Grave Consequences (Grand Tour Series #2) Read online

  “Do you mind if I escort Miss Cora for a brief walk on the veranda?” Richelieu asked the bear, after shaking his hand in greeting.

  “Not at all,” the bear said, gesturing them outward, obviously as eager for their reunion as they were. Will swallowed hard. From the salon windows, they’d be in plain view, giving them privacy, but not beyond propriety. How can I keep my eyes from straying to them?

  Arthur snapped a photo of the two as Richelieu tucked Cora’s hand around his arm, then bent to show Felix something on the back of the camera. Felix had purchased his own Autographic Kodak and was learning to use it. The two excused themselves to continue their tutorial, following Cora and Richelieu outside.

  “William Henry McCabe,” Stuart said, striding toward him with no shortage of fury, the cane in his hand shaking. “What have you done?”

  “Wh-what do you mean?” Will glanced to the empty doorway. He took the red-faced old man’s arm. “Sit, Uncle. You know such agitation isn’t good for your heart.”

  “Pour me a drink,” demanded his uncle, falling more than sitting down. Had he become so much frailer in the last week? I’ve hardly given him a moment’s notice, Will admitted to himself. His attention had been solely…elsewhere.

  Will walked over to the crystal decanter and poured a stiff drink for his uncle, then carried it over to him, sitting where Cora had been. “What has you so upset, Uncle?”

  The man took a quick swig of the amber liquid and swirled the rest around the glass, studying it. Then he looked back to Will. “I asked Cora if she thought of you as husband material.”

  Will swallowed hard, now wishing he’d poured a glass for himself. “And…and what did she say?”

  “You saw what she said! She said as much in what she didn’t say as what she did! It’s as plain as day! The girl’s holding Pierre de Richelieu at arm’s length because she’s in love with you!”

  Will’s eyes widened, and he glanced over his shoulder to the closed door. A moment before Felix and Arthur’s voices could be heard on the veranda; now they’d dropped to silence. “Please, Uncle, keep your voice down.”

  “Are you in love with her?” Stuart bellowed, ignoring Will’s entreaty, his face becoming even more red.

  “What? No! I know what the rules are,” Will said. “My only intentions are to get through this tour and get back to school. No matter how attractive Cora might be.”

  His uncle stared at him, searching his eyes. Will stared back at him, lips clamped.

  “Are you certain?”

  “Of course!” But even as he said it, his heart sank. Because he wasn’t certain. Not certain at all…“I know what this tour means to you,” he whispered. “The extra money will see us both through in good order.”

  His uncle let out a breath and sank back against the chair. He rubbed his temples, squeezing them with one hand. “More than you know. And I would have to send you home if—”

  “No. No,” Will said, raising a hand, giving him an exasperated look as if his uncle had imagined far too much. If Stuart sent him home, there would be no increased pay for the summer’s toil, possibly no pay at all. What would happen then to his plans to return and enroll in fall session? His plans to finish his degree? He’d never be on his own, never be free to be an adult, out from under Stuart’s ever-present watch.

  Stuart swallowed the rest of his drink in one enormous gulp and studied him again. “So, you are telling me that there is nothing at all to be worried about between you and Cora?”

  “An idle attraction, flirtation, nothing more,” Will said, smiling as if it were a painful joke, hating himself with every word. “It’s part of my assignment, yes? To make every young lady feel attractive, desirable, while keeping a respectable distance?” How many times has Uncle said those very words to me?

  Stuart paused for several long seconds and then nodded once. “Good. Good. Forgive me, Nephew. But I would advise you to ease back, since the girl seems to be a tad confused on that front. We don’t want her leaving with a broken heart.” He shook his head and brought his fingertips to his forehead, looking more gray and frail than ever. “That can enrage a father even more than having his daughter fall in love.”

  “Understood,” Will choked out.

  “We’re to be on to supper at the café in but an hour,” Stuart said with a sigh, apparently mollified for the moment. “You’d best go change.”

  Will nodded and turned on trembling legs while trying to convey utter ease. But what he saw in the foyer stopped him cold. Hugh stood right around the corner, leaning against the wall, arms crossed.

  “Hugh,” Will grit out.

  “William,” the man said with a catlike smile. He followed Will up the stairs, and Will instinctively knew the man had heard every word of his conversation with Uncle Stuart. Every word. Even if Felix and Arthur hadn’t, this one had.

  “I thought you were up resting before supper,” Will said, hating his own strangled, infuriated tone.

  “Indeed,” Hugh said, falling into step beside him as they climbed the grand staircase. “I’d come down to see if I might have a word with our bear, but from what I heard, he seems cantankerous.” He paused to take a breath. “Perhaps later.”

  “Catch him right after supper,” Will said, forcing some semblance of kindness to his voice. “He’ll be in brighter spirits. But you know how sleepy he gets after a meal.”

  “I shall.”

  They parted at the landing, Will heading to one wing, Hugh the other. As he walked, he rubbed his neck, thinking it felt as stiff as a rock. He’d failed them all. His uncle. Mr. Kensington. Cora.

  And Hugh knew it. Would he tell her? Drop his hurtful words on her at some fateful moment, hoping to get a chance at her himself? To become a confidant of a kind for her? Will’s eyes narrowed. He was the sort. Hurt her in order to comfort her.

  Will had to get to her first. Say something that would help her understand, if it came up. But did he dare? When he was feeling so…weak?

  Cora

  Our hosts had left for Marseilles, telling Arthur that he could play host in their stead, but he led us to a town café for dinner, rather than have us eat in the massive dining room again. Even in our most simple of touring suits, we far outdressed the locals. I shifted uneasily as I entered. The ceilings were low; the place packed with laughing, mingling people who gave us only a cursory glance before dismissing us; and we were led to a long table in the corner.

  I glanced at Pierre, wondering how he’d fare in a café so…base. Part of me relished seeing him here, for once far from his usual environs. More like my own. To my surprise, he looked utterly at ease.

  “Oh, it’s marvelous. Perfect, Arthur,” the bear enthused. “Thank you for suggesting it.”

  “Not at all,” Arthur said, his eyes moving to the others. “It’s one of my favorites in Carcassonne. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.”

  “Come, Cora, Pierre,” the old bear said. “I’d be very honored if you sat with me.”

  “Of course,” Pierre said, moving to follow him, tugging me along. We were at one end of the table, and Will was on the other. I couldn’t help but think the seating arrangement was by the bear’s careful design.

  We settled in, and two waitresses set out long baguettes that smelled like they’d just come out of the oven, as well as escargot, snails covered in butter and garlic. I’d still not acquired a taste for them, but I tore off a piece of bread as the others did before me, smiling as my younger sister giggled over the “barbaric practice.”

  “Oh, no, no, no, my dear,” said the bear. “It isn’t barbaric. Only customary. These people would surely giggle if they sat down at the chateau table we shared last night.”

  “All that cutlery makes me giggle,” I said lowly.

  He smiled at me and nodded graciously. “There are charms belonging to each, yes?”

  “Yes,” I said, looking down the long, country table covered in a clean but worn linen and over to Pierre. “Given the choice, I
’d sit at this one most every night of our tour.”

  Pierre gave me a mischievous look, pulled off his jacket, and settled it on the back of his chair, then unbuttoned his sleeves and rolled them up. His action gave me pause. What was this? He immediately looked more relaxed, welcoming, even if his shirt was made of a finer cloth than anything I’d ever touched before joining the Kensingtons. He broke off a piece of bread and handed it to me with a grin.

  Never had I thought he looked more attractive. Was it because he looked less…formal? More approachable?

  Vivian, sitting between Arthur and Andrew, had overheard me. “This might be good, hearty food. But surely you would miss Pierre’s chef’s preparations. Or what we ate aboard the Olympic? Or with the Bellamys?”

  “Forgive me,” I said. “I don’t mean to sound ungrateful. It’s only that cafés like this are more…me. Where I’d come if I was just Cora Diehl, traveling on her own.”

  She stared into my eyes a moment, her own squinting a little as if she was trying to understand such a mad statement. Andrew leaned over and whispered something in her ear while Arthur took a sip of his wine, absorbing every word, every nuance. What was his interest in all of us anyway? I shoved away the idea that Andrew was saying something dismissive about me and concentrated on my crusty bread, trying to rein in my thoughts. We were past all the cattiness. Weren’t we?

  “I wouldn’t mind dinner and company like this every evening,” Pierre said in my ear, daring to squeeze my hand under the table.

  “Is this like other Grand Tours that people have taken?” I asked the bear, eager to change the subject and shift the attention as my cheeks flamed from Pierre’s touch. Had I not been thinking of sharing only Will’s kiss, these last two days? But what was this? Pierre seemed…different. Somehow more in reach, accessible, than when we were in Paris. More like when we’d met on the ship.

  “No. The tours are far more relaxed, these days. Our predecessors of the seventeenth or eighteenth centuries, even the Victorians, would never do something such as this.” He motioned to the quaint but rustic room. “But the tour is what we make it, is it not? I want you to feel like you are in these places as they really are. Living them. Touching, smelling, hearing, absorbing them.”

  I smiled over the older man’s passion. I loved it when he talked this way. “Today, as we toured the ruined chateau, wandered her walls—I could imagine enemy forces gathering, trebuchet stones battering the chateau. It came alive in my mind.”

  “Excellent!” the man said, clapping his age-thickened fingers together. “Such memories will stick with you until you’re as old and gray as I am. That will serve you as well as the knowledge of nobles and art you gain along our trail.”

  “It is all well and good,” Andrew tossed out, putting a thick pat of white butter on his bread, “but there is a part of me that wishes I was back at home, working with our fathers, learning more about my future than about the past.”

  “What? No, no,” said the bear. “These experiences shall serve to connect you to others and your world, your whole life through. Even if you never meet any of the people you’ve met here again, speaking with someone in the States who has been in Carcassonne, for instance,” he said, waving toward the windows of the café, “in this ancient city, gives you immediate connection. It is much like sharing the same alma mater.”

  “I suppose,” Andrew said doubtfully, stuffing another piece of bread into his mouth.

  Just watching Andrew lather the bread with that amazing, creamy butter made me want another, but the trays were empty. Soon after, the waitresses arrived with wide bowls of vegetable soup and, after that, perfectly roasted hens, their skin a lovely golden brown and sprinkled with herbs, and to the side, tiny red potatoes. The chicken was so tender it practically fell off the bones. When we were done, I couldn’t remember feeling so full. Or so happy to have eaten what I had.

  Afterward, we walked the streets, enjoying pockets of locals singing and dancing. In one small plaza, people walked beside us, speaking rapidly in French, flirting playfully. They gestured over and over to the musicians and others dancing, and at the bear’s nod of permission, we turned and followed them. They gave us a brief lesson in a peasant dance, and we split up, several of our group joining clusters of the locals. The detectives—as well as Will and Antonio—did not take part, each moving to a different side of the square to keep watch. It was then I realized that they still worried that we might be trailed…targeted. Here, now, the threat of our would-be kidnappers seemed distant. I disliked that their actions reminded me of it.

  It made me sad for them, having to maintain the role of constant vigilance, because to be at the center of the dance was joy itself. Pierre knew the steps—having learned them as a child—and proved a skilled teacher. I let him lead me, enjoying the sway and dip, jump and skip, turn-turn-turn, sway and dip…and only once caught Will glancing my way. In frustration? Consternation? Anger? It was impossible to discern.

  I shoved away a sense of guilt. Had he not turned from me in the chateau stairwell when he had his chance? Had he not insisted that it was better for us to stay apart? We traded partners, and Hugh swung me around in a circle, then led me in a broader one.

  “Pay no attention to the bear’s apprentice, Cora,” he whispered. “You are right to welcome Pierre. Will’s intentions…” He shook his head.

  We parted and turned for three claps, then rejoined for a moment. He left me hanging on his last words, of course. Made me ask. My eyes flicked to Will and then across the circle to Pierre.

  “What? What do you know of his intentions?”

  “He has none,” Hugh said, and for once I believed him. “The bear accused him of loving you from afar. He denied it. Said he only wished to get through the tour, collect his fee, and return to university.”

  I swallowed hard and forced a smile. “As well he should. I have my own plans to return to school come autumn.”

  He scoffed and looked at me in disbelief. “A Kensington girl as a country schoolteacher? Ah, no. Likely Wallace has far greater intentions for you. This is but the beginning. And none of your father’s plans would include a man of McCabe’s low means, regardless of his fine character.”

  I frowned. “No, Wallace and I only agreed—”

  But then we were separated, and I was in Arthur’s arms. “Are you all right?” he asked, looking down at me with concern. I missed a step, and he caught me, one hand at the small of my back and the other holding tight to my hand. Within a moment we eased back into the rhythm.

  “I am fine, fine,” I said, forcing another smile, suddenly wishing to return to the chateau, to my room, to put a door between me and everyone else. “Only getting tired, I think.”

  “It’s been a long, full day.”

  “Indeed.” I peered up at him. “Are you enjoying this? Joining us for part of our tour?”

  “I am,” he said, searching my eyes. “And you, Cora? Isn’t this more a joy than a trial?” He paused as I digested his question. “I take it you’ve experienced nothing like it. You’re like a duck in a new pond. Cautious but exulting in it.”

  “What a thing to say!” I sputtered in surprise.

  He smiled. “What? It’s true, isn’t it? Couldn’t you say those words yourself?”

  The song came to an end, and he gave me a little bow as I followed the women in the group, giving him a small curtsy. “Yes,” I said. “I suppose I could.”

  We stayed with the locals for several dances, then the men tossed coins into the musicians’ open baskets and we moved on in pairs down the cobblestone streets—past smoky cabarets and empty cafés where waiters and waitresses cleaned tables and swept floors; past storefronts with lovely Provençal linens or brightly painted pottery in the windows; past a young couple caught in a secret embrace; past welcoming old men, three to a bench, smoking pipes; past old women frowning at us as they dumped cold dishwater, silently telling us to go back to where we came from.

  At last we returne
d to the chateau, and the old bear stood by the door, counting as we all entered, like a mother hen making sure all had returned to the roost come nighttime. He nodded, looking weary but content, as was I. Antonio and I held back, and I stepped beside the old bear. “Thank you for one of the finest days of our entire trip,” I said, touching his arm.

  “You’re welcome, my dear,” he said, eyes twinkling. “Rest well. For tomorrow is another.” He and Antonio paused, obviously waiting for me to say good night to Pierre. So I turned to him.

  “Thank you for journeying all this way to see me for but one night,” I said, taking his hands in mine.

  He leaned forward and gave me as slow and tender a kiss on either cheek as was permissible. “I could do nothing other. I only regret that I must leave you again. The memories of our time together, our dance, shall have to sustain me in the meantime.”

  I laughed at his dramatic words. “I will look forward to it,” I said, genuinely feeling it. Whatever was transpiring between us was not entirely unwelcome. However far-fetched it was, the idea of us being together beyond the summer wasn’t impossible, was it? I enjoyed his company. And, unlike Will, he made me feel wanted. Worth being pursued regardless of what it cost him. “Good night, Pierre.”

  “Good night, mon ange,” he said, reluctantly releasing my hands.

  I entered the foyer and saw that the others had reached the landing and were separating to their own wings. Will was not in sight, and I swallowed hard, past a lump of disappointment. But what had I expected? A good-night kiss? A hug? If I were honest, part of me had wanted him to see my tender parting from Pierre. Part of me wanted to spur him with jealousy, drive him to truth.

  But it was clearly true, what Hugh had said. Will had made his decision. Regardless of what we’d shared, or nearly shared…

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Cora

  I paced my room like a caged tiger. My mind was swirling with thoughts of Will, as well as of Pierre, of Wallace, of my future. It didn’t help that the room was hot, given its placement on the western side of the chateau. All afternoon, the stone walls seemed to absorb the sun’s rays, and now they seemed bent on cooking me inside. I have to escape it.…