French Leave (16 page)

“Ah, yes,” said Conor, unmoved. “With her own true love. I confess it had slipped my mind.”

“Understandable,” murmured Barbary. “It being a matter of such slight significance to you.”

“Precisely,” agreed Conor.

Miss Barbary had told Master Conor
what?
“Oh, miss!” said Tibble, from the stove.

Conor ignored this strange comment. He studied his wife’s cousin, who in her own turn was studying the Oriental vase which she inexplicably clutched.

His wife’s cousin. Conor marveled. Profligate he knew himself to be, but he would not have thought himself depraved. Yet he had made love to his wife’s cousin as easily as if she had been his wife. Admittedly Conor had made love to his fair share of women these past months—rather more than his share, if the truth be told—and without experiencing the least degree of guilt. It was not, he told himself, as if he had taken advantage of Mab. She had sought him out. But Mab was Barbary’s mirror-image. The whole business seemed perverse.

Perhaps it was the perversity that drew him. Conor had few illusions about himself. “I did not come here to quarrel with you,” he said in what he hoped was a reasonable tone. “You must see you cannot keep me in further ignorance of what is going on.”

Could she not? Barbary hoped to do precisely that. How she regretted the fit of folly that had inspired her to say that she was Mab. On the other hand, had she not said it, Conor might well have throttled her right there in the Jardin des Plantes. “I think you would prefer to be kept in ignorance. I know I would myself.”

“You think incorrectly.” Again Conor marveled at the uncanny familiarity he felt with this woman he had just met. “You will allow me to make that decision for myself.”

Barbary had a sudden impulse to make a clean breast of things to Conor. “I suppose you could not care for someone who told you an untruth,” she sighed.

“No,” replied Conor, “I could not. I had my fill of taradiddles during my marriage to your cousin. Why are the police asking questions about you?”

Barbary contemplated the Oriental vase and wished that she might hurl it at Conor’s head. He had a monstrous poor opinion of the woman who had been his wife.

But she had known that. Barbary supposed there was some consolation in that he was still attracted to her. Not that he would be if he knew who she was. The cream of the jest was that the attraction was mutual. So much for her fine notions of revenge.

Conor watched the expressions flit across her face. Barbary had acted just this way when he insisted that she tell him something she didn’t wish him to know. It never failed to annoy him, and he felt that same way now. He couldn’t decide if he wished to shake Mab or to crush her in his arms.

Amazing, to feel so strongly about a stranger. “I’m waiting,” he said.

Yes, and he obviously was prepared to do so until doomsday. “Very well. The police believe that I am withholding either—or both!—an escaped Jacobin or a missing Duc.”

“They suspect you of what?” Conor had not expected this. If she was involved in matters political, Mab was very different from her cousin indeed.

“You did not misunderstand me.” Barbary stood up. “Since you are so determined to know the truth, help me with this kayak.”

What had the kayak to do with anything? As Conor lent her his assistance, the memory of their last encounter was vivid in his mind. He would not have thought anyone could look so damned desirable in so drab a gown. Had Tibble not been present, he might have pulled her down with him on the divan. Surreptitiously he slid his hand along her hip. She blushed. He was charmed.

The kayak was proving surprisingly difficult to turn over. “It’s all right!” said Barbary. “You can let go.” This statement startled Conor, who had let go her hip to help with the kayak. Suddenly it came up in the air, causing him to almost lose his balance. When he had untangled himself from the kayak, he stared at the stranger who lay upon the divan.

The gentleman was certainly worthy of attention, clad as he was in a toga and a laurel wreath and clutching a cluster of plaster grapes.
“Mon Dieu!”
he gasped. “I wakened in the darkness and I thought it was the darkness of the grave.” There was a bandage on his brow.

Tibble came forward. “It’s that sorry I am, sir. It was the best I could do. We had only the briefest warning when Miss Barbary was at the door.”

“Miss
Barbary?”
Indefinable emotions assaulted Conor upon hearing his wife’s name.

Tibble looked guilty. “Miss Mab, that is! I get them confused.”

“And so you wakened to find yourself interred in a kayak,” Barbary interrupted quickly, and smiled at the Duc. “What a horrid turn it must have given you! You will forgive us, I hope.”

“Forgive my ministering angel?” The Duc caught and kissed her hand. “I should forgive you anything.”

Barbary snatched back her hand. Here was a complication she had not envisioned when she sought to encourage the Duc’s feelings for Mab.

Conor had not missed this byplay. Perhaps Barbary was not the only member of the family who was a tremendous flirt. “So the suspicions of the police are not entirely without foundation. Who is this, the Jacobin or the Duc?”

“Ah, the Jacobin!” said the Duc cheerfully. “My name is Edouard. And you, m’sieur?”

Conor introduced himself. He’d be damned if he knew what to make of all this. Perhaps Edouard could tender the explanations that Mab appeared so determined to withhold.

Thus applied to, Edouard spread his hands in a charmingly Gallic gesture. “I have no answers, alas.
I have lost my memory, m’sieur.”

Conor was taking an unreasonable but quite large dislike to this charming Frenchman. “That must be bloody inconvenient for you.”

“Not at all,” said Edouard cheerfully. “Now that my head has ceased to ache. Or perhaps it is—assuredly it must be—but it is not important, since I cannot recall. It will all come back to me at some point, I daresay. In the meantime I am content to be here with the good Tibble and Miss Mab.”

Conor would have been similarly content, which didn’t inspire him with kinder feelings toward the gentleman whom he perceived as his rival. “How the devil did you get here?” he inquired.

“Oh, do not ask!” said Barbary. “It is much too long and complicated a story to tell. Now you understand why the interest of the police is so inconvenient. I regret to have involved you in all this.”

Conor also regretted his involvement. He regretted that he’d visited the Jardin des Plantes and spoken to the woman who looked so much like his wife. Clearly the wounded Edouard was quite
épris
in that direction. Conor could not imagine that this infatuation had been formed without encouragement.

He knew Mab to be a woman of strong passions. Apparently she indulged them with great latitude. Dog-in-the-mangerish though it might be in him, Conor didn’t think he approved. “It’s a little late for regrets,” he said grimly. “The question is, how the devil do we get you out of this fix?”

“Oh!” Barbary was touched by his concern. “I didn’t think— That is, this is our muddle. You need not involve yourself.”

“I already am involved.” Conor’s tone left no one with the notion that he might be pleased by the fact. “You are cousin to my wife. I feel an obligation to do what I may for you and your—friend.”

“My— You think—” It was obvious that he thought again she’d played him false. In that most inconvenient moment, Barbary realized that she was still in love with her spouse. “Not mine! My cousin’s!” she gasped.

“Your cousin!” Conor frowned. “You said your cousin had eloped.”

So she had. “Yes, well!” stammered Barbary.

Her thought processes were not speeded when Conor grabbed her and gave her a good shake. “The devil fly away with both you and your cousin! I’ll have the truth. Now!”

The spectators of this scene each tried in his own way to make peace. “Oh, Master Conor!” cried Tibble, and wrung his hands.
“Pardon,
M’sieur Conor,” said Edouard, “but it would be
very difficult for Miss Mab to tell you anything while you rattle the teeth in her head.”

Conor could not deny this logic. “Very well then! But I’ll have the truth, damn you!” he said, and let her go.

Barbary raised her hands and pushed back her hair, which had come unpinned. She wished the Duc had not intervened, because she had enjoyed her shaking very well. Now she would tell Conor the truth, and he would condemn her for her conduct and turn his face against her once more.

So be it. She might as well get it over with. Barbary took a deep breath. Before she could speak, from the direction of the divan came a muffled sneeze.

All eyes turned to the Duc. He looked surprised.

Was a policeman secreted on the premises? Conor snatched up one of Tibble’s pistols from the table where they lay and thrust it under the divan. “Come out or I’ll blow your blasted head off!”

“No, no, Master Conor!” Tibble hurried forward and tugged at Conor’s arm. “Begging your pardon, sir, but you must not!”

“Oh?” Conor was in the devil’s own temper at this point. “And why must I not, pray?”

Prayer might not have been amiss in that moment. “Because it’s Miss—” On the verge of saying “Mab,” Tibble bit his tongue. “It’s the other one!”

The other one? Prey to a nasty presentiment, Conor stepped back. Tibble bent and helped the hidden person emerge from beneath the divan. Golden hair, sapphire eyes, a fashionable blue gown. “Hell and the devil confound it!” said Conor, not best pleased to thus encounter his estranged wife.

Chapter Nineteen

To avoid undue confusion, it seems expedient at this point in our narrative to refer to the cousins by their correct names. Tibble knew the truth, of course, as Conor and the Duc did not—and to further complicate matters, Mab was wearing one of Barbary’s gowns, her own having been hopelessly bloodied, and Barbary having borrowed her only spare.

Tibble helped Mab onto the divan. Her face was pale and her wounded arm had begun to bleed anew, to the detriment of Barbary’s pretty dress. Tibble tsk’d and went to fetch a fresh bandage. “There are two of you,”
observed Edouard. “This explains a great deal.”

So far as Conor was concerned, nothing was explained at all. He scowled at the woman he took to be his wife. “What the devil happened to your arm?”

“She was shot,” Barbary said quickly, before Mab could speak. Did Conor hear Mab’s voice, the fat would be truly in the fire. “That’s why the police were searching here. And why she was hidden, so they would see that I had not been shot and think their information was false.”

The Duc watched Tibble affix a fresh bandage to Mab’s arm. “A risky business, being a Jacobin,” he observed. Mab glanced at him. He smiled. She did not return the smile but leaned back among the pillows, looking glum.

His wife had changed, thought Conor. Once it had been her nature to return the smile of every gentleman who glanced her way. Amazing to discover that he felt nothing at all for her, except perhaps surprise to find her in such a predicament. Who would have thought that Barbary would turn passionate over politics? Certainly not he. Yet here she was, with a bullet wound in her arm. And where was this mysterious lover with whom she had ridden off into the sunset? He looked again at the divan. Very cozy she looked, snuggled up to Edouard.

But of course she would. Where Barbary was, so must be her own true love. Conor was stunned to realize his wife’s own true love was a Jacobin. Since Conor had no inclinations in that political direction—certainly he had never put either himself or his wife in the way of stopping bullets—it was no wonder they did not suit.

Perhaps  some husbandly show of interest was called for. “Since when do you involve yourself with Jacobins?” Conor inquired. “When last we met, your foremost concern was how Grenville would like you in your new dress.”

Mab responded to his questions with a blank look. “It is not kind of you to remind her!” Barbary said quickly. “Or to plague her with questions just after she has been shot.”

Conor could not care for this intervention, or for the inference that his wife needed protection from himself. “That is hardly your business. She
is
my wife.” Edouard arched an eyebrow.

What a brute Conor was. How desperately she loved him. “And she is my cousin, and you are bullying her!” Barbary snapped. “At any rate, I thought you did not wish to see your wife.”

Conor scowled at the divan. “In that, at least, you are correct.”

Of course she was. Damn and blast. “Then perhaps you should stop looking like a thundercloud and leave her alone.”

Looked like a thundercloud, did he? Conor scowled at the source of this insult. She scowled back at him, hands on her slim hips. What a virago she looked, her golden hair disheveled and tumbled down around her shoulders, her sapphire eyes sparkling with rage. Odd, but Mab seemed more to Conor like the Barbary he remembered than Barbary did herself. He certainly felt much more strongly about her than he did about his wife—although, since he had vowed he wouldn’t lift a finger to prevent his wife going to the devil in a handcart, perhaps he shouldn’t have been surprised.

But he couldn’t allow that to happen. Any trouble of Barbary’s must reflect disastrously upon her cousin. Conor wasn’t certain how he felt about Mab— aside from wanting her, that is—but he didn’t wish to see her in the hands of the police. He didn’t wish to see her in any hands but his own, and what he would do with her once he got her there remained to be seen. “I would like to leave her alone, but she still bears my name. Therefore I am in the unenviable position of tidying up the messes she leaves behind her, which apparently includes everything from unpaid bills to wounded Jacobins.”

This was very bad. Barbary hadn’t known that Conor had paid her accounts. Still, he didn’t need to speak of her life in such disparaging terms. “I’m sure my cousin asked you to do no such thing!” she snapped. “Anyway, you may thank yourself for at least part of it, because if you hadn’t been so busy with your gaming clubs and your opera dancers, she wouldn’t have been left to make a byword of herself.”