Mademoiselle At Arms, Elizabeth Bailey [bearly read books txt] 📗

the comtesse’s daughter some few yards away, listening in suddenly. ‘How fascinating. Were you born here, madame?’

‘Mais non.’ The lady shook her head, contriving at the same moment to utter a breathy little laugh. ‘C’est à dire, I would say from my father only comes the English.’

‘Oh,’ Gerald uttered, disappointed. ‘Not entirely English then.’

He heard Roding snort, and suppressed a grin as he bowed, taking the trouble to salute Madame’s hand and cast her a provocative look as he did so. He would pursue that little pastime on some other occasion. It might prove rewarding. For the present, he murmured his farewells, and turning, caught Hilary’s eye and walked away, crossing the ballroom to move into the less opulent, and less crowded, saloon next door where servants were dispensing refreshments.

In a moment, Roding and Lucilla joined him.

‘Well?’ demanded Miss Froxfield, accepting a glass of lemonade proffered by a passing lackey.

‘Well, nothing,’ uttered her betrothed crossly, before Gerald could answer. ‘Playing games to tease me, that’s all he can think of doing.’

‘Nothing of the sort,’ Gerald said calmly, sipping at his burgundy.

‘It looked to me as if he was playing games with Madame Valade,’ Lucilla said frankly. Her eyes quizzed the major. ‘Flirting, Gerald? A new come-out for you.’

Gerald grinned. ‘Merely making a useful contact. Interrogation takes many forms, you know, Lucy.’

‘Some of them more pleasurable than others, I take it.’

‘Gammon,’ interrupted Hilary scornfully. ‘Hates doing the pretty. I can vouch for that.’

‘But in pursuit of information, Hilary, I am prepared to sacrifice my preferences,’ Gerald told him.

 ‘Don’t tell me. I know you. That “entirely English” comment was said just to provoke me.’

‘I was merely drawing your attention to the odd prevalence of French émigrés claiming English antecedents.’

‘So you think she is an émigré?’ Lucilla put in before the incensed Roding could respond. ‘Your mystery lady, I mean.’

‘I don’t, as a matter of fact,’ Gerald said decidedly, a frown creasing his brow. ‘She didn’t behave in the least like an émigré, if these people are anything to go by.’

‘She behaved like a madwoman,’ Hilary declared roundly. ‘It’s my belief she is a nun.’

‘Now why didn’t I make that connection?’ Gerald asked of the air in a tone of regret. ‘Quite mad, nuns are. They are often to be found dashing about secret passages in strange houses, armed to the teeth. After all, where prayer fails, a pistol is bound to succeed.’

‘You know, Gerald,’ Lucilla put in thoughtfully, forestalling a withering rejoinder from the captain, ‘there may be something in that. After all, it is not long since that a Catholic nun in this country would have had to remain in hiding. And their monasteries and convents are still not officially permitted to exist here. Though they do, in secret, I believe.’

Gerald was staring at her, an arrested expression on his face. ‘Now I see why you’re marrying this woman, Hilary. You can give up thinking and leave all the brain work to her.’

‘She’s as clothheaded as you,’ Roding retorted, but he slipped an arm about the lady’s waist and gave her a quick squeeze.

‘But only think, Hilary,’ Lucy protested, evidently too involved in her theory to waste time in scolding. ‘It is all too probable that she would wish to change into lay clothing to escape recognition.’

‘Yes, a pretty theory, Lucy,’ Gerald said evenly, ‘but for one thing. She told us that it was a disguise.’

‘She told you!’

‘And,’ pursued Gerald, ignoring his friend’s scornful interjection, ‘that it was not always convenient to be dressed as a young girl.’

‘And you believe her?’ asked Lucilla, raising her brows.

‘I believe that. Though there is something to be said for your idea of a secret convent, at least as a hiding place.’ He frowned again. ‘Which presupposes that she needs to hide at all. And if she is not a nun, nor a refugee, and yet is entirely English, I’m hanged if I know what she is.’

‘Why should you care?’ demanded Roding, exasperated. ‘Obsessed, that’s what you are.’

Gerald grinned. ‘Yes, but I’m probably chasing moonbeams. The likelihood is that I shan’t see the wench again.’

***

 

It must have been fate, Gerald decided, near an hour later, staring intently at the closed French windows on the raised alcove that led out to the terrace. Or else he was indeed obsessed. But there was a face pressed to the glass. The features were indistinct, but was that not a halo of white about it? And the dark shadow below, was that a cloak, or the habit of a nun?

Skirting the dancing, from which he had taken a breather—not from lack of energy, but to escape the inanities of the young ladies he had partnered—Gerald made his way to a side door in the saloon and opened it.

Cautiously stepping outside, he looked up towards the terrace. Yes, there was someone there. Keeping to the shadow of the house, he crept forward until he could see better without, he hoped, being seen. But the figure was evidently too intent on peering within the ballroom to pay any attention to what might be occurring outside.

It moved a trifle, stepping back and lifting an arm to rub the sleeve against the glass. Lord, but it was a nun! Just as he had suspected. He smothered a laugh. What in the world was the wench up to now? For it must be she. How many nuns were there in England who might have occasion to spy on Lady Bicknacre’s ballroom? The presence of the French refugees took on greater significance.

Gerald began to ease forward, deciding just how he would accost her. Then he paused. She was shifting, moving back. Turning now, and running down the terrace.

The noise of a bolt came to Alderley’s ears. Someone was coming out of the house. Either she had been seen, or they were seeking the air. Probably the latter, for the thronging ballroom was insufferably hot.

The thought passed through his mind even as he started to cross the terrace at a jogtrot, moving to head her off. He leapt down into the haha surrounding the terrace, and saw that the nun was there also and backing towards him, anxiously checking now and then above the level of the terrace. Voices floated down, but there was no sound of pursuit.

Crouching down, Gerald waited, hands at the ready. There was no way to warn her of his presence without startling her. Whatever he did, she was bound to scream. He would have to make sure of her silence.

As she came close, he took a pace forward and seized her from behind, one strong arm clamping her tight against his chest, the free hand seizing her about the mouth, stifling the cry that gurgled in her throat.

But he reckoned without his host. His only warning was a gleam of silver in the faint spill of light from the house above. Then the dagger’s point came in a whirling arc towards his face.

By a miracle, he averted its path, his hold on the girl’s mouth shifting fast to grasp her wrist. He forced her arm back, away, stretching it out to keep the weapon at bay.

‘Desist, you little devil,’ he growled in her ear. ‘Let it fall!’

‘Brute!’ she spat, struggling, and he knew at once he had guessed aright. ‘Moi, je vais vous tuer!’

‘I don’t think so,’ Gerald said through his teeth. ‘You’re not going to kill me this time. Let—it—fall.’

The command was accompanied by an increase of pressure on the wrist he held. She gasped with pain, but she did not release her grip.

‘Laisse-moi,’ she panted, shifting wildly in his hold, so that he had all to do to keep her thus imprisoned.

‘Damn you, what’s the matter with you?’ he snapped in frustration. ‘I don’t want to hurt you any more. Listen, it is I. The imbecile. Remember?’

‘Parbleu,’ came from his still struggling victim. ‘You will release me at once, imbecile.’

‘Not until you release that dagger. Now drop it.’

A strangled sob escaped her as his thumb dug cruelly into the soft flesh of her wrist. Her fingers opened and the weapon fell from her nerveless grasp.

‘That’s better,’ said Gerald, and let her go.

In an instant, she turned on him. The struggle had dislodged the white wimple, which was evidently too large for her, and her black hair broke free, whirling like a whiplash about her head as her hands curled into fists, coming up to beat at his chest, her little teeth bared for attack.

‘Espèce de bête,’ she snarled. ‘Idiot!’

‘Enough, now! Softly, you little termagant,’ he ordered, seizing her wrists to hold her off. But his own ferocity was less now that she was disarmed.

‘Softly, you say?’ she uttered, raging. ‘Is it soft, the way you seize me from behind? Parbleu, my heart it is flown from my chest! Boom, boom, it goes, even now. Imbecile.’

‘Yes, I’m sorry about that,’ Gerald uttered in a rueful tone. ‘It could not be helped, whichever way I made my presence known. And I guessed you would attack if I startled you.’

‘You should be happy that you are not dead,’ she retorted, but with a diminution of the venom and fright in her voice.

He felt her relaxation and let go of her wrists. She grasped at the right one, massaging where his grip had been and Gerald hoped he had not bruised her.

‘How could I know that it is you?’ She peered at him in the darkness. ‘It is in truth you?’

‘Of course it is I.’

‘Where then is your uniform?’

‘I don’t wear it to balls.’

‘Eh bien, it is your fault entirely in this case. Easily I could have killed you. Just as I might have killed another, if he had come out.’

‘Ah, so you did come here to find someone,’ Gerald responded eagerly. ‘One of your countrymen, perhaps?’

The girl clammed up, the moon of her white face staring up at him in the darkness. Then she spoke, with a carelessness he instantly suspected.

‘I do not understand you.’

‘I think you understand me very well.’

He could just see the glare.

‘What do you want with me? Why did you catch me?’

‘You intrigue me,’ he told her frankly. His gaze dropped to the black garment that covered her. ‘For instance, why have you reverted to your nun’s habit for this particular adventure?’

‘That is easy. For a nun at night it is less dangerous than for the jeune demoiselle.’

Gerald eyed her. His vision was becoming accustomed to the faint light now and her features were clearer. She was trying to adjust the wimple, dragging at it and fighting with her loosened hair. The white veil had fallen to the ground and Gerald retrieved it for her.

‘And how is it that you have acquired this garb of a religieuse?’ he asked as she fitted the veil over her head.

‘From the convent, where else?’

‘It does not strike me that you can possibly have been in a convent.’

‘Ah, non?’ Her voice was neutral. ‘And why not?’

‘Because,’ Gerald said matter of factly, ‘convent-bred jeune demoiselles do not commonly know how to handle either pistols or daggers. You did not learn that in a convent.’

A giggle answered him. ‘Not from the nuns, no. But there are ways to learn more than a nun would teach.’

Fresh suspicion kindled in his breast. ‘Oh, are there? You are not quite alone in these adventures of yours, I take it.’ He thought a wary look came into her face, but it was difficult to be sure. ‘Come, I am concerned merely for your safety, you know. I am not prying for my own amusement.’

‘Then leave me to guard myself, and do not ask me questions any more,’ she snapped, and crouched down suddenly,