Lessons in French (27 page)

root vegetables, and unable to attend the public proclamation that Trev had arranged to

give under the auspices of the president of the Agricultural Society. The colonel would

not remain long in the dark, however, as Trev had caused a copy of the Challenge to be

delivered to him by hand, courtesy of Monsieur Malempré, along with a bottle of

excellent French wine to rub salt in the wound.

Trev had at first felt a twinge of guilt over leading Davenport a dance, but then he'd

thought of how the fellow had taken Callie's bull and refused to sell it back for an honest

price. When he remembered her tearstained cheeks hidden under the bonnet, his brief

qualm vanished, replaced by a chilly desire to carve a liberal piece out of anyone who

made her unhappy. Knowing that he himself was not entirely blameless in that regard did

nothing to diminish his ire, but rather made him more inclined to exact revenge on

whatever culprit he could reach.

"Something is amiss, Monsieur?" Callie asked in a worried tone, gamely keeping to

French as she looked up sideways at him through the netting.

Trev realized that he was scowling, and softened his expression. "I beg your pardon,"

he replied, smiling down at her. "I was meditating on the shocking cost of pastries in this

town."

"I understand you," she said with feeling. "Mrs. Farr would take to her smelling salts if

she knew."

"We must pray that my bank will stand against the strain. But we have an hour or two

before we issue our announcement—what would you like to do? Take in the shops?"

"I would rather look at the animals," she said. She spoke very pretty French, he thought,

when she would venture to do so. It made him want to kiss her, to brush his mouth

against her lips while she formed the words. "Would it be possible?"

"Certainly. Whatever would please you the best, ma chérie." He flourished his cane and

pointed as they turned the corner to the wide street that was filling rapidly with all

manner of livestock for the show. Under the shadow of the cathedral spire, the scent of a

barnyard permeated the air. "Where shall we begin? Let us critique the pigs!"

"Do you make a study of pigs, Monsieur?" she asked, with a muff led note of

amusement.

"Of course. I've observed them frequently on my breakfast plate." They had neared the

first of the pens, where a stockman was lovingly bathing the ears of an enormously fat

spotted sow. Five piglets squealed and gurgled about her panting bulk. "Note the

marvelous coil of the tail." He gestured with his cane. "Absolute perfection!"

"And those ears," Callie said, nodding sagely. "She appears to have two!"

"Four legs," Trev added, cataloging all her points.

"Are you certain she has legs?" Callie asked dubiously. "I don't see any."

"They are hidden under her porcine vastness," he informed her. He tilted his head

speculatively as they reached the pen. "Unless she has wheels. Perhaps she rolls from

place to place?"

The handler glanced up, startled to hear a language not his own. Seeing a fashionable

lady and gentleman observing him, he straightened up and pulled his forelock, red-faced.

"An animal
par excellence,"
Trev said in thickly accented English as he indicated the

pig with an approving nod. He reached inside his coat and drew forth one of the printed

broadsides. "Myself, I have a bull."

The stockman took the bill and perused it with a serious air. He seemed to read it,

though Trev had made sure there were numerals in addition to words, for the edification

of the illiterate. A working man might not have book learning, but the number of guineas

was something that anyone would comprehend. "Looks to be a dead gun, sir," the

stockman said politely.

Trev was well aware of the local vernacular, but he affected surprise. "Dead? No, he is

alive, very much, I assure you!"

"Aw, no sir, I mean to say, he looks a dead good 'un, sir. Them's his length and breadth,

in'net?"

"And five hundred gold, you see there," Trev pointed out, "to say there is none to match

him."

The stockman grinned, showing spaces in his teeth. He shook his head. "Naw, sir, I fear

you'll be losing it. Him's a good big 'un you got there, but we've the biggest old bull ever

you seen, right here, comin' up today from Shelford."

"Indeed!" Trev said. "But I must see this animal. Who belongs to him?"

"Colonel Davenport has him now, but 'tis his late lordship's bull. The Earl of Shelford,

sir. They call him Hubert."

"Ah yes." Trev nodded wisely. "Of this bull I have had a great description. With red

and black—how do you say this—the spots—ah, mottles, eh? Hubert." He gave it the

French pronunciation, "Oo-bear". "I long to see him!"

"You'll see him, sir. Can't miss him, can you? He's the size of a house."

Trev turned to Callie and said in rapid French, "Good. Better to raise the challenge first,

before they all learn he's gone missing." He patted her arm and reverted to English again.

"And what do you think of this lovely pig, Madame?"

"A peeg of the first merit," she said obligingly, with such an earnest copy of his

overwrought enunciation that Trev found it difficult to keep a straight countenance.

"Indeed," he agreed. "Great good luck to you with this peeg,
mon ami."

The stockman thanked Trev with a gruff acknowledgment. They left him turning to his

curious neighbor with the broadside stretched out in his hand. From there, Trev was quite

certain, the word would spread. He had planted news of a bout often enough to know how

quickly intelligence could travel.

"But deplorably fat," Callie murmured as they walked away. "I cannot approve of it.

She will overheat."

Trev nodded gravely. "I thought I smelled bacon burning."

She gave a gurgle of laughter under her veil but then added in a troubled tone, "It's not

really a funning matter, though. It's become all the rage amongst the cottagers to show a

poor pig so fat that it cannot even get up without help. I fear they suffer for it. I mean to

write a letter to the society. I place full blame upon the judges for encouraging it."

He smiled. Only his Callie would champion the cause of leaner pigs for the greater

good of pigdom. "I daresay they will be eager to know your view of the matter." He

escorted her round a table where a woman was laying out molds of cheese in an artistic

fashion.

"Of course they won't," she said wryly. "They will say that they are only pigs, and I am

only a female— but pigs are most intelligent and feeling, I assure you. I taught one to

play a wooden f lute once."

"A f lute!"

She nodded. "I secured it between a pair of fire dogs, and he soon learned that he could

procure a bit of molasses if he made a note upon it. I stopped the holes for him, and he

would play 'Baa Baa Black Sheep.'"

"
Mon dieu." He shook his head. "And I was not ther
e to see it." He slid his fingers

between hers, so that their hands were clasped where they rested on his arm. She tilted

her head aslant, glancing up at him, but he could not detect her expression through the

veil. He wasn't sure if she knew just how difficult it had been for him to break off from

their lovemaking. He was in a state of exquisite torment even to walk beside her, with her

shoulder brushing his at every step. It was he who had conceived this grand plan of a

manufactured marriage, but he found now that what had seemed as if it would be a

diverting amusement was in fact a bittersweet ordeal.

If they had been married in truth, he would not have been strolling through a street full

of straw and bawling calves, that was a certainty. He would have had her on the sofa—

no, not the sofa, in the bed, stretched out on the sheets in very daylight, a long and slow

and leisurely discovery of her white skin and golden red curls.

"I shall write to the officers of the Agricultural Society, in any event," she continued. "I

would even—" She paused. "Well, they would never invite me to speak at the monthly

meeting, so I needn't fear that, but I
would."

He really very badly wanted to pull her up against him right there in the midst of the

street and kiss her ruthlessly. "You are a heroine," he said, lifting her fingers brief ly to

his lips. "A heroine of overstout pigs everywhere!"

"I doubt even the pigs would thank me," she admitted with a rueful chuckle. "I'm sure

they like their liberal dinners."

"Then you are my heroine," he said warmly.

Her fingertips moved slightly under his as she peeked up at him. He found that their

slow stroll had stopped somehow; he was distantly aware of geese honking from inside

their crates to his left, and a woman carrying a red hen on his right, but he stood looking

down at Callie like a callow boy gazing helplessly at the adored object of his affections,

unable to see more than a hazy shadow of her face but knowing just what her shy

sparkling smile was beneath the veil.

He was not a man who thought much of the future. He'd had enough of the expectations

and demands of his grandfather's extravagant fantasies as a boy. In the early days of his

boxing promotions, he'd had dreams of backing Jem Fowler to the Championship of

England, until that ended in the bout that killed Jem and left his wife and baby on Trev's

hands. It was a lesson. There were no more friends of his heart in the ring.

He maintained no ambitions for himself beyond arranging the next prize bout or

making good on the betting books he held. His very detachment was his strength. With

no particular desires or emotions to burden his judgment of the outcome, he was very

good at what he did. It did not ruin him to pay out on a losing stake, because he never

made odds that would break him.

It made no odds for him to think of the future now, but he couldn't seem to help

himself. It wasn't a real future; it was this moment of smiling down at her, extended

somehow into tomorrow, and the next day and the next, and he would never have to say

that he must go, or put her hand away from his, or hide what he felt, or lie. He was

profoundly weary of lies. He wished to be himself—if he could have settled on any

notion of who he might be.

Both of them seemed to realize at the same instant that they were stopping the way.

Callie gave a slight "oh!" and Trev stepped aside, escorting her up onto the pavement to

avoid a goat cart that desired to pass. As he raised his eyes from the curb and looked

ahead down the crowded street, he saw the certain end of any wishful reveries.

"Sturgeon!" he uttered, forgetting himself far enough to lapse into English. "God curse

the man."

Callie went stiff beside him. She gripped his arm and craned her neck to see past the

crowd.

"Don't look," he said, quickly turning her away and reverting to French. "He's down

beside the Green Dragon. The devil seize him, what's he doing here?" They were walking

now away from the danger, Trev restricting himself with an effort to a more casual pace.

He had thought Sturgeon had departed for London yesterday, when Colonel Davenport

came up to Hereford. That had been the word from Jock. He paused for a moment,

catching the eye of the "footman" who had been dogging them at a respectful distance.

The burly boxer came forward, bending his bewigged head to listen as Trev murmured

to him. Charles gave a brief nod as he took his instructions and stood back again, folding

his hands behind him.

"It seems I'm forced to be suddenly unwell, chérie," Trev said to Callie, pulling the

sheaf of broadsides from his coat. "I'm afraid you'll have to make the announcement.

Noon, at the prize platform."

"Me!" She gasped. "Oh no, I—"

"You must, love," he said. "I'm sorry. I can't let myself be recognized, or we'll all be in

the soup. You won't have to speak to the crowd. Just hand one of these to the secretary

and ask him to read it aloud on my behalf. Tell them I've been taken ill with a headache

but will be better presently. You needn't say much—remember that you don't speak

English well. Charles here will fetch the salver and the coins to display just before you

take to the stage."

"But—"

"No, attend to me." He touched her shoulder, cutting her off. "Go back to the

dressmakers' afterward to change. Lilly will be looking for you. Make some sort of

appearance as yourself this afternoon—see to your animals, walk out with Lilly. I'm

going back to Dove House for the night, to Maman, but I'll send word to you early

tomorrow." He pressed the papers into her unwilling hand. Without lingering to answer

her stammer of objections, he tipped his hat and kissed her fingers, and left her alone with

Charles in the street. Callie stood on the wooden platform with several of the officers of

the society, feeling as if everyone in the crowd could see right through her veil. She

hoped that Trev had made certain that her hair didn't show where the net was gathered at

her nape. There were familiar faces in the audience—Farmer Lewis and Mr. Downie and

any number of men who knew her perfectly well, waiting with looks of interest and

speculation as the secretary of the Agricultural Society stepped to the fore. The colonel

was not there—Trev had assured her he wouldn't be, but she was distressed to find that