The Ballad of Gregoire Darcy (5 page)

“No, thank you.”

He donned his cap and walked off, leaving them alone on the shore. Technically, he was their bodyguard, but Nadezhda's sword was intimidation enough, especially when she walked as though
she knew how to use it, instead of being an aristocrat carrying a sign of her office. She was a samurai's wife, and she took that as seriously as her husband did. No one questioned her odd dress when they heard her accent—how were they to know the difference between a Hungarian princess dressed as a Hungarian and a Hungarian princess dressed as a Japanese?

Nadezhda and Georgie eventually tired of standing in the water and played on the shore. Nadezhda set up a branch in the sand as a target and had Georgiana hurl coins at it. Few of them hit their target. “Some did,” Nadezhda said encouragingly, before taking down the makeshift tree with one good flip of the wrist to its lower trunk. Georgie picked up all the coins, large circles with pointed edges and a hole in the center, and Nadezhda put them back on the string in her pocket.Wet from the splashing of the waves against the rocks and the sea breeze, Nadezhda toweled off Georgiana's hair. Her own was protected by her headdress.

“Can I braid your hair?”

“Tonight,” Nadezhda said. “Not now. Someone might come along and see us.”

“But they can see
my
hair.”

“You are not married and you are not from Transylvania,” her aunt responded. Georgiana had shot up in the past six months. She was still quite short, but Nadezhda did not have to kneel to be at her level. “My hair is for my husband, not other men.”

“Did you let him see it before you married him?”

“I did not. He was most curious about it,” she said with a smile as they collected their things and made their way back to the path that would take them up to their coach. “If you hide something, it makes people curious. If you show it all the time, they get bored. Men, especially. I cover it and it becomes special, something only for him.”
Among other things,
she added silently. “And you. But if your brother asked, I would not let him.”

“What about Uncle Maddox?” Georgie said, referring to her proper uncle, the doctor.

“Only if I had a scalp wound.”

“What about Papa?”

“No.”

“What about the King of England?”

Nadezhda smiled and looked down at Georgie. “It would never come up, but no. Not even for the King of England. For my husband only.”

The sun was setting when they returned to their inn. From the room, they could see the water and hear the waves. Despite the beauty of it all, Georgie was noticeably melancholy as she watched the skyline turn red and then a deepening blue.

Nadezhda put a hand on her shoulder. “We'll be home soon.”

Georgie nodded.

“You miss your father?”

She nodded again.

“I miss my husband,” Nadezhda said, taking Georgiana into her arms. “But they'll be home soon.”

“Do you think they're all right?”

“I'm sure that Brian will take good care of your father.”

“It says
what?
” Brian said. He hadn't heard the first time over the din of the crowds, who were cheering as the wushu master on the platform defeated yet another opponent by pushing him off the stage.

Mugin, who could speak Chinese but not read it, had to have it read to him by the man offering the sheet of rice paper. “It is a death contract. In case the challenger dies in the fight, it is legal.”

“We've not seen a single person die in one of these fights,” Bingley said, his eyes still on the champion.

“We've witnessed only limbs broken and heads bashed. Nothing
serious,
” Brian said to Bingley.

“I still want to do it.”

“Of all the stupid things I've let you do on this trip—“

“I told you, I did not know the word meant ‘prostitute'! I
thought I was saying that she was a dancer! How good do you expect my Punjabi to be the first time I hear it spoken?”

“For God's sake, man, you put your head in a tiger's mouth before I could stop you!”

“The handler said it was safe,” Bingley shouted. “And I emerged with my head intact.”

“Because I saved you!”

“Arguable. Other times, you
definitely
saved me. But that one is up for debate.” Bingley turned to Mugin. “Is it safe? The contest?”

“You can't win, Binguri-chan.”

“Of course not. I just want to try it.”

Brian growled. “Will you please find things to try that don't involve wild animals, compromising situations, or experts in martial combat?”

“Oh,
Brian Maddox
has never done anything daring or outright insane.”

“Not while I was guarding a relative, no.” He paused. “Well, yes, but not
this time.
”

“I will take care of it,” Mugin said, and began to argue with the official in Chinese. Eventually, money changed hands and he handed the contract to Bingley. “Sign.”

Before Brian could lodge a protest, Bingley signed his name. The wushu master, a young man with a surprisingly pleasant disposition, given his violent trade, smiled and helped him up into the ring.

“He's just going to knock him around a little,” Mugin said, grabbing Brian's kimono to stop him from following his charge, “not hurt him.”

“I hope the bribe was big enough,” Brian said.

Bingley stepped up on the matted dais. The announcer began to speak to the crowd of men with identical queues, and raised Bingley's arm. “
Hongmao Guizi!
” he bellowed.

There were boos from the crowd, and a little laughter. Mugin just laughed.

“What'd he call him?”

“Red-furred demon,” Mugin answered.

Bingley, clueless as ever, was not put off at all as the announcer raised the hand of the current champion, and the crowd cheered. The champion bowed with a hand gesture that Bingley copied incorrectly, with his fist on the wrong side.

“Five dago he lasts more than three seconds,” Mugin said.

“You know I don't gamble anymore, Mugin-san, don't try to tempt me,” Brian said, watching as Bingley assumed a fighting position. “Though it is tempting.”

Brian would have won the bet. Bingley succeeded in throwing a single punch, which, of course, was sidestepped by the champion, who grabbed Bingley's wrist and pulled him forward as he kicked his challenger's feet out from under him. Bingley landed on his back as the crowd gave their noisy approval.

“Ow,” Bingley said. He looked up, and the champion was offering a hand. “What? We're still going? Fine, I'm a sporting man.”

“So do you give up?” the challenger said in broken Japanese. He assumed a different but still complex stance as Bingley slowly got to his feet and tried again. And again. After landing on his back three times (the third in a full flip, with the champion somehow sliding under him entirely as he did it), he tapped the ground.

“Ow. Winner,” he said in Japanese, pointing to the champion. Smiling, the master helped Bingley to his feet again, and Bingley raised the master and still-champion's hand up. That was as long as he could manage to stay standing before he collapsed again, and Brian and Mugin leaped up to help him off the stage.

“That was…I think I need—to be ill,” Bingley said.

Brian stifled his own smile as the cheering continued. As he helped Bingley to sit down on the stands again, he watched Mugin and the champion exchange some words before Mugin jumped off the dais and rejoined them. The official presented him with a certificate of his defeat, which Bingley probably would have appreciated more if he hadn't been vomiting into a porcelain vase.

The day's fights were over, and the crowd began to disperse as people returned to their businesses. The champion stepped off the dais and approached the three of them, saying something to Mugin.

“He says he was most interested to fight a foreigner,” Mugin said. “He would like to invite us to dinner.”

“Of course,” Brian said, and bowed to the champion.

“His name is Ji Yuan,” Mugin said, and translated their answer in more formal terms to the champion, who took his leave. “You are all right, Binguri-chan?”

“I'm going to be a bit—ow,” he said, trying to stand, “—sore in the morning, but I think so, yes.” He squinted. “Do they have, say, doctors in China?”

An hour later, they were back at the inn, where a terrified Bingley was lying with needles in his back, a prospect he found far more intimidating than fighting a wushu master.

“Don't complain; you got yourself into this,” Brian said, stepping into the other room. Bingley was bruised, but not harmed, as promised. In the next room, Mugin was drinking whatever the local vintage was. “What did Ki Yun say to you?”

“Ji Yuan,” Mugin corrected. “He challenged me.”

“And you said no?
To a fight?
” Brian leaned against the doorway. “What is wrong?”

“Nothing,” Mugin said. “I did you a favor, you know. You should give me the money.”

“What money?”

“The prize money. For winning.”

Mugin was being amply compensated for serving as their translator during their visit to Hong Kong and their minor expedition into mainland China, so that was hardly the issue. “You would have won that fight, wouldn't you?”

“He is wushu master here. If I beat him, I take his title, his honor. His students abandon him. He has no reputation until he beats me,” Mugin said, taking another swig and launching into his meat dish. “It would have been big trouble for all of us. More trouble than fighting is worth.”

“I never thought I would hear you say that,” Brian said. “Thank you, Mugin. But how can you be sure that you would have won?”

Mugin took a mouthful, swallowed, and followed it with the liquor. “Ah, spicy. His technique was good, and he knows more about the use of chi than his competitors, but he doesn't know how to use that to make himself faster.” He offered Brian the bottle, but Brian turned it down with a gesture. “I studied wushu for three years in a school in the north. I'm faster; I would beat him.”

“Do you think he knows it?”

“Yes.”

“Then we do owe you a favor,” Brian said. “But before you say it—I am
not
buying you a prostitute.”

Mugin scowled at him and turned away in a huff.

CHAPTER 4

DANIEL MADDOX, LICENSED PHYSICIAN and surgeon, was not known to take part in the many pleasures offered to him at Carlton House. Even in the riotous atmosphere of the Prince Regent's grand parties, now almost nightly, he did not socialize with the upper crust, keeping his professional veneer intact. This evening, having just come from his own meal in his own home, he did not sup with the guests—even though he was told repeatedly he was welcome to do so. Around midnight he did partake of a light dinner, which he took alone in the kitchen. While the upper crust of English society drank and feasted and did things that would surely make the
Courier
, he sat quietly with a medical journal from the Continent. He sat awaiting his usual cue. The Regent or a guest would pass out, and he would be called in to resuscitate the reveler. On one occasion, the sixth Duke of Devonshire, who would have been the richest man in England but for his gambling habit, tripped against the outer corner of the Chinesestyle pagoda, and Dr. Maddox put three stitches in his knee. The soused but nonetheless grateful duke gave him his diamondencrusted snuffbox on the spot. Not a fan of snuff and not wanting it around his sons, he had the diamonds removed and made into a necklace for his wife, the silver box paying for the expense. Caroline walked on air for a week, which was the only joy he had from the entire exchange.