Noble Satyr: A Georgian Historical Romance (12 page)

“How can you be certain he will show his
face after what has happened?” asked the Chevalier de Charmond,
contemplating the cards dealt him. “It is your lead, Gustave,” he
said to a fat nobleman with large red painted lips that twitched
annoyingly.

“All of Paris is here tonight. Of course he
will show up,” muttered the Comte de Salvan and picked up the pile
of cards in front of him. He did not look at them immediately.
Again his small black eyes scanned the crowded and noisy gaming
tables and then went to the door. There were more than the usual
number of faces and not one belonged to his English cousin. “
Mon
Dieu
it is close in here.”

The Chevalier chuckled. “I sympathize,
M’sieur le Comte. I truly do. It is very bad for you I think. What
will you discard?”

“I do not know why you came to Paris! It is
not bad, not bad at all! You will see how Salvan makes the most of
this situation.” He discarded recklessly and his gaze went back to
the door. “I admit he has an advantage. But I will have the girl
returned to me.”

“How do you know the girl is still with
him?” asked the Chevalier. “Mayhap she ran away into the Paris
night after he—”

“Absurd!” declared the Comte. He snatched up
a glass of wine off a tray a waiter offered him. “What time did he
have to seduce her and kill three—or was it four?—men who held up
his carriage? Eh? None I tell you!”

Charmond fanned out his cards and took time
to discard. “He may be with her now. Think of it, Salvan! While we
sit here your cousin he is mounting the little
demoiselle
for a third time!”

“It was two men,” said the fat nobleman, one
Gustave, Marquis de Chesnay. “I know. Marguerite had me stop the
driver so she could take a look at them. She not the only one.
There was quite a crowd gathered. The police, they questioned
everyone! They even questioned Marguerite. Imagine that!” He looked
about the table with wide expressive eyes. “She lied to them of
course. She always does. What an absolute angel! I wish my wife was
half as clever—”

“—and half as talented,” murmured a
gentleman to De Chesnay’s right. He made a rude gesture with his
tongue which sent the men into great guffaws of uncontrolled
laughter.

De Chesnay smiled broadly and waited for the
laughter to subside. “Marguerite, she said those two bodies
afforded more interest than a visit to the morgue! Have you ever
heard the like of her? Ah! She truly is an angel! Fabrice, I
believe it is our rubber.”

“One was shot through the heart,” said a
gentleman in a powdered-blue bob wig who leaned on the round back
of the Chevalier de Charmond’s chair. “The other in the temple. I
would have done the same. Filthy vermin!”

“Why hold up Roxton’s carriage and no
other?” asked the Marquis de Chesnay. “And so I asked Marguerite.
You must agree, gentleman, that that is a very odd circumstance.
She said it must have something to do with a female.”

“Who said?” asked the Comte de Salvan too
quickly. “Who was the female?”

The Marquis shrugged and licked his fat
lips. “Marguerite, she said it must be a female. It always is with
our friend Roxton. Depend upon it! If there is trouble with a woman
Roxton can be counted to be involved! Who can forget, only a month
back that absurd actor challenged M’sieur le Duc de Roxton to a
duel. An actor. All because of that actress Félice. The audacity of
the man! That Félice, well, she is of a softness, and it is said
her talents with her—”

“M’sieur le Marquis need not elaborate!” cut
in Charmond and threw down his hand. He stood up, pushing the
gentleman in the bob wig off-balance. “Unless, Gustave, this Félice
has given you the pleasure of her company?”

“No,” said the Marquis and blinked. “I don’t
like actresses.”

The Chevalier bowed. “No. M’sieur le Marquis
prefers other—”

“Leave him be!” growled the Comte de Salvan
and pushed the fat nobleman back in his chair. “I apologize a
thousandfold for Fabrice. He is not himself. He aches for Félice,
oh, how he aches! But alas, my friends, it is Roxton who makes the
divine Félice ache over and over again!”

Those gentleman at and about the table
laughed loudly at this, each nudging the other; even De Chesnay
smiled. The Comte de Salvan sauntered off, well-pleased with his
quip. He found the Chevalier in the adjoining room filling a plate
high with food from a buffet set out on a long table against one
wall. Salvan selected an oyster and let it slide down the back of
his throat. He took another and waited until the Chevalier’s plate
was full and they were comfortably situated at a table by the
window before he took out his snuffbox and returned to the topic
uppermost in his thoughts.

“You brought it with you?” he asked in a low
voice.

The Chevalier stuffed his mouth with a slice
of pigeon pie and nodded. He put down his napkin and reached in a
deep pocket of his puce velvet frockcoat. He dumped the contents on
the table: two snuffboxes, an etui, a wad of folded bills, a
handful of papers and a scatter of livres. He handed the Comte what
he so desperately wanted and went back to eating.

“Keep it safe, Salvan,” he said between
mouthfuls. “There will not be another. You do not know what trouble
poor Fabrice took to—”

“I know, I know,” answered the Comte
impatiently, his bejeweled fingers caressing the royal seal
lovingly. It was only for a moment, then he quickly slid the
lettre de cachet
in an inner pocket of his flowered
waistcoat. “I will not forget your exertions on my behalf,
Fabrice.” He held up his wine glass in a toast. “Let us drink to
our good fortunes. I have heard the soft Félice is not at all happy
with her lover.”

“Yes?” whispered the Chevalier, hardly
daring to breathe.

The Comte drank deeply. “It has come to her
attention M’sieur le Duc contents himself with what is on offer at
the Maison Clermont, one blossom in particular, rather than spend
his evenings in the arms of Félice. Your actress, she does not like
to be upstaged, especially by an Oriental.”

Charmond’s watery eyes glowed. He bit
ravenously into a cooked onion.

“Oriental? It was you who told Félice? Ah,
M’sieur le Comte, you have lifted a great burden from poor
Fabrice’s shoulders! I shall go to her tomorrow with gifts and a
mouth of sympathies! Yes, that is what I shall do! She will not be
able to resist me. I must have a new wig and my tailor, he must run
up a pair of velvet breeches. Perhaps new diamond knee
buckles—”

“It pleases me you are happy, but close your
mouth! The contents, they disgust me!” The Comte pulled a face and
called a waiter to bring another bottle of wine. “You eat like a
pig! It is too hot in here. Open the window. Where is that
wine?”

“You are worried, very worried. I, Charmond,
can tell it,” said the Chevalier sympathetically. “I do not blame
you. I would be very worried were I in your heels, my dear Comte.
It is very bad for you I think. This situation, it is very bad. The
little
demoiselle
, she is in the satyr’s skilful hands and
you, you are powerless to act, to go to her, to spirit her away!
Why even with the
lettre de cachet
now in your possession,
what is the good of it? What can you do with it? Your son, he is
not the problem any longer. You can thrust it under his nose but to
what end? Your plans, they are all in a ruin. All your efforts,
they are wasted.

“Best find another female. She can’t be the
only one. To tell you a truth, Salvan, I did not like the slant of
her eyes; like a cat’s! And their color, a green! It does not do
well to bed females with green eyes. And now? The pitcher, it is
broken. Roxton, he is probably between her soft thighs as we speak.
My friend, you can do better than she.”

“I don’t want another! I won’t have another!
I will have her! I
will
!” screeched the Comte like a nasty
spoiled child. He was up on his heels and pounding the table with a
clenched fist, sending the silver and crockery clattering, drops of
wine spilling from his glass and the noise in the room hushed.
Salvan was oblivious to it all. The white’s of his eyes were all
that Charmond dared look at. “Imbecile! Idiot! Great fool! Do you
think it is only her virtue I crave? Ah! Why do I try to explain
these things to you?”

He sat down again and drank a great gulp of
wine. A minute’s quiet reflection helped to restore his calm. The
Chevalier dared not eat or drink or look away from the little man’s
pitted face.

“I am a flea’s hair from signing a marriage
contract with Strathsay,” said the Comte in a quiet voice. “It is
being drawn up as we speak. My lawyers, they are working night and
day to see it is done. Time, it is of the essence! The old man is
dying. His insides, they rot I think. I tell you, Charmond, every
time I visit him I almost vomit in his face. The stench, it is
unbelievable! But what do you think will happen if he hears the
slightest whisper of this night’s work, eh? What?”

The Chevalier did not speak. He did not even
shrug.

“All of it! Everything in ruins!” said
Salvan dramatically. “It will kill the old buzzard! And he will
hear of it soon enough because although it has taken all my genius
to keep that Italian whore from his bedside, she will contrive to
get to him. I am in Paris and not at court and so cannot watch her
every move. She thinks he does not want her, but he does, oh how he
wants her! It is pathetic, Fabrice, truly pathetic. Such a great
General and he reduced to calling out for a whore like a child for
its nanny!”

He washed the distaste from his mouth with
more wine. “Casparti will tell him everything if she gets to him
before he dies. He thinks the girl wants to marry my son. I have
made him think it. He desires to see her well cared for before he
dies. That is what keeps him alive. He likes the idea of her
marrying into a noble French family. But if that whore tells him
otherwise? Ah! He will hesitate, call the girl to his bedside and
ask her! A disaster! I must make certain that does not happen.”

“Salvan, you are a genius,” whispered the
wide-eyed Chevalier.

The Comte smiled smugly. “Yes, I am,
Fabrice.”

“Such a mind as yours shall conceive of a
solution to this difficult—but I am certain not insoluble—problem.
Mayhap the little
demoiselle
will come to no harm?
Especially if Roxton took her to his hôtel. Does not he live with
his widowed sister? Estée de Montbrail is a most respectable and
beautiful creature. One look at the little
demoiselle
and
she will take her under her wing.”

“You are not such a great fool as I
thought,” conceded Salvan. He leaned across the table and the
Chevalier followed his example; their long noses almost touched.
“About this business on the Versailles road. I will tell you
something. I came upon the scene moments after it happened.
Naturally I did not show myself. I was pursuing the girl. I see her
leave the masquerade in company with my cousin. I follow with all
speed. Yet, I have my driver stay at a distance. And then! He is
held up!

“I stop my driver and wait. Another carriage
behind stops. It is some bourgeois lawyer I do not know and care
not to remember. We wait together. I send a lackey closer under
cover of darkness. He hides in the forest. He comes back all white.
Roxton he fires without hesitation, he says. There was too much
confusion to unravel the rest. We wait, this lawyer and I, until
all is quiet and a carriage flies past in the opposite direction.
We know it is safe now. We go on. This lawyer continues on his way.
He is cowardly and fears for his reputation to stop.

“But I, I send a lackey with a flambeau to
inspect the carnage. One of the canaille, he is still alive! Shot
in the lung and going fast! But he tells my man with great glee one
of his companions found his mark and struck the girl—”

“Great God! But this is hideous!” gasped the
Chevalier. “To fire on an innocent—it is a thing that is most
shocking in the world!”

Salvan sat back in his chair, an arm hanging
loose over its ornate frame. “I do not believe it,” he said with a
wave of a ruffled hand. “That piece of scum, he lied. Had he said
Roxton was struck perhaps I believe it. But not the girl. That is
too fantastic.”

“But—Salvan,” said Charmond confused, “why
should a dying man lie? That too is unbelievable!”

“How should I know,” snarled Salvan. “Am I
his confessor? Do I care if his soul is in hell? Now we wait. Wait
for
mon cousin
. He has the girl. I admit I am no longer
master of the game. This worries me a little. But I wait. And when
the marriage contract it is signed I shall retrieve what is mine.
He will be forced to concede my win. He will. He must. He is a man
of honor is
mon cousin
, thus I am only a little
worried.”