My Naughty Minette (20 page)

“I wish August might have joined us tonight,” she said, as the footmen came to clear the ravaged dessert plates. “Lady Barrymore could not spare him.”

“I imagine the truth is that he didn’t wish to face me,” said Warren. “What a coward he’s become.”

“He’s not a coward.” Minette frowned at her brother. “And the ‘truth’ is that he stayed back to be with Lady Barrymore because she’s feeling poorly. If he doesn’t want to be around you, perhaps it’s because you’ve treated him badly when you ought to have been a friend.”

Arlington arched a fine, bronze brow. “I believe you’ve just had a scold, Warren.”

Her brother frowned back at her. She didn’t wish to annoy him. She loved him beyond measure, but she loved her husband too and she couldn’t bear to hear him disparaged.

“Do you really think I’ve treated him badly?” Warren asked.

“Yes, I do,” said Minette. “I think you’ve made him feel defensive and ashamed at every opportunity. It wouldn’t hurt for you to extend him an olive leaf.”

“An olive branch?”

“Whatever. Branch, leaf. Whatever will make the two of you stop glowering at one another.”

“Oh, my dear,” sighed Arlington. “They glowered at one another long before you and August wed.”

“I think I’ve shown admirable patience,” said her brother, sitting up straighter in his chair. Josephine laid a hand on his arm, which he appeared not to notice. “Considering his behavior toward you, both before and after you married, I think I’ve exhibited a great deal of restraint. I ought to have called him out the very day he ruined you. I may still call him out.”

Arlington looked heavenward and Josephine tsked. Minette bristled, standing from her chair. “You most certainly will not. If you do, I’ll stand right in front of him so whatever you do to him, you can very well do to me first.”

“You would take a pistol shot for him?”

“Of course I would.”

Josephine broke into appreciative applause. Warren muttered to Arlington, “She is never polite and boring when she converses with me.”

“But it’s wonderful that she’s in love,” said Josephine, taking Minette’s hand. “I find it very romantic that you should stand between your husband and brother and be shot, or run through with a sword, or whatever grisly method they chose to settle their accounts.”

“There will be no settling of accounts,” Minette insisted.

“Josephine, please, don’t work her up.” Warren held out a hand to her. “Minette, come here and give me a kiss.”

She went to her brother’s side, into his arms that felt so familiar. He kissed her on the forehead and then held her face between his palms.

“I won’t call out your husband. As long as you’re happy, I’m happy.” He said this lightly, but his deep blue eyes searched hers. “Are you happy?”

“Of course I am.” She looked away so he couldn’t study her too closely. He’d mistake the tiniest bit of doubt as a very big deal. He turned from her and smiled at his wife, a smile which seemed especially...loving. Dear Josephine was only three months from having her baby. She was round and glowing and so pretty. No wonder Warren looked at her that way. If only August would stare at her so, with such admiration and longing. Perhaps if he was happier, more at ease in his life. Minette kept thinking about his musical expertise, and how much good it might do her husband to bring his secret talents into the light of day. Why, he would surely begin to feel more proud and content, and happier in general. Even better, he’d be grateful to her for giving him that wifely little push.

Minette cleared her throat and drew back from her brother’s embrace. “I have a question for you, Warren, and you too, Arlington. Did you know August composes music?”

“I didn’t,” said Warren. “I knew he played, but I didn’t know he wrote.”

“He composes music?” Arlington asked. “What sort of music?”

“Concertos and symphonies and sonatas, mountains of them,” said Minette. “He’s written them all by hand, marking the notes and measures and various notations with his own pen. There are pages and pages of it at the house.”

Arlington and Warren looked at each other, genuinely shocked.

“How difficult that must be,” Josephine said, “to write entire concertos.”

“I think he could be famous if he wanted, as famous as Mozart or Bach,” Minette told them. “I’ve brought some of his work to show you, only a fraction of what’s there. He’s got cabinets full.”

“Cabinets, eh?” asked Warren. “Wherever does he find the time?”

“He doesn’t sleep much these days.”

Warren and Arlington exchanged another look. Minette crossed to the side table to fetch the portfolio she’d snuck out of the house. Not that August would object to her sharing the music with his friends. Well, he probably wouldn’t object. If only he were not so shy about his talents, when he ought to be proud!

“I was hoping you might play it for me and tell me what you think,” she explained. “You know, whether it was good enough to be published by the music printers. August has been so tense and distracted lately, and sad about his father. I thought it might cheer him to see his music in the shops. Why, our friends might buy it, and play it in their parlors, and congratulate him on what a clever musician he is.”

Warren looked doubtful, but when he opened the leather case and saw all the pages of musical notation, his expression changed. “Blast,” he murmured. “This is a full bloody suite.”

Josephine chided him for his language, but Minette felt a secret thrill that the dense display of notes had shocked and impressed her brother. “Arlington?” Warren said, looking up. “I never had a hand at music. Play it for us, will you?”

The duke took the pages, flipped through them with a rustle of lace cuffs, then headed through the dining room into the parlor beyond. He sat at the pianoforte, arranging the music as Josephine and Minette settled on the divan. “Turn pages for me?” Arlington asked Warren.

“Yes, Your Grace,” Warren muttered. “If you can’t be bothered to turn them yourself.”

“Very good. I may be a bit out of practice,” he said.

He began to play, and Minette thought that it sounded awfully fine, even if Arlington was out of practice. The piece began with lyrical stately chords, easy for the duke’s long fingers. These soon transformed to a complex melody, a beautiful arrangement of notes. Louder, softer, slower, faster. Arlington smiled as he played a particularly dramatic bit.

“I say, this is grand.” He paused as Warren was late turning a page.

“Do you know, he doesn’t even write it at the pianoforte?” said Minette. “He hears it all in his head.”

“Even with you chattering in the background?” teased her brother.

The piece lightened, notes tripping over one another in a dizzying cascade of harmony. Arlington stumbled, stopped, squinted at the page, and tried again twice before he got through the sequence. “Damn him,” he said with good nature. “No pity for the clods who have to play it.”

Josephine listened in awe. “It’s amazing, Minette. You must be so proud of your husband.”

Minette felt a flush of pleasure rise in her cheeks. It wasn’t her place to be proud, for she hadn’t written the music, but she was indeed very proud on her husband’s behalf. When Arlington came to the end of the first movement, he stopped and cracked his fingers while Warren leafed through the rest of the folio.

“You say he has more like this?” asked Warren.

“Yes, so much more. I wish everyone could hear it.”

“Indeed, it’s a fine piece of music,” said Arlington. “But it must be August’s decision to share it with the world.”

Minette felt the first pangs of conscience, that she had brought this music here without her husband’s permission. “He doesn’t wish to show it to anyone,” she confessed. “I only hate that no one knows how talented he is. Why, I didn’t know until I found him composing in his study, and he pretended it was nothing, a trifling pastime. I think he can be...shy.”

“I think he can be stubborn,” said Warren. “If he doesn’t want to share his music, he won’t.”

“But he should.”

“Yes, he should,” said Arlington, looking back at the music. “It’s a shame not to share such work.”

“Poor Minette,” said Josephine. “It’s difficult when you don’t agree with your husband. I also believe he ought to share his talents with the world, and perhaps one day you can convince him to do so. That’s what makes a good marriage, you know—looking out for your partner and helping them become the most whole and full person they can be.”

Warren sat on Josephine’s other side and caught her in an embrace. “I’ve made you whole and full, haven’t I?” he joked, smoothing a hand over her rounded belly. Josephine grinned back at him, her cheeks going pink in a spreading blush.

The two of them were so in love, Minette could hardly bear to look at them. Even Arlington, the rakish bachelor, seemed charmed by their display.

Please
, Minette thought.
Please let August love me this way too. Someday. Some way. Let him make me whole and full, and let me make him happy.

God, yes. Happy most of all.

*** *** ***

Minette arrived home in a vexing state of delight mixed with devastation. She was delighted that she’d had a wonderful evening with her brother and her sister-in-law, and that Arlington had been kind enough to play some of August’s concerto before he headed off.

She was devastated because August’s music was even more beautiful than she’d imagined it would be.

Nothing seemed right in her life, although she ought to be happy. Why, she might be Lord Barrymore, dying of a horrible, painful disease that had rendered him insane. She might be Lady Barrymore, about to lose her husband. She might be August, about to lose his father, and married to an annoying wife. How selfish she was, to feel sad when everyone around her was suffering so much.

She must go to her husband and see how his evening had gone with Lady Barrymore, and inquire how his father fared, but first she must replace the music she’d taken before it was missed. She made her way to the study, the folio tucked securely beneath her cloak. She pushed open the door, finding the fire low and the desk empty. Thank goodness. She scurried over to the cabinet, opening the correct drawer and putting the music back exactly the way she’d found it.

“Minette.”

She froze. August’s voice drew out her name’s two syllables in exasperation. She turned to find him frowning at her from a couch against the far wall.

“Why did you have my music with you?” he asked. “Why did you take it from this room without my permission?”

“Well... I was only...”
Think, Minette.
“I thought... I was going to look through it and perhaps find a passage I was capable of playing.”

“You’ve been away all evening.”

“I was going to...try to...play it at my brother’s.”

He looked at her in a very hard way. “I know you took it to your brother’s, and I know you showed it to all of them. Arlington came to see me afterward. Imagine my surprise when he told me he’d just played some of my work.”

“He did a very good job of it. Not a perfect job. He said he was out of practice, but I still thought it sounded wonderful.”

“Oh, he had plenty to say about how wonderful it was, and how I ought to sell it to the music publishers, and put on concerts, and other such nonsense that sounded a lot like something you would say.”

“None of it’s nonsense,” she said, sticking out her chin. “I knew you would never show them, and so I thought I had better do it for you.”

“You thought that, did you?” he asked in a low and frightening voice. He stood and crossed his arms over his chest. “Even after I warned you to leave it alone?”

“You didn’t really say so, did you? Not in so many words.”

“Come here.” His voice sounded very sharp now. Minette edged instead toward the door.

“I didn’t mean any harm,” she insisted. “I was trying to make you happier.”

“Happier? You know what would make me happier, Minette? A wife who obeys me. A wife who doesn’t lie and sneak about and go expressly against my wishes in order to do whatever she pleases. A wife who doesn’t visit courtesans or browse my friend’s lurid book collection or steal my music to show others. A wife who doesn’t run from me!”

Minette nearly made it out of the room before he grabbed her and hauled her back. He kicked the door shut with a resounding bang and pulled her over to the couch.

“I’m sure you won’t wish to punish me in such a tumultuous mood,” she said, struggling to remain upright.

If only he were not so much stronger than her. He bent her over his lap and gathered up her skirts before she could catch a breath, much less plead her case.

“You wish me in a less tumultuous mood?” he asked, corralling her arms behind her back. “You’re fortunate you weren’t here earlier, when Arlington visited and rang a peal over my head.
Why didn’t you tell us? Why aren’t you in the concert halls? Why don’t you hold a recital next season at my house?
”

“I think that sounds like a wonderful idea.”

August must not have agreed. He commenced to punish her bottom with a series of stinging spanks. “It is
not
a wonderful idea,” he said. “I told you very clearly my music is private. If I wished to share it with Arlington and the Warrens, and all of bloody London, then I would have. But I haven’t, have I? And I doubt I ever will.” As he lectured, he spanked her again and again, sharp, firm cracks on either cheek.

“You are not being fair,” Minette cried.

“I’m being entirely fair. You’ve behaved poorly and disobeyed me—again. How many times is it now?”

“But I only wanted—
oww!
I was only trying to do a good thing, so I think it is very cruel of you to punish me for it.” He disregarded her pleas and dealt her a firm blow to the underside of her bottom. “Ow! Oh, please!”

She tried to shield herself but he caught her hand and held it in an unforgiving grip. “If you don’t wish to be punished,” he said, “then the solution is simple. Learn to obey me.”

“
Ow!
Please, I hate that you are doing this to me when I only meant to do a thoughtful thing for you. You’re not being fair. You’re not listening to me.”