One Touch of Scandal (33 page)

“Hurrah!” said the boys, bounding from the room.

Just her side of the threshold, however, Lord Lucan hesitated. “But just so I'm clear, Miss Gauthier—are you quite,
quite
settled on my elder?” He dangled the bat gracefully from two fingers. “I mean, prophets can be so portentous and gloomy, don't you think? And then there
is that whole Vedantic philosophy thing—dashed hard to get your noggin round
that
business, I always say. And some women, let's face it, just prefer the golden Greek god look to dark and myst—”

“
Lord Lucan.
” Grace thrust out a hand. “Give me the bat.”

His brows shot aloft. “Thank you, no. I've seen your swing.” He beamed one last wolfish smile. “Anyway, looks like the better man won. Usual thing, eh? Mustn't keep the lads waiting!” Hastily, he turned, and slammed at once into his sister.

“What was he up to?” Lady Anisha cut a suspicious glance over her shoulder as her brother hastened away.

“Just taking the boys to the park,” said Grace evenly. “How do you do this morning?”

Anisha sighed and fell into one of the chairs. “Well, I had hoped to see my children,” she complained, propping one elbow on the worktable. “It seems to me Luc has taken to indentured servitude a little too cheerfully, and now the boys would rather play ball than be read to.”

“Don't despair,” said Grace, sitting down opposite her. “Luc's heart is good—if not pure—and the children are of an age when boys long for a fatherly influence.”

“Now there's a frightening bit of syntax,” she said. “The words
Luc
and
fatherly
in the same sentence. By the way, where did Raju hare off to at the crack of dawn?”

Grace lifted both brows. “
I
should know?”

“Yes,” Anisha returned. “And you do.”

It was Grace's turn to sigh. Were there no secrets? Not, apparently, in a houseful of psychics. Then why didn't Anisha know the answer to her own question?

“To Lord Bessett's,” she finally said.

“All the way to
Yorkshire
?”

“So I gather,” said Grace. “He left from Euston Station.”

“Do trains go to Yorkshire?” Anisha's dark brows snapped together. “I don't even know where it is.”

“North, I think?” Grace suggested. “My French governess believed the geography of England a waste.”

“Did she indeed?”

“Oh, yes. She lived secure in the belief that one day the French would triumph and simply rename all the towns and counties, so there was no point troubling to learn them.”

“Ah, the hazards of a foreign education!” said Anisha, grinning. “We've doubtless learnt all manner of heresy, you and I.”

Then at once they burst into peels of laughter, but the laughter fell away, leaving only a heavy silence.

“Seriously,” said Grace. “Are you all right?”

Anisha cut her an odd look from beneath a fringe of inky lashes. “Raju told you?”

Grace looked away. “Anisha, I am sorry,” she said. “You harbored a certain fondness for him, did you not?”

She gave a sharp, bitter laugh. “And you think you don't have the sight.”

Grace reached out and covered Anisha's hand with her own. “Rance Welham is a
good
man,” she said fervently. “A good man and a brave soldier, and whatever else he may be is quite beside the point. But that does you no good at all, I know.”

Anisha shrugged and sat up straight on a sigh. “Oh, I'm over it, I daresay,” she said evenly. “But it would have been…pleasurable, perhaps. And it would have driven Raju wild.”

“You…aren't in love with Rance?”

Anisha lifted one slender shoulder. “Oh, not hopelessly,” she admitted. “A little taken, perhaps. All right, a great deal taken. But what woman wouldn't be?—No, wait. Don't answer that.
Not you
, that's who—but only because fate has been saving you for my brother.”

“Anisha—!” Grace said warningly.

Anisha broke her gaze and leapt up to ring the bell. “I fancy a cup of tea,” she said abruptly. “And while we wait, I shall finish your palm.”

“And my stars?” Grace asked teasingly.

“I can tell you a little, perhaps,” said Anisha. “But I have not completed my charts.”

A footman came in, and went out again to do Anisha's bidding. Anisha sat back down, extended her hand across the narrow table, and waggled her fingers at Grace.

With a bemused smile, Grace thrust out her hand, palm up. Anisha swept her fingers down it, as if clearing away cobwebs, then began to work her way around the palm, rubbing her finger lightly over the bumps and swells of flesh, her brow creased.

“These are your mounds,” she finally said. “Each tells us something different.”

“My future, do you mean?”

Anisha cast up a scowl. “
Jyotish
and Vedic palmistry are sciences,” she said with mock censure. “Not tent tricks at a country fair. They can help you understand your true nature, and your tendencies—both good and bad—and teach you to manage your life with grace.”

I have a tendency,
thought Grace,
to fall in love with dark, incomprehensible men.

Could Anisha help her cope with that, she wondered?

But Anisha was tapping the tip of her finger lower on
the hand now. “This is Saturn.” Her voice had taken on a soothing, almost singsong quality. “Saturn tells me that you possess good judgment. That you are a woman of judicious restraint in most things.”

“Am I?” Grace laughed. “Well, that is a comfort, I daresay.”

“This,” said Anisha pensively, “now
this
is your Sun line. It is…merely average.”

“Oh,” said Grace. “What does that symbolize?”

“It is…what is the word? Something more than charm. Your
magnetism.
How you draw people into your orbit. Adrian's is much the same, though he can charm when he wishes—which is almost never. And you…well, you have a quiet grace, not a magnetism. You are well named, which is a good omen. Now Rance's Sun line—oh, it is like a deep groove cleaving apart his hand.”

Grace laughed again. “Why am I not surprised?”

But Anisha's face had taken on a serious cast. “Your head line tells me you are an optimistic person, and that you know yourself to be capable. All things I would agree with, by the way. And I see here that you have clear thinking. Whatever fears you possess, they are rational. You must never dismiss them outright. I beg you will remember this.”

“Oh, dear,” said Grace. “That sounds dire.”

Anisha did not answer but instead set her hand flat over Grace's, her fingertips touching Grace's pulse point. “Grace, you are a woman of strong emotion and energy,” said Anisha quietly. “Now tell me, what specifically would you wish to know?”

“What
I
would wish?” she murmured. “Why, just the usual, I daresay.”

“Jyotish
and the hand together tell us many things,” said Anisha. “Who we are, and who we will be. Who we will love. How we will live, and how we will die. All
these things are written.
Karma
is the summation of our words, thoughts, and deeds. One reaps what one sows, either in this life, or the next.
Prarabdha
is the karma in this life, and
sanchita
is past—”

“But I know my past.”

“Sometimes, my dear, we
know
the past, but we do not
see
the past.” Anisha's lilting, musical voice had dropped to a near whisper. “Moreover,
sanchita karma
is the accumulation of all your actions through all your past lives, not just this one. Now, shall I tell you what I see? And be certain when you answer.”

“
Mon Dieu.
” Grace swallowed hard. “Anisha, are you
trying
to alarm me?”

“Only ignorance is alarming,” she replied.

Grace felt suddenly foolish. “Yes, go ahead.”

“Very well.” Anisha flashed a muted smile. “Now, I see that the death of Mr. Holding has brought you much sadness. And guilt. Yes, you feel in some way to blame for his death.”

“Do I?” Grace's unease returned.

“Yes, I feel it strongly,” she murmured, and Grace had the oddest impression they weren't really talking about palms or stars any longer. “In your unconscious mind,” Anisha continued, “you feel that but for you, or your actions, this death might not have occurred.”

A heavy warmth was seeping up her arm now, bringing with it a strange and certain clarity. She
did
feel guilty. All along she had blamed herself. But why?

“Grace,” said Anisha sharply, “what does number thirty-five mean to you?”

“N-Nothing, why?”

Anisha gave a little shake of her head, her eyes still closed. “I cannot say,” she answered. “It is a bad number for you. You must avoid it at all costs.”

“Avoid it?” Grace was beginning to feel oddly lethargic, much as she had the first time Adrian touched her. “As in…roulette, for example? Or some sort of cards? I never gamble.”

Anisha sighed. “I cannot say,” she said again, sounding frustrated. “And the sign of the swan?”

“The swan?” Grace frowned, and tried to think. “Like a public house?”

“Perhaps.” Anisha's inky eyebrows were almost drawn together now. “Were you born there? Have you ever stayed in such a place? Sailed on a ship so named, perhaps?”

“
Non,
” said Grace slowly. “And you know, I was born in London—Manchester Square, to be precise.”

“Yes, it must be nothing.” Anisha sounded suddenly awkward. “Very strange. Let us turn to your present and future, and to your propensity for love, health, and happiness.”

“Why not?” Those sounded far more pleasant, and her arm was growing wonderfully warm and heavy.

“Grace, you are ruled by the plant Mercury,” Anisha said. “You are
Mithuna,
the pairing of male and female. Your match with
Mesha
will bring you many challenges and difficulties.”

“Who would have dreamt?” said Grace dryly.

Without opening her eyes, Anisha smiled. “You will bring
Mesha
into the light with your energy, but you must not push too hard or he will…what is the term?—buck up? Yes. But you can temper his stubbornness and give to him much joy if you are careful. You will help
Mesha
find his direction and reenergize his wish to learn and grow.”

“But what does that mean?”

“Specifically? That Raju has much to learn about himself.” Her voice took on a lulling, decidedly singsong
quality. “He has shut away the half of him that is spiritual and truth-seeking.”

“His
Rajputra
half, you mean?”

“We hold no claim over spirituality,” she answered. “But yes, perhaps. His life force—his
prana
—has suffered because he has not nurtured this half of his soul. This neglect, in turn, is the cause of much inner pain.”

“
Oui.
” Grace murmured, giving in to the relaxation. And Anisha's explanation actually did make sense, at least in her lethargic state.

Anisha's words continued to flow around her. “And I warn you, Grace, that though you are very attracted to
Mesha,
” she went on, “a fire sign can burn badly. Be serious in this relationship or back away. If you choose, however, to go down this path,
Mesha
will wish to lead the way, and you must let him—or let him think you do.”

Grace laughed, but even to her own ears, the sound seemed far away. “
Alors,
is that my future?”

“In part.” Anisha's voice was low and fraught with frustration. “But there is something else. What, though? What is it…”

“What do you mean, something else?” Grace murmured drowsily.

“Something frustrating. Just beyond my reach. Like a sneeze that will not come.”

For a time, Anisha said no more, but merely began to breathe deeply, in that way Adrian sometimes did when they made love with slow, exquisite lassitude. The pressure of her hand against Grace's seemed unrelenting. Grace still felt as if she were held in thrall in some way she could not quite give words to.

“Damn it all,” Anisha finally uttered, most uncharacteristically. “Grace, give me your other hand.”

Grace opened her eyes and did so. Anisha held both her hands across the table, her head slightly bowed, no longer even pretending to look at Grace's palm. She held the position quietly, and for so long Grace wondered vaguely if Anisha had fallen asleep.

But after a few quiet moments had passed, the strange lethargy began to drain from Grace, the heat flowing down her left arm, like a river of cleansing warmth flushing all the way through her, only to return to the mother sea.

When the warmth was gone, Anisha lifted her chin, opened her eyes, and spoke. “Someone, Grace, bears you much ill will,” she said, her voice clear as a bell and no longer rhythmic. “You are the tool of another's vengeance.”

“
Mon Dieu!
” Grace's breath seized an instant. “Someone does want me blamed for Mr. Holding's death.”

“It feels likely,” she said. “It is what Raju has long believed.”

“I think it is why he has gone to Yorkshire.” Grace's voice went up sharply. “But Anisha, who could hate me that much?”

Anisha shook her head. “This is about envy,” she said. “Not hate.”

“But I have nothing
to
envy,” she stridently protested. “Nothing. Not unless…Mr. Holding had a scorned lover?”

Again, the shake of the head. “I think the envy is not directed at you, but at others,” she said. “I feel, as I said, that you are a tool of vengeance. Sometimes animals symbolize emotions. I think that is what the swan means. Tell me, Grace—think very hard—what does the swan mean to you?”