Louise Allen - Regency Surrender - Passion And Rebellion

Simple. He thought she was simple. Not up to cutting it in his world.

Well, why should she be surprised? It was what he’d thought ten years ago, too. Well, she’d show him.

But before she had the chance to work out exactly how she was going to prove that she was not the simpering, weak-willed kind of ninny that needed a man to protect her from all the big bad wolves in the world of politics, the stout couple in front moved away and she and Nathan were finally standing face to face with their host and hostess.

‘Oh, Mr Harcourt, what an unexpected pleasure to see you here,’ gushed the bejewelled woman, flashing a lot of teeth and bosom in his direction. Though how it could be unexpected, since she must have sent him an invitation, Amethyst couldn’t imagine.

‘I would have thought our sort of gathering would be much too tame for you,’ she said archly, before going off into a peal of shrill laughter.

So why invite him, then? Because my father is, and always will be, the Earl of Finchingfield and he wields enormous political influence.

‘And who is this delightful young lady you have brought with you? I don’t believe I have seen her about anywhere, have I?’

Nathan paused, only very slightly, but the woman promptly leapt to her own conclusion.

‘Oh, how very naughty of you,’ she said, flattening one hand to her impressive bosom. ‘To bring your latest chère amie into such a gathering. Oh, but isn’t that just like you!’ She rapped his arm with her fan. ‘Always courting scandal one way or another. But I shall not be cross with you. This is Paris, after all, so what does it really matter? Algernon, dearest,’ she rattled on, while Nathan seemed to have turned to stone at her side, ‘look who it is. Mr Harcourt and his lovely young...French friend.’

‘Harcourt, you dog.’ He grinned. ‘Still the rake, I see! But do you have a name, you lovely young thing?’ Mr Wilson, who looked exactly as she’d imagined a minor politician with delusions of grandeur would look, seized her hand and pressed a wet kiss on the back of it.

She flashed Nathan a swift, challenging glance from under her eyelashes, dropped Mr Wilson a curtsy and, summoning up what little French she knew, said, in a little, breathy, voice, ‘Moi, je suis Mademoiselle D’Aulbie.’

Nathan let out a choking sound and turned to her with a look of complete shock.

‘It is such the honour to meet the very important man of whom I hear so much,’ Amy simpered, batting her eyelashes up at her host, the way she imagined a woman of pleasure, who did not know when she was being insulted to her face, would do. ‘And Monsieur ’Arcour, he does not want to attend at all, but I did so want zis treat.’

‘Did you, my dear?’ Mr Wilson puffed up to almost twice his not-inconsiderable size. ‘Don’t suppose young Harcourt could resist, eh? Don’t say I blame him.’ He winked at Nathan over the top of her head.

‘But what is zis rayk you say of eem?’ she said, her execrable accent getting thicker by the second. ‘He is the artist, n’est-ce pas? Not some kind of gardener.’

At that point, Nathan abruptly came back to life, grabbing her elbow and tugging her into the room, whilst muttering something to their hosts about making room for the next couple in line.

‘What the hell,’ he said through gritted teeth, ‘has come over you? Putting on that ludicrous accent and letting them think...’

‘Oh, I don’t know,’ she said airily, beckoning a waiter who was circulating with a tray of champagne. ‘Perhaps I just couldn’t resist showing you that I could very easily disguise not only what I am thinking, but also my very nationality, if I put my mind to it.’

He snagged a glass of champagne himself and knocked it all back in one go.

‘But why would you want to do any such thing?’

She sipped her champagne whilst considering how to answer him. And then decided to plump for the truth.

‘Do you know, I’m not entirely sure. But I’ve felt on the verge of...revolution ever since I arrived in Paris. I have the strangest feeling that I can be anyone I want to be here. And just for a moment, I rather fancied the idea of letting that stupid woman think I was your chère amie. You have to admit it was rather amusing to see the judgemental, pompous, narrow-minded bladders of wind both run to the lengths of their boorishness, wasn’t it? Far better than having to explain that actually I am—’

‘No. You don’t need to say another word.’ He’d frozen in horror when Mrs Wilson had expressed curiosity about her. He’d hesitated to give her real name, knowing it could signal the eruption of another battle between him and his father, with Amy at risk of getting caught in the cross-fire.

He’d been relieved, if a little stunned, when Amy had started to poke fun at their hosts. And now that they’d escaped the danger that people who still had connections to his father’s world might find out who she was, he had to admit that he would have found her performance amusing if he hadn’t been frozen solid with horror at the danger he’d so foolishly exposed her to.

It reminded him of the rather tart sense of humour she’d displayed ten years before. The perceptive and witty comments she’d made about people they met that had chimed so exactly with his own feelings that he’d felt as though he’d found the perfect partner.

And her remark about being anyone she wanted to be here in France was another case in point.

‘I know exactly what you mean about the atmosphere of Paris,’ he said. ‘The moment I got here, something about the attitude of the people made me feel as though I really could make a fresh start. As though I could wipe the slate clean and be whoever I wanted to be. Or perhaps to find out who I was meant to be—yes, that sums it up more neatly. Because none of them assumed I had an inherent value just because of who my father is,’ he said, shooting a dark look towards the doorway, where the Wilsons were gushing over the next arrivals.

Amethyst followed the direction of his gaze.

‘In fact, they would be as likely to think of that as an impediment, since they have taken such a dislike to anyone connected to the aristocracy.’

‘Hasn’t it made you feel a little...scared?’

‘No. The revolution is over. They’ve done with executing people just because of their ancestry,’ he said.

‘I have sometimes felt a little concerned, though,’ she said. ‘It is as though there is some sort of charge in the air. Like you get just before a storm. And there seem to be soldiers everywhere, loitering in packs, looking mean and hungry.’

‘Yes, well I can’t blame them, can you? They’ve had a taste of power. They’ve overthrown one corrupt regime and spent years forging a military empire. It won’t be easy for them to settle back into the kind of lives they had before, if that is all the Bourbons mean to offer them.’

‘What do you think will happen?’

He grinned. ‘Who knows? Certainly not the Parisians. Everyone has a different opinion about what should happen to their country next, from the lowliest street vendor to the deposed aristocrats who’ve come flocking back demanding they have their estates restored, and they aren’t afraid to voice it. Nobody here accepts the status quo. They feel they have the power to change just about everything. It’s...invigorating.’

‘I...suppose it is,’ she said.

‘I think it is. Nothing is set in stone here any more. And apart from that, Parisians don’t care that I caused such a scandal in London, that no political party would ever back me to stand for them ever again. It makes me feel that the past is gone. Done. I’ve broken free from my family’s expectations, my reputation, everything. It’s as though I’ve been given a blank sheet of paper and what I draw on it is entirely up to me.’