Лорен Уиллиг - The Seduction of the Crimson Rose

"I'll take that as a no." Without missing a beat, Vaughn extended a graceful hand to the two gentlemen approaching. "Gentlemen! How delightful."

"May we help you?" asked the taller man forbiddingly. With that nose, Mary reflected, he couldn't help but look forbidding, no matter how benign his intentions might be. Up close, he looked even more like a saint returned from forty days in the wilderness. Rather than the closely tailored coats in fashion, he wore a long frock coat in a rusty black that bore an uncanny resemblance to a cassock. Hollows beneath his cheekbones gouged triangular gashes in his long face.

"We do find ourselves among the distinguished members of the Common Sense Society, do we not?" Vaughn drawled, deploying his quizzing glass in a way that suggested he hoped the answer would be not.

The thin man regarded him warily. "You do. And since you appear to have the advantage of us…"

Vaughn made an elegant leg, lace fluttering and jewels glinting. He was as out of place in the rough-hewn room as a tiger in Hyde Park.

"I am Vaughn," he announced, with the unconscious arrogance of three hundred years of being able to introduce oneself by one name alone. "I had the pleasure of meeting your estimable Mr. Paine many years ago through the good auspices of my cousin, Lord Edward Fitzgerald. It was…an unforgettable experience."

The hawk-nosed man inclined his head, his dark eyes never leaving Vaughn. "I am Mr. Rathbone. This" — he indicated the shorter man — "is Mr. Farnham, who acts as chairman for our Society."

The round-faced man bobbed and mumbled his pleasure at the introduction. It seemed, thought Mary, a rather curious disposition of roles. Mr. Rathbone, with his automatic habit of command, appeared unlikely to take second chair to anyone, much less so insignificant a figure as the pink-cheeked Mr. Farnham, who was beaming welcome and goodwill through his chipped teeth. Either there was some title higher than chairman in their little Society, or Mr. Farnham possessed unexpected talents beneath his humdrum faзade.

Vaughn must have entertained similar questions, because he trained his quizzing glass lazily on the taller man, in a way that made the hollows beneath Rathbone's cheekbones go even hollower. "And you, Mr. Rathbone? What role do you play?"

"I have the honor to serve as vice-chairman," said Rathbone shortly.

"Vice…chairman," mused Lord Vaughn, separating the one word into two. "What a very pleasant position that must be. Such…scope."

"Are you, too, a reformer, Lord Vaughn?" inquired Rathbone. He seemed to have difficulty wrapping his tongue around the title. Ah, one of those, thought Mary. The problem with revolutions was that they scraped up all sorts of ideologues with ridiculous ideas about doing away with hereditary honors and giving land in common to the masses and all that sort of rubbish.

Polishing a corner of his quizzing glass, Vaughn neatly avoided the question. "I do what little I can. I have," he added modestly, "been fortunate enough to be admitted into the august company of the Societé des Droits des Hommes."

Mary had never heard of it, but it worked an immediate magic upon the shorter man, who in his excitement rose to the balls of his feet and flapped his hands like a chicken.

"The SDH! Our sister Society in Paris," he explained to Mary, for want of anyone else to explain to. His voice emerged in a nasal squeak, too high-pitched for his amply padded frame. "Our model, our guide…I'd always hoped to visit the SDH someday," he finished wistfully.

Rathbone was less impressed. "Then you know Monsieur Delaroche, of course."

"Of course," Vaughn assured him blandly. "Excellent fellow. A bit quick with the guillotine finger, but always good for a spot of revolutionary rhetoric. His extemporaneous harangues were quite the rage when I was last in Paris."

Rathbone looked at Vaughn sharply, but Farnham cut in, bobbing in front of the other man. "How lucky you were to be in Paris during such stirring times! How did it feel," he demanded eagerly, "to breathe the clean, pure air of liberty?"

"Rather fetid, actually. The French, you know," Vaughn replied, touching his handkerchief delicately to his nose.

Farnham's face fell, but after a moment's deep reflection, he nodded in understanding. "Of course," he said. "We are so frightfully cut off here. Did the resolution pass?"

"Which one? Sausages for all, or death to the aristos?"

Farnham frowned uneasily, as though not quite sure whether Vaughn were bamming him. "The latter, of course."

"Oh, indubitably. Four frogs to one. We adjourned just before midnight, and had a bang-up sausage fest at Mme. Lefarge's pie shop."

Farnham looked wistful. Unmoved by culinary considerations, Rathbone's eyes narrowed. "You seem to treat our goals with a certain levity, Lord Vaughn."

"Far be it from me to impart undue humor to so serious a cause. I am simply giddy with the delight of being here among you tonight. Do tell me, Mr. Farnham, have you read Mr. Paine's latest pamphlet?"

"You mean…" Farnham's head sunk until it seemed to have nearly disappeared into his cravat, leaving nothing but a pair of eyes peering out.

"Precisely," said Lord Vaughn.

"I'm afraid I don't understand," interjected Mary.

"His new pamphlet," whispered Farnham, his piggy eyes swiveling madly from side to side. "It is about…It suggests…"

"Invasion," declared Lord Vaughn.

The word shivered in the air among them.

Lord Vaughn hefted his cane as though testing its weight. "Invasion," he repeated, rolling the word on his tongue as Mr. Farnham wrung his hands and Rathbone's eyes continued to narrow until they were all but swallowed up. "A French invasion to bring about the glorious benefits of the revolution to those of us here at home. Mr. Paine has generously offered himself and his expertise to Bonaparte as guide in helping us create a new form of representative government in our degenerate state. A bold prospect for a new age."

"Indeed," squeaked Mr. Farnham, clasping his hands together and peering over his shoulder. "But to speak of it…easy enough for Mr. Paine to write from the safety of America, but to talk of such a thing, here…"

"Come, man," said Vaughn jovially, his diamonds winking incongruously as he dealt the other man a hearty clap on the back. "We are all friends here, are we not, Rathbone?"

"So we have been given to believe," replied Rathbone tightly. "And you, Miss…"

"Alsworthy," supplied Mary, with a modest droop of her bonneted head.

"And you, Miss Alsworthy? What do you think of our prospects for a French style of government?"

"I think," said Mary demurely, "that if it comes with a French form of fashion, I shall like it very well indeed."

Lord Vaughn took refuge behind his handkerchief.

"The dust, you understand," he explained innocently, flapping the lace-edged linen in illustration. "Damnable to the delicate nose."

Mr. Rathbone was unconcerned by the state of Vaughn's sinuses. "A very light response, Miss Alsworthy, to such weighty events. Am I to understand that you view the fate of nations as nothing more than a diversion? A parlor game, perhaps?"

"It was certainly not my intention to give you that impression," hedged Mary, even if it did fall close to the truth. Did this scarecrow of a man truly believe he could command the destiny of empires? It would have been laughable if he hadn't been quite so serious about it. He would, reflected Mary, have made a brilliant Grand Inquisitor, if only he had had a Spanish accent and a small goatee.

Even without those props, he managed to radiate disapproval, all of it in Mary's direction. "We prefer our members to demonstrate a certain seriousness of purpose."

Mary struck her Joan of Arc pose, one hand clasped to the bosom and the head tilted slightly back towards the heavens. Or where the heavens ought to be if there weren't a ceiling in the way.

"I pray you, sir, do not judge me by my mere faзade. Beneath these meaningless rags beats a heart that burns with the injustices perpetrated by an unequal society" — it was, in fact, entirely unfair that some girls should get husbands while other, prettier girls did not — "and I have pledged myself in whatever humble way I may to doing my own small part to remedy those iniquitous inequities."

Mary was quite proud of the alliteration at the end. All those tedious years of playing poetic muse did have their benefits. She could also do an excellent epic simile if the occasion called for it, but she thought that might be a bit much, even for a revolutionary society.

Rathbone shifted so that they stood a little apart from the others. "Perhaps your part, Miss Alsworthy, may be larger than you think."

"I would be honored to think that might be the case," replied Mary carefully, trying not to notice the way his dark frame walled her away from the rest of the room. The expanse of black broadcloth barring her path emitted an unpleasant smell, musty wool with an acrid overtone of wood ash, like a damp fire. Mary darted a glance past him at Lord Vaughn, but Vaughn was arm in arm with Farnham, bending over the man with exaggerated solicitude. She hadn't really expected him to ride to the rescue, had she? That hadn't been in their arrangement — and saving embattled maidens wasn't much in Vaughn's line.