Dangerous Dalliance (17 page)

“It was hardly a tiring drive for him. He was kind enough to let me handle the ribbons.”

“That was generous of him. His team is valuable, I believe.”

Snoad didn’t answer. He crossed his arms and stared at me a moment. “I don’t think you came up here to discuss Fairfield’s headache,” he said.

“No,
I didn’t.”

“Why did you come?”

Necessity betrayed me into indiscretion. “I seem to recall I was asked to return. Soon, and often, I believe you said.” It sounded like an invitation to flirtation, and Snoad was not tardy in reply.”

A quizzical smile lit his face. “Ah, then it is a social visit!” he exclaimed. “Excellent. I have been pondering the eligibility of offering you a glass of your father’s excellent sherry. As it is a social call, I expect some refreshment might be offered.”

I was relieved he did not offer brandy, but he did not refer to last night’s strange meeting at all. He went to the table between the two old mildewed chairs and began fiddling with wine and glasses. “How is Cassidy working out?” I inquired, to keep the conversation going, but on an impersonal subject.

“He has the makings of a good pigeon man. Gentle hands, and a true love of the birds. You chose wisely.
Salut!”
He touched his glass to mine, and we drank.

It was extraordinarily difficult to find a subject that did not involve either spying or flirtation. In desperation I said, “Has Fairfield selected his birds yet?”

“No. He seems more interested to learn how a proper operation is carried on. He is just beginning to assemble his flock. You have noticed his lack of expertise, I think?”

“Yes. I wonder how long he plans to stay. He mentioned a day or two, when the invitation was first extended.”

“There are other attractions than the pigeons,” he said. His black eyes studied me. I turned away to place my glass on the table. Snoad did the same.

My first mental response was amazement that he would mention their spying, even obliquely. In a twinkling I realized
I
was the alleged attraction. “Oh! Yes, he is an excellent parti, I believe.”

“Which of his excellencies do you refer to? His title or his wealth?”

“Actually, it was his face and figure I meant. He is very handsome.” It seemed ludicrous to be prating of Fairfield’s beauty when the man beside me was a regular Adonis. It was like comparing a candle to the sun.

“I had not thought Miss Hume would settle for a handsome face and a broad set of shoulders,” he scoffed.

“Well, throw in the title and estates ...”

His voice, when he spoke, was rough with annoyance. “Do you really care so much for a title?”

“Not unduly, I hope, but there is some appeal in a tiara,” I answered with a dismissing laugh.

Frustration steamed from his obsidian eyes. An ungentlemanly curse growled from the depths of his throat, and while I watched this jungle display in disbelieving fascination, his hand flashed out and gripped my wrist. He crushed me against the unyielding wall of his chest. My one yelp of outrage was silenced by his lips, which found mine with the swift, unerring accuracy of a hawk seizing its prey. I made one convulsive effort to escape. His arms tightened to bands of oak, clamping me to him. His angry growl softened to a reassuring croon, which was more devastating than those lips that flamed on mine, and the pressure of his strong body. Something inside me melted at the exquisite intimacy of that sound, coming from inside him.

Beneath the soft jersey, his back was strong and wide. I allowed myself the luxury of examining it. Snoad followed my example. His warm hands caressed my body with possessive knowledge, leaving a trail of fire where he took my measure. I gave up all hope of escape, or of wanting to, and abandoned myself to his primitive lovemaking. It was at once more physical, yet more metaphysical, than I had imagined it could be.

Oh yes, I had imagined this scene a hundred times, yet for once, reality outpaced imagination. Like the beat of a drum, my heart throbbed, seeming to echo not only in my ears, but in my loins. It engendered a fever at the very core, robbing me of common sense.

The beating spread through me like wildfire, laying waste the last dregs of my self-control. I was overwhelmed by a yearning need for—something. I was at that point where the mind vaguely conceives of an unimagined infinity, a place beyond space and time, yet I was tethered to the here and now by his devouring embrace. I tried to turn away. His hand palmed my head, turned it back, and found my lips again.

Such rapture could not long be endured. With the seasoned art of the master, Snoad released me gently, slowly. His lips softened from demand to pleading; his arms lessened their tension, and too soon we stood an inch apart, gazing at each other like a pair of thieves.

While I hastily surveyed whether I should bridle up and deride him for this outrage, or throw myself back into his arms whimpering, as I felt like doing, Snoad gave his lower lip a sharp bite, and laughed. It was the sort of nervous eruption that crops out under mental stress. It told me nothing, except that he was ashamed of himself.

Having anticipated either an abject apology or a declaration of undying devotion, I was highly displeased with that laugh. I knew which course I must take: the bridling-up course.

“Is molesting unsuspecting ladies your idea of a joke, Snoad?” I demanded. “I find it as vulgar and reprehensible as everything else about you.” These brave words were marred by a breathless voice. I wished I had kept my mouth shut until I was more fully recovered.

His black brows quirked up. “Unsuspecting?” he said. I glared him down. “I wasn’t really laughing.” He said it so simply and so contritely that I was sorry I had lashed out at him. “It was shock,” he added. When he reached to take my hand, I let him. I wanted to feel his touch again. “It’s a devil of a situation, isn’t it, Heather? You cannot love Fairfield. I don’t believe it. It’s only the title you love.”

“Of course I don’t love him! But I could never marry you, Snoad. I must marry a
gentleman
at least.” Not that he had asked me!

“Do you really care so much for birth?”

“You know this is impossible.”

“I’d marry you if I were the king of England, and you a serving wench.”

“Then you would have a revolution on your hands, sir, and in my opinion, you would deserve it.”

“Then I’d make you my official mistress.”

This idea was too dangerous to pursue. “I shan’t come up here again, Snoad.” An arrow pierced my heart to consider my desolate future. Then I remembered Depew’s orders. “Not without an escort,” I added.

He lifted my hand to his lip and kissed it ardently. “Just come,” he said softly. “Don’t deprive me of even the sight of you. I couldn’t endure it.” While my heart was melting at that tender speech, he added, “And for God’s sake, keep Fairfield away from the ocean. You can make me jealous from the east park. I can see you equally well under the elm trees. You don’t want to drown the poor fool.”

“People who spy are apt to see things they don’t want to see,” I said grandly, and left. How had I come to use that dangerous word “spy”? I turned and rushed downstairs, before any other unwise words were said, or unwise things done.

I went to my room to recover my wits. I was trembling. So this was why, and how, respectable ladies fell into alliances with their grooms or footmen. I would not be so swift to laugh at them another time. Such a powerfully compelling thing, this attraction between the sexes. It drove the hummingbird and the horse, the flea and the elephant. It drove Papa to Mrs. Mobley. I could understand it now, and to understand is to forgive. But I must not let this infatuation drive me to indiscretion. And that meant I must avoid being alone with Snoad. Kerwood. He had called me Heather, and I wished I had used his first name.

Snoad didn’t suit him. It sounded like toad. What he required was a princess to turn him into a prince by her kiss. I glanced in the mirror, and was disgusted by the moonling smiling back at me. How could I so far forget duty as to go falling in love with a spy? Five minutes remained of the half hour that would bring Bunny to my rescue. I was about to return belowstairs when I heard Fairfield’s door open.

Was he going to join us below? He might be more forthcoming about the “accident” that Snoad thought was no accident. What could it be? I listened, but his footsteps retreated instead of advancing toward my door, and the staircase. He was not going downstairs. There was only one place he could be going: to the loft.

I darted downstairs, and found Bunny just rising from the card table, using the excuse of a glass of wine. I poured it for him and said, “I’m going back up. Fairfield just went up to the loft.”

“Learn anything?” he asked.

“No, but I’m going to listen at the door.”

“Depew said not to.”

“Depew is not God.”

“Be careful. I’ll check in half an hour if you’re not down.”

“All right.” I said a few words to Auntie and left.

I stopped to tap at Fairfield’s door, to make sure he had not returned. His valet replied. “I was just wondering if Lord Fairfield is feeling better,” I said.

The valet raised his finger to his lips, while adjusting his shoulders to conceal the empty bed. “He’s sleeping, miss. I gave him a few drops of laudanum half an hour ago. The best thing for toothache.”

“I hope he feels better by morning.”

The valet smiled and closed the door. He and Fairfield ought to have gotten together on his lordship’s malady. Toothache indeed! Without wasting another moment, I went to the door up to the loft and began a silent, slow ascent. I was grateful for Fairfield’s laxity. He had left the door open an inch. The men sat at the table, drinking Papa’s sherry and smoking his cheroots. They spoke in tones just a notch lower than normal, which carried well on the still night air.

“She’s got to be working with Depew,” Snoad said.
She
was, of course, me. Or I, as the case may be. “She’s rifled my room.” How did he know that? I had been careful! “She told him where we were going this afternoon. And she came up here this evening trying to wheedle information out of me.”

“How?”

“By the usual method of ladies, John. Her charms.”

“Ah. You could tell her the truth.”

Snoad laughed, a nasty laugh. “She wants to know when you’re leaving, incidentally.”

“When am I?”

I took note of this. It was Snoad who was in charge. And Snoad had tried to cozen me with his charms. The cozening was not all in one direction.

“I’m just waiting for word from Caesar. She suspects Caesar is being used, of course. She keeps asking about him. You nearly blew it when you showed your surprise at Caesar’s return.”

“It was his being in Caesar’s tree that fooled me.”

“And Heather. A pity Cleo dislikes Hector so much. She didn’t help, pecking at him. I told Cassidy I was taping him down to prevent a mating when Miss Hume came up. He thought it very civil of me.”

My blood boiled to hear all this. I had been duped, made a fool of for days. Caesar was abroad, bringing in an important message.

“I’ll send out the last message after Caesar arrives,” Snoad said. “He should be here tonight, then we’ll have to abandon this position.”

“Where to next?”

“We’ll receive our orders from headquarters. I’ll be damned glad to get out of here, I can tell you. I mean to ask for something in London. More going on there.”

London is swarming with spies
,
I remembered Depew had said.

“Seems to me there is plenty going on here. That little shoot-out this afternoon was lively. Perhaps I oughtn’t to have winged him.”

“A pity you didn’t kill him,” Snoad said ruthlessly.

So the “little accident” had been a pitched battle, using bullets. They must have spotted Depew, and tried to kill him. Such desperate goings-on as this were more than I had bargained for. I retreated back down the stairs before they caught me and put a bullet through me as well.

I was weak with fear, and went again to my room to recover. I reviewed their conversation. Caesar was on his way with a crucial message. That was why he had been missing, and why some other bird had been used to fool me. I had thought Caesar’s hood unique in our loft, but obviously I was mistaken.

I could not sit idly by and let Snoad recover that message, and send out some false orders that might imperil our troops. I knew now that he had the code book. He had said point-blank that he would send out a message. I had to be rid of him, at once. The only thing I could think of was to relieve him of his post. This was my house; I paid him. I could order him to leave, and I would do so. I felt it imperative to consult with Depew on this matter first, however.

I went below, and by eye contact let Bunny know it was crucial that I speak to him. He began yawning and soon said, “I don’t know about you, Mrs. Lovatt, but I am ready for the feather tick.”

“It is early yet,” she said, glancing at the clock. Piquet was not her real love, however. And Bunny was not her first choice of partner. She soon acceded. I was happy that she did not linger long behind, but went abovestairs to continue her rendezvous with Sir Walter Scott. She was greatly involved with his Waverley novels. She said they had helped her through her brother’s death.

“What did you learn?” Bunny demanded as soon as we were alone.

I emptied my budget, and he listened, frowning in concentration. “I was right. The bird was taped to the tree,” he told me, with a wise look.

“And they know Depew is an agent.”

“That’d be why Depew is so hell-bent we not use his name, or let them catch a sight of him. He’s not wearing his Horse Guards jacket, but that wouldn’t fool them.”

“You’d best go to the inn and speak to him.”

“I’m gone. Don’t tackle Snoad alone. I’ll go up with you when you give him his marching papers.”

“I am not that foolhardy. They tried to kill Depew this afternoon. Hurry back, Bunny. I am frightened out of my wits, harboring that pair of assassins.”

I was sad, too, that my great love affair had fizzled out to nothing. What is it about rakes and ruthless men that we foolish ladies inevitably fall in love with them?