Out of the Dark (4 page)

The movement slow but decisive, she lowered her gaze then stepped away from the man. Turning toward the panther, she led him the last few yards to the steps of the gallery. Extending the last shrimp puff, she waited until he had swallowed it down. Then she brought her hands together in a sudden, sharp clap.

“Go!” she cried as she clapped them again. “Scat!”

The panther shied, then surged around and bolted into the night. His body made a dark arc as he leaped to the brick walk. A solid thump came as his full weight struck the ground. He streaked away, a vanishing shadow. And all that was left was the night.

Lucien
Roquelaire
moved to her side. In quiet approbation, he said, “That was well done.”

She turned to look at him. “Was it? He is wounded. And now I may have made it easier for him to be hunted down because he will have lost some of his fear.”

“While the hunters have the excuse that he is dangerous since he has dared venture close to man. Yes, I see.” He went on with deliberation. “Perhaps if I called on you tomorrow we might discuss this problem?”

“I doubt there is a solution.” She glanced away into the dark. His suggestion was only a courtesy. What more could it be?

“Perhaps not,” he answered in whimsical tones. “But then, don’t you feel we have an obligation?”

“We?”

“Assuredly,” he answered. “Having claimed the panther as my own, I cannot desert him now. Or you.”

She gave him a straight look at last. “You owe me nothing.”

“But I do,” he said, reaching to take her hand and carry it to his lips. “You are something of an enigma, Mademoiselle. Because of it, I have escaped from my dark humors for an hour or two, and seem likely to have the same pleasure again. For these favors alone you are due my humble thanks and my homage.”

“I’m not sure what you mean,” she said shortly.

“Don’t you? Intended or not, you offer provocation that strikes me as very like a challenge. If you know anything of me, then there is one thing you may be sure.”

As he paused, she searched the dark depths of his eyes, wondering at the fierce light that gleamed there. Her voice unaccountably tight, she said, “And that is?”

He smiled, a slow twist of sensual, well-molded lips. “I thought you might have guessed, Mademoiselle. I never refuse a challenge.”

“Your intentions toward my stepdaughter cannot possibly be serious,” Madame
Decoulet
said sharply. “Can they?”

Lucien
Roquelaire
thought Anne-Marie’s stepmother appeared torn between amazement and disgust, hope and disbelief. He regarded the calculating glint in her china blue eyes and her upright, rigorously corseted figure while he fought the urge to return an acid answer. As much satisfaction as it might give him to put the woman in her place, that would not aid the purpose of his morning visit.

Shifting on the hideously uncomfortable horsehair settee that graced the parlor of Pecan Hill, he spoke in even tones. “I trust you have no objection?”

“None whatever.” The reply was prompt, simmering. The woman reached out a plump hand toward a bell that sat on the side table. “May I offer you coffee and cakes?”

He declined with every civility. It was not his purpose to be trapped into a long têté-a-têté with the woman across from him.

“Perhaps you might be tempted by something stronger? A julep, yes?... No? You’re quite certain?”

Madame
Decoulet
appeared disappointed, perhaps because he had removed the excuse for her to indulge in mid-morning refreshment. He shook his head as he shifted yet again while glancing around him. The parlor had recently been refurbished, or so it seemed; Gothic monstrosities of stiff mien and dark finish had been crammed in with older and more graceful Queen Anne pieces, while the plastered walls had been covered with flocked cloth figured with improbable shapes in muddy colors. He assumed the result was the handiwork of the new mistress of the house, since he could not feature the young woman he had met the evening before at the ball being comfortable in it.

Madame
Decoulet
favored him with a smile that was crimped at the edges. “I trust you will not regard my questions. I should be failing in my duty if I did not make some effort to discover the nature of your interest. To raise my poor stepdaughter’s hopes only to disappoint them would not be a kindness.”

“That is not my intention,” he said with the surface politeness that often came to his rescue when his patience was most strained.

“Indeed?” The woman gave a grunt of satisfaction.

Lucien was not particularly gratified by her approval. He had few illusions about his eligibility as a future husband.

Brought up by a harsh and overbearing father, he had spent a large portion of his younger years proving to all and sundry how unaffected he was by frequent applications of the whip. Then had come the string of duels, with the bitter feelings and whispered epithets that went with them. The only thing that had ended his wild career had been the deaths of his father and elder brother in a steamboat accident. Responsibility for his father’s vast holdings in land and real estate, in addition to the well-being of a younger brother and sister, had finally sobered him.

Parents among the French aristocracy of New Orleans took careful note of such a wild past, however. It did not give him a good opinion of Madame
Decoulet
to realize she was willing to welcome a libertine, gamester, and notorious duelist into the family in order to be rid of her stepdaughter.

His manner was barely polite as he spoke again. “Given your relationship to the lady, I quite understand that other matters take precedence over her welfare in your eyes. Should the situation warrant at a later date, it will naturally be my pleasure to discuss the matter with someone more closely related.”

The bosom of the woman who sat on the salon’s settee across from him swelled with indignation as she took his point. She contained herself, however, most likely because giving rein to her annoyance might lose her a possible
parti
for Anne-Marie. Through stiff lips, she said, “You will discover that her father is guided by me in these matters.”

“Nevertheless, there may be explanations required which I prefer to make to her natural guardian. Consider it a personal preference, if you like.”

“As you wish.” The tone of the words did not match their content.

He inclined his head. “If you are satisfied then, Madame, I will repeat my earlier inquiry: Is Mademoiselle
Decoulet
at home?”

“She is about the place somewhere,” the stepmother snapped. “With such an odd girl it’s difficult to say where she might be at any given moment.”

“Yet you have the responsibility for watching over her,” Lucien suggested with acid in his voice. “I assume she is not close by or you would have sent for her before now. If you would be so kind as to give me her general direction, I will save you the trouble of a search.”

“You must do as you please,” Madame
Decoulet
said through pinched lips. “It’s possible you may run her to earth if you care to walk in the direction of the barns; there was some mention of a new litter of kittens. Don’t blame me, however, if the effort is for nothing.”

“Certainly not,” he said, rising to his feet with a short bow. “I’m sure you are anxious for me to discover her.”

Lucien did not find her at the barn, nor at the stable, the plantation hospital, the nursery, or the dairy. She was not in the kitchen garden or any other place a daughter of the house might be expected to visit. Still, he was able to inspect all these places in the course of his rounds, as well as the cooperage and the sugar mill. The exercise was sufficient to gauge the extent of the holdings owned by her father.

Their size and prosperous condition suggested a reason her stepmother was so anxious to have Anne-Marie off her hands. The young lady would doubtless be heiress to a considerable fortune one day unless Madame
Decoulet
could find a way to separate her from her father. The circumstances meant little to Lucien, since he had no need for a wealthy bride, but it seemed that the young lady was in need of a strong husband to look after her interests.

It was his experience that plantation children were always aware of everything worth knowing about what went on around a place. Since he had collected an escort of at least a dozen grinning youngsters, he finally resorted to asking for information about their young mistress. Several knew where to find her; that much was plain to see. It was also obvious they were not inclined to part with the information.

“What you want with her?”

The question came from a sturdy young black boy with a pugnacious stare. Lucien was diverted at having his intentions questioned again, this time from what appeared to be true concern. He lifted a brow. “I am paying a courtesy call, or trying my poor best. It’s customary after a ball, you know.”

“You courting
Mam’zelle
?” There was no relenting in the dark, liquid gaze.

Was he? Lucien was beginning to wonder. “Now that I can’t tell you. It’s remotely possible.”

“Maybe she don’t want to see you. Maybe she don’t want to see no
menfolks
a-tall.”

The questioner put his fists on his hips and pushed out his bottom lip. It seemed that Mademoiselle
Decoulet
had a protector. Lucien said quietly, “If she doesn’t want to see me, then I will go away again. I will not hurt your
Mam’zelle
, I promise.”

The boy considered that for some seconds before he gave a short nod. “I’ll show the way. But
Mam’zelle
must say if she wants you.”

That thought had intriguing possibilities. “What are we waiting for? Lead on, my friend.”

“Name’s James.” Without waiting for more, the boy whirled and made off at a fast pace.

The way led across the wide pasture that lay behind the barn, then across a creek and down through the woods. The boy James barreled through tall grass, weeds gone to seed, briars, and vines like a puppy on a home trail. Lucien fought his way past the impediments with the help of the sword cane he wore in place of a dress cane, but was ruefully aware of sacrificing his favorite boots to the quest.

Topping a small rise after some minutes of walking, they came to a clearing under the shaded canopy of tall oaks. At the edge was a spring with mossy banks around which grew ferns so thick they blanketed the ground in rich, vibrant green. Cool and secluded, stippled by the sunlight striking through the foliage overhead, it was a perfect retreat. There they found Anne-Marie.

She was frolicking in the middle of the clearing, running and tussling with what appeared to be a large dog. An instant later, Lucien caught his breath as he saw that the animal was no dog, but the shining black panther from the night before.

The sun through the trees made a golden halo around her hair that spilled in loose waves down her back. It touched the skin of her face with the shimmering translucence of pearls. As she ran and romped in an old day gown that was minus hoops and petticoats, the light outlined the shape of her body with gentle fidelity. The pale nonentity of the night before, with the tight coiffure and tighter manners, had been replaced by a wood nymph.

Free and graceful as that classical spirit of the forests, the turns of her arms, the curves of waist and hips, had a natural comeliness that surpassed mere beauty. Her smiles were quick and without shadow, her laugh rang out with the clear sweet sound of untrammeled joy.

At the same time, there was a fey quality about her, something not quite of the mundane world with its worries about money and conventional behavior. It was not simply that she had no fear of the wild beast at her feet, but rather that she celebrated the wildness of its nature, and of her own.