Dangerous 01 - Dangerous Works Read online

  “Have you seen him recently? Is he well?”

  “Not, not recently … that is, no. If you’re asking if he is a scholar”—Jamie swallowed convulsively—”he, well, of course, he was the best. He is long from his studies, though. He doesn’t need to take up a profession.”

  He rattled on to cover the obvious lie. “Was wounded badly at Waterloo. Mad saber-waving charge. Took out four blasted frog cannoneers at their gun. Explosion, shrapnel hit, horse fell on him. Terrible thing. Shouldn’t have been with the Dragoons.”

  Georgiana felt the blood drain from her face. She heard a muttered, “Damn,” and Jamie took her glass from her trembling hand.

  “More’n a lady wants to know. Sorry. Ugly thing, war.” He drained his glass and poured another. “But, it happened months ago.”

  Jamie’s tale stopped too soon and explained too little. She may not know weaponry, but she would bet her quarterly allowance that the line across Andrew’s face didn’t come from cannon shrapnel. She no longer cared for subtlety.

  “You have seen him then?” She pleaded with her eyes.

  Her good port must have breached his defenses. He sat back with a sigh, elbows on his knees. He held the wineglass loosely in both hands between them and hung his head. “Yes. I saw him yesterday. Getting good care. He’ll be fine.” His head snapped up as if at a sudden memory. “Doesn’t need work though. Lives alone. Likes it that way.” His face looked stern.

  Georgiana, beyond caring, dropped pretense. “Why did Andrew Mallet join the army? Didn’t his father intend him for teaching?” Jamie choked on his port.

  “Don’t know, Lady Georgie. Never asked.” Jamie mopped drink from his shirtfront. “Joined quite suddenly. I had my orders with the First Dragoons to follow Wellesley in India. Strutted around in my regimentals bragging to them all. Next thing I knew Andrew bought colors in the Fighting Fifth, and we were both off to war. Dashed glad for the company at the time.”

  “You have no idea why?”

  The baron’s son shrugged and grinned. “Liked to pretend my sterling example won him.” He lowered his glass and began to swirl the dregs in the bottom.

  “Did it?”

  He shook his head mournfully. “Andrew didn’t follow. He led. Always assumed a woman caused it, though I never saw him chase one. Not even sure why he hung around London that last Season after University.” His face pinched inward, as if the effort of thought pained him. The glass in his hand stilled. “The upper ten thousand wanted more than a schoolmaster’s son for their daughters, though, and especially one more or less penniless.”

  “You think he joined the army to impress people?” she asked.

  “Maybe, or at least so fathers thought he was up to snuff. It was the same for me. Thought the army would help. Maybe he thought the army would make his fortune. In his case it worked out.” He ran his finger around the rim of the glass and stared at it with unfocused eyes.

  “He didn’t care about money,” Georgiana said.

  “No,” Jamie agreed with reluctance. “I didn’t expect him to choose the army. I figured him for a University fellow. He wasn’t really the celibate type, though. Can’t say why he bought colors.”

  “Where did Andrew get the funds to buy an officer’s place? Isn’t the Fifth a prestigious regiment? You said he was penniless.”

  “Don’t know. Never thought of it before.”

  “His father perhaps?” The thought chafed her; it didn’t fit what she remembered.

  “Old Mr. Mallet couldn’t find that kind of money, now that I think about it. Wouldn’t have wanted to. Andrew must have found a sponsor.” The glass stilled in his hands. “A wealthy one,” he said. “Not a small expense, an officer’s commission in the Fighting Fifth.”

  Georgiana remembered that Jamie’s maternal grandfather bought his own commission. Richard once said it was the only thing the old man ever did for him and that Jamie had refused Richard’s help. She looked up with pity and found Jamie examining her with calculation and a bit of devilment in his eyes.

  “What is it?” she asked.

  “The more I think about it the surer I am that a woman drove him into the army.” He watched her closely. An unasked question hovered in the air between them.

  “How can you know that? You said he never talked about it.” Heat burned up her neck, but pride kept her from breaking eye contact.

  “Broken heart would explain it.” He cocked his head to one side, but he held her gaze.

  “Perhaps he made a lucky escape from an unwanted entanglement.” She looked away, dropping her eyes to her lap.

  “Perhaps.” He downed his wine, made a face, and went on. When she looked up she found him watching her speculatively. “And perhaps a proud papa wanted him well out of the way of temptation.”

  Hours after she saw Jamie on his drunken way, Georgiana’s heart drummed in her throat, just like it had pounded while Andrew kissed a blazing trail down her neck eleven years before. She had always been certain that no one saw what passed between them in Pembrook’s garden that year, but now she wondered. Her response to Andrew’s kisses had been passionate and enthusiastic, and she had left Pembrook’s certain that he felt the same way she did—certain he would call on her the next morning as he had promised. He did not.

  She heard later—a full month later—that he left for India with his regiment. Her father would have acted if he had found out what had happened or if he had feared worse. Her father would buy what he wanted. It fit.

  She wondered if Andrew might have accepted bribery, but that didn’t fit. All these years she assumed he simply didn’t care or that he fled an unpleasant and unwanted entanglement. The army wouldn’t have been his choice, however. He wouldn’t have enlisted on his own.

  Suspicion, once admitted, grows quickly. Hunger to know the truth about that night and the day after took hold deep in her gut. The past stood in the way of Andrew’s cooperation with her translations, and she wanted his help, wanted it badly. She needed him.

  She stopped pacing and forced herself to be at ease. He would come to Mrs. Potter’s on Sunday. Then she would see him.

  Chapter 7

  “See, Geoff, one of our guests has arrived,” Mrs. Potter chirped when Georgiana presented herself for dinner.

  One? Georgiana raised an eyebrow in question. Mrs. Potter gave a slight shake of her head in answer. Andrew hadn’t come.

  “This is my grandson, Geoffrey Dunning,” the old woman went on.

  A large man, tall and broad shouldered, stood to greet Georgiana. He wore a modest gray suit, a simply knotted neck cloth, and a stern expression. Mrs. Potter’s grandson looked very ill at ease, but he bowed over her hand. “Honored to make your acquaintance, my lady.”

  His formality felt oddly out of place in his grandmother’s parlor. Any other time Georgiana might have sought to put him at ease, but preoccupation with Andrew absorbed her.

  No one mentioned him. Georgiana looked around the tiny parlor as if by doing so she could conjure him up, flesh and blood, sipping sherry on Mrs. Potter’s pink flowered settee, but he wasn’t there.

  “Shall we sit for a while?” Mrs. Potter said. “Geoff is a Fellow, you know.” The forced sound of her cheer began to grate on Georgiana’s nerves.

  Georgiana’s eyes strayed to the door. It would be better, she thought, if he didn’t come. She forced a stiff smile and made a stiffer reply. “Have you been at the University long, Mr. Dunning?”

  There would be no confrontation with Andrew tonight. Even if he came, she couldn’t ask the man about something so personal in front of an audience.

  Dunning’s answer was monosyllabic. Georgiana wondered if he knew of her unfortunate encounter with Watterson and disapproved. Georgiana tried to dismiss the thought that Dunning might be as big a fool as Watterson because it seemed unworthy in her hostess’s sitting room, especially since Dunning was Mrs. Potter’s grandson. She tried frantically to find polite conversation.

  Mrs. Potter leapt int
o the breach. “Geoff has lived in or near Cambridge his entire life. Do you remember, my dear, that my darling Henry was a canon at Great Saint Mary’s?”

  “Yes, yes, of course!” Georgiana grabbed on to the gambit. “What was it like, as a boy, in this wonderful town?”

  The opening was broad enough. Dunning and his grandmother began to toss humorous anecdotes at one another while Georgiana stared into her teacup. Her thoughts strayed back to Andrew. Ideas planted by her visit with Jamie had fermented for three days. They created a heady brew of self-doubt and anger. She wanted nothing so much as to confront Andrew and demand the facts.

  What could I say if Andrew did come? Pardon me, Mrs. Potter, while Mr. Mallet and I reminisce about an intimate moment.

  Mrs. Potter asked Georgiana to pour tea. Georgiana stretched her lips in an attempt at a smile and held it out to the old woman. Her eyes continued to move to the door, which remained firmly closed.

  Georgiana envisioned Andrew in that door, black cape billowing and dark eyes. Perhaps I would simply confront him with, “Tell, me, Andrew, did you care at all, or did lust and moonlight intoxicate you?” That, she knew, wouldn’t do at all.

  Georgiana regretted coming. She knew she couldn’t ask the question that preyed on her mind, not in company anyway. Who sent you away Andrew? I demand to know.

  They passed an hour in awkward conversation, guided by the old woman, until Georgiana and Dunning found common ground in conversation about Socrates. Dunning, she suspected, hid surprise at her knowledge behind well-developed manners.

  The knock came while they finished a final glass of sherry, one more than was customary. Mrs. Potter scurried to the door with speed and agility that belied her pose of frailty. Georgiana’s pounding heart prevented her from rising. She forgot to breathe.

  He had come.

  “I beg your forgiveness, Mrs. P.”

  Andrew leaned against the doorway, smiling down at the old woman who greeted him. The tender affection for Mrs. Potter in his smile seeped like liquid fire into Georgiana; something deep in her heart melted. “I’m not moving very fast tonight,” he said.

  Blue shadows under his eyes accented the purple scar snaking across his ashen face and answered her questions about his health. He was still unwell. She thought perhaps he made the effort so that he wouldn’t disappoint an old woman. She expected such courtesy of him, or at least she would have expected it once. A limp more pronounced than the one she saw the week before impeded his steps.

  “I apologize for the delay,” he whispered.

  “It isn’t a problem at all. Dinner is late. We were just sitting down, weren’t we, my dear?” Mrs. Potter turned to Georgiana. A slight smile failed to mask her concern.

  Andrew gripped his staff and shrugged off his coat. Georgiana hated the clumsiness. She fought an urge to push forward and help him, knowing he wouldn’t welcome it.

  Dunning helped him to a chair with great tact and as little ostentation as possible. Georgiana gained a measure of respect for Dunning because of it. “I, for one, am hungry,” Dunning said with false joviality.

  “It is good to have you back, my boy.” Mrs. Potter told him.

  “It is good to be in England, Mrs. Potter. I see I’m not the only guest.” A look passed between Andrew and Dunning.

  “The lady and I were discussing the classics.” Dunning said gruffly as they all sat down.

  Andrew accepted some soup. “This looks delightful. Thank you.” He smiled at the cook who beamed at the approval.

  He always graced her father’s house with courtesy to the highborn and the low. She watched him stir the soup but noticed that he wasn’t eating it.

  “We were deep into Socrates before you arrived.” Dunning motioned toward Georgiana with a smile that was rather like the approval the owner of a particularly talented spaniel might give his pet. “Did you know Lady Georgiana has actually read a little in Greek?”

  Dunning’s comment coaxed a smile from Andrew who looked at her, shrewd amusement lurking under hooded lids. “I heard something of the sort.” His lips actually twitched. Georgiana covered her own amusement with a napkin.

  Andrew himself had given her a copy of Plato’s Dialogues and coached her through her struggles to read it. He aided and abetted her in her secret pleasure, hid it from her friends and family, and slipped her texts and textbooks during her first three Seasons. He treated it as a game—a defiant schoolboy game—his way of tweaking her father’s nose.

  “I think that you read the Dialogues of Socrates many years ago. Do I remember correctly, Lady Georgiana?” His eyes bored into her, amusement gone.

  “It began then. I haven’t changed.” Not as you have changed. She held his gaze, watching the lines deep in the corners of his black eyes and the pain in their dark depths. She wondered now if she had ever understood him or his motivation.

  He looked away first and pretended to eat his soup.

  Opportunity to mention her work lay open before her, but she couldn’t force the words out. She wished instead to ask, “Is that all you wanted to do—thwart my father?” She stared at the table, struck dumb, while the cook cleared away the soup course.

  “Georgiana translates poetry, also, don’t you, my dear.” Georgiana blinked at the sudden return to reality. Mrs. Potter’s puzzled expression urged her on.

  “Yes, I—”

  “Andrew translates also.” Dunning interrupted suddenly, his voice tight. She couldn’t tell if concern for Andrew caused it or discomfort with discussion of her work. “I brought him work from Wallace Selby the other day. Are you making a start at it, Mallet?”

  “No energy for it, Dunning. Not yet.” She could see that he played with his food. Merciful heavens! His hands are shaking. Why on earth did he come if he is ill?

  Andrew looked up and caught her gaze. “What conclusions did you come to regarding Socrates?”

  Socrates got them through the fish course, and Emma, the most recent work by the anonymous author of Pride and Prejudice got them through the cheese. Dunning’s opinions regarding the lady author surprised Georgiana. He didn’t dismiss her. He thought the bite of her satire quite sharp.

  “I agree, Mr. Dunning, but the conclusions are a bit too tidy, don’t you agree?” Georgiana found that the happy conclusions of each of the woman’s books left her disappointed with her own fate. They depressed her.

  “Lady Georgiana, never say you are unromantic!”

  “One might wish for such a conclusion, Mr. Dunning, but in real life it is rarely so, don’t you agree?” Her words were for Dunning, but her eyes were on Andrew.

  He didn’t look back. He responded directly to Dunning in his deep, rich voice. “Lady Georgiana is correct to a point, Geoff. One rarely gets what one wants in life. Duty, honor, responsibility to one’s parents, one’s station in life all stand in the way.” Georgiana wished he hadn’t been so quick to agree.

  “Quite the point of the lady’s works, I think. Passion leads her lesser characters astray, but the admirable ones, motivated by logic and duty, win happiness in the end. It is often their reward. She is an admirable author,” Dunning insisted.

  “As I said, Mr. Dunning, life isn’t that tidy.”

  “Utter poppycock!” Mrs. Potter drew all eyes with her vehement outburst. “I enjoyed fifty-six happy years with my Jonah in spite of family displeasure at the beginning. We found a way.”

  Andrew smiled, sad-eyed. “Life isn’t always that simple.”

  “Who said my life was simple, young man?” The old woman waved a hand, and a light pudding appeared on the table.

  “Georgiana, about your work—” the old woman began. Mrs. Potter’s determination to recruit Andrew in Georgiana’s service pushed ahead of Georgiana’s own.

  “What of it, Mrs. Potter?”

  “Can you describe it for these gentlemen?”

  Georgiana felt shy in Dunning’s presence. She couldn’t afford to let the opportunity pass, however. The work was what mattered.
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br />   “It is a work of translation.” Dunning looked uncomfortable and distant; Andrew concentrated on his pudding. She wished he would eat it rather than stir it. He needed to eat. “I have collected fragments of poetry, written in Greek, from the classical era.”

  “Which poems, Lady Georgiana?” Dunning’s well-mannered question was forced. Any polite interest would evaporate when dinner was done.

  “Those by women.”

  “Really? There can’t be very many.” The idea genuinely stunned Dunning.

  “You would be surprised, sir.” Her words were for her hostess’s grandson, but she continued to watch Andrew, who had given up pretense of eating. He held his hands flat on the table as if to still them.

  “But where are they, I mean to say, how do you find and collect them?” Dunning’s bafflement irritated her.

  “They hide in plain sight. They can be found in anthologies. They are quoted in larger works by men. Most are fragmentary, but they are very much there. I believe their contemporaries, or more likely men who came after, didn’t treat their work well.”

  A frown creased Dunning’s forehead. “But they can’t be of great importance if they haven’t been studied.”

  “That is exactly why I wish to do so!” Georgiana’s temper rose.

  The sound of cutlery hitting the floor interrupted them. Andrew lurched forward and knocked his spoon and knife off the table.

  Mrs. Potter leapt into action, cleared space, and located a coverlet to put over him. She brought water for him to drink and urged him to keep his head down until the weakness passed.

  Andrew refused to allow them to call in a physician. Dunning, to his credit, summoned Andrew’s chaise, assisted him into his coat, and insisted that he accompany Andrew home.