T he picnic and punting took place in the late afternoon, in the gardens stretching behind the castle. The gardens were laid out very formally, stretching from the bottom of a vast flight of white marble steps. There was a hedge maze, and a lake with swans, and everything imaginable a self-respecting castle’s garden should have, including an orchestra, scraping away on a marble terrace.
Kate wore a cherry-tinted wig to match her gown, a lovely tunic with overskirts in cherry, cut back to reveal two layers, one in a paler cherry and another in cream. She had a little argument with Rosalie over the wax inserts, but her maid had insisted that the cherry dress would be disgraced by Kate’s natural shape. Or, more to the point, by her lack of natural shape.
“They may melt, and then where would I be? What if I grow hot, and they change shape? What then?”
“Do not grow hot,” Rosalie had said, with impeccable logic.
Algie and Kate strolled to the top of the long flight of stairs leading down to the garden and paused.
The orchestra was playing something delicious, a waltz perhaps . . . She’d heard of waltzes and their decadent influence on dancers. The music made her want to pick up her skirts and dance.
“Wonder how they keep those fountains going,” Algie said. Water was shooting into the air out of the mouths of great stone sea monsters.
“You might ask Mr. Berwick,” Kate suggested. “I find he’s remarkably knowledgeable about the castle.”
“I certainly will not have a conversation with a servant,” Algie said, appalled. “For God’s sake, Kate, remember that you’re Victoria, will you? My wife would never lower herself in such a manner.”
“If you want to know something, why not ask?” retorted Kate. “I do think that you’re being a snob, Algie. The prince won’t be able to answer your question.”
“As if I would ask him !” Algie cried, insulted all over again.
Kate sighed and began walking down the steps. There were more people in the gardens than she had seen in the drawing rooms yesterday; apparently guests were already arriving for the ball. “Don’t leave me, Algie,” she told her sulky fiancé. “I’m quite likely to see people whom Victoria knows. I’ll smile at everyone, but you must handle introductions.”
Algie took a quick look at her and said, “You look more like Victoria today, which is lucky.” Then, suddenly aware of a crucial detail, “Where are the dogs?”
“I left them with Rosalie,” she said. “I thought—”
“No, you must have them,” Algie said, snapping his fingers at a footman in a way that Kate considered contemptible. “Victoria takes them with her everywhere; they’re her signature. Bring the dogs from Miss Daltry’s chamber,” he commanded the footman. “And be quick about it. We’ll wait here.”
The wait gave Kate the opportunity to discover exactly where the prince was. He wasn’t hard to find, as he was surrounded by a veritable flowerbed of young ladies, and wearing a costume of dull yellow silk. At least she knew in which direction not to go.
“Just look at that,” Algie said in an awed voice.
“What?” Kate asked, pretending she had been examining the lake.
“Mr. Toloose’s coat has five seams down the back, rather than three.” He twitched his own sleeve.
“I find it remarkable that you are able to see such minute detail from here,” Kate said, and then, turning to the young footman, “Thank you! That was very kind of you.” She gave each dog a stern look in turn. “Caesar, no barking. Coco, stay away from the water. And Freddie . . .” She paused and looked down at Freddie’s silky little ears and sweet eyes. He looked so happy to see her. “Well, you’re perfect as you are. Come on, then.”
They all pranced down the steps together, Algie in the lead, and she was so busy complimenting the dogs for not pulling on their leashes that she didn’t realize that the prince had shaken off his coterie of admirers and was waiting to greet them at the bottom of the steps.
“Miss Daltry,” he said solemnly, as if the previous night had never happened.
“Your Highness,” said she, dropping into a deep curtsy.
“Nephew,” he said, turning to Algie.
Algie obviously wrestled with the question of what to say in response; he finally blurted out, “Your Highness, Uncle,” and bowed so deeply that his nose likely brushed his breeches.
“I insist that you come with me for a turn on a punt,” the prince said, raising Kate’s hand to his lips.
It really wasn’t fair to the rest of mankind that a prince should have eyes like that. More accurately, it wasn’t fair to womankind.
“Perhaps I will, at some point,” she said, retrieving her hand.
“Now,” he said, sweeping her across the lawn without another look at Algie.
“What are you doing?” she hissed, trying to keep the dogs’ leashes from tangling with her skirts.
“Taking you out on the lake, of course.”
Mere seconds later they were on one end of a long boat the approximate shape of a green bean, with a footman punting them along from the other end.
“Algie—that is, my darling fiancé—won’t like this,” she said, wondering if she could take off her gloves and trail her fingers in the water. It was so beautiful, clear and dark blue.
“Yes, take them off,” the prince said, guessing her thought. “We’re far enough out that no one will see.”
“What on earth do you mean by taking me out in this boat?” she demanded, though she did pull off her right glove.
“Do you know what that group of women over there is talking about?” he said, jerking his chin toward the fluffy cloud of silks and satins in which she’d first spied him.
“No. Here—” She handed him Caesar’s leash. “Can you take care of him? Freddie will be fine, and Coco is actually quite well-behaved, but I wouldn’t put it past Caesar to topple in if he sees a fish.”
“I dislike dogs,” the prince said, looking disdainfully at Caesar’s fluffy tail.
“So do I,” she said cheerfully, and then remembered whom she was pretending to be. “Except for my own sweet doggies, of course.”
“Those women are discussing the extraordinary way you’ve changed since they last saw you in London, two months ago,” the prince said, leaning back and regarding her with a wicked gleam in his eye. “By all accounts, you were much more attractive a matter of a few months ago, rounded in all the right places, et cetera.”
“How churlish,” Kate said. “Very mean-spirited of them to be so critical after my illness. Kind of you to warn me, though.”
“So who are you?” the prince said, leaning in.
“Look, I think I see a fish, right there!”
“You are not Miss Victoria Daltry.” He reached out and took her hand, turning it over. His thumb rubbed slowly over her palm and her eyes rose to meet his. “Calluses. The darling of the ton would not have calluses. Not even after an illness.”
“Well,” Kate started, and stopped.
“Let me guess,” the prince said, with the kind of tempting smile that really ought to be outlawed. “Wick and I discussed it at length earlier this afternoon.”
“Wick?”
“My brother Berwick. He says you ratted to the fact that he’s my brother.”
“I may have surmised—” Kate begun.
“I surmise the same,” the prince said triumphantly. “In short, you are not Victoria Daltry. You are an illegitimate twig of the family, who for some unknown reason has replaced Victoria, thereby explaining many mysteries: your hands, your apathy toward both your dogs and my poor sod of a nephew, your lack of resemblance to the plump and powdery Victoria, and your knowledge of the sufficient area of a sow’s sty.”
“Plump and powdery?” Kate repeated, desperately wondering what she should say. To protest her legitimate birth seemed rather foolish, under the circumstances.
“One of the sharpest-tongued of the young ladies expressed grief over the fact that a doctor must have forced you to spend time in the sun, because you used to have the most beautiful skin.”
“She was distracting you, in the hope that you wouldn’t notice her cloven hoof.”
“Could be,” the prince said, grinning madly.
“I can see you’re finding this a great deal of fun,” she said crossly.
“Well, you are family,” he said. “That is, once Algernon has married the undoubtedly delectable Victoria, you’ll be part of my extended family.”
“Won’t that be lovely,” Kate said, scooping up a water lily. She stole a look at the footman standing in the punt’s stern, but he seemed to be preoccupied with avoiding the other boats skewing recklessly across the lake. “Related to a prince. On my list of things to achieve in life, I assure you.”
“Quite like the homeland, where, I assure you, half of the population is related to me on one side of the blanket or the other,” the prince said. “So what’s your name? Wick thought it might be Katherine, but he wasn’t sure.”
So Berwick had heard Rosalie’s slip of the tongue. “Katherine,” she admitted. “Though generally people call me Kate.”
“Gabriel,” he said.
“Though generally people call you Your Highness,” she pointed out, “and so shall I.”
“No one can hear us out here.” He leaned back looking rather happy, and she realized with a start that for the first time, he wasn’t looking at her mockingly. “What happened to plump and powdery Victoria?”
“Caesar bit her,” Kate said.
He glanced down at Caesar, who was standing with his front paws on the side of the boat, watching the water keenly in case he saw a reason to attack it.
“He may look tame, but he has a wild side,” she added.
“Shall I push him over?” Gabriel asked helpfully. “With all that hair, he would sink like a stone. Though not as fast as that little one. Are those jewels glued to her coat?”
“Not real ones. They’re glass.”
Gabriel leaned over and examined Coco more closely. “Actually, they are star sapphires. Although as a prince, I may not know their price , I can tell you that the value of that dog, jewels included, is approximately the same as a small cottage on the outskirts of this estate.”
Kate looked down at Coco with some dismay. “No wonder she’s so proud of herself.”
“Yes, she’s like one of those circus dancers who carry a dowry in her navel,” Gabriel said. “Obviously I truly missed an experience when Victoria was unable to come. She and I would have so much to talk about.”
“Do you decorate your dogs as well?”
“I have no dogs, but I’m willing to consider the lion as a substitute.”
“Your lion is desperate for a larger cage,” Kate said, scowling at him.
“Dear me,” the prince said lazily. “I’m afraid that we’re attracting quite a bit of attention.”
Kate looked up to discover that the lake was now positively littered with boats, and most of them seemed to be filled with aristocrats craning their necks in the direction of the prince’s punt. “Damn and blast,” she muttered. She shook the water off her hand, but there was nowhere to dry it. “Do you have a handkerchief?” she asked.
“No,” the prince said, looking amused.
“I suppose you have servants who carry around that sort of thing in case you sneeze,” she said.
“You aren’t carrying one either,” he retorted.
“I don’t have room; my reticule is full of cheese.”
“I thought you had an interesting smell! Most ladies smell rather French.”
“Whereas I smell of the dairy,” she said, resigned. “How do French ladies smell?”
“Like flowers,” he said, grinning. “Or sweat. It all depends.”
Kate wasn’t really listening. She couldn’t dry her hand on the cherry silk of her dress because it would spot. “Don’t look,” she told him, and hastily pulled up the cherry silk, and the two layers of silk underneath, until she reached the delicate linen of her chemise.
He looked.
Of course he looked.
She felt his eyes and looked up. He had the oddest little smile.
“You shouldn’t!” she said, twitching her skirts over her ankle.
He leaned forward. “I like your slippers.”
They too were cherry silk, with small heels, and quite irresistible.
“Thank you,” she said sedately. She was fairly sure that a gentleman was not supposed to see a lady’s ankles, but surely shoes were meant to be admired?
He picked up her hand, still ungloved, and raised it to his lips. His eyes glittered at her, a kind of wild invitation, a temptation. “Though not as much as your ankles. Ankles like that . . .”
“They’re just ankles,” she said.
“Yes, but you should never let a man see your ankles.”
“I know that,” she said, tugging at her hand. “I wasn’t raised in a barnyard, you know.”
His eyes were laughing now, but there was a sultry burn in them, a heat that made her stomach curl with . . . something. “You should never let a man see your ankles,” he repeated, “because if they are as finely and beautifully knit as yours, it tells him a great deal.” He turned her hand over and put her palm against his lips, for just a split second.
“About what?” she asked, unable to stop herself.
He leaned forward. “About the rest of a woman’s body. The curve of an ankle talks of the curve of a waist, the curve of a woman’s thigh, the slope of her back . . . other places as well.” His eyes lingered on her bosom.
Before she could stop herself, a giggle escaped from Kate’s mouth. She clapped a hand over her lips.
“You are laughing at my compliment?” His face was utterly unreadable.
“I’m so sorry,” she said, but she couldn’t help herself. “I suppose I am.”
“Why?”
Kate straightened her back, which made the wax that was propping up her real bosom jut forward.
He looked puzzled.
“Did you know that Algie pads his chest? Do you ?” She eyed his coat and realized that he didn’t. His chest was twice as large as Algie’s, but it was pure muscle.
“No.”
“Algie also has little pads sewn into the thighs of his breeches,” she said patiently.
“He used to have a very fat bottom; he must have lost all that flesh somehow,” the prince said. “What does that—oh!”
His eyes fastened directly on her bosom.
She grinned at him. “A word to the wary, Your Highness: I would not consider the curve of an ankle to be an altogether reliable forecast of a woman’s curves.”
He looked up from her bosom and, to her surprise, smiled with that fierce spark of desire in his eyes, the one that made her feel instantly hot.
“Don’t do that,” she snapped. “You look like an old goat.”
“You practically instructed me to look at your breasts.”
“What you are looking at only nominally fits the label,” she pointed out.
He snorted. “There may be some sort of padding underneath, Kate, but what I see is utterly desirable, luscious, creamy . . .”
Kate couldn’t help smiling. “You know, just because I’m not Victoria doesn’t mean that I’m available for seducing.”
“I know that,” he said, sitting back. “I’m not seducing you, either.”
“I’m glad to know it,” Kate said. “Otherwise I might be quite confused. Your being a prince and all, and likely expecting women to fall into your arms. You might decide I was a dairymaid, given my lovely parfum de fromage .”
He laughed. “I did consider trying to steal you from Dimsdale, but that was when you were Victoria, with all the money to lavish on her dogs.”
“Why do you need an heiress?” she asked. “Berwick—”
“Wick,” he put in.
“Wick implied the castle might be able to support itself.”
“In a nip-cheese fashion that would make my aunts unhappy. One can never have too much money.”
Kate looked at him. It was four o’clock now, and the sun’s rays were slanting golden across the lake. Gabriel’s hair was falling from its tie, and a strand or two curled against his cheek. He was arrogant, and regal, and utterly triumphant to have found out her secret.
He didn’t look greedy.
Just arrogant.
Her silence seemed to prick him and he said, “Money can buy you freedom.”
“Freedom,” she echoed. “Freedom from what? You’re not the lion—”
“Oh for God’s sake, shut up about the lion,” he snapped.
She raised an eyebrow.
“I never speak to anyone that way,” he said, with the sweet ruefulness of a boy.
“Obviously I bring out your worst side.”
“Yes, let’s blame it on you. At any rate, I would like to have so much money that I could leave my wife in charge here, with all the aunts and uncles and the lion and all, and go off.”
“Go? Go where? Back to Marburg?”
“No!”
“Then?”
“Have you ever heard of Dido and Aeneas?”
She shook her head. “Are they historical or literary? I have to admit that I’m shockingly ill-educated. I can speak some French, and I did read most of Shakespeare, but otherwise I’m an ignoramus.”
“Who happens to know the size of a pigsty,” he said, his eyes thoughtful.
“Yes, I’m full of charming knowledge of that sort,” she said. “What about Dido, then? She has a very unattractive name, I must say.”
“She was the Queen of Carthage. She fell in love with Aeneas, but he was bound by the gods to continue his journey and found the city of Rome . . . so he did. And she threw herself on a funeral pyre in grief when he left.”
He stopped.
“She burned herself for love?”
He nodded.
“Fiction,” Kate declared. “No woman would ever be so foolish. Do you think the footman would consider it improper if you buttoned up my glove? I’m afraid that I can’t do all these buttons myself.”
“It’s not the footman who’s the problem; it’s the other boaters. You’d better sit next to me so I can do it without anyone’s being able to see.” He moved to the right side of his bench.
So Kate stood up and then quickly turned and sat down next to him. He was very large, and his leg pressed directly against hers. She could feel color rising in her cheeks.
That spark was back in the prince’s eyes. “Well?” he said. “Let’s have the glove, then.”
Reluctantly Kate turned over her right hand. The tiny pearl buttons on the glove went past her elbow. The prince bent over her arm. His hair wasn’t as dark as she had thought. It was chestnut streaked with lighter strands, the color of earth that’s been turned over for tilling.
A not very romantic comparison, now she thought of it.
“You do know,” he said, fastening the last pearl, “ladies never sit next to gentlemen.”
“Even princes?”
“Only if they’re hoping to become princesses.”
“I’m not,” she said quickly. She was glad to hear the ring of truth in her voice.
“I know that,” the prince said. “Kate?”
“Yes, Your Highness.”
“Gabriel. Don’t you want to know more about Dido?”
“Not particularly. She sounds like an extraordinarily foolish woman.”
“Dido was literary,” he said, ignoring her reply. “But she may well also have been historical. And at this very moment a former professor of mine, Biggitstiff, is excavating an ancient city that might have been her city of Carthage.”
If there had been a ring of truth in her voice when she talked of marriage, there was a ring of true longing in his when it came to Carthage. “Well, go then,” she said, startled.
“I can’t. I have this castle.”
“So?”
“You don’t understand. When my brother Augustus cleaned his stables, metaphorically, he threw out everyone and anyone whom he considered to be less than godly.”
“Including the lion and the elephant?” Kate asked. “I could see if he were talking about Coco, since she clearly has no gods before herself, but the elephant? And the monkey?”
“I think that was just because his wife was tired of the smell. But everyone else . . . out they went, bag and baggage, into my care.”
“Are you saying that you are marrying a Russian princess in order to support all of them?”
“Yes,” he said bluntly. “Not only is her dowry essential, but I can leave her here to run the castle.”
Kate stood up with one quick movement and sat back down opposite him. “I think we should head for shore,” she said. And then: “I just want to make sure that I understand you. You’re planning to marry so that you can support your motley family, and then you will promptly leave your wife in charge of the lot of them and go to Carthage, wherever that is? I assume it’s not in Lancashire, because Englishwomen never , even in literature, burn themselves for love.”
“You make it sound rather self-serving,” he said, cheerfully enough, “but that’s marriage, isn’t it?” He waved at the footman and gestured toward shore. “After all, she will gain my title. And with my inestimable gift for ascertaining value, I can tell you that the value of being a princess is high. For all that you show no interest.”
“I can’t believe that you ever considered seducing Victoria out from the very arms of her betrothed,” Kate said. “She’s terribly in love with Algie, you know. And he’s your nephew .”
“Yes, but it’s so hard to feel loyalty to him,” the prince said ruefully. “Though I suppose now that I’ve met you, I should.”
“I’m no relation to Algie.”
“But if my guess about your parentage is right, you’re his sister-in-law, or you will be,” he pointed out.
“So you’ll approve the marriage, then?” she asked, deciding not to comment on the question of her parentage. “Algie will be very happy. If it’s all right with you, we’ll leave this afternoon, because what with all the ladies who’ve noticed my less-than-delectable figure, this is a quite nerve-wracking visit.”
“No.”
She blinked at him. They were gliding into shore now, the punt knocking against the marble ledge circling the lake, and she thought perhaps she misheard him. “Did you say no?”
“You’ll stay for my ball.” He folded his arms and looked mulish.
“Don’t be absurd. Someone might realize that I’m not Victoria, and now that you know the truth, there’s no reason to stay.”
“You’ll stay because I wish you to.”
“ You can say whatever you please,” she snapped, “but—”
He leaped onto shore and held out his hand. She stepped from the boat, fuming, and he said in her ear, “Dimsdale will never cross me, Kate.”
Of course he was right, blast him. She turned and thanked the footman, who was handing out her dogs. “Well,” she said. “Do run along and be a prince now, Your Highness.”
“Come and dance,” he said, holding out his hand.
“You must be mad. Caesar, behave yourself!” One of the swans was swimming perilously close to the shore, at least from Caesar’s point of view. Thank goodness none of them had swum up to the boat to greet them.
“Do come,” he said.
“Your Highness—”
“Call me Gabriel!” He said it between clenched teeth.
Kate took one look at his fierce eyes and rolled hers. “Gabriel,” she said in a near-whisper. “I’m the dairymaid, remember? I had a governess for only three or four years, and I’m not sure I remember how to dance. I certainly don’t want to stumble around in front of Victoria’s acquaintances.”
“What are you planning to do at the ball?”
“I’ll wrap a scarf around my ankle and pretend Caesar tripped me.” That scapegoat was pulling at the leash like the little monster he was. “Caesar!” He turned and looked at her, so she made him sit, then rewarded him with a piece of cheese from her reticule.
“Your Highness,” Wick said, appearing before them. “Miss Daltry.” It wasn’t her imagination that he gave her name just the slightest, mischievous emphasis. “I do hate to interrupt Your Highness, but the Countess Dagobert has arrived and she wishes to greet you.”
“Wait here,” Gabriel said to Kate, moving away without looking back.
“Sod that,” Kate muttered. “Come on, dogs.” She took off in the opposite direction, Coco prancing ahead. The sapphires glued to the dog’s coat caught the setting sun and made it look as if she had a gleaming halo around her neck.
There’s the money that should have gone into refurbishing the cottagers’ roofs, Kate thought. And her dowry. She didn’t believe for a moment that Mariana hadn’t got her hands on it.
She had taken it—and glued it to a dog.