Miss Antiqua's Adventure (6 page)

“I must beg pardon, Miss Greybill, for causing you a distressful scene,” Balstone said, never taking his slitted gaze from Vincent’s anger-drawn face. “I hope I shall meet you again under happier circumstances.” Without awaiting a response, he strode from the room.

The soft click of the closing door shattered the silence he left behind.

Antiqua’s resentment exploded in a blaze of fury. She leapt from her chair to stand rigidly facing Vincent silhouetted by the fire in the grate. “How dare you! You have no right to treat my guest to such ill-manners! Nor to behave toward me with such arrant disregard for my feelings!”

The amusement she saw cross his features infuriated her further still. In a suffocated voice, she declared herself utterly sorry to have ever seen fit to speak with him, much less to travel with him.

“Be that as it may, my dear Brown-eyes,” he drawled in return, no longer looking the least lethal, “you did see fit to travel with me. And while a member of my entourage, you shall behave as I see fit.”

“Stop treating me like a child,” she demanded.

“Stop acting like one,” he shot back.

“
And
,” she added, “never, ever lecture my maid again.”

Vincent was clearly bored. “If you insist on subjecting me to your tiresome rages, Miss Greybill, I can only postpone this discussion until you have regained control of your temper. Shall we say, over dinner?”

He left her standing, trembling from the force of her fury. It gave her great pleasure to envision Jack Vincent defeated by her, upon the gallows, declared to the world a traitor! At length, she calmed sufficiently to realize it would not do to annoy him to the point where he left her in Calais. She would, she decided, be most conciliating to him tonight.

But once in England, Antiqua vowed, let Vincent beware!

Chapter 6

Her hands were folded primly upon her muslin lap. Her lips were firmly fixed in a sedate smile. Her eyes were properly downcast. In short, Miss Antiqua Greybill presented the veriest portrait of becoming decorum.

Which didn’t fool Vincent for a moment. Immaculate in heavy brown velvet and cream linen, he paused and raised his quizzing glass for a closer look. Amusement glinted in his blue eyes as he scanned this depictment of propriety already seated at the lace-covered table. 

“Planning to fatten the calf for slaughter, Miss Brown-eyes?” he inquired lethargically as he dropped the beribboned glass.

Her eyes swept up to encounter his, and her inward struggle was writ clear within them. “Good evening, Mr. Vincent,” she at last demurely managed.

“Now I do wonder,” he mused with a note of interest, “just precisely what it is that you wish to say to me?”

Indignation crossed over her face and she responded with a touch of asperity, “Oh, there is nothing at all I
wish
to say to you, believe me!”

Laughing, Vincent drew slowly near. “Indeed, I do not doubt you in the least, little one. But I suspect we shall deal rather better together if you cease throwing me such dagger-looks.”

Antiqua opened her mouth to refute this accusation, but abruptly shut it as she realized things were not progressing as she had intended they should.

“Much better,” he approved in a voice which made her hand itch to slap him. “By way of making amends, may I say you look enchanting tonight?”

This compliment was no less than the truth, for Antiqua was indeed looking lovely. The simple white empire gown set off her slender figure and dark hair to admiration, while the pale blue cashmere shawl draped round her shoulders added a touch of flattering hue.

“Thank you,” she murmured, just as she ought.

It appeared that conversation, if left to Antiqua, would lag. Mr. Vincent, however, seemed disposed to peacemaking, for he smiled most engagingly and appealed to her, “Confess, my dear! Just how many broken hearts did you leave behind in—Atterberry, was it?”

A light blush shaded her cheeks. Still young enough to respond warmly to any masculine flattery, Antiqua was not proof against the extremely charming look and tone accompanying his words. Though she tried to hold onto it, her hostility began to fade.

“Arrberry,” she corrected.

“Ah, yes. Arrberry. I am filled with sympathy for the legion of brokenhearted lads in Arrberry.”

She attempted to keep from smiling, but his light teasing was too much for her and the corners of her mouth curved up.

“You led me to infer this morning that your father had died,” he said, turning serious now. “But is your mother still there?”

“No, Mother died when I was nine. Since Father’s family has never indicated the least desire to even see me, I decided to accept the offer of my mother’s sister to make my home with her family. I doubt if I’ll ever see Arrberry again,” she ended on a small unguarded sigh.

Coming up behind her, Vincent leaned over the back of the settee, so close that Antiqua could feel his breath gently stir tendrils of her hair. A fingertip brushed the curve of her cheek. She turned her head to face him. His expression was noncommittal and yet she felt oddly affected by him.

“And do the Cotswolds mean so much to you?” he asked.

It seemed he was capable of affecting her in many ways, too many ways, for now she felt a longing which for no accountable reason she wished him to share. Somewhat unsteadily, she replied, “The steep hills, the beautiful beechwoods, the rivers and streams are—well,
home
. It’s familiar and lovely. It’s what I’ve always known, you see.”

“Yes, I do see.”

Something about the tone of his voice prompted her to inquire, “Do you feel attached to one certain place, Mr. Vincent?”

For a moment, she thought he did not mean to answer her, but after a lengthy pause, he said, “I cannot claim it as ‘home,’ but yes, there is one place that means to me what other places cannot. And now, my dear, I believe I should offer you a glass of ratafia . . . to promote your lagging appetite.”

“My appetite?”

He smiled at her bewilderment. “Fully five minutes or more have passed without your once taking so much as a nibble.”

Antiqua wished with all her heart he would not tease her so. It was too delightful, and she was quite certain it was unpatriotic of her to feel delighted by him. Whenever she felt like this, it was nearly impossible for her to accept that he was the sort of man who dealt in treachery.

Telling herself sternly that he was precisely that sort of man, she watched closely as he poured a small portion of a golden cordial into a glass, then a more full-bodied wine liberally into another. Though he moved with his usual fluid grace, she sensed an underlying tension within him and wondered at the cause for it. Had he discovered her possession of the packet? Could he be planning further nefarious intrigues?

 He held out the ratafia. She reached for the glass, and her fingers briefly grazed his. Liquid leapt up the sides of the crystal as she quickly snatched her hand away. She tried to hide her embarrassment behind a smile of sweet confusion, tried to dispel the unnerving effect of that mere touch by turning her attention to the wine. She was, however, vividly aware of his movement as he came to stand beside the crackling fire dancing in the grate. To her vast relief, he began amiably discussing the continued rainy weather and carried on a light conversation through the succulent meal which followed their aperitifs.

So agreeable was Vincent, in fact, that Antiqua quite relaxed, forgetting for a time that her charming companion was her enemy. The aroma of good food filled the air and the patter of rain upon the windows soothed away all doubts. Her sense of warm contentment lasted until the moment when, after the turtle soup, fillet of sole, roast fowl and oyster had been cleared away and a blanc mange set before her, he dismissed the servants.

A second bottle of wine had been left at his elbow. Pouring himself a glass, Vincent leaned back in his chair and slowly drank. He stretched his long legs out before him, causing his muscles to strain against the brown knit of his dress pantaloons, while he propped his elbow upon the thin scroll-arm of the chair and dropped his lids half-way over his eyes, affecting his most sleepy look. Swaying candle flames shimmered over his dark hair as he tilted his head to press the etched crystal to his lips.

Of all this Antiqua was violently aware. She tried to concentrate on her dessert, on the lacing of the tablecloth, on anything other than how disturbingly attractive she found this man. But she was unable to stop herself from staring at his long fingers as they casually twirled the crystal stem of his glass. Suddenly, she recalled the feel of his fingers about her slender neck and a strange longing welled up within her.

Fresh doubts assailed her. Could she be wrong? Could Allen have meant someone else? More than anything, she wished she were. Then an unwanted vision of Vincent’s deadly intensity when facing Lord Balstone appeared before her eyes. Mentally chiding herself, Antiqua told herself that until she knew who he was, what he was, she would do well to remember that vision.

“I trust that you are as tired of Calais as I, my dear,” he said without warning, “for I intend we should leave in the morning.”

Startled, she sought something to say. “You have arranged our passage?” she managed.

“Not precisely,” he replied over his wine.

The teasing note was back in his voice. She raised her eyes to his. The sapphire clarity took her breath away.

“All is readiness for us to sail tomorrow, weather permitting,” he told her. “After awaiting me for the last year, the
Blue Angel
seems as eager as I to return to England.”

“The
Blue Angel
?” she questioned, not understanding.

“We sail on my own ship, Brown-eyes.”

“Oh, how exciting!” she exclaimed. “I’ve never before sailed on a private ship. And no one, sir, could be more eager than I to reach England,” she added truthfully.

Vincent stared deep into his wine for a silent moment before raising his gaze. “I must confess that I am curious as to why, when you were going to live with your aunt in Paris, you should suddenly turn around—in the middle of the night—in Amiens.”

Hot spots of color bloomed on her cheeks. He had spoken in a voice of velvet, yet Antiqua understood that he would have an answer. Unable to meet his penetrating gaze, she stared steadfastly upon the fringe of her shawl.

“I, um, I heard from a—a sick friend,” she said, making it up as she went along. “And I—I decided I must hurry home to—”

“To Arrberry?”

“Yes, and—”

“And yet you still doubt of ever seeing Arrberry again?”

The taunting tone rang clear. A swift glance to his cool face told her Vincent was enjoying her discomfiture. Being of a veridical nature, such lies did not come easily to Antiqua. She sat wordlessly nonplussed. After a vast pause which seemed to her to last a lifetime, a flash of inspiration saved her.

“What I meant, sir,” she said quite brightly, “was that my friend is from Arrberry, but she awaits me now in Dover.”

“Your friend must be a close one, indeed, for you to rush off to her in the dead of night with a total stranger,” he remarked blandly.

“She is absolutely my
dearest
friend,” Antiqua declared with emphasis. “In fact,” she embellished grandly, “Miss Susan Sullivan is like a sister to me.”

Miss Sullivan was, in fact, the elder sister of the local parson in Arrberry and though the grey-haired lady would have been greatly flattered at the sisterly affection so movingly expressed by Miss Greybill, she would have been equally as surprised at such a description.

“And I must, of course, hasten to her side in her hour of need,” Antiqua finished gallantly, quoting word-for-word a line from the last Minerva Novel she had read.

“Of course, I can only hope we do not reach Miss Sullivan’s side too late,” Vincent agreed easily, once again setting his glass to his lips.

“
We
?” Antiqua bleated.

He drank before he spoke. “As husband and wife, we shall naturally visit your dearest friend together.”

She felt the blood drain from her face. “H-husband and . . . and w-wife?” she stammered in disbelief.

To her, it seemed an eternity as Vincent drank the rest of his wine. Finally, he placed the empty crystal down upon the lace and inquired, “Surely, my dear, you have seen the necessity for our immediate nuptials?”

“No, I do not see—”

“You have now been traveling under my protection—alone—for more than long enough to ruin your good name, Miss Greybill,” he said in a severe tone. “One glance at you this morning was sufficient to inform me that there could be only one possible remedy for this situation, and that is a wedding without delay.”

Staggered by his presumption that she would actually marry him, Antiqua could only stare wordlessly at him.

He searched her whitened face and then stretched out a hand to brush a wayward strand of hair off her face. “I was unable to discover any English clergy currently in Calais, but I can rectify the wrong I have done you once we reach Dover.”

Finally making a recovery, she shrank away from his touch. “There’s not the least need for us to get married, sir,” she insisted. “You’ve done me no wrong. Why, no one even knows that I’ve been traveling with you . . .”

Her voice faded into a teeming silence.

“Someone, I collect, does know?”

“I . . . wrote my Aunt Yvonne . . .”

“Why is it,” Vincent asked of his freshly filled glass, “that women must invariably write a letter?”

“Even so, I do not see that there is the need for such a drastic step as our marriage,” she said resolutely.

“Your Tante Yvonne aside, little one, there is, in the eyes of the world, every need,” he pointed out. “You cannot have forgotten Lord Balstone? Such a blow to his vanity, my dear.”

The lift of his lips seemed to scoff at her. She set her full mouth in a stubborn line. “But I do not
wish
to marry you!”

Vincent heaved a sigh. “My dear Miss Greybill, you cannot possibly imagine that this is what I should wish for either. Marriage with a chit barely out of the schoolroom”—he ignored her incensed objection to continue calmly—“does not amuse me, I assure you. But marriage it must—and shall—be.”