Vienna Dawn (The Imperial Season Book 3) Page 18

  Mr. Corner then spoke less formally. “Are you not the officer who is engaged to one of Lord Launceton’s sisters?”

  Trelawny, who’d all but forgotten Vanya also held an English title, answered a trifle belatedly that he did indeed have that honor.

  “Then we do have a connection, sir, albeit faint! I am engaged to Lady Launceton’s cousin.”

  Trelawny smiled. “I wish I’d known before I tried to batter my way in.”

  “Be sure Mr. Daniels will take your information seriously,” Mr. Corner assured him.

  Trelawny trudged home for a well-earned rest. But he’d barely let himself into the tiny apartment and shut himself into his own little room, before he was disturbed once more. He’d just thrown his coat over a chair and sat on the bed to pull his boots off when a knock sounded at the door.

  “Come in,” he said without much enthusiasm.

  The door opened and Vanya—Lord Launceton himself—strolled into the room.

  “Greetings.” Trelawny threw his second boot after the first. “Take a seat. Rather, take the seat. What can I do for you? Judith is making tea, I think.”

  “She told me to give you this,” Vanya said, proffering an epistle with Trelawny’s name inscribed across the middle. “It was delivered while you were out, apparently.”

  Trelawny grunted his thanks. He didn’t recognize the writing. Curiosity piqued, he broke the seal and scanned the document. A breath of laughter escaped him.

  “Good news?” Vanya enquired, removing Trelawny’s coat to the bed and lounging into the chair.

  “Not really. I’ve been challenged to a duel.” He tossed the letter on to the bed.

  “So it’s true then,” Vanya observed.

  “What is?”

  “That you’re the ferocious one-armed, one-eyed pirate of a British officer who insulted Etienne de la Tour and threw him and five other men through the windows of some gaming hell on Singer Strasse?”

  Trelawny touched both his eyes. “No, that must have been a different officer. I don’t suppose you’d be my second, since you’re here?”

  “That rather depends on whether or not it’s a worthy cause. For example, I couldn’t tolerate my sister’s name being dragged through the mire of a duel.”

  Trelawny met his gaze.

  “Is it about Dunya?” Vanya asked. Danger stood out in his eyes like spears.

  For answer, Trelawny passed him the letter.

  “You insulted him beyond endurance and knocked him down,” Vanya murmured as he read. “What about the other five?”

  “There was only one other. By good fortune, I got him with my elbow when he ran at me.”

  “I doubt there was much fortune involved on either side,” Vanya remarked, fixing Trelawny with his gaze once more. “Is it about Dunya?”

  “It began that way,” Trelawny said steadily.

  “Well of course you have my blessing to damage anyone who hurts my sister with word or deed.” His lips curled into something that wasn’t quite a smile. “Unless that’s you, Trelawny. In which case, I’ll kill you.”

  Trelawny believed him, although not quite sure why he should suffer a worse fate than anyone else who’d hurt Dunya. On the other hand, he couldn’t help approving of Vanya’s sentiments.

  Trelawny met his gaze. “De la Tour said something I couldn’t tolerate. I don’t know why. Perhaps he thought he’d get away with it or could scare me off. Perhaps he just meant to cause trouble between me and Dunya. Whatever, I made the quarrel about something else, and then I hit him.”

  Vanya sat up straighter in his chair. “Suppose I’d better act for you, then. No one will believe I’d be merely a second if my sister’s honor was being defended. Er, can you win with one arm?”

  “Maybe. I certainly can’t win—or lose—with two anymore.”

  “Pistols?” Vanya asked. “You get to choose, since he challenged you.”

  “I might kill him with a pistol.”

  “I might kill him if you don’t. Depending on what he said about Dunya.”

  “He offered to play me at cards for her. Maybe I should have let it go. No one else heard, after all. But I couldn’t.”

  Vanya gazed at him in silence. Finally, he stirred. “When do you want to do it?”

  Trelawny shrugged. He stood up and reached for the washing bowl, then paused as an idea came to him. “Try and make it for tomorrow morning,” he suggested. “Tell me if he quibbles.”

  *

  The ice between Anastasia and Nikolai seemed thicker than ever. Dunya had tried to talk to them both, with little success. Anastasia had seemed preoccupied and only half-listening. Nikolai brushed her aside as if she were irritating him. Dunya would have minded less if she hadn’t seen the misery in both their eyes. Misery in a Savarin generally meant trouble, whatever it betokened in a Lermontov.

  For Dunya, their troubles were the only damper on an evening that promised fun, excitement, and music. Optimistically, she hoped these things would rub off on her sister and Nikolai.

  As soon as she arrived, she saw Captain Trelawny across the room, apparently deep in private conversation with Vanya. Catching sight of her, he gave a slow, untroubled smile that made her heart behave very strangely and then they both came over to greet the countess.

  Rows of seats had been arranged in the larger salon. Although most of them were empty as the guests still mingled, Lizzie sat in the middle of one near the front with the Mrs. Fawcett who was not Mr. Fawcett’s mother. Vanya nudged Dunya in their direction.

  “I don’t want to sit anywhere near the Fawcetts,” Dunya hissed at him.

  “Eleanor Fawcett doesn’t count,” Vanya said carelessly. “I want a word with you.”

  She eyed him uneasily as they edged their way nearer Lizzie. “What about?”

  “Trelawny. What are you doing with the man?”

  She glared at him. “I don’t care if you think he isn’t rich enough. I like him and I am engaged to him!” She broke off to smile and greet Lizzie and Mrs. Fawcett. Vanya pulled her down to sit beside him.

  “Well I like him, too, which is the problem. He’s going well out of his way for you Dunya, and if you’re just using him to make some weasel jealous—”

  “He knows all about the weasel,” Dunya interrupted.

  Vanya paused. “You know your Etienne is a weasel?”

  Dunya flushed uncomfortably. “I thought I would care more about that. But he was like a…a story you read to distract yourself. And since we’d made each other promises, I stuck to them, and kept reading myself the story. Only once I met him again, I didn’t really like him at all. Which is quite lowering. I seem to be as fickle as he is.”

  “No. You’ve just grown up.”

  “Don’t make it sound so dull, Vanya!”

  He gave a quick grin. “Sorry. It needn’t be. So what about Trelawny? Your engagement?”

  She looked beyond her brother and found Trelawny escorting Anastasia toward them. A breath of something very like panic seized her. There was no reason to be engaged to him any longer, and yet she hated the idea if becoming unengaged. It might still help him with Jane, of course, but she didn’t much like that idea either.

  “I don’t know,” she whispered.

  “Don’t be dishonest with him,” Vanya said severely. “It isn’t fair, and it leads to all sorts of problems. Trust me, I speak from experience.”

  “I’ve always been honest with him,” she protested.

  “Well, maybe there’s hope for you,” Vanya said.

  *

  In the first part of the evening, Madame de Talleyrand’s guests were entertained by professional singers and musicians. Anastasia, remembering how music had once affected her, hoped very hard for distraction, especially when the first singer’s voice soared like an angel’s. But it seemed that nothing could touch her now, except anger and shame and the nasty knot in her stomach which tightened when she saw that Basil von Wahrschein was present.

  Why wouldn’t he
understand that she could not go with him? She was married.

  In the rush to applaud and speak to the singer after her performance, she saw him make his way toward her and deliberately turned in the other direction, greeting an acquaintance and joining in the general praise of the singer. But she couldn’t focus her attention. After a few minutes, she caught sight of Dunya laughing up at Captain Trelawny—and she forgot to breathe.

  She’d never seen that precise look on her sister’s face before, a strange mixture of shyness, excitement, and fun. And there was such simple trust in the way she took Trelawny’s arm as they moved on to speak to General Lisle. It seemed she’d wronged Dunya. If her sister had ever been pretending affection for Captain Trelawny, it was palpably real now. Dunya loved him. His unsuitability didn’t matter a hang to her.

  But that wasn’t what froze Anastasia. It was memory. Dunya’s wonder and excitement, that sense of trust and reliance…had those not been hers when she’d first met Nikolai? Kind, devoted, safe Nikolai…

  She spun around, suddenly desperate to see him. Foolish pride disintegrated around her. All that mattered was that love… And when she saw him, standing quietly at the side of her mother’s group of friends, she knew that it was still there, that he was the most valuable, precious thing in her life. That she should be fighting for that love, not destroying it.

  Impulsively, she moved through the crowd toward him, watching him speak politely to the young woman next to him. It was a bit like one of those dreams where it takes you so long to get to the other side of the road that you’re sure you’ll be run down by the approaching horse and carriage.

  When, at last, she was nearly there, he glanced up and saw her. Their eyes met and her heart turned over. She smiled at him, a smile of both pleading and relief. Let it be over, let us be friends again, and lovers, for I do love you, my staid, wonderful Nikolai…

  Abruptly, he turned away from her.

  She stopped, frozen. She felt as if she’d been kicked in the head, in the heart, everywhere. It had never before entered her head that she couldn’t fix this if she really tried. The tantrum had been a big obstacle, of course, but not insurmountable if he loved her. And she’d never doubted that in her heart. Until now.

  I killed it. I killed his love for me. And so quickly…

  She stood there for several seconds, utterly lost.

  “Anastasia,” breathed a voice behind her.

  Wahrschein. His devotion seemed to drip onto her like balm. Beneath the surface, she might as well be dead, but at least the surface revived with attention. It seemed that was all there was left for her now.

  *

  For Jane, life had gone badly downhill. Mr. Fawcett was cold to her. His mother, as if she’d discovered the truth, perhaps from Fawcett himself, or from one of the lawyers she’d sent to her parents, seemed to have followed his example. At least he was no longer fawning over Dunya Savarina, but it was small comfort. Especially since Dunya was monopolizing Richard and she couldn’t get a chance to speak to him.

  She finally found her moment after the young violinist had performed. Dunya was some distance away, speaking animatedly to her sister, and Trelawny was idly propping up the doorway between the salons.

  Approaching him, Jane put on her best social smile, quite at odds with her heartfelt, “Richard, you must help me!”

  “What’s wrong?” he asked, straightening at once. “What has happened?”

  “Nothing! He is colder than before, avoids me, to be truthful, and I think his mother knows the truth also. They will abandon me here in this strange country—”

  “Don’t be silly,” Richard soothed. No one else ever accused her of silliness. “Even if they were so ill-natured and irresponsible, you have other friends who would look after you.”

  She nodded. “You’re right. I’m sure you’re right. But Richard, I wish you’d speak to him now, try to explain how it all came about, and how I am not truly the fortune hunter he thinks me—”

  “I spoke to him last night, Jane. There isn’t really much more I can do. I can’t force the man to marry you.”

  She felt the blood drain from her face so fast she had to put her hand on the wall to steady herself. “No, of course not,” she whispered. She tried to smile. “I am undone, am I not? I reached too high and came to grief. Now I have nothing, not even an honest reputation.”

  “You’ve done nothing wrong. You’re hardly ruined.”

  “I might as well be. Who would look twice at a woman who tried to snare a rich man by pretending to be rich herself? At the very least, such a man would be mocked.”

  “He wouldn’t care about such things if he cared for you.”

  “You are such a good man, Richard.”

  His gaze had shifted beyond her. Perhaps he was embarrassed. They’d known each other forever. And yet she’d jilted him for a taste of wealth. Another, rather wonderful idea rocked her. It wasn’t perfect but it was better surely than her other, much riskier alternative.

  “Richard,” she breathed. “You cared for me once.”

  His gaze came quickly back to her. “I did.”

  “Why don’t we revive our old engagement,” she said in a rush. “You know the worst of me. We’ll have nothing, of course, and yet I know no one will sneer at me for choosing you.”

  She had the oddest idea he was about to laugh, that something was happening here beyond her understanding.

  “Thank you,” he said gravely. “And I do appreciate your flattering offer, but you know I am now engaged to Countess Dunya.”

  “Richard, she is too flighty, too…Russian! It will never last. You must see that.”

  She knew at once she’d overstepped the mark. His good-natured face had lost its smile. Instead, she caught a glimpse of the steel needed to keep rough, wild soldiers in line and to fight horrific battles she could never truly imagine. She’d never thought of him as frightening before…or had she? Was the unconscious awareness of it not one of the reasons she’d jilted him for someone she’d thought more malleable?

  “I’m afraid that isn’t your concern,” he said. “I won’t deny I was hurt when you threw me over, but in truth, you acted for the best. It’s you and I who would never have lasted. Even if Dunya weren’t here, I couldn’t marry you now.”

  Without warning, tears prickled her eyes. “You don’t love me anymore.”

  “Not in the right way for marriage,” he said gently. “And truthfully, Jane, that goes for you, too. We’d hate each other in a week. Less. But I will always stand your friend. Don’t do anything hasty.”

  She walked blindly away from him, almost unable to believe that the rock she’d always thought of as there to be fallen back on when necessary, no longer was. Not only did she no longer have Fawcett and the brilliant life he offered, she couldn’t have her old love either.

  “Jane,” Etienne murmured, coming up behind her. “Are you ready to leave tonight?”

  Almost drearily, she supposed she was. She’d played her last card. But at least Etienne had lands in France. And he was undeniably a count.

  *

  Careful not to give any cause for suspicion, Etienne didn’t linger with Jane Reid for longer than a few words and a warm look. He’d triumphed. And since Wahrschein was still here, too, Etienne was also likely to win their wager. Which was fortunate since he’d lost at the club last night and would have had barely enough money to get to Elba, had he not obtained money for his expenses from Talleyrand. Now, he could at least travel comfortably on to Paris, and with his winnings from Wahrschein, he could even pay for both women to come with him.

  The next stage, of course, was to claim the other woman. For one thing his wager with Wahrschein had begun with the Savarin women and the Prussian might try to wriggle out if Etienne turned up with a different woman. For another, he found Dunya playing hard to get curiously alluring. She was becoming an obsession, one he needed to assuage. Annoyingly, she seemed to spend far too much time with the one-armed nobody, th
e Englishman he’d teach a lesson tomorrow. A pity it couldn’t be tonight, but when he shot the fool and explained how he’d enjoyed Dunya, Trelawny’s humiliation would be complete.

  He had one chance to speak to her, one chance to do this the easy way. She and her mother were about to take their seats once more when Countess Savarina paused at the end of their row to speak to someone. Dunya carried on to her own seat and Etienne squeezed through to sit on the chair immediately behind her.

  There, in relative privacy, he leaned forward. “Dunya.”

  But she still had no sense of discretion. She should have kept facing the front and given no one any idea they were conversing. Instead, her head whipped around at once. “Yes?”

  There was nothing else for it. “Dunya, I adore you,” he breathed. “I always have. Come with me on the greatest adventure of our lives. Leave all this dullness and propriety as you’ve always wanted to and come live with me, love with me in freedom.”

  The minx actually laughed. “I’m not a child anymore, Etienne. And I’m afraid I have no desire even to leave the room with you.” And she turned away from him, her gaze moving around as though seeking someone else.

  Etienne, though conscious of a tinge of pique, and even jealousy spiking through his annoyance, could only vacate his seat for the elderly gentleman who claimed it. He slipped away to find his servant, Panard, and ordered him to put the alternative plan in place.

  *

  A light supper followed the first part of evening, after which Dorothée invited the talented among her guests to entertain. Which was a wonderful opportunity for unmarried young ladies to show off their accomplishments to prospective husbands. And some, Dunya thought, really shouldn’t have bothered.

  “More likely to scare ’em off,” Vanya muttered beside her.

  Jane Reid turned out to be much better. She had a light touch on the pianoforte and a pretty voice. Richard gallantly turned the pages of her music for her, which Dunya thought quite unnecessary. She couldn’t understand why she was reluctant to praise Jane for her talent, so she compensated with over-enthusiastic applause.