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Elodie smiled. ‘You are very wise.’
‘Actually, I’m very grateful to you.’ At Elodie’s startled look, she said, ‘Yes, I know who you are and what happened in Vienna. But you see, if Max hadn’t been in disgrace after the assassination attempt, I would never have met him. I wouldn’t have now the sweetest love a woman could ever desire and the joy of bearing his child. And Max truly is content here.’
With a wife who obviously adored him and a healthy newborn son, Elodie wasn’t about to suggest otherwise, but her hostess continued, ‘I did try to resist him, you know. I urged him to return to Vienna, to look for you and do everything he could to clear his name and resume his government career. But as he began to work with me, training horses, he discovered he had a real gift for it. He says he’s happy with his life here and, of course, I want to believe him.’
It eased her guilt to think that perhaps she hadn’t ruined Max’s future after all. That their interaction in Vienna had merely sent him down a different path, perhaps an even more rewarding one.
She still intended to do what she could to restore his reputation. For now, he was content training horses, but some day he might long to rejoin the circles of power for which he’d been born and bred. If that happened, she wanted to make sure nothing from their association in Vienna prevented him.
‘With a lovely wife and a handsome son, how could he not be content? But I thank you for telling me.’
As if trying to remind his mama of his presence, the newborn squirmed in her arms and gave a preliminary wail.
‘My master calls,’ Mrs Ransleigh said with a grin. ‘Enjoy your bath. We’re very informal here, so we dine early. Dulcie will get you anything you need, and then we’ll let you rest until dinner.’
With that, shushing the baby with a kiss on the nose, she put him to her shoulder and walked from the room.
Swiftly divesting herself of her grimy clothes, Elodie climbed into the tub and sank with an ecstatic sigh into the hot scented water. Even in the grimmest of times, one should not fail to savour the wonder of a warm bath.
Tired as she was, the water both soothed and made her drowsy. Perhaps, as his wife suggested, Max was no longer angry at being reduced from a rising star of government to a breeder and trainer of horses. What was it he’d said—’everything has changed’?
For the better, she hoped. But she was too weary and the water too deliciously relaxing to contemplate the matter any more. Doubtless Will and Max were discussing it at this very moment. All she need do was be ready, at last, to fulfil the bargain she’d made with Will.
And then see him walk out of her life.
Chapter Nineteen
Will watched Caroline Ransleigh usher Elodie out the parlour door with a panicky feeling in his gut. There’d been no time to reassure her that he didn’t suspect she would try to run away. It was just that, after two attacks against her, he didn’t feel comfortable about her safety when she was out of his sight.
He turned from the door to see Max studying him and another layer of dread overlay the first. He’d give anything not to have to say to Max what he was about to say. Anything but Elodie’s life.
That thought put matters in perspective, so he swallowed hard and looked for a way to begin. The very idea of cutting himself off from his cousins and losing Max’s esteem was so painful he’d not been able to bear thinking about or planning what he meant to say, as he normally would have done before broaching a matter of such gravity.
While he stood there, staring at Max and dithering, his cousin shook his head and laughed. ‘I should have known if anyone in the world could have turned up Elodie Lefevre—and I gave it more than a go myself—it would be you. A tremendous, and I fear costly, crusade that Alastair said you insisted on funding and carrying out alone. How can I ever convey the depths of my gratitude and appreciation?’
Wonderful—in his very first speech, Max had made him feel even worse. ‘I appreciate your kind reception of Elodie; under the same circumstances, I’m not sure I would have been so forbearing.’
‘You always were a hothead, faster with your fists than your tongue,’ Max observed with a smile.
‘You were responsible for teaching me to use my wits instead.’
‘I did my poor best.’
‘Whatever improvement there is, I owe to your persistence. As for Madame Lefevre, you know the facts of what she did, but you don’t know the “why”. I think it’s important that you do.’ Maybe then you will understand a little better why I’m about to betray you, he thought.
‘Very well, I’m listening. But something tells me the story would be better heard over a glass of port.’
Will didn’t object. He’d need all the reinforcement he could get to force himself through the next half-hour. At the end of which, he would likely be saying goodbye to the best friend he’d ever had.
After a gulp of the fortified wine that warmed him to his toes, Will launched into a halting recitation of how he’d found Madame Lefevre and how she’d become involved in her cousin’s plot. But as he began to describe Elodie and her life, the words flowed faster and faster, the stories tumbling out one after another: her childhood trials as an exile, her struggles as a young soldier’s wife and then widow, her courageous tenacity in Vienna, when, abandoned by all but her maid after the attack, she found a way to survive, and finally, the return to Paris and the wrenching second loss of her son.
He finished, his glass untouched since his first sip, to see Max watching him again, that inscrutable, assessing gaze on his face.
‘A remarkable woman,’ Max said.
Will nodded. ‘Yes, she is.’ Now for the difficult, agonising part. ‘Max, you know better than I how much I owe you. I promised Alastair I would find Elodie, bring her back to England and make her tell the Foreign Office how she’d involved you in the plot, corroborating your account of the affair. So your reputation might be restored at last, along with the possibility of resuming the government career to which you’ve aspired as long as I’ve known you. But … but if she goes to London and the authorities open an official investigation, she could well be imprisoned as an accomplice to an attempt on Lord Wellington’s life. Maybe even hung. I can’t let her do that.’
Max frowned. ‘Are you sure? If her testimony cleared my name, I might indeed be able to revive my government career. There would be no limit to my gratitude! I don’t know how you mean to get on, now that you’ve resigned your army commission. Papa should have made you an allowance when you returned, but …’ Max grimaced ‘… no great surprise that he’d conveniently forget his promise. If I’m in London, Caro will need help here. She’d never give up the stud; breeding horses is in her blood. You could take my place as manager, be the go-between at Newmarket, take a percentage of the sales. She raises excellent horses; it would pay well. You could have a comfortable position for life, accumulate enough to buy property of your own, if you wished. Become a “landed Ransleigh” at last.’
‘Thereby finally earning your father’s respect?’ Will said derisively. ‘Though I thank you for the offer, as it happens, I’ve accumulated sufficient funds on my own. And even if I hadn’t, I’d never bargain for Elodie’s life.’
Max’s frown deepened. ‘You obviously care for this woman. Does she return the favour?’
Will swallowed hard. ‘I’m not sure. She’s fond of me, I know. But … losing her son again has devastated her. I don’t think she’s capable of feeling anything now.’
‘She’s “fond” of you,’ Max repeated, a bit dismissively. ‘You would betray your oath to me for a woman who you’re not even sure loves you, or has any appreciation of the consequences of your dishonouring your pledge?’
Trust Max to strip fine rhetoric down to its bare essentials. Unpalatable as it was, that was truth. ‘Yes.’
To Will’s utter shock, Max gave a crow of laughter. ‘So, it’s happened at last! Wagering Will’s bet was called by a lady with a better hand.’
Sobering quickly, he clapped a hand on Will’s shoulder. ‘As I said at the outset, I can’t begin to express my appreciation and admiration for all you’ve done, going to Vienna to find madame and bringing her back. I’m not sure any man deserves such loyalty. But you needn’t risk the life of the woman you’ve come to love.’
‘So, you’re … not angry?’ Will asked, amazed, too rattled by Max’s unexpected response to dare believe it to be true. ‘Then why did you try to tempt me with a position here?’
‘From the look on your face when you spoke of Madame Lefevre and how protectively you hovered around her, I suspected you loved her. I’ve never seen you that way with any other woman. But I wanted to discover just how deeply the attachment ran. True, I might not always have felt so forgiving towards her. After Vienna I was angry, dismayed, disbelieving. My world and the future I’d always dreamed of had been destroyed and I didn’t think I’d ever be content or fulfilled again. But then I met Caro. Worked with her. Fell in love with her and the farm. I have what I want now, Will. I think, in Elodie Lefevre, you have what you want, too. Am I right?’
