The Player (Rockliffe Book 3) (23 page)

 
Looking at
it objectively, she supposed that, in every respect save one, he was a better
bargain than she could have hoped for.
 
Unless quite
everything
he said was a lie, he was financially solvent, would let
her help Mama and the girls and make her a Countess.
 
He was also alarmingly clever and quite
good-looking in that severely-chiselled, slightly forbidding way of his. But
none of that made up for what he’d done. She was utterly and mind-blowingly
furious with him for making a fool of her; demons of misery were clawing
constantly at her insides; and she would never, in a million years, be able to
trust him.

She said, ‘You make a good case. But I doubt the
risks are as great as you say and I can’t … I just can’t marry a man so capable
of deceit.
 
I want to go home.’

‘Your last word, I take it?’

‘Yes.’
 

Repressing the desire to swear, Sarre rose and
walked to the door.
 
He was about to do
something else she’d better not find out about … or he would be if Bertrand
picked up his cue correctly.
 
Taking a
step into the hall and spotting the housemaid, he said, ‘Ask Monsieur Didier to
join me immediately, then go and pack for Mistress Maitland.
 
She’ll be leaving as soon as possible.’

And, returning to Caroline, ‘There’s obviously no
point in trying to change your mind, so I’ll have Bertrand harness the horses
and drive you back to Town.
 
I trust that
will suit you?’

‘Yes.’
 
Something peculiar seemed to shift inside her but she put it down to the
fact that she hadn’t expected him to give way so suddenly. ‘Thank you.’

‘I won’t say it’s a pleasure because it
isn’t.
 
I’d hoped --’ He stopped when Bertrand
materialised in the doorway and immediately switched to French.
 
‘Mademoiselle insists on returning to London
and I’ve failed to persuade her otherwise.
 
She wishes to leave as soon as the carriage can be made made ready. I’m
sure I can rely on you to deal with it.’

Without so much as a blink, Bertrand made a broad,
helpless gesture and said, ‘Milord – forgive me but it can’t be done.’

Adrian scowled at him.
 
‘What?
 
Why not?’

‘It’s the horses, Milord.
 
One of them has a badly strained hock and we
were lucky to get here without him going lame on us. I’ve started applying
poultices but he won’t be fit to make a long journey for at least two days, if
then.’

As previously, Caroline’s school-girl French
lagged woefully behind.
 
She caught three
or four key words but precious little else.
 
So when Sarre turned back to her with a frown, she said, ‘What is it?’

‘I think you’d better hear it from Bertrand.’
 
And switching back to French, ‘Repeat what
you just told me in English for Mademoiselle.’

Although he had a perfectly sound grasp of English,
one of the small pleasures in Bertrand’s life was mangling the language almost
beyond recognition.
 
He did so now, at
such length and to such a degree that Caroline was hardly any wiser and Adrian,
despite everything, was struggling not to laugh.
 

When he finally stopped speaking and fixed her with
a woeful stare, Caroline said hesitantly, ‘The horse’s knee is on fire?’

‘He has a strained hock,’ supplied Sarre.
 
‘He can’t work today.
 
Bertrand is sorry – and so am I – but there’s
nothing to be done. Sandwich doesn’t boast an inn where horses can be hired and
the horses that brought us here have to be returned to The Ship in Faversham so
that I can reclaim my own cattle.
 
I’m
sure you see the problem.’

She stared at him, completely aghast.

‘You’re saying I’m stuck here until the horse is
well?’

‘Unfortunately.’
 
He dismissed Bertrand with a wave of one hand.

‘No!
 
I
can’t!
’

‘I’m afraid there isn’t any alternative.’

‘There must be! What about
your
horse – the one you rode here?
 
Can’t he --’

‘Argan isn’t a carriage horse.’

‘But I have to go home today!’ she said urgently
and then stopped, still half-unable to comprehend how badly everything was
going wrong. ‘If I don’t … if I don’t …’

‘The heavens will fall?’ he said acidly.
 
‘Yes.
 
I’m aware of it.
 
But it’s an ill
wind, you know.
 
At least you’ll have the
satisfaction of taking me down with you.’

~
 
*
 
*
 
~
 
*
 
*
 
~

Having been out to the stables and fixed a bran poultice
to the perfectly healthy hock of one of the carriage-horses, Bertrand ambled
back into the house and narrowly avoided colliding with Caroline, wrapped in a
cloak and storming in the other direction.

He said, ‘
Mademoiselle?
’
 
And very slowly, ‘
O
ù
allez-vous?
’

‘Since one hopes that, aside from being trapped
here, I’m not actually a prisoner,’ she snapped, not caring whether he
understood or not, ‘I’m going out.’

Bertrand stepped aside and let her go.
 
Then he strolled into the parlour where
Adrian was standing at the window, watching her pick her way over the shingle.

Without turning his head, he said, ‘It’s all
right.
 
She’ll be back.
 
If she walks far enough in that direction,
she’ll arrive at the mouth of the river and have no choice but to turn around.
And if she burns off some of her temper, it can only be an advantage.’

‘Mm.
 
You’ve
got what you wanted, anyway.’

‘No.
 
You
got me what I wanted – although I
nearly undid all your good work by laughing.’

‘Pity you didn’t,’ muttered Bertrand.

Adrian turned away from the window. ‘What?’

‘Nothing.
 
What now, then?’

‘I’ll have to
ad
lib
. I suppose you’ve already put a dressing on that unfortunate horse?’

‘Just in case she looks,’ agreed Bertrand.
 
Then, ‘You’re set on this, aren’t you?’

‘Marrying her? Yes.’

‘Why?’

Adrian shrugged.
 
‘She’s got character.
 
She’s
stubborn, not easily frightened and nobody’s fool. She also knows something of
the real world – and that will suit me better than one of those fluttering girls
who’ve rarely stepped outside Mama’s drawing-room.’

‘I see.
 
And
that’s all, is it?’

‘You know it isn’t.’

‘Ah. Getting her down the aisle gives Sheringham
his own again?’

‘Exactly.’

For a moment Bertrand said nothing and, if Adrian
had been looking closely, he might have detected a hint of worry.
 
Then, bluntly, ‘Are you going to tell her the
truth about yourself?
 
In particular,
about what happened before you left England?’

‘After she agrees to marry me and if she asks,
yes.’ He eyed Bertrand obliquely. ‘What is it you’re trying to say?’

‘Nothing you don’t know already.’

‘Excellent.’

‘But I’ll say it anyway. You’ve deceived her in a
way that’s left her feeling humiliated.
 
If she catches you out in any other lies, that stubborn streak you like
so much is going to make your married life a bloody nightmare.’

‘If you’re talking about the horse, I shall claim
ignorance and blame you,’ shrugged Adrian.
 
‘And in the meantime, I’m setting myself the task of worming my way into
her good graces whilst simultaneously getting her out of those hideous gowns.’

Bertrand folded his arms.

‘I know it’s been a while – but surely you can
wait till after the wedding?’

‘Very funny.
 
Find that pink monstrosity she was wearing last night and put it in a
saddle-bag.
 
If I can find a decent
dressmaker in Canterbury, I’ll need it.’ On the point of leaving the room, he
turned back to add, ‘She hasn’t eaten since God knows when.
 
If she’s not back reasonably soon, take some
food and find her.
 
At the moment, she’d
probably rather it was you that chased after her than me.
 
And it’s not going to help matters if she
passes out from hunger on the beach and ends up with inflammation of the lung.’

*
 
*
 
*

Since the strip of sand was wet, Caroline set off
across the shingle and swiftly discovered that walking over small, slippery
pebbles was both uncomfortable and tiring. In addition, the keen easterly wind
froze her hands, found its way inside her cloak and made it impossible to keep
her hood on her head.
 
After roughly half
an hour of determined tramping, her feet hurt and she was chilled to the bone.
 
The only thing that stopped her retracing her
steps to the warmth of the house was a very natural reluctance to give Sarre
the satisfaction of seeing her defeated.

Not that she knew where she was going.
 
As far as she could see, there was nowhere
to
go;
 
just the choppy sea on her right, grassy dunes and fields full of green
tussocks to her left and nothing else for miles apart from dozens of seagulls,
all laughing hysterically at some joke only they understood.

She stamped to the nearest dune and sat down,
huddling into her cloak and trying to tuck her feet beneath her.
 
Then she stared out to sea and forced herself
to think.
 
Whichever way one looked at
it, her current situation was a disaster.
 
She had no means of getting home before tomorrow at the earliest – and
that meant that everything Sarre had said about ruined reputations and scandal
was going to be proved true. If, in addition to those ladies who already looked
down their long noses at her, word leaked out that she was no better than she
should be, she’d become a pariah. She would have to leave London and go back to
Yorkshire.
 
Mama would never let her hear
the end of it, Grandpa would be disappointed in her and, for all she knew,
running away might not solve the problem anyway.
 
Halifax wasn’t exactly the ends of the earth
and people wrote letters, didn’t they?
 
If
she became truly unmarriageable … if no respectable man would have her … it
meant no dowry and no way of helping Mama and the girls.

And the weight of society’s disapproval would fall
on Sarre’s head as well.
 
She could try
arguing that he deserved it and that this whole mess was entirely his fault …
but it somehow failed to convince her.
 
He’d behaved atrociously, of course.
 
But he’d known from the outset that he could and would put everything
right, if only she’d let him.
 
It made it
difficult to paint him as a total villain.
 
And then there was the other thing; the thing she’d been doing her best
to ignore. The small insistent voice inside her that kept whispering hopefully,
He was Claude.
 
Perhaps some tiny part of him still is
.

She still couldn’t make sense of any of it.
 
She was filled with hurt and anger and, above
all, confusion.
 
It didn’t seem possible
that he could have taken her in so completely or that she’d never noticed that
the Earl and the highwayman looked very much alike.
 
Piece by painful piece, she went back over those
meetings with Claude.
 
That first night
at the roadside; his sudden appearance on the terrace at the
Overbury
ridotto; and, more incredible than either of
those, the evening at the Pantheon when he’d somehow managed to play both
Claude and himself, switching roles so swiftly and easily.
 
How had that been done?
 
And why hadn’t she had the slightest
suspicion that something was wrong?
 

My God.
 
Fooled by nothing more than a highwayman’s
mask and a French accent? Just how stupidly blind
was
I?

Then she went over the conversation with Claude in
Kensington Gardens.
 
What exactly had he
said?
 

‘
You know
nothing about me.
 
I have been many things
– more than you can imagine.
 
When you
learn the truth, there is every likelihood you will be disappointed
.’
 

A harsh laugh shook her.
 
Disappointment didn’t even begin to cover it.
 
Sarre had made her fall in love with an
illusion.
 
An illusion that had been
everything its cold-hearted creator was not. And an illusion the loss of which
she hadn’t yet even begun to deal with.

The crunch of pebbles under booted feet made her
turn her head.
 
Monsieur Didier was
trudging towards her clutching a basket and scowling dreadfully.

Bertrand absorbed the state of her in a single
glance.
 
She looked frozen, miserable and
very, very lonely.
 
Sitting down beside
her, he pulled a stone bottle from the basket, poured something hot and
steaming into a cup and handed it to her wordlessly but with a look that dared
her to refuse.

She didn’t.
 
The smell of coffee was too tempting.
 
With a whispered, ‘
Merci
’, she
wrapped her numb fingers round the cup and took a small sip.
 
It was so good, she could have cried.

Bertrand fished in the basket again and came up
with something wrapped in a napkin.
 
He
unfolded and re-wrapped it so that she could take it in her other hand.
 
Warm pastry stuffed with apple and cinnamon.
 
This time she had to blink away actual tears.
She said, ‘This is so kind.
 
Thank you.’

He grunted. ‘
Ce
n’est rien, Mademoiselle
.
 
Madam
Clayton makes good pastry, no? When you ’ave eaten and drunk, we will go back
to the ’ouse, yes?’

Caroline narrowly avoided choking on a morsel of
pastry.

‘You can speak English.
 
Properly, I mean.’

‘Not so properly, perhaps – but of a
sufficiency.’
 
He sent her a fleeting,
semi-apologetic grin. ‘Before was my little joke. Not so funny for you,
maybe.
 
But ’e knows I do this and I
’oped ’e would laugh.’

She swallowed another bite of the tart and said
bitterly, ‘
Does
he laugh?
 
Ever?’

‘Yes. Adrian is … ’e is not so cold, you know.’

‘Hadrian?’
 
The other dropped aitches made it seem possible, if outlandish.
‘Really?’

‘No, no. In French, A-dree-
enn
.
 
Or Ay-dree-ann, as you English say.’

‘He told me his first name was Francis.’

‘
Oui
.
 
But ’e does not use it. In the many years we
’
ave
been together, ’e never ’as.’

Caroline decided to abandon this point in favour
of another.

‘And these many years were in Paris?’

‘Some, yes.
 
And before that, other places.’
 
He reached for her cup, re-filled it and added simply.
 
‘I am ’is friend.
 
He does not ’ave so very many because … what
is it the English say? ’E plays ’is cards close to ’is chest.’

Caroline finished the last bite of pastry, licked
flakes of it from her fingers and dried them on the napkin before taking back
the cup. ‘But not with you, it would seem.’

‘No.
 
Not
with me.’
 
He pushed the cork back into
the stone bottle, shoved it in the basket and stood up. ‘Finish your coffee,
Mademoiselle and let us return to the ’ouse.
 
This bit of England is very cold … and if we are to talk, you and I, it
will be better by a good fire,
n’est
ce
pas
?’

She looked up at him, her expression frankly
disbelieving.

‘
Are
we
to talk, Monsieur?
 
I don’t somehow see
you breaking his lordship’s confidence.’

‘You should call me Bertrand.
 
And of course I shall not break confidences.’

‘I also don’t see us sitting down to discuss him
when he’s in the next room.’

‘But ’e is not. ’E is not in the ’ouse at all.’

‘Then where is he?’

‘Out.’ Bertrand took the empty cup, tossed it into
the basket and held out his hand to her. ‘Come, Mademoiselle.
 
Time to go ’ome.’

They walked back along the beach to the sound of
the receding tide and the crunch of their own footsteps.
 
Caroline wondered what, if anything, the
Earl’s odd friend would tell her and whether any of it would make the slightest
difference.
 
She also wondered where Sarre
had gone and what kind of devilment he might be up to now.

In the back parlour, Bertrand settled Caroline
into a chair by the hearth and crouched down to turn the gently-burning fire
into a blaze.
 
Absorbed in this task, he
said, ‘Adrian says I know all ’is secrets and, of a certainty, I know
most.
 
Of these, I will not speak because
they are the things ’e must tell you himself.
 
But there are other things … things ’e will
never say because ’e does not see the importance.
 
And me, I think some of this may ’elp you.’

‘Help me in what way?’

‘To understand ’
im
a
little.
 
And to decide what you will do.’

Caroline had her doubts but decided there was no
harm in listening.

‘Go on.’

Bertrand rose from the hearth and dropped into a
chair.

‘The day this story starts was the day of ’is
twenty-second
anniversaire
.
 
On that
day,’e
was
still the Vicomte d’Eastry, son of the Earl of Sarre.
 
On the next one, ’e left England and became
Adrian St. Clare.’