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She scanned the letter and smiled. “Oh, my,” she said. She read it again, this time more slowly, giggling now and again.
Longmore stood and waited, the remnants of his good humor slipping away.
“Is it a great secret?” he said. “Or may I share the joke?”
She held out the letter to him. He didn’t take it, only glanced at the bottom, at the signature. Adderley. As he’d thought.
“Do you want to read it?” she said. “Or shall I? I do think it needs to be read aloud for the full effect.
“Go ahead,” he said. “Read it.”
“ ‘My dear Madame de Veirrion,’ ” she read, “ ‘I find I cannot sleep. Indeed, I cannot rest at all. My heart is too full for rest, my mind too agitated. To sleep were impossible until I had unburdened my heart to the celestial creature who has stolen it utterly. E’en now I hear your voice, like a haunting melody. I close my eyes and all I can see is your beautiful—”
“Breasts,” Longmore said. “All he can see is your beautiful breasts, the oily blackguard.”
“Eyes,” she said, stabbing the place with her finger. “My beautiful eyes, ‘like twin oceans, of fathomless depths and mystery.’ ”
“I’m going to be ill,” he said.
“Shall I stop reading?” she said.
“No, go on. I have an irresistible need to hear it, rather in the way one can’t help gaping at a carriage accident, or bodies being carried out after a building collapse.”
“ ‘I’d always thought myself immune to love’s pangs and raptures,’ ” she read on. “ ‘I’d always believed those feelings were for schoolboys and poets. Then I met you. Please forgive me, madame—I hardly know what I write. I’m distraught, confused. I know only that I couldn’t rest without penning some few words, however inept’—”
“He got that part right, at any rate.”
“—‘some few words, however inept, to express my feelings. You are so kind, so understanding, my very dear lady. Pray be kind to this, your humble supplicant.’ ”
“What a ghastly assault to commit upon an innocent piece of paper.”
She giggled again and went on, “ ‘Only send me a word or two, enough to keep me from utter despair. A little hope is all I seek—let me know when I may see you again. In pity’s sake, pray make it soon. I am yours, devotedly, A.’ ”
She looked up at Longmore. “Isn’t it wonderful?” she said.
“Wonderful? Have you taken leave of your wits? The effrontery of the fellow! Plague take him, I knew he was low, but each day proves my estimation grossly flattering. This passes anything! Engaged to my sister and making love to my—my—what-you-call-it.”
Her eyebrows went up. “Your what-you-call-it?”
He frowned at her. “You know what I mean.”
“Your ‘aunt,’ perhaps.”
“Not an aunt, Sophy. Not that. Never that.” How could she be so thick? “Nothing like that.”
“What then?”
He waved a hand at the letter. “He knows I’ve been escorting you everywhere. He knows I’ve an interest. A gentleman doesn’t poach on another’s preserve.”
“Will you listen to yourself?” she said. “You act as though Madame is real. This is all a sham, remember?”
“That isn’t the point.”
“It’s the entire point,” she said.
“The point is, he has no damn business writing you love letters,” he said. “If I can dignify this turgid spew by that title, which I’m sorry to do, as it gives love letters a bad name.”
“Longmore.”
“I thought I was Harry by now,” he said. “Or is that a sham, too?”
“Which part?” she said. “I’m not sure what you mean.”
He wasn’t sure what he meant, either. He stared at the letter in her hand. Her hands, her soft hands. She’d raked her hands through his hair, and made as if to strangle him and held his cock and told him she wanted him.
“How dare he?” he said. “How dare the cur be haunted by your voice? How dare he presume to be distraught and confused? He doesn’t even know you. It’s a damned insult.”
She was studying him, her head tipped to one side, thinking, thinking, trying to make him out. “What is the matter with you?” she said. “He’s only saying those things.”
“Yes,” he said. “He’s saying the things women want to hear. That we’re thinking about their eyes, not their breasts. Their voices, not the place between their legs. Their conversation, not the quickest way to get under their skirts.”
“But he’s trying to get me into bed,” she said. “That’s the point. What on earth has possessed you? You said your mind was clear. I thought we’d settled that matter. How many times do we have to fornicate for you to—”
“We don’t fornicate,” he said between his teeth.
“It isn’t ladylike to say the shorter word,” she said.
“We make love,” he said.
He snatched the letter from her, crushed it into a tight little ball, and threw it across the room. “You and I. We make love. There’s a difference. Worlds of difference. And he has no business making love to you in his illiterate, idiotish letter. And just because I don’t write you illiterate, idiotish letters that make one gag—and just because I don’t say . . .”
He trailed off, aware of the feeling, the strange feeling, of being stabbed and of being happy and wretched at the same time.
He looked at her for a long time.
Her hands were folded. She had ink on her fingers again. But not on her face this time. She watched him so intently, h
er eyes piercing, trying to bore into his thick, so very thick skull, trying to understand what he scarcely understood himself.
“Just because I don’t say . . .”
He walked back to the bedroom.
She followed him.
He collected his garments from the floor and everywhere else they’d landed, flung them in the general vicinity of one of the room’s three chairs, and started to dress. In a growing, increasingly taut silence.
Finally, “It’s a sham,” she said. “You’re not used to pretending, and it’s troubling you and making you . . . disoriented.”
He pulled on his shirt, unbuttoned his trousers, and stuffed the shirt inside.
“The trick is to believe it while you do it,” she said, “but to step back into yourself as soon as you’re off stage.”
He pulled on his waistcoat and buttoned it. He sat and put on his stockings and shoes.
“He’s playing into our hands,” she said.
He stood, took his neckcloth off the back of the chair, and threw it round his neck. He knotted it quickly, in a fashion that would give his valet a seizure.
“Adderley’s the pigeon,” she said. “He’s the dupe. He’s the mark. It isn’t real.”
He twisted himself into his coat. “Yes, it is,” he said.
“No, it—”
“Yes, it is,” he said. “You and I: That’s real. I love you.”
He heard her quick, sharp inhalation.
“That’s my trouble, imbecile me,” he said. “I love you.”
She stood very still, for once—for once—too shocked to pretend she wasn’t, too shocked for the tell-nothing face. Her blue eyes were enormous, a great, endless surprise.
He bent and kissed her, full on the lips. “I’m going now,” he said. “This is much too shocking. I need to—drink, I believe. Or fight. Something. I love you. That’s what it is. That’s what’s happened. Yes.”
He turned away and shook his head. Then he laughed and went out.
Sophy stared at the door he’d gone out of.
“That didn’t happen,” she whispered. “I imagined it.”
Her gaze traveled the room, now bereft of all signs of him.
