“And here I thought you referred to her dramatic tendencies.” Flipping open the lid of his snuffbox with a practiced gesture, Vaughn scattered a few grains on the side of his wrist. “A fascinating thing, heredity.”
Mary’s eyes narrowed as Vaughn raised his wrist gracefully to his nose and essayed a delicate sniff. “Particularly inbreeding,” she retorted.
Before Lord Vaughn could reply, St. George intervened. Possessing himself of Mary’s gloved hand, he said winningly, “I’m sure it wouldn’t do to keep your aunt waiting. I have a few of those myself,” he added with a smile, “and I know they mustn’t be kept from their naps.”
“You’re very good,” said Mary warmly.
“Positively saintlike,” murmured Lord Vaughn, snapping shut the lid of his snuffbox. “Pity there aren’t any dragons in the vicinity.”
Mary silenced him with an elbow to the ribs. “Are you in London long, Mr. St. George?”
“I have business concerns that will keep me in town at least till the opening of Parliament. And then, of course, there is my sister.”
“And her turtles,” twinkled Mary, favoring him with a private smile designed to irritate Lord Vaughn. Its effect on Lord Vaughn was unclear, but it caused St. George to blink rapidly and forget whatever it was he had been about to say.
“And you, Miss Alsworthy?” stammered St. George, recollecting himself with visible effort. “Will you be staying in town?”
Mary kept her head tilted away from Lord Vaughn, an angle that gave him an excellent view of her profile. “Yes, at least for the present. With so few people in town this time of year, I’m sure our paths must cross again.”
St. George swallowed hard and squared his shoulders. “I shall make sure of it, Miss Alsworthy, and that you may be sure of.”
“Surely?” echoed Vaughn in saccharine falsetto.
St. George flushed, a deep mauve creeping up beneath the browned skin of his cheeks. “I meant
that is to say
”
He was saved from disgrace by Aunt Imogen, who swept grandly into their midst, her entrance only slightly marred by her hat flopping forwards. Pushing it back with one crooked hand, she smiled coquettishly up at St. George as Mary performed the necessary introductions.
Aunt Imogen clutched at St. George’s arm, uttering a series of sounds that resolved themselves into, “What did you say your name was, young man?”
“St. George?” said St. George diffidently.
“Yes!” cried Aunt Imogen, her hat tipping drunkenly. “You shall be my Saint George!”
“That is my name,” said Mr. St. George hesitantly, not wanting to give any offense.
“What Aunt Imogen means,” said Mary hastily, well aware of Vaughn’s sardonic gaze, “is that she wants you to take part in Lady Euphemia McPhee’s latest play. It is a history of Britain.” Avoiding Vaughn’s eye, she got out the worst of it. “In rhyme.”
Vaughn’s lips quivered at the corners. “A rhyming history of Britain, in fact?”
Mary couldn’t quite control an answering smile. “Some have called it that.”
“Will you be taking part?” asked St. George earnestly.
“I play a princess of ancient Britain,” said Mary, smiling at him.
“Preferably painted blue,” drawled Lord Vaughn. “As princesses of ancient Britain were wont to do.”
“In that case,” said St. George, oblivious to mockery or rhyme, “I shall most decidedly accept.”
“Lovely, lovely.” Vaughn cut off further declarations by the simple expedient of shooing Aunt Imogen along in front of him. “I’m sure you’ll rhyme brilliantly, St. George. Say your good-byes, Miss Alsworthy. There’s a good girl.”
Acceding to the inevitable, St. George bowed over her hand. “Good day, Miss Alsworthy.”
“The company made it so.” Mary lifted one hand in a little wave as Lord Vaughn propelled her towards the door. In an undertone intended for Vaughn’s ears alone, she added, “Some company much more than others.”
“I shan’t demand to know which is which.” Vaughn ushered her after Aunt Imogen. “I doubt my
amour propre
could survive the experience.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure of that,” murmured Mary, waiting just that crucial moment before adding, “I would have thought your self-regard was too firmly rooted to be struck down by such an insignificant creature as myself.”
In a tone drier than kindling, Vaughn said, “You appear to have made an impression, even if not the one intended.”
Mary slid her arm out from Vaughn’s grasp. “I was seen. Wasn’t that the point?”
“It would have been better had you been seen to take an interestin something other than St. George and his dancing turtles.”
Mary glanced up at Vaughn from under her lashes. “Jealous?”
Vaughn stifled a yawn with one jeweled hand. He made no move to reclaim her handin any sense of the word. “My dear, I’ve never had any aspirations to sainthood. Or hard-shelled amphibians.”
Mary matched his tone of brittle boredom. “I hear they make excellent soup.”
Holding the door open, Vaughn ushered her through into the main room of the tavern with an elaborate sweep of the arm. It was still early enough in the day that only one ale-sodden sot sprawled across the hard wooden benches. “I’m sure I can find hot water enough for you, if you so desire.”
Mary cast a glance back over her shoulder at the gaunt figure still orating in the next room. “Haven’t you already?”
“Ah, yes. I noticed your little tęte-ŕ-tęte with Mr. Rathbone.”
Mary lowered her voice. “Apparently, he has some background with incendiary devices, as well as radical politics.”
“Did he have anything interesting to impart?” Beneath the well-tailored elegance of his clothes, Vaughn’s lean frame was taut, alert, like a swordsman poised for an attack.
“He might have done. We were interrupted.”
Vaughn’s lip curled. “For which you can thank your estimable St. George. The man appears congenitally incapable of ignoring a maiden in distress.”
“Aren’t the dragon jokes a bit too easy?” scoffed Mary, but her heart wasn’t in it. She frowned down at the worn planking. “If we hadn’t been interrupted, I might have learned whether he was our quarry.”
“St. George?” Lord Vaughn raised a sardonic brow.
Vaughn knew very well what she meant. “Rathbone,” replied Mary, with a quelling glance.
“No.” Vaughn dismissed the vice-chairman of the Common Sense Society with a brisk flick of his fingers. “He’s all bluster. Not the sort to manage a delicate operation and keep it secret for a decade.”
Unlike someone else she knew. Mary favored Vaughn with a brief, sideways glance. “You seem remarkably sure of his character for such a short acquaintance.”
Vaughn placed a hand on her back to boost her into the carriage, his touch warm through layers of linen and twill. “One should never speak unless one intends to do so with conviction.”
“Even when there is nothing on which to base that conviction?”
“The one has nothing to do with the other.”
Mary moved aside to make room for Aunt Imogen. Twitching out the folds of her skirt, she said irritably, “And what you say seldom has anything to do with what you mean.”
Lord Vaughn paused in the act of climbing into the carriage. With one hand on either side of the door frame, he stood silent for a long moment, his eyes fixed thoughtfully on Mary’s face. “On the contrary, sometimes I say exactly what I mean.”
Despite her better judgment, Mary couldn’t help but be drawn in. “Such as?”
“Tomorrow. Five o’clock. We ride in the park.” Vaughn swung himself into his seat, resting his cane between his knees. “Is that direct enough for you, Miss Alsworthy?”
“Eminently.” Mary squirmed to the side as Aunt Imogen’s brim scraped across her cheek. “Do you intend to tell me what we mean to do in the park, or must we play twenty questions for that, too?”
“What does one always do in the park?”
Mary had conducted a series of clandestine meetings, in the interest of arranging an elopement, but she decided not to bring that up. Lord Vaughn had already made quite clear his feelings on the subject of matrimony.
“Whatever my esteemed employer wishes me to door isn’t that the correct answer?”
“A bit testy this afternoon, aren’t we? Fear not, my dear, I’m sure your hero will sally forth eventually to rescue you from the big, bad dragon.”
“The park?” Mary asked pointedly.
“We go to see and be seen. Just as everyone else does.”
By whom they went to be seen was another matter entirely. Mary had some notions of her own on that score. It was not beyond the realm of possibility that a sporting gentleman, missing his usual country pursuits, might take to the paths of the park on a sunny autumn afternoon for a brisk canter.
Mary resolved to tell the maid to set out her most becoming habit. After all, as Mr. Rathbone had said, if the spirit was willing, the opportunity would present itself.
Across the carriage, Vaughn was gazing idly out the window, hands resting loosely on the head of his cane. In profile, he resembled nothing so much as a portrait medallion of one of the Roman emperors, austere and slightly alien, accustomed to pomp and no stranger to intrigue. Plots and counterplots, alliances and betrayals had all left their mark on his form. They were written on the thin, flexible line of his lips, designed to laugh or sneer as the occasion required; the hooded lids that shielded his eyes from scrutiny more effectively than any number of hats; the lean swordsman’s body disguised beneath an incongruous armor of lace and jewels. Vaughn, Mary thought, would have made an excellent Caesar, raw power clothed in deadly pomp.
Mary leaned forward, swaying with the motion of the carriage. “Why did we leave so early?”
Vaughn waved a lazy hand. “
Pas devant
, my dear.”
“
Pas devant
whom? Aunt Imogen? She can hardly hear a word. And she wouldn’t care if she did.” Mary leaned towards Vaughn. “Had we stayed longer, I might have prized more particulars out of Rathbone.”
Vaughn’s posture was just as lazy, but there was something watchful in his silver eyes as he countered, “Come, come, Miss Alsworthy. You can’t expect me to believe that Mr. Rathbone was the primary attraction.”
In any other man, Mary would have suspected jealousy. But in Vaughn, nothing he said was ever as it sounded. If he pretended jealousy, it was clearly for some ulterior motive. Why bring her there and dangle her in front of Rathbone only to pull her away again? Unless, of course, Vaughn was playing a game of his own, quite different from the one he had represented to her.
“I was merely following your advice,” returned Mary primly. “Finding myself a reforming gentleman, as you suggested. Can you think of any reason why I should do otherwise?”
“If you cannot think of it on your own,” said Vaughn very softly, “there’s very little point in my telling you.”
Mary could think of several reasons, but she wasn’t at all sure they were the ones Vaughn meant. She was about to say as much, when an imperious voice rang out like an impromptu cannonade, bringing the carriage to a jarring halt that made Vaughn’s hat tip forwards over his face and Mary’s elbow bang against the wall hard enough to bring tears to her eyes. As Mary rubbed her aching elbow and righted Aunt Imogen, a gargoyle galloped up to the window.
It took Mary only a moment to determine that the object floating in the window frame was not a gargoyle but merely a singularly ugly woman, her craggy face contorted into an expression of extreme distaste. Reining her horse alongside them with the ease of a practiced horsewoman, she stuck her head imperiously through the window frame. She looked like one of the gnomes Mary’s childhood nursemaid had warned her about, the ones who snatched up naughty children and bore them away deep beneath the earth.
“So it
is
you,” she rasped, in a voice as low as Mr. Farnham’s had been squeaky. “I thought I recognized your carriage, but I had hoped to be mistaken.”
Vaughn bowed as elegantly as any man could from a semireclining position. “It is an ill wind, my dear Lady Hester. I hear it blows nobody good.”
“One of these days,” replied Lady Hester icily, “it will blow you straight to perdition.”
“Before that happy day occurs, may I introduce my companions to you? Lady Cranbourne and her niece, Miss Alsworthy.”
“Alsworthy?” Lady Hester nearly cracked her head on the window embrasure. “But I thought” Her eyes narrowed, and she pulled back slightly, her broad shoulders rasping against the window frame. “No. No. I see that it is not. How very curious.”
“Miss Alsworthy,” broke in Lord Vaughn, seeming to apply undue emphasis to the repetition of her name, “you have the honor to be addressed by none other than Lady Hester Standish.”
“The Lady Hester Standish?” inquired Mary breathlessly, since such a reaction seemed to be called for.
