Noble Satyr: A Georgian Historical Romance (52 page)

Salvan gave a snort and waved a hand in
dismissal. “Preposterous.”

“The snuffbox!” announced Vallentine.
“That’s our proof, ain’t it, Roxton? Damme, if I didn’t think of it
earlier.”

The Duke’s eyebrows shot up. “My dear, I
applaud you. Yes, the snuffbox.”

Estée shook her head. “Me, I am lost.”

“Your brother and I went to Rossard’s that
very night,” explained Vallentine. “All Paris was there and talking
of nothing else but the hold up of Roxton’s carriage. Well, Salvan
was there too. And d’Ambert storms in creating a damned fuss,
shouting at his father it was his fault Antonia was shot and—well,
it’s all rather complicated. Anyway, Roxton here passes the boy a
snuffbox and says to him he dropped it. Well, d’Ambert thanks him
and pockets the thing! Don’t you see?”

“And did he drop it?” asked Estée.

“Of course he dropped it!” blustered his
lordship. “He—”

“Allow me, my dear,” the Duke intervened.
“He did drop it. But not at Rossard’s. But in a puddle on the
Versailles road. I cannot take the credit for its discovery. I
was—er—otherwise occupied. I sent a party of men under my valet’s
direction to scour the countryside at the scene of the crime. It
was they who found the Vicomte’s snuffbox.”

“Good man Ellicott,” said Vallentine with a
firm nod. “I’ve always said so. I like the man.”

“Oh, I like him very much,” said Antonia
sweetly and glanced mischievously at the Duke.

Lord Vallentine’s brow furrowed. “I’d watch
him all the same, Roxton,” he said darkly, with a glance at the
Duchess.

“Lucian! What are you implying?” demanded
his wife.

“It is nothing, Madame,” said Antonia
airily. “Vallentine is merely jealous of M’sieur le Duc’s valet. Is
that not so, Monseigneur?”

Roxton smiled at her but Lord Vallentine was
far from pleased and he groped for a suitable response. Just then
the Comte stood up, but his sudden movement had his lordship’s
sword drawn on the instant.

“M’sieur! Put away that blade,” demanded
Salvan. Yet he decided to resume his seat when Lord Vallentine
poked the tip closer his throat. “This snuffbox business I find
infinitely
de trop
,” he said haughtily. “Why would I want to
kill my son when I had arranged such an advantageous marriage for
him? Why would I go to such lengths to secure him mademoiselle’s
hand and then want to kill him, and have all my plans a ruin?
Estée, I appeal to your good sense in this! You must believe poor
Salvan.”

“It was never your intention to marry your
son to Mademoiselle Moran,” said the Duke. “You planned to marry
her from the start. You offered Strathsay your son because the Earl
rejected your suit, though you still had every intention of killing
the boy. Strathsay said you were too old for his
granddaughter.”

“Too old for her?” scoffed the Comte. And
for the first time since entering his cousin’s house he let down
his guard. “As are you,
mon cousin
,” he sneered, “Strathsay
must turn in his grave knowing it is you who mounts her every
night.”

“That’ll do, Salvan,” growled Lord
Vallentine.

“It fills me with disgust I tell you. When I
think of you and her as one; you filling her with your seed—”

“Enough I said! Shall I slit his throat for
you, Roxton?

“No,” answered the Duke quietly. “That would
be too easy. I have a much neater solution.”

Lord Vallentine removed the point of his
sword. But he was careless and nicked the Comte under the chin. He
made no apology and symbolically wiped the blade clean with his
handkerchief. He smiled as Salvan dabbed at the stinging cut with a
sweaty handkerchief, and, for good measure, trained a pistol on
him.

Paul de Montbrail came back into the room
carrying a sealed parchment. He handed it to the Duke with a
reverential bow. His respect for this English Duke had increased
tenfold within as many minutes. The seal was the royal seal of
Louis, King of France. The parchment, a royal warrant.

“Montbrail! Tell this fool to put away his
pistol!” commanded the Comte.

The musketeer looked at Salvan but did
nothing.

“Where is my son? I demand to see him!”
shouted the Comte. “Roxton tells me he is alive but this I do not
believe! Montbrail! I say arrest this man! Him! The Duc de Roxton!
He has killed a nobleman of France! My son! Did not the King send
you with me to bring back my son to France alive and unharmed? What
do you think will happen to you and the others when His Majesty
learns the truth of your treason? And when I tell him you disobeyed
my orders, what then?” When the musketeer continued to stare at
him, immobile and blank-faced, nervousness showed in his voice, it
was almost hysterical. He began to sweat. “My son had his head
turned by that—that whore over there! If he is mad it is only
because she made him so. He loved her. And this pox-ridden rake
defiled her! It is true I tell you!”

“I await your orders, M’sieur le Duc,” said
the musketeer calmly.

“The Vicomte d’Ambert will be attended to in
the Blue drawing room,” the Duke told the musketeer. “Once he
awakens he is yours to escort back to France with all speed. I am
entrusting you with his safe return. It is imperative he is
incarcerated in the Bastille, alive.”

“I understand perfectly, M’sieur le Duc,”
said de Montbrail. “And M’sieur le Comte?”

“Treason! This is treason!” screamed the
Comte on his feet but wary of the pistol. “It is you who will be
clapped up, Montbrail! Executed, if I have my say!”

The musketeer was shaken by this threat but
he remained steadfast. “And M’sieur le Comte de Salvan?” he
repeated in a steady voice. “What does M’sieur le Duc require I do
with him?”

Roxton turned the warrant over in his hands
several times, as if considering his answer. When he looked up it
was to stare at Antonia; at the state of her dress, the cut to the
corner of her beautiful full mouth, and at the deep green of her
eyes.

“Nothing,” he whispered.

The musketeer blinked. “Pardon,
Monseigneur?”

The Duke looked at the musketeer. “I said do
nothing with him. I only ask that he be escorted off my land and
out of my country immediately. Once in France he is free.”

“Aha! I knew you would come to your senses!”
said the Comte with a grin. “Put that pistol away, Vallentine. I am
famished! Let us eat, yes?”

“Roxton,” Vallentine said in English, “I
don’t understand. You can’t leave it there. You can’t! Jesus! You
had him! You had him and you’re going to let him go? Not on my
life! The moment he steps off your land I’ll meet him and kill him.
I swear it.”

“Show a little brain, Vallentine. Death is
too good for him.
Think
.” Roxton sighed at his friend’s
blank face and addressed the Comte in his own tongue. “You may eat
whatever you wish, Salvan. But not at my table. Nor will you take
another drop to drink. Put down that glass.”

“I do not understand,” said the Comte
flustered. “We are cousins! All is forgotten. My son, he will be
locked away. He will not bother you again. He will be taken care
of. I give you my word!”

“Your word?” drawled the Duke. “When you
leave England I never want to see your face again. When I desire to
go to Versailles, or to Paris to Rossard’s, to the
Comédie
Française
, to take a stroll in the Tuileries with my wife, you,
my friend, will simply disappear. If ever you approach the Duchess
for any reason I will kill you. If you ever cause her the slightest
distress, be this the mere mention of your name in connection with
my family, or you cause a rumor of any description to reach my
wife’s ears, I will kill you.” He held up the warrant. “If your son
should have the misfortune to die before he reaches the Bastille
you will live out your days at the Castle Bicêtre.” With that he
bowed to his cousin with exquisite politeness and turned his back
on him forever.

The Comte was choked with such terror that
his whole body trembled, and when the Duke held up the
lettre de
cachet
his face drained of all natural color. The silence that
followed the Duke’s bow was broken only when Lord Vallentine
started to laugh loudly. He was still laughing as the musketeer
marched Salvan from the room and the door was closed on their
backs.

“I still say you should have run him through
here and now!” complained her ladyship with a pout. “Both of
them!”

“Oh, no, my love,” said his lordship wiping
tears from his eyes with the lace of his sleeve. “This is much
better. Much, much better. Don’t you see it? With his crazy son and
heir locked up in the Bastille he’ll be a laughing stock at court.
It don’t matter a tester if he remarries and has ten more sons
’cause d’Ambert’s his heir and that’s that! And he ain’t going to
shout it to the world the boy’s insane. No, not Salvan! He’s too
proud. And if that ain’t enough to turn his hair white, there’s the
prospect of Roxton sneaking up on him and making good his threat.
It’ll be a living hell for a man like Salvan. I wouldn’t be at all
surprised if he don’t retire to his estates or end it all with a
bullet. He might as well. His life is over. Damme, if you ain’t a
cunning fox, Roxton!”

The Duke bowed. “I will accept that as a
compliment, my dear.” He sat beside Antonia on the settee. “What is
it,
mignonne
? Did you hope I would—er—run him through?”

She shook her head but the frown still
lingered. “No. He is not worth your energy. He will kill himself I
think. It is the only honorable thing left for him to do.
Monseigneur,” she said quickly and grabbed suddenly for his
fingers, “I have something of importance to tell you.”

The Duke tried not to smile. “Yes, you do,”
he said softly, raising her hand to press it to his lips.

“But I do not need to tell you because you
know, do you not?” she asked hesitantly, peeping up at him.

“Do I? You think me a mind reader,
mignonne
.”

“No. I think somebody has already told you
my great surprise for you,” she said with a pout. “I do not know
who because—because oh! My surprise, it is all spoiled because
everyone
knows it!”

“Why do you think that is?” the Duke asked
gravely, although he was fast losing his composure.

“How should I know,” she grumbled, plucking
at the lace at his wrist. “I have known for some time now but me I
did not believe it could happen so soon, so I waited until there
was absolutely no doubt.” She glanced up to find him smiling down
at her. “You are laughing at me because you are thinking how can
someone who reads so much be so ignorant of such worldly things.
But how could I recognize the signs when this is my first… I’ve
never been… I mean, how could I know for certain what was happening
to me? It seems it is I who am the last to know!”

“Know what?” interrupted his lordship, and
received such a scold from his wife that he grinned sheepishly.
“Aha. Sorry! Not my business…”

The Duke and Duchess ignored them.

“Why didn’t you tell me earlier?” the Duke
asked gently. “Must needs my valet know before me?”

She blushed. “Oh! That—I could not help. I
was very afraid, you see, when I saw the blood—but all that does
not matter now.”

“Is this the reason you foolishly decided to
flee to Venice?” he asked softly.

She frowned and could not look at him. “I
did not want to be a burden.”

“
Burden
? My poor misguided darling.”
He kissed her forehead then whispered near her ear, “You conceived
in Paris,
mignonne
?”

She nodded and finally met his gaze.
“
That
is the one thing I am very sure about.” She smiled
shyly. “You are pleased, yes?”

“Beyond words,” he murmured and added at an
audible level, “And I not the only one.”

“Glad that’s all sorted out!” said Lord
Vallentine with an impatient sigh. “Now perhaps we can all talk
about the baby, eh? Here,” he said, and handed each a glass of
wine. “It ain’t champagne, and we’ll get Duvalier to fetch up a
bottle pronto, but I’m parched at the present. And I want to
propose a toast here and now! A toast to—”

“But, Vallentine,” Antonia interrupted, “I
do not find it at all convenient Renard should do this to me so
soon.”

Lord Vallentine blinked and wondered if he
had heard correctly. “Did-did you hear what the—what the chit just
said, Estée?” he blustered. “You needn’t laugh about it! You
either, Roxton! She can’t go about saying such—saying such—Damme!
Am I the only one with any sense of the proprieties? It’s
damned—it’s damned—”

“Outrageous?” suggested the Duchess of
Roxton raising her glass in a toast, a smile at the Duke and with a
mischievous twinkle in her green eyes. “Me, I am quite an
outrageous duchess, yes?”

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