Mademoiselle at Arms Read online

  Chapter Six

  Creeping along the dark narrow passage, with lantern held well ahead to keep her step steady on the uneven stones—and to warn her of the advent of rats—Melusine kept her long petticoats fastidiously clear of the dirt with an efficient hand, a habit she had learned in the convent.

  ‘Parbleu, I hope that I do not have many more times to come in this way to the house,’ she muttered fretfully.

  ‘What, miss?’ asked Jack Kimble from behind her.

  ‘This journey I do not like,’ she said more loudly. ‘And if it was not for that imbecile of a Gérard, who has put his soldiers to watch for me, it would not need that I make it.’

  ‘Even if they militiamen weren’t there, miss,’ cautioned her cavalier, ‘you couldn’t go marching into the house open like. That there gatekeeper would’ve called them out again.’

  ‘Ah yes. He will be sorry when he knows who I am,’ decided Melusine with satisfaction.

  There was some justification for her annoyance, for negotiation of the secret passage demanded either a stout heart, or a desperate one. The original passage, Martha had told her, had led only from an upstairs room to one downstairs. But the Remenhams in the days of Charles the First, with the need for an escape route from Cromwell’s increasingly victorious forces, had cut a trapdoor through its floor into the cellars below, and thence hewn the long rough passageway that led underground right outside the boundary of the estate. The entrance was concealed between two huge boulders within a clump of trees, and was now so overgrown that no one who did not know of its existence could ever hope to find it.

  Even Melusine, armed with special knowledge, and the enthusiastic assistance of Jack Kimble’s strong arm, had taken almost half a day to locate the place. She had known that Remenham House would be deserted, for Martha—released, as she had carefully explained to her charge, by her vows to God from servitude and obedience to Nicholas Charvill, a mere mortal—had begun a correspondence with a friend of her youth, Mrs Joan Ibstock, née Pottiswick. That good woman, although astonished to hear of Martha’s conversion to Catholicism and embracing of a religious sisterhood, responded with the news of Jarvis Remenham’s death.

  Martha had been careful to make no mention of Melusine, and did not reply to Mrs Ibstock’s enquiry about the fate of the little babe. When she confessed all this to her charge, telling the now grown up babe that there was no hope in the world of establishing any claim, she very soon discovered her mistake. Rebellious and resentful, Melusine decided there and then that she would do exactly that, come what may. Once in England, she made all haste to visit Remenham House.

  On that first occasion, the delay in locating the entrance to the secret passage meant that she had to wait until morning to make her search. She had been obliged to spend the night in that fateful bedchamber, the faithful Kimble—who had foraged at a nearby inn, bringing back a large pie and a jug of porter for his mistress—guarding the door outside. In the early hours of the morning, unable to bear the suspense any longer, Melusine had ventured to explore the mansion, the lantern she had brought in hand, commenting to herself all the time on the state of the place and the difficulties of her task, and having no idea of the consequences she was bringing on herself thereby.

  To her intense disappointment, she discovered that all papers had been removed from desks and cupboards. Not the most stringent search, conducted all morning, turned up one solitary sheet. There was nothing to replace the all important letter from her father. But she found an unknown lady’s discarded garments, and selected some of those that she tried on, sending Kimble off down the secret passage to load them onto the horse she had borrowed—unbeknownst to its owner—from Father Saint-Simon. Kimble had bedded the animal down at the local inn. And then she had been disturbed by the eruption into the room of Major Gerald Alderley and his companion, Captain Hilary Roding.

  On this second excursion, forewarned, she would use no light and keep as quiet as a mouse, she vowed, and thus refrain from attracting the attention of the militia at the gates. Arrived at the secret door, she grasped the lever that opened it and placed the lantern on the floor.

  ‘This we will leave. I do not wish that the soldiers there will see it shine.’

  A panel slid open and she stepped into the relative light of the little dressing-room, Kimble close behind her. Coming from the gloom of the passage, even the corridors seemed sufficiently illuminated for them to see their way. And the bedchamber, for which Melusine instantly headed, was almost bright.

  ‘That is good. There is light enough from the sun,’ she said, relieved.

  ‘What are you after this time, miss?’ asked Jack.

  ‘A thing Marthe told me of,’ Melusine answered, her attention on the garments that were still lying higgledy-piggledy, just as she had left them. She saw her discarded nun’s habit still on the floor and scooped it up. Martha had not been pleased to find her spare one borrowed for that expedition when the major had found her outside the ballroom. Besides, it did not fit her well, which was why the loose wimple had slipped. She would take this one back with her. One never knew when it would be necessary to resume her disguise.

  ‘Jacques,’ she said, turning to the lad, and holding the habit out, ‘take this for me and leave it in the passage where we have left the lantern. I do not know if I will have to escape quickly once more.’

  ‘Aye, miss,’ Kimble agreed, taking the garments, ‘but where will I find you?’

  ‘I do not know. I must go perhaps in all the rooms. Not up here, I think. I shall start at the bottom. Oh, wait!’ She seized Jack’s arm as he was about to go out of the room. ‘Go you through the passage and find the other door. Martha said to me that it must come to the bibliothéque.’

  ‘The what, miss?’ asked Kimble, frowning.

  ‘I do not know the word in English. The place for reading.’

  ‘You mean the bookroom, miss. Will I meet you there?’

  ‘Yes, yes, I shall await you. Now go.’ She thrust him out of the room and made for the stairs.

  The library was on the ground floor, Melusine recalled from the previous visit, for she had searched through a desk in a room filled with bookshelves of leather-bound volumes. But she was not sure just how to reach it. It had been brighter than the rest, for dawn light had come in through high unshuttered casements above the bookshelves.

  Melusine glanced at the walls as she sped down the four flights of stairs, and noted with relief that some paintings remained. Here and there, a rectangular patch, darker than the rest, showed that some had been removed. Well, one must hope, that was all.

  In the flagged entrance hallway at the bottom, where extra light came in from a window above the double doors, it was easy enough to distinguish a family group, and a landscape which clearly included Remenham House in the distance. But, moving through into the first of the large main rooms that led one into another around the house, with here and there an antechamber between, it was obvious that the task was not going to be easy.

  If only one might open the shutters and let in the light. This gloom was impossible.

  Moving to the shuttered window, Melusine dragged the heavy drapes back. Yes, this was a little better. Parbleu, but must she do this all through the house? Evidently she must, for not only could she not properly see the paintings and portraits that hung on the walls, but she was in imminent danger of bumping into the sheet-shrouded furniture.

  She had just passed into a little antechamber beyond when she suddenly heard a faint knocking.

  Her heart thudded. Dieu du ciel, what was it? She turned slowly, listening for the direction of the sound. It came again. It seemed to emanate from the back of the house. She looked about and discovered a door partially hidden by shadow.

  Melusine crossed to open it, and immediately the knocking intensified in volume. The room behind was another small antechamber, presumably linking the back rooms. Swiftly following the sound of knocking, she crossed right and passed through a door near
the windows—and found herself in the bookroom. Suddenly remembering Kimble, her heart thudded with excitement. Had he found the secret door?

  Running to the centre, she tried to judge where the knocking came from. There was a huge desk of heavily carved ebony at one end, and at the centre, a couple of straight-backed chairs stood before a great fireplace at the outer wall, flanked by two bookshelves with casement windows above. Over the mantel, set into an ornately carved panel with fluted columns at each end, was a portrait of a man on horseback. Every other wall comprised bookcases, except where the doors appeared. The entire place was a masterpiece of wooden carving, a design of interleaving carried throughout.

  Melusine turned and turned, unable to imagine just where the secret door could be. Upstairs, in the little dressing-room, the panel was opened by means of tugging a small candlesconce in the wall. Here, it might be anything at all. And nothing to tell her where to begin.

  ‘Jacques?’ she called out, forgetting the need for silence.

  ‘Here, miss,’ came faintly from somewhere close at hand.

  ‘Can you not open it?’ she cried.

  ‘I dropped the lantern,’ Jack’s muffled voice told her. ‘Can’t see a thing.’

  ‘Oh, peste,’ exclaimed Melusine, and louder, ‘Where are you? Call, that I may find you.’

  She moved quickly to the nearest bookcase, and listened intently to the sound of Jack’s voice. She could not judge its direction, and began to move swiftly along the bookshelves, her hand running behind her across the spines of the calf-bound volumes.

  She had traversed perhaps three bookshelves, passed across the door that must lead to the hall, turned the corner, and was just about to reach the fireplace when she abruptly became aware that something under her fingers had felt wrong. Moving back to the corner again, she ran a hand back over the leather-bound books—which, she realised, were not books at all.

  Her fingers passed over a cunningly wrought surface of wood, with just the correct amount of protrusion, the precise colours of dyed leather, and cleverly gilded surfaces and neatly painted lettering. But the whole set of some three or four shelves were of wood.

  Melusine tapped on it. At once there came an answering knock. She had found him! Excitement welled.

  ‘Wait, Jacques! I will find the way to open this.’

  It took several frustrating moments, working at the protrusions of the carving down the side of the bookshelves, tugging at leaves, pushing at flowers. But at length, there was a click, and with a swish, the panel of painted books swung outward from the wall.

  An astonished Jack Kimble was revealed in the aperture. Melusine started back, blinking.

  ‘Parbleu, but I find that this is excessively clever, this passage.’

  Jack stepped out, and pushed the door to. It clicked and the bookshelf was once more intact. They stood back together and stared at it.

  ‘You could not tell it,’ said Melusine, ‘unless you were as close as we.’

  A sudden clatter of booted feet sounded in the hall beyond. Jack looked towards the door. At the back of her mind, Melusine noted an odd look in the boy’s face, but there was no time to explore it. Swiftly she ran her hands over the carvings, trying to find the lever to the secret panel again. She was too late. The door to the library burst open.

  ‘Ha!’ uttered Captain Roding triumphantly. ‘Got you!’

  ‘You!’ Stunned, Melusine moved quickly away from the tell-tale bookshelf. ‘But how do you come here?’

  ‘Down on a routine patrol, unluckily for you,’ he answered grimly. ‘I was just looking the place over when I heard you calling out.’

  ‘Oh, peste,’ exclaimed Melusine crossly. ‘It is all the fault of that lantern.’

  ‘I’m that sorry, miss,’ Kimble said glumly.

  ‘It does not matter, Jacques.’ She glared at Hilary. ‘If it is that your men there are going to arrest us, then why do they not do so?’

  ‘Left to myself, I’d let them,’ he replied grimly. But he looked back into the hall and spoke to the sergeant who could just be seen behind him. ‘All right, Trodger. I’ll take over here. Get the men back to their posts.’

  ‘Sir!’ came from Trodger, and the booted feet clattered off and out of the front door.

  ‘Now then,’ said the captain sternly, ‘I’m not going to ask you what you’re doing here. I’d only get a pack of lies in reply.’

  ‘Then it is good that you do not ask me,’ Melusine snapped, and flouncing away from him, went to sit in the large chair behind the desk at the far end of the room. She watched, puzzled, as her cavalier frowned at the newcomer, glancing from him to Melusine and back again.

  The captain saw it too and nodded at the boy. ‘You the fellow Gerald spoke to?’

  Kimble flushed beetroot, and Melusine had a flash of insight.

  ‘Jacques!’

  She got no further, for Kimble came towards her, speaking fast and low. ‘It were that there major, miss. I didn’t betray you, I swear I didn’t. Seemed like he knew so much—more than me, miss. And―and he wanted to help you.’

  ‘So this is the way you serve me,’ exclaimed Melusine, her quick temper flaring as she jumped up, slammed her hands on the desk and leaned towards him over it. ‘What is it that you told him?’

  ‘Nothing, miss, I swear. At least—’

  ‘Don’t be more of a lunatic than you can help,’ broke in the captain, addressing himself to Melusine. ‘If the boy had sense enough to send word to Gerald as he was told to do, then God be praised!’

  ‘Parbleu,’ broke from Melusine, as she turned on him instead. ‘By traitors I am surrounded!’

  ‘Stop talking utter twaddle,’ ordered Roding, marching up to the desk. ‘You ought to be glad someone cares enough about your wretched little neck to try and save it. And if you dare to produce any kind of weapon at all,’ he added, taking a plain brass-barrelled little pistol from his own pocket and levelling it, ‘I will have no compunction in blowing off your head, you madcap female. You’re dealing with me now, not Gerald.’

  Melusine looked resentfully at the pistol. ‘I see well that I am dealing with you. Do not imagine that I cannot do so, as well as I can this Gérard.’

  ‘Do you tell me you think you can outwit Gerald? I wish I may see it.’

  Melusine did not reply. Her anger died and she eyed him. She could manage the major. Let her see if she could manage this one, perhaps turn all to suit herself?

  ‘What do you think to do with me now?’

  The captain lowered the pistol. His tone changed, becoming a little more moderate. ‘I don’t propose doing anything with you. The thing is, Miss Charvill—’

  ‘He told you my name?’ cut in Melusine, surprised.

  ‘He told me everything, if you mean Gerald.’

  Impatience overtook Melusine’s resolve momentarily. ‘Do you think it is the man in the moon that I mean? What is it that Gérard has told you?’

  ‘That you need help.’

  Melusine sat slowly down again, looking him over thoughtfully. This became very interesting. Let her see what she could make here. She watched the captain tuck the pistol back in his pocket, and perch on the edge of the big desk. Very good. He became a little less en garde.

  ‘I do not know how you think you may help me,’ she said slowly.

  ‘Neither do I,’ he responded, frowning, ‘but for Gerald’s sake, I’ll do anything I can.’

  Mischief overtook Melusine. She ran her gaze over him, and allowed her eyelashes to flutter down.

  To her satisfaction, the captain reddened a trifle. ‘No need to upset yourself. Happy to do anything in my power.’

  Melusine sighed deeply. ‘You see, it is that I have a plan to marry an Englishman.’

  His brows rose. ‘So that’s true, is it?’

  ‘Certainly it is true,’ Melusine said, opening her eyes wide. ‘And I am thinking now that you may be very suitable.’

  ‘Eh?’

  Almost Melusine betrayed he
rself at his startled look. But she must not laugh.

  ‘You will like to marry me, yes?’ she pursued. ‘That will be very helpful to me.’

  ‘Marry you!’

  He shot off the desk, such horror in his face that Melusine felt a little irritated. Was she so bad a prospect?

  ‘No good, Melusine,’ said a new voice from the doorway.

  Melusine jumped up, turning swiftly. ‘Gérard!’

  Before she could react to this new menace, the captain spun round. ‘She wants me to marry her.’

  ‘So I heard.’ Gerald came into the room as he spoke, his eyes on the stormclouds rapidly gathering in Melusine’s face. ‘He’s already spoken for, Melusine. You’ll have to find someone else.’

  ‘You, perhaps?’ she flung at him furiously, stepping out from behind the desk.

  He uttered a short laugh. ‘Lord, no! I’ve a better regard for my skin, I thank you.’

  ‘Parbleu, but I find you excessively rude,’ she snapped, marching to meet him.

  ‘You usually do,’ he said lightly.

  ‘Do not smile at me and try to make me not angry any more,’ Melusine warned, ‘for I am very angry indeed with you.’

  ‘What, for not wanting to marry you?’

  ‘Imbecile. Do you think I would marry you? Rather would I marry the pig in the convent.’

  ‘You mean the one that you refused to feed?’ demanded Gerald, seizing this promising cue and adopting a mournful note. ‘But that is excessively unkind of you, Melusine. To compare me to a starving pig.’

  She bit her lip, but her eyes betrayed her. ‘Do not say such things, you—you imbecile.’

  With satisfaction, Gerald noted that her voice was hopelessly unsteady and drove home his advantage.

  ‘I will not, if you will assure me that an imbecile is a better marriage prospect than a starving pig.’

  Melusine bubbled over and warmth rose in Gerald’s chest.

  ‘Idiot. Near as idiot as this capitaine of yours. He believed me when I asked him to marry me. You would not have believed me, I know well.’

  Gerald eyed her with interest. ‘Did you sigh and flutter your eyelashes?’

  ‘Certainly I did.’

  ‘No, I wouldn’t have believed you.’ He glanced at Roding. ‘Don’t concern yourself, Hilary. She was only trying to distract you so that she might escape.’

  ‘Distract me? She nigh on gave me an apoplexy.’

  Gerald laughed, and turned back to Melusine, who was frowning again. ‘What now?’

  ‘Now,’ she answered flatly, ‘you will please to tell me at once why you have come here.’

  ‘That’s easy. You’re trespassing again, and I’ve come to arrest you,’ Gerald said promptly.

  ‘I do not believe you. En tout cas, I am not trespassing at all. This—’ waving an imperious hand in a sweeping arc about the library ‘—is my house.’

  So that was it. Gerald glanced at Hilary and saw the stunned look on his face. The fellow Kimble, to whom Gerald was indebted, was gaping.

  ‘You will have to prove it, you know,’ Gerald said quietly.

  ‘Do you think I do not know? What am I doing here, do you think?’

  ‘That’s just exactly what I’ve been asking myself,’ he returned. ‘Are you going to tell me?’

  ‘But looking for proof,’ Melusine uttered impatiently. ‘Have I not said so?’

  ‘No, as it happens.’ He smiled down at her. ‘But that will do for a start. Now I’d like the rest of your story.’

  Melusine’s eyes flashed. ‘You would like? And do you imagine that I will tell you?’

  ‘Won’t you?’

  ‘No, a thousand times.’

  ‘Damnation!’

  ‘What the devil ails you?’ demanded his friend, striding forward. ‘You know pretty much everything you need to know.’

  Melusine swung round and stared at him, while Gerald silently cursed.

  ‘How much does he know?’ Without waiting for a reply, she turned narrowed eyes on Gerald. ‘So it is that you have made Jacques betray me.’

  ‘No, miss,’ cut in Kimble.

  She glanced at him and made a dismissive gesture. ‘Do not be alarmed, Jacques. I am not angry with you, but with this—this—’

  ‘Idiot? Imbecile?’ offered Gerald in a helpful tone.

  Melusine choked on a laugh, and Gerald at once seized the initiative, speaking in a tone deliberately soothing.

  ‘You have every right to be angry with me. You see, I kidnapped poor Jack and made him promise to send me word if you went careering off anywhere. He was extremely loyal to you. Indeed, he told me nothing at all. But he was at last persuaded that I mean you no harm, and that I might—just possibly, since I am both a gentleman and a major of militia—be able to be of more assistance to you than he himself. So, you see—’

  ‘Do not say any more,’ Melusine uttered, flinging away and moving to the fireplace. She turned there, clasped her hands behind her back and put up her chin. ‘I see that Leonardo was right. One cannot trust any man at all.’

  The lad Kimble moved swiftly to the door and walked out of the room. Disappointment flickered in Gerald’s chest, and he did not hesitate to speak his mind, unable to help a reproachful note.

  ‘I don’t think he deserved that, Melusine.’

  Quick remorse raced through Melusine’s veins, but she hit back strongly. ‘It needs not that you tell me.’ Then she ran swiftly out of the library, calling out as her cavalier was almost at the front door. ‘Jacques!’

  He stopped, but he did not turn. Melusine ran to catch at his arm.

  ‘Jacques, do not go!’

  Jack gazed steadfastly at the floor. ‘You were right, miss. I didn’t ought to have sent for him.’

  Melusine’s heart twisted. ‘Jacques, you have been very much my friend. I have had no one but for you. But it is that I have a very bad temper, you understand.’

  She sighed relief to see a faint grin as he ventured to raise his head.

  ‘I know that, miss. I don’t mind it.’

  ‘But you mind that I say I do not trust you. This is not true at all.’

  Melusine put her arm through his in a friendly way and moved with him outside to stand on the porch, leaning into him in a confidential way.

  ‘Even the nuns they say I am like a devil. But you have looked after me very well, and we will not allow this Gérard, who makes me all the time excessively angry, you understand, to make trouble between us.’

  ‘I think he only wants to help you, miss,’ offered Jack. ‘He don’t mean you no harm.’

  Melusine withdrew her hand. ‘Yes, but I do not know why he should wish to do so, and therefore I cannot permit that he interferes.’

  She was about to develop this theme, when Jack’s gaze became fixed, and his expression changed. ‘Inside, miss!’

  ‘But what is it?’

  ‘Quick! We need the major.’

  Before she could object, Melusine found herself hustled back into the house and dragged willy-nilly towards the library door, where Jack called softly.

  ‘Major, sir!’

  The major appeared so swiftly that Melusine was instantly suspicious. Had he been listening inside?

  ‘What is amiss?’

  ‘That Frenchie, sir. He’s riding down the drive.’

  ‘Valade?’

  ‘Aye, sir.’

  Shock threw Melusine’s heart out of kilter and she looked instinctively towards the major. ‘But―but how can he know?’

  His soldier’s instinct overtook Gerald and he dropped all his insouciance in a bang, becoming brisk.

  ‘Never mind that now.’ He called through the library door. ‘Hilary!’

  The captain appeared, alert at the note in his major’s voice as Gerald had known he would be.

  ‘What’s to do?’

  ‘Valade is here. Go out there and head him off, will you? Tell him anything you like, but don’t let him in, and don’t tell him Melusine is here.�
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  Roding left the house instantly, not even pausing to nod.

  Gerald seized Melusine by the hand and drew her towards the stairs, throwing a command at Kimble as he did so. ‘Keep watch, Jack! If Captain Roding fails to keep the man out of the house, run upstairs and warn me quickly. We’ll be somewhere on the floor above.’

  ‘Aye, sir,’ Kimble said at once, and took up his stance at the bottom of the stairs as Gerald dragged Melusine up them.

  ‘But, Gérard—’

  ‘Don’t start arguing,’ he said in a tone that brooked no defiance. ‘We’ll have you right out of the way, just in case. And don’t talk until we’re well out of earshot.’

  Rather to his surprise, she obeyed this injunction as he led her up two flights of stairs to the first floor. Moving swiftly to the end of the corridor, he pushed open a door at random and entered a large room, which looked to have been a saloon, judging from the faded gilt and crimson wall-paper, a mirror above the fireplace which was surrounded by an ornate gilded frame, now sadly tarnished, and a worn Chippendale sofa with striped upholstery and tasselled cushions.

  Gerald closed the door and released Melusine, and then went to open the shutters on a window that faced the side of the house. Light flooded the uncarpeted chamber, revealing the decayed state of the place.

  ‘Lord,’ he uttered, glancing about with a disparaging eye. ‘One would take it that the house had been ransacked.’

  Melusine had crossed to the window that overlooked the front of the house, and was trying to peep through a crack in the shutters. Cursing under his breath, Gerald moved swiftly across and dragged her away.

  ‘You’ll make shadows.’

  She allowed herself to be pulled to the centre of the room, but uttered in a low tone, full of suppressed anxiety, ‘How can he know? How can he know?’

  ‘You mean how can he know that this is your house?’

  Melusine looked up at him, distress in her eyes. ‘There is no one who could have told him this. No one.’

  ‘What of your grandfather?’

  Her lips parted in surprise. ‘You know?’

  ‘Come, come, Melusine. Remember that I’ve seen Brewis Charvill, and I’m well aware of your identity. You told me yourself you are not half French, which means the girl calling herself Madame Valade is completely misinformed, so Valade himself cannot know. But they’ve just been to see General Charvill.’

  Fury was in her face. ‘Alors, I see how is this. He will not help them—and I told Emile so—and thus he sends them to my other grandpére, even that he knows he is dead. Pah! What a pig is this générale.’

  ‘I thought so,’ Gerald said with satisfaction. ‘Jarvis Remenham was your mother’s father.’

  She bit her lip, frowning. ‘How did you guess?’

  ‘I guessed as soon as you said this was your house. Didn’t I say that this whole business of your camping in Remenham House was the one aspect I could not puzzle out?’

  ‘You are very clever, monsieur Gérard,’ she conceded, although Gerald was amused by the grudging note, ‘but in truth it is not yet my house. I do not know how I shall get it, but I must, you understand.’

  ‘Why must you?’ asked Gerald calmly.

  Melusine opened her eyes at him. ‘But for my dowry, what else? One cannot expect that an Englishman will marry any jeune demoiselle without a dowry. That is not reasonable.’

  ‘Not if you want one of good family, no,’ he agreed mildly. ‘Unless he is himself a man of substance.’

  ‘Even that he is, one must be practical. For that such a man does not mind about the dowry, he must be in love en désespoir. And even if that,’ she added bitterly, ‘he must be also a person of a disposition extremely mad, that he can go against the family.’

  ‘Like your father,’ Gerald put in deliberately.

  Her eyes flashed. ‘Exactly like my father. Only my father he is also of a disposition extremely stupide. And it is all for his behaviour tout à fait imbecile, and that of monsieur le baron his father entirely unforgiving, that I am put at this need to come myself and get a dowry that I may marry in all honour. And an Englishman, which is my right of birth.’

  She turned and swept away from him, pacing the length of the room to the window Gerald had unshuttered. And turning again, as if the emotions she had churned up kept her on the move, she paced back to the mantel and there stopped, staring at her own reflection in the tarnished mirror.

  Gerald watched her perambulations in silence, his heart wrung. So this was what it was all about. Hurt beyond what he could imagine by the selfishness and pride of her forbears, whose fateful disputes had robbed her of the life she should have led, the plucky little devil had taken matters into her own hands. It was not only Leonardo who had instilled in her this distrust of men. Small wonder she had learned to be self-reliant. Every man in her life had betrayed her one way or another.

  ‘Well then, Melusine,’ he said calmly, ‘it seems as if we must get you your dowry willy-nilly.’

  She turned, her eyes narrowed. ‘We?’

  Gerald smiled. ‘Precisely. You may command my services at any time. I told you that at the outset.’

  ‘No.’ She advanced towards him. ‘I do not command your services, mon major. I do not command the services of a person who will not tell me why he offers them.’

  Gerald moved to the long sofa, dusted it with elaborate care with one of its cushions, and with a gesture invited her to sit down. Melusine approached with caution and sat warily at one end, looking up at him expectantly. He removed his cockaded hat, putting it down between them as he sat at the other end, placing himself at an angle and, crossing his legs, leaned back at his ease, his eyes fixed on her face.

  ‘Eh bien?’

  ‘You are perfectly right, Melusine. It is quite outrageous of me to go about rescuing a damsel in distress—’

  ‘Who does not in the least wish to be rescued,’ put in Melusine.

  ‘—without telling her why,’ he finished, ignoring the interjection. ‘So I shall do so.’ He sighed, spread his hands quite in her own manner, and fluttered his lashes.

  To his intense satisfaction, Melusine bit her lip on a tremor.

  ‘You see,’ he pursued blandly, ‘I lead a life of the most intolerable boredom. And the opportunity to share in your exciting adventures was just too tempting to be put aside.’

  A derisive snort greeted this passage.

  ‘I beg your pardon?’ said Gerald.

  ‘Do not beg my pardon. I know well that you are making a game with me.’

  ‘I swear to you, it is the exact truth,’ he protested. ‘You have no idea how dull the militia is compared to the Army. I had to sell out, you see, when my father died, for the estate is in my hands.’

  ‘Estate? But are you not obliged to do this work of the milice?’ asked Melusine, her eyes round.

  Gerald grinned. ‘Believe it or not, I do it for pleasure. At least I rather hoped I might spend my time chasing smugglers, which would have afforded some excitement. But sadly, at Lullingstone we are too far off the coast to be of use. It would have given me intense satisfaction to have been able to catch a French spy.’

  ‘That is what you thought of me.’

  ‘Yes, but in fact you’ve offered me far more entertainment than any French spy could have done. And that’s why I’m at your service. Now do you see?’

  Melusine frowned. ‘I do not see at all. It seems to me very silly.’

  ‘So did your business about marrying an Englishman seem to me,’ Gerald returned. ‘Until today.’

  ‘And why are you not married,’ she demanded suddenly, ‘if it is that you have land?’

  Gerald grimaced. ‘I’ve never found a woman who did not drive me into a frenzy of boredom.’

  ‘But what age are you? Do you not require an heir?’ Melusine asked, her tone shocked.

  ‘I am nine-and-twenty,’ he answered. ‘As for an heir, I have Alderley cousins enough.’ He sat up. ‘While we’re on th
e subject of age, it may be relevant to your claim to this house. How old are you?’

  ‘I have nineteen years, and it is quite unimportant. Marthe has told me that the house comes to my mother, Ma—ry Re—men—ham.’ She pronounced the name with painstaking accuracy, Gerald noticed. ‘And if not her, for she is dead, then me. For it cannot be that this Jarvis will leave the house to my father. That is not reasonable. But there is need for the proof that I am me, and that is what I look for.’

  She jumped up, and moved impatiently to the door. ‘Has this capitaine of yours not yet rid us of this Emile? What can he find to say to him?’

  ‘Don’t be impatient,’ Gerald said, rising too and coming to draw her away from the door. ‘Keep still, for God’s sake! Hilary will send him off all right and tight, never fear.’

  Melusine shook him off. ‘But do you not see that he will come again? I think it is better if you, both of you, go and leave me here to find—’ She broke off, looking away.

  ‘To find what?’ demanded Gerald. ‘What is this proof?’

  ‘I will not tell you.’

  ‘Hang it, Melusine!’ Losing patience, Gerald seized her by the arms. ‘I’ve had enough of this. Haven’t I shown you over and over again that I mean you no harm? What do I have to do?’

  ‘You can go away and leave me to my affairs,’ she threw at him.

  ‘Left to yourself, my girl, you may not have any affairs. Can’t you see that Valade is an extremely dangerous man?’

  ‘Do you think I am afraid of that pig?’

  Gerald gave her a little shake. ‘You should be. That he’s come here at all shows he’ll stop at nothing. The minute he discovers Roding here, he’ll know something is up. Why would militia be infesting the place? And he must by now be aware of my interest. He may not know you’re in England, but if he has the smallest knowledge of your character, he must surely be expecting you. How long do you think it will take him to put two and two together?’

  ‘Eh bien, then if he will try to harm me, I will kill him.’

  ‘You may not get the chance.’ He let her go. ‘Now be sensible, Melusine, and let me help you.’

  She tossed her head. ‘Me, I do not need the help of anyone.’

  ‘Oh, don’t you?’ Gerald said grimly. ‘Do you think because you’ve managed to pull a gun on me—not to mention several daggers and a vicious little knife—that you can get away with it against a man who means business?’

  ‘Do you think that the trigger I would not have pulled, or stuck the dagger into you, if you had not been as you are?’ she countered.

  Gerald’s temper flared. ‘You little fool! I’m a trained soldier with ten years experience at my back. I’ve more than twice your strength and at least ten times your cunning, when it’s needed. If I’d meant it, my girl, you’d be dead meat.’

  ‘That is what you think? Let us try!’

  ‘Don’t be idiotic!’

  She was backing from him, reaching through one of the slits she had carefully manufactured in her petticoat. ‘I can take care of myself, bête.’

  Exasperated, Gerald glared at her. ‘You obstinate little devil. I’m minded to take a whip and beat some sense into you.’

  ‘Pah!’ scoffed Melusine. ‘I have told you, a whip it is nothing. The nuns, they were very good with a whip. You do not make me afraid like this.’

  The dagger was in her hand. Gerald lost his head.

  ‘Then mayhap this will persuade you!’

  With a scrape of steel, he drew his sword from its scabbard. Melusine cast one swift glance at it, and her eyes, flashing magnificently, came back to his face. But whatever she may have said was lost as Gerald pinned her to the wall, the point of the sword at her throat.

  ‘I’ll play you at your own game,’ he growled, holding the foreshortened foil in place with rigid control.

  Melusine’s eyes blazed into his. Then her fingers moved. Pain sliced into Gerald’s hand and his sword arm jerked. The sharp point of the sword at the girl’s throat bit sideways. A thin line of red appeared in the white neck.