Point of Honour (34 page)

“And so you did.”

“I did.” He was coming toward her now, hand outstretched. “All politics. But I don’t fathom why you are so distressed, Sarah. Your dislike of Trux—″

“Where did you learn about Trux’s past?” she asked dully.

“You said—″

“I told you what I
wondered.
I had not come as close as to suppose anything, and I knew nothing for fact. You have made me complicit in this …″ Words failed her. She clenched her teeth together, rose from the chair, and went to the window, avoiding him.

When she looked back, she saw Versellion standing in the middle of the room, watching her warily as if he feared a great hurt at her hands. Despite her anger and distrust, she was moved by the vulnerability of that gaze. One hand was still open at his side, as if at any moment he might reach out to implore her understanding.

“I did not think,” he said at last. “It was a stupid, thoughtless,
political
thing to do. I did not think of you or Miss Ash or—
Damn!”
This last was in response to a knock on the door. A footman entered warily, looked from the earl to Miss Tolerance, then murmured something in a low voice to Versellion. “I will come,” Versellion said. “It is the Prince, I must go down. Sarah, for the love of God, wait for me. I will not be long, I promise. Please.”

He turned and followed the footman from the room with a backward glance. Miss Tolerance watched him go, then resumed her restless prowling of the room, stopping by the window to watch a crowd of drunken revelers, young dandies with more money than sense by the look of them, baiting the Watch. She saw the Watch raise his rattle threateningly, saw the drunkards make faces of mock terror and reel away from the corner into the unlit street, and then she turned back, blinking in the light. She returned to the paintings.

She knew little of art; she recognized some of the important names of an earlier day, but knew nothing of their styles or schools. There was an unappealing collection of apples in a silver bowl next to a dead pheasant: all, even the bowl, looked as if they might have been carved from wood. She rather liked one landscape, a scene looking over fields as the mist was clearing to reveal a fine rising sun. The painting reminded her of the country where she had grown up; for a moment she imagined herself as a girl, riding over such fields and returning to her lessons late, breathless, flushed, and wind-tossed, filled with uncomplicated joy.

She looked away.

There were several portraits on the same wall. Judging from the clothes their subjects wore, the oldest was more than a hundred years old, the most recent somewhat less than thirty. In the oldest, a fine-looking older man in the steepled wig and full-skirted coat of Queen Anne’s day stared reprovingly at her; there was no trace of humor about the face, only a simper of rectitude. There was a pretty portrait of a young woman with a rosy, dimpled face and powdered hair; her eyes were pale blue and round. The eyes seemed familiar to Miss Tolerance. They were not Versellion’s color or shape; with surprise she realized that Sir Henry Folle’s eyes were very like this unknown girl’s.

The last painting she stared at the longest, seeking some clue, something that might help her to understand her lover better. The figures in the painting were clearly Versellion and his parents. The boy looked to be six or seven, his parents both appeared to be well into middle age. The father had the same dark hair and long, well-sculpted face as his son; his eyes were of a gray-blue which appeared to match the blue coat he wore and the glinting blue of the intaglio signet he wore on one hand. He smiled, his expression a blend of intelligence and confidence; Miss Tolerance recognized the expression from the Versellion she knew, but with rather more kindness. Versellion’s mother was slender, almost emaciated, the bones of her collar visible even through the fichu that crossed her bosom. She wore a pretty lace cap on hair that was an indeterminate color between yellow and gray, her eyes were watery blue, and her fine-boned countenance was curiously insubstantial, so that even the hint of color in her cheeks could not save her from looking ghostly. Her expression rather affirmed the impression of insubstantiality: her lips were pressed in a tight, anxious smile as she looked at a point halfway between her husband and son.

The boy Versellion was seated between his parents. His hair was long, in the fashion of the day, and spilled over the collar of his coat. Like his father, the boy wore blue and buff, the Whig colors, and his placement in the foreground, as much as his dark hair and dark eyes, made him the focus of the painting, drawing the eye from his parents. The artist had captured something of the boy’s charm, and his reluctance to sit still for so long. His resemblance to his father was truly striking, but there was vulnerability there as well, as if his mother’s expression of uncertainty were the only thing he had inherited from her. Miss Tolerance noted that one of his hands lay open in his lap, as if he might raise it at any moment to ask for something.

She turned away, blinking. If she meant to keep her resolve and deal dispassionately with Versellion, it would not do to examine this boy too closely. Again she walked a circuit of the room, stopping to look out on the empty street. Finally she took her chair again and closed her eyes, waiting.

She became aware, after an indeterminate period, of noise downstairs, the noise of guests departing, voices raised to thank the host, the scurry of servants restoring hats and other property to the visitors, and then the door closing. A few more murmurs in the hallway and then Versellion had entered, closing the door quietly behind him. Miss Tolerance kept her eyes closed, acutely aware of him in the room, listening for him, feeling his warmth as he passed behind her chair and came to sit next to her. He reached to take her hand.

“I am not asleep,” she said, and opened her eyes.

He drew back, regarding her with confusion. There were a few minutes of quiet in which it was clear to Miss Tolerance that he was struggling to find the right thing to say to her. At last, “I’m sorry it took so long. The Prince … I meant to return to you immediately. Sarah, I have been thinking all this while of what to say to you. It comes to this. I’m sorry. I acted wholly with my head-that part of my head that thinks politically, in terms of getting and maintaining power.”

Miss Tolerance looked away from him, fearing that in the repentant earl she would see too much of the vulnerable boy in the painting, and give way too easily.

“You are a politician,” she agreed. “But if we are to continue together in any way—if I am to pursue the fan, if we are to be lovers—you cannot play the politician with me. Can I trust
you?
You hired me for my discretion, but discretion must flow two ways. Without that …″

He nodded and reached again for her hand. “There has never been a reason to do it before, to keep the politician in check. You see that I need you.” His smile was rueful and wholly charming. “At the moment, in fact, I can think of far more reasons why I need you than you me.”

She was not prepared to acquit him yet. “I am serious, Versellion. Trux believes that I sent Miss Ash that note. My reputation is my livelihood, and this tarnishes it.”

His smile vanished. His grip upon her hand tightened. “I see that now, Sarah. I am not sorry for Trux—he played his game and got caught, and was punished for it. I am sorry for Miss Ash, although I think she’s well shut of a bad bargain. And I am heartily sorry if you were harmed by any action of mine. I will not allow rumors of your involvement to stand.” He raised her hand, unresisting, to his lips.

Miss Tolerance sighed.

“And this will never happen again,” he promised.

She sighed again. He believed what he said, but she would take care to watch what she said to him from now on. Versellion must have sensed a giving-way in her, for he smiled again.

“I have missed you. Are you quite recovered?”

“I have been busy on your business. I met with Dr. Hawley,” she said. “And Mrs. Virtue.” She began to explain the little she had learned from Hawley and the Cheapside madam. Versellion stopped her.

“We may dispense with Dr. Hawley and his associates, I gather. And Mrs. Virtue?”

“I believe we may dispense of her as well. She was anxious that her involvement in forwarding the letter not come to light—she has even less chance than Hawley of defending herself. She says she did not remove anything from the fan in order to hide the letter there, and while there are many things she might be concealing, I think she is dealing plain with us upon this subject.”

“Can you be certain? If she is hiding something—″

“I have her word of honor. I believe her.” Miss Tolerance shook her head at Versellion’s expression of disbelief. “There is something else, Edward. I want you to promise not to act upon this information until we have thought the matter through.”

Versellion promised.

She explained what her attacker in the alley had told her.

Versellion listened thoughtfully. “My cousin hired the men who attacked me. Was Trux working with him?”

“I am not perfectly sure of it. ’Tis another reason I wish you had not written that letter to Miss Ash, for I certainly cannot ask Trux about the matter. I still believe he was working with Balobridge, which argues either that Balobridge and Folle are in league, or Trux was working both sides of a game I doubt he had the wit to understand.”

“Christ.” Versellion loosed her hand and leaned back in his chair, running his hands through his hair. “You’re right, I must think about this before I act. I know my cousin hates me—but have me killed? My God. He’d have the title from it, I suppose that’s motive enough. But even our fathers at their worst never contemplated anything like …″

“Like murder? You will need rather more evidence than the word of a footpad to catch him out. Just be on your guard for now.” Miss Tolerance sat up in her chair. “My God, what o’clock is it? And how did your meeting with the Prince?”

“Well, I think.” With apparent effort, Versellion turned his attention from his own thoughts. “As well as I can expect. He was noncommittal but friendly. And he has agreed to come to the party my aunt Julia is holding here. It will be seen as a sign that he is declaring himself a friend to the Whigs.” He stood and looked at the ormolu clock on the mantel. “It is late. Will you stay?”

Miss Tolerance bit at her lip, considering.

“Sarah, please. We need to make a new beginning, you and I.”

She had no more energy to resist him or herself, and what he said was true. “I am a great believer in new beginnings,” she said at last, and took his arm.

Seventeen

A
fter a pleasantly restless night, Miss Tolerance was wakened by her lover’s kiss. Versellion, in the wake of their argument, was disposed to passion. Miss Tolerance put her wariness aside to return his embraces with her whole heart—but still insisted upon leaving early, shortly after sunrise, and making her way to Manchester Square as quietly as an unaccompanied woman might do at such an hour. Before she had left his house, noting the slenderness of her pocketbook, she had presented Versellion with a reckoning of all the monies she had advanced in his behalf, and of the time she had spent upon his business. Versellion had settled the account with only a mild tweak for her insistence upon mixing business with pleasure.

“Indulge me,” Miss Tolerance said. “I work far more effectively when I know I shall not have to scramble for my supper. Now, you will promise me to keep your bodyguards about you when you leave the house?”

He assured her he would do so, although he owned the accompaniment bothersome.

“Death would be more bothersome still,” she reminded him, and with a kiss, and then a second, she left him.

She went first to her own cottage, where she stripped off her evening dress, dozed, bathed, and finally dressed and took herself across the garden to her aunt’s establishment. She found Mrs. Brereton presiding over a pot of chocolate in a parlor overlooking Manchester Square, deep in conversation with one of the girls. The older woman’s dress indicated that she had not yet been to bed. Half past eight in the morning seemed a harsh time for so serious a talk, and Miss Tolerance kept herself out of the way until, at last, the young woman left looking chastened, and Mrs. Brereton signaled to her niece to approach.

“I am not certain at all that Clara is meant for this establishment,” Mrs. Brereton said coolly, and handed her niece a small gilded cup. “She exhibits very little ability to adapt herself to the requirements of her callers. I expect my girls to exhibit a little range, or at the very least not to subject me to displays of fastidious vapors.” She shrugged. “Clara plays the pianoforte and sings beautifully, and her manners are exquisite, but in matters of love, I begin to think her better suited to a bread-and-butter place in Southwark where all she would be expected to do was lie on her back and moan convincingly.”

Miss Tolerance raised her eyebrow.

Mrs. Brereton regarded her niece without irony. “My love, not everyone is up to the standard I set here. Your acquaintance at Blackbottle’s establishments—”

“Acquaintance
is a generous word for it. How did you hear I had been at one of Blackbottle’s houses?”

Mrs. Brereton made a vague gesture with one hand, as though brushing away a fly. “Here or there, my love. Perhaps poor Matt told me before—You know how talk flies about.”

Since it was Mrs. Brereton’s expressed policy that talk not fly about, at least not on her premises, and since Miss Tolerance’s recent experience with idle speculation had been painful, it was now on the tip of her tongue to say that she did
not
know. She was saved from making this observation by the appearance in the doorway of a departing client. The morning sun which filled the hallway lit the gentleman from behind; when she had blinked the dazzle from her eyes, Miss Tolerance was dismayed to see that it was Sir Henry Folle.

Miss Tolerance composed her face into tranquil lines and prepared to study the bottom of her chocolate cup. She had no wish to disturb the early morning peace of her aunt’s parlor, and hoped Sir Henry would feel likewise. At first, it seemed that he did. His swagger, and the disorder of his clothes, suggested that he had just risen from one of Mrs. Brereton’s well-appointed beds. His hair was tousled, and his neckcloth was creased and would not hold the shape of the knot he had attempted. Miss Tolerance particularly noticed the gold-headed walking stick she had observed before; there was, she saw now, an intaglio jewel set on one face of the knob, deeply graven with the lines of a family crest. A glimmer of unpleasant suspicion occurred to her.