sparkled with humor as he reached into the pocket of his coat and extracted a gold watch. “Salas has a better one than this. You may have it back.”

“Thank you.” Brandon grinned at him. “Think you could take a look at the lady’s nag there. Strained a fetlock on the trail. Daresay it needs a compress applied to it, soonest.”

The gypsy nodded and knelt to examine the injury. Carolyn saw that his hands were large but gentle as they moved swiftly over the leg. Now that he was not looking at her, she found it difficult to take her eyes from him. Muscles rippled beneath his coat, and his manner was as lordly as his father’s, his profile positively princely. Except for such trifling distinctions as the contrasting colors of their hair, skin, and eyes, he looked just as she had imagined Sir Bartholomew Lancelot must look.

When Salas turned toward them as he arose again, she noted the natural grace with which he moved, and a daring notion shot into her mind. She tried to suppress it, calling herself a fool, but it remained to tantalize her with possibilities. She had wanted to teach Sydney a much needed lesson. Was it possible that the opportunity had come to do just that?

S
ALAS’S VOICE INTERRUPTED CAROLYN’S
reverie. “The
gree
should not walk farther today, lady,” he said. “We will keep him here, and you may return for him tomorrow.”

Brandon said, “I don’t know if—”

“Leave him,” Carolyn said, adding when the two gypsies looked at her in astonishment, “Shadow is mine, you see, and I should take it kindly if you would tend to him. My groom said your people have got magic in their fingers.”

“Magic in many limbs, pretty one,” Salas said, flashing her a wide, teasing smile. “I would be pleased to show you.”

“Thank you,” she said crisply, “but I should be grateful if you will confine your attention to my horse, and perhaps be so kind as to lend me another to ride home.”

“As you wish,” he responded, unoffended. “You will then, all of you, return tomorrow?”

“We shall,” she said firmly. “Thank you.”

“Are you daft, Caro?” Brandon demanded when she was mounted again and they had ridden some distance from the camp. “You don’t want to have anything more to do with those fellows.”

“Oh, but I do,” she said, grinning at him. “I have the most delightful plan for that beautiful man.”

“Look here, my girl, if you think for one minute that I’ll let you make a cake of yourself over some damned gypsy—”

“Don’t be nonsensical,” she said, laughing. Then, glancing over her shoulder, she added, “Fall back a bit, Cleves. Mr. Manningford and I wish to speak privately.”

“Very well, miss, but beggin’ yer pardon, am I to tell anyone you’ve gone and left that black with them gypsies?”

“Good gracious, I never thought about that! And we’ve this horse to explain as well,” she added, patting the bay she rode. “What can we tell them, Brandon? It won’t do for Sydney to discover we’ve been to the gypsy camp.”

“What, running scared?” he said. “Serves you right. It’s his nag, after all, not yours as you told those fellows. And since Shadow’s better bred than that slug you’re riding now, Saint-Denis might not have any more confidence in their returning him than I have. I think you’ll come a cropper this time.”

“No, I won’t. They won’t wish to offend him, after all, if they are camped on his land, so I doubt that they will steal Shadow. Salas looked much too gentle to do such a thing.”

“Well, I wouldn’t count on that. Just what do you think you can tell Saint-Denis, or his stable man, for that matter?”

“Beggin’ yer pardon,” Cleves said, “but I could say as I’d left ’im at one o’ the tenant farms ’n borried that nag in ’is place, ’n that I’ll trade ’em round again come mornin’.”

“Good enough,” Brandon said. “You do that. But you,” he added to Carolyn when the groom had fallen behind, “will leave well enough alone. Cleves can fetch the nag without us.”

“Oh, no, he cannot,” Carolyn said. “That would not suit me at all, Brandon, and I’ll need you there to help me.”

He looked suspiciously at her. “Help you with what?”

“Salas is a perfect foreign count,” she declared, twinkling.

Brandon’s eyes widened. “You’re daft.”

“No, I’m not. Sydney will never guess Salas is a gypsy if we dress him suitably and tell him not to talk very much. Can’t you just imagine what he will look like in evening breeches and a snugly fitting coat?”

“And where,” Brandon demanded grimly, “does your fruitful imagination suggest he’s going to get such stuff, if you please? No, don’t tell me. I am to manufacture it out of whole cloth.”

“I don’t think you will have to do that,” she said. “Surely you must know someone of his size who would lend you a coat and a decent pair of breeches.”

“Well, I don’t,” he said flatly.

“Brandon, don’t be difficult. I am doing this on your account as well as my own.” Faced with his blatant disbelief, she flushed and said, “Well, nearly, anyway. It was when I said I had no reason not to trust you to take me into the gardens that Sydney said I was a poor judge of men and must trust his judgment above my own. Now, I ask you, was that fair of him? All I want to do,” she added hastily when he did not at once reply, “is to give him back a bit of his own, to prove to him that he doesn’t know as much as he thinks he does.”

“I don’t know,” Brandon said. “A canny fellow, Saint-Denis. I doubt you can fool him so easily as that.”

“Well, I can. You wait. I saw how Salas moves and how he carries himself. In his way, he’s as puffed up with his own esteem as Sydney’s brother, Skipton, is. I mean to get Godmama to invite Salas to dinner, thinking he’s a foreign count, you know, and then you just watch. Sydney will be as polite as can be to him and will never suspect he’s entertaining a gypsy.”

“You’d better hope he doesn’t,” Brandon said, but his eyes were alight now with mischief. “I say, Caro, it will be a fine hoax if we can carry it off. M’ sister Ramsbury’s husband is of a size with that fellow. Daresay there are a few of his rags about the house somewhere that I can filch.”

“Even if Sydney isn’t fooled,” she said, relaxing now that he had entered into the plan, “he won’t be angry. For one thing, he never is, and for another, he is accustomed to my pranks. Indeed, I mean for him to know,” she added with a chuckle, “just not until after we have succeeded in hoodwinking him.”

Brandon shook his head at her, but now that he had agreed to help, he entered into the plan with wholehearted enthusiasm, and when he called the following day to escort her back to the gypsy camp, he had an unwieldy bundle of clothing tied to his saddle.

“A full rig, complete to the shoes,” he announced with satisfaction as they rode out through the gates, followed at a distance by Cleves, leading the gypsy horse.

“Won’t everything be dreadfully wrinkled?” she asked, doubtfully eyeing the bundle and hoping they would not have the misfortune to meet Sydney.

“Lord, I won’t leave it with him. We’d never see it again. Best thing is if he comes to my house and dresses there, so my man can see that all is done right and proper. Then I’ll bring Salas here with me. Just brought the things today so I can see if they fit. Salas still has to agree to the plan, you know. You’re taking a deal for granted, thinking he will.”

“Oh, he will,” she said confidently.

“And just how do you know that?”

She grinned at him. “Well, I don’t, actually, but I fancy he will if we offer him recompense for his participation.”

Brandon frowned. “Hope he don’t want too much. I’m not precisely plump in the pockets just at the moment. Are you?”

“Well, not precisely, but I’ve a bit by me and I thought we could pay him more later if he will only agree to the plan.”

Brandon looked doubtful but said only, “Have you spoken to Lady Skipton?”

“Not yet. I want to be certain Salas will do as we ask before I mention him to her. Then, all I’ll have to do is tell her you know a foreign count who wishes to visit Bath without making a noise, and she will hasten to invite you and your guest to dine if only so that she might puff it off later to all her bosom bows. Puck will love it, too. The difficulty will be to assure Sydney’s presence that evening, but I think I can manage that by affecting an interest of my own in the count.”

“No doubt,” Brandon said dryly. “I see no way now of avoiding a lecture from Saint-Denis. First I disgrace myself by abandoning you to the mercies of a villain like Lyndhurst, and now I introduce you to a foreign count about whom Saint-Denis knows nothing. I perceive dangerous shoals ahead.”

She laughed. “Poor Brandon. And you will not know in the least how to avoid them, will you? Not having had any experience in such matters.”

He grinned at her. “Very well, think what you will, but before you can cook up this rabbit stew of yours, my dear, you must first catch your rabbit. Then we can discuss the difficulties involved in serving him up to Saint-Denis.”

They fell silent after that, but Carolyn was not concerned that her plan might fail. Something in the way the young gypsy had looked at her the previous day gave her to know that his sense of mischief was as well developed as their own, and she was certain he would agree to do as they asked.

Salas was the first to greet them when they entered the camp, expressing his pleasure in seeing them again and assuring them that the black’s leg was altogether mended. While Cleves examined the fetlock for himself, Brandon began to explain their plan to Salas. The gypsy’s first reaction was to stare in disbelief, whereupon Carolyn added her voice to the discussion.

“It will be amusing for you,” she said. “You have only to call upon Mr. Manningford at his house in Bath when the time comes, and he will instruct you in precisely what you must do. You have only to be rather dark and mysterious, and silent. ’Tis for a wager, you see. All you need to do is satisfy them for one evening. You will get a very fine dinner out of it, and perhaps we can pay you a little something afterward for your trouble,” she added, hoping he would not demand too much.

Salas smiled at her, causing her to remember again, and with an inward sigh, Sir Bartholomew Lancelot. “Lady,” the gypsy said softly, “a man would be much of a fool to deny you, but what is to happen to Salas if your plan fails. Your master will be much displeased, I think, and then there will be no gold for Salas.”

“He is not my master,” Carolyn said sharply, adding on a more reasonable note, “He is, of course, the master of Bathwick Hill; nevertheless, I can assure you that if he should discover our hoax, he will know perfectly well that it was no idea of yours. In any case, Mr. Saint-Denis will never guess that you are not precisely what we say you are.”

“Then Salas will do as you ask. You need pay him nothing.”

Carolyn, despite what she had told Brandon, was as surprised as he was that the young man agreed so readily. She had been prepared to argue as long as necessary to convince him, and felt a little as though the wind had gone out of her sails. When Brandon went off with Salas a moment later to let him try on the clothes, she soon realized she was drawing a considerable amount of interest from the other occupants of the camp. She smiled at one woman who stood nearer than the rest, but the woman moved no closer. Nor did anyone else, and since they all continued to stare silently at her, she was glad when Brandon returned.