The Emerald Swan cb-3 Page 4

  Imogen marched into the small parlor where her cousin spent most of her days. "Out!" she ordered the elderly woman sewing beside the fire blazing in the hearth, despite the warmth of the afternoon. It was suffocatingly hot in the small paneled room and the air was thick with the acrid reek of the clarified pig's fat smeared on the Lady Maude's chest to guard against chills.

  The woman gathered up her embroidery and looked doubtfully between her young mistress, lying on a cushioned settle drawn up so close to the fire as to be almost in the inglenook, and the Lady Imogen, who stood tapping one foot impatiently, her brown eyes glittering with rage.

  "Out! Didn't you hear me, woman?"

  Lady Maude's companion curtsied hastily and withdrew.

  "I give you good day, Cousin Imogen," a thin voice murmured from beneath a mound of shawls and rugs on the settle.

  "Don't you dare wish me a good day," Imogen declared, somewhat idiotically. She approached the settle. The girl lying there regarded her solemnly but without fear. Her dark reddish brown hair was rather lank, her complexion had the lifeless pallor of one who is chronically short of fresh air and exercise. But her eyes were a brilliant blue.

  "I will not stand for this nonsense another minute. Do you hear me, girl?" Imogen bent over Maude, spitting her rage into her face.

  Maude flinched and turned her head aside. But she said in the same reedlike tones, "I must follow my conscience, cousin."

  "Conscience! Conscience! What has that to do with anything?"

  "I cannot believe, my lady, that you would discount the power of conscience in your life," Maude said gently. "I know you act according to your own."

  Imogen's color deepened. How could she deny it without digging a hole for herself? "You will obey," she said coldly, straightening. "That is all I came to tell you. You will obey those who have authority over you. And I will use whatever methods are necessary to ensure your obedience." She turned to the door.

  "You could break me on the rack, madam, but I will not act against my conscience."

  The thin voice followed Imogen out of the room and she ground her teeth in frustration. Gareth would have to deal with the girl. It was for him to compel her obedience. He was her official guardian although typically he had always left the hard work to his long-suffering sister.

  Who had nursed the girl through her incessant ailments? Who had overseen her education? Who had taught her the meaning of her social position, the obligations of her lineage? Who had had first responsibility for the ungrateful brat's welfare?

  Imogen, furious, posed these rhetorical questions to the air and quite without regard for the truth of the matter. The number of hours she had actually spent involving herself physically with her young charge's welfare could be counted on the fingers of both hands.

  Once more alone, Maude plaited the fringe of the shawl lying across her lap. Her features while not exactly weak were not drawn with a strong line, but there was something arresting in the blue eyes.

  "Berthe." She spoke without looking up from her plaiting as her elderly companion returned. "Fetch the priest tonight. I will make my conversion this night and then there is nothing they can do to me. The advisor to Protestant King Henry cannot marry a Catholic."

  "Are you certain you're ready to take such a step, mignonne?" Berthe bent over her, laying a hand on her forehead.

  "I have taken instruction, and now I am ready to convert," Maude stated with a stubborn flash in her eyes. "Before Lord Harcourt returns, I will make absolutely certain that I am ineligible to play this part they would have me play for their own advancement."

  "I will send for Father Damian." Berthe smiled, stroking the lank hair back from the girl's forehead. Her dearest wish was about to be fulfilled. For twenty years she had struggled to save the soul of the girl she had nursed and cherished as if she were her own child. For twenty years in a country where to profess Catholicism was to be persecuted, she had struggled for a conversion, and now it was within reach.

  Maude closed her eyes under the soothing strokes of Berthe's fingers. Lady Imogen would be beside herself, but she would discover that all the torments of the saints couldn't shake her young cousin's faith. She would show them all what true fortitude was.

  The landlord of the Adam and Eve didn't look best pleased at the return of the monkey. "I trust that wild beast won't be roamin' around, m'lord."

  "I shouldn't think so," Gareth said carelessly. "Show me to that private chamber you promised me and then bring supper for me and my companion." He gestured to Miranda, moving her in front of him.

  Molton's little mouth pursed but he turned to ascend the stairs ahead of them.

  "His mouth looks just like a chicken's arse," Miranda observed in an undertone, taking a firm hold on Chip.

  "An accurate if infelicitous comparison," agreed Lord Harcourt, gently prodding her to follow the fortunately oblivious innkeeper.

  "In here, m'lord. Clean and sweet as you could wish." Molton lifted the latch on a small narrow door under the eaves and flung wide the door with a grand flourish. "Nice an' quiet it is, too. Away from the street and the taproom. An' there's no washday until Wednesday, so you'll not be disturbed by the girls heating the coppers below."

  Gareth glanced around the apartment. The ceiling was so low he had to duck his head, but the bed was of a reasonable size. A round table and two stools stood beneath the small window that was graced with a narrow window seat. The air was stuffy, infused with the acrid residue of lye and the sickly smell of the soap made from rendered beef fat wafting from the washhouse below. But it was private and far enough away from the main part of the inn to ensure continued privacy.

  "It'll do," he said, drawing off his gloves. "Now see to that supper and send up a couple of bottles of Rhenish."

  "Aye, m'lord." Molton bowed, his little eyes darting toward Miranda, who stood just inside the door, clutching Chip. "The young person'll be stayin', will she?" An oily lascivious note was in his voice.

  Gareth turned slowly and stared at him. Both indolence and humor had vanished from the brown eyes and the landlord backed out hastily, closing the door behind him.

  Miranda wetted her lips that were suddenly dry again. The landlord's question, but even more Lord Harcourt's refusal to answer it, had banished her hunger. Her previous wariness returned in full measure. How could she possibly know that a complete stranger could be trusted? His lordship might appear unthreatening but Gertrude had said many times that smooth surfaces were also slippery, particularly when it came to gentlemen.

  She reached for the door latch with the hand that wasn't holding Chip. "I… I think I've changed my mind, milord. I… I don't think I'm interested in a proposition and it wouldn't be fair to take your supper in bad faith."

  Gareth frowned. "Just a minute, Miranda!" He reached for her wrist and drew her back into the room. Miranda's eyes sparked alarm. She tried to pull away with all her sinuous strength but the fingers at her wrist tightened. Chip suddenly shrieked and bared his teeth, only Miranda's hold keeping him from jumping at the man.

  "God's good grace!" Gareth released her wrist, half laughing, half exasperated. The monkey was a formidable bodyguard. "I do assure you I have no designs on your virtue. I'm just asking you to hear me out in exchange for a decent meal."

  He moved away from her farther into the room. She reminded him of a fawn on the banks of a stream, quivering with wariness as it plucked up the courage to drop its guard enough to drink.

  He sat down on one of the stools, rested his elbow on the table, and propped his chin in his palm. The silence in the room lengthened. Then she closed the door and stood leaning against it, her hand behind her on the latch.

  "The troupe is my family," she said with a touching dignity. "And the men in my family are not pimps and the women are not whores."

  "Of course not," he agreed gravely.

  "I know people think that traveling players are-"

  "My dear Miranda, I don't know what people think, but I am no
t one to make assumptions," he interrupted.

  Miranda regarded him with her head on one side. A bang at the door made her jump. She stood aside as two tavern wenches entered with trays of food and drink. Miranda's nose twitched at the toothsome aromas and she found herself moving into the chamber to the table without further hesitation.

  The two tavern wenches shot her assessing glances as they left. Miranda knew perfectly well what they were thinking, but since they probably sold their own bodies as freely as they filled the tankards in the taproom below she didn't take offense at their assumption that she was doing the same.

  She released her tight grip on Chip, who immediately leaped to the top of the bed canopy, where he crouched chattering.

  Miranda came over to the table, hungrily examining the offerings. "White bread," she murmured in awe. White bread was not the staple fare of the laboring classes on either side of the Channel. She took the second stool and waited, politely controlling her eagerness, for her companion to make the first move.

  "I believe this is a jugged hare." Gareth sniffed appreciatively at the contents of an earthenware stew-pot. He dipped his knife into the pot and cut off a piece of rich dark meat, spearing it on the point of his knife. He tasted it and nodded. "Excellent." He gestured that she should help herself and broke off a chunk of the soft fresh white bread.

  Miranda needed no second invitation. She dipped her spoon into the savory juice and was about to use her fingers on the meat when she remembered that her companion had used his knife. Such niceties were not the habit of the traveling folk but she was adept at imitation and followed suit. It was with relief however that she saw he didn't have any scruples about dipping his bread into the communal pot.

  Gareth paused in his eating to fill pewter goblets from the leather flagon of Rhenish wine. He was covertly watching the girl at her supper, noticing how daintily she was eating, how she wiped her fingers clean on her bread instead of licking them, how she chewed with her mouth closed.

  Chip leaped from the top of the bed and perched on the end of the table with his head on one side and a somewhat mournful air. "He doesn't eat meat," Miranda explained, breaking off a piece of bread and holding it up to him. "He likes fruit and nuts, but he'll have to make do with bread today."

  "I expect mine host can produce a dish of raisins and a couple of apples," Gareth suggested, looking pained. "Do you think you could encourage him to leave the table? I don't care to eat in the company of even well-behaved animals."

  Miranda lifted Chip off the table but he promptly jumped onto her shoulder, still clutching his piece of bread. "I don't think I can persuade him to go any farther away," Miranda said apologetically.

  Gareth shrugged in resignation. "As long as he stays off the table." He took up his goblet. "Your family are French?"

  Miranda gave the question rather more thought than such a simple inquiry might ordinarily have warranted. " The troupe are French, English, Italian, Spanish. We come from all over," she said eventually. "Is that what you meant?"

  "What about your own family?"

  "I don't know. I was found." She sipped her wine. It always embarrassed her to have to confess to being a foundling, even though she had never lacked for a sense of family.

  Lord Harcourt, however, seemed to find nothing to condemn about such a careless beginning. He merely asked, "Where?"

  Miranda shrugged. "In Paris somewhere, when I was a baby."

  He nodded. "And how old are you now?"

  Miranda shook her head. "I don't know exactly. Mama Gertrude thinks I must be about twenty. She found me in a baker's shop and since I didn't seem to belong to anyone she took me with her. And now she wants me to marry Luke. Which is absurd. Luke's been my brother all my life. How can one marry one's brother?"

  "Without benefit of clergy."

  Miranda grinned at this dry response. "You know what I mean."

  He just laughed and refilled her goblet. "So the troupe is the only family you've ever known. You speak English as if it's your mother tongue."

  "I speak lots of languages," she said almost indifferently. "We all do. We travel all over, you see… Oh, Chip!" She gave a mortified cry, grabbing up the monkey, who had slid from her shoulder while her attention was diverted and was now digging into the stew-pot. He flourished a piece of carrot between two fingers before cramming it into his mouth, chattering gleefully.

  "I do beg your pardon, milord. He must have realized there were vegetables as well as meat in the pot." Miranda looked stricken. "His fingers are quite clean, though."

  "How reassuring," Gareth replied without conviction. "Fortunately, I've satisfied my appetite for the moment, so you might as well let him dig to his heart's content."

  "It's very kind of you to feed Chip, milord," Miranda said as they watched Chip forage. "So many people seem to be afraid of him. I can't understand why, can you?"

  "Your fellow players presumably accept him."

  "Some of them don't like him." Miranda sipped her wine. "But he earns his keep. The crowds love him and he's very good at collecting money after our act… and Robbie loves him. He makes him laugh." Her smile was sad, her lovely blue eyes momentarily shadowed.

  "That's the little crippled boy?"

  She nodded. "One foot is badly formed and one leg is shorter than the other. It means that he can't do much toward earning his keep, but I share my takings with him and he does what he can."

  "Whose child is he?"

  "No one knows. He was found, too. I found him in a doorway."

  Gareth was startled by his response to this simple speech, to the simple generosity and the depths of human feeling that lay behind it. The girl had so little to give, but what she had she freely shared with those even less fortunate than herself. And no one could describe the hand-to-mouth existence of a strolling player as a fortunate one. He'd grown accustomed to the idea that his own better nature had died with the discovery of Charlotte's betrayal. Life had seemed so much easier once he'd stopped expecting anything from people that he had embraced his own cynicism with pleasure and relief, but this diminutive scrap seemed to make nonsense of such cynicism.

  "So what is your proposition, milord?" She changed the subject, resting her chin on one elbow-propped palm, her other hand firmly clutching Chip's jacket.

  "I would like you to stand in for someone," he stated. "In my house just outside London, I have a young cousin who is frequently unwell. She looks rather like you… in fact you are astonishingly alike… and I think it might be helpful if you were to take her place in some situations that might arise."

  Miranda blinked in astonishment. "Pretend to be someone else, you mean?"

  "Precisely."

  "But this cousin… won't she object? I wouldn't like someone pretending to be me."

  His smile was a trifle sardonic and took Miranda aback. She hadn't seen such an expression on his face before. "In the circumstances Maude will not mind," he said.

  "Is she very ill?"

  He shook his head, and the sardonic smile would not go away. "No. Maude is more of an imaginary invalid."

  "What situations are going to arise?"

  The arrival of the king of France expecting to woo the

  Lady Maude d'Albard. Gareth stroked his chin, regarding Miranda in a silence that she began to find unnerving. The man she had felt so easy with a few minutes before seemed to have changed. "Milord?" she prompted.

  He said briskly, "That I can't tell you at this point. I don't even know for sure that I will want you to take Maude's place. I don't know if it will be necessary… in the end. But I would like you to accompany me to my house and stay there for a while and practice conducting yourself like the Lady Maude d'Albard."

  Miranda's gaze dropped to the table. This sounded very strange and not entirely honest. "You want me to practice a deception, milord?"

  "I suppose you could call it that," he said. "But I assure you that no one will be harmed by it. Quite the opposite. You'll be doing many people
a great favor."

  Miranda chewed her lip. It still sounded very peculiar. She crumbled bread between her fingers. "How long is a while?"

  "Again I don't know precisely."

  "But I have to go back to France and find my family," she said doubtfully. " They will wait in Calais for a week or two, but then they'll have to travel and I might never find them again."

  Gareth remained silent, sensing that pressure from him would only drive her away.

  "If I say I will come for two weeks…?" she suggested.

  Gareth shook his head. "No, you must agree to remain until the task is completed. Then I will fee you with fifty rose nobles."

  "Fifty rose nobles!" Her eyes became as round as saucers. One rose noble was more money than she had seen in her entire life. "Just for pretending to be someone else."

  "Just for agreeing to pretend to be Maude," he corrected. "You may not even have to play the part."

  "Oh." A deep frown corrugated her brow.

  "But I'm afraid the monkey is not included," he said gently.

  Her response was immediate. "Oh, no, then I couldn't agree."

  "You would throw away fifty rose nobles for the sake of a monkey?" Gareth was so incredulous he lost his carefully preserved calm.

  Miranda's mouth set and she said firmly, "Chip belongs to me. Where I go he goes."

  It was the set of her mouth that convinced him. How many times had he seen Maude look exactly like that, the same damnably stubborn expression in the cerulean eyes, the same line of the mouth? Henry would never know the difference between the two of them.

  He bit the bullet and accepted the ultimatum. "Very well. But God help us all when Imogen sees him." "Who's Imogen?"

  "My sister. And I'm afraid you will not like her." He stood up on the words. "Are we agreed, Miranda?"

  Miranda continued to hesitate. With fifty rose nobles she could do anything. Even buy Robbie the special shoes that would lift his shorter leg. The cobbler in Boulogne had said he could make such shoes for a lame person. But he wanted five guineas for them, and where was a strolling player to find five spare guineas? Until now.

  She looked up, met his dark eyes, grave and unsmiling now, but she was once again struck nonetheless by the steadiness, the sense of security, that emanated from his large loose-limbed frame.