The Adventuress (3 page)

When we arrived in Cannes, each member of the party was assigned rooms in the town's best hotel, located in the eastern end of La Croisette, the wide, fashionable avenue skirting the coast of the Mediterranean. To my mind, we were a motley party: English nobility, American robber barons, and a collection of nouveau riche from both sides of the pond. I hated myself for sounding like my mother, but in this instance, I could not help myself.

“It is not that I object to Americans,” I said, doing my best to explain myself to two of my dearest friends. We had taken a table in the center of the hotel's terrace, a large, beautifully landscaped space, surrounded by graceful palms between which one could watch a steady stream of elegant tourists walking along the sea. Mimosas, orchids, and hyacinths brimmed over vases on each table, their bright colors contrasting with the deep azure of the sky and the seemingly endless stretch of water in front of us. “You of all people know that perfectly well, Margaret, but this American in particular—”

“She is even prettier than you are. I hated her the moment I laid eyes on her.” Margaret Michaels, whom I had met while in the last days of mourning for the death of my first husband (and who had, as previously mentioned, once pretended to be in love with Jeremy), was a Bryn Mawr–educated American who had skillfully persuaded her parents to accept an Oxford don rather than a duke for a son-in-law.

“Heavens, Margaret, how I have missed you!”

“You are both jealous.” Cécile du Lac waved for a nearby waiter and ordered more champagne. “It is unseemly.”

“We are not jealous,” I said. “It is just that, well, Jeremy is—”

“Bainbridge is no longer mooning over you and you feel the loss keenly. It is to be expected. I cannot count the number of times I warned you that it would, eventually, happen.” Cécile, a stunning and elegant Parisian of a certain age, was my confidante, the one person other than my husband who understood every dark corner of my soul.

“When Jeremy did moon over me it was only for show,” I said, frowning. “He used me as an excuse to avoid marriage.”

“Perhaps.” Cécile shrugged. “But who would not enjoy a constant stream of attention from a gentleman so longed for by the rest of society, even if he is not nearly so handsome as your own husband?”

“Her own husband is Adonis,” Margaret said. “Even Mr. Michaels admits as much.”

“I do wish you would stop calling him
Mr. Michaels
, Margaret. You have been married for how many years now?” I asked. I leaned over to make it easier for the waiter to refill my glass with champagne.

“You have met him, Emily. Could you call him Horatio? It does not suit him in the least.”

“No, it does not,” I admitted. Margaret's husband, a dear, serious man, and a scholar of Latin, rarely left Oxford. He and his wife were a perfect match, leading a life full of raging intellectual arguments and the exchange of semiobscene Latin poetry.

“Mr. Michaels would be mortified by Miss Wells,” Margaret said. “She is everything he despises about Britain.”

“She is American,
ma chérie
,” Cécile said.

“Precisely. I would not have dreamed of letting him accompany me here. I do think Miss Wells would have pushed him so far over the edge that he may well have been unable to speak coherently again in any language other than Latin. Perhaps that is why I object so vehemently to her. Her mere presence would destroy my husband's will to live.”

“That is unfair. She is a lovely girl!” Cécile drained her glass and signaled for another refill.

“She is,” I said. “Stunningly beautiful. Bright. Refined when necessary, but otherwise in possession of a passion for life my mother would find wholly unacceptable.”

“Rather like you, Kallista.” Cécile had always objected to my Christian name and chose instead to call me by the nickname bestowed upon me by my first husband. “Perhaps you are too similar to get along.”

“That is such a cliché.” I bunched up my napkin, frustrated, and flung it onto the table. “I object to Miss Wells not as an individual, but as a spouse for Jeremy. She is a flawless example of studied perfection. It is as if everything she does has been carefully designed to attract him. Heaven only knows what she is really like. We are not bound to find out until well after the wedding.”

“I cannot agree with that, Emily,” Margaret said. “I think we are seeing her true self, and unfortunately that true self is intolerable. She is not like Emily, Cécile. She is obnoxious and crass and—” She stopped and smiled too sweetly, looking over my shoulder. “So nice to see you, Miss Wells. Won't you join us for some champagne?”

“I can think of nothing I should better enjoy. Garçon, another chair for this table please!” Her voice as she called for the waiter grated on my nerves. It was an octave too low and a level too loud. Furthermore, she had a manner with staff that bothered me. She was in every way technically polite, but at the same time managed to convey that she thought herself superior to them. I did not like it. “You girls must call me Amity. Jeremy is so fond of you all that I feel as if you will be like my sisters, and sisters ought not address each other in formal terms.”

“Were I your sister, Mademoiselle Wells, I should be most concerned about our parents,” Cécile said. “I am very nearly of an age with them.”

“Oh, Cécile, you are simply too very! I don't know how I ever lived before knowing you.”

“One shudders at the thought.” Cécile drained her glass. “I fear there is not enough champagne in Cannes.”

“Perhaps that is why I have always preferred whisky. Please don't share that with my mother.” Miss Wells bubbled with sultry laughter. “Margaret, I must tell you how I laughed at Jeremy's story of your false courtship. I cannot remember ever before being so amused.”

“Yes.” Margaret pressed her lips into a firm line.

Amity gulped down her glass of champagne. “I have come to inform you that we are all going for a stroll along La Croisette this evening before dinner. The light is so lovely as the sun starts to set. I have promised the gentlemen cigars for the occasion. I do hope you can tolerate them smoking.”

“I would prefer to join them,” Margaret said.

Miss Wells grinned. “My dear, you really are simply too very. I would smoke with you but promised my darling Jeremy that I would only do it when we are alone so that his friends aren't scandalized. I imagine your own divine husband wouldn't look kindly on the activity, would he, Emily? Although I suspect he is far more enlightened than his dignified exterior suggests. Still waters and all that. At any rate, we shall take a turn along the sea before we eat. The boys are off to the casino afterward for a party I've organized. I thought it would be nice for them to have some time away from us ladies. I don't like to stifle them. Ah! I see them now. Ta-ta, girls!” She stood up and excused herself, flitting across the street to the edge of the beach, where Jeremy and some of his friends were standing.

“I cannot put my finger on what it is, precisely, that I don't like about her,” I said, “but there is something that rings decidedly untrue. She is an extremely beautiful chameleon. She likes cigars when Margaret does, whisky when Jeremy fancies it.”

“As I have already said, it is jealously.” Cécile's smile resembled that of a cat. “And it is unbecoming in a lady.”

Three hours later we gathered in front of the hotel, where Amity lined us up, two by two, like schoolchildren. “I want us all to get to know each other better,” she said. “There's no fun in everyone sticking with their ordinary partners, so I have decided to mix us all up. Jeremy, darling, you walk with Christabel. Emily, you're to be with Jack.” She continued on, and I wondered if Cécile's opinion of her high spirits and similarities to me would change after she endured this forced march on the arm of Amity's father, Cornelius Beauregard Wells. She had saved Colin for herself, saying that it was only fair the bride should be escorted by the most handsome gentleman, and flirted with him so shamelessly that his eyes danced with a mixture of mortification and amusement. Chauncey Neville, Jeremy's chum from his school days at Harrow, dutifully took the arm of Mrs. Wells, politely complimenting her on the rather extraordinary hat she was wearing, and as soon as Amity had finished pairing off the rest of the crowd, we set off along the pavement.

“Your brother has shocked us all,” I said, leaning close to Jack as we strolled. “All these years he has sworn off marriage and then a handful of weeks in Egypt convinces him to abandon his principles.”

“It shook me to my very core, Emily,” Jack said. “Yet they were so very happy from the moment they met, I do not see how things could have ended any differently.”

“I understand you made Miss Wells's acquaintance some time before Jeremy's arrival in Cairo.” I shook my head. “It is difficult to imagine him agreeing to go to Cairo. I half suspect you dangled her in front of him as an enticement.”

“I did, and I am not ashamed to admit it. She is such a wonderfully open girl. One gets to know her so quickly that before long one cannot imagine having ever not known her.”

“You first met her in India, did you not?” I asked. He nodded. “Was it immediately apparent your brother would like her?”

“Without a doubt. They are so very alike. When I told her stories about him I was amazed by how readily she related to him.”

“Yes, it is rather astonishing.” I wondered if my tone shouted cynicism.

“Not so astonishing,” he said. “They are both under a great deal of pressure to satisfy the desires of their families. You know how difficult that can be. I am pleased they have found each other and only hope they have a pack of sons as quickly as possible so that I am as far removed from the dukedom as possible.”

“Jeremy does so wish you would return to England.”

“And I do so wish I would be posted back to India. My brother and I have rarely wanted the same things for me.” He flashed a bright smile. “Or for him, for that matter. Amity may indeed be the first.”

“Then I am happy for him,” I said. “He is deserving of every good thing, and if he is content that is what he has found in her, no one could be more delighted on his behalf.”

Jack's grin widened, conspiracy in his eyes. “We both know he always wanted you, Emily. I may have only been six, but I saw him kiss you—”

“Don't be silly. We were children and any flirtations we may have shared in the past were mutually agreed upon performances to keep him from the bonds of matrimony for as long as possible. Now that he has found his heart's desire, he has no need for such games.”

“Quite right. You were too good to him, you know. You may think him deserving of every good thing, but that can only be because he was far kinder to you during your childhood than he was to me. I think him a perfect beast.”

“You two fought constantly. I remember it well.”

“I recall your father taking him to task for bad behavior on more than one occasion,” Jack said. “Perhaps we should warn Miss Wells. She may not be aware of just what she is taking on.”

I smiled—warmly, I hope—but did not tell him I feared it was Jeremy, rather than Miss Wells, who was blissfully unaware of just what he was taking on.

We looped back along the promenade and returned to the hotel, dining before the gentlemen abandoned us for the casino. On their way out, they led us into the lounge, where Amity had organized coffee and sherry to be served to us ladies. Like the rest of the public rooms in the hotel, its walls were covered in a delicate porcelain-colored paint, trimmed with elegant gilt work. Shimmering Persian carpets softened the pale marble floors, and the Louis XIV furniture was upholstered in golden silk.

“I understand that some among us may prefer something other than sherry,” Amity said, her perfect lips spread into a smile that lit up her face. “I have ordered port for you, Emily.”

“You are very kind to have taken note of my wife's habits, Miss Wells,” Colin said, standing behind my chair.

“My darling Jeremy insists that I take good care of her to make up for how abominably he treated her when they were small,” Amity said, “and I make a point of always doing whatever he says.”

“How did I get so lucky?” Jeremy beamed. If ever a man appeared truly happy it was he on that night. “Right, now, chaps, we must take our leave from these lovely ladies and console ourselves as best we can without them.”

“I am certain you won't miss us for a moment,” Amity said. “I have made arrangements with the management of the casino to ensure the establishment will cater to your every whim. Daddy, you must behave just a little, though. I cannot have Mother angry at me.”

At this comment, Victor Fairchild, a tall, well-built man whose studious countenance belied a personality devoted to cricket rather than any academic pursuit, raised an eyebrow, and then leaned down to whisper something to Cécile. She whacked Mr. Fairchild's hand with her fan and shooed him away as the gentlemen departed. He skulked behind the others, but looked back twice as he crossed the hotel lobby. Cécile met his gaze both times.

“Really, Cécile,” I said. “He is not yet forty and therefore does not meet your ironclad requirement for being interesting.”

“Sometimes,
chérie
, a lady does not require interesting. There are other qualities that, on occasion, prove more important. I do believe that Monsieur Fairchild's devotion to cricket might prove to have some fascinating and unexpected benefits.”

“If I understand you correctly, Cécile, you might want to take better notice of Jack,” I said. “He ran the marathon in Athens in 1896, when the Olympics were reestablished.”

“I shall take your suggestion under consideration,” Cécile said, “although at the moment it is the patience cricket requires that intrigues me. Only consider what ramifications such a well-developed skill might have when applied in other situations.”