The Prince of Midnight (53 page)

She bit her lip and turned on him. " 'Tis little enough to undertake. Such a
miserable small promise."

He dropped his hand. "And what more do you fancy?" he asked bitterly. "Le
Seigneur du Minuit! A ten-days' wonder, now that he's caged up and petted and
made into naught! Aye, they'll tire of me. Do you think I've not reckoned it?
What else can I give you?"

"Yourself."

"Myself!"
he shouted, and it echoed all over the courtyard. "What am
I?"
He let go of the pillar and turned, then leaned back against the
marble column with his fingers spread and his cheek against the stone. "I'm
invented! I made a mask, and I invented myself. And everyone believes in it,
save you."

Leigh stood silent.

"You've made of me an arrant coward, do you know it?" He laughed, a hollow
sound in the empty courtyard. "I never was truly afraid of anything, until I
found myself pardoned."

"I don't understand," she said painfully.

"Don't you? I think you understood from the start. You scorned it all,
Sunshine, all the illusions. You never suffered anything but honesty, but I'm
all fraud and fabrication. And when it came time to offer myself in truth, I
found it out. Damn me, but I found it out." He pressed his forehead against the
pillar. "Curse you—Leigh, why wouldn't you believe in me? You're the only one.
The only one who wouldn't believe. And now it's too late."

She stood with her arms folded, pressed against her sides. She was shivering
inside. "Too late for what?"

"Look at me." He pushed away from the column, holding on at arm's length.
"Devil out of hell—
look
at me!" he yelled to the sky. "I can't stand
up without my head spinning! You can't believe in a farce."

"No, I can't," she cried. "I never could!"

He scowled. "I'll go on a ship. It worked once." He made a frustrated sound.
"But then what? So it cures me again. How long does it last? When next do I wake
up a buffoon?" With a harsh, angry chuckle, he let his shoulder hit the pillar
and stood leaning hard against it.

"It doesn't matter," she said in a tight voice. "None of that matters!"

"It matters to me," he said inflexibly.

Leigh felt a sensation of drowning creep upon her, a powerless sinking
beneath forces beyond her ability to vanquish. "And you'd leave me for that? Are
you really so proud?"

He stared past her into the darkness, into the empty park, the cool night.
"Is it pride?" His voice changed. She could barely hear it, soft as it became.
"I wanted to bring you the best of myself." Still he did not look at her. "It
seems to me 'tis love."

A minuet floated on the night air, pianoforte notes that followed one another
in a thin waterfall of melody.

"Monseigneur," she whispered. "You don't know the best of yourself."

He lifted his hand and rubbed his ear, the blond lace swinging in a pale,
graceful tumble from his wrist. "Aye— wonderfully elusive devils, my virtues
are," he said ruefully. "Can't seem to keep a grip on 'em at all."

Leigh spread her fingers over her skirt and took a step away from him.
"Courage is a virtue, is it not?"

He turned his head toward her. His face was in shadow; the velvet of his coat
burned a dull, tarnished gold where the light fell across his arm. "One of the
greatest."

She said, " 'Tis strange, then. Why have I so often wished you had less of
it?"

"I don't know." He sounded disconcerted. "Perhaps I've not so much as you
think."

She gave a little helpless laugh. "Or perhaps you've more—God help anyone who
might wait for you and worry."

Behind her, he stirred; his dress sword made a metallic sound against the
marble column. The minuet tinkled like a gay pirouette to its conclusion. Amid
the sound of a muffled, genteel tribute from the guests, she closed her fist
around her folded fan, crushing the feathery trim.

"Do you love me at all?" she asked suddenly.

He moved closer to her, close enough that she could feel his presence shield
her from the almost imperceptible breath of evening air.

"Sunshine ... I love you. I cherish you. But I can't stay. Not like this."

She bent her head, fiddling with the fan. "I wonder, Seigneur—if virtues are
so important; if offering the best of oneself is so imperative . . . how did I
ever manage to inspire such regard in you?' She gazed out at the park and bit
her lip. "You've seen naught of me but my unloveliest scars, that's certain."

"You're beautiful."

She looked back over her shoulder. "Is that why you love me? For my
appearance?"

"No!"

"What, then? What virtues can you see in me? What of my best have I offered
you?"

"Your own courage," he said. "Your steadfastness. Your proud heart."

She smiled ironically. "As well love one of the king's Horse Guards,
Seigneur, if 'tis pride and staunch courage you admire."

"That isn't all." He stepped closer, clasping her shoulder. "Not nearly all."

"No? What more of my best have I given you?" She bit her lip. "Bitterness and
vengeance and grief—are they so enchanting? What have I done to match your
renowned horsemanship, your mask, your sword, all of your celebrated daring,
Monseigneur du Minuit?"

His hand tightened. She felt his breath on her bare skin, quick and deep. His
head was bowed, his face turned a little toward her hair, not quite touching.
"Pride and courage. Beauty. All of that. All of that, and . . ."He pressed his
mouth to her hair. "I can't—explain it well."

Leigh stepped out of his hold and turned, opening her battered fan and
staring down through the dimness at the painted design.

He made a move, as if to reach out to her again. Then he dropped his hand.
"You're lovely," he said, with careful emphasis. "Lovely and brave and . . ."He
came to a precarious pause. "But it is not that. 'Tis none of that."

Beyond the portico, across the unseen lawn, the lake held a faint reflection
of starlight and distant lamps.

He stared into the dusky oblivion. He shook his head and gave an uncertain,
suffocated laugh. "You're the one who said 'together.' "

She lifted her head and looked at him.

The remote lamplight caught his expression as he met her eyes. He stood
frozen, as if he had only just heard his own words. There was discovery in his
face, a quiet shock, a comprehension.

"Aye, together," she whispered, standing taut and trembling. "Side by side. A
family."

"Leigh." He sounded desperate. "I don't know how. I've never ... no one ever
... I don't know how to do it!"

"How to do what?" she asked in amazement.

"How to stay! How to be a frigging family, for God's sake. All I know is what
I've been. I've tried—everything I've tried you've scorned; I tell you I love
you, and you tell me I know nothing of it. I've shown you my best—I fought, I
rode, I was everything I could be and it wasn't enough. And
now—
now
it's gone again, now I'm no more than a—" he made a fierce gesture—"a shadow! No
more than what I was when you came to me ... now do you say you want me? If
that's 'together,' if that's what love is, that I come to you out of
weakness—Leigh ... I cannot. I can't do it."

She gazed at him. Bright music drifted on the still air.

"Seigneur," she said. "I love an allemande. Dance with me."

"I can't dance!" he said furiously.

She took his hands. "Dance with me."

"I can't—my balance—"

"I'm your balance." She closed her fingers hard around his.

He tried to pull away, and then suddenly his grip tightened on her hands. He
lifted them to his mouth. "Ah God, you are ... you are .. and what can I give
you in return?"

"Give me your joy, Seigneur." She pressed her forehead against their clasped
hands. "Oh, give me your joy. I can go on alone if I must. I'll endure, oh
yes—I'm too strong to break. And I'll grow old and turn into stone if you leave
me. I'll never look up and see you play with the wolf; I'll never hear you call
me sweet names in French; I'll never learn to beat you at chess." She shook her
head violently. "Please . . . dance with me. Take me to Italy. Paint me in the
ruins at midnight. Give me all your mad notions and your crazy heroics and your
impossible romantical follies. And I'll be your anchor. I'll be your balance.
I'll be your family. I won't let you fall."

His hands opened. He slipped his fingers over her cheeks, cupping her face
between his palms.

She felt hot tears fill her eyes. "I'm so weary of grief and hate." She bent
her head and stepped away, looking up into his face. "I want a chance to give
you the best of myself, too."

Far off beyond the lake, a crane made its warbling whoop, exotic and
startling against the background of the harpsichord. He lifted his hand, touched
her cheek, caught the single tear that tumbled down it.

She bit her lip. The tears came, impossible to stop. "I love you," she said
in a cracked voice. "The truth is, Monseigneur ... I need you more than you need
me."

He was silent, his hand against her skin, warm against the night air.

"Don't let that happen to me." Her words shook. "Don't leave me to be what
I'll become without you."

"Sunshine," he said huskily.

"That was what my father called me." She kept her body still, holding his
look. "If you go away from me, Seigneur—if you go away—" She spread her hands
helplessly. "Tell me then . . . when will I ever be Sunshine again?"

He bent toward her, his mouth barely touching the corner of her lips.

"Always," he whispered. "Always. Smile for me."

She took a tremulous breath. Her lips quivered, pressed together.

"I'm afraid that's a pretty feeble attempt." He put both his hands on her
shoulders and gave her a little shake. "Try again, Sunshine. You've asked me to
dance—now you'd best cultivate a sense of humor."

Outside the silent interior of the riding school, the bells of Florence
filled the early air: bright quick tones, and beneath them, the deep, slow notes
that tolled in time to the pale horse's stride. Leigh looked down from the
arcaded balcony into the school, her hands on the wide stone rail. She watched
mount and rider canter leisurely around the huge oval of tanbark with a motion
as methodical and easy as a rocking horse, moving in and out of the sun shafts
where the sheen of dust motes drifted, kindled by the light of the towering
windows overhead.

Mistral was bridleless; S.T. rode bareback, dressed only in boots and
breeches, with his queue trailing down between his shoulders in careless gold
and shadow. The horse halted, retired three steps, and made a perfect
demi-volte
on two tracks, marking one half circle with its forefeet around
another made with its hind legs before it started off in the other direction
again at a canter, while the man on its back never seemed to move.

She smiled, leaning her chin on one hand. The spectators' balcony was empty
except for herself and Nemo, who lay napping in a cool corner. No one came here
now: with Italian hospitality S.T. had been invited by one of his Florentine
intimates to make all the use he would of this palazzo; the cavernous apartments
and riding school were completely at his service. It was nothing, the marchese
said; make free of the empty palace; his family and his stable summered at some
country villa in the hills.

It was the one place and time of day in Florence that she could be sure to
find S.T. alone. He was convinced that it was the riding that kept his
equilibrium—that a month on foot in London was what had renewed the affliction.
Leigh wasn't so completely certain, but she saw the logic in it. The whole
notion had come of an off-hand musing of hers, that if a rough sea could cure
him, then perhaps constant lesser motion might have some influence. He'd seized
on the idea like a drowning sailor on a floating log. She couldn't have kept him
off a horse, concerned for his safety or not. As soon as the notion had struck
him, he'd had one of Mrs. Child's steady cobs saddled. After a lengthy argument,
at Leigh's insistence he didn't ride free, but spent hours circling at a trot on
the longe, with his hand gripping the pommel and an elderly groom holding the
longe line.

It had mortified him, of course, to be longed like a boy at his lessons. No
miracle took place: he didn't dismount steady on his feet. The progress came in
small increments, but by the time two months had passed and they were ready to
board a packet for Calais, he claimed he was only dizzy if he closed his eyes
and turned sharply.

Leigh fared worse on the smooth crossing than he did. He was disgustingly
cheerful when they arrived, and after they'd taken ship for Italy and spent
forty days fighting contrary winds, he arrived at Naples and danced with her at
the English ambassador's ball the same night.

She supposed that he didn't know she came to watch in these quiet dawns at
Florence; he never looked up from his silent concentration on the endless
sidepasses and airs and changes of leading leg, the magnificent dance of man and
horse to the sound of the morning bells. She carried her sketchbook, but she'd
long since given up trying to reproduce the columns of sunlight and the heavy
shade, and Mistral's motion and power and beauty. She could not duplicate it on
paper, so she engraved it on her heart.

Down the length of the balcony, a servant appeared, hovering discreetly
beneath the arch of red and black marble at the entrance. Leigh passed quietly
along the gallery and accepted the thick, bundle of letters from the youth.

The servant withdrew with a bow, never once raising his eyes above the hem of
Leigh's dressing robe. It occurred to her that the marchese's well-trained staff
was unaccountably loath to disturb these morning sessions in the school with any
offer of service. She'd left specific instructions that these particular letters
were to be brought to her as soon as they arrived—but never before had an
attendant shown himself at the balcony entrance.