Clandestine (5 page)

“Though you were married to a captain who fought at Waterloo, I understand,” Lady Ryderbourne said gently. “And that's the most honorable title that there is. Ah, I see that I've spoken out of turn. I'm so sorry.”

To her intense embarrassment, tears pricked at Sarah's eyes. Yet it was impossible to resist her hostess's charm, and especially impossible to resist the certain knowledge that Lady Ryderbourne understood a great deal about the human heart.

“Did Mr. Devoran tell you that?”

“Guy thought I ought to know, but we'll say no more about it. Here, let me help you with your mask.” Lady Ryderbourne took the slip of blue fabric from Sarah's hand and tied it securely. “You look wonderful—so mysterious and sensual. You have very lovely eyes, Mrs. Callaway.”

Sarah blinked away her moment of distress and stared at herself in a wall mirror. The freckle-faced schoolmistress had disappeared. In her place stood an enigmatic, long-necked lady with a witty little hat perched on her silver wig.

“Goodness,” she said. “Not even my own cousin would ever guess it was me.”

“No one knows who anyone is, which is a big part of the fun.” The new mother linked her arm through Sarah's. “Everyone is in costume, except the Duke of Blackdown himself and Wellington—and the king, of course.”

“The king is here?”

“Propped on a large chair filled with cushions. As for Blackdown and the Iron Duke, it's too far beneath their ducal dignity to cavort about in fancy dress. The duchess, however, is ruling the roost as Queen Elizabeth. Her Grace is even wearing a breastplate, as Good Queen Bess did when she addressed the troops at Tilbury before the Armada.”

“Ah,” Sarah said. “One of the most famous speeches in history: ‘I know I have but the body of a weak and feeble woman, but I have the heart and stomach of a king—and of a king of England, too—'”

“‘—and think foul scorn that Parma or Spain, or any prince of Europe, should dare to invade the borders of my realm,'” Lady Ryderbourne finished with a flourish. She tapped on the massive double doors. “You may take it that Her Grace's armor is appropriate.”

“And Mr. Devoran's?” Sarah asked. “Might he be dressed as that knight?”

“I doubt it. Guy's a wonderful dancer, and who'd want to be escorted by a man who'd be clanking around the ballroom?”

“Then how will I know him?”

“I don't know.” Lady Ryderbourne grinned as the footman swung the doors wide. “But since Guy suggested your costume and picked out the sheep, he'll certainly know you.”

G
UESTS STREAMED INTO THE BALLROOM, A MASS OF WIGS
and headdresses and costumes. Everyone was masked.

A tall man in a splendid curled wig and red velvet coat immediately walked up to join Sarah and Lady Ryderbourne. Though a black mask hid his face, he could only be Guy Devoran's older cousin, Lord Ryderbourne, heir to the duchy.

Flourishing his plumed hat, he swept both ladies a bow, then he pulled his wife into his arms and kissed her on the mouth.

“A buss for your sweetheart, Nell! What the devil have you done with your oranges?”

“I lost them.”

“Which explains why Lady Fallay sat on them and created a small social disaster for Queen Bess. Though Her Grace will forgive you anything, sweetheart, now that you've given her a new Earl of Wyldshay to dandle.”

Lady Ryderbourne laughed and reached up to kiss him again. “Which is too great a name for such a tiny baby, sir. Ambrose Laurence Jonathan Devoran St. George is mouthful enough. But this is Sarah Callaway, Ryder: Guy's shepherdess.”

Sarah curtsied, but Lord Ryderbourne took her hand and raised it to his lips. His eyes were deep green, like the laughing shadow beneath a wave.

“Of course! Very pleased to meet you, Mrs. Callaway. I see my cousin's wicked sense of humor has been at work, yet I'm most partial to sheep. May I ask for the honor of this next dance?”

It was impossible not to smile. “You're very gracious, my lord, but—”

“No, don't refuse!” Lady Ryderbourne said. “If you don't dance with Ryder, Guy will think we've abandoned you.”

“And then he'll call me out. My tragic corpse will be found on Hampstead Heath, and my little son will be left fatherless.” He tucked Sarah's hand into his elbow. “I pray you'll not pretend that you cannot dance, ma'am?”

She was trapped, so she smiled again. “I'm delighted to accept, my lord. But I assume this is only part of some devious plot of Mr. Devoran's?”

“Most definitely!” Lord Ryderbourne led her onto the floor. “Guy's a great plotter, but only in the most noble of causes. He first enlisted me to shadow you in St. James's, in case you didn't take the right street and he lost you.”

Sarah swallowed the shock. “So you were the gentleman that Mr. Devoran stopped to talk to in front of the wine seller's? I had no idea that either of you had noticed me.”

“I hadn't, until Guy pointed you out. After that, you were the unfortunate victim of our conspiracy. I followed you as you tracked him, while Guy lay in wait for you in a bookstore. I trailed you again after that—in the most casual fashion—until you had safely entered your hotel. Enlist one of us, Mrs. Callaway, and a small army is at your disposal. I hope you'll find that more reassuring than intimidating, though we can be an overbearing lot, I'm afraid.”

Sarah tried not to let her growing alarm show in her face, for the green eyes seemed to miss nothing.

“We?” she asked lightly.

“My brother, Lord Jonathan. My cousin, Guy Devoran. And myself. Plus any of a select group of gentlemen whom we could call upon at any time, and whose discretion we trust absolutely. If you're in trouble, Mrs. Callaway, you have powerful regiments of aid still held in reserve.”

Her heart seemed to be skipping every other beat. “How many of those gentlemen know of my exact predicament, my lord?”

“None,” he replied, “including me. Guy said only that you'd be here tonight and need our support. So now that you're reassured that you still retain absolute privacy, are you ready to dance, ma'am? Guy will find you later, but meanwhile these are the best musicians in London.”

The lines had already formed for the next set. Further conversation was impossible. Sarah stood between Atalanta in her gauzy purple gown, and a swan in a mask and costume of white feathers. Lord Ryderbourne took his place next to Julius Caesar. The ladies curtsied as the men bowed, and the dance began.

Sarah wove in and out, touching fingers with every gentleman as she passed up the line. Almost every partner took the brief chance to flirt. She did her best to respond graciously, though her thoughts raced like leaves in a millstream.

How much had Guy Devoran really told his cousins? And where was he? He must have had some purpose in inviting her here tonight. Whenever the movements of the dance allowed, she glanced about the room, hoping somehow to recognize him among all the centurions and knights and monks.

There was no sign of him.

When the set was over, Lady Ryderbourne introduced her to several more partners. As Sarah was led onto the floor for the second time, a footman approached. Nell Gwyn listened to the man for a moment, then whispered in her husband's ear—obviously the baby wanted his mother. Lord Ryderbourne glanced at Sarah and signed an apology.

Sarah nodded her understanding. The new parents linked arms and walked away.

King Charles's plumed hat briefly touched his wife's shoulder as he bent his head down to listen to something she said—such a simple gesture of intimacy that made all the glitter of the ballroom irrelevant.

Sarah spun back to face the dance floor as some deep place in her heart filled with poignancy. She would never again know the warmth of her marriage, the comfort of touching and being touched with respect and caring, the moments of shared humor and gentleness. And children! She and Captain Callaway had never seized their chance to have a baby, and then his final illness had robbed them both of his life.

She shook herself and smiled as a masked gentleman in monk's robes bowed for the next dance. No one except Lord and Lady Ryderbourne—and Guy Devoran himself, of course—could possibly know who she was. Perhaps somewhere in this sophisticated crowd was the very man who was responsible for Rachel's disappearance.

That was one among many compelling reasons for enlisting Guy Devoran's help. How else could a schoolteacher from Bath mingle so freely with the nobility of England?

Meanwhile, the sense of frivolity was infectious. Not only the dizziness of the dancing itself, but the idea that the St. Georges of Wyldshay had taken her under their protection, for at least this one night.

By the time supper was announced, Sarah had danced almost every measure. She escaped her last partner—a rather dull Alfred the Great—and dodged beneath some palm fronds at the side of the room to catch her breath. Her blood ran hot in her veins.

Laughing and talking, the crowd moved past her toward the supper tables. She tried to study each man as he passed, though she had no idea what to look for. Could guilt be betrayed by posture or gait? Even without the masks, she might see the villain and not know it.

“There's quite a jungle a little farther through here, Mrs. Callaway,” a male voice whispered in her ear. “Would you like to explore it?”

Sarah whirled around. A tall man in a crimson mask and silk turban had silently walked up to stand beside her. His Oriental robes were flamboyantly embroidered with dragons.

Uncertainty fractured her perception for a moment, as if she were thrust suddenly into a fantasy. Her heart had leaped in a shock of recognition at his expressive mouth and the hint of perfect profile, yet the gilt-brown gaze was most definitely not Mr. Devoran's.

This man's eyes were filled with a similar humor and bright intelligence, yet she thought that grim determination—even something of anger—also lurked just beneath the surface.

Sarah smiled with blind courage. “Do I know you, sir?”

“Lord Jonathan Devoran St. George, at your service, ma'am.” He bowed his head. “Guy asked me to take care of you, should Ryder be otherwise occupied. Come! You'll like this.”

Ah! Lord Ryderbourne's younger brother, Wild Lord Jack, who had recently returned to England from India. Mr. Devoran must have told him, too, about the sheep. Yet Lord Jonathan enjoyed an oddly terrifying reputation in the popular accounts of his adventures in the East.

Sarah dismissed her stab of apprehension and took his proffered arm.

They ducked together beneath the palm fronds and through a concealed doorway. Trees and vines clustered, some trailing long sprays of blossom, their roots bound in enormous clay pots. The floor disappeared beneath a thick layer of tanbark. Far above their heads, night scattered dark reflections between the stone ribs of a glasshouse.

The music faded as her escort led Sarah ever deeper into the rustling jade silence.

They stepped out into a small open space, dimly lit by a scattering of paper lanterns. A moist eddy carried earthy, flowery scents, with a strange undercurrent of danger, like air stirred by dragon's wings.

Lord Jonathan released her arm, stepped away, and slipped off his crimson mask.

“Well, Mrs. Callaway,” he said. “How do you like our little domestic jungle?”

Her heart beat hard. Orchids she had never seen before nestled among the other plants.

“It's amazing,” she said. “Yet I wonder if a real jungle is anything like this.”

“No, it's not.” His eyes studied her as if he would peel away her skin. “This fantasy is missing the darker scents, the secrets—and the tigers, of course. The real jungle is neither so pretty, nor so tame.”

Prickles danced down her spine as she looked back at him. “It doesn't feel particularly tame to me. It feels quite real, though the water must be piped in from somewhere.”

He laughed, though he still seemed on edge. “What a very practical mind you have, Mrs. Callaway! You must be a bluestocking.”

A sudden splashing started somewhere nearby, as if someone had just turned on a fountain. Sarah's unsteady pulse skipped a beat.

“We're not alone here, my lord,” she said quietly.

“No, but you're quite safe with me, Mrs. Callaway.”

Lord Jonathan took her arm again to lead her deeper into the trees. The splash of falling water grew louder.

“So what did you think of Miracle?”

“Miracle?”

“Lady Ryderbourne. Nell Gwyn. Ryder's wife. Miracle is her given name.”

“I think it's impossible to resist her.”

“Ah! Though fortunately I did. She was sixteen when we first met, but she was magical even then.”

“Then you and Mr. Devoran met her at about the same time?”

“Yes, but that was a long time ago, many years before she met Ryder. What counts is that Miracle is among the most honest, compassionate, and courageous of ladies. I'm honored to call her my sister.” Lord Jonathan stopped to pluck a blossom. Fragrant white petals offset the golden-yellow heart—
Coelogyne cristata
, the combed coelogyne. Sarah had only ever seen it before in prints. “We all agree that white flowers spring in her footsteps, like Olwen.”

“Olwen White Track? The fairy tale—?”

“Beautiful, is it not?” His intense gaze fixed on her face as he twirled the orchid in his fingers. “Yet this plant's a parasite, I believe.”

Her sense of threat deepened, as if suspicion or dread underlay every casual comment. Perhaps all those lurid accounts about this powerful aristocrat were true?

“That's not a parasite, my lord,” she said. “It's an orchid. It feeds mostly on air.”

“The host plant isn't harmed?”

“No, not at all.”

“Then I'm very glad to hear it. I hate to think that something so apparently fragile might be dangerous.”

“Dangerous?” another man's voice asked with a distinct note of humor.

Sarah spun about as if she were cleaved to the heart.

One booted foot propped on a fern-covered stump, his crossed forearms resting on that taut thigh, a masked corsair lounged beneath a riotously flowering vine. A live parrot sat on his shoulder.

A wave of heat spread down Sarah's spine, tingling into every limb, as if her veins melted beneath the onslaught.

“Mr. Devoran!” She swallowed hard and bobbed a small curtsy.

His open-necked shirt offered shocking glimpses of a powerful male throat and chest, smooth and perilous. A scarlet belt beset with daggers and pistols emphasized his trim waist.

The parrot flew off to perch on a branch several feet away, where it began to preen its feathers.

Guy Devoran stripped off his black mask and bowed. “Good evening, Mrs. Callaway.” His eyes held a wild glint, as if he often spoke with angels or demons. “I see you've just had the misfortune to meet my other cousin, Wild Lord Jack. I trust the experience was entertaining, at least?”

Lord Jonathan laughed. The family resemblance was striking, both in bone structure and intensity—and in that perilous intelligence.

“Yes, indeed.” Though she was floundering to understand the strange undercurrents, a little rush of rage straightened her spine. “His Lordship was kind enough to show me a glimpse of the tigers in the jungle.”

Lord Jonathan raised a brow. “That was hardly my intention, ma'am.”