Moonlight Masquerade (12 page)

Christine was beginning to feel a little
desperate. She dropped to her knees, pulling back the edge of the
carpet to press her hands against the bare floorboards. She sneezed
twice as she raised dust the male servants of Hawk’s Roost had
neglected for decades, but nothing more productive happened.

She released her breath in an audible
whoosh. “Hang you for a horse thief, Vincent Mayhew, I give up!”
She reached for the edge of a small bookcase set into the corner,
planning to use it for leverage as she stood. Her hand grasped it
just at the left corner, her thumb pressing against the
fleur-de-lis pattern.

“
Oh!
”

Magically, a ceiling-high, three-foot-wide
section of paneling disappeared, neatly, soundlessly, sliding
behind the adjoining section. A cool, only slightly dank draft
slipped into the room, so that her shiver could be more easily put
down to excitement rather than the cold.

Hurriedly scrambling to her feet, Christine
brushed down the skirt of her pink muslin gown and picked up her
single candle. She took a deep breath, counting to ten, trying to
steady her resolve.

This was the moment of truth. She had spent
three hours preparing herself for dinner earlier that evening, only
to have to face her aunt’s probing questions as to why her niece
would wear one of her best gowns for a simple country meal, all the
while being silently mocked by a vacant chair at the head of the
dining table.

She had waited impatiently, but in vain, for
Lazarus to come scratching at her door—ready to escort her once
more to Hawkhurst’s study—anxious to hear his explanation for
having lied to her, her abused emotions running the gamut from
confusion, to despair, to downright anger.

It was this last emotion that had finally
succeeded in gaining the upper hand and just before midnight had at
last sent her scurrying about her chamber, gathering candles to
help her in her search for the secret panel. Now, more than an hour
later, she had found it.

“The question remains,” she told herself
ruefully, still staring at the empty black hole, “just what are you
going to do about it?”

She felt that she had right on her side for,
after all, he had promised to dine with her. He had promised he
would see her in his study. He wasn’t ill, Lazarus had assured her
of that. And he certainly hadn’t left the estate—in this weather he
would have to be gifted with the secret of flight in order to get
past the walls.

No, she was convinced he was hiding. Hiding
from her. Hiding from what he termed the ultimate sin—love. “And,”
she declared, defiantly raising her small chin, “he is simply
not
going to get away with it!” Her decision made, Christine
carefully lifted her skirts and daintily stepped over the low
threshold, and into adventure.

Adventure took her no more than three steps
before it hit her square in the face in the form of a sticky spider
web, and she had to cover her mouth to hold back a maidenly screech
as she fought to free herself before the spider made a nest in her
hair.

But she persevered, for she was made of
stern stuff. Holding the candle in front of her, she kept on
walking, noting that the passageway was not so well used that the
earl’s footprints did not show in the dusty, uneven floor.

The passageway was not exactly what she had
expected. There might have been steps, she had thought, leading
down to the earl’s study, or this particular passageway could have
led her into a greater network of secret passages and tunnels that
honeycombed the entire structure. But it was just a single
corridor, with only one other logical outlet—Vincent’s
bedchamber.

A prudent female would have turned back at
this point, barring the door behind her, but Christine couldn’t do
that. If she was about to do wrong, she was going to do wrong for
the right reasons.

Idly, just to keep her mind occupied, she
wondered to what purpose other earls of Hawkhurst had put this
secret corridor. Had one of his lordships used it to visit his
mistress? “He certainly wouldn’t have needed it to visit his wife,
you idiot,” she informed herself ruefully.

Her head down, she followed Vincent’s
footprints for what seemed like miles, but which in actuality was
less than fifty feet, before coming up against another seemingly
impenetrable wooden wall. “Here we go again,” she groused,
sighing.

She looked at her candle, distressed to
realize that it had burned quite low and was in danger of
sputtering out before she could even make it back to the safety of
her own chamber.

She turned around, thankful to see that the
multitude of candles still burning in her chamber cast a faint
yellow glow in the distance, but the sudden presence of an
indignant, scolding mouse ten feet behind her had her once more
concentrating all her efforts on going forward.

Scanning the wall frantically, she saw a
round iron pull ring just above eye level. Obviously the need for
secrecy was not as important once inside the passageway. She closed
her eyes and gave the ring a strong tug. The solid wall slid
silently away.

The mouse chattered at her again and
Christine hurried to step through the narrow opening, to find
herself in the chamber she had been in once before, to
bathe—Vincent’s bedchamber.

“Where did you think you’d end up, you silly
creature, in the dairy?” she berated herself out loud, knowing that
she had just passed beyond the pale. She had deliberately set out
to beard the lion, as it were, in his den. Now she was here, and it
was too late to turn back.

Very definitely too late.

His voice made her jump, coming to her as it
did out of the darkness.

“It would appear my bad habits have served
to set you a poor example, Miss Denham. Or am I wrong, and you have
accidentally stumbled into my room on your way to visit your aunt?
Never fear. I forgive you. It was a most logical mistake. The
well-lit hallway—a dark, musty passage. I can quite readily see how
you must have gotten the two of them confused. As a matter of fact,
I won’t even mention that I have been sitting here for over an
hour, listening to you tap, tap, tap against your chamber
walls.”

“Oh, be quiet, Vincent,” Christine commanded
pettishly, trying very hard to get her suddenly racing pulses back
under control.

He was here, in the darkened chamber, but
she couldn’t see him. Her sputtering candle was no help to her, so
she blew it out, tempted to hurl the pewter holder against the
nearest wall. Useless thing! She was in the dark, with no idea
where he was, with not a single idea what she would say to him if
she could see him, and no way to make any but an ignominious exit
if she decided to make a run for it.

Obviously, she had been wise not to run off
to the continent to offer her services to Wellington as a spy. She
wouldn’t have lasted a moment behind enemy lines.

“Where the devil are you, Vincent? I can’t
see a thing past the tip of my nose.”

“And a lovely nose it is,” he answered,
seemingly amused by her predicament, “if a bit long. All the better
to poke into my business, I imagine.”

“Keep talking, if you please,” Christine
begged sweetly, advancing into the room, trying to locate his
position by the sound of his voice. “I’d like to find you so that I
might return your insults.”

He laughed aloud at her impertinence. She
moved toward a chair in the far corner, somehow knowing that he was
there, far from the light cast by the fire, hiding.

“I’m not moving, Miss Denham. I have nowhere
to go, it seems, where you will not hunt me down. Tell me, has
anyone ever used the word pernicious when referring to you, little
brat?”

“You consider me to be wicked, Vincent?”
Christine couldn’t keep the pain out of her voice.

“I consider you to be a somewhat
fatal
young lady,” he answered simply. “Ah, here you are at
last. Congratulations on the successful conclusion of your little
expedition. Good evening, Christine.”

Christine stopped in front of the wingback
chair, the fireplace at her back. She leaned forward slightly,
trying to make out his form in the darkened room. “Good evening
yourself, my lord Hawkhurst. Why didn’t we see you at dinner?”

He sighed, fatalistically, as if he had been
expecting the question. “Why did I reject you? That is your real
question, isn’t it, Christine?” he inquired softly, almost kindly.
“Your entire posture speaks most eloquently of injured pride.”

“As your retreat from me speaks most
eloquently of your fear of life, Vincent,” she returned, once more
letting emotion make a shambles of her best intentions, yet not
caring that she might be making a fool of herself. “Oh, Vincent,”
she cried, falling to her knees in front of him, her hands closing
convulsively on his thighs, “why? Today, in the garden, we were so
close. It was so wonderful, so very special. I thought we had
reached an understanding. Why are you doing this to me—to us?”

His right hand, folded over his left in his
lap, tentatively reached out to her, then just as quickly withdrew.
“Do get up, Miss Denham,” he ordered coldly. “You are making a fool
of yourself.”

Christine looked down at her own hands,
realized where they were, and immediately removed them, to sink
back on her heels. “Then you—you don’t care for me?” Her voice was
small, and injured.

Vincent’s next words tore into her,
assaulting her with the force of physical blows. Even in the
darkness she knew that he was wearing the forbidding face she had
seen in his study. There was no trace of kindness in him now. “Care
for you? I care very much—for certain portions of you, that is. I
have been without a willing woman for a long time, Miss Denham. You
are not only young and beautiful, but you seem to be more than
usually ripe for the picking.

“If you could be so kind as to lie on your
back for me, for instance, I would most certainly be appreciative.
I had thought my sad, tragic story would allow me to work my way
into your bed. I had not counted on arousing your infantile
affections as well. But, unfortunately, you are very immature, and
prone to romantic exaggerations which could only complicate matters
once I’d had my fill of you.”

Another woman might have swooned. Another
woman might have jumped up and beat furiously at him, hoping to
return injury for injury, hurt for hurt. Yet another woman might
have quietly acquiesced, willing to take him on his own terms.

Christine sat very still for a long time,
allowing the tears to roll unchecked down her cheeks, not caring if
he saw them. Then, just as the silence had grown nearly unbearable,
she spoke, her voice very small in the huge chamber, caressing him
with its tenderness, its compassion. “I suspect I might be falling
in love with you too, Vincent.”

Hawkhurst bolted out of the chair, nearly
knocking Christine down as he reeled almost drunkenly toward the
fireplace, quickly, prudently, putting half a room between
them.

“What am I going to do with you, woman?
Don’t you listen? Don’t you understand? I’m rejecting you, totally
and absolutely. I don’t want you. I don’t want you here, in my
house. I don’t want you in my life. Damn you, Christine, why can’t
you leave me alone?”

Still on the floor, Christine turned her
upper body, supporting herself on her hands as she stared at him as
he was revealed in the firelight, glad to see that he was dressed
in only breeches and an open-collared white shirt, with the cloak
nowhere in evidence. She was stretching toward him, a supplicant,
begging to be heard. “You would do this, Vincent? You would condemn
us both?”

“Condemn us? What would I be condemning us
to Christine? I would regain my hard-won peace, and you’d go off to
London to enjoy a successful debut. The condemnation, my sweet
infant, would be in allowing you to stay.” His voice rose as his
control threatened to snap. “I do not love you. I refuse to love
you! Go now, Christine. Leave me with some shred of my
dignity.”

She did as he bid, rising, her shoulders
bowed under the weight of her defeat, her humiliation, his complete
and utter rejection of her. Shunning the dark passageway, she
walked to the door, turning at the last moment to see him, still
standing in front of the mantel, his head bent, massaging his left
shoulder.

“I’m sorry for you, Vincent,” she said, her
voice breaking. “I’m so very sorry—for both of us.”

C
hristine ran down
the long hallway, nearly blinded by her tears, searching in her
pocket for the key to her own bedchamber.

It took her an eternity to insert the key in
the lock, an eternity during which she prayed that no servant would
find it necessary to walk down the hallway. Finally, closing the
door behind her, she gratefully leaned against it, her eyes
squeezed tightly shut, her breast heaving, as she tried to
recapture her breath.