Experience, the mother of true wisdom, has long since convinced me, that real beauty is best discerned by real judges; and the addresses of a sensible lover imply the best compliment to a woman of understanding.

La Belle a.s.semblee, or Bell's Court and Fashionable Magazine, Advertis.e.m.e.nts for June 1807 Early afternoon, Sunday 10 May The Duke of Clevedon blinked at the excessively bright light. Saunders, the s.a.d.i.s.t, stood looking down at him. He'd opened the curtains, and the sun was as bright as lightning bolts. When Clevedon moved his head, thunder cracked, right against his skull.

"I'm so sorry to disturb you, your grace."

"No, you're not," Clevedon croaked.

"Mr. Halliday was most insistent," Saunders said. "He said you would wish to be wakened. Mrs. Noirot is here."

Clevedon sat up abruptly. His brain thumped painfully against something hard and sharp. The interior of his skull had grown thorns. "Lucie," he said. "Is she ill? Lost? d.a.m.n, I told her that child needed..." The sentence trailed off as his drink-poisoned brain caught up with his tongue.

"Mrs. Noirot said we were to a.s.sure your grace that the Princess Erroll of Albania is well and safely at home doing sums with her aunt. Mr. Halliday has taken the liberty of asking Mrs. Noirot to wait in the library. Being aware that you would need time to dress, he saw to it that refreshment was brought to her. I have brought your coffee, sir."

Now Clevedon's heart was pounding, too, along with his brain, but not at the same tempo.

He did not leap from his bed, but he got out more quickly than was altogether comfortable for a man in his condition. He hastily swallowed the coffee. He washed and dressed in record time, though it seemed an age to him, even though he decided not to bother with the nicety of shaving.

A glance in the mirror told him shaving wouldn't do much to improve his appearance. He looked like an animated corpse. He tied his neckcloth in a haphazard knot, shrugged into his coat, and hurried out of the room, still b.u.t.toning it.

When he came in, smoothing his neckcloth like a nervous schoolboy called on to recite from the Iliad, he found Noirot bent over the library table.

She was perfect, as usual, in one of her more dashing creations, a heavy white silk embroidered all over with red and yellow flowers. The double-layered short cape, its edges gored and trimmed in black lace, was made of the same material. It extended out over her shoulders and over the big sleeves of her dress. Round her neck she'd tied a black lace something or other. Her hat sat well back on her head, so that its brim framed her face, and that inner brim was adorned with lace and ribbons. More ribbon and lace trimmed the back, where a tall plume of feathers sprouted.

He, clearly, did not make nearly as pretty a picture. At his entrance she looked up, and her hand went to her bosom. "Oh, no," she said. Then she collected herself and said, in cooler tones, "I heard about the fight."

"It's not as bad as all that," he said, though he knew it was. "I know how to dodge a blow to the face. You ought to see Longmore. At any rate, this is the way I always look after an excessively convivial night with a man who tried to kill me. Why are you here?"

He was careful to keep any hope from his face as well as his voice. It was harder to keep it from his heart. He didn't want to let himself hope she'd changed her mind. He was fully awake and sober now and wishing he were drunk again.

He could truly understand at last, not only in his mind but in his gut as well, why his father had crawled into a bottle. Drink dulled the pain. Physical pain dulled it, too. While fighting with Longmore he'd felt nothing. Now he remembered every word he'd said to her, the way he'd opened his heart, concealing nothing. It hadn't been enough. He wasn't enough.

She gestured at the table. "I was looking at the magazines," she said. "I'm unscrupulous. I looked at your notes, too. But I can't read your writing. You said you had ideas. About my business."

"Is that why you've come?" he said tightly. "For the ideas for your shop-the ideas to make you the greatest modiste in the world."

"I am the greatest modiste in the world," she said.

Dear G.o.d how he loved her! Her self-confidence, her unscrupulousness, her determination, her strength, her genius. Her pa.s.sion.

He allowed himself a smile, and hoped it didn't look too sickeningly infatuated. "I beg your pardon," he said. "How could I forget? You are the greatest modiste in the world."

"But I'm someone else as well," she said.

She moved away from the table and walked to the window and looked out into the garden.

He waited. Had he any choice?

"I was tired yesterday," she said, still looking out. "Very tired. It was a shockingly busy day, and we were run off our feet, and I was in a state, trying not to fall apart." She turned away from the window and met his gaze. "I was trying so hard that I was unkind and unfair to you."

"On the contrary, you declined my offer quite gently," he said. "You told me I was kind and generous." He couldn't altogether keep the bitterness from his voice. It was the same as telling a man, We can still be friends. He couldn't be her friend. That wasn't enough. He understood now, not merely in his mind but with every cell of his being, why Clara had told him it wasn't enough.

"You were kind and generous enough to deserve the truth," she said. "About me."

Then he remembered the stray thought he'd had after he'd seen Lucie for the first time. "d.a.m.n it to h.e.l.l, Noirot, you're already married. I thought of that, but I forgot. That is, Lucie had to have a father. But he wasn't in view. You were on your own."

"He's dead."

Relief made him dizzy. He moved to stand at the chimneypiece. He pretended to lean casually against it. His hands were shaking. Again. He was in a very bad way.

"Your grace, you look very ill," she said. "Please sit down."

"No, I'm well."

"No, sit, please, I beg you. I'm a wretched ma.s.s of nerves as it is. Waiting for you to swoon isn't making this easier."

"I never swoon!" he said indignantly. But he took his wreck of a body to the sofa and sat.

She walked back to the library table and took up a cup from the tray resting there. She brought it to him. "It's gone cold," she said, "but you need it."

He took it from her and drank. It was cold, but it helped.

She sat in the nearest chair. A few, very few feet of carpet lay between them. All the world lay between them.

She folded her hands in her lap. "My husband's name was Charles Noirot. He was a distant cousin. He died in France in the cholera epidemic a few years ago. Most of my relatives died then. Lucie fell gravely ill."

Her husband dead. Her relatives dead. Her child on the brink of death.

He tried to imagine what that had been like and his imagination failed. He and Longmore had been on the Continent when the cholera struck. They'd survived, and that, as far as he could make out, had been a miracle. Most victims died within hours.

"I'm sorry," he said. "I had no idea."

"Why should you?" she said. "The point of all this is my family, and who I am."

"Then your name really is Noirot," he said. "I'd wondered if it was simply a Frenchified name you three had adopted for the shop."

Her smile was taut. "That was the name my paternal grandfather adopted when he fled France during the Revolution. He got his wife and children out, and some aunts and cousins. Others of his family were not so lucky. His older brother, the Comte de Rivenoir, was caught trying to escape Paris. After he and his family went to the guillotine, my grandfather inherited the t.i.tle. He saw the folly of trying to make use of it. His family, the Robillon family, had a bad name in France. You know the character, the Vicomte de Valmont, in the book by Laclos, Les Liaisons Dangereuses?"

He nodded. It was one of a number of books Lord Warford had declared unfit for decent people to read. Naturally, when they were boys, Longmore had got hold of a copy and he and Clevedon had read it.

"The Robillon men were that sort of French aristocrat," she said. "Libertines and gamblers who used people like p.a.w.ns or toys. They weren't popular at that time, and they're still not remembered affectionately in France. Since he wanted to be able to move about freely, Grandfather took a name as common as dirt. Noirot. Or, in English, Black. He and his offspring used one or the other name, depending on the seduction or swindle or ruse in hand at the moment."

He was leaning forward now, listening intently. Pieces were falling into place: the way she spoke, her smooth French and her aristocratic accent... but she'd told him she was English. Well, then, she'd lied about that, too.

"I knew you weren't quite what you appeared to be," he said. "My servants took you for quality, and servants are rarely taken in."

"Oh, we can take in anybody," she said. "We're born that way. The family never forgot they were aristocrats. They never gave up their extravagant ways. They were expert seducers, and they used the skill to find wealthy spouses. Being more romantic and less practical than their Continental counterparts, the men had great luck with highborn Englishwomen."

"That must hold true for English men as well," he said.

Her dark gaze met his. "It does. But I never set out to get a spouse. I've lied and cheated-you don't know the half of it-but it was all for the purpose I explained early in our acquaintance."

"I know you cheat at cards," he said.

"I didn't cheat during our last game of Vingt et Un," she said. "I merely played as though my life depended on it. People in my family often find themselves in that position: playing a game on which their life depends. But cheating at cards is nothing. I forged names on our pa.s.sports to get out of France quickly. My family often finds it necessary to leave a country suddenly. My sisters and I were taught the skill, and we practiced diligently, because we never knew when we'd need it. We were well educated in the normal ways as well. We had lessons in deportment as well as mathematics and geography. Whatever else we Noirots were-and it wasn't pretty-we were aristocrats, and that was our most valuable commodity. To speak and carry ourselves as ladies and gentlemen do-you can imagine the fears it allays, the doors it opens."

"I can see that it would be much easier to seduce an aristocratic English girl if you don't sound like a clerk from the City or a linen draper," he said. "But you married a cousin. You have a shop. You didn't follow the same path."

She got up abruptly from her chair and moved away in a rustle of petticoats. He rose, too, unsteadily, and he couldn't tell whether that was the aftereffects of fighting and drinking or the hope warring with the certainty he'd lost her.

She walked to the library table and took up his notes. "Your handwriting is deplorable," she said. She put them down and, turning back to him, said, "I haven't told you about my mother."

"An English aristocrat, yes? Or something else?"

She gave a short laugh. "Both."

She returned to her chair, and he sat, too. His heart thudded. Something was coming, and it wasn't good. He was sure of that. He was leaning forward, waiting. He was wanting it to be over with and hoping against hope it would be good news. But it couldn't be good, else she wouldn't be so ill at ease, she who was never ill at ease, mistress of every situation.

And what was wrong with him? She'd admitted to forgery! She'd told him she came from a line of blue-blooded French criminals!

"My mother was Catherine DeLucey," she said.

He recognized the surname, but it took a moment for him to place it. Then he saw it: blue, vivid blue.

"Lucie's eyes," he said. "Those remarkable blue eyes. Miss Sophia, too. And Miss Leonie. I knew there was something familiar about them. They're unforgettable. The DeLuceys-the Earl of Mandeville's family."

Her color came and went. She folded her hands tightly in her lap.

He remembered then. Some old scandal to do with one of Lord Hargate's sons. Not the one who'd manhandled him yesterday, though. Which one? He couldn't remember. His brain was slow and thick and aching.

She said, "Not those DeLuceys. Not the good ones with the handsome property near Bristol. My mother was one of the other ones."

He'd been leaning toward her so eagerly, and she'd seen the hope in his eyes, and the uncertainty.

Then she saw the truth dawn. His head went back, and his posture stiffened, and he looked away, unable to meet her gaze.

Sophy and Leonie had told her he didn't need to know. They'd said she'd only heap coals on her own head, and since when had she taken on the role of martyr?

But they didn't know what it was to love a man, and so they didn't know what it was to hurt at causing him pain. He'd opened his heart to her. He'd offered her the moon and the stars, knowing nothing about her. And she hadn't had the courage to offer what she could in fair return: the truth.

She'd reminded him again and again of her trade, because she could cope with his coming to his senses and rejecting her because of what she did for a living. But to tell him who she was, then see his face change as he shut her out... That would hurt more than she could bear.

She saw it now, and it hurt more than she'd imagined. But the worst was over. She'd live.

She went on quickly, eager to have her sordid tale done. "My mother was a blueblood, but she wasn't like the other Noirot wives. She hadn't any money. They married each other for fortunes that turned out not to exist. They didn't learn the truth until the marriage night, and then they thought it a great joke. She and Father led a nomadic life, from one swindle to the next. They would run up debts in one place, then leave in the dead of night for another. We children were inconvenient baggage. They left us with this relative or that one. Then, when I was nine years old, we ended up with a woman who'd married one of my father's cousins. She was a fashionable dressmaker in Paris. She trained us to the trade, and she saw to our education. We were attractive girls, and Cousin Emma made sure we learned refinement. That was good for business. And of course, a pretty girl with good manners might attract a husband of wealth and quality."

She looked up to gauge his reaction, but he seemed to be studying the carpet. His thick black lashes, so stark against the pallor of his skin, veiled his eyes.

But she didn't need to read the expression in his eyes to know what was there: a wall.

A sense of loss swept over her, and it was like a sickness. She felt so weary. She swallowed and went on, "But I fell in love with Cousin Emma's nephew Charlie, and he had no money. I had to continue working. Then the cholera came to Paris." She made a sweeping gesture. "They all died. We had to close our shop-not that I would have stayed. I was terrified I'd take sick. Then who'd look after my daughter and sisters? I felt we'd be safer in London, though we were nearly penniless. But I went to the gaming h.e.l.ls and played cards. You saw how I won in Paris. That was how I fed and housed my family when we first came to London, three years ago. That was how I started my shop. I won the money at cards."

She stood. "There it is. You know everything. Your friend Longmore thinks we're the devil, and he's not far wrong. You couldn't ally yourself with a worse family. We seduce and swindle, lie and cheat. We have no scruples, no morals, no ethics. We don't even understand what those things are. I did you the greatest favor in the world when I said no. No one in my family would understand why I did it."

She started for the door, still talking, unable to help herself. It was the last time, perhaps, they'd ever speak.

"They'd see you only as a pigeon ripe for plucking," she said. "But you needn't believe I was being n.o.ble and self-sacrificing in declining your proposal. It was pure selfishness. I'm too proud to endure being snubbed by your fine friends."

"You could endure it." His low voice came from behind her.

She hadn't heard him rise from the sofa. She'd been deaf and blind to all but despair, and too busy trying not to fall apart. She wouldn't turn around. Nothing he said could make any difference now. He was trying to be kind, probably. She couldn't bear kindness. She continued toward the door.

"You can stomach the obnoxious women and their demands and their treating you like a slave," he said. "You have no trouble handling them. You have Lady Clara eating out of your hand."

Hope was trying to claw its way up out of the dark place where she'd buried it. She stomped it down. "That's business," she said without turning her head. "That's part of the guile and manipulation. My shop is my castle. But the beau monde is another world altogether."

"It's Lucie you're protecting, not yourself," he said. "You insist you have no redeeming qualities, but you love your daughter. You're not like your mother. Your child is not an inconvenience."

She paused, her hand on the door handle. Her chest was tight, a sob welling there, threatening to get out.

"Perhaps you don't own the usual set of scruples and morals and ethics and such," he said, "but you don't cheat your customers."

"I manipulate them," she said. "I want their money."

"And in return, you give them your utmost. You make them better than they think they can be. You gave Clara the courage to stand up to her mother and to me."

"Oh, Clevedon, you're such a fool. You're blinded by love." She turned to him then. "Do you think, because you can find a redeeming quality or two in my black heart, that all of the ton will see the same? They won't. They'll see that you married a Dreadful DeLucey-"

"The Earl of Hargate's son married one, and her daughter married an earl."

"I've heard that old story," Marcelline said. "You're talking about Bathsheba DeLucey. She brought Lord Rathbourne a great fortune. What do I bring? A shop. And Rathbourne's father, Lord Hargate, is a powerful man. You may stand higher in rank, but you've nothing like his power. Yesterday he walked into a crowd of bloodthirsty men as though you were a lot of schoolboys. The world respects and fears him. You're not like that, and you've no one like that to throw his weight around on your behalf. You've lived on the Continent and in the fringe world of London where idle aristocrats play. You've no political power. You haven't cultivated social power. You can't make your world accept me. You can't make them welcome and love Lucie."

"If you can't be welcome in my world," he said, "I'd rather not live there."

The horrid sob was building in her chest.

"I love you," he said. "I think I've loved you from the moment I first saw you at the opera-or, if not then, from the time you took my diamond stickpin. I'll admit that matters are sticky-"

"Sticky!"

"But it was a mad scheme to come to Paris and attract my attention, in hopes of getting your hooks into my d.u.c.h.ess," he said. "It was a mad, brave scheme to come to London in the first place, with a small child and two younger sisters and a few coins. It was mad to think you could set up a dressmaking shop by winning money at cards. But you did that before you knew me, before you'd ever thought about the d.u.c.h.ess of Clevedon. And so I'm very, very sure that you'll devise a mad scheme to solve our present problems, especially with my brilliant mind a.s.sisting you."

She was looking up at him, into those dangerous green eyes, and all she saw there was love. His beautiful mouth curved into the smile that could so easily warm a woman's heart, and lower down.

He truly did love her. After all she'd told him. He truly believed she could do anything.

"And if I don't?" she said. "If this sticky little matter proves too much even for my guile and imagination-"