Lessons in French (46 page)

language, Mademoiselle, but I'm afraid that's what we French call your countrymen under

certain circumstances—and we'd have some hulking local
géant
ready to come up and

fight. There'd be a lot of sound and fury before we made sure he won, and split the

takings with him." He crossed his arms and leaned back against the mantel. "But Jem got

tired of it. He began to fight in earnest. And he was good." His voice softened, and he

shook his head a little. "He was amazing. But we couldn't make any profit in France by

thrashing Frenchmen. So we changed his name, came back to England, and made a bid

for the championship."

"Instead of coming home to your family," she said tartly, "as you might have done in

place of starving on the streets of Paris or becoming a… a—"

"An operator of the Fancy," he supplied. "I arranged bouts and held the stakes. I didn't

want to come back. My grandfather was still alive." He paused. "Among other reasons."

That cause she did comprehend. The old Duc had used mockery and scorn like a rapier

on his grandson; Trev had always ignored it or turned it away with a shrug, but Callie

knew. Their wildest adventures were driven by his grandfather's sneering voice. Trev

would give his alley-cat yowl under her window in the middle of the night, and all the

rules were at naught then. There would be a hint of violence in his laughter that only

some journey to the edge of disaster could quell. To stand before his grandfather and

admit that he had tried to regain Monceaux and failed—no. She understood that much.

"But this is a boring topic," he said with a shrug. "We did well enough for ourselves.

Jem fell in love with the adorable Emma, and they had a son, and everyone loved them

all, and when the Rooster lay there dying on the grass, he asked me to take care of Emma

and the boy." His tone was light and careless, but his expression was rather hard.

"Perhaps they didn't print that part in the newspapers."

"No," she said quietly, "they didn't print that."

"God knows I tried to do it," he said, drawing a deep breath. "She'd listen to Jem. She's

a remarkably silly woman, but she doted on him. Once he was gone—we couldn't deal at

all, she and I. There was a nice sum of money that was meant for her and the boy. I had

charge of it, but I could see she'd run through it before he was out of short coats. And she

did. So I made her an allowance myself—aye, you may lift your eyebrows, but I'd built

up a pretty fortune, and a good deal of it was from making book on the Rooster's fights,

so I reckoned it was only what I owed him. But she got herself on tick with some jeweler,

and he frightened her, and she was too stupid or stubborn to come to me." He blew a

scoffing breath. "As if we'd let a bill broker carry her off without breaking his legs for

him first."

She sat looking at him, sorting out this new Trevelyan in her mind: this rather fierce

gentleman of fisticuffs and a friendship that outlasted death. In truth, it suited him better

than presiding gravely over a grand châteaus, something that she had always had a

difficult time envisioning even with his letters from France full of details and

embellishments.

But there was a certain force, a hint of real brutality about him now. In all her fantasies

of pirates and swords, amid the skewering and cannon fire—clean and bloodless in

imagination—Trev had been at the center. It had always been a part of him, that violence:

hidden and checked, but understood. The world had brought it out in him, she thought.

No, he'd never allow anyone under his protection to be carried off or threatened—not

when Callie had been tagging along with him on adventures, and not now.

"I marvel at her lack of sense," she said thought fully. "Certainly you would break his

legs."

He gave her a sardonic smile. "Well, I wouldn't do it personally, of course."

"I did wonder why all your menservants were so large."

He made a slight bow.

"I ought to be shocked," she said.

He tilted his head to the side. "Aren't you,
ma mie
?"

Callie's forehead creased as she considered the question. She stood up and took a turn

across the carpet. "I am exceedingly cross with you, certainly."

"So I had noticed," he murmured.

"Trevelyan," she said with determination. She stopped and faced him, taking a deep

breath into her lungs in preparation to speak her mind.

"Call me 'Seigneur,'" he suggested to her mildly. "If you wish to reduce me to a

quivering dish of jelly in the most efficient manner."

She ignored this. "I was led to believe you were
married
to that woman." She gathered

her skirt, strode across the room again, and then looked back at him. "Married!"

"I'm sure I never said so."

This was so reasonable that it merely fed her displeasure. "You also never said you

weren't!"

"At what point did the topic enter into our conversation?" he inquired.

"And that is another thing!" she expostulated. "Previous to this, sir, your conversation

has been singularly uninformative regarding anything of any consequence whatsoever."

"I beg your pardon, Madame," he said, thrusting himself away from the mantel. "In that

case I'll endeavor to confine myself to subjects of more worth and significance than my

admiration for you."

She was cast into confusion by that, but recovered and began to pace the carpet again.

"Indeed, it's been an excellent diversion, all this making up to me. I collect it was your

intention to keep me wholly in the dark about everything!"

"Well of course," he said. "I always tell women I'm in love with them in order to

produce mystification and bafflement. What other reason could I possibly have?"

"I can comprehend that you didn't wish to reveal these things to your mother, about

making money off of boxing matches, and not truly owning Monceaux, and nearly being

hung—but you might have told
me
and saved us a good deal of trial and tribulation."

"I didn't want you to know," he said curtly.

"What's more," she added, "you talk a great deal of how you admire and… and…

whatever it is that you say—"

"That I love you?" he interrupted.

"Well, that. Yes, you seem to say that." She became flustered. "You have said that,

several times. And that you would like to murder Major Sturgeon, and that sort of thing,

which of course is quite nonsensical, and perhaps it is all nonsense." Callie stopped her

pacing. She looked over at him where he stood beside the fire place. The hard expression

had returned to his face.

"I think it is all nonsense, because it is only words," she ventured. She wet her lips and

then blurted out: "Like your letters, and everything you've said before. Words, with

nothing behind them."

She glanced toward him under her lashes. White lines had appeared at the corners of his

mouth. For a long moment they stood in silence, but her heart was beating so hard that it

seemed to fill her ears. She had never seen him look so forbidding.

"Because if…" she said, summoning all her nerve, "if you aren't already married,

then…" She broke off, realizing with horror that she was as near as was practical to

demanding that he propose to her instead. Her courage failed her, overcome by a

miserable wave of shyness. "Of course I understand now," she continued hurriedly, trying

to appear as if she had meant nothing of the sort, "your circumstances are—with what

you've told me, it's quite plain—you have abundant reason for not seeking matrimony

with any respectable lady."

"Any respectable lady such as yourself?" he asked in a smothered voice.

"Myself!" she said with a dismissive flurry of her hands. Three gentlemen had assured

Callie that they loved her, and then reexamined their characters and belatedly determined

that they were not worthy of taking so bold a step as to actually escort her to the altar. He

was going to say he wasn't worthy to marry her. She could feel it coming. "Oh no. I

wasn't speaking of myself, of course. You wouldn't be offering for me!" She gave an

unconvincing laugh. "I'm betrothed, am I not? I didn't mean that at all. I merely meant—

some chance respectable lady."

He examined the coals in the fireplace. Callie examined the hem of her skirt.

"In fact," he said slowly, "you are correct. It was all nonsense. Merely words, with

nothing behind them."

Since she had entered into the room, Callie's emotions had spun from fury and shame to

astonishment—and then a feeling that she could hardly put a name to, something rather

like a fragile joy, but half-disbelieved, too tentative and tender to fully show itself. At

these words, it snapped back into hiding like a frightened turtle.

"To be frank," he went on grimly, "I never wanted to see you again. I assumed you

were married and long moved away from here. If I'd known you were in Shelford, I'd

never have come back at all."

"Would you not?" she asked lightly, assuming a defensive shell of hauteur against the

shock of this attack. "Perhaps, after all, that would have been best."

"Certainly it would." He plucked her scarf from the floor and tossed it on her dressing

table. "In point of fact, I don't care to be your lover." His voice gained strength. "I didn't

want to tell you anything at all about what my life has been. Not a goddamned thing!

Here you are in this quaint little village, a respectable lady with your fortune and your

cattle, where you're safe and comfortable, where a goat up a tree is the about the greatest

threat to anybody's peace of mind. If there's one thing that's certain, it's that I don't belong

in this pretty scene—as your father made perfectly clear years ago. When I saw you in

that ballroom, I should have turned on my heel and walked out. And that, as you suggest,

would have saved us all a great deal of trial and tribulation."

"Of course!" She was forced to agree immediately, and indeed to raise the stakes. "I'm

sure that would have been the best for all of us!" she exclaimed in an unsteady voice.

"Except for your mother, and if you did her a great deal of good at first, I believe with

these Runners and constables besetting her, you may be the death of her yet!"

The instant she spoke, she wished the words back. She lifted her hand quickly, but he

was already turning away.

"I'll remedy that at once," he snapped. "I bid you adieu, my lady. Accept my

felicitations on your marriage." He threw open the shutters and the sash. It had come on

to rain heavily again, and a gust of cold air blew her scarf from the table.

"Wait!" she said hastily. "Of course, I didn't mean—please wait. Oh, please wait!"

He paused with his hand on the sash, the wind blowing past him, tousling his hair.

"What is it? Quickly, before I'm seen here in broad daylight."

A tumble of words fought to reach her tongue, but all she could manage to utter was,

"Where are you going?"

"Where I've always been going." He swung his legs fully over the windowsill and

ducked out. "To the devil."

Twenty-Two

THE DOWNPOUR HELD ONE ADVANTAGE, WHICH WAS that the Bow Street

Runner apparently didn't care to stand outside in it and watch Dove House. Trev actually

entered by the front door, a rare treat in his life lately. He had to shake off his coat, strip

to his shirtsleeves in the entryway, and towel his hair dry with a cloth brought by Lilly,

before he could step into the dining room. His mother seemed to have gained enough

strength to sit up and have her breakfast there.

She glanced up at him from a newspaper spread out on the table. "Lilly, bring the fresh

coffee. And then you must—" She caught her breath on a light cough. "You must do a

guard at the kitchen door."

"Yes, ma'am." Lilly curtsied and gave Trev a pert glance, ogling him in his shirtsleeves

as she left the room.

He pulled out a chair. "You frighten me,
ma mère.
I hope this doesn't mean Cook is

entertaining the constable again."

"No, this time it is the Runner," she said, taking a sip from her cup.

"Excellent," he said. "A redoubtable woman."

"But why are you here,
mon enfant
?" She coughed again, covering her lips with a lacy

handkerchief.

"Where is Nurse?" he countered. "Should you be cavorting out of bed in this frivolous

manner?"

"I have made Nurse an errand, to walk very far in the rain."

"Making a nuisance of herself, is she?"

"She is a good woman, but she troubles… me very much, that I must be bled, which I

do not wish."

"Never mind her, then. But you look well, Maman. You look well." He gazed down at

one of the heavy old knives of sterling, running his finger over the ornate coronet

engraved above the f lowing initial
M.
"Je t'aime, ma mère," he said to the tablecloth. "I

must leave England."

He heard her give another small cough, but he didn't look up. Lilly scratched at the

door. Trev gave a gruff assent, and the maid entered. She poured his coffee, set the pot

down, and retreated.

"
Voyons,
it is just as good that you go, then, eh?" his mother said, when Lilly had

closed the door behind her. There was a hint of anger in her thin voice. "What need do

we… have with you here?"