City of Secrets (32 page)

“Do we have to go to the concert?”

“I wish we didn’t.”

He kissed her once more and reluctantly let her go. She sighed, and they walked in silence the rest of the way to the Conversationshaus, a huge colonnaded building set against the hillside, where a band was already playing on the promenade in front. A large crowd of stylishly dressed people were milling around the grounds, apparently paying little attention to the music. To join them Maddie and Devin had to cross a bridge and pass through two rows of bazaar stalls selling all manner of wares.

And there, haggling over a lace tablecloth, was Florence Wingate, with her husband waiting patiently nearby. Geoffrey saw them first and waved.

“Good Lord,” Devin said under his breath. “Did you know they were here?”

“I knew they were coming to Baden,” Maddie said, “but I thought not for several days.”

“Madeleine, darling!” Florence exclaimed, when Geoffrey had finally caught her attention. “What a
lovely
surprise. I called your room this morning, but that woman of yours said you were out takin’ the waters for your rheumatism or something. Did she give you my message? No, I can see she didn’t. But never mind, here we all are. How are you this fine evenin’, Mr. Grant?”

Florence gave Devin a gloved hand and a flirtatious glance and asked, none too subtly, if the prince had arrived yet.

“I’m sure you’ll be the first to know when he does, Mrs. Wingate.”

Florence laughed, taking no offense at his insinuation. “Well, of course I will, dear boy. I was only askin’ to be polite, you know.”

“Are you going to listen to the concert?” Maddie asked, feeling suddenly possessive of Devin and slipping her hand a little more tightly into his arm.

“Well, darlin’, we were on our way there, but then I discovered this delightful little bazaar. Do look at this lace—you know I collect fine lace—handmade, I’ve no doubt, by some little elves in the Black Forest. It probably has pine cones woven into it.”

“Florence would far rather empty my purse than fill her mind,” Geoffrey said, despite his wife’s kicking his shin for his honesty. “But I can recommend the band to you; I heard them rehearsing earlier today. And there are some chairs set up under the trees, where it is very quiet and you can see the violinist up close.”

“Heaven protect us from any more violinists,” Florence said, laying the piece of lace over Geoffrey’s shoulder while she picked up another to examine.

Maddie would have liked to invite Geoffrey to join them, for he sounded a little wistful, as if Florence’s energy had exhausted him for the day, but it wouldn’t do for him to leave his wife alone in this crowd. She compromised by suggesting that they all meet for supper later on and was promptly invited to do so in the Wingates’ suite in the Stephanie—this time they were staying in the same hotel—and they made arrangements to meet.

It was only when she and Devin had at last found a secluded place to sit down and listen to the concert that she realized he had withdrawn into his own thoughts again. She would have liked to leave him to them, but something told her that this time, she should not let him. This time he should let whatever it was out.

The orchestra had followed an attempt to arrive at an end to Shubert’s Unfinished Symphony with a selection from Mozart, which, Maddie told Devin, even badly played was better than some of the modern German composers who made far too much noise about everything, in her opinion. Mozart, at least, allowed them to talk.

But he did not take this hint, so she answered herself, “You’re perfectly right, Madeleine, as always. Who can listen to Wagner and carry on a civilized conversation at the same time?”

He did not respond to this, either, so she prodded him more gently. “What’s wrong, darling?”

He looked at her, and she was surprised to see how worried he really was; despite his effort to smooth his frown for her, he could not erase the concern in his eyes.

“It’s just been borne in on me again,” he said, “how little I’ve really done about securing the prince’s safety when he arrives. It’s supposed to be tomorrow afternoon, but Florence is probably right; she’ll know about it before I do.”

“Don’t talk like an idiot. You’ve been exhausting yourself since you arrived, from what Oliver tells me, from overwork.”

“But I haven’t
found
anything!”

“Your first job is to be sure the prince is safe. You’ve eliminated ninety percent of the possible perils that could face him in the town. You can’t expect to do everything on your own.”

“He expects it of me.”

Maddie studied the handsome face in which the laugh lines had deepened recently—and not from laughter. It did not trouble her that he was at the moment only barely aware of her existence; what worried him now had nothing to do with her. But she wished she could ease it.

“You are very loyal to him, aren’t you?”

“Of course.”

Maddie tried to remember the last time she had felt loyalty toward anyone or anything. She had been so eager to give her devotion when she was a child, then went to the opposite extreme later, suspecting everyone’s motives and unwilling to give herself at all, much less totally. Her feeling for Teddy had been a kind of loyalty, but a perverted one, a selfish need to have him there to parade before the world and say, “See what a loyal wife I am.” They were not very comforting memories.

“What are you going to do?” she asked, when Devin said nothing more.

He considered that for a moment. “Find Oliver, I suppose. See if he and Brenner have discovered anything. Sit down and plan the precise route the prince will take to Baden and make sure it is as safe as it can be, for as far out of town as possible.”

Scarcely realizing that he had done so, he thus set his brain in motion again. She was glad that he felt sufficiently at ease with her after all to do his thinking aloud, even if he didn’t expect anything from her but to listen.

“Brenner’s boss will help, I expect. If I can get fifty policemen to patrol the railroad station and track, and fifty more in plain clothes to—”

He became aware of her again, suddenly, and stopped. “I’m sorry, Maddie. I’m being a bore. But I’m afraid I can’t stay here with you any longer; I’d be miserable company anyway, and it’s important that I get to work.”

“I know.” She looked into his tired eyes; the circles under them were more pronounced in the dim light, but he’d stay awake all night if she let him.

“Come up to my room,” she said, but when he raised an eyebrow at her, added, “No, I mean only to sleep a little. An hour or two will do you good. I’ll go to the Wingates’ supper in the meanwhile and make some excuse for you. And I’ll send for Oliver to come to you. He’ll help, but you must get some rest before you set out, or you’ll fall asleep on your feet somewhere, perhaps when it’s vital that you be alert.”

He looked as if he would object, but she knew she made too much sense for him to reject her suggestion. He smiled and kissed her hand. “Thank you.”

It was such a little thing to be grateful for, but it meant he trusted her completely now. Nothing could have made her happier.

#

They walked back the way they had come, in silence but in perfect accord with each other, and for the first time in her life, Maddie felt at peace, despite the anxiety she felt for Devin and, by extension, for herself. He was in physical danger too, after all, although he never talked about that. If some madman pointed a gun at his prince, Devin would step between them and get himself killed without even thinking about it. But Maddie was just as determined to help the man she had given her love to as Devin was to protect the man to whom he owed his loyalty.

Louise had for once obeyed her instructions not to wait up and had gone to bed in the Drummonds’ little room under the eaves, so they had the suite to themselves. With only the most fleeting regret for the use they might have made of this delicious, unexpected privacy, Maddie showed Devin where everything was and waited until he had lain down on the bed and dropped off to sleep before she pressed a cold towel to her face to freshen her cheeks, ran a brush gently over her hair, and went out again.

“There you are, darlin’,” Florence said, opening her own door to Maddie. “Do come in. We’ve had the most delicious-looking little supper sent up—cold smoked trout, vegetables in some sort of interesting cream sauce, strawberries,
and
champagne. But where is your handsome cavalier? Doesn’t he ever eat? I’ve never seen him do so, you know, so I was determined to help fatten him up.”

“He received a telegram,” Maddie lied smoothly, shaking Geoffrey’s hand and joining him at a linen-covered, candlelit table just inside their open balcony doors. “Oh, this looks lovely. The hotel chef is so clever about arranging these little dishes, isn’t he? Have you had a meal in the hotel restaurant yet?”

“What sort of telegram?” Florence said, sitting down with them and holding her glass out to Geoffrey to fill with wine. “Mr. Grant’s, I mean. I trust it was nothin’ in an emergency nature?”

“Oh, no, I don’t think so. I didn’t read it, of course, but I gather it was from Frederick Ponsonby to let Devin know that the prince will be arriving slightly earlier than expected. Naturally, Devin had to go off to hurry the arrangements along.”

“Well, I’m glad you mentioned it, dear, for now I will have to go back to that sweet little dressmaker in the Augusta Platz to urge her to finish my new gown. I daresay if the prince arrives early enough, he will be sufficiently rested from his journey to hold some sort of do
in the evening. I don’t suppose you’ve heard anything about the hour he’s expected? No, naturally you didn’t read the telegram. Well, I shall send my card to his suite first thing in the morning.”

Florence rattled on a little longer, trying—Maddie suspected—to regain her advantage of being more intimate with the prince than anyone else, despite Maddie’s apparently being privy to telegrams from the royal party. The fictitious telegram had seemed to Maddie a clever way both to account for Devin’s absence and to gently depress Florence’s pretensions. At the same time she provided herself with an excuse not to accompany Florence on her shopping the next day—not that Florence had asked her to come, but she was likely to do so.

Even considering Florence’s chattiness, Maddie noticed that Geoffrey had even less to say than usual tonight; indeed, he looked tired and she hoped he was not unwell, but she did not remark on it since he listened attentively to the conversation and, furthermore, seemed to understand Maddie’s little subterfuge. He even winked companionably at her when Florence’s attention was elsewhere.

Maddie stayed for a last liqueur and a display of Florence’s trophies from the bazaar, then began to yawn discreetly and presently made her excuses, promising to telephone Florence the next day. Geoffrey insisted on escorting her back to her room, and they walked down the hall in a silence that Maddie concluded was natural to Geoffrey and not a constraint imposed on him by Florence’s greater than usual volubility this evening. At her door, however, he made a little bow and kissed her gloved hand lightly, saying, “Thank you for staying friends with Florence.”

Maddie had in fact been conscious again of her distaste for that supposed friendship, and Geoffrey’s words made her feel even more ashamed of her pettiness, but she said lightly, “Well, why should I not?”

Geoffrey smiled. “Florence can be a little ... overwhelming. And most people tire quickly of her conversation when they realize it is always about herself. But she does not mean it maliciously; she can be kindness itself to one who is simply willing to listen.”

“I know. Good night, Geoffrey.”

“Good-bye, my dear.”

Maddie let herself into her room as quietly as she could and went to see if Devin was still sleeping. He lay unmoving on the bed, his features barely distinguishable in the pale moonlight. She sat down on the side of the bed and looked at him, wondering what was different about him.

Then she realized that, unlike Teddy, he did not look younger in his sleep. Even the moonlight did not erase those faint lines around his eyes or smooth the rough skin on his hands. Only his hair seemed younger, tousled on the pillow; she reached out to touch it, then let her hand travel down to his mouth and was surprised yet again by the softness of his mustache.

He opened his eyes, but she stayed where she was, suspended for the moment by the unexpectedness of his waking so completely and silently; he didn’t even stretch. Her heart began to beat violently.

“Were you awake all along?”

“Only since you came in.”

“I tried not to make any noise.”

He smiled, and the mustache moved; she took her hand away. “It was the stealthiness that woke me,” he said.

“Must you leave now?”

“Do you want me to?”

“No.”

He did move then, reaching his hand up to pull her face down to his and kiss her. Then he moved one leg to pull her across the bed beneath him and deepened the kiss. She welcomed him, feeling the warmth spread from where their bodies met all through her, but then, when the warmth became heat, she shivered suddenly, as if to throw it off. All the while his hand caressed her neck, then her breast beneath the silk, and the curve of her hip. When his mouth followed his hand, she moaned and arched against him, inviting him to come yet closer.

Instead he raised his head to look at her. “You are so beautiful,” he said, wonderingly. He lowered his head only a little to kiss her lightly, his tongue flickering in and out of her mouth, tantalizing her at first, then making her eager for him to enter her there, to show her how he would claim her wholly. But he was in no hurry to fulfill his promises tonight.

She reached her arms up to stroke his back, and it registered on her that sometime in the night he had gotten up and taken off his clothes. She touched smooth, taut skin, and the contact stirred something deep inside her. She wanted to get closer still; she could never be close enough.

“Devin,” she breathed, “love me….”

It was only her clothing that was in the way now. Keeping his mouth close to hers, he raised his body enough to pull off her dress, then kissed her again and sat her up to remove the rest of her clothing, not so carefully or slowly as that time in the poppy field. She helped him, for she was in a hurry too, eager for that closeness. He pulled off her stockings last, and his hands rode back up her legs, stopping at her revealed core to impress her with the heat of his touch there, pressing her with passionate force under the palm of his hand until she began to writhe under it and call out to him.