Odette Speex: Time Traitors Book 1 (13 page)

Odette felt again the familiar twinge of her conscience. She tamped it down firmly. “Pointe shoes, Mrs. Garrick. They allow me to push the boundaries of ballet to a new level.”

“Extraordinary!” she exclaimed again. “I will have to look at them more closely later.” She straightened her shoulders and gathered about her a more professional demeanor. “Now, Miss Swanpoole, if you will come with me.”

Cara was left in the wings while Eva led the way out onto the stage. Adjustments had been made to the lighting. Two of the large chandeliers were lit illuminating the forward part of the stage. In the wings, candles were set in holders mounted on partitions. These partitions were set on tracks that could move the candles further out onto the stage if necessary.

Eva walked to the edge of the stage and motioned Odette to follow. “I would like to introduce your accompanist for today, Arthur Harrison.”

Odette nodded politely and bent down to speak with the fashionably dressed young man standing in the orchestra pit. She hadn’t noticed earlier the railing that separated this small space from the rest of the pit. But now she could see the neatly arranged benches and the two harpsichords that bounded the orchestra on each end.

Arthur stared at her in some fascination and said, “I play the harpsichord. Do you have any preference in music?”

Odette knew this to be her most difficult task. Typically classical music of the time was composed with vocal accompaniment in mind. The harpsichord, in particular, had a tendency to sound stilted and courtly. The early ballet music with which she was most familiar came later in the eighteenth century.

“For the type of dance I perform, Mister Harrison, I need music that is lyrical and flowing. Perhaps something by Christoph Gluck.”

He blinked at her in surprise. “As it happens, Miss Swanpoole, he is working on a new ballet. His first, I believe. I know much of his music. I think I can improvise something for you.”

Eva clapped her hands together decisively. “Yes, yes, Arthur, improvise. She looks like a magical creature. You must provide proper music.” She gazed off into the boxes and waved her hand, speaking loudly, “Jean, are you ready?” She must have received an affirmative gesture in return, because she said, “I go now to join Jean. You may begin when ready.”

After Eva had exited the stage, Odette addressed the young musician again, “Would you please play a few stanzas for me. I just need to hear it.”

Odette breathed deeply to calm her racing heart. To be sure there was always some anxiety before a performance. But not since she was a very young dancer had she felt her hands grow clammy and knees wobbly as they were doing now. It was as if the eyes of all those she was about to usurp frowned down upon her from the heavens.

The first notes of the harpsichord floated up onto the stage, and she closed her eyes. “Forgive me,” she whispered.

She struck a pose. Her arms were delicately bent and slightly out from her body, right foot pointed behind her. Odette kept her eyes closed and let the music flow through her. She opened her eyes as she heard the harpsichord falter and realized she had been still too long. She took a deep breath and nodded reassuringly to Arthur. He bent over the instrument again and resumed.

Odette opened with an arabesque, balancé, cabriole and chassé. She felt her muscles loosen. The familiar movements flowed out from her hands and feet, arms and legs, head and neck. Her whole body became part of the music. Years of training allowed her to move with technical precision and startling grace. She executed another arabesque, followed by a grand jeté and développé.

The music became smoother. The twangy notes of the harpsichord softened. Odette transitioned effortlessly into a bourrée, chaîné, penche, chassé, fouetté and finally a pirouette—a single—a double. She faltered. Odette felt the pointe shoe give way, the makeshift shank broken almost in two. Drawing the muscles of her leg up taunt and trying to control her faltering foot, she came to a stop and held herself for a millisecond more
en pointe
. She slowly rolled down. Not very gracefully, but she was grateful not to have fallen.

It was a short variation. No more than two minutes. It still left her gasping for air her chest visibly heaving. Even through her heavy breathing, she could sense the profound silence around her. She put her hands on her hips and walked forward so as to see Arthur at the harpsichord. He was bent over the instrument his fingers splayed across the keys as if still playing. Odette looked out into the silent house, and then finally over at Cara.

She licked her lips and stared down at her feet. Something was wrong. Why was no one applauding or even speaking? Her whole performance was intended to overwhelm, to give the Theatre Royal no other option but to employ her. As a
tour de force
, people would flock to see her. No door would be closed to her, and she would have access to important people.

But the silence only deepened, and she felt her legs tremble. Cara joined her on stage and grasped her hand.

Finally there was movement at the back of the theater. She focused her eyes on a dark, fuzzy figure that solidified as it came into the circle of light cast by the chandeliers. He was neatly dressed entirely in black. A trim figure with strong shoulders, his only adornment was a powdered wig. Odette looked into his face and felt her knees buckle. She clung tightly to Cara’s hand and hurriedly sat down on the edge of the stage. She bent forward and put her head in her hands sucking in air.

“Mademoiselle, you are unwell?” The voice was gentle with only a very slight French accent.

Odette struggled for self-control and finally lifted her head. She looked again into his face and was not mistaken. No serious student of ballet would fail to know him. Even from a painting, the expressive eyes and sensual month of Jean-Georges Noverre was instantly recognizable.

“I am fine, Monsieur Noverre.”

“Ah, so you know me.”

“Yes… ah… no… I recognize you from… from a performance in Paris I once attended. I had not expected you to be here.”

“I had not intended to be here. I have delayed my departure as a favor to Madam Garrick. We, my company and I, are planning to leave England. The atmosphere is not so congenial for Frenchmen at the moment.”

Odette knew this to be true. Noverre had come to London in hopes of developing a more naturalistic style of dance with the help of David Garrick. During that time, he had staged many ballets. But the only production directed under his name,
Les Fetes
, was destroyed by rioters on the eve of the Seven Year War.

He still worked with the theater but only from hiding. How could she have forgotten? That he was here now, in front of her, Odette felt like she was meeting a god.

“I must tell you, mademoiselle, your performance was most unexpected.”

Odette laughed a little hysterically. “Yes, well.” She waved her hand flippantly. “I was taught by an obscure master and all that. He is… almost certainly… dead.” She confusedly killed off the retiring Mister Blasis. “His academy was shut down by the authorities, and his few students cast out—I as well. It was all very, very sad.”

She heard the absolute ridiculousness of her story and knew if he dug any deeper, she would crack. But how could she have known? Never in her wildest dreams had she ever imagined standing face-to-face with the Father of Modern Ballet.

Instead he said, “It is as if you have emerged fully formed from my mind.”

She looked at him intently, her golden eyes aglow with admiration. “But I have, Monsieur Noverre, I have.”

Chapter 16

Odette sat on
the window seat in the snug parlor and watched raindrops bang against the glass. Their watery paths created a maze of crisscrossing tracks which she randomly traced with a lazy finger.

The garden was drenched and muddy, but she could see a green sheen along the grass. Tree buds were just beginning to unfurl. She pushed open one of the panes and leaned out to feel the warm rain on her face. The air was heavy with oxygen and nutrients. Just breathing it could cure almost anything, she thought. She was going to miss this place.

“Odette, please do your best not to fall out or get struck by lightning.” Cara bustled in from the bedroom holding a hatbox in one hand and a piece of paper in the other. “For the life of me, I can’t find the blasted sealing wax. It should have been in the desk with the stationary,” she muttered.

“Oh.” Odette looked at her guiltily and rose to weave her way among the various packing materials. She stopped at a battered trunk with an impressive array of drawers and compartments. “I’m sorry. It’s in here with my other stuff.”

Cara cocked an eyebrow and pursed her lips irritably. “I don’t know why I’ve made this list if you are going to snatch things willy-nilly and squirrel them away in that monstrous trunk.”

The two had made an agreement that Odette was responsible for packing her ballet belongings, and Cara was responsible for everything else. Cara had very definite ideas about packing and, for the most part, Odette could care less.

“It wasn’t willy-nilly, Cara. I’ve found that sealing wax works well when warmed. I can wrap it around my toes.”

Cara sighed. “Is there anything else on this list that you’ve appropriated for your feet?”

Odette looked at the list and then back up at the parlor overflowing with boxes, cases, and trunks.

How have we accumulated so much in such a short time?

As if reading her thoughts, Cara said, “Honestly, I think we’re going to need another coach just to carry our belongings.”

Odette slouched back to the window and sat down heavily. The last few days had been busy and exciting.

Fortunately both Monsieur Noverre and Mrs. Garrick had attributed her near emotional collapse to the “exertions of the dance,” as Noverre had so delicately put it. A change of clothes and cup of tea later, Odette was situated with the other three in David Garrick’s spacious office discussing the next step in a collaborative ballet.

At first Noverre was inclined to try and entice Odette back to France with him. Eva’s stern response soon put an end to that notion. “Nein. Nein, Jean! She came first to us. I will not hear of it! The work must be done here.”

He looked at her in his mild way and reminded her, “The work is difficult for one such as me to do here.”

Her expression softened and she reached over to pat his hand. “I know, I know. But we will make it easier. I promise.”

Since Odette had no intention of going to France, even with the great Noverre, she sat silent and let Eva do the talking. From there the discussion veered into several different directions. What would be Odette’s role? How would she work with the other dancers? Can Cara recreate the costuming for an entire company? How much help would she need? And the pointe shoes, was it even feasible to try and teach the other dancers?

Insisting that it was the fundamentals of his developing technique that would best help his dancers evolve, Odette repeatedly deferred to Noverre. Much of what she did was a mere extension of his work. “Little tricks,” she said. Odette often found him looking at her perplexedly, but he never gave voice to his curiosity.

Twice during this marathon session, a messenger was sent to inform the coachman of the delay. By mid-afternoon Odette and Cara finally emerged from the theater moving against the stream of patrons attending the day’s performance.

Back at the inn their news was heralded by Barbara as, “Splendid!” Her mother merely smiled and herded them into her private parlor for tea and scones demanding a full accounting of events.

Odette stared out again at the rain-soaked garden and sighed. Only a few short days and everything had changed. Her plan was working better than she could ever have imagined.

So why do I feel listless and deflated?

“Miss Swanpoole.”

Odette looked up and perceived the source of her dissatisfaction in the doorway.

He stood neatly attired his coat exactly tailored to set off his broad shoulders. While he didn’t wear a wig his fair hair was, for once, powdered and tied back in a fashionable manner. He had studiously avoided her. But when they did chance to meet, she could sense his disapproval in the overly polite manner of his address.

“Certainly, Miss Swanpoole.” “My pleasure, Miss Swanpoole.” “Mary can most assuredly help with packing, Miss Swanpoole.” “I would be happy to ask my uncle’s assistance in finding you lodgings, Miss Swanpoole,” and so on.

He was accommodating in everything. It was like he couldn’t push her out the door quickly enough. The fleeting intimacy in the garden was never repeated. He took great pains not to touch her.

She looked at him now and felt angry with herself.

Why am I letting this sanctimonious stuffed-shirt make me feel bad?

“What do you want, Mister Wright?” She waved her hand around languidly. “As you can see, I am quite busy.”

She turned her head to look back out into the garden and didn’t see the frown that creased his forehead. He stepped cautiously into the room and cleared his throat. “My mother would like to invite you and Miss Mills to supper tonight before your departure in the morning.”

Odette turned her attention back to Gabriel. Whatever her son’s behavior, Josephine Wright had been nothing but kind to them. She stood and walked over to him. “We would be most honored,” she said with feeling. “We owe her so much.”

Odette looked up at him, her face soft with gratitude. She was like no one else he had ever known, lovely and graceful, kind and intelligent. He had avoided her like the plague.

A dancer… he could hear it now… the bastard and the ballerina. To his ears, only one of these sounded obscene. She was never the threat to his mother’s respectability that he was. Nothing could remove the stain of his origins. Not his mother’s reassurances or even his stepfather’s love.

He would marry a conventional girl. When he was established, he would marry a girl whose breeding could cover up the stain. Nothing could remove it, but it could be hidden.

Odette, open and brave, would only expose it and think nothing of the damage she did. She would think it stupid and insignificant. She would tell him it meant nothing. And he would believe her and be lost.

Misinterpreting the frozen look on his face, Odette felt a burning sensation of anger shoot through her. “Well, Mister Wright, I can see that just being in the same room with me is causing you considerable pain. Please, feel free to leave. And you won’t offend me if you are absent from the supper. I realize that my presence will only pollute—”

She got no further. She heard only his strangled reply before all thought was obliterated from her brain.

Odette stood alone in the room her hand to her lips. He had kissed her!

Who had moved? She hadn’t. Had he?

She couldn’t even remember his face close to her own. She had felt the pressure of his lips on hers. She could still feel the imprint of his hands on her face.

“My, my,” cooed Cara from the sitting room doorway. “Now
that
was impetuous and manly.”

Odette stared at her wide-eyed. Her hand dropped to her side.

What did he mean by “tainted?” What on earth was he talking about?

*

Lady Caroline Winter was worried. It was a sensation she seldom experienced. At thirty-five she was a woman in full possession of all her impressive faculties, both internal and external. She was accustomed to a level of control that few of her gender attained. This gave her a serenity of bearing that was often remarked upon in polite society but rarely approved of. Such a self-possessed woman was hardly natural—her disregard for the opinions of others indicative of a freakish nature.

Just now, however, Lady Caroline’s serenity and self-possession were severely disrupted. Many would have been shocked to see her agitatedly pacing the length of her opulent parlor. Elegantly gowned in green silk and coiffed in an elaborate powdered wig, she still looked the part of the disinterested society beauty. But her long strides and balled fist belied all indifference.

The door opened softly. “My lady.”

She turned and smiled absently. “Aamod,” she addressed the tall, Indian man standing at the door, “What is it?”

“Mister Gabriel Wright to see you.”

She breathed deeply and relaxed her hands. “Yes, thank you. Please show him in.”

Gabriel crossed the threshold and smiled. Just to see Caroline in this absurdity of a parlor was almost enough to make him forget his horrific blunder of the morning.

The brightly colored silk billowing down from the ceiling combined with a multitude of cushions, ivory screens, golden statues, and beaded tapestries were designed to make most society visitors uncomfortable. Gabriel only laughed and bent over his hostess’ hand.

“My, Gabe, but you get more handsome every day,” she purred with exaggerated sensuality.

Gabriel looked at her with genuine affection. He knew many found her beautiful, but he had never thought her so. She was much more than that. The high cheekbones, long straight nose, and square chin had too much strength for mere beauty. Her deep-set, gray eyes were heavily lashed and looked out on the world with cynicism and a great deal of compassion. She was good, Gabriel had long ago concluded. She was a very good woman.

“I think I shall marry you, Gabe. Yes, we shall marry. You will be my finest possession, the prettiest thing in my very, very big house.”

“What? So you can grow bored of me and leave me like that many-armed statue gathering dust in the corner.”

She looked up at him lasciviously. “Oh, no… no, Gabe. I have no intention of keeping
you
in the parlor.”

Neither of them could keep it up for long, and soon both were laughing uproariously on the sofa. This ridiculous banter was a prelude to all their private conversations and, Gabriel assumed, a way to dispel any possibility of sexual tension between them.

Caroline breathed in deeply and hugged a cushion to her chest. She leaned a shoulder against the sofa back and faced him. “What brings you here, Gabe?”

“Do I need a reason to visit my favorite member of the nobility?”

Caroline smiled again and looked at him closely. “A woman… definitely a woman.”

Barbara had been incorrect when she described Caroline as a woman completely unrelated to him. She had, in fact, been married to the younger brother of the man responsible for Gabriel’s birth.

According to Caroline, Thomas Winter was everything his brother was not—kind and loving, fair-minded and generous. He married her barely out of the schoolroom. She was only eighteen, and he twenty years her senior.

“Not at all!” Gabriel feigned surprise. “I wanted to discuss another matter.”

She sighed dramatically. “And here I was hoping for something interesting.” She peered at him provocatively from under her lashes.

“Well, if this matter
involves
a woman…”

She clapped her hands and bounced a little on the sofa inching closer to Gabriel. “I knew it! I knew it!”

He really didn’t know how she did it. Her perception was legendary. If one had a secret to keep, it was best not to come within breathing distance of Lady Caroline.

People whispered that it was all her years lost in India. She had been presumed dead with her husband, both of them killed by marauding bandits. Only two years a bride. But somehow she had survived. She arrived on English shores ten years later, fabulously wealthy and with an Indian servant.

It was believed that she had been a raja’s concubine… that she had studied with the Hindu mystics. No one knew for sure, and Caroline was just disobliging enough not to tell. Gabriel never asked.

She leaned back now and propped her expensively shod feet upon an ottoman. She crossed her arms over her chest and arranged her face in the serious expression of an advisor. “Well, go on, go on. Do tell,” she demanded impatiently. “If I’m to help you, you must tell me everything.”

He did. It all began with Odell.

“Yes, yes, I remember. Rather lost, poor boy. But by no means defenseless. Also a little arrogant, I fear.”

He told her of Odette’s arrival.

“Ah, the woman.”

“…with her friend, Miss Mills.”

“Another woman, even better. Beautiful, you say. But it’s the younger one, Odell’s sister, who interests you. Oh, for heaven’s sake, don’t glare at me. You think I can’t tell.”

He told of the arrival of Ethan Graham at the inn. Gabriel at the time had been puzzled. The boy’s description was similar to the one he had seen at the coffeehouse, although it was general enough to fit many boys. He wondered aloud if Ethan had followed the boy from the coffeehouse and, if so, why? That his search had ended up at The Ferrous Swan seemed an odd coincidence.

He finished his story with Odette’s warning about Ethan’s connection to Sir Archibald Brandon, but stopped short of revealing his embarrassing actions of the morning.

By the end of his recital, Caroline was sitting up straight her hands neatly folded in her lap. She got up and walked over to the window.

She looked out onto the vast gardens below and asked, “And Odette, she… what? Guessed that Sir Brandon might be spymaster to the Crown?”

“Well, there are rumors, or more like whispers. Until she told me, I didn’t even know Ethan and Sir Brandon were acquainted.”

“And I didn’t know you were acquainted with Ethan Graham.”

“Do you know him then?”

“I’ve met him once or twice. He’s not a man I’m likely to forget.”

“Interesting,” he mused, “half the time I don’t even know he’s there.”

Caroline smiled down at the floor and whispered, “A useful talent.” Looking up, she said more loudly, “So now Odette is headed to London. To draw out this evil man who has her brother captive.”