St. Raven, page 24
Cressida felt as if wild laughter might choke her. “I’ll be strong enough for both, Mama. Please. Will you trust me to manage this?”
Her mother bit her lip, but then she stepped forward and took Cressida’s hands. “You remind me so much of your father, darling. Confess, a little of this is sheer adventure, isn’t it?”
“Yes.”
“But will you be content to return to Matlock when it’s over?”
Cressida sighed, staring at a wall of books. “I doubt I’ll have other exciting possibilities.”
Her mother touched her cheek. “I am a conventional woman, but I’ve suspected for a while that you are not. I set your father free. He would have returned to England with us, but I knew it wasn’t his place to be. He loved me, but he loved adventure more. So I set him free. Now, I set you free, too. Go adventuring, Cressida, but always know you have a home to return to, tomorrow, or twenty years from now.”
Cressida saw her mother through tears, understanding so much, but not really understanding at all. Now, however, she felt she had to tell more.
“It’s the Duke of St. Raven, Mama. My friend. We met . . . by accident. It’s amusement for him. A quest. But—”
“But you’ve fallen in love with him. Hardly surprising.” Her mother sighed. “Poor Cressy. It seems you have the most dangerous parts of your parents. My tender heart and your father’s bold spirit. The duke is very handsome.”
“That’s not why I love him.”
“No, it wouldn’t be. If he asks, will you become his mistress?”
The direct question made everything clear.
“No. It wouldn’t be right for us for long, and the wounds would last a lifetime. And he has to marry, so it might be hardest for him. . . .” She breathed deeply. “If I’m going, I must go. Thank you!”
“Remember, I’ll always be here, waiting for the wanderer’s return. I believe I can deal with little wounds, at least. A touch of basilicum ointment, some soothing warm milk . . .”
Cressida gave her mother a fierce hug, then ran upstairs to gather a change of linen and her toiletries. How to carry them? Walking through the streets with a valise could look strange. She pulled out the hatbox for her tall bonnet and packed her things into that, adding the statue.
She didn’t wear that bonnet, however, but kept the small one from Matlock days. Would she still be recognized? Talk would fly if anyone saw Miss Mandeville driving out of town with the Duke of St. Raven.
She really shouldn’t go.
But she couldn’t give up this opportunity.
She glanced at the clock, then grabbed Roxelana’s thin blue veiling. She tied it around the brim of the bonnet and then pulled it down over her face. Ladies did sometimes wear veils when driving in an open carriage.
It turned everything a dim blue, however, making it hard to see. That reminded her. She pushed the veiling up, but grabbed her spectacles. She’d never worn them in public in London, so they’d be another disguise.
After one last hasty glance around, she picked up the hatbox, rushed downstairs, and left the house. She knew that one way or another, her life would never be the same.
Cressida forced herself to walk steadily to the rendezvous, praying that she not meet anyone she knew; praying especially that no one delayed her by wishing to speak.
She turned into Hays Street and saw him. At least, she saw his back and his splendid curricle. She faltered for a second, then hurried on. Her soft half-boots made no sound, so when she said, “I’m here,” he started.
He must have jerked on the reins, for his horses sidled and he had to work to settle them. Then he held out a gloved hand and pulled her up into the seat.
She couldn’t tell if he was surprised, pleased, or reluctant.
“Hatbox?” he queried.
“I thought I should bring a few things. Including the statuette. We might be able to exchange them.”
“Ah, good thought. Ready?”
I don’t know! Cressida tugged the veiling down over her face, relieved to be able to hide her expressions. “Ready,” she said.
He flicked his long whip over the horses, and they set off.
As he turned into a wider street, she became desperate to say something. “I’m sure I should make some admiring comment in praise of your horses, but the best I can manage is that they seem good at this.”
“So they are.”
She thought she saw the hint of a smile, but through the veiling it was so hard to tell.
She could see when they came up behind a huge cart laden with bales of something. It was traveling at a walk and taking up most of the road. Occasional vehicles coming the other way pinned them there until she wanted to scream. There wasn’t that much urgency, she supposed, but she couldn’t stand this dawdle.
Then he said, “Hold on.”
Cressida realized a moment too late that he meant it literally, and had to make a mad grab for the rail beside her as the curricle surged forward to fly past the cart in a small gap in the traffic. Once they were past, the road ahead was clear, and they whirled by people and houses at terrifying speed.
“All right?”
Cressida unglued her stare from the buildings flashing by at her side. “Can we go a little slower?” She sounded strangled.
“Come now”—he steered around a hole in the road with alarming nonchalance—“is this my intrepid Roxelana?”
“No, this is your terrified Miss Mandeville of Matlock, who doesn’t want to die just yet!”
“You won’t. Trust me.”
Trust. Trust. She forced her fingers to release the rail.
Then he added, “I haven’t overturned in at least six years.”
“You’ve overturned?” she squeaked, gripping again.
“When I was young and foolish and racing with Uffham.”
“Uffham?” Talking was some distraction. She prayed it wasn’t distracting him.
“Heir to the Duke of Arran. A kind of foster brother.”
“Oh, yes.” She remembered there being almost as much flurry among the society hopefuls about Lord Uffham as about St. Raven. “Do you know anyone who isn’t from a ducal family?”
“Don’t be ridiculous. Feeling better?”
Cressida realized that she was, a little. She eased her painful grip on the iron rail, though she didn’t let go entirely. “This is a foolhardy way to travel.”
“This is the best way to travel as long as the weather is fine. It’s also the fastest.”
“That’s what I mean.”
“We need speed. We want to be ahead of La Coop. Now, why are you swathed like a veiled mourner?”
“So that if anyone who knows me sees me, they won’t. Know me. With you.” Her brains must be blowing away with the wind of their speed.
“Ah. Quick wits, as always. You can put it up for now, though. We’re passing through nursery gardens with no vehicles in sight. I can’t see anyone from the ton strolling here.”
Cressida pushed the veiling up as best she could with one hand. She still was not ready to release her grip on the rail. Clear vision did help her nerves, and Tris’s relaxed confidence helped even more.
He, after all, wasn’t holding on to anything except the reins, and they wouldn’t keep him from falling out. Instead he was riding the movement of the curricle with a foot braced on the board in front of him. Unfortunately, her foot wouldn’t reach there.
She made herself release her grip on the rail and tried to sway with the carriage. The road was quite smooth, kept in good condition by the tolls. Even though they were whirling past pedestrians and people on donkeys and placid cobs, she was not tossed off the flimsy vehicle into the air.
She began to almost enjoy it.
But then he said, “Coach up ahead. Mail or stage coming this way.”
Cressida yanked down the veiling, and in moments the coach passed by and was gone on its way to London in a swirl of dust. At least, it was them speeding by. The coach was doubtless trundling on its steady way.
“You’re better off where you are than traveling on the outside of that,” he said.
“I don’t doubt it.” She’d always thought that being an outside passenger would be uncomfortable and dangerous. Miss Mandeville of Matlock had never had to contemplate such a fate. If she didn’t get the jewels, she might end up traveling that way.
Dread tangled with screwed-up tension, making her want to scream. Instead she fixed on their purpose. They were going to get the jewels, and that would solve most of her problems. She and her parents could live in decent dignity—and she would never travel in a curricle again.
That meant, she knew, that she wouldn’t travel with Tris Tregallows again, but that was an old wound by now.
“What is our plan? Where are we going?”
“Hatfield, where a certain Jean-Marie Bourreau lived before he was arrested for being Le Corbeau.”
“Oh, of course. How clever! But will he still be there?”
“Having been proved innocent, I hope he’ll have stayed put. Anything else might look suspicious. He has lodging and employment there.”
“Employment?”
“He does portraits in pastels, and is quite good at it.”
This struck Cressida as very peculiar. “An artist? Are you sure he is Le Corbeau?”
“Artistic skill guaranteeing virtue?”
A tollgate blocked the road ahead, and he slowed to toss a coin to the waiting toll-keeper, whose son was already swinging open the wide gate. In moments Cressida was pressed back by speed again, and Tris’s attention was all on the road.
“So he’s in Hatfield.” She concentrated on that, not on the speed. “And he has the statue. Didn’t you say he has a cottage?”
“But he knows that cover is blown. I had the place checked before we left Nun’s Chase. He’s cleared out all his important possessions.”
“So if he has the statue, it is probably with him in Hatfield.”
“That’s the hope. If he’s found a new hiding place, I’ll squeeze it out of him.”
“And how are you to do that without revealing that it has some importance?”
He flashed her a glance. “I’ll find a way. Do you truly think me hotheaded enough to forget the need for discretion?”
Had her thoughtless words hurt him? “No, of course not. You’re coolheaded. I’m in a fret.”
“Trust me, Cressida. This is the last stage. We’ll soon have your jewels.”
The last stage. She certainly couldn’t accuse him of sugarcoating things.
“How are we to get it from him without him knowing its true value?” After a moment, she answered herself. “Perhaps I should handle that. It doesn’t sound as if he’ll be disposed to please you.”
“I’m willing to beat it out of him if necessary—but the less fuss, the better.”
They slowed to pass through a small place called Finchley.
When he didn’t say any more, her lips twitched. “Do you have any less violent plan?”
She saw her humor echoed in him. “Robbery still appeals.”
“Unless we get caught.”
“I am a duke.”
“Which doesn’t make you immune to criminal arrest.”
“But makes it unlikely. Unjust, I know, but there have to be some compensations. He’s living at an inn called the Cockleshell. We could take rooms there and be enterprising.”
One word registered. “Rooms?”
“Rooms.” He slowed the team and glanced at her. “We can’t pretend to be married, Cressida, even under a false name. There’s too great a chance of being seen by someone who knows me. And anyway, that outfit and hat cry out a lack of funds. A fine husband I’d look to be dressed by the best and driving this rig but with my wife in servant’s clothes.”
“I thought they would be inconspicuous,” she muttered, and did not tell him they were part of her everyday Matlock wardrobe. She could point out that they were made of durable cloth, and very well made, as well, but what was the point?
“Penny for your thoughts?”
Cressida snapped alert. “I’m constantly worrying about being thrown out of this ridiculous vehicle.”
“I’ve slowed.”
“We are still going too fast.”
“Be bold. Be brave. You were far away, weren’t you? Are you worrying about the night? You can trust me.”
“That’s what I feared.” It slipped out before she thought.
“Devil take it, Cressida. You’ll drive me mad. We can’t. It’s too dangerous. And it won’t make it any easier.”
It—the inevitable parting.
“We’ll doubtless be too busy in the night anyway. Switching the statues,” she added, in case it was unclear.
“Yes.” But the horses broke step as if he’d given them some conflicting signal.
She found some satisfaction in that. The noble Duke of St. Raven wanted another night, perhaps as much as she did. What’s more, she believed that he wanted more than her body. There was a bleak sort of comfort in that.
They drove for a while in silence, and the less-than-suicidal speed allowed her to think more clearly. She noticed that even at their moderate pace, they passed three coaches of the slower sort, lumbering north on this busy road. She was grateful for her veil.
“Perhaps,” she said, “we should arrive separately.”
“Why?”
“It would avoid any chance of a scandalous connection, and allow us more options. . . .” Before he could interrupt, she added, “At the next coaching stage, I could take a coach to Hatfield. They seem to pass by quite frequently.”
“Impossible! You could end up traveling on the outside.”
“If I don’t succeed in this venture, I could end up traveling there for the rest of my life!”
He drew the horses to a halt and faced her. “We are not going to fail.”
“Even you can’t shape fate to your choosing.”
“I should at least be able to shape this. We’re dealing with a foreign petty criminal who doesn’t realize what he has. There’s no need for you to take risks.”
“Yet nothing in this seems to go smoothly, remember?” When he didn’t agree, she said, “You cannot dictate to me in this. My plan makes the most sense.”
“Does it, indeed? Then what is this plan other than to travel in discomfort?”
“You call hurtling along in this thing comfort?”
She wouldn’t have thought that his jaw could tense any further, but it managed to. “The plan, Cressida.”
She swallowed another retort. “You will arrive and demand to speak to Bourreau. I will arrive separately and search his rooms when he’s with you.”
“Out of the question. As soon as you enter his rooms, you’re a criminal.”
“Surely my lord duke can extract me from jail.”
“I may decide to leave you there if you ‘my lord duke’ me again!”
The desperate violence behind his words stilled her breath. She pushed up her veil so she could see him more clearly.
“I’m sorry, but you’re bullying me. I did not grow up trained to the male bridle. Your word is not my law.”
“So tempting to marry you, to hear you promise to obey me.”
“A prime argument against matrimony!”
But they were dancing close to an impossible edge, and she saw that knowledge in his eyes, along with a great many other painful things.
“You can distract Bourreau,” he said, “and I will search the rooms.”
“And how am I supposed to do that, dressed like a servant?”
His brows twitched. “Did that offend you? For heaven’s sake, Cressida, you can’t deny—”
“These clothes are my everyday wear in Matlock, sir, and I like them.”
“Then I wish you joy of them. But,” he added, his expression softening, “you won’t make yourself any less attractive to me that way.”
“I didn’t. I wouldn’t . . . Wretched man, you will not distract me that way! I cannot guarantee to hold Bourreau away long enough. You can. I will search the rooms. I have come up with a story.”
“What?” She heard a disbelieving sigh.
“I’m an abandoned lover come to beg him to take me back. That gives me an excellent reason to sneak into his rooms and one not likely to land me in jail.”
He seemed angry at its reasonableness. “Not if you’re caught red-handed.”
“How would that be? I have the similar statue in my hatbox. I need the merest moment to switch them, and only a little more to remove the jewels from the one he has.”
“Dammit, Cressida, I don’t like it!”
“Clearly, since you’re swearing at me again.”
“You’ll hear worse than that before this is over.”
She bit back laughter and touched his tense gloved hand. “It is not so outrageous a plan as that, Tris, to travel by stage for a few miles and then sneak into a man’s rooms.”
His raised brows were sufficient commentary.
“Not outrageous for mere mortals, at least, my lord duke.”
“Harpy.”>
“Winged and clawed.”
“I’m running blood to prove it.” He turned his hand to take hers. “Cressida, I need to keep you safe.”
Ah, that could break her heart. “Truly, the risks are not great, and the advantages are. Especially one. Think. We will not be linked. Even if we meet someone who knows you, or who knows me, there will be no connection, so no scandal.”
She put into words what had not yet been said. “After Stokeley, we can’t afford any scandalous connection.”
His thumb rubbed against her hand. “I’d marry you, Cressida, but it would only make matters worse.”
She knew what he meant. “It would put me in the center of the world’s eye, and somebody would put two and two together and realize that I was your houri at Stokeley. Crofton would make the connection between you and Le Corbeau—”
“That doesn’t matter, and we can stare down scandal—”
“No! No, I don’t want that, Tris. Truly I don’t. Bad enough to be the center of the world’s attention, but to be the center of the world’s disgusted whispers all my life? No, no, no!”
