Читать книгу What a Gentleman Desires - Kasey Michaels, Кейси Майклс, Kasey Michaels - Страница 9

PROLOGUE

ENGLISHPIGS. FRENCHDOGS.

Roasted beefs! Frog eaters!

Sworn enemies. Temporary truces.

The histories of England and France can be plotted out on a time line of wars between the two countries: a legacy of insults, envy and, paradoxically, smatterings of admiration.

But, mostly, the populace of the two countries heartily disliked each other, which did not keep them from occasionally using each other for their own gain.

English gold and wool for French brandy and silks, for instance; the boat traffic across the Straits of Dover was never ending, both in times of peace and when the two countries were at war. In peacetime this was called trade; in times of war the term was smuggling. This dance of advance and retreat, peace and conflict, had gone on so long many seemed to believe the pattern was some sort of natural order, and merely accepted the ever-changing status quo.

It was left to more inventive minds to see the larger picture, and seek a more permanent solution to this near-constant conflict. One, as it would naturally follow for some of those clever minds, which included immense personal gain.

Charles Redgrave, Sixteenth Earl of Saltwood, was just such a man. He understood enough of history, of the vulnerabilities and peculiar appetites of men, of the way the world works, to believe the unpopular French king would assist him in his dream of being named at least nominal ruler of Great Britain. He felt himself qualified for this role thanks to a thimbleful of possibly illegitimate royal Stuart blood flowing in his veins, his immense wealth and the ruthless pursuit of enough land in Kent to proclaim it his own kingdom if necessary.

When a man like Charles Redgrave dreamed, he did not dream small dreams.

In return for this assistance, Charles believed, all he had to do was assassinate the bumbling George III (and probably the Archbishop of Canterbury, as well), and hand over a large part of the English treasury to Louis XV. Louis would be popular again, and Charles happy beyond his wildest dreams and ambitions. And, at last, there would be a permanent (and mutually profitable) peace between the two nations, all thanks to Charles IV of the House of Stuart.

Really. Even if most people would agree the Earl of Saltwood had more than a few slates off his roof. Either that, or the man was so thoroughly insane he was, in fact, dangerously brilliant.

To give the earl some credit, somewhere in this idea was perhaps a kernel of a chance for possible success, although it should be pointed out that rarely is it a particularly splendid notion to begin any Grand Plan with the words: “Off with his head!”

In any event, both men were called to their final rewards before things could get out of hand, one still hated, the other unfulfilled.

Decades later, Barry Redgrave, Seventeenth Earl of Saltwood, learning of his father’s ambitions—and of his unique and titillating modus operandi—also set his sights and hopes on France, and Louis XVI, who was proving to be even more unpopular than his papa. Barry’s plan was to convince England (by fair means or foul; hopefully foul, actually, because that was much more delicious) to intercede on Louis’s behalf.

He pointed out that revolution in France could just as easily become revolution in England. Louis and his queen, the lovely Marie Antoinette of “let them eat cake” infamy, would be so grateful, and in return support Barry’s coup d’état...again, a plan ending with a Saltwood on the English throne.

But just as the Bastille fell, Barry was lying dead on the dueling field, shot in the back, purportedly by his unfaithful Spanish wife. Not that much later, the embattled Louis lost his head, literally.

Both earls had employed a rather strange route to their hoped-for success, that of gathering together secret groups of wealthy, politically and socially powerful men, in point of fact forming a corrupt and sexually deviant hellfire club known only as the Society. Whether through ambition, sexual appetite or even discreet blackmail, the Society moved beyond its original devil’s dozen thirteen members, all of whom quickly went to ground when Charles died, and most certainly repeated their ratlike scurry for the exits after the scandal of Barry Redgrave.

After nearly a half century of on-again, off-again existence as a haven for seditionists and easily-led sexually promiscuous devil worshippers, the Society was as dead as Charles and Barry.

The world could heave a collective sigh of relief, even if it never knew it perhaps should have been holding its breath.

The Saltwoods buried the history of the last two ambitious and possibly mad earls under the deepest carpet at Redgrave Manor and moved on, Barry and Maribel’s four children eventually reaching adulthood and going into Society (no, not that Society!). The scandal of Barry’s murder and their mother’s involvement, along with never quite quelled whispers of the possibility of some deliciously naughty hellfire club, moved on with them.

But that was all right with the family, who rather enjoyed being referred to as those scandalous Redgraves. The dowager countess, Lady Beatrix (Trixie) Redgrave, fairly reveled in the notoriety, actually. She certainly did nothing to discourage it at any rate, and had bedded more lovers since Charles’s death than many Englishmen had teeth left to chew their roasted beef.

And then one day about a month in the past, the Eighteenth Earl of Saltwood, Gideon Redgrave, was shocked to learn that the Society, the tawdry creation of his sire, his grandsire, intended to be the instrument of their success, was back in the treason business, this new devil’s thirteen conspiring with none other than Napoleon Bonaparte.

The Redgraves looked to each other, but only for a moment, as none of them were the sort to drag out the Society for another airing, and then began the race to identify and stop whoever in blazes was using the methods of the Society for their own gain.

The protection of England was, of course, the Redgrave family’s immediate and main concern. Of course!

But, yes, there were also all those unknown, sordid bits of Redgrave history that needed to be safely kept beneath that deep carpet....