A Prince Among Men (26 page)

"Where shall we start?"

Hetty straightened with a deep breath and folded her hands in her lap. "With my mother, I suppose."

"Have you seen her?" Ophelia asked.

Hetty nodded. "She called here the day after the ball. She didn't know, of course, that I'd heard the truth. I told her straightaway." Hetty paused. "She was very gay. Sorry if the truth had hurt me. She'd had her reasons, and that was all she meant to say about the matter. After all, my knowing the truth didn't really change anything, did it?" Hetty's eyes were dry, but the expression in them was bleak. "I tried to explain that I wasn't hurt by the truth or ashamed of her, whatever others might think, but I was hurt by the concealment. I don't think she cared at all."

Sunlight whitened the table linen, a brightness that made Ophelia's eyes water. She reached out and took her friend's hand in hers.

"Before we knew her connection to you, we both admired your mother," she said. "We admired her independence, her daring, her wit, her work. The way she didn't let herself be bound by the rules."

"But how can I respect her now, esteem her? Her dishonesty has been such. She concealed who she was to avoid responsibility, to make father vulnerable."

"She left you, deserted you, and lied about your connection, but she's the one to be pitied."

"You think so?" Hetty gave Ophelia a doubting glance.

"I do. She chose independence over love, and does not even know what she's sacrificed, though I think she must have guessed when she saw you with Solomon. I think she must have been jealous."

Hetty shook her head in firm denial and took a slow, meditative sip of coffee. "I think I can forgive her more easily than him. She made no pretense of affection or respectability."

Ophelia smiled. "Hetty, you will forgive your father sooner or later. I'm afraid it's inevitable. It is your nature to forgive, and if he's erred, it is only through wanting what is good for you."
Hetty said nothing. Ophelia gave her hands a squeeze and released them. "I suppose your father, having once concealed the truth, found it difficult to know when to tell you. How does one judge another person's readiness for such startling news?"

Hetty laughed. "Ophelia, it's very wrong of you to be so knowing of my character."

"Then I fear I'm going to offend you further.
I think you should accept my brother."

"No. Your parents will be so very much against us. And I have not even the faintest claim to respectability now."

"You do. You are as respectable as you've ever been. And you certainly should not consult my parents as models of happiness, to be guided by them in this matter would be the height of folly."

Hetty looked unconvinced.

"Oh Hetty, if you had seen my mother's face when Pet threw himself into her skirts in front of the most elevated members of society."

"What's become of Pet, do you think?" Hetty asked.

"He's probably been locked in the dungeons of Searle House."

"The poor dog."

"Hetty, if you can pity that beast, you'd better be prepared to be kind to my brother when he next offers for you."

A sly look came into Hetty's eyes. "Prince Mirandola has offered for you, hasn't he, Ophelia?"

Ophelia looked away. "Yes, he has."

"An
d you've refused him because…
?"

Because he makes me weak and sick with longing. Because he's everything shining, glittering, and good, and I've been a selfish creature all my life.
"We would not suit," she said woodenly.

"Ophelia, you put me out of all patience. I don't think you've meant a word of what you've said to me this morning."

"How can you say that?
I…
"

"What have you been saying about my mother? She's to be pitied for her inability to love, right?"

"Yes."

"Then don't be like her."

"I'm not. I do love him." Ophelia felt her face bu
rn
at the admission.

Hetty grinned. "Good. The next time he calls, I hope you'll accept his offer."
Hetty rose, and with a rustle of skirts, headed for the door, but as she reached for the knob, the door flew open.

Jasper strode in without ceremony, threw down two copies of the
Morning Chronicle,
and after a brief bow to Hetty, flung himself into a chair.

Ophelia reacted first, reaching for one of the papers.

"The banquet?" Hetty asked.

"A disaster," Jasper said. He propped his elbows on the table and buried his head in his hands.

Ophelia, scanning the news columns, found the story. "Miss Tesio denounced him?"

Jasper's head came up. "Stood up before the lot of them. Called him a traitor to his country. Refuses to marry him. Wants to sue him for breach of promise."

"I thought she spoke only Italian," said Hetty.

Jasper's face turned furious. "She does, but our own dear brother, Sebastian, translated the whole of her outburst. The fund will never fly, and the prince will be lucky to get his throne. He'll be Castlereagh's puppet."

"Here's his speech," said Hetty, looking over Ophelia's shoulder.

Ophelia read, her throat tightening around the words. "It is the participation of citizens in government, and not the name of republic, that constitutes liberty. It is above all the reign of laws, the public administration of justice, equality, and the removal of all shackles on religion, education, and thought."

Ophelia sat numbly. She never dreamed he could fail. He couldn't fail. She thought of how his eyes must look without the dream in them. He would not go to Trevigna to be a crowned puppet. He would run away again.

"Where is the prince?" she asked Jasper.

"At the tailor's shop, I suppose."

Ophelia stood up. "Jasper, find him. Bring him here, now."

Jasper rose, moved by her urgency, but looking confused. "Ophelia, what are you thinking?"

"We have to do something. We have to make the fund work."

"It's a bit late for that now."

"It can't be."

"What can we do?"

"Write," said Hetty.

Ophelia spun to her friend. "Yes! Tell his story in every afternoon paper. In broadsheets."

"It might work," said Jasper doubtfully.

Both women turned to him. "Get the prince."

Chapter 21

"
H
e's not at the tailor's." Jasper spoke quietly.

Ophelia looked up from the writing desk where she worked in the Grays' morning room. Her sleeves were pushed up, and ink marked her fingers. Her eyes had a softness he'd never noted before. He made up his mind not to tell her about the message he'd received from the prince, a brief scrawl that had said merely, "Rowley requires my presence in Staines." The note baffled Jasper; he could see no reason for the prince to leave town with a school friend, but he wanted to believe some explanation would come to light.

Ophelia put down her pen. "The shop was closed? Did you knock? Did you talk to the neighbors?"

"I did."

She straightened the pages on the desk. "What about his aunt and Miss Tesio? Did you call on them at the Pulteney?"

Jasper avoided Ophelia's gaze. "They haven't seen him. They have removed to Searle House."

"Really?" Ophelia stared.

"Sebastian insisted." That drew a faint smile. "There will be an announcement in the papers soon. Mother will have a grand wedding to plan."

"There's no sign of the prince, then?"

"None." Jasper regarded his sister closely. He had never seen her in such low spirits, so quiet, so without motion. "Most likely the prince
is occupied with Hume and Toll
worthy in some effort to save the fund. Do you have any articles ready for me to take to the printers?"

"Just give me a few more minutes."

He nodded, and when she didn't respond, he let himself out.

Ophelia stared at the lines she'd written. She thought it odd to find clarity in a moment when action seemed fruitless. What she had once feared, that he would make her weak and even wanton, seemed unimportant. More important was the fear that he would disappear into London's vastness, into some other life, without her knowing where he'd gone, with no bell to ring, no way to send an imperious note that would make him stay to do her bidding.

The comfortable illusion that he was her servant had vanished in his true identity. But perhaps one last time her words would reach him and call him back. She bent to her task.

In the days that followed, the task of writing to save the fund filled her mornings. According to Jasper, all of London had read "An Argument for an English Alliance with the Ancient State of Trevigna," which appeared in the
Times,
written by D.D., the reviewer of "The Prince of Balat." The argument emphasized the role of Prince Mirandola in the future of his nation and implied that with such traditions, such allies, and such a leader, Trevigna could only prosper. Readers with other tastes would find an ode by one H.L. Gray dedicated to Prince Alexander di Piovasco Mirandola. In it the poet followed the arc of a thrush into the free air and imagined the arch of the wide sky from England to Trevigna, the same sky for everyone who desired freedom.

New places to send her writing, and new people to appeal to as potential investors occurred to Ophelia almost every hour. In the afternoons there were calls to pay on Hetty's friends, who had met Alexander and discerned his unusual qualities, and who now wanted to hear the story of how he had come to be Hetty's guest and what he hoped to accomplish in Trevigna.

Then there were details to resolve about Ophelia's having removed herself from Searle House. She consulted with Solomon Gray's solicitor and wrote her father of her intentions. With help from Jasper and her former maid, she managed to collect some of her clothes. She worried about Shadow.

Ophelia and Hetty even visited Mrs. Hart in Bloomsbury, questioned her closely about how she had managed her finances, and met her lover, a coffee merchant, who watched them through lazy-lidded eyes as he told shocking tales of the Amazon.

Jasper came in the evenings to play backgammon with Solomon and stare at Hetty until she blushed and he remembered to look away. He had not renewed his addresses to her, but Ophelia was confident he would.

By Saturday morning Ophelia had but a few inquiries left to write. She sat in the morning room with her pens and paper, pretending. There was no point in trying the papers, for they were given over to pages of details of Princess Charlotte's evening weddin
g to Leopold of Saxe-
Coburg.

The
Times
explained how the crimson drawing room of Carlton House, the Regent's residence, had been fitted with an altar, where the Archbishops of Canterbury and York would preside. Other details of the grand event included descriptions of the route Prince Leopold would take from Clarence House to the wedding in his plain green carriage and of the princess's elaborate silver dress. The fifty select guests would join the aging queen and her children, the royal dukes and the Princesses Augusta, Elizabeth, Mary, and Sophia. Castlereagh would be there with the rest of the cabinet, but Ophelia knew that her parents would not. Her mother's disastrous encounter with Pet had made the duchess a figure of fun in the print shops.

T
h
e wedding had caught hold of London's fancy. Portraits of the enormously popular young royals adorned teacups, boxes, and cards in dozens of shops. There was even a "Coburg hat
"
offered for sale as a fashion tribute to Leopold.

As the morning wore on, Ophelia felt her spirits sink even lower. It was excessively silly, and she was vexed with herself. Had she accepted one of the offers made her in her first season or encouraged Dent, she could read in the papers a description of her dress, her plans for a wedding
breakfast, her guests, her proposed wedding journey.

Marriage wa
s
the end of every story she had envisioned for herself, and yet she had spent two seasons avoiding it. Reading about Princess Charlotte, Ophelia knew why. Charlotte's marriage was different from any that Ophelia had been offered. The plump princess, with her doughy arms and loud manner that Miss Mercer-Elphinstone mocked, had found love. All London rejoiced in her happiness. Wyatt and Mrs. Hart were wrong when they laughed at love. It was real, and one needed only the courage to trust in it. Of course, that was precisely what Ophelia had lacked when Alexander had asked her to marry him.

She was reflecting on this dismal truth when Mrs. Pendares knocked on the morning room door to tell her she had a caller.

George Wyatt stood with his back to the parlor door, his face to the window. Bright sunshine streamed into the room around him, but he seemed indifferent to it, leaning his hands on the ledge, his head down.

Qphelia tried to master her surprise. She could not be glad to see him, but she was curious to know how he'd found her and what he wanted. "Good morning, Wyatt."

He didn't turn. "You must wonder at my coming here."

"Won't you sit down?"

He shook his head. "My visit will be brief."

Ophelia took a seat herself, deciding to ignore Wyatt's apparent rudeness. "May I ask why you've come?"

He gave a bitter laugh and turned toward her silhouetted by the brightness of the window behind him with his face in shadow. "To beg your pardon, Ophelia."

Looking into the light, Ophelia wanted to lift her hand to shade her eyes and see his face, but she wouldn't give him the satisfaction. "An apology? Why now?"

With a slow, arrogant stroll he came toward her, stepping out of the stream of sunlight. Ophelia gasped. Circles of brownish purple and livid yellow ringed his eyes, one no more than a slit in puffy folds of bruised flesh. A piece of sticking plaster made a bar across his nose. His upper
li
p looked lopsided.

"Who did this?" she couldn't help asking.

His brows rose in a grotesque parody of gentlemanly wit. "You can't guess?"

"I cannot."

He looked surprised, or she thought he did. It was hard to read the expression in his slitted eyes.

"No matter," he said. "It's my one opportunity for redemption."

She studied his ruined face, trying to look past the bruises to gauge his sincerity. "Very well. Apologize. I'll listen." She folded her hands in her lap.

Wyatt took a deep breath and plunged his hands into his pockets. The cynical lines of his face showed through the swollen, discolored flesh. "In society one can be a scoundrel or a fool, and I chose to be a scoundrel. Women of our class want to bind a man in marriage. A woman sets a trap for him, and once he's won, she goes
her own way, draws on his bank account, takes her lovers, and lets his friends snicker behind his back. That was not for me."

Ophelia thought it odd how much he sounded like Mrs. Hart.

"I set out to play a different game, to make my own harem, if you will, to teach pleasure to girls who would be my lovers when they married." His good eye closed briefly and opened again. "You have no idea how many brides have turned to me, dissatisfied with the marriage bed."

Chilled, Ophelia pulled her shawl about her. This had been Wyatt's plan for her, that she would marry someone like Dent and become Wyatt's lover.

"But you were different, Ophelia."

"Please, don't flatter me," she said, unable to control a flash of temper.

"It's not flattery. I was affected by you, Ophelia, and I pushed you too far, too soon. I wanted you to respond with
the
…
same passion I felt. Instead, you stopped me cold."

"This is your apology?" she asked.

"I thought you'd appreciate the piquancy of it, the biter bit, the vile seducer hoisted on his own petard." His mouth twisted in a wry smile.

Ophelia stood. "I suppose I must thank you for your apology and tell you I forgive you, but your chief regret seems not to be any injury you've done me, but your own loss of yet another lover. Good day, Wyatt."

She turned on her heel and crossed to the door.

"Wait, Ophelia. I want to offer amends."

Reluctantly she faced him again.

"The gentlemanly thing to do, and in my case,
the selfish thing as well, is to offer for you."

"What?" She stared in disbelief.

"You could marry me, Ophelia. You don't need your prince."

"He's not my prince," she said carefully, wondering how Wyatt knew about Alexander.

"The devil he's not, Ophelia. I didn't end up with my face rearranged for nothing."

"Alexander did this? Alexander sent you?"

Wyatt's mouth closed in a sullen line.

Ophelia's heart lurched crazily. He wasn't gone. He had been somewhere, thinking of her, acting on her behalf. Though how he knew about Wyatt she couldn't guess, he had certainly known where to find her. The sunbeams from the window seemed to dance. In her heart she felt answering twinkles of happiness that threatened to escape in skips and leaps and unrestrained smiles.

With an effort she kept a sober face and fixed her thoughts on Wyatt. Whatever compulsion he was under to apologize, she doubted Alexander had encouraged Wyatt to make her an offer of marriage.

"Thank you, Wyatt. There was a time when your offer would have been most welcome to me. Even now I am sensible of the honor you do me, though I must refuse."

"He's poor, Ophelia." Wyatt gave her what she supposed was a measuring look, though it was hard to tell from his ruined face.

"He offers me what I require."

Wyatt removed his hands from his pockets. "There's no point in my staying any longer, then.
Thank you for hearing me out, Ophelia. I wish you every happiness." He gave a curt bow and strode toward the door.

Ophelia made no move. The door opened behind her, and he spoke again. "Tell him I called."

"Good-bye, Wyatt," she said. "I wish you happiness, too."

The door closed with a quiet click.

Ophelia was still watching the merry sunbeams when Hetty knocked and entered. "Mrs. Pendares says George Wyatt called for you."

"It was the strangest thing," Ophelia said. "He came to beg my pardon."

Hetty sat down opposite Ophelia, her brows drawn together in a frown. "Wyatt apologize? You never expected that."

"No. Neither did he. From something he said, I think Alexander put him up to it."

"Oh," said Hetty, with a quick flush.

"What do you know that you've not told me, Hetty?" Ophelia could see that Hetty was considering whether her scruples permitted her to reveal this particular information.

"When the prince came and spoke with me, he knew Wyatt made a habit of misleading girls and that Wyatt had paid attention to you last season. He must have talked Wyatt into speaking."

Ophelia was silent. So Alexander had known about Wyatt that day that he had spread their hands and held her captive to his lovemaking. He had been showing her how equally powerless they were in love. Wyatt and Mrs. Hart insisted on power and mastery when what was needed was this mutual yielding.

"Ophelia? Are you well?" Hetty asked. Ophelia brought her gaze back to Hetty's. "Yes. Perfectly." Or she would be if Alexander returned.