Some hours later, after Amanda had retired disconsolately to her cabin, she heard a commotion on deck. Matt had left a skeleton crew aboard, with orders to keep an eye on everything, including, Amanda suspected, herself. Before she could leave the cabin to question one of the men, she was surprised to hear a brisk rap on the door. Opening it, Amanda blinked in astonishment at the figure who stared imperiously at her.
It was a lady—a very elegant lady. From the top of her plumed bonnet to the fashionable walking dress to the soles of her high-heeled buttoned shoes, she was the epitome of fashion. For a moment Amanda stared without speaking, too bemused to do more than blink while she wondered what possible business this woman could have on the
Clorimunda.
Then it came to her that the lady had knocked on the door of Matt’s cabin, which meant that, more than likely, she was a friend of Matt’s. Amanda’s eyes narrowed and moved over the woman critically. Quite attractive, she thought, if one didn’t mind that the lady was a trifle long in the tooth—and Matt apparently didn’t.
“I’m sorry, but Captain Grayson is not here at the moment,” Amanda said coldly, and made as if to close the door.
“Pooh, what has that to say to anything?” The woman shook her head, clearly scornful of such stupidity. “You are Lady Amanda?” She looked at Amanda with some suspicion, as if a lady could not possibly be found in a man’s ill-fitting breeches and shirt, with her hair tousled and tumbling over her shoulders.
“Yes,” Amanda admitted, eyeing the woman curiously. Who on earth was she, and how did she know her name?
“Then it is you I wish to see,” the woman announced, and swept by Amanda with a haughty grace that would not have been out of place in a duchess. Surprised, Amanda turned to look at her, only to be even more astonished when two other, younger women, each dressed in a severe black gown and carrying a large valise, followed the first woman inside. She had been so bemused by her visitor’s finery that she hadn’t noticed her retinue.
Seeing nothing for it, Amanda turned to face her uninvited guests, cautiously leaving the door open. “How may I help you?”
“It is
I
who will help
you,
” her visitor sniffed, withdrawing a lethal-looking pin from her hat before removing the feathered concoction and placing it on the table. She eyed Amanda critically as she drew off her gloves. “I am Madame Duvalier, the most fashionable
modiste
in all of New Orleans. I was told that you need a complete wardrobe
tout de suite.
” She favored Amanda’s breeches with a disdainful glance. “And I can see that it is true. We will begin.”
Amanda gaped as the two young women in black descended on her and began removing her clothes, making scornful noises at her unconventional attire all the while.
“These are my assistants, Rose”—the pretty brown-haired girl, who was helping Amanda off with her breeches, smiled shyly up at her—“and Marie.” Marie had removed Amanda’s shirt and was now opening one of the valises. She was not so pretty as Rose, Amanda saw, but her coloring—black hair and eyes and vivid red lips—was more striking. Madame Duvalier herself was a redhead, but Amanda suspected that the brassy tint owed more to artifice than to nature.
“But who sent you?” Amanda’s voice was faint. She was standing in the center of the room, clad only in her much-laundered chemise, while Marie ran a tape measure around different parts of her anatomy, calling out the measurements in a businesslike tone to Rose, who jotted them down in a small notebook. Madame Duvalier herself had commandeered a chair and from it supervised the proceedings.
“Captain Grayson,” Madame replied patiently, as if she were addressing a slightly backward child. Amanda would have taken exception to her tone if she hadn’t been mulling over that most interesting bit of information. Matt … Matt had ordered a dressmaker for her? He must not be so indifferent to her as she had supposed. At least he was concerned about her creature comforts. Then the sudden animation faded from her features as she considered the alternate possibility that Zeke was responsible for the modiste’s presence. That seemed far more likely. Zeke would have known she needed clothes if she was to go ashore. Matt wouldn’t have given the matter a single thought. Still, she would ask.
“Which Captain Grayson?” she asked carefully. Marie was putting away the tape measure while Rose extracted a book of fashions from the valise and carried it to Madame Duvalier. Madame accepted it without so much as a word of thanks and began to leaf through it, alternately looking at Amanda critically as she did so.
“That will do. Number three, Rose, in figured white muslin, I think. Very
jeune fille.
And number seven, in blue silk—”
“Madame,” Amanda interrupted impatiently. Marie was pulling a garment over her head, so her words were briefly muffled.
“You do not know?” Madame looked surprised. “I would have thought only a very particular friend … But perhaps they both are that, as they are of mine. I have known both since they were boys. Matt is
très
beau,
is he not? And Zeke is very attractive too, in his own way.”
“But which one sent you to me?” Amanda had to know.
“I do not know,” Madame answered, sending her hopes plummeting. “I received a note: ‘Lady Amanda on
Clorimunda
needs complete new wardrobe. Bill to Captain Grayson.’ Matt or Zeke, no matter. Either will pay.”
“I see.” Marie was pushing her this way and that as Rose pinned the garment. Looking down rather abstractedly, Amanda saw that it was a lovely dress of deep cream muslin, figured with tiny green flowers. The neckline, which bared her shoulders and the tops of her breasts, was edged with exquisite handmade lace in the same deep cream as the dress. The hem of the full, fashionably short skirt—it just covered her ankles—was edged with more lace. The narrow waist was bound with a wide green satin sash that tied in the back in a ravishing bow. Looking down at herself, Amanda could not suppress a little thrill of pleasure. Except for the yellow silk dress that Matt had torn to shreds, she had never owned a garment so beautiful. She would be less than human if she did not relish the idea of wearing it in Matt’s presence.
“A little tighter in the waist, Rose,” Madame instructed as she eyed Amanda, her head cocked to one side like that of an inquisitive bird. “And just a tiny bit shorter in the skirt. There—
ravissante.
Is it not fortunate, Lady Amanda, that the family of one of my best customers was visited by a tragic loss? She had ordered this dress for her daughter, but with the family in mourning for six months, of course she had to cancel the order. I understood perfectly.
C’est la
vie.
Besides,” she added with a sudden smile and without her French accent, “she wouldn’t dream of letting anyone else supply her and her daughter’s mourning clothes. Her unpaid bill is too big.”
Amanda smiled back, suddenly liking the woman. When she reverted to her true self, she was much nicer than when she assumed the role of the formidable Madame Duvalier.
“This dress you will have tomorrow early,” Madame decreed, reverting to her original manner as Marie lifted the dress over Amanda’s head, careful not to disturb the pins. “And accessories, of course. The others—one or two the next day. The rest—a week.”
“Thank you for coming, Madame,” Amanda said as she stepped back into her breeches and shirt, which the women eyed with severe disfavor. Rose had packed everything in the valises and they were ready to leave.
“It is my pleasure,” Madame said formally. “For Matt or Zeke, which one it doesn’t matter, I am always available. You will have the dress tomorrow,” she repeated as she preceded her assistants out the door. Amanda stared bemusedly at the closed door for some little time after the trio had gone.
The prospect of new clothes relieved one of Amanda’s nagging worries. She had been wondering how she was to get about in New Orleans clad in ill-fitting male attire. In England it would have been considered scandalous for a lady to appear in such garments, and she doubted that the New World was much different. But without a skirt to her name, she had had no choice. It was thoughtful of Zeke—or Matt—to think of her difficulties and take steps to remedy them. Which brought her to another problem: it was less than respectable for either Matt or Zeke to pay for her clothes, but as she had no money, she didn’t suppose that there was anything she could do about it. Besides, so much of what had happened to her since she had met Matt had been unconventional, to say the least, that she must now be quite outside the social pale. Losing her virginity had been dreadful, but no one but herself and Matt need ever have known of that. But she had been missing for nearly two months now, and she was sure that most of the people who mattered to her must be aware that the Duke of Brookshire’s young half sister had disappeared. Even if no one had associated her disappearance with Matt—who, after all, was presumed dead—an unexplained absence of such length inevitably meant social ruin. And if it became known that she had spent the time with a company of men, one of whom had shared her bed … She shuddered; she would be lucky to find a convent that would take her in.
Amanda frowned. She was in a strange country, without friends or money, and with no place to go. She doubted that Matt would see her in want—indeed, he seemed to take it for granted that she would make her home with him and Zeke—but she could not allow him to support her for the rest of her life. The knowledge that she was now indebted to him for every morsel of bread flayed her pride. What would it be like in the future, when he had another woman and she was merely an object of charity living in his home? Unbearable, she thought with a grimace. True, he was solely responsible for her presence—he had stolen her away from her school; she certainly hadn’t begged him to take her with him—but that didn’t alter by so much as a hair the situation in which she now found herself.
Painful as it was, it was time to face facts: socially she was ruined as thoroughly as ever Susan had been. No gentleman would marry her now. As she saw it, she was left with three choices: she could continue to live with Matt, labeling herself his mistress in the eyes of everyone and thereby cutting herself off forever from the respectable society of the wives and daughters of gentlemen; she could leave Matt’s protection (if he would let her go, which was unlikely) and make a life for herself independent of him, which would undoubtedly include genteel starvation; or she could return to England, and eventually to Edward, whose family pride would at least ensure that she did not starve to death—if he did not plan a worse fate for her.
She was happier now than she had been since before her father died, she acknowledged. For the first time in years she felt alive, free; every day was an adventure. Matt’s coldness was the only cloud in her newly blue sky. But with a sudden flash of insight, Amanda knew that she would rather be with Matt, coldly angry or not, than without him. He had become the focal point of her life—and that was something she hated to admit to herself. Damn the man, Amanda thought despairingly, and damn me, too, for being foolish enough to fall in love with him. But at least it solved her dilemma: feeling about him as she did, she could not bring herself to leave him. It would be easier to live without her pride than without her heart.
It was long after dark when Matt and Zeke returned. Amanda was curled up on the bunk with a book when she heard Zeke’s laughing voice and Matt’s muted reply. They undoubtedly intended to go to their cabin without disturbing her, but Amanda was determined to resolve the matter of the clothes as soon as possible. She would be unable to sleep a wink if she did not.
She flew out on deck, a small, slender figure, with streaming red hair and clad in too-big men’s clothes. The still-crowded dock was lit by flaming torches, which cast flickering shadows over the
Clorimunda
’s deck; the ship herself was lit by a few strategically placed lanterns. The two sailors who were assigned to remain topside as officers of the watch were nowhere in sight. Presumably they were at either end of the ship to sound a warning if someone unauthorized tried to board her. Matt and Zeke were just coming aboard, with Zeke in the lead and Matt a pace behind. As they stepped into a golden pool of light Amanda noticed that they both looked oddly disheveled, Zeke more so than Matt. His brown hair was wildly tousled and his shirt collar was standing rakishly on end. Matt’s black curls were untidy, too, but his clothes seemed to be in order. What struck Amanda was the dangerous glitter of his eyes.
Zeke saw her first. She had stopped, eyeing them suspiciously. The thought came to her that they had been drinking. Then Zeke spoke, and the faint slurring of his words told her all she needed to know.
“Good evening, Amanda,” he cried, bowing so low that he would have fallen flat on his face if Matt had not caught hold of his coattails. Zeke straightened, with the assistance of Matt’s balancing hand, and looked at Amanda, frowning. “What, no new clothes? Didn’t that pox of a woman come after all?”
Her question had been answered for her without her having to ask. Amanda swallowed an aching surge of disappointment that it hadn’t been Matt, then summoned a smile for Zeke.
“Thank you, Zeke. As soon as Madame Duvalier told me why she had come, I knew that you were the only one thoughtful enough to have sent her. It was very nice of you.” If those words had been selected with an eye to pricking Matt, Amanda wasn’t admitting it. She didn’t look at him as he stood a half pace behind Zeke, holding his brother unobtrusively upright. But she sensed his gleaming eyes boring into her.
“It
was
nice of me, wasn’t it?” Zeke nodded, looking owlish and pleased with himself. Then he held out his arms to Amanda, grinning wickedly at her. “Won’t you thank me properly?”
Ordinarily Amanda would have laughed at such a suggestion from Zeke. She knew it was made tongue-in-cheek, probably with a little-boyish desire to annoy his brother and shock her girlish sensibilities at one and the same time. But she, too, was conscious of Matt standing just behind Zeke’s shoulder, watching her, his mouth and eyes sardonic. With a little toss of her head and nary a glance at Matt, she moved into Zeke’s arms.