He nodded at her, a smile on his lips, before he removed his hat and began tugging at his cravat, his eyes unable to mask his worry.
“Where have you been?”
“I went to see your cousin, but he would not speak to me. I left a letter for him, but he sent a note back saying he is to be Luc Lémy’s second and cannot converse at this time.”
“Then I shall have to go see him.”
Nina sat down at the edge of the bed. In her childish excitement over purchasing new clothes, she had forgotten all about her mother and hersister and her cousin. She should have written to them at once; it might have smoothed the proceedings. They must all be thinking ill of Hector and of her.
“No, let it be. He has made a choice. After the duel, we can try to speak to him together and secure your family’s blessing.”
The duel. That, too, had been pushed from her mind, eclipsed by her mundane errands. Now the fear clawing at her heart washed over her anew.
“Luc hunts,” she declared.
“Yes, he does.”
“I mean he is a skillful shot.”
“I won’t deny it.”
“How good are you with a pistol?”
“I am a performer, not a hunter.”
At Oldhouse, Luc had made a show of riding on his horse and slinging a rifle over his shoulder. He’d know how to shoot; it was a gentleman’s pursuit. Hector had not been reared a gentleman, and even if he’d had a chance to toy with pistols at a later point in life, surely he could not overcome the edge Luc had.
“But then, what will you do?” she asked.
“I shall wait until tomorrow. Tomorrow he may have changed his tune,” he said calmly, as if they’d invited Luc over for tea.
“And if he doesn’t?”
“Then tomorrow my second is coming to see me, to relay and negotiate the conditions of the duel.”
“If you can’t shoot properly, we might as well call it an execution,” she said, unable to soften the grim words.
Hector removed his jacket and set it on the back of a chair. “Let us not discuss my mortality right this instant, shall we?” he asked, trying to make light of the whole affair. “There are more important topics to discuss.” He sat next to her on the bed.
“Like what?” she scoffed.
“Like you.”
“Me?”
He leaned toward her, his voice dipping, almost secretive. “I have a delicate question to ask. It is about us. About us last night. I hope I did not frighten you.”
Rather than feeling embarrassed, as might have been expected, she was incensed, guessing that he probably thought her a complete fool fresh from the countryside who could not say what went on in the marital chamber. They covered the genitals of statues with fig leaves, marble made modest in this manner, but not the drawings in anatomical books.
“Hector, I am a naturalist. I have read books discussing the mating habits of many species,” she told him.
“It is somewhat different when you are talking of something other than beetles.”
“It depends. Beetles have fascinating mating habits. When stag beetles emerge, all they want to do is mate, and the male encloses the female on the ground with its antlers.”
“I’m wanting to ask whether you are fine. Whether it was fine,” he said.
He ran a hand carelessly across the rumpled bedsheets, and it was that vague, intimate gesture that made her dip her head and blush.
