Louise Allen – Regency High Society Vol 2: Sparhawk's Lady / The Earl's Intended Wife / Lord Calthorpe's Promise / The Society Catch (страница 33)

It would do.

“Vesuvius, my lady?” asked the driver, his eager, florid face filling the window of the hired carriage. “The Castel Nuovo? Santa Chiara? The Royal Palace? Or would my lady see the antique statues taken from Pompeii? Very popular they are with the English gentlepeople, my lady.”

“Whatever you please,” said Caro wearily, burrowing back further into the worn squabs. In her present mood she wanted only silence, not a visitor’s itinerary. “It doesn’t matter at all to me. Simply drive until nightfall, or until I tell you otherwise.”

Though the driver’s face fell, he tugged on his forelock and climbed up on the box, ready to do as she requested. As much as he would have liked to show his city to the beautiful Englishwoman, his disappointment was tempered well enough by the fare she’d pay. Until nightfall, she said: caro mio, she’d owe him a fortune!

Inside the carriage, Caro closed her eyes and tried to let herself be lulled by the repetitious clip-clop of the horse’s hooves and the rasping of the iron-bound wheels against the paving stones. She might as well have been back in Portsmouth for all the famous scenery meant to her. Certainly she would have been happier if she were.

For now she’d been assured that Frederick lived. In a few weeks, maybe even less, she would be reunited with him, and after returning here to Naples to visit his mother as she’d promised, they would sail back home to England. At the same time Jeremiah Sparhawk would redeem his friend, bid her and her husband farewell and leave for America. Most likely she would never see him again, and that was how it should be for a contented, married woman.

But deep inside, she knew she didn’t want it to end like that. It was not that she wished ill for Frederick. Her joy for his survival was very real, and the thought of holding him again in her arms was wonderful indeed. But things were different since Frederick had gone away. She was different.

God help her, what was she to do?

The carriage passed a garden, and the heady fragrance of full-blown roses filled the carriage. She breathed it deeply, remembering.

Another June, long ago, and she had held roses in her trembling hands when she stood beside Frederick in the chilly chapel at Blackstone. There had been no guests and only two witnesses—Mr. Perkins and the housekeeper—and the anxious young curate who owed his living to the Moncriefs had stumbled over the words of the service. Afterward she had signed her name after Frederick’s in the register, prouder of the elegant penmanship she’d only recently mastered than of the new name and title she had written.

There had been more roses in the earl’s bedchamber, on the mantel in tall porcelain vases, on the desk, on the little tables beside the bed, and when Caro had drawn back the coverlet she’d discovered hundreds of rose petals scattered over the sheets, deep, velvety red against the white linen. With her long hair combed about her shoulders she had waited for Frederick in the center of his bed, the heavy curtains looped back against the posts, and felt the rose petals tickle against her bare toes as she’d listened to the thumping of her own heart.

Tonight he would truly make her his. Tonight she would do all the things her mother had taught her and please him, her new husband. She was now his by right and by law, and because she loved him she would do it, even as she prayed she would not shame herself and be sick.

At last Frederick had come, in a yellow dressing gown and nightcap, and she had hastily looked away, already embarrassed by the intimacy his dress implied. She had felt the bed shift when he sat on the edge, and her hand had been cold when he’d taken it in his.

“You know before this I have never done anything to hurt you, Caro,” he had said gently. “I won’t begin now.”

Troubled, she had raised her eyes. “But as your wife—”

“I know all about what the world says of old men who take young wives,” he said, smiling indulgently. “It’s not much different than what is said of old men with young mistresses. What matters more to me instead is the love we share, pure and unsullied by animal passions. You are in many ways more like a daughter to me than a wife, and like a father I’ve found great joy in the woman you’ve become.”

She had shaken her head, confused, and he had lightly pressed his finger to his lips to hold her silence.

“Innocence like yours is a rare jewel, Caro, beyond any price. You are too young now to know the value of what you have given me today, but I am not, and I rejoice in the gift, however fleeting. Someday, perhaps, you will learn otherwise, and though I shall grieve, I will understand.”

“But I love you, Frederick!” she had cried from the depths of her heart. “I will never love anyone else as much as I love you!”

“I love you, too, Caro.” He had kissed her on the forehead, his lips dry as parchment and his dark eyes full of tenderness and sorrow. “And because I love you, I will understand.”

And now, at last, so did she.

“Pirates?” repeated the one-legged Englishman as he squinted up at Jeremiah. “Oh, aye, guv’nor, we’ve all manner of rogues here in this little harbor. Pirates, smugglers, corsairs, heathens and rascals of most ev’ry order.”

Only half listening, Jeremiah looked over the man’s head, across the Neapolitan waterfront to the rambling medieval castle that was the royal palace of King Ferdinand IV and his Court of the Two Sicilies, and to the lavish villas on either side that belonged to other aristocrats. Caro would be in one of them now, and he longed to know how she was faring with the dowager countess. Damnation, he should have insisted on going with her! She’d only been away from him for an hour at most, and already he missed her more than he’d ever thought possible. He picked up a stone and skipped it across the water, trying to concentrate instead on what the beggar was saying.

“‘Twas better when the fleet was here, of course,” said the man, hopping after Jeremiah on his crutches. “Lord Nelson, well now, he wouldn’t tolerate that sort of offal in his waters.”

“Left behind here, were you?” asked Jeremiah, eyeing the stump of the man’s leg and his tattered clothing. The English navy was notorious for ignoring its veterans and abandoning those who were too ill or wounded to serve.

“Aye, lost me leg in the service, but here I’ve a new wife and a new life and it never snows in Naples, so I don’t be complainin’.” The man winked broadly, contented enough even though he’d been whining for coins and tobacco when he’d accosted Jeremiah. “But as for the pirates, King Ferdy, well now, he’d jes’ as soon wink as look the other way.”

The man lowered his voice, confidential. “Are you lookin’ for a berth yourself, guv’nor? Hopin’ to make a quick fortune on the other side? If you is, I’ve got mates who—”

“All I’m interested in is information.” Jeremiah flipped a guinea to the man, who caught it deftly in his palm. “I have a friend who’s a prisoner in Tripoli, and I mean to get him out. Taken by a thieving Scotsman who’s renamed himself Hamil Al-Ameer.”

“Andrew Gordon, y’mean.” The beggar tapped his nose. “He’s a clever one, is Gordon, signin’ over to the heathens that way. He chants their mumbo jumbo, takes a new name, and just like that, he’s one of them, preying on Christians like he weren’t born one his own self.”

“I know,” said Jeremiah curtly. “Does he ever drop anchor here?”

The beggar shrugged, his shoulders propped high on his crutches. “Don’t doubt but that he has, but I can’t say when or for how long. You’ll have t’ go t’ him in Tripoli if you want t’ ransom your man. Lives fine as a lord there, they say. But even then don’t expect much from Hamil. He hates Englishmen, an’ he’s just as like to take your ransom money and slit your throat as smile at you.”

All too easily Jeremiah remembered the feel of Hamil’s blade pressing into his throat. Would Caro’s husband have felt it, too, as it eased him into death? “Then it’s a good thing I’m American, not English.”

“You’re a Yankee, guv’nor?” The man’s eyes lit merrily. “You been deep water sailing, and not heard the news?”

“I’m arrived this day from Portsmouth, aye,” said Jeremiah uneasily. “What news?”

“Why, news o’ the wars, of course! The big one’s France and England settin’ to it again, with the Peace all blown to bits like tinder to a powder keg.”

“That one was brewing when we cleared the channel,” said Jeremiah. “I knew the Peace had broken, for we were chased and boarded by a French frigate not two days from here.”

“But do you know what the Pasha o’ Tripoli up an’ done?” said the beggar eagerly, grinning with anticipation to tell his story. “Let that Yankee frigate Philadelphia run aground on his doorstep an’ then calls it his, jus’ like that, an’ now your country an’ his are at war, too.”

“At war?” repeated Jeremiah, stunned, his thoughts immediately flying to Davy. “America and Tripoli are at war?”