The Dowager's Wager (10 page)

Isabella poured out her speculations to Amy as they sat
over tea at Briarton House five days after the scandal broke.

“You did the best you could, my dear,” Amy comforted
her. “Have another scone, you look wan. I am sure all this has
worn you out. I suppose there’s no hope for a match with
Cornelia Hamilton now. What will you do?”

Isabella tried to show a lack of concern. “The scandal will
pass by the time the Season is in full swing. He’ll be presentable again by then. I am certain there is a large amount of
misunderstanding mixed in with all this nonsense. All the
nosy parkers who are whispering rumors now will be groveling for his forgiveness by April.”

“And if not?” Amy replied in a cautious tone that hinted
at more.

“What do you know, Amy?” Isabella asked suspiciously,
setting down her teacup and waiting for the worst.

Amy lowered her voice. “Briarton told me that the latest
rumor around the clubs is that Gresham has recently
acquired a secret admirer who sends him roses on a daily
basis with love notes tucked inside. Everyone speculates the
admirer is the Smallwood woman.”

Isabella looked at her friend triumphantly. “That’s the
biggest bit of poppycock I’ve heard in ages. Who started the
rumor? I’d bet it’s that idiot, Calverton.”

Amy shook her head. “Briarton heard the rumor from
Gresham himself, just the admirer part, not the bit about Mrs.
Smallwood. That’s everyone else’s addition,” she clarified.

Isabella was grateful she’d already set her teacup down or
she would surely have dropped it, so great was her shock.
Tristan had an admirer? First the rejection of the decent candidates she’d put together, then the appearance of the problematic Mrs. Smallwood and now the brazen secret admirer
he flaunted for public notice. These were not the behaviors of
the Tristan who had counseled her to make the honorable
choice seven years ago. This new Tristan was a womanizer,
a man of dubious connections and questionable practices.
This Tristan had come home with a shattered hand and a
murky past which he never discussed. What had her heart
gotten her into? Isabella began to realize she didn’t know this
Tristan at all.

Late Afternoon, the Sail and Anchor Public House on the
docks

The sounds of workmen loading and unloading drays in
the dockside street were minimally shut out in the relative
privacy of the dingy parlor she had frequented all too much
in recent weeks. Her surroundings added to her growing irritability as she glowered at her partner. “You look too comfortable in such squalid surroundings. Used to slumming, are you?” she snapped as she shoved his polished, booted
heels off the table. He was handsome enough with his sleek
blond hair, but it was hard to believe he was a professional
the way he’d dawdled this past week.

“I thought you had everything under control.” The woman’s
eyes flashed blue fire as she paced the length of the private
parlor at the inn. “I did my part at the musicale. I kept him
busy once I got him out of the drawing room. I expected you
to do yours. All you had to do was retrieve those coded love
notes arriving in the rose bouquets from his `secret admirer.’”

“Darling, there was some difficulty sneaking in through
the back gate of Moreland’s town house” The man tried to
placate her with explanations.

She tapped him firmly on the chest with a well-manicured
finger to emphasize her point. “Then don’t sneak about like
a common thief. You’re a titled noble man; it isn’t unlikely
you might pay him a visit as a peer. Go in through the front
door,” she condescended. Good lord, how difficult is it to
create options? He was exasperating.

He rose to his full height of six feet plus, his temper finally pricked. “Don’t treat me like a novice, my dear. I am not
one of your fledgling agents panting at your heels. Moreland
and Halsey are on to us. We need to be careful.”

“They are on to you,” she clarified. “Moreland and Halsey
suspect nothing unusual about my appearance or involvement. Still, that doesn’t give you a license for sloppy work.
We need to be quick.” Her eyes narrowed as she looked up
into his face, calculating her next move. She tapped her chin
thoughtfully. “I could have Tristan take me home for old
time’s sake and afterwards, I could take the cards while he’s
sleeping.” She got the result she was looking for.

He grabbed her upper arm forcefully. “Never. I know
what you once were to him, but you’re mine now and I will
not allow it. I’ll get the cards. In the meanwhile, I’ll remind
Moreland how dangerous I am”

She smiled coyly at his display of jealousy. It was good he believed the tales about her and Moreland. “Excellent. I’ll
stay close to him and keep rumors of our supposed affair
alive, in case we need other avenues of access to his town
house.”

He grimaced. “As long as they’re just rumors”

She purred wickedly. “But of course.”

March 5, 1816

The house was beginning to resemble a florist shop in both
look and scent. Tristan stood in the middle of the front hall,
half dressed and more than a little annoyed at how roses
were taking over his foyer and drawing room mantel. An
arrangement had arrived everyday for the last week. He
would have preferred something more exotic like the
Turkish roses in his greenhouse on his country estate. At
least, he supposed the roses he’d sent back were still thriving. He hadn’t been home yet. But he’d done his job by bragging about the bouquets to any male who would listen for
five nights in a row. He couldn’t remember when he’d spent
so much time in London Society. Surely everyone knew his
“story” by now.

From the center of the bouquet he withdrew the card containing a coded message of moderate difficulty. Tristan
scanned the card quickly before placing it back in the center
of the bouquet. At least Halsey had been right about the simplicity of his role in the plot. He had only to leave the flowers with the card semi-visible on the foyer table or on the
fireplace mantel in the drawing room with the other bou quets to attract the notice of anyone who might happen to
call.

The untutored eye would notice nothing untoward about
the cards in the bouquets. They would only see a novice’s
attempt at romantic poetry. An agent with training in codes
would immediately see the beginnings of a pattern and the
double agent who hid among the ton would attempt to steal
the note. It wouldn’t be a difficult feat to palm the note and
slip it into a pocket.

Tristan’s other part in the game was to get the play in
motion. He needed to get the word out about his “admirer”
and wait for the visitor to arrive. To get the rumor circulating, he had to tell someone, preferably a lot of someones.
Beatrix’s bold performance at the musicale had certainly
helped. With word of the admirer spreading, everyone would
assume it was she who sent the bouquets when in reality
there was no one, just a trap for the informant. The sooner
the trap was sprung, the better. He had not seen Isabella
since the musicale and he chafed to set the record straight.

Tristan suspected the appropriate parties would get wind
of his situation within a week, maybe sooner. Things would
happen quickly from there on out. Thanks to the nearbotched mission last fall, the double agent knew Tristan’s
true identity and knew that vital information had been passing through him to other agents in the field via “love notes”
from a “secret admirer.” Waterloo might be over, but there
was still plenty of work for the government’s secret agents.
No one was ready to risk another escape attempt by
Napoleon.

For all its simplicity, the “love note” tactic had worked
exceedingly well given Tristan’s cover as a gallant officer
with a talent for romance. No one had questioned the
amount of bouquets that found their way to Tristan’s quarters on Rue de Madeleine. No one had questioned the night
time hours he kept, supposedly sleeping in boudoirs other
than his own. Then, after years of success, someone suddenly had.

A frisson of ice snaked down Tristan’s back, unbidden as
he recalled how close it had been on the Parisian docks the
night he discovered his secrets had been betrayed. His everpresent stiletto had been all that stood between him and certain death. The informant had run bleeding into the night but
he’d gotten what he came for, Tristan’s identity.

Tristan knew that in his line of work that was just the same
as being dead. Once an agent was known, his days were
numbered. So he’d come home, not so much to die, but for
the chance to live. This last mission was about his freedom.
He’d find the man who posed a threat to his life and then he’d
retire with as much peace of mind a former spy could have.

Seven years ago, he had not imagined such repercussions
for his hasty decision to embrace a life of espionage. Some
people drank away their mistakes, others turned to opium,
but not him. He turned his agile mind to the all-consuming
world of intelligence gathering. The foreign office established a cover for him as a modern day Lancelot of sorts and
the world did the rest, spinning tales of his entertainments
and affaires des coeurs. In the dangerous world of espionage, his good looks had been his coin and seduction his
lingua franca. But it wasn’t him, at least not the real him.

At first he’d told himself the deceit was part of the job, for
king and country. His justification hadn’t lasted long. At
some point, his cover became his reality. He’d become what
he had pretended to be. Only now, when he wanted so badly
to find his way back to the light, did he realize how far he’d
fallen into darkness.

He’d come home to Isabella and subjected her to the company of Beatrix Smallwood, an agent like himself.
Compared to Isabella, Beatrix appeared coarse and unpolished. Seeing the two women next to each other served as a
reminder that Isabella was not one of his war time conquests
to be treated so casually. It also illustrated to him in the
bluntest of fashions just how far he’d fallen. For all his handsome features, title and fortune, he felt himself nothing more
than a beast arrayed in fine clothing.

He knew that was exactly how decent women saw him.
After the rumors had started to fly, he’d come to understand
that men found his sexual exploits worthy of praise, but
women, at least the right sort of woman-the woman a gentleman married, found his behavior disgraceful.

Isabella was the right sort of woman. She’d fallen in love
with him once before. Could he convince her to do so again?
Persuading her to do so was at the heart of his plan to have
her help him find a wife. He had not seen her since the debacle at Lady Hampstead’s a week ago, but he’d heard of her
valiant attempts to thwart the rumors. He hoped to show her
through his gracious behavior that he was capable of being
the man she once believed him to be, that this other man
he’d become was a fiction.

Tristan laughed at the irony of his situation. He’d spent
the last seven years seducing women based on the forbidden
intrigue of his ungentlemanly behaviors, now he had to
seduce the woman he loved by stifling those very tendencies
which had been his stock in trade.

The bell rang, jarring Tristan from his ruminations. He
answered it himself, startling Alain, who stood on the porch,
his mouth wide open at such a breach of etiquette. “I hope
you gave the butler a good reference, Tristan, and the valet
too,” he said dryly, taking in his friend’s dishabille. Alain
lowered his voice. “Is this a bad time? Is there a lady in the
house?”

“No, of course not. No gentleman brings dalliance into
his house. What kind of man do you take me for?” Tristan
said irritably to hide his disappointment. He knew the
answer already. Alain believed the rumors. It was a credit to
his friendship that he believed the gossipmongers and had
still lent his support by coming here.

Alain stepped inside and sniffed, looking polished and
well turned out in buff breeches and an elegantly tailored
jacket of deep green. “Lud, you weren’t joking. This place
smells like a perfumery. I had to come and see for myself. I
know it’s early but I’ve had the devil’s own time trying to catch up to you this past week. You’ve been spending a lot of
time at the clubs and hells. We’ve missed you at the more
genteel entertainments. Giles and Chatham insisted I check
up on you. Isabella sends the message that she can’t help you
find a wife if you’re invisible. She’s been quite chagrined by
your absence this week; she takes her matchmaking seriously, you know.”

Alain strolled through the black and white tiled entry hall
looking at the various arrangements and stopping to study
the latest one, fresh in the bowl on the round table in the
middle of the hall. He picked up the card, looking at the bold
hand on the short note. “Do you have any idea who it is?”

“No. And I don’t particularly care. I am not interested,”
Tristan said curtly as he tucked in his shirttails and finished
buttoning his shirt.