Chapter Five
But at eleven the next morning, Giselle sat in the main salon at a table filled with her supplies to make a kite.
She had donned her newest gown, clothing the other indulgence beside cognac that she gave herself for her solitary life and the dangerous work she did.
She glanced down at her skirts of a delicate muslin she called her summer cloud of blue.
Telling herself she wore the pretty frock for confidence, she allowed herself the basic truth that the shade was an exact match for her eyes.
Youthful silliness though it was, she’d taken longer than usual with her toilette this morning because she wished to impress monsieur le marquis.
Fruitless as self-deception was, she did not usually lie to herself about anything, if she could help it.
But this man lingered inside her, uplifting her, varied and bright as a rainbow.
He appeared no more than a minute later. He led by the hand his charming little girl.
Bella broke free from him and ran to her. “Madam”—she mangled the word, but Giselle did not care—“we make a kite. It will be red?”
“Exactly as the one we lost, Bella.”
The child beamed at Giselle. Her heart twisted. She was so like her own Sophie, sprightly and fun, with her chubby cheeks and pink, heart-shaped mouth.
Giselle patted the chair beside her. “Come sit down.”
“Bonjour, madame.” The marquis was all smiles this morning.
From his silver-gray waistcoat and apple-green frockcoat to his flashing gray eyes, the man mesmerized her.
Nothing like her husband, who’d barely tolerated any act at any hour before two in the afternoon, this man seemed to have no bad humors.
Only gaiety, love for his daughter, and smiles for both Bella and her.
He made her mouth water. She swallowed hard and killed the temptation to do more than greet him as a mere acquaintance.
“Do you mind if I sit with you?” He had his hand on the back of the chair next to Bella.
“Please do.” At least he was far from her on the other side of his daughter.
She turned her attentions to his child. “The important thing to remember about a kite is that it must be light as a feather.” With a flourish, she produced a long white feather from the pocket of her skirt.
Bella giggled as Giselle swept it down her little cheek.
“Belle will fly. We shall make your kite so it flies very high.”
The child went wide-eyed. “Wib feabbers?”
“The feathers are for you. But we’ll make our kite so light that it seems to have them.” Then Giselle pulled out four more, all of which she’d purchased from a milliner in the Lanes early this morning.
Bella took the five feathers and swiped them down her arm. “Tickles. Tickles,” she sang to herself, and wiggled at the sensation.
Her father sat back, benevolent and approving.
“So, now,” Giselle said to Bella, “we will start. We’ll take these two sticks and put them together like that.” She wound thin string around the jointure.
Bella picked up two more sticks and rubbed them together. The angle was not useful, and Giselle tried to change it.
But Bella frowned and shook her head. “No, no. This. This is…” She didn’t finish the sentence but thrust her two sticks at Giselle and nodded.
“Oui, d’accord,” Giselle said, because she understood the demands of a child were often best not refused. “We will make your kite and another. How is that?”
Bella nodded eagerly.
“Madame,” the marquis said in a warning tone as he turned to caution his daughter, “Bella knows she should follow your lead.”
“Belle,” blurted the little girl, “wants this kite.”
“Yes, of course you do, sweetheart, but—”
Giselle reached out and put her hand atop his.
The warmth, the firmness of him beneath her own flesh, made her stop and stare up into his large eyes.
“We will make two,” she said, though she had no idea where she found the logic of it.
The man filled her head with visions of laughter and kisses.
She tried to shake it all away…but the fires in her belly only flared higher.
He did not move, but his gaze devoured hers. “If you say so.”
She nodded, suddenly tongue-tied.
He’s married, titled, rich, and English. So far beyond you. So far above you, Giselle, that your desire for him has no future.
None.
Then a lady appeared on the threshold of the salon, called his name, strode to him—and bent to kiss his cheek.
“Ezz! Ezz!” Bella waved both her hands as she called to the lady.
“Hello, dumpling,” the lady greeted her as she bussed the child’s cheek and ruffled her blonde curls.
The marquis was on his feet, his arms around the woman. “I was so worried about you. What happened that you are so delayed?”
“The storm,” she explained with a nonchalant tone. “We had to pause just outside Crawley for the night at an inn. Not a bad one, for the countryside, I must say.”
Giselle got to her feet. This was his wife. His wife! She clutched her hands together. To be introduced to the marquise, she had to show respect for her betters. Manners did not die, even after guillotines did their worst.
“Well, I am relieved,” he told the woman with a hug. “I was worried all night long.”
“No need. Jamison knows our horses. Poor things had a devil of a night when that storm descended on us. He left ours in Crawley and paid to hire fresh ones for our journey here this morning. We’ll get them when we return.
Now,” the woman said as she put her gloved hand to his forearm, “do introduce me to your charming friend.”
“I will be delighted.”
And he truly looked as though he was. That he should be so bold—and so out of character as to wish to make her acquainted with his wife—took Giselle’s breath. Her heart shriveled like a child’s deprived of candy.
“Terese, my dear, allow me to present Madame Laurant. Madame, Lady Winterton, my sister.”
The news sang through Giselle’s bones, so much so that she had her hand out to the woman. “I am pleased to meet you, my lady.”
The marquis was grinning. “Madam Laurant has been so gracious as to help Bella construct a kite.”
“How exciting,” said the lady, winking at Bella.
“We had a mishap yesterday on the beach, and the kite Madame Laurant had made flew away.”
“I see.” She frowned, her soft gray eyes so like her brother’s. “What kind of mishap?”
“Bella rushed to hold it and lost the lead. She fell into the sea just as a wave came for us all, and it was Madame Laurant who saved our Bella.”
“Well!” The lady gazed at Giselle with fresh delight, that too so true and genuine like her brother’s. “Thank you, madam. Our Bella can be impulsive, and I’m glad you were quick to act.”
“As was I, my lady. I know how children of this age cannot understand the fullness of what they do.”
Terese, or rather Lady Winterton, tipped her head. “You have a child of your own, madame?”
“Non. I did…but she is gone.”
The woman reached out to take Giselle’s hand. “I am so sorry. To lose a child is heartbreaking.”
Giselle preferred not to talk about this. “It is. Very.” She looked up into the face of the marquis. His expression had melted to compassion for her loss. Flustered, she said, “You both have much to discuss, so if you prefer, we can postpone our kite making until later.”
“No, Clive,” the lady objected, and touched his wrist. “I will settle myself in my room. Unpack. Order a service of tea and sandwiches. Terrible food in that inn, you know. Adieu, Madame Laurant. Thank you for saving our little girl. She is the light of our lives.”
“I was happy to help, Lady Winterton.” Giselle smiled as his given name resounded in her head. Clive. Gentle Clive is simply a man, not a lofty marquis. Clive, friendly, kind, and chivalrous. Giselle liked the color of his name. Gold, like him.
Lady Winterton twiddled her fingers at the three of them. “Do not rush, Clive. I need an hour or so to myself.”
With that, she was off, and the marquis was left standing there gazing down at Giselle.
“Shall we continue with the kite?” he asked in a mellow tone. “I’d like to see it through. Bella would, too.”
They both glanced over at the array of joined sticks that Bella had made.
Giselle, free of her fear that Terese was his wife and bemused by the mess Bella had made, beamed at this man whom she enjoyed more with each passing moment. “Well, goodness. Look at that. Hmmm. Bella, that’s an intriguing shape.” Like a garden worm.
He chuckled at her words and at the jumbled thing his daughter had made. Then he shocked her and took her hand in his. “Look at me. You were pleased to hear that Terese is my sister.”
The surprise of his touch matched the jolt of his words. But she loved being held by him. “Did I reveal so much?” she ventured, and knew once her words were out, she should not have been so bold.
“You show me almost everything you are,” he said beneath his breath. “I have no idea why that is.”
Alarmed, she admitted to herself that she knew why. But to him, her answer was, “No, nor I.”
“But I beg you not to change.”
A man and woman entered the room.
Giselle went quite still. “Oh, sir, that is not wise.”
“Tell me why.”
She rolled a shoulder and tried to free her hand from his. He would not let her go. “I am French.”
He arched a long, inquisitive golden brow. “Are you my enemy?”
“No.” That was so true. “Never.”
“I did not think so.”
“Still, monsieur, you are a marquis.”
“Does that make me ineligible to be your friend?”
“No, but—”
“Tell me why not, madame.”
She stiffened her spine. “I am a foreigner in your land.”
“Yet not so foreign that you are not permitted a license to visit the southern coast in this time of peril.”
“That is true. I am quite harmless.” Except for the work I do.
Her friends who worked in London had obtained that license for her.
No official had asked to see it yet. For that, Giselle was happy.
She disliked feeling different…branded. Yet what she created was definitely a singular product.
Proud of it, she assumed no one else had her abilities or her unique task.
Or so it seemed. Out of curiosity these past months here in England, she had searched London’s, Greenwich’s, and Dover’s book- and print shops for anything resembling her work.
There was none. Only her older brother had accomplished the same sort of diagrams. For his audacity to show the real lay of estate lands along the Loire River, he had gone to La Force and died there.
Those who owned large tracts of land and who had defrauded the government of tax money had joined together and deluded the government tax collectors, blaming her brother for fraud.
She stilled at the memory of his death. Now that he was gone, only she knew how to do this particular art.
To the marquis, she said, “I…I work for my living.”
“So do I.”
She put two fingers to her lips. His gaze followed and melted all her reserve. “You run an estate.”
“Among other things,” he replied.
She raised her face to the ceiling. She must warn him off. Frustrated he would not relent, she swallowed her dismay. “I am no one. I should remain so to you.”
“That time when you could be no one to me has passed. You’ve saved my daughter from the sea. You’ve made her morning a happy one.”
“Little doings, sir.”
“Not to me. Nor her.”
She snatched back her hand. “You have been gracious to me, sir.”
He turned cool, narrowing icy gray eyes upon her. “Do you refuse to see me because you have a lover?”
“No! None!”
“I know you were to meet a man last night outside the hotel.”
She sucked in a breath. What to say about that?
“And he left you waiting for him out in the rain, my dear.” He took her hand once more. “Will you meet him and disappear with him?”
“No, no. It is not like that.”
“Then he is…what to you?”
“Business.” Oh, why had she admitted that? “Business!”
“I see.” He relaxed, full of a rogue’s confidence. “So I may call upon you without a contender for your affections.”
“My affections, sir, are not to be had.”
“No?” He gave her a pure, sweet smile.
She stiffened. “What will your wife say?”
“Nothing. She died two years ago.”
Her mouth opened.
“I am free, madame, to court you honorably. Did you think I would do so otherwise?”
“No, I see who you are. All of you. Noble and wise. How can I do that? I do not know you. I do not.”
“Nor do I know all of you, my dear. But you stir me. I gaze at you and find new vistas I wish to explore.”
“You mustn’t. I am a widow, sir. Alone in your country. My family—my husband and daughter, my brother, my sister and parents—are gone. Life has not been easy and I…I have few affections left.”
He brought her hand to his lips and pressed an angel’s kiss to her fingertips. “Allow me to help you find your lost affections. I confess I have a few of my own I must reclaim.”
His words swept her along as if she took to the sky with him.
“Let us finish these two kites. Then go out into the air and send them up where we will wish we, too, could fly with gay abandon.”
Oh, he had a subtle art with words that warmed her blood with hot, red longing. “Yes. I want that.”
“Good.” He tucked her hand between both of his. “I am in earnest, dear madame. We will declare we aid each other in some kind of rehabilitation. To find great joy is a treasure to which few devote themselves. Let us do it, shall we?”