The Duke's Messenger (27 page)

Chapter Twenty-Six

Vienna at first sight was a city made of gingerbread, lavishly iced.

There were confection palaces, riotous with trimmings on roofs, eaves, doorways. The streets went in different directions, with a bewildering change of name at every cross street. Nell knew she would never feel at home in this capital. However, it seemed that everyone else in the world had come to Vienna and felt as much at home as though they had been born Austrian.

Within an hour only that morning, Nell reflected, she had seen the Emperor Francis, riding out through the great iron gates of the Hofburg behind armed postilions and outriders, his coachman driving six pure white horses. And Prince Clemens Wenzel Metternich, who considered himself the host of the glittering gathering of statesmen. The young Tsar Alexander, whom she had already met in London in the summer — he had recognized her and bowed most graciously.

Tom had pointed out to her the man who, above all others, was responsible for Napoleon’s defeat — the eyes hooded like a hawk’s hid all expression on the features of Charles-Maurice de Talleyrand-Perigord. “He’s on our side,” confided Tom, “at least for now. Although he can’t be trusted — he was Napoleon’s adviser not a year since.”

Nell tried to pay attention as her brother pointed out the various notables whom he recognized. Her abstraction was obvious to him, and at length he gave up. “What maggot’s in your head, now, Nell?”

“Nothing, Tom.”

“Don’t blame me, Nell. You’ve been moonish ever since you arrived last night.”

“I am a
little
weary of traveling, I think. Pray, Tom, don’t scold me.”

He looked sharply at her. He had been on the lookout for Lady Sanford’s blue traveling chariot since he had arrived himself three days since. Lord Castlereagh had generously set aside a suite of rooms in the palace allotted to the English dignitaries, and Phrynie professed herself delighted with the arrangements. Tom cast his mind back over certain remarks that his aunt had let fall, seeking some hint as to what had transpired since his own unceremonious but entirely necessary departure from the inn where Reeves had been recovering from the attack on the road.

Now, seeing that Nell had little interest in the traffic along the Ringstrasse — in fact, he was positive she did not even see what crossed before her eyes — he took her arm and led her back toward their quarters. “Who is this gentleman, Nell, that our aunt mentioned? The one who escorted you here?”

Nell forced herself to return a sensible answer. She had sunk low in her spirits, and the last three days on the road had been a trial, to put it mildly. “He is the Archduke Josef Salvator,” she told her brother.

“Good God, an archduke? Trust Aunt Phrynie to fall on her feet even in a foreign country. He seems quite smitten, does he not?”

Nell smiled reluctantly. “He has promised to give a ball in her honor. In his palace here. He — he was most helpful, you know. When — when Emile, Pernoud’s servant, you remember? — tried to steal that parcel. Tom, I must get that parcel to Lord Castlereagh!”

“He was busy all morning,” said Tom.

“I know they would not let me see him. But dear Rowland will manage all.”

“Dear Rowland,” repeated Tom flatly. “Do I detect a certain lack of enthusiasm in your voice?”

“Not at all,” she protested. “He is very busy. He has a great deal of responsibility here, you know. I am to see him later this morning.”

“You did not tell me about Aunt Phrynie’s latest conquest. He was helpful?”

“Oh, yes. You see, when that rogue of a servant attacked me, and then Fulke took him away — Fulke is the archduke’s man, you know — and then the archduke had Emile put into jail, and I do not quite understand, but he told me that Emile would not trouble us again.”

They had strolled nearly halfway back to the palace. Tom pulled her to a halt. “What of Reeves?”

“R-Reeves? What of him?”

“Don’t pretend to be hen-witted, Nell. Where was Reeves while this attack was taking place? Why is it that Fulke captured the man?”

“Reeves — helped. Pray do not persist, Tom. If you want to know all, ask him.”

Tom was as nearly set back on his heels as he had ever been. He had his own reasons for asking these particular questions of his sister. He had in truth never seen her quite so — he could not quite find the precise word to fit. Mooning in a dream — that was quite the habit of young girls, he believed. But Nell’s dream was not a happy one. He was more troubled than he allowed her to see.

*

Nell had much to think about, and did not like any of it. Reeves had suddenly reverted to stiff remoteness. He had not once caught her eye on the journey from the inn to Vienna.

They had traveled tandem with the archduke and his three carriages, and there had been little opportunity for conversation. But he could have glanced at her. She found she had become accustomed to his habit of sharing amusement silently, the feeling of intimate conspiracy that lay between them. Now she sorely missed that.

But how could she have expected anything more? In truth, it should have been Nell herself who ignored her aunt’s servant and put him in his place, as she knew well how to do. He had made insufferable advances, he had behaved as though they were equals, and he had even presumed to think that she would not object to the growing intimacy.

How dared he take her in his arms…

Her brother said, “Your cheeks are flushed, Nell. What are you thinking?”

Tartly she snapped, “I’m cold, that’s all. What else would one expect with snow on the ground?”

How dared he — but he had dared, as though he had no doubt that she would respond to him.

The dreadful thing, though — the knowledge that kept her from sleeping for three nights, the realization that sent her emotions into dizzying swirls — was that she had welcomed his embrace, and more than that, she ached to be in his arms again, and again.

*

The parcel in her hand, she followed a page through the bewildering passages that led from the suite to Lord Castlereagh’s headquarters. The servant, chosen for his supposed fluency in English, chattered away as they walked.

She could not understand everything he said, but it was clear to her that if they had delayed one more day on the road, they must of necessity have spent last night in the Prater, the park across the street from the Schwarzenbergh Palace. “Never seen the town so full of folk,” he told her. “A couple hundred families of royalty come to town to be in the swim of things. It costs a year’s pay to rent a room on the Karlsplatz. That’s the street that the church is on, the Karlskirche, I mean, not Saint Stephen’s.”

Fortunately they arrived soon at the white double doors that marked the entrance to the English minister’s quarters. She had barely time to notice the rococo tables and chairs, in the style that more than ever reflected the Viennese tendency to decorate any surface, flat or rounded.

And coming toward her, smiling in welcome, was dear Rowland. He took both her hands in his and raised them one by one to his lips.

“My dear Elinor,” he said, “I had never expected to see you here. But your brother of course told us you were on your way. I have been impatient, I must confess, for your arrival.”

Strange, she thought, how one’s ideas are altered. Just a month ago, she would have swooned had Rowland smiled down at her in such a way. Only four weeks ago, she had seriously believed that she would swim the Channel to be by his side, to gaze again on the handsomest face in England.

She was exhausted — that was all, she told herself. She could not quite summon up the enthusiastic response he waited for.

“Rowland, we are not alone,” she said, glancing around her. “Can you bring me to Lord Castlereagh?”

The interview with Lord Castlereagh was short. A moment of explanation from Nell, a gracious word of thanks from the foreign minister, and it was over.

One month of peril, uncertainty, rough traveling, all for a moment’s transaction. She could not explain the importance of the parcel to the peace negotiations, for she did not herself know. She did not quite know what she expected, but she knew it was not this simple handing over, as though she had brought a soiled shirt to the laundress.

She left the humming hive of Castlereagh’s office, dissatisfied. She realized then that Rowland was beside her.

“Would you like some chocolate?” he asked. “Elinor, pray sit here. I should like a word or two with you.”

Here it comes! she thought. Rowland will offer, and I don’t know what I want.

In a moment a servant appeared with two small cups of chocolate, topped with whipped cream in the fashion that Phrynie recalled. They were in a large room, just outside Castlereagh’s white doors. Surely Rowland would not choose such a public place in which to renew his attentions! It would be as inappropriate as receiving intimate addresses in the British Museum!

Rowland, however, had no such intentions. Instead, when he broke into speech, his question was on an entirely different head. “I must admit, Elinor, that I am in a way confused. This parcel that you delivered to the minister?”

“Yes, Rowland? Pray do not ask me what it contains, for I do not know.”

“No, of course not. But it is the strangest thing. Your brother delivered a similar parcel — in fact, one might even suggest that it was identical — only three days since, when he first arrived.”

She felt as though she had been struck in the face. There were not two parcels. There could not
be
two parcels. And yet there were.

“Tom did?”

“I fear I have startled you. Believe me, it is not my intention to cause you the least distress, Elinor.”

“What was in Tom’s parcel?”

Rowland looked sharply at her. Her voice had altered and become taut as a fiddle string. He was not overly sensitive as a rule, but his diplomatic training had instructed him to listen for nuances, and to interpret them.

His interpretation of Nell’s demeanor was excessively unsettling to him. “I am not permitted to discuss the contents,” he said warily.

“Nonsense! You have come so far with it, Rowland, you cannot stop now. What was in the parcel that my brother brought?”

“Certain documents,” he said. “Of great value to our cause.”

“Precisely.”

If Tom had in truth taken the true parcel, then he had left her with a worthless package of whatever of an expendable nature might have been found at the inn. She scoured her memory to discover whether there was opportunity for him to make the substitution. There was indeed. He knew where she had hidden it, for she had told him. There was no reason why she should have secreted it away from him — and this was how he repaid her.

“I should not worry, Elinor,” resumed Rowland. “I shall take it on myself to explain to Lord Castlereagh …”

Her gray eyes turned steely. “And what exactly will you explain, Rowland?”

“Why, that you considered it sufficient …” His voice died away. She was not listening, however, and it was not until later that she understood what he did not say.

Just now, she rose from the brocaded settee. “Thank you, Rowland,” she said absently and walked swiftly in the direction of her rooms. He rose belatedly to his feet and watched after her.

She hadn’t even touched her chocolate, he marveled.

*

Moments later, she emerged from the rooms she shared with her aunt. Phrynie was, as usual, somewhere being amused by her new friend Josef Salvator. Nell was left lonely, but on the other hand there was no one to ask her where she was going. This was as well, for she did not quite know. She needed to ask some searching questions of her brother, wherever he might be.

Quite some time later, she caught sight of him in the distance. A drive from the street below curved around before the front entrance of the palace. Another, narrower road took off at a tangent to lead to the outbuildings spreading out behind the palace. Toward the back of the palace itself, on this service road, she saw Tom and another man in close colloquy.

She hurried toward them. She had come within calling distance when Tom looked up. Obviously aware that she was angry, for she had let her cloak fly out behind her and she was walking in a determined manner, he left the other man and in a moment disappeared behind some buildings.

She stopped short. She would have run after him shouting his name had she been at home, but she was among strangers. Even Tom’s companion, watching her approach, was a stranger to her, even though she knew him well.

“Reeves!” she said when she drew near. “I wanted to talk to Tom, but the coward has vanished.”

Reeves again wore the amused expression that she had grown accustomed to — and sorely missed. “Coward? Any man might flee if an avenging angel was bearing down on him.”

“B-but you did not.”

“I did not see you in time,” he said, his features impassive, but his hazel eyes laughing.

“Nonsense!” She should have returned the way she had come and caught Tom at another time and place. She stood where she was, loath to leave.

A small silence fell between them. At length, the coachman inquired, “Shall I wish you happy?”