Читать книгу Mischief in Regency Society: To Catch a Rogue - Amanda McCabe, Amanda McCabe - Страница 18

Calliope tied the ribbons of her bonnet into a jaunty bow just under her left ear and examined herself in the mirror. Did it really look well on her? It was her favourite hat, chip straw trimmed with blue satin ribbons. But was it too—plain?

And why was she so very worried about hats, when there were so many other more important things to be concerned about? Clio and the duke, the Lily Thief, the Ladies Society.

She knew why the sudden preoccupation with fashion, though, and she didn’t like it. She was worried because she was to wear the bonnet to go driving in the park with Lord Westwood.

Cameron.

With a frustrated sigh, Calliope pulled off the bonnet, completely disarranging Mary’s careful construction of curls, and reached for the note that had arrived over breakfast.

“Miss Chase, would you do me the honour of driving with me in the park this afternoon? I think that there, surrounded by hundreds of people, would be the only place where we could really talk. If you are agreeable, I will call for you at half past three.”

If she was agreeable. The gossips would certainly have a splendid time to see them together in Cameron’s yellow phaeton. Calliope idly wondered what the betting books would say. She didn’t want to be talked about, especially now, when she needed to move as unobtrusively as possible in society to discover the Lily Thief. Was it the duke? Westwood? The mysterious Minotaur from the ball? Or someone she had not yet even thought of? She could never find out if everyone was watching her, laughing behind their fans.

But she did need to talk to Westwood. He was the only one, besides Clio and the duke, who knew what really had happened in that dark gallery. Perhaps he could help her now, but she had to be careful. It was possible he was also her biggest obstacle.

Calliope pushed the bonnet aside and reached for the newspapers from that morning. The more disreputable ones were full of news from the masquerade ball, nearly all erroneous. One had the duke’s head split completely open, blood and brains spilling forth on to the floor. It didn’t mention how the man still lived after such carnage. One had jewels stolen from the house, ladies fainting, masked thieves brandishing pistols. Or swords. Or daggers.

None of the accounts were as bad as her own memories, though. Of the smell of coppery blood mingling with dust. Of that scrap of silk in the duke’s hand.

Calliope shuddered and shoved the papers away. Under all those black headlines, under her own confused memories, there lurked the truth. And she intended to find it. Surely it was the only way to stop the Lily Thief, and keep Clio safe.

Yet she couldn’t do it alone. She was no Athena. She needed as many allies as she could find. Her sisters, the Ladies Society. Cameron de Vere?

Could she trust him? Last night he had been like a rock amid chaos and confusion. But that did not erase his old attitudes towards antiquities, their old quarrels.

There was only one way to find out. Talk to the man. Try to see beneath his light, charming façade to the truth beneath.

Calliope reached again for her bonnet and popped it on her head. She wished it had some flirtatious feathers or bright fruit and flowers, or that she herself possessed Thalia’s blue eyes or Emmeline’s fine figure. Brown eyes and skinny limbs, clad in classical white plainness, weren’t likely to coax secrets out of any man, let alone one as admired by the ladies as Westwood.

It was no use worrying about it, though. She was who she was, and there was nothing to be done about it. And she was going to be late if she didn’t hurry.

Calliope retied the bow under her ear and reached for her blue spencer. Maybe she didn’t have flirtatious azure eyes, but she did have one thing she shared with Cameron—a knowledge of history and antiquities. They could speak the same language, if they just tried.

As she pinned a tiny brooch, a golden owl of Athena, to her collar, a knock sounded at her chamber door.

“The Earl of Westwood is waiting for you in the morning room, Miss Chase,” the footman announced.

“Thank you,” Calliope called. “I will be down directly.” She touched the owl and whispered, “Courage.”

The fashionable hour was just beginning as Calliope and Cameron turned into the gates of Hyde Park, his dashing yellow-and-black phaeton rolling smoothly along the lane, joining in the bright parade. Calliope opened her parasol, turning it over her shoulder to block the afternoon sunlight—and some of the stares of the curious.

“Are you quite well today, Miss Chase?” Cameron asked, steering his horses down a slightly quieter pathway. She had been right about his driving skills. His gloved hands were featherlight on the reins, his horses perfectly responsive to his slightest touch. Just as she had been responsive when they danced.

“A good night’s sleep and a strong pot of tea can do wonders,” Calliope answered, nodding at Emmeline as they passed her and her mother in their carriage.

“Did you sleep well, then?”

Calliope laughed ruefully, and shook her head. “Hardly at all. I had such dreams!”

“Dreams of falling statues?”

“Of being chased by hairy Minotaurs down endless corridors.”

He gave her a sympathetic smile. “That house would be quite enough to disturb anyone’s dreams, even without other—events.”

“Quite. I hope never to see Acropolis House again.”

“Or its owner?”

“Him, too. Will he live, do you think?”

“The doctor who was summoned last night says his prognosis is quite good. Once his brain is set right. Whatever right might be for such a man.”

Calliope swallowed hard, her throat suddenly dry. “And have you heard what the events of the night are supposed to be?”

“That the duke was examining his treasure, and she fell from her unsteady base. A tragic accident.”

“At least until the duke awakens and tells the truth.”

“Until then. How is your sister today?”

“Quiet, but well enough. Clio does not stay discomposed for long. But her account of events is much what you would think, I fear. The duke surprised her as she examined the Alabaster Goddess, and when he tried to do—something, she hit him with the statue.”

“Well done for her.”

Calliope laughed. “I think she is mostly disappointed she didn’t finish the job.”

“Well, I’m sure one day someone will—finish the job. The duke has many enemies.”

“Like you, Lord Westwood?”

He glanced at her from the corner of his eye. “Perhaps. One can never predict what might happen in the future. And I thought I asked you to call me Cameron.”

“When we are alone.”

“Aren’t we alone now?”

Calliope looked around at the crowd of carriages and equestrians. “Hardly.”

“No one can hear us.”

“All right, then—Cameron. I hope that, if something does one day happen to the duke, it won’t be by your hand.”

“You wouldn’t like to see me in Newgate, then?”

Calliope had a vision of him locked behind stout bars, dishevelled, waiting for the noose or the ship to Botany Bay. Once it might have made her laugh; now it made her shiver. “Not for the likes of the Duke of Averton. I don’t want to see you or my sister hurt because of him.”

“I don’t want to see such a thing, either, believe me.”

“Then how can we prevent it?”

“We?”

Calliope examined the passing scenery, the neat rows of trees, feigning a carelessness she was far from feeling. “I think we worked together well last night, did we not?”

“Yes,” he agreed slowly. “Certainly we prevented anyone knowing what really happened in that gallery, though I’m sure there is no power on earth that could stop speculation.”

Calliope thought again of those rumours Emmeline told her about. The wagers on how soon she and Westwood would be betrothed—or would kill each other. “No, indeed. People do like their gossip.”

“But not us,” he said teasingly. “We are above all that. We care only for the benefit of art.”

Calliope laughed. “I am not so high in the instep as all that, I hope! I confess I do indulge in a spot of, shall we say, speculative conversation now and then.”

“Never! Not Miss Calliope Chase.”

“Sad, I know, but I must be honest.” Calliope sighed.

“And what do you speculate about?”

You, she almost said. She bit her lip, turning away again to peer at the passing pedestrians on the walkways. They were in a more sparsely populated part of the park now, most of the stylish gawkers behind them. Here were mostly serious strollers, nurses with their charges, footmen with dogs on leads. The phaeton rolled past them slowly, at a snail’s pace. “Oh, this and that. Bonnets, of course. Parisian fashion papers. Fans and plumes. Don’t ladies always interest themselves in the latest styles?”

Cameron shook his head. “Some ladies perhaps, Miss Chase. Not you, nor, I dare say, your sisters, or your friends in that Ladies Society of yours all the females of the ton are so anxious to join. You can’t fool me.”

She hoped she could fool him, at least some of the time. He couldn’t know how much they really did talk about him at Ladies Society meetings, how most of her acquaintances were half in love with him, called him their “Greek god”. He couldn’t know why she needed his help so much now. Why she had to keep an eye on him.

And he really couldn’t know that she was beginning to like him.

There. She said it, at least to herself. She was beginning to like him, to look forward to his conversation, his smiles. It surely wouldn’t last, though. Such silliness rarely did. She knew this from watching ladies like Lotty, who were infatuated with a different gentleman every week.

It was like one of Lotty’s beloved novels, turned farce rather than Gothic tragedy. The Folly of Calliope. At least it was folly with a purpose.

“Very well,” she admitted. “Sometimes we do talk about hats, and sometimes suitors. Mostly we talk about art and history. And books.” No need to mention that once in a while the books were things like Lady Rosamund’s Tragedy.

“I knew it. Did I not say you cared only for the benefit of art?”

“You did. And that, Lord Westwood—Cameron—is why I need your help.”

He glanced at her, his brow arched. “My help? Dear me, Miss Chase, I fear I shall swoon!”

Calliope lightly slapped his arm. “Don’t tease! I’m serious.”

“As am I. Who would have thought this day would come? I’m quite dizzy with surprise.”

“Hmph.” She snapped her parasol closed, just in case she was required to rap him over the head with it. “Do you want to hear what I have to say or not?”

“Always.”

“Very well, then. I think we both agree the duke is an odious man, yes?”

His smile melted, the corners of his beautiful, Greek god-ish lips turning down. “Of course.”

“You know that better than I, I’m sure. You went to university with him. I only have his behaviour towards my sister to judge by. And his rapacious collecting habits. Those are quite vile enough.”

“Believe me, my dear Miss Chase, you don’t want to see what the man is like outside of polite society,” he said darkly.

My dear? Calliope peered closer at him, trying to read his face under the shadowed brim of his hat. It was as smooth as a statue, as Hermes. Only an obsidian glint in his eyes betrayed the depths of emotion roiling inside.

“No, I don’t,” she said softly. “But I will, if that’s what it takes.”

“If that is what what takes?”

“To protect my sister. And the Alabaster Goddess.”

“The Alabaster Goddess?”

“Of course. It is too much to think I could protect all those objects in that dreadful house. The lioness, the sarcophagus, Daphne. But I think Artemis is in the most immediate danger. Both from the duke and from whoever might think to take her from him.”

“The Lily Thief again?”

“Perhaps. He is not the only petty criminal about, you know. She could be in danger from any number of people.”

“You think some pickpocket from Whitechapel is likely to break into Acropolis House and steal a Greek statue? Maybe some of those cat mummies while he’s at it?”

Calliope sighed. “Put like that, it does sound silly. No, I don’t think some cutpurse is going to haul the goddess away. There are plenty of criminals with more sophistication who could carry off such a crime, though. She is a prime target. Not too large, in beautiful condition…”

“Too famous to sell on the open market.”

“That wouldn’t stop a collector who wants only to gloat over her in private.”

“As the duke has done?”

“Yes, just so.”

He turned the phaeton on to yet another lane, this one more crowded. Their progress slowed even further, caught in a knot of vehicles. “Say the Lily Thief—or someone else—does steal the Alabaster Goddess. How is she worse off than she was in Averton’s possession?”

“At least with him we know where she is. There is a chance she could pass to a museum or a respectable scholar one day. If she is stolen, she would likely never see the light again. Never be studied properly.”

Cameron shook his head. “Calliope, she has been studied, as much as can be. Taken from her original context, most of her lessons are lost for ever anyway. The duke does not deserve her.”

“I won’t argue with you about that. He doesn’t deserve any of those antiquities in his house! But he does own them, for good or ill, at least for now.”

“And so you think that gives him the right…”

Calliope reached out and pressed her fingers to his tense arm, stilling his angry growl. This was that old quarrel of theirs, and there was just no time for it now. She needed him. “Please, Cameron. I need your help. Let’s not argue.”

He stared down at her intently, perfectly still under her touch. “My help with what exactly?”

“I told you—to keep Artemis safe. No matter what our disagreements are, we both want that, yes?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Then can we declare a truce? A new alliance, to save the Alabaster Goddess?”

He was silent for a long moment, until Calliope half-feared he meant to reject her truce, to set her down here in the park and drive away, laughing at her folly. Finally, though, he pressed his hand atop hers. “Very well. A truce. Now, how do your propose we protect our divine charge? Put surveillance on the duke’s house? Follow him around town—once he is conscious, of course.”

Calliope laughed in sheer relief. “I’m afraid I haven’t thought that far ahead. That is one reason why I need your help.”

“I thought strategy was Athena’s strong point.”

“I fear I had to put my helmet and shield away and don this bonnet instead. But I am sure we will soon think of something. Come to my house tomorrow evening. My father is having a small card party, and we can talk more there.”

“Strategise over a game of astralasi, eh?”

“Perhaps if the Trojans had done so rather than make war, things might have ended better for them.” Calliope sat back in her seat, opening her parasol again. She felt a new, warm glow of satisfaction. The truce was begun; a new game was afoot. “Thank you, Cameron. You won’t be sorry, I promise.”

You won’t be sorry.

Cameron laughed aloud as he bounded up the steps of his house. That was where Calliope Chase was wrong, for he was already beginning to be sorry. If he joined forces with her, allied with her to protect the Alabaster Goddess, he would have to spend time with her. And then how would he ever stop himself from kissing her?

When he looked at her today, the sun dusting her fair skin with glistening gold, her cheeks flushed with the excitement of her mission, her lips parted on a breath, it took everything in his power, every ounce of self-control, not to grab her. Not to pull her close and kiss those pink lips, feel their softness, their warm yielding. He was so hot to kiss her, embrace her—her, Calliope Chase of all women! A woman who always seemed to regard him with suspicion and disapproval. A woman who was beautiful, but oh so stubborn.

Until that blasted masquerade ball, anyway. The drama and danger, the strange nightmare quality of that evening, had changed something between them. The old distrust cracked and broke, but hadn’t yet reformed into something he could identify.

Except lust. And he’d always had that for her.

Now they were to be allies in some scheme she had to “save” the Alabaster Goddess from the Lily Thief, the duke, and who knew what else.

Cameron opened the door to the library and found Athena’s painted image, her solemn grey-eyed stare. Aside from the fact that Calliope’s eyes were brown—a deep, melting chocolate brown that a person could drown in, happily unable to extricate himself—they were the mirror image of each other. He wondered if Athena had been a member of a Ladies Society, too.

They were certainly up to something, Calliope and her Ladies Society friends. He knew that even before they found the duke in his gallery, when they were dancing and she and Emmeline Saunders kept exchanging glances and whispers. Everyone thought they were some sort of harmless study group, a way for ladies to occupy themselves before they married, yet Cameron had always suspected otherwise. Any society with the Chase sisters as members could hardly be called “harmless”. And now he was somehow a part of it all, God help him.

If he was truly wise, he would stay far away from Calliope and her plans, would pack his bags and retreat to the countryside. Retreat, though, was never his way. Nor was running away from an intriguing puzzle. His curiosity had always got the better of him, especially since life was so dull since he had returned from his travels.

Cameron remembered the way his father would look at him, puzzled, taken aback, as if this son wasn’t what he bargained for. He would shake his head, and say, “You are Greek, aren’t you?” And he was. That insatiable curiosity, that temper that so often got the better of him—that weakness for a pair of dark eyes.

He laughed ruefully, as the painted Athena gave him a scolding stare. He was her acolyte now, a soldier in her adventure. Perhaps it was foolish of him. The last thing he wanted was to be involved in the Duke of Averton’s sphere again, in any way. Perhaps he would be sorry. It was obvious Calliope and her sisters trailed trouble in their beautiful wake.

But he very much looked forward to it. He had been rather bored lately, floundering in his new English life. Unsure of his place, even though he was brought up to it. He was far from bored now.

Yes. He would not be sorry.